DUET PART ONE

WHILE I WASN'T LOOKING   BY PHOENIX E

I have to find him.

We're having a really bad day.  Bad, BAD day, neither one of us shoulda left the house this morning never mind gone through that goddamned gate.  Bad day, even worse mission, and now here we are, back home again, finally free to go home but that ain't gonna happen any time soon, at least not the two of us going home together.

No such luck, Daniel's way too pissed at me for that.  So now that Hammond's happy and Janet's happy I'm free to go after my distinctly unhappy archaeologist.  Who made like Danno and booked for parts unknown the second we were cut loose.

Peachy.

My current mission?  Seek and grovel.  Fortunately I don't have far to look; Security says Daniel hasn't signed out yet so he's gone to ground right here underground.  He might have run but he didn't run far.  That's a good sign, right?  I hope it's a good sign.  He's figuring I'd come after him and he wants me to, so he didn't run too far so I wouldn't have that far to go.  To come after him, that is.

That actually made sense.  Or I'm just too far gone to tell.

Bad day, but good sign.  God, I hope so. Yeah, I know I already said that but I'm still hopin'.  I'll hold that happy thought as I head up to his office. That's where he's most likely to be so if I find him there I'll know for sure he wants to be found.

Well, at least I hope that's what it means.

Oh God, I am in so much trouble. We've had disagreements before - crap, sometimes it seems like if we're not screwing we're scrapping.  Sometimes scrapping while we're screwing. Anyway, it always seems to be one or the other.  We frequently don't see eye to eye but this...

God... this was so bad. I don't think I've ever seen him so angry, ever since I've known him. The look on his face cut me deep and the knife's still hacking pieces out of my soul.  I just wish I knew what we were really fighting about.  I know what happened, what I had to do, what he said. I was there for the whole thing, after all.  it's not like we haven't played this particular scene out before, and both gotten pretty upset with each other in the bargain but this time it's different.  Something's not right.  I can't help thinking there was more going on, that it wasn't just about a bunch of squiggles.

Crap on a wall.  I can't believe we're all over because of  chicken scratches on a wall.  No way, that can't be right,  not going to happen.  I have to find him, have to fix this.  I will fix this, make him understand he's got it all wrong.

You think I enjoyed having to rain all over your parade back there, Daniel?  Think again -  it killed me to have to do that to you.  To have to make you leave something that was such a big deal to you.  I saw the way you looked at that place.  I know how much it meant to you - what you found on those walls and what you thought you could learn from all that gobbledegook.  More 'meaning of life' stuff.  I got that.

I got it. I get a lot more about what matters to you then you think I do.  If it matters to you then it matters to me, but here's my thing  -  you matter more.  More than a thousand wonders on a thousand worlds in a thousand galaxies - there isn’t anything out there that’s worth more than you, whether you see it that way or not.  I know I hurt you when I took it all away from you and  it might even mean you’ll hate me for the rest of your life but you know what, at least you get to have it.  The rest of your life, that is.  You're alive and to keep you that way I’d go and do the same dammed thing all over again in a heartbeat.

Yasureyoubetcha.

I know you don’t see things the same way - this ‘meaning of life’ stuff is more important to you than - than you, even. You get a whiff of some weird-ass alien 'this might contain all the secrets of existence' motherlode and all your usually finely honed and pretty damned impressive survival instincts go right out the frigging window. Which leaves me stuck with the entirely thankless task of having to save your shapely ass for you fighting you all the while I'm trying to do it. But hey, saving you in spite of yourself seems to be my lot in life.  It's a job I'm more than willing to take on - and take all the heat for doing it so I get to keep you in my life.

This is the second time I’ve had to pull you kicking and screaming out of what to you was paradise.  Yeah, I'm a military jerk and everything else you let me have it with all the back to the gate, guilty as charged but you know what, Dannyboy, you're not the only one who can do this 'meaning of life' stuff.  Only thing is, what counts in my book as being right up there on a cosmic level - way different than the what gets your blood pumping.

What does it for me, Daniel?  Total no-brainer. You.  Just you, it's all about you. What gives my life meaning isn't somewhere ‘out there’ over the rainbow, written on the wall of some crumbly alien building, buried in the ground or locked up in a blinking light-show puzzle which might take several lifetimes to sort out.  For me ‘meaning of life’ is a pair of blue eyes leading into a certain archaeologists soul. Whenever I want to know what it is that makes everything I’ll ever try to do in this life damned well worth the effort all I have to do is look in your eyes and I get all the answers and reasons and inspiration I need.

