SG-1 Gen Fic: For Every Action 8/10
Dec. 6th, 2008 03:05 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
superbadgirlTitle: For Every Action
Author:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
superbadgirl
Category: H/C with a Daniel slant, Team
Season/Spoiler: Very early S2
Rating: R
Word Count: 5,495 this chapter, 44,900 total
Summary: Sam struggles to cope with reality as it is now ... and so does Daniel.
A/N: I claim artistic license for the timeframes I'm using. :)
Sam lurked in the hallway like a kid eavesdropping on late night adult conversation. She’d spent lots of time as a small girl doing the same, sneaking down after being put to bed to listen to her mom and dad talk about things she did not understand. She found she didn’t fully understand what she was hearing now, or maybe just didn’t want to. And her reasons for lurking were far less innocent than they’d been when she was a child. She wasn’t trying to spy in the hopes of catching some juicy tidbit or gossip. It was just that she couldn’t seem to bring herself to round the corner yet.
“You won’t have as big a threat from pressure sores as some of our patients,” a woman’s voice floated out of the room. “You’re young and I’m guessing you’re active?”
“I try to be,” Daniel said with a soft laugh.
“That’s good, but you’re going to have to be aware of the possibility. It’s a bit of a learning curve when you first start out. If we can get you on a schedule quickly, it should be a non-issue.”
Sam smiled sadly, picturing Daniel so wrapped up in whatever project was on his desk that he would forget he couldn’t sit around for days. Oh, god, except that was all he could do. Her stomach twisted into a tiny ball, the way it always did when she thought about Daniel now. It wasn’t right, and she knew she was being a horrible friend. A horrible person. She simply had no idea how to deal. Coming to the hospital for a visit was supposed to have been the start of a new attitude, and here she was hiding like a frightened rabbit. Somewhere deep inside her, she thought that if she didn’t see Daniel’s disability, then it wasn’t real.
“We’ll also be working on building your upper body strength. I think you’ll find it won’t be difficult at all.”
Taking a deep breath, Sam closed her eyes and counted to five. If she weren’t ready by then, she’d turn around. No one would be the wiser. She’d tell the colonel she tried. When she closed her eyes, she saw Daniel’s face looking at her. He wasn’t recriminatory, which actually only made her cowardice worse. It’d been too long since she seen him, and she truly did have things to discuss with him. If it could be called discussion.
She had been asked and then ordered on a fool’s errand, and she knew it. The colonel had insisted Sam was the only one who hadn’t tried ‘talking some sense’ into Daniel. It was true only because she was the only one who hadn’t been to the hospital, and that made this all the worse. Even Teal’c had found a way to visit.
Sam shoved her broken heart aside, straightening her shoulders and entering Daniel’s room with a bright smile on her face. Daniel sat by the window. For a second, he looked so normal and healthy she could almost swear he was. Then Sam saw the wheels of his chair and it all came back. A curly-headed woman in scrubs was perched on the arm of the room’s plush chair.
“Oh, hello,” the woman said, looking up from Daniel’s chart. “You must be a friend of Daniel’s. I’m Maggie Grayson. I’ve been working with Daniel on the various therapies we’ll be employing as part of his treatment.”
“Nice to meet you. I’m Sam. Captain Samantha Carter,” Sam said, satisfied when she didn’t sound like she was choking. She felt like she was. “I don’t mean to interrupt.”
“Not at all. We were just finishing up. I’ll see you tomorrow, okay, Daniel? Nice to see you here, Sam.”
Sam nodded like a stupid bobble-head doll, kept nodding as Maggie left the room. She turned, gaze lingering on the door. Taking another breath, Sam returned her attention to her friend, smile still plastered on her face. She willed herself to look at only his face. Not the legs. Not the wheelchair. Had it really only been just over a week?
“Hi, Daniel,” she said.
“Hey, Sam,” he said.
They stared at each other for a few moments, neither of them really sure where to go. It was awkward and familiar, like she had never met Daniel before and was a childhood friend all at the same time. That’s how it always had been with Daniel, from the second she’d met him. For the first time, though, it was more awkward than comfortable.
“So, uh, how’ve you been?” he asked with a smile. “I haven’t seen you in a while.”
Just like the Daniel in her head, there was no hint of recrimination in real Daniel, either, no hint that he was angry she’d essentially abandoned him. It made her queasy with guilt.
“I’ve been busy.” She sounded defensive. “I’ve been helping Janet … Doctor Fraiser as often as I can, though so far there hasn’t been cause to think my expertise might lend anything to it. And General Hammond doesn’t want me to stop looking for a way to return to P9C-742. I haven’t made much progress, I’m afraid. From what I could see, their technology trumped ours at every turn, and if we were able to construct an impenetrable shield I don’t really know what they might have come up with. Not only that, but I’ve got Col…”
“Sam,” Daniel interrupted her. “You’re babbling.”
“Oh,” Sam said. “I am? I guess I am.”
“It’s okay, you know.” He kept smiling up at her. They were certainly doing a lot of smiling. “Hey, what do you say we go out for a walk? It’s a nice day, and it’d be good to get some fresh air.”
She nodded weakly, not knowing how to tell him no. The only reason she had to hesitate was outside, in the great wide open, it would be even more obvious that she was uncomfortable. More, it would be impossible to pretend Daniel was wheeling around instead of walking. Sam cringed internally. There was something wrong with her.
“What’s in the bag?”
“Oh, cookies,” she said. She’d forgotten. Sam clung to the paper bag as if it were a life preserver. “There’s a new bakery up the street from my house. I thought you might like something besides hospital food.”
Daniel laughed. “Yeah, even if it’s temporary I do get tired of the bland choices. Bring them with?”
“Okay.”
Sam didn’t know what to do. She started reaching out to push Daniel, but put her arms back down. Thankfully for her, Daniel didn’t seem to notice her disconcertion as he wheeled to the door. She followed dumbly, face still frozen in a smile. They walked in silence through a short corridor, to the elevator and then out onto the grassy grounds. Wide sidewalks wound around, and there were plenty of benches and tables around.
“It’s good to get practice in out here, but I’m nervous about how I’m going to get around at home.” Daniel pulled up to a picnic table, gesturing for her to sit. “Tight corners are tricky.”
Her stomach did another strange jump. While she’d buried herself on base, Colonel O’Neill had spent his spare time outfitting Daniel’s apartment with ramps and hand bars. He’d insisted on making everything temporary, so convinced he was that Daniel’s condition wasn’t permanent. The kitchen counters were too high, but short of moving Daniel into a new place, they’d have to stay. The colonel had been really worried about that, as if Daniel spent a lot of time at home cooking.
“You don’t have to pretend you’re okay for me,” Daniel said, breaking into her thoughts.
She startled, blinking at him with a puzzled smile. “What do you mean?”
