Friday

Daniel needs to get drunk. I mean, really, really needs to get drunk. Well, it’s either that or get laid. And despite what some people might think, even I draw the line at taking one for the team. Or giving one for the team. Whatever.

Because I have to tell you, never in all my days in the Air Force have I seen anyone asked to be reprimanded. Actually, demand it, if you want the truth. But I saw it this morning.

It began with the fact that SG-1’s mission had to be scrubbed when Daniel got a look at the translation and interpretation of the culture of PX-503A. A document that Daniel judged to be full of supposition and what he termed as ‘half-assed’ translations.

The general had recognized that we might not have all the information we need to break the impasse SG-9 and Major Davis had run into, hence the decision to send SG-1 into the fray. When I say SG-1, what I really mean is Dr. Jackson and the three stooges. Hammond agrees with Daniel’s suggestion that the mission be postponed until the document in question could be fixed, repaired, revamped. Daniel promised it would be done by morning.

“Monday is soon enough, Dr. Jackson.” Hammond may be a wily old character, but he’s also a good man, recognizing the agony on Daniel’s face. His voice softens, as it invariably does when he addresses him. “This isn’t your fault, son.”

Daniel stiffens. “General Hammond, are you not responsible for every man and woman who serves under your command?”

“I am.”

“And am I not responsible for every man and woman who works in my department and every piece of work that they contribute to this command?” He may be deathly pale, but he is sitting straight up in his seat and he’s looking the general right in the eye.

“Yes. Yes, you are.” I don’t think Daniel knows just how much the general respects him and his sense of pride in his work. And so he gives Daniel the reprimand he is asking for. “I trust this won’t happen again, Dr. Jackson?”

“No, sir.”

“And you’ll let me know when we can re-schedule the mission?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Dismissed.”

Daniel dashes for the door but I anticipate him and make it onto the elevator before the door closes. “Daniel.” He just holds his hand up to stop me. Jammed in the corner, his arms wrapped around his chest, he is white with anger. And completely silent.

A mad Daniel is scary. A furious Daniel is truly frightening. A Daniel who is so incensed that he is inarticulate is bone-chilling. I’m beginning to wish I’d waited for the next elevator.

When we stop at his floor, he’s out the door, leaving me in his dust. Good thing for us these offices don’t have regular doors, I figure he would have slammed the shit out of his. We enter his office only to find Dr. Keith Rice, a member of Daniel’s staff and the primary author of the translation Daniel just trashed. And he is sitting behind Daniel’s desk with his feet propped up on Daniel’s desk. Doesn’t take a genius to figure out what he’s thinking.

I have seen soldiers chewed out royally. Hell, I’ve done it myself more than once. But never have I ever seen anyone systematically reamed as well as Daniel does to the no-longer cocky looking Rice. Daniel knows a lot of words, some of them actually English, but he only needs a few of them to let Rice know just what his supervisor-love the way Daniel stresses that word-thinks of the quality of his work.

By the time Rice is dismissed, he is no longer certain he has a job, much less any skin left on his sorry ass.

He is silent so long he’s scaring me now. “Daniel.”

His voice is hoarse. “Jack, don’t. I’m not…safe.” He’s hanging on by a thread and he’s begging me not to cut that tenuous hold he has on his rage.

Dr. Annette Smith, who isn’t in the least frightened of either me or Daniel, comes charging into the room. Evidently word has gotten around that SG-1’s mission got scrubbed due to something the linguistic staff screwed up. “Daniel.”

“Dr. Smith,” I wince at the ice in his tone.

“I’ve sent Dr. Rice down to catalogue artifacts.” She stops, with just a hint of mirth in her eyes. “Behind a locked door. With a flashlight. Four floors down.” Despite his fury, I see his lips twitch just a bit. Feeling that my work is done, I ease my way toward the door.

I don’t think I’m far off when I assume Daniel stayed up all night, fixing Rice’s work. Especially since I just passed Dr. Smith in the commissary face down in a bowl of oatmeal.

At our 0800 briefing, Daniel is pale, heavy-eyed, still shower-damp, caffeine-loaded, letter perfect and meticulously prepared to offer suggestions of how to approach the governing committee of PX-503A. Since we missed our window of opportunity, gate-wise, he sent a sincere message of apology in which he took personal responsibility for the delay and made a request to re-schedule the negotiation. The council agrees to see us next week.