I’ll do anything in the world for you, Danny, anything but let you throw yourself away.  I don't care if it's for the answer to every question the human race has been asking since the beginning of time you don't get to trade your life for it.  End of story, and that's my bottom line, sunshine.  I'm not giving you up and and I'm not letting you go.

So there.

Oh yeah, how to put your foot down, Jack, you're pretty cocky when it's just you, your ego and an empty corridor, tough guy.  Daniel's office is just around the bend.  Let's see if you're feeling so damned sure of yourself when you have to face the wrath of Doctor 'Mad at the Universe and most especially honked off with obstinate, insensitive colonels'.

So, here we are at Daniel's door. It's closed, but - aha, not locked.  Another good sign.  He didn't leave the mountain so he he wanted me to find him, he holed up but he's doing it here, the first place I'd logically look for him, so - so he's mad at me but he's  not hiding and now - no locked door.  He could have locked me out, could have, but he didn't. Didn't lock me out.  Good, that's good. That's gotta mean something, right?

Crap, I guess I should stop sweating all over the wrong side of his door, go in  and see if he's actually in his office.  I'm gonna feel pretty stupid if he isn't.

Found him.  Oh boy.  Now what?

I’m in.  He’s here.  I’m so shit scared.  All of a sudden I'm hearing every ugly thing we both said, remembering the whole sad scenario with the nauseating clarity of a really bad movie playing over and over in my head.  And me with no popcorn. I can see it all in sickening Scare-o-colour - the way his face lit up when he saw the building - all that stuff on the walls, he was glowing like he'd died and found the promised land  - sometimes he looks that way - at me…

Then the other look, the bad one, when I had to take it all away from him.

What was I supposed to do, Danny?  Just what was I supposed to do?  I know you didn't have time to record any of it, even, but those green guys weren't taking any prisoners.  We almost lost you as it was.  There’s just no reasoning you sometimes.  Yet, if I have any hope at all of fixing this, that’s exactly what I have to do.  It would be easier if I could stop shaking and focus.  I'd rather face a whole passel of System Lords with whoopee cushions and feathers than have to do this… talking stuff….

Crap, if it was any colder in this room I’d be spitting icicles.  Jesus, is he pissed.  Christ, am I scared.

So, here we are, the pair of us, me standing here like a doofus holding up the other side of his door, and him,  sitting there with his back to me, giving me the cold shoulder along with the silent treatment, just a few feet away, only across the room, but he might as well be across the universe.  He knows I'm here but he's not letting on.  Not moving, not turning around, and worst of all, not saying a word.  Oh momma, you could cut the air in here with a chainsaw.  All the times I've wished he would stop talking, now the silence scares me.  Say something, Danny.  Anything.  Call me a name.  Tell me to get out.  Throw me a bone; give me somewhere to start.

Well, this is fun.  Not.

I’m dying here.  On my feet but nothing’s coming to mind. So, what now, Jack?  You’re here, he’s here.  What now?

Oh crap, there go my brains….

I don’t believe what you do to me, Daniel. I'm so knocked out, just being in the same room with you I can barely stand.  My heart’s pounding, head swimming and all I can see is your  back.  It’s crazy it’s nuts, how you can get to me like this but I don’t care. Yes I do.  I care so much it scares me sometimes.  Oh hell, freaks the freaking crap out of me most of the time.

Especially now, because...because of what happened out there - everything - everything we have - or had - it could all be over.

I'm so fucking terrified I can't see straight. I want him like crazy, right here, right now, everywhere, all the time, can't be without him, won't - won't be without him and I'm so afraid - so damned scared he’ll never let me touch him again, don’t understand why he let me touch him in the first place, it was all so good, so right, so strong between us and yet now - I don't get it, don't understand -  how did something so wonderful suddenly get so fragile?

My mind is mush.  I'm standing here gawping and shaking and trying to think of something to say - rooting around in my brain for the words that will somehow reach him.

That's a laugh!  Me say something intelligent?  I can barely manage that on a good day and right now, the state I'm in, I couldn’t talk my way out of wet paper bag.  I can barely string two coherent thoughts together never mind making anything in my head come out of my mouth in any way that would make a shred of sense.

Words are where he shines.  He can say stuff… well it just takes my breath away sometimes what he knows.  When it comes to sounding off I’m only good when I’m drunk or mad or not giving a shit and then the crap that comes outta my mouth….

I could cut my tongue out sometimes.  If they gave out an award for saying the wrong thing at the wrong time I’d be a shoe-in to take the sucker home.  And you know what, if I had a nickel for every stupid thing I’ve ever said to him I’d have a shit-load of nickels and still be saying stupid things to him.