“Sam, if you don’t stop smiling your face is going to crack. Just … relax. Part of the education around here is learning how other people will react. It’s okay to be freaked out. I won’t take it personally.”
Spoken like a man who’d had to reiterate something similar a million times over. He probably had, but she wouldn’t know that because she had been a terrible friend. Sam let her smile drop, and for a second she thought Daniel had been right. Her cheeks felt sore. She raised a hand to rub at them, suddenly self-conscious.
“I’m trying not to freak out,” she said. Now that she wasn’t smiling, though, the urge to cry swelled. “I keep thinking it’s not real.”
“Is that why you’ve stayed away?”
Sam gasped, the question like a blow to her gut. Daniel was there, acting like he was okay with her avoidance, she knew it wasn’t reasonable for that to be true. And this question made that clear. She looked him in the eyes, seeing a glimmer of something. Anger. Sorrow. She couldn’t lie her way out of anything, so she’d have to admit she was not a good friend.
“Partially. It’s like … if I didn’t see you, if I didn’t see this,” Sam thumped the arm of the wheelchair, relieved to be saying it out loud, “then maybe I’ll wake up and we’ll be gearing up to go on another mission. And I keep thinking there’s something I should be able to do to fix this. There has to be something, some way to work around the problem with the gate on P9C-742.”
“It’s like I told Jack, Sam, I won’t go back there if that poor man has actually transferred his affliction on me,” Daniel replied automatically. “There’s no need to waste your time anymore. I’m fine. Really.”
Ah. She believed Daniel, but at the same time could not stop thinking that no one could be so well-adjusted days after losing the use of his legs. It did not make sense to her. She couldn’t reconcile it with the Daniel she knew. The colonel going off on frustrated tangents about Daniel should have forewarned her, but she hadn’t really understood where he’d been coming from. She’d been too wrapped up in her own angst.
“Are you fine, Daniel?” she asked. She sat on the edge of the picnic table bench. “This is a lot to handle all at once. No one would bat an eyelash if you were less than okay.”
She put a hand on his arm, the first time she’d touched him since they’d come back from the deserted beach planet. Sam felt Daniel’s forearm muscles tighten, as if he were going to pull away. She just held on tighter, finding that now she had something besides her own inadequacies to concentrate on, she could look at Daniel as Daniel and not some man in a wheelchair. If she was guilty of avoidance, she wondered if everyone else had been as well. She feared Daniel had become lost in the shuffle, which did nothing to ease her guilt. It did, however, make it somewhat easier for her to push him.
“I don’t know what you want me to say, Sam.”
“Say you’re angry. Say you’re scared. Tell me how you really feel. You don’t have to pretend you’re okay for me, or anyone else.”
The door was open now, and Sam was scared of what might come through. Up until now, she’d kept herself guarded from anything hurtful. From the truth. If anything, that tactic had only made her feel awful. Now that she was there, looking her fear and dread in the face, she felt immeasurably better. Maybe bringing Daniel to the same sort of realization was worth the pain.
“You came all this way after a week of conspicuous absence to lecture me? To coach me on how I should be feeling and reacting?” Daniel looked at her sadly. “I’m not just saying it. I really am fine. Life goes on.”
She searched his eyes. It hadn’t taken her long to find out that was the key to understanding Daniel Jackson. The eyes were the windows to the soul for some more than others. Actually, this was true for all three of her teammates. Men of few words but deep stores of emotion. He was angry. She could see it and she couldn’t blame him.
After a few seconds, Daniel broke eye contact, looking down at his left hand.
“You’re a better person than I am, Daniel. You’re part of something bigger than life. If I were you, I’d hate losing the chance to go through the Stargate, at the very least.” Her heart rate jumped as she determined where she had to go. Sam didn’t know if she could. She swallowed, looking at Daniel’s legs for the first time in a week. “I’d hate losing the chance of finding my wife. I’d do anything to get that chance back.”
She glanced up at Daniel’s face. His focus remained on his hand. He looked different, not quite himself. His expression was hard and closed-off. That was all it took to change him from the person she was starting to love dearly to a stranger. Oh, crap, she couldn’t believe she’d actually said that to him. It was unforgivable. The lowest blow anyone could deliver.
“Oh, Sam, that’s not fair,” Daniel said. “And that’s Jack talking, not you. You don’t think I realize all of that? It’s my legs that don’t work, not my brain.”
She realized the colonel had made a tactical error, and used her to do it. No, Sam couldn’t hold anyone else accountable for her mistakes. If she’d visited Daniel earlier on her own terms, she’d never have come as Colonel O’Neill’s ambassador on a mission she wasn’t even sure was valid. Upon first seeing Daniel, she understood her CO’s instincts. It was hurtful as hell to see Daniel resigned to his fate, embracing it, even. If hammering on about P9C-742 brought about a reaction, that was supposed to mean something. She shouldn’t have judged the situation without knowing anything about it. One look in Daniel’s eyes now, and all she saw was hurt and unshed tears and proof she was awful.
“Daniel, I’m sorry. The colonel, he just doesn’t want you to give up,” she said, a lame attempt to justify. She couldn’t.
“You think I don’t know this keeps me from finding my wife? I think about that every day. Tell Jack that. Every single minute of every single day I know I can’t do anything to bring her back to me.” Daniel’s face was flushed slightly, two bright spots of color on his cheeks. “Not being willing to go back to that planet is not the same thing as giving up. Right now, I don’t see many options, but if there were some other means to solve this you have to know I’d take them.”
The world was a blurred mess, hot tears welling up in her eyes too. Sam had asked for this. She was stupid. They all were.
“Of course I’m angry. Of course I don’t want to be this way. Talking about it doesn’t help. All I can do at this point is move forward, but no one else wants to let me. You all keep coming around, reminding me how I’m not normal. It’s like I’m not a person anymore.” Daniel finished speaking, slightly out of breath.
Around them, birds chirped and a lawnmower droned by, but the only sounds Sam really heard were Daniel’s harsh breaths and her own resonating in her skull as if it were an empty cavern. They sat without speaking. She didn’t know what she could possibly say. She accomplished her task, but at a high cost.
“Well,” Daniel said quietly, after a minute. “I guess I had a lot to get off my chest after all. You okay?”
Sam gave a soft half-laugh, half-sob, relieved the silence had been broken but still uncertain where to go from here. There was really only one way.
“I’m so sorry, Daniel,” she said. “For not being here for you when I should have been.”
“It’s fine, Sam. I meant it when I said it was okay to freak out. I guess I should have taken my own advice earlier. That was exhausting.”
She rubbed at her nose, brushing an errant tear away. Straightening, Sam willed her inner coward away. She looked at Daniel, all of him, with a smile that was more genuine than any she’d given lately.
“You know what will help with that?”
