Stargate SG1: What Dreams May Come (8/21)
All disclaimers, notes, warnings and summary are in the Master post: What Dreams May Come
Chapter Eight
Jack sighed and flopped back on his bed again. "This is stupid."
"Jack ..."
"Colonel, it's just ..."
"What, Carter?" Jack asked, lifting his head to look at her. "It's what?"
"It's just really hard to believe. That's all."
Jack snorted. "See, Daniel? I told you no one would believe me. Or you. Us. Whatever."
"What else can I do, Jack?" Daniel asked from across the room. He was leaning against the doorframe, watching the corridor for Fraiser and Hammond to return. "It's not exactly like I have a lot of options here, is it?"
"Oh, I don't know. You could always try talking to someone else."
"Colonel, can't you please just talk to me? I'm right here."
Jack looked across at Daniel and sighed again. "Maybe you could convince Carter to admit that she knows you're here just as much as I do."
Sam clenched her teeth and turned away. "Sir, please ..."
Daniel shrugged and leaned his head back against the wall. "I don't think she's ever going to admit that, Jack. She's too upset over all this." Daniel chuckled lightly. "She still thinks she killed me."
Jack laughed. "Oh, that's right. Yeah, that's funny, isn't it?"
"Sir?" Sam turned back to him, her face a mask of concern. "Sir, are you all right?"
"Oh, I'm fine. Daniel here was just telling me that you think you killed him, and he thinks that's why you won't admit that you can feel him. That's just kind of funny, seeing as how he's not even really dead."
"She's worried that they'll think she's ..."
"Sir, they'd think I'm ..."
"... as crazy as I am. Got it. From both of you." Jack smiled. "It's not really so bad, Carter. So they think I'm nuts. I don't really care any more. Daniel's alive. That's all that matters right now."
Sam stood up from the chair she'd been sitting in and walked to Daniel's body. "I do wish I could believe it, sir. I really do. I just can't. Colonel, we watched him die."
"Yeah, well, we watched him die the last time too," Jack answered with a shrug. "And we were wrong then, weren't we?"
Sam reached down to Daniel's head and brushed his hair out of his eyes absently. "But this time, we've got his body right here in front of us." She closed her eyes and let her hand drift to his arm. "I can't argue with this, sir."
"You mean you won't," Jack said.
"Jack!" Daniel called from the door. "They're coming back."
Jack pushed himself up and swung his legs over the edge of the bed. He shrugged his shoulders and straightened the scrubs Fraiser had insisted that he change into. "Do you think they believed us?"
Sam spun toward him in confusion. "Colonel?"
Jack waved his hand at her. "It's all right, Carter. Daniel?"
"No," Daniel answered quietly. He walked across the room quickly, crossing from the door to Jack's side as he shook his head. "No, I don't think they did."
"What makes you think that?" Jack asked.
"They're not alone," Daniel answered.
"Not alone?" Jack turned to face Daniel, his face a combination of concern and confusion. "Who's with them?"
Hammond and Fraiser entered the room, followed closely by a third person that SG-1 recognized immediately.
"MacKenzie," all three of them said in unison.
Jack closed his eyes briefly, and opened them again to look directly at Daniel's anxious face. Jack smiled at him, trying his best to reassure him that this new development was only a stumbling block. Daniel's life depended on whether or not Jack could convince the psychiatrist that he wasn't as crazy as he seemed to be. Jack had made Daniel a promise that no one would kill him, and he intended to keep it.
"Don't worry, Daniel," he whispered. "This might even be fun."
"Colonel O'Neill," General Hammond said. "Dr. MacKenzie is here ..."
"Because you all think I'm crazy," Jack finished. "Yeah, I figured that out already."
"Jack, please," Daniel said beside him.
"So the good doctor is going to pick my brain, right? Find out why I've suddenly decided to go off the deep end?"
"Colonel, ..." MacKenzie began.
"Don't bother with the pleasantries, okay? Daniel doesn't have time for them."
"Very well, Colonel," MacKenzie answered. "If you would please come with me to ..."
"Um, no," Jack interrupted. "No, if you want to talk to me, you do it here. I'm not going anywhere."
Hammond stiffened. "Colonel, this is just an interview, but you had best cooperate."
"I will cooperate," Jack insisted. "But I'll do it here and nowhere else."