Nah, appropriate verbal expression in a pinch is not my strong suit.  However, if you wanna talk the whole 'actions speak louder than words' thing -  different story. Totally!  Give me something to do with my hands and I’m your man.

So, I guess we go with what we know. Not that I have any other options at this point.

So, we go.

Yup. We go.

We’re not going, Jack.

Crap.

You noticed.

Double crap with a cherry on top.

I'm still standing here gasping and doing a fair guppy impersonation when something makes him turn - see me - awwww, damn, look at his face.  Oh Danny, not a happy face - can't have that.  Just can't...

I'm gone.  And I go.

I've bounded across the room and reached him before my brain catches up with my body's urgent need to touch him. My hands are on his shoulders before he can get away from me.  He's still mad as hell at me, fighting my touch, trying to pull away, but that’s not going to happen.

He tries to get out of the chair but I hold him where he is, trapped beneath my hands. His smouldering indignation and fury streak up my arms and rocket through me as he bitterly struggles to wriggle out of my clutches. It's not easy to hold him down, he's strong, he's damned determined and pissy as hell and it's not helping touching him is enough to turn my knees to water. But I ride him out without giving and hold him, his body rigid, implacable and unfriendly beneath my fingers.

For the moment.

He’s trembling.  Oh yeah, me too. I get over  it and get busy massaging his shoulders, working the tense, corded muscles, bunching as he bristles against my palms.  I pull his head back until he's resting against me.  He’s not fighting me now.  Not resisting, but it's more resignation than compliance.  He's 'putting up' with me.  Thinks he can sit through my touching untouched. 

We'll see.

I keep working the shoulders, kneading the knotted, defiant muscles firmly but gently.  Trying with every careful, deliberate touch  not only to calm him down, but to communicate.  My hands are all I've got to reach him with because being capable of anything even remotely resembling verbal communication - forget it.   I couldn’t speak now if I tried.  So I fall back on letting my fingers do the talking as I stroke my palms down the top of his shoulders to his chest.  Smooth strokes, gentle, up and down, my hands gliding across this beloved expanse I've travelled along so many times, not just with hands. Caressing, adoring, I pass my hands over him with careful reverence coming from the place where the best of my love resides. Telling him with each touch everything I want to say but can't find the words for.

I never meant to hurt you.  I only want to protect you.  I'm sorry.  I say all of that and more with each gentle motion, trying to tell him - why.  The only way I know how.

Right now, I’m delivering the frigging Gettysburg address.  Ten fingers with a mission.  Boy is he listening!  I guess it’s not so much what you say, it’s how you say it.  You can keep the flowers; I work with the tools at hand.  The ones at the ends of my wrists, to be precise.

It’s gotta be wrong somehow, to love someone so much.  The fear comes surging back up bringing with it the sweet pain of how much he means to me. I watch him, rapt with wonder as I stroke his throat; his head falls limply back, moving languidly against my stomach, eyes closed,  his mouth falling open as his chest heaves with a huge, contented sigh .  His face flushed, cheeks glowing,  pulse racing beneath my hand - God help me, he's so beautiful -  I could look at him forever, the way he is right now.  Completely - gone.

Why can’t it always be like this; why can't we always be like this...

Damn you! Why do you make me hurt you?  How can you expect me to stand by and do nothing, let you get yourself killed - for what?  A building?  Crap written on walls?  Jesus, even I know that’s stupid! I know you thought you could handle it.  You think you can talk to anyone; any weird ass bug eyed monster and it will just roll over and do what you want.  Funny thing, it’s almost true...  Almost - but damn it, almost isn’t always.

These guys weren’t going to listen, Danny.  You have to trust me on this.  Assessing threat.  That’s my job.  And I'm damned good at at.  That's how I got to be the colonel.  They would have shot you down like a dog.  Every time you make me do this, make me save you from yourself, I wonder if this is going to be it.  The big one - the time when you finally won’t forgive me for doing my job and  keeping you safe.

I get so confused.  Everything is so clear on this side of the gate. But when we go out there, the rules change.  It’s not just you and me anymore.  I’m not just your friend.  Your lover. I’m the guy in charge. I’m responsible for your life, for the lives of everyone under my command. That’s no joke to me Danny, and I wish you would stop messing with me about it 'cause there are some things I can’t go soft on. You fight me on this, you’re gonna lose.  That’s the way it is.  I won’t let even you keep me from doing what I have to do to get the job done and get everybody home again in one piece.  Especially you.  God, especially you…

I don't care if you don't think you're worth it.  Even if you were right, which you're not, I'm not losing anyone on my watch.  It's like, a ton of paperwork.