Daniel shook his head.
“A cookie,” she said, picking up the bag, opening it and sticking her nose in for a deep inhalation. “Mmm.”
“Give me one of those already,” Daniel said.
They munched cookies together in the sunshine. Catching Daniel looking at passersby wistfully, Sam vowed she’d devote her spare time to finding an actual way to help him. They didn’t know for sure what was causing the paralysis. There were lots of alternative treatments out there on Earth; the same should be true for the whole universe. No more putting all the apples in one basket, not when what might work just as well were oranges.
~~*~~
In most ways, his life was completely the way it used to be. He did the same things he had always done, sometimes in a more creative or occasionally painful way. He got out of bed, he brushed his teeth. He ate food, he exercised. He’d eventually go back to work. On paper, everything looked fine. On the inside, Daniel felt like he was falling apart. One minute he was coping well, the next he had to quell unfocused rage. There was scarily little difference between the two. Apparently that was how he was supposed to be feeling. It was terrifying and exhausting.
Yes, he had accepted paralysis was most likely permanent for him. All of the poking and prodding he’d undergone in the last twelve days revealed nothing concrete about the cause. He didn’t fault Doctor Fraiser for being unable to find the source of his paralysis. The best she could do was narrow it down to a nerve condition stemming from what she called T12, and an alien one at that. His treatment was devised based only on this conjecture.
“Just five more reps, Daniel, and you’re done for the day,” Maggie said.
He pushed himself, fighting past the extremely odd sensation of taxed upper body muscles and absolutely no feeling from his lower half. He could only take her word that this was doing him any good at all. Yes, Daniel did nearly everything he used to do, but at this point he did nothing alone except sleep. Despite the near-constant companions, he had never felt so alone.
“That’s great. You’re coming along well.”
“Thanks,” he said breathlessly. His arms felt like rubber, the workout more taxing than usual today. He took a moment before he maneuvered himself from the raised platform to his wheelchair. He could do that all by himself now. “It feels good.”
It did. He had to keep himself focused on the positive, which he knew frustrated the hell out of Jack O’Neill. Unloading on Sam didn’t change that much, really, except it gave Daniel voice where he had had none. Now his friends got frustrated, but they understood better. That was something.
“Think you’re up for a shower by yourself today?” Maggie asked.
“I think I might actually be.” He truly was a big boy now.
It was customary for Maggie to walk him back to his room. Today was no different. He did enjoy her company, for the most part. When he had to, Daniel could pretend they were friends, not patient and practitioner. He certainly liked her better than the psychologist he had to see. But the illusion of friendship always burst when Maggie started talking shop, introducing new therapies or gauging his muscle tone.
“It’s your last night in the hospital. You excited to get home?” Maggie said as they reached his door.
“Yes, actually,” he said, meaning it.
She patted him on the shoulder, leaving him to the task of opening the door.
Daniel leaned for the door handle, pushing the door open with his wheels. It would be nice to get into a space bigger than a breadbox, to be rid of the antiseptic smell of a hospital. If he were honest, though, it also scared the crap out of him. He trusted Jack had set everything up for him, but he felt like he’d be exploring a whole new planet. Daniel grabbed a clean pair of sweats, angrily plopping them on his useless lap. He’d never explore a whole new planet again. A burgeoning feeling of resentment grew within him. Once again, he halted it before it swallowed him whole. He had a random thought of the slums on Wiutehia.
“You look like you’re going to be sick. You okay?” Maggie asked, reminding him he wasn’t alone.
“I’m fine.” He looked up at her, fending off her concern with a weak smile. “I thought I was going to get to do this alone.”
“Ah, you are, but I’m staying out here to make sure everything goes smoothly. I know you’re tired of flashing your man-bits at me, but trust me, I’m no longer impressed.”
“That means you were impressed to start, right?” he said, forgetting himself for a moment. “I’ll remember that.”
“Oh, you. Here I thought you didn’t have that male ego thing. Go scrub that luscious bod of yours.” Maggie’s eyes gleamed, like she actually meant it.
It was as alarming as it was welcome. Or maybe it was just alarming because it was welcome. Daniel liked the evidence that he was still a person.
“Speaking of luscious bods, your colonel friend’s due to stop by any time now, isn’t he?”
“Ah, so you just want to hang out here because you’ve got a crush on my friend?” Daniel rolled his eyes, then rolled into the bathroom, calling as he shut the door, “You could do so much better.”
Her response was muffled by the door, but he could guess it anyway. He concentrated on the task at hand. They’d been practicing in stages. Maggie said he was far more advanced at this early point in his paralysis than most patients, which heartened him. He might be feeding delusions, but it gave him hope that someday he could get out of the chair. At the very least, it was nice to be able to take off his own pants even if it still took him ten minutes to do so.
Everything went well in spite of his unusual fatigue, until Daniel tried to transfer from his wheelchair to the shower chair. His arms might have been too tired from the PT session, or maybe he didn’t have the right balance going. All he really knew was that he had a tight grip on the side of the shower and the assist bar, and then he was mysteriously ass over teakettle on the cold tile floor, with a dull thumping in his head and bright lights in his eyes.
“Daniel, are you all right in there?” Maggie called. Oh. It was her fist on the door that was making the pounding noise.
He tried to answer her. He was too confused.
“I’m coming in.” The announcement came a millisecond before Maggie burst into the room, a scared but also calm expression on her face.
Daniel finally had the wherewithal to wriggle his way onto his elbows, vaguely noticing the wheelchair was on its side and one of the wheels was spinning and spinning. Whoops. He watched Maggie right the chair before patting his naked body down for signs of injury he couldn’t detect himself.
“I’m fine,” he said. “Really embarrassed, but fine, I think. Am I fine?”
“Yes, you’re fine. Looks like you’ve got a welt on your right cheekbone. What happened?”
“I’m not sure.” He started to smile, sliding down until he was flat on his back again. “It’s just that I’ve fallen and I can’t get up.”
She started laughing, and he couldn’t help but join her. He could only imagine what they looked like, him stark naked and her pretty much on top of him. It was a good thing he was neither shy nor unaccustomed to being naked in her presence, or this would be incredibly embarrassing. After a minute, instinctual worry and fear worked its way through both of their systems, their laughter subsiding. The tile was becoming really uncomfortable on his shoulder blades. His butt was probably freezing.
“So maybe I still need a little help with the bathroom stuff,” he said.
“I like a man who knows his limitations. Come on, let’s get you up. You’re going to have to do some of the work.”
He used his arms while she struggled with his legs. They were halfway through their odd game of Twister when Daniel heard a faint knock on the room door, followed by a hesitant, recognizable voice as someone entered.
“Oh, no,” he said into Maggie’s curly hair. “Jack.”