"Why here?" Sam asked.
"Because Daniel's body is here," Jack answered. "I promised him that I'd make sure no one killed him and no offense to anyone, but I don't know that I'm so sure that if I leave this room that he'll still be alive when I get back."
"I can stay here, Jack," Daniel pointed out.
"And what exactly are you going to do if someone decides to push that button, Daniel? How do you plan to stop them when no one but me can even see you?"
Hammond, Fraiser, and Carter sighed and MacKenzie smirked.
"Have it your way, Colonel. We can do this in here. If the rest of you will excuse us?"
Hammond nodded. "Captain?" He turned on his heel and left the room.
Sam gave one last look over her shoulder and flashed a weak smile at Jack before she followed Hammond out.
"I'll just be in my office. If you need me ..." Janet let the thought trail off as she looked directly into Jack's eyes.
He appreciated the sentiment, and he nodded at her and smiled as she turned away.
"So, Colonel, now that it's just you and I, perhaps we should get started?"
"Should I leave?" Daniel asked.
Jack shook his head slightly, wanting to make certain that Daniel got the message without giving MacKenzie any indication that Daniel was still there.
"Okay, well, I'll just stand over here then," Daniel said. He walked around behind Jack and took up a position just on the other side of the bed.
MacKenzie pulled a chair up between Jack's bed and Daniel's and sat down with his back to Daniel's body. He looked up and flashed a quick smile that immediately made Jack want to smack him.
"Don't do that, Jack," Daniel said behind him. "Hitting the psychiatrist is a bad idea."
Jack turned his head quickly and looked up at Daniel in surprise. Daniel only shrugged.
"So, Colonel," MacKenzie began. "I understand that you're having some difficulty dealing with Dr. Jackson's condition."
"Not at all," Jack answered with a shake of his head. "I'm dealing with Daniel's condition just fine. It's everyone else that's having the problem with it."
"I see." Dr. MacKenzie scratched some notes down on his clipboard. "And what is Dr. Jackson's condition, Colonel? In your own words?"
"He's in trouble, and he needs our help."
MacKenzie kept writing. "Help with what, Colonel?"
Jack felt a sudden urge to grab the clipboard from the psychiatrist's hands and hit him with it, but one look at Daniel's face stopped him. It was Daniel's life on the line, and it depended solely on Jack's behavior. Jack didn't doubt that one wrong word, one suspect action, would motivate MacKenzie to relieve Jack of medical custody of Daniel's body, and if that happened, Jack knew that Daniel would not survive.
Nobody believed what Jack was saying-MacKenzie's sudden appearance was proof of that. Responding to his impulses and acting crazy wasn't going to make convincing them of the truth any easier. So long as Daniel's life depended solely on Jack, he would behave himself, no matter how much he wanted not to.
Jack took a deep breath and repeated the same explanation he'd given Fraiser, Hammond, and Carter.
"Something happened to him on the planet. He got separated from his body somehow, and he can't get back in. He thinks that the answer is on the planet, in some scribbles on the walls of the temple, but he has to go there to read them. So we need to take his body ..."
"His dead body, Colonel?" MacKenzie asked without looking up.
Jack nodded slowly. "Yes, his body is dead. But it's only temporary, and when we go back ..."
"Do you know what it means to be brain dead, Colonel?"
Jack froze as a sudden surge of anger flooded over him. The bastard knew damned well that Jack understood what brain death was, and he knew exactly how Jack came by the information. It wasn't exactly a secret, and it was right there in Jack's file. Jack gnashed his teeth and dug his fingers into the mattress he was sitting on.
"Easy, Jack." Daniel's soft voice floated across Jack's shoulder from behind. "He's trying to push you over the edge. He's trying to make you snap. Don't let him."
Jack nodded wordlessly, afraid that if he opened his mouth the string of invectives running through his mind just might tumble out.
At the lack of verbal response, MacKenzie looked up. "Colonel? Do you know what the term brain ..."
"Yes," Jack managed through clenched teeth. "I know exactly what it means."
"Then you also understand that when a person is ..."
"Yes." Jack's voice was tight and hard. The effort required to keep himself from actually growling was tremendous.
"And Dr. Fraiser did show you Dr. Jackson's electroencephalogram readings, did she not?"
"She did."