Okay, that's not funny.  And now we're getting to what scares me the most. If anything is ever going to come between us, this is going to be what it is.  We both are what we are. That’s our greatest strength and our biggest problem.  I love every curious, idealistic, impossible inch of you but that’s not going to stop me from doing my job.  Which means doing everything I can to keep you in one piece.  It makes it so much easier to love you that way.

Even if it eventually means you hate me for it.

Don’t fight me, Daniel.  I’m on your side.

Ah, Daniel, that’s it. That’s the way.  Go with it.   He's melting, falling, God - I love it when he gets like this. Becomes this glorious, incandescent embodiment of pure desire, shuddering, shaking, gasping, moaning - every sound and movement showing me what I can do to him. Me and only me.  That's half the rush, knowing I'm the only one who can do this, gets to do this and will ever see it.  And the rest of what makes it all so good - ah, just look at him!  He's so  goddamned sensitive, so unbridled - so responsive. My heart stops as he moves under my caress, turning into the hand stroking his cheek, nuzzling my palm with unconscious, unheeding abandon.  He takes my breath away.  The way he makes me feel when he shows me how I make him feel...

Damn...

He was joking around once and called me “Maestro”  - saying  no one had ever ‘played’ him the way I do.  I can’t take any credit, Danny.  I’m only as good as the instrument. Working with the best here.  Forget your heavenly choirs, touching him evokes a symphony of responses would put a whole sky full of yodelling angels to shame.  His moans, his cries, when he says my name like he’s saying it now, that smooth and mellow honey sweetness of his voice even thicker, deeper and richer with arousal, that small noise he makes in the back of his throat when I touch him - there - like that, ah, there it is, Jesus just don’t let me die before I hear him scream my name just one more time…

How in the hell did this happen to me?  Exactly when did this man get under my skin so bad I can barely see straight when I'm with him and sure as shit can't live without him?

I thought I had it all figured out, here, once upon a time.  Who I was, exactly what I was, none of it was particularly pretty and it sure didn't involve me letting anyone mean anything to me ever again. Which suited me just fine. This is me, this is what it is, take it or leave it.  You don’t like it, you can leave.  Or bite me.  Your choice.

Yeah, I knew where it was at, all right.  Only problem was, I sure never counted on you showing up and messing it all up for me, did I, Daniel?  You’ve been a blessed thorn in my side from the day we met.  Shaking me up, calling me on all my crap, showing me in a thousand different ways how wrong I was about everything. Most of all, how wrong I was about me.

Not just the 'never letting anyone get close again' stuff, but everything, including  the gate, the SGC, the team, rah rah rah the whole - razzle dazzle let’s all save the world thing - I thought I knew why I came back, signed on and stayed on for this pony ride but even that’s all changed.

You don’t know about that, do you? You really don’t know.  That’s okay, it took me long enough to clue in myself.  I never said I was smart.  Just tenacious.

The key to getting me is just as simple as I am -  all the roads in Jack O'Neill's life lead straight to you. I came back here, went through that gate again for you. Stayed on for you.  Everything I've done since?  You guessed it, all for you. if I'm nothing else I'm consistent.  You want a higher purpose, knock yourself out.  Me? I’m just fine with the one right here, breathing hard and turning into nicely pleasured, purring putty in my hands.  I might not be able to talk you under the table, love, but I do have my uses.

And will you get a load of me, here, Bucky the love-drunk colonel.  Just about as goofy on this guy as they come.  I used to laugh at schmucks like me and now I am one. Thank God!  Who’d ever have thought such a jaded, tired, more-than-slightly-cranky curmudgeon like me could be so complete changed.  You’ve more than rounded off a few rough edges, Daniel; you’ve almost completely remade the man.  It hasn’t killed me yet. Whaddya know about that.

Wouldn’t they all laugh if they could see me now.  Jack O’Neill, the original hard-ass.  Man of stone, heart of ice. The one voted ‘most likely to succeed’ - at suicide.  That Jack O'Neill, reduced to a gibbering puddle of sentimental sap by a soft-eyed, idealistic, head-in-the-clouds, hasn’t-got-a-clue, too-smart-by-half, utterly gorgeous - geek.  My geek.  Anyone else calls him that they’ll be spitting out teeth for a month.  And then some.