Before either of them could head Jack off at the pass with a shout, Daniel saw motion out of the corner of his eye. He looked toward the bathroom entrance, right up at Jack O’Neill who, for the first time since Daniel had returned to Earth from Abydos, appeared absolutely stunned into silence. His eyes roamed up and down the scene, eyebrows rising at the placement of Maggie’s hands on Daniel’s bare thighs.
“Hi, there. Would you mind closing the door, Colonel O’Neill?” Maggie asked sweetly, startling Jack out of his stupor. “We’re in the middle of a new therapy for Daniel.”
Jack immediately reached for the handle, mouth still agape, shutting the door so fast a cold breeze wafted over Daniel and Maggie.
It was so far beyond humiliating, all Daniel could do was exchange a look with Maggie and start laughing again. And then he was crying, the transition so seamless he didn’t know his emotion had switched until he was in the shower chair and Maggie handed him a tissue. Mood swings would be the death of him. Like the laughter, he couldn’t seem to stop the tears from erupting. While Maggie made quick work of bathing him, he snuffled like a two-year-old all the way through. He was still going at it when she helped him tug on his sweats, though the tears were mostly dried up by then. She said nothing, letting him get it all out of his system. There was no choice in that regard. He had no control, not now, and not in the countless other times he’d smiled and raged and sobbed all in the blink of an eye.
“Sorry,” he said at last.
“Hey, don’t worry about it,” she said. “You ready to go face the music?”
Jack had seen him naked many times. They were often in the locker room together, pre and post mission. And like he’d said, he wasn’t body-conscious despite the overwhelming militaristic nature of the SGC. But this was different. Daniel nodded, though. He didn’t think there was any way around it. No window to escape out of, and even if there were he was on the fifth floor and legless. He let Maggie lead the way, hanging back on the off chance Jack had fled the room.
No such luck. Jack slouched in the armchair, looking antsy and awkward. He was toying with a pitcher of water, flipping the lid up and down.
Maggie smiled awkwardly and left the room, abandoning Daniel without so much as a by-your-leave.
“Hi, Jack,” Daniel said, cheeks flushing. “You’re a little early.”
It had taken the better part of the week for him and Jack to be on semi-easy terms with each other, their conversations usually filled with arguments Daniel found tiring and pointless. Since Sam’s visit, Jack had been less bullheaded. Maybe he’d been less bullheaded himself. Whatever it was, he hoped Jack seeing him in such a vulnerable state wouldn’t be a setback. The few times he didn’t feel so alone had all been in scattered, seldom moments with his friends.
“Yeah, uh,” Jack said, clearly at a loss, looking everywhere but at Daniel.
Daniel couldn’t take that.
“Well, don’t get used to the pre-visit show. This was a one-time deal.”
Jack gaped at him for a full ten seconds, which Daniel had to admit was worth the cost of his wounded pride. Who knew one look at a bar ass could silence a man who had a comeback for every situation. Well, maybe not every.
“Don’t flatter yourself.” Jack cleared his throat, dunking a finger in the water pitcher and flicking droplets on his leg. “You wouldn’t believe the things I’ve seen in my lifetime.”
Relief washed through him, leaving his limbs slightly tingly from fear-induced adrenaline. Truthfully, now that it was all over, Daniel was more embarrassed about the crying jag Jack had to have heard than he was about the humiliating grope and grab with Maggie. It wasn’t very manly to cry, after all, and Jack was all about the military hard edge.
“You okay, though?” Jack pointed to Daniel’s face. “You’ve got a bruise.”
“I had a little tumble, that’s all,” Daniel said. “Maggie had to lend a hand. Sorry you had to see that.”
Jack frowned, setting the pitcher down. He stood, moving toward the window. He looked out at the rain, which ruined their usual visit habit – chess at one of the picnic tables.
“Like I said, nothing I haven’t seen before.”
“Of course,” Daniel said. “How are things at the SGC?”
“Good. Weird without you there,” Jack said, wincing toward the rain-streaked window as if he’d said something terrible.
“I think it’ll only be a week or two more before I can start office hours. It’s a shame it took this long for anyone to think about access for the disabled, though.”
He saw the muscles in Jack’s cheek bunch up. Jack hated the word disabled, Daniel knew, but it was unavoidable. The communication dance they had going required Jack to sidestep now. Daniel sensed there was something more.
“What’s on your mind, Jack?”
“Hammond wants SG-1 back on active duty. He’s making me choose a new … you.”
Hearing that stung more than Daniel thought it would. He’d prepared himself for it, knowing it was inevitable. He had absolutely no expectation SG-1 wouldn’t go on without him, but his life at the SGC had quickly become more than his need to find Sha’re. He could accept his new life, but at this point he couldn’t keep from looking back at his old one. It had only been months since the SGC was even formed, yet somehow it seemed like everything.
“Of course he does. That’s good,” he said, voice sounding faint through a sudden ringing in his ears. “You guys need to be out there.”
“Yeah, I suppose. But there can never be a new you.”
He could barely hear Jack, either. Odd. Daniel wondered if it was just shock exhibiting in a strange way. He shook his head. He wheeled to the dresser, pretending he wasn’t bothered at all by Jack’s news. He withdrew a pair of socks, suspecting his feet were probably cold. Every inch of his body that he could feel ached with unhappiness. Closing his eyes, he struggled against the surging emotion. He’d never be good to anyone if he couldn’t go more than ten minutes without doing a mini Jekyll/Hyde.
“I think we could give it some more time,” Jack said. “It seems too soon, but Carter’s excited. She thinks she and Teal’c have found a planet Teal’c claims has healing waters.”
“Healing waters? We have places like that here on Earth,” Daniel said, biting back further words when he saw Jack frown. He wasn’t denying it was worth checking into. “Two weeks seems like long enough.”
Rolling over to the window, he thought the rain on the glass looked like tears. Daniel reached out, tracing a drop as it took a directionless path downward. The socks bounced off his lap, landing on the footrest of the wheelchair.
“No healing waters that actually heal,” Jack said. “And two weeks isn’t that long in the grand scheme.”
That was true. Daniel leaned, stretching to reach the wayward socks. He snagged them, on his way back up when he was overcome with intense pain. Gasping, his intended motion was lost and he sagged forward, head smacking into the window.
“Daniel?” Jack called
Hands tugged at Daniel’s shoulders. He barely felt them. All he could feel was…
“Jack,” he panted, clutching at his friend for support. “I think something’s wrong.”
Jack crouched in front of him, clasping Daniel’s forearms in a mirror of his grip.
“What? What is it?”
“My back,” Daniel said. Sharp pain stabbed at his lower back, so unexpected Daniel could scarcely breathe. “It hurts.”