"You're doing fine, Jack," Daniel said. "Just stay calm. You can do this."
"So you do know how severe Dr. Jackson's condition is. You are aware that he's brain dead."
Jack closed his eyes and pressed his lips together tightly.
"Breathe, Jack. In and out. Let it go. I'm not dead. I'm standing right behind you."
Jack did as Daniel suggested and took a deep breath. He blew it out slowly, letting his anger dissipate into the air around him as he did so.
"I am aware of what the squiggly things ..."
"EEG readings," Daniel corrected.
"... EEG readings make it look like, yes."
MacKenzie's pen scratched against the paper once more. The sound seemed inordinately loud to Jack's ears and it set his teeth on edge. His pounding head magnified the slight noise so badly that he could almost feel the pencil scratching against the surface of his brain. "So you maintain your belief that Dr. Jackson isn't actually dead?"
"It's not a belief," Jack answered.
He was certain. The only things he did know for a fact at that moment were that Daniel was alive, and that he was the only one who could keep him that way. Jack drew strength from those two things and continued on, feeling once again like he was in control of the situation.
"I know he's not."
"Good answer, Jack!"
Jack smiled.
"Colonel, I'd like to talk to you now about the events of just over one week ago. You returned to the SGC without Dr. Jackson, did you not?"
"We did," Jack answered with a nod.
"And why was that?"
"We thought he was dead."
MacKenzie's pencil was making more scratching noises, but Jack forced himself to ignore them. "And how was it that you came to believe that Dr. Jackson was dead?"
Jack sighed in frustration. "You know how that came to be. You were there when we figured it out, remember?"
Dr. MacKenzie lowered his pencil and looked up at Jack over the top of his glasses. "Colonel O'Neill, your tone is becoming hostile."
"I'm not being hostile," Jack snapped back. "You're asking stupid questions."
"Calm down, Jack," Daniel said. "It doesn't mean anything. It's just a question."
"Are you going to answer the question, Colonel?"
Jack turned his head and looked back at Daniel across his shoulder. Daniel reacted immediately and walked around the bed. He took up a position directly across from Jack, behind MacKenzie.
"I'm right here, Jack. Just look at me and answer him."
"Our memories were altered," Jack answered, never taking his eyes from Daniel's face. "Nem ... an alien being wrote a false memory for us. He made us think that we'd watched Daniel ..." Jack swallowed hard and closed his eyes.
"I'm not dead, Jack. You said it yourself. What you saw didn't really happen. It wasn't real then, and it's not real now."
"He made us think that we'd watched Daniel burn to death right in front of us." Jack flinched as the visions played against the inside of his closed eyelids again: Daniel being swallowed by the flames; Daniel's voice, screaming his name, begging for help that Jack was powerless to give, as the flames began biting into his flesh; Daniel crying out in terror and agony-"Jack! Help me!"
"Jack! Help me!"
Jack's eyes shot open as the sound of Daniel's cries reached his ears. The sight he saw froze his blood in his veins.
Daniel was standing behind MacKenzie, eyes closed, breathing heavily. Tears were running down his cheeks and his face was a mask of incredible pain.
He was still screaming.
"It hurts, Jack! God, help me! Jack!"
"Daniel!" Jack jumped to his feet and pushed his way past MacKenzie, all attempts to convince the psychiatrist of his sanity forgotten.
Daniel collapsed to the floor, writhing in pain. "Jack!"
Jack ignored MacKenzie's shocked stare and fell to his knees at Daniel's side. "Daniel! Open your eyes! Look at me!"
"Colonel O'Neill!" MacKenzie shouted from behind him. "What are you doing?"
Jack shook his head quickly. "I don't know. I don't know what's happening. Daniel, what's wrong? What hurts?"
"Jack! Help me! Help!"
Daniel's voice, screaming his name, begging for help that Jack was powerless to give, as the flames began biting into his flesh ...
The secrets of the universe floated above his head, filling the air with the undeniable truth that they existed ...
A huge black shadow loomed behind Daniel's back, and before Jack could shout out a warning, it had wrapped itself around Daniel's chest and arms and was pulling him into itself ...
Where did Earth and Oannes diverge?
Where did Daniel end and Jack begin?
"Oh, Jesus!" Jack shouted as he finally understood. "No, Daniel, it's not real. It's not real. It was a dream. It was just a dream."