Hammond gives us the weekend off. I believe I can correctly interpret the look he keeps giving Daniel. I give him a little nod right back, letting him know I have the situation well in hand.

After Daniel lethargically drags himself away from the briefing room, I rope Teal’c and Carter and hand out their assignments for the weekend plans. I have the hardest part of the operation, I have to provide an awake and aware Daniel. Since I have no shame, I pay an airman to help me play a joke on Dr. Jackson. He nods, pockets the ten-spot and walks away, probably thinking about that old joke about failing upwards and how I’m living proof that it is, in fact, no joke after all.

“But how can all four of my tires have gone flat, Jack?” His brain isn’t quite all wired up properly or he’d know that the odds of all four going flat on the same day are pretty astronomical. Inwardly, I curse Airman Lopez for being so damn enthusiastic; I’d actually only paid for one tire.

“You came past that construction site, didn’t you? Probably picked up a nail.” I don’t tell him that most new tires can take a nail without going instantly flat. “Come on, don’t worry about it, I’ll get it towed for you.” Siler’s already on that; he has a major soft spot for him ever since Daniel made a couple of phone calls and got Siler’s nephew an interview for the history grad program at UCLA. “Get in the truck, Daniel, you’re too tired to drive, anyway.” It’s a testimony to just how exhausted he is that he crawls in without any more of an argument.

Carter and Teal’c are already at my house when we get there. Daniel doesn’t even question why we end up there and not at his apartment. The grill is smoking, the beer is chilling and we can leave work far behind us. And so we do. We eat some great food and just relax on the back deck, watching the sun go down. Daniel starts out fairly quiet but once he gets his belly full, he comes down from his snit induced high and begins to enjoy himself. Carter found, and I’d like to know how because I damn well know I hid it, my high school yearbook and she and Daniel are currently shrieking over my hair.

“You have no room what-so-damn-ever to talk about my hair, young man.” I tell him sternly, grinning with satisfaction at his glare.

He and Carter were in the commissary at three-ish one morning last week, where and when they had no business being, engrossed in a serious discussion about how many universal truths there were in the world. Apparently, the other denizens got tired of the discussion and one of Frasier’s saucier nurses inserted a truth of her own; that women won’t date guys who have prettier hair than they do. That, she offered archly, was why Dr. Jackson spent all his Friday nights up close and personal with artifacts. It took Daniel excruciatingly long seconds to realize he had been insulted but by this time the nurse had been carried off in triumph for ice cream and Carter had carried Daniel back to his office in defeat.

They were all having so much fun they decided to bunk down at my house for the night. Not that I objected or anything, neither of the two of them were fit to drive home. Daniel won the flip for the spare room, Carter gets the foldout couch in the den and Teal’c unearths a sleeping bag and pulled up a piece of the living room floor. I drift off to sleep wondering if Carter had remembered to get Daniel’s coffee for the morning.

My first thought as I wake the next morning is that that sounded an awful lot like my truck starting out front. In fact, it is my truck. I lie back down in defeat; no way could I make it downstairs in time to stop whoever just drove away. I decide to go back to sleep and call the cops later.

It’s rare for me to sleep in like that but I have to admit, it feels pretty good. After I shower and dress, I head down the hallway, first stop, Daniel’s room. I stop in amazement. There on the bedside table is a Starbucks bag and two coffee cups, which explains where my truck went. But the biggest surprise is the blonde head sharing Daniel’s pillow. I don’t know who happened to who but I don’t see clothes strewn around the room so I’m assuming sleep is all that went on here. This definitely falls into the ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ category.

Teal’c is sitting on the back deck as I nuke a cup of coffee and join him. “Good morning, O’Neill.”

“Morning, T. Care to explain this?” I heft the Starbucks cup in his direction.

“Major Carter discovered upon rising, that your refrigerator did not contain the coffee Daniel Jackson demands. She borrowed your truck to retrieve coffee before he awoke.”

I get the picture now. She took the coffee up to Daniel, they shared breakfast, probably snuggled up together. “But why didn’t she drive her own car?”

“Because your vehicle was parked in such a manner to prevent her from doing so.”

Oh, I had her blocked in. I take the other chair and just appreciate the silence. Because as soon as those two wake up, that silence will be history. They’ll come bounding down the stairs, arguing about who woke who up, what we’re doing today, who gets the first shower.

Teal’c and I sit here and watch the sun come up on another day in Chez O’Neill.