Jack shouted for help, not letting go of him.
to chapter nine
Author:
superbadgirlCategory: H/C with a Daniel slant, Team
Season/Spoiler: Very early S2
Rating: R
Word Count: 5,495 this chapter, 44,900 total
Summary: Sam struggles to cope with reality as it is now ... and so does Daniel.
A/N: I claim artistic license for the timeframes I'm using. :)
Sam lurked in the hallway like a kid eavesdropping on late night adult conversation. She’d spent lots of time as a small girl doing the same, sneaking down after being put to bed to listen to her mom and dad talk about things she did not understand. She found she didn’t fully understand what she was hearing now, or maybe just didn’t want to. And her reasons for lurking were far less innocent than they’d been when she was a child. She wasn’t trying to spy in the hopes of catching some juicy tidbit or gossip. It was just that she couldn’t seem to bring herself to round the corner yet.
“You won’t have as big a threat from pressure sores as some of our patients,” a woman’s voice floated out of the room. “You’re young and I’m guessing you’re active?”
“I try to be,” Daniel said with a soft laugh.
“That’s good, but you’re going to have to be aware of the possibility. It’s a bit of a learning curve when you first start out. If we can get you on a schedule quickly, it should be a non-issue.”
Sam smiled sadly, picturing Daniel so wrapped up in whatever project was on his desk that he would forget he couldn’t sit around for days. Oh, god, except that was all he could do. Her stomach twisted into a tiny ball, the way it always did when she thought about Daniel now. It wasn’t right, and she knew she was being a horrible friend. A horrible person. She simply had no idea how to deal. Coming to the hospital for a visit was supposed to have been the start of a new attitude, and here she was hiding like a frightened rabbit. Somewhere deep inside her, she thought that if she didn’t see Daniel’s disability, then it wasn’t real.
“We’ll also be working on building your upper body strength. I think you’ll find it won’t be difficult at all.”
Taking a deep breath, Sam closed her eyes and counted to five. If she weren’t ready by then, she’d turn around. No one would be the wiser. She’d tell the colonel she tried. When she closed her eyes, she saw Daniel’s face looking at her. He wasn’t recriminatory, which actually only made her cowardice worse. It’d been too long since she seen him, and she truly did have things to discuss with him. If it could be called discussion.
She had been asked and then ordered on a fool’s errand, and she knew it. The colonel had insisted Sam was the only one who hadn’t tried ‘talking some sense’ into Daniel. It was true only because she was the only one who hadn’t been to the hospital, and that made this all the worse. Even Teal’c had found a way to visit.
Sam shoved her broken heart aside, straightening her shoulders and entering Daniel’s room with a bright smile on her face. Daniel sat by the window. For a second, he looked so normal and healthy she could almost swear he was. Then Sam saw the wheels of his chair and it all came back. A curly-headed woman in scrubs was perched on the arm of the room’s plush chair.
“Oh, hello,” the woman said, looking up from Daniel’s chart. “You must be a friend of Daniel’s. I’m Maggie Grayson. I’ve been working with Daniel on the various therapies we’ll be employing as part of his treatment.”
“Nice to meet you. I’m Sam. Captain Samantha Carter,” Sam said, satisfied when she didn’t sound like she was choking. She felt like she was. “I don’t mean to interrupt.”
“Not at all. We were just finishing up. I’ll see you tomorrow, okay, Daniel? Nice to see you here, Sam.”
Sam nodded like a stupid bobble-head doll, kept nodding as Maggie left the room. She turned, gaze lingering on the door. Taking another breath, Sam returned her attention to her friend, smile still plastered on her face. She willed herself to look at only his face. Not the legs. Not the wheelchair. Had it really only been just over a week?
“Hi, Daniel,” she said.
“Hey, Sam,” he said.
They stared at each other for a few moments, neither of them really sure where to go. It was awkward and familiar, like she had never met Daniel before and was a childhood friend all at the same time. That’s how it always had been with Daniel, from the second she’d met him. For the first time, though, it was more awkward than comfortable.
“So, uh, how’ve you been?” he asked with a smile. “I haven’t seen you in a while.”
Just like the Daniel in her head, there was no hint of recrimination in real Daniel, either, no hint that he was angry she’d essentially abandoned him. It made her queasy with guilt.
“I’ve been busy.” She sounded defensive. “I’ve been helping Janet … Doctor Fraiser as often as I can, though so far there hasn’t been cause to think my expertise might lend anything to it. And General Hammond doesn’t want me to stop looking for a way to return to P9C-742. I haven’t made much progress, I’m afraid. From what I could see, their technology trumped ours at every turn, and if we were able to construct an impenetrable shield I don’t really know what they might have come up with. Not only that, but I’ve got Col…”
“Sam,” Daniel interrupted her. “You’re babbling.”
“Oh,” Sam said. “I am? I guess I am.”
“It’s okay, you know.” He kept smiling up at her. They were certainly doing a lot of smiling. “Hey, what do you say we go out for a walk? It’s a nice day, and it’d be good to get some fresh air.”
She nodded weakly, not knowing how to tell him no. The only reason she had to hesitate was outside, in the great wide open, it would be even more obvious that she was uncomfortable. More, it would be impossible to pretend Daniel was wheeling around instead of walking. Sam cringed internally. There was something wrong with her.
“What’s in the bag?”
“Oh, cookies,” she said. She’d forgotten. Sam clung to the paper bag as if it were a life preserver. “There’s a new bakery up the street from my house. I thought you might like something besides hospital food.”
Daniel laughed. “Yeah, even if it’s temporary I do get tired of the bland choices. Bring them with?”
“Okay.”
Sam didn’t know what to do. She started reaching out to push Daniel, but put her arms back down. Thankfully for her, Daniel didn’t seem to notice her disconcertion as he wheeled to the door. She followed dumbly, face still frozen in a smile. They walked in silence through a short corridor, to the elevator and then out onto the grassy grounds. Wide sidewalks wound around, and there were plenty of benches and tables around.
“It’s good to get practice in out here, but I’m nervous about how I’m going to get around at home.” Daniel pulled up to a picnic table, gesturing for her to sit. “Tight corners are tricky.”
Her stomach did another strange jump. While she’d buried herself on base, Colonel O’Neill had spent his spare time outfitting Daniel’s apartment with ramps and hand bars. He’d insisted on making everything temporary, so convinced he was that Daniel’s condition wasn’t permanent. The kitchen counters were too high, but short of moving Daniel into a new place, they’d have to stay. The colonel had been really worried about that, as if Daniel spent a lot of time at home cooking.
“You don’t have to pretend you’re okay for me,” Daniel said, breaking into her thoughts.
She startled, blinking at him with a puzzled smile. “What do you mean?”
“Sam, if you don’t stop smiling your face is going to crack. Just … relax. Part of the education around here is learning how other people will react. It’s okay to be freaked out. I won’t take it personally.”