Daniel still writhed on the floor in front of him, and still he screamed.
"Daniel!"
"Colonel O'Neill!"
"Shut up, MacKenzie!" Jack bellowed without turning around. He heard the huff of indignation behind him, and he heard the psychiatrist moving away and picking up the phone to call Dr. Fraiser, but he paid him no mind. He was focused solely on Daniel and on convincing him that the pain he was feeling wasn't real, had never been real, had never been anything but a vision in Jack's mind.
"Daniel, listen to me. It's in my head. It's all in my head. It's not real. Wake up!"
The screaming stopped.
Daniel still lay on the floor, but he'd stopped thrashing against the flames that didn't exist. He was shaking and panting, but he wasn't screaming any more.
"My God," Daniel gasped.
"Daniel?" Jack reached out to touch Daniel's face, but pulled his hand back, afraid that touching him might cause the vision to start all over again. "Daniel, you with me?"
"That's what ..." Daniel swallowed hard and drew another harsh, quivering breath. "That's what he made you think? That's how you thought I died?"
Jack nodded slowly. "Yeah."
"No wonder you ... no wonder you didn't tell me."
"You okay?"
Daniel nodded and opened his eyes. He looked around slowly, almost as if he were looking for the flames to flash up again. When they didn't, he pushed himself up from the floor and leaned back against the side of his bed.
"What the hell was that, Jack? Why did I see that? Feel that?"
Jack moved over to sit beside Daniel and leaned back against the bed next to him. "Remember what you said about our minds being linked somehow? That the beam did something to our minds, and that's why I can see you?"
Daniel nodded.
"I think it's a bit more than that, Daniel."
"Colonel?"
Jack looked up and found a worried Janet Fraiser kneeling beside him. "Hey, Doc."
"Colonel O'Neill needs to be restrained and sedated," MacKenzie snapped from where he stood behind Dr. Fraiser. "General Hammond needs to be informed of just how severe the situation is. This man is clearly suffering from hallucinations and can no longer be entrusted ..."
Fraiser waved MacKenzie off and turned back to Jack. "Colonel, what's going on? Are you all right?"
Jack smiled. "Oh, I'm fine, Doc. I'm just fine. Daniel was having a rough time of it for a while, but we're both okay now."
Janet closed her eyes and shook her head sadly. "Colonel, Daniel is ..."
"No," Jack interrupted. "He's not. But I know why the EEG says he is."
"You do?" Daniel asked, his voice full of hope.
"You do?" Janet echoed the question, but her voice held only shock.
"Yep," Jack answered with a nod. He looked at Daniel and continued. "It says he's brain dead because he's not in his own head any more," he explained.
Daniel's face lit up with understanding, and Jack smiled.
"I'm in yours!"
"He's in mine."
Chapter Eight
Jack sighed and flopped back on his bed again. "This is stupid."
"Jack ..."
"Colonel, it's just ..."
"What, Carter?" Jack asked, lifting his head to look at her. "It's what?"
"It's just really hard to believe. That's all."
Jack snorted. "See, Daniel? I told you no one would believe me. Or you. Us. Whatever."
"What else can I do, Jack?" Daniel asked from across the room. He was leaning against the doorframe, watching the corridor for Fraiser and Hammond to return. "It's not exactly like I have a lot of options here, is it?"
"Oh, I don't know. You could always try talking to someone else."
"Colonel, can't you please just talk to me? I'm right here."
Jack looked across at Daniel and sighed again. "Maybe you could convince Carter to admit that she knows you're here just as much as I do."
Sam clenched her teeth and turned away. "Sir, please ..."
Daniel shrugged and leaned his head back against the wall. "I don't think she's ever going to admit that, Jack. She's too upset over all this." Daniel chuckled lightly. "She still thinks she killed me."
Jack laughed. "Oh, that's right. Yeah, that's funny, isn't it?"
"Sir?" Sam turned back to him, her face a mask of concern. "Sir, are you all right?"
"Oh, I'm fine. Daniel here was just telling me that you think you killed him, and he thinks that's why you won't admit that you can feel him. That's just kind of funny, seeing as how he's not even really dead."
"She's worried that they'll think she's ..."
"Sir, they'd think I'm ..."