I can hardly believe it myself sometimes.  How everything has changed.  How much I've changed.  I can't get my head around how much power a pair of blue eyes has over me.  God help me, I'm fucking doomed if it should ever happen they turn their glorious light away from me and God, oh God, don't I just know it.

If I was smart I'd save myself, but it's way too late for that now.  No point closing the barn door, horse is long gone.  Giddy up.  Who am I kidding, I never had a chance from the word go.  I was signed, sealed and sucker punched right between the eyes the very first time he looked at me.  And by the time I figured out what was going on the little blue-eyed bugger had already slipped in the back door and was camping out smack dab in the middle of my heart.  Snuck right in my secret happy place when I wasn't looking.  The battle was over before I even knew the ramparts were being breached.

Unconditional surrender was the only logical course of action.  I'm enough of a strategist to know when I’m beat and man enough to admit it.  What's more I was never happier to discover the better man had come out on top.

Okay, strictly speaking that's only true part of the time.  We both give as good as we get.  So damned good...

My biggest regret, my only regret?  He deserves way more than stolen moments behind closed doors. So many times I wish I could let everyone know how wonderful he is.  How crazy he makes me.  How much I love him.

Unfortunately as long as we both work for George and Uncle Sam that's not going to happen. So, I settle for doing my best to let him know.  Just like I'm telling him bigtime, right now. Hard work, this.   Oh yeah, a real chore.  Not that I'm one to brag about my own handiwork or anything, but what do we have here? One extremely relaxed and  aroused archaeologist.  Well done Jack, he’s practically purring.   I think my apology is definitely going over well.  God, look at his face….

I want - I really, really want to -

Dammit, how does he always know? Here's me thinking how much I want to kiss him and suddenly there he is, out of the chair and all over me before I've got chance to blink, pushing me up against the wall, grinding his pelvis into me, mouth locked to mine, consuming me, hands roaming up and down my back - I can’t think, can’t breathe,  he’s holding me up now as shooting sparks of desire confuse already frankly bewildered neural pathways and legs don’t work so good any more.

We shouldn't be doing this.  Not now, not here, but ohhhh, oh God, I don't care!  He's too much, never enough, God, that mouth, so sweet. His tongue scraping the back of my throat practically, pulling me back with it into warm, wet darkness,  I swallow my pride, what little is left of it and I'm helpless, helpless my hands, clutching his ass, kneading, crushing, pulling him into me as he gasps and laughs and bites my bottom lip…

I think I’m going to die now.

His lips roam across my jaw, tongue tracing a path to my neck, teeth nipping, sending shocks of pleasure through me, somewhere I hear him muttering...things.  Saying, something what - what's he saying? He's sorry, he doesn't think sometimes, didn't mean it, nothing matters more to him than me, is that really true, I want to believe him, I hope so, not always sure it could be true, does he really mean it - does he -

I don’t know what I’m doing, don’t know what’s happening.  Suddenly he’s cradling my head to his chest  stroking the back of it and clutching me tight, saying its all right, what's going on,  am I - oh, oh shit,  I am - I’m crying.  Crying.  I didn't know I was that scared.  I guess he didn’t either, 'cause now he's kissing me once more saying he’ll try not to be so stupid and he won't ever scare me like this again.

He takes my face in his hands, makes me look at him. It's hard -  face to face with such perfection with me being what I am and all. How did I ever get so lucky?  What does he see in me?  Looking into those amazing eyes so full of love - I feel like a clown.  A rough, dumb boob.  He must know what I'm thinking, because he starts  kissing me again, ardently, covering my face with reassuring affirmations of his affection. Actions speak louder than words?  Oh Danny, don’t I know it…

Right now he's telling me not only are we good, from now on we'll only get better.

Tenderness, sweetness, his lips so soft against mine as he breathes his love into me,  I'm not scared now, he holds my life in his hands and he knows it, but it couldn’t be safer.  I couldn’t be safer.  I protect him out there, but here, just the two of us - he’s the one who leads and knows.  Who keeps us both safe.

Mine, mine, all mine now, signed sealed and forever.  That's what he's telling me and I'm taking him at his word.  Every panting syllable, every moist, sweet token of intent.  All mine.

I'm not sure how we got here but I've gone from thinking I had nothing left to knowing I've got everything and more so I'm not wasting time worrying abut the how, where, when and why.  However, he seems to be having so much fun making things up to me as soon as I get him home I plan to let him keep right on doing me.

Carpe Daniel.  Yep, you bet, every day in every way, twice on Sundays. It's a date, love.  As well as the promise of a lifetime.

FINIS

On to Not Without Me