Spoken like a man who’d had to reiterate something similar a million times over. He probably had, but she wouldn’t know that because she had been a terrible friend. Sam let her smile drop, and for a second she thought Daniel had been right. Her cheeks felt sore. She raised a hand to rub at them, suddenly self-conscious.
“I’m trying not to freak out,” she said. Now that she wasn’t smiling, though, the urge to cry swelled. “I keep thinking it’s not real.”
“Is that why you’ve stayed away?”
Sam gasped, the question like a blow to her gut. Daniel was there, acting like he was okay with her avoidance, she knew it wasn’t reasonable for that to be true. And this question made that clear. She looked him in the eyes, seeing a glimmer of something. Anger. Sorrow. She couldn’t lie her way out of anything, so she’d have to admit she was not a good friend.
“Partially. It’s like … if I didn’t see you, if I didn’t see this,” Sam thumped the arm of the wheelchair, relieved to be saying it out loud, “then maybe I’ll wake up and we’ll be gearing up to go on another mission. And I keep thinking there’s something I should be able to do to fix this. There has to be something, some way to work around the problem with the gate on P9C-742.”
“It’s like I told Jack, Sam, I won’t go back there if that poor man has actually transferred his affliction on me,” Daniel replied automatically. “There’s no need to waste your time anymore. I’m fine. Really.”
Ah. She believed Daniel, but at the same time could not stop thinking that no one could be so well-adjusted days after losing the use of his legs. It did not make sense to her. She couldn’t reconcile it with the Daniel she knew. The colonel going off on frustrated tangents about Daniel should have forewarned her, but she hadn’t really understood where he’d been coming from. She’d been too wrapped up in her own angst.
“Are you fine, Daniel?” she asked. She sat on the edge of the picnic table bench. “This is a lot to handle all at once. No one would bat an eyelash if you were less than okay.”
She put a hand on his arm, the first time she’d touched him since they’d come back from the deserted beach planet. Sam felt Daniel’s forearm muscles tighten, as if he were going to pull away. She just held on tighter, finding that now she had something besides her own inadequacies to concentrate on, she could look at Daniel as Daniel and not some man in a wheelchair. If she was guilty of avoidance, she wondered if everyone else had been as well. She feared Daniel had become lost in the shuffle, which did nothing to ease her guilt. It did, however, make it somewhat easier for her to push him.
“I don’t know what you want me to say, Sam.”
“Say you’re angry. Say you’re scared. Tell me how you really feel. You don’t have to pretend you’re okay for me, or anyone else.”
The door was open now, and Sam was scared of what might come through. Up until now, she’d kept herself guarded from anything hurtful. From the truth. If anything, that tactic had only made her feel awful. Now that she was there, looking her fear and dread in the face, she felt immeasurably better. Maybe bringing Daniel to the same sort of realization was worth the pain.
“You came all this way after a week of conspicuous absence to lecture me? To coach me on how I should be feeling and reacting?” Daniel looked at her sadly. “I’m not just saying it. I really am fine. Life goes on.”
She searched his eyes. It hadn’t taken her long to find out that was the key to understanding Daniel Jackson. The eyes were the windows to the soul for some more than others. Actually, this was true for all three of her teammates. Men of few words but deep stores of emotion. He was angry. She could see it and she couldn’t blame him.
After a few seconds, Daniel broke eye contact, looking down at his left hand.
“You’re a better person than I am, Daniel. You’re part of something bigger than life. If I were you, I’d hate losing the chance to go through the Stargate, at the very least.” Her heart rate jumped as she determined where she had to go. Sam didn’t know if she could. She swallowed, looking at Daniel’s legs for the first time in a week. “I’d hate losing the chance of finding my wife. I’d do anything to get that chance back.”
She glanced up at Daniel’s face. His focus remained on his hand. He looked different, not quite himself. His expression was hard and closed-off. That was all it took to change him from the person she was starting to love dearly to a stranger. Oh, crap, she couldn’t believe she’d actually said that to him. It was unforgivable. The lowest blow anyone could deliver.
“Oh, Sam, that’s not fair,” Daniel said. “And that’s Jack talking, not you. You don’t think I realize all of that? It’s my legs that don’t work, not my brain.”
She realized the colonel had made a tactical error, and used her to do it. No, Sam couldn’t hold anyone else accountable for her mistakes. If she’d visited Daniel earlier on her own terms, she’d never have come as Colonel O’Neill’s ambassador on a mission she wasn’t even sure was valid. Upon first seeing Daniel, she understood her CO’s instincts. It was hurtful as hell to see Daniel resigned to his fate, embracing it, even. If hammering on about P9C-742 brought about a reaction, that was supposed to mean something. She shouldn’t have judged the situation without knowing anything about it. One look in Daniel’s eyes now, and all she saw was hurt and unshed tears and proof she was awful.
“Daniel, I’m sorry. The colonel, he just doesn’t want you to give up,” she said, a lame attempt to justify. She couldn’t.
“You think I don’t know this keeps me from finding my wife? I think about that every day. Tell Jack that. Every single minute of every single day I know I can’t do anything to bring her back to me.” Daniel’s face was flushed slightly, two bright spots of color on his cheeks. “Not being willing to go back to that planet is not the same thing as giving up. Right now, I don’t see many options, but if there were some other means to solve this you have to know I’d take them.”
The world was a blurred mess, hot tears welling up in her eyes too. Sam had asked for this. She was stupid. They all were.
“Of course I’m angry. Of course I don’t want to be this way. Talking about it doesn’t help. All I can do at this point is move forward, but no one else wants to let me. You all keep coming around, reminding me how I’m not normal. It’s like I’m not a person anymore.” Daniel finished speaking, slightly out of breath.
Around them, birds chirped and a lawnmower droned by, but the only sounds Sam really heard were Daniel’s harsh breaths and her own resonating in her skull as if it were an empty cavern. They sat without speaking. She didn’t know what she could possibly say. She accomplished her task, but at a high cost.
“Well,” Daniel said quietly, after a minute. “I guess I had a lot to get off my chest after all. You okay?”
Sam gave a soft half-laugh, half-sob, relieved the silence had been broken but still uncertain where to go from here. There was really only one way.
“I’m so sorry, Daniel,” she said. “For not being here for you when I should have been.”
“It’s fine, Sam. I meant it when I said it was okay to freak out. I guess I should have taken my own advice earlier. That was exhausting.”
She rubbed at her nose, brushing an errant tear away. Straightening, Sam willed her inner coward away. She looked at Daniel, all of him, with a smile that was more genuine than any she’d given lately.
“You know what will help with that?”
Daniel shook his head.
“A cookie,” she said, picking up the bag, opening it and sticking her nose in for a deep inhalation. “Mmm.”
“Give me one of those already,” Daniel said.