"... as crazy as I am. Got it. From both of you." Jack smiled. "It's not really so bad, Carter. So they think I'm nuts. I don't really care any more. Daniel's alive. That's all that matters right now."
Sam stood up from the chair she'd been sitting in and walked to Daniel's body. "I do wish I could believe it, sir. I really do. I just can't. Colonel, we watched him die."
"Yeah, well, we watched him die the last time too," Jack answered with a shrug. "And we were wrong then, weren't we?"
Sam reached down to Daniel's head and brushed his hair out of his eyes absently. "But this time, we've got his body right here in front of us." She closed her eyes and let her hand drift to his arm. "I can't argue with this, sir."
"You mean you won't," Jack said.
"Jack!" Daniel called from the door. "They're coming back."
Jack pushed himself up and swung his legs over the edge of the bed. He shrugged his shoulders and straightened the scrubs Fraiser had insisted that he change into. "Do you think they believed us?"
Sam spun toward him in confusion. "Colonel?"
Jack waved his hand at her. "It's all right, Carter. Daniel?"
"No," Daniel answered quietly. He walked across the room quickly, crossing from the door to Jack's side as he shook his head. "No, I don't think they did."
"What makes you think that?" Jack asked.
"They're not alone," Daniel answered.
"Not alone?" Jack turned to face Daniel, his face a combination of concern and confusion. "Who's with them?"
Hammond and Fraiser entered the room, followed closely by a third person that SG-1 recognized immediately.
"MacKenzie," all three of them said in unison.
Jack closed his eyes briefly, and opened them again to look directly at Daniel's anxious face. Jack smiled at him, trying his best to reassure him that this new development was only a stumbling block. Daniel's life depended on whether or not Jack could convince the psychiatrist that he wasn't as crazy as he seemed to be. Jack had made Daniel a promise that no one would kill him, and he intended to keep it.
"Don't worry, Daniel," he whispered. "This might even be fun."
"Colonel O'Neill," General Hammond said. "Dr. MacKenzie is here ..."
"Because you all think I'm crazy," Jack finished. "Yeah, I figured that out already."
"Jack, please," Daniel said beside him.
"So the good doctor is going to pick my brain, right? Find out why I've suddenly decided to go off the deep end?"
"Colonel, ..." MacKenzie began.
"Don't bother with the pleasantries, okay? Daniel doesn't have time for them."
"Very well, Colonel," MacKenzie answered. "If you would please come with me to ..."
"Um, no," Jack interrupted. "No, if you want to talk to me, you do it here. I'm not going anywhere."
Hammond stiffened. "Colonel, this is just an interview, but you had best cooperate."
"I will cooperate," Jack insisted. "But I'll do it here and nowhere else."
"Why here?" Sam asked.
"Because Daniel's body is here," Jack answered. "I promised him that I'd make sure no one killed him and no offense to anyone, but I don't know that I'm so sure that if I leave this room that he'll still be alive when I get back."
"I can stay here, Jack," Daniel pointed out.
"And what exactly are you going to do if someone decides to push that button, Daniel? How do you plan to stop them when no one but me can even see you?"
Hammond, Fraiser, and Carter sighed and MacKenzie smirked.
"Have it your way, Colonel. We can do this in here. If the rest of you will excuse us?"
Hammond nodded. "Captain?" He turned on his heel and left the room.
Sam gave one last look over her shoulder and flashed a weak smile at Jack before she followed Hammond out.
"I'll just be in my office. If you need me ..." Janet let the thought trail off as she looked directly into Jack's eyes.
He appreciated the sentiment, and he nodded at her and smiled as she turned away.
"So, Colonel, now that it's just you and I, perhaps we should get started?"
"Should I leave?" Daniel asked.
Jack shook his head slightly, wanting to make certain that Daniel got the message without giving MacKenzie any indication that Daniel was still there.
"Okay, well, I'll just stand over here then," Daniel said. He walked around behind Jack and took up a position just on the other side of the bed.
MacKenzie pulled a chair up between Jack's bed and Daniel's and sat down with his back to Daniel's body. He looked up and flashed a quick smile that immediately made Jack want to smack him.
"Don't do that, Jack," Daniel said behind him. "Hitting the psychiatrist is a bad idea."
Jack turned his head quickly and looked up at Daniel in surprise. Daniel only shrugged.