They munched cookies together in the sunshine. Catching Daniel looking at passersby wistfully, Sam vowed she’d devote her spare time to finding an actual way to help him. They didn’t know for sure what was causing the paralysis. There were lots of alternative treatments out there on Earth; the same should be true for the whole universe. No more putting all the apples in one basket, not when what might work just as well were oranges.
~~*~~
In most ways, his life was completely the way it used to be. He did the same things he had always done, sometimes in a more creative or occasionally painful way. He got out of bed, he brushed his teeth. He ate food, he exercised. He’d eventually go back to work. On paper, everything looked fine. On the inside, Daniel felt like he was falling apart. One minute he was coping well, the next he had to quell unfocused rage. There was scarily little difference between the two. Apparently that was how he was supposed to be feeling. It was terrifying and exhausting.
Yes, he had accepted paralysis was most likely permanent for him. All of the poking and prodding he’d undergone in the last twelve days revealed nothing concrete about the cause. He didn’t fault Doctor Fraiser for being unable to find the source of his paralysis. The best she could do was narrow it down to a nerve condition stemming from what she called T12, and an alien one at that. His treatment was devised based only on this conjecture.
“Just five more reps, Daniel, and you’re done for the day,” Maggie said.
He pushed himself, fighting past the extremely odd sensation of taxed upper body muscles and absolutely no feeling from his lower half. He could only take her word that this was doing him any good at all. Yes, Daniel did nearly everything he used to do, but at this point he did nothing alone except sleep. Despite the near-constant companions, he had never felt so alone.
“That’s great. You’re coming along well.”
“Thanks,” he said breathlessly. His arms felt like rubber, the workout more taxing than usual today. He took a moment before he maneuvered himself from the raised platform to his wheelchair. He could do that all by himself now. “It feels good.”
It did. He had to keep himself focused on the positive, which he knew frustrated the hell out of Jack O’Neill. Unloading on Sam didn’t change that much, really, except it gave Daniel voice where he had had none. Now his friends got frustrated, but they understood better. That was something.
“Think you’re up for a shower by yourself today?” Maggie asked.
“I think I might actually be.” He truly was a big boy now.
It was customary for Maggie to walk him back to his room. Today was no different. He did enjoy her company, for the most part. When he had to, Daniel could pretend they were friends, not patient and practitioner. He certainly liked her better than the psychologist he had to see. But the illusion of friendship always burst when Maggie started talking shop, introducing new therapies or gauging his muscle tone.
“It’s your last night in the hospital. You excited to get home?” Maggie said as they reached his door.
“Yes, actually,” he said, meaning it.
She patted him on the shoulder, leaving him to the task of opening the door.
Daniel leaned for the door handle, pushing the door open with his wheels. It would be nice to get into a space bigger than a breadbox, to be rid of the antiseptic smell of a hospital. If he were honest, though, it also scared the crap out of him. He trusted Jack had set everything up for him, but he felt like he’d be exploring a whole new planet. Daniel grabbed a clean pair of sweats, angrily plopping them on his useless lap. He’d never explore a whole new planet again. A burgeoning feeling of resentment grew within him. Once again, he halted it before it swallowed him whole. He had a random thought of the slums on Wiutehia.
“You look like you’re going to be sick. You okay?” Maggie asked, reminding him he wasn’t alone.
“I’m fine.” He looked up at her, fending off her concern with a weak smile. “I thought I was going to get to do this alone.”
“Ah, you are, but I’m staying out here to make sure everything goes smoothly. I know you’re tired of flashing your man-bits at me, but trust me, I’m no longer impressed.”
“That means you were impressed to start, right?” he said, forgetting himself for a moment. “I’ll remember that.”
“Oh, you. Here I thought you didn’t have that male ego thing. Go scrub that luscious bod of yours.” Maggie’s eyes gleamed, like she actually meant it.
It was as alarming as it was welcome. Or maybe it was just alarming because it was welcome. Daniel liked the evidence that he was still a person.
“Speaking of luscious bods, your colonel friend’s due to stop by any time now, isn’t he?”
“Ah, so you just want to hang out here because you’ve got a crush on my friend?” Daniel rolled his eyes, then rolled into the bathroom, calling as he shut the door, “You could do so much better.”
Her response was muffled by the door, but he could guess it anyway. He concentrated on the task at hand. They’d been practicing in stages. Maggie said he was far more advanced at this early point in his paralysis than most patients, which heartened him. He might be feeding delusions, but it gave him hope that someday he could get out of the chair. At the very least, it was nice to be able to take off his own pants even if it still took him ten minutes to do so.
Everything went well in spite of his unusual fatigue, until Daniel tried to transfer from his wheelchair to the shower chair. His arms might have been too tired from the PT session, or maybe he didn’t have the right balance going. All he really knew was that he had a tight grip on the side of the shower and the assist bar, and then he was mysteriously ass over teakettle on the cold tile floor, with a dull thumping in his head and bright lights in his eyes.
“Daniel, are you all right in there?” Maggie called. Oh. It was her fist on the door that was making the pounding noise.
He tried to answer her. He was too confused.
“I’m coming in.” The announcement came a millisecond before Maggie burst into the room, a scared but also calm expression on her face.
Daniel finally had the wherewithal to wriggle his way onto his elbows, vaguely noticing the wheelchair was on its side and one of the wheels was spinning and spinning. Whoops. He watched Maggie right the chair before patting his naked body down for signs of injury he couldn’t detect himself.
“I’m fine,” he said. “Really embarrassed, but fine, I think. Am I fine?”
“Yes, you’re fine. Looks like you’ve got a welt on your right cheekbone. What happened?”
“I’m not sure.” He started to smile, sliding down until he was flat on his back again. “It’s just that I’ve fallen and I can’t get up.”
She started laughing, and he couldn’t help but join her. He could only imagine what they looked like, him stark naked and her pretty much on top of him. It was a good thing he was neither shy nor unaccustomed to being naked in her presence, or this would be incredibly embarrassing. After a minute, instinctual worry and fear worked its way through both of their systems, their laughter subsiding. The tile was becoming really uncomfortable on his shoulder blades. His butt was probably freezing.
“So maybe I still need a little help with the bathroom stuff,” he said.
“I like a man who knows his limitations. Come on, let’s get you up. You’re going to have to do some of the work.”
He used his arms while she struggled with his legs. They were halfway through their odd game of Twister when Daniel heard a faint knock on the room door, followed by a hesitant, recognizable voice as someone entered.
“Oh, no,” he said into Maggie’s curly hair. “Jack.”
Before either of them could head Jack off at the pass with a shout, Daniel saw motion out of the corner of his eye. He looked toward the bathroom entrance, right up at Jack O’Neill who, for the first time since Daniel had returned to Earth from Abydos, appeared absolutely stunned into silence. His eyes roamed up and down the scene, eyebrows rising at the placement of Maggie’s hands on Daniel’s bare thighs.
“Hi, there. Would you mind closing the door, Colonel O’Neill?” Maggie asked sweetly, startling Jack out of his stupor. “We’re in the middle of a new therapy for Daniel.”
Jack immediately reached for the handle, mouth still agape, shutting the door so fast a cold breeze wafted over Daniel and Maggie.
It was so far beyond humiliating, all Daniel could do was exchange a look with Maggie and start laughing again. And then he was crying, the transition so seamless he didn’t know his emotion had switched until he was in the shower chair and Maggie handed him a tissue. Mood swings would be the death of him. Like the laughter, he couldn’t seem to stop the tears from erupting. While Maggie made quick work of bathing him, he snuffled like a two-year-old all the way through. He was still going at it when she helped him tug on his sweats, though the tears were mostly dried up by then. She said nothing, letting him get it all out of his system. There was no choice in that regard. He had no control, not now, and not in the countless other times he’d smiled and raged and sobbed all in the blink of an eye.
“Sorry,” he said at last.
“Hey, don’t worry about it,” she said. “You ready to go face the music?”
Jack had seen him naked many times. They were often in the locker room together, pre and post mission. And like he’d said, he wasn’t body-conscious despite the overwhelming militaristic nature of the SGC. But this was different. Daniel nodded, though. He didn’t think there was any way around it. No window to escape out of, and even if there were he was on the fifth floor and legless. He let Maggie lead the way, hanging back on the off chance Jack had fled the room.
No such luck. Jack slouched in the armchair, looking antsy and awkward. He was toying with a pitcher of water, flipping the lid up and down.
Maggie smiled awkwardly and left the room, abandoning Daniel without so much as a by-your-leave.
“Hi, Jack,” Daniel said, cheeks flushing. “You’re a little early.”
It had taken the better part of the week for him and Jack to be on semi-easy terms with each other, their conversations usually filled with arguments Daniel found tiring and pointless. Since Sam’s visit, Jack had been less bullheaded. Maybe he’d been less bullheaded himself. Whatever it was, he hoped Jack seeing him in such a vulnerable state wouldn’t be a setback. The few times he didn’t feel so alone had all been in scattered, seldom moments with his friends.
“Yeah, uh,” Jack said, clearly at a loss, looking everywhere but at Daniel.
Daniel couldn’t take that.
“Well, don’t get used to the pre-visit show. This was a one-time deal.”
Jack gaped at him for a full ten seconds, which Daniel had to admit was worth the cost of his wounded pride. Who knew one look at a bar ass could silence a man who had a comeback for every situation. Well, maybe not every.
“Don’t flatter yourself.” Jack cleared his throat, dunking a finger in the water pitcher and flicking droplets on his leg. “You wouldn’t believe the things I’ve seen in my lifetime.”
Relief washed through him, leaving his limbs slightly tingly from fear-induced adrenaline. Truthfully, now that it was all over, Daniel was more embarrassed about the crying jag Jack had to have heard than he was about the humiliating grope and grab with Maggie. It wasn’t very manly to cry, after all, and Jack was all about the military hard edge.
“You okay, though?” Jack pointed to Daniel’s face. “You’ve got a bruise.”
“I had a little tumble, that’s all,” Daniel said. “Maggie had to lend a hand. Sorry you had to see that.”
Jack frowned, setting the pitcher down. He stood, moving toward the window. He looked out at the rain, which ruined their usual visit habit – chess at one of the picnic tables.
“Like I said, nothing I haven’t seen before.”
“Of course,” Daniel said. “How are things at the SGC?”
“Good. Weird without you there,” Jack said, wincing toward the rain-streaked window as if he’d said something terrible.
“I think it’ll only be a week or two more before I can start office hours. It’s a shame it took this long for anyone to think about access for the disabled, though.”
He saw the muscles in Jack’s cheek bunch up. Jack hated the word disabled, Daniel knew, but it was unavoidable. The communication dance they had going required Jack to sidestep now. Daniel sensed there was something more.
“What’s on your mind, Jack?”
“Hammond wants SG-1 back on active duty. He’s making me choose a new … you.”
Hearing that stung more than Daniel thought it would. He’d prepared himself for it, knowing it was inevitable. He had absolutely no expectation SG-1 wouldn’t go on without him, but his life at the SGC had quickly become more than his need to find Sha’re. He could accept his new life, but at this point he couldn’t keep from looking back at his old one. It had only been months since the SGC was even formed, yet somehow it seemed like everything.
“Of course he does. That’s good,” he said, voice sounding faint through a sudden ringing in his ears. “You guys need to be out there.”
“Yeah, I suppose. But there can never be a new you.”
He could barely hear Jack, either. Odd. Daniel wondered if it was just shock exhibiting in a strange way. He shook his head. He wheeled to the dresser, pretending he wasn’t bothered at all by Jack’s news. He withdrew a pair of socks, suspecting his feet were probably cold. Every inch of his body that he could feel ached with unhappiness. Closing his eyes, he struggled against the surging emotion. He’d never be good to anyone if he couldn’t go more than ten minutes without doing a mini Jekyll/Hyde.
“I think we could give it some more time,” Jack said. “It seems too soon, but Carter’s excited. She thinks she and Teal’c have found a planet Teal’c claims has healing waters.”
“Healing waters? We have places like that here on Earth,” Daniel said, biting back further words when he saw Jack frown. He wasn’t denying it was worth checking into. “Two weeks seems like long enough.”
Rolling over to the window, he thought the rain on the glass looked like tears. Daniel reached out, tracing a drop as it took a directionless path downward. The socks bounced off his lap, landing on the footrest of the wheelchair.
“No healing waters that actually heal,” Jack said. “And two weeks isn’t that long in the grand scheme.”
That was true. Daniel leaned, stretching to reach the wayward socks. He snagged them, on his way back up when he was overcome with intense pain. Gasping, his intended motion was lost and he sagged forward, head smacking into the window.
“Daniel?” Jack called
Hands tugged at Daniel’s shoulders. He barely felt them. All he could feel was…
“Jack,” he panted, clutching at his friend for support. “I think something’s wrong.”
Jack crouched in front of him, clasping Daniel’s forearms in a mirror of his grip.
“What? What is it?”
“My back,” Daniel said. Sharp pain stabbed at his lower back, so unexpected Daniel could scarcely breathe. “It hurts.”
Jack shouted for help, not letting go of him.
to chapter nine
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Date: 2008-12-07 04:18 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-12-07 06:19 pm (UTC)I haven't seen Continuum, but I shudder to think what TPTB came up with. As for me, I'm neither disabled nor do I work with the disabled. Your comment is very touching - I'm very, very glad the emotional side is coming off as realistic.