"So, Colonel," MacKenzie began. "I understand that you're having some difficulty dealing with Dr. Jackson's condition."
"Not at all," Jack answered with a shake of his head. "I'm dealing with Daniel's condition just fine. It's everyone else that's having the problem with it."
"I see." Dr. MacKenzie scratched some notes down on his clipboard. "And what is Dr. Jackson's condition, Colonel? In your own words?"
"He's in trouble, and he needs our help."
MacKenzie kept writing. "Help with what, Colonel?"
Jack felt a sudden urge to grab the clipboard from the psychiatrist's hands and hit him with it, but one look at Daniel's face stopped him. It was Daniel's life on the line, and it depended solely on Jack's behavior. Jack didn't doubt that one wrong word, one suspect action, would motivate MacKenzie to relieve Jack of medical custody of Daniel's body, and if that happened, Jack knew that Daniel would not survive.
Nobody believed what Jack was saying-MacKenzie's sudden appearance was proof of that. Responding to his impulses and acting crazy wasn't going to make convincing them of the truth any easier. So long as Daniel's life depended solely on Jack, he would behave himself, no matter how much he wanted not to.
Jack took a deep breath and repeated the same explanation he'd given Fraiser, Hammond, and Carter.
"Something happened to him on the planet. He got separated from his body somehow, and he can't get back in. He thinks that the answer is on the planet, in some scribbles on the walls of the temple, but he has to go there to read them. So we need to take his body ..."
"His dead body, Colonel?" MacKenzie asked without looking up.
Jack nodded slowly. "Yes, his body is dead. But it's only temporary, and when we go back ..."
"Do you know what it means to be brain dead, Colonel?"
Jack froze as a sudden surge of anger flooded over him. The bastard knew damned well that Jack understood what brain death was, and he knew exactly how Jack came by the information. It wasn't exactly a secret, and it was right there in Jack's file. Jack gnashed his teeth and dug his fingers into the mattress he was sitting on.
"Easy, Jack." Daniel's soft voice floated across Jack's shoulder from behind. "He's trying to push you over the edge. He's trying to make you snap. Don't let him."
Jack nodded wordlessly, afraid that if he opened his mouth the string of invectives running through his mind just might tumble out.
At the lack of verbal response, MacKenzie looked up. "Colonel? Do you know what the term brain ..."
"Yes," Jack managed through clenched teeth. "I know exactly what it means."
"Then you also understand that when a person is ..."
"Yes." Jack's voice was tight and hard. The effort required to keep himself from actually growling was tremendous.
"And Dr. Fraiser did show you Dr. Jackson's electroencephalogram readings, did she not?"
"She did."
"You're doing fine, Jack," Daniel said. "Just stay calm. You can do this."
"So you do know how severe Dr. Jackson's condition is. You are aware that he's brain dead."
Jack closed his eyes and pressed his lips together tightly.
"Breathe, Jack. In and out. Let it go. I'm not dead. I'm standing right behind you."
Jack did as Daniel suggested and took a deep breath. He blew it out slowly, letting his anger dissipate into the air around him as he did so.
"I am aware of what the squiggly things ..."
"EEG readings," Daniel corrected.
"... EEG readings make it look like, yes."
MacKenzie's pen scratched against the paper once more. The sound seemed inordinately loud to Jack's ears and it set his teeth on edge. His pounding head magnified the slight noise so badly that he could almost feel the pencil scratching against the surface of his brain. "So you maintain your belief that Dr. Jackson isn't actually dead?"
"It's not a belief," Jack answered.
He was certain. The only things he did know for a fact at that moment were that Daniel was alive, and that he was the only one who could keep him that way. Jack drew strength from those two things and continued on, feeling once again like he was in control of the situation.
"I know he's not."
"Good answer, Jack!"
Jack smiled.
"Colonel, I'd like to talk to you now about the events of just over one week ago. You returned to the SGC without Dr. Jackson, did you not?"
"We did," Jack answered with a nod.
"And why was that?"
"We thought he was dead."
MacKenzie's pencil was making more scratching noises, but Jack forced himself to ignore them. "And how was it that you came to believe that Dr. Jackson was dead?"
Jack sighed in frustration. "You know how that came to be. You were there when we figured it out, remember?"
Dr. MacKenzie lowered his pencil and looked up at Jack over the top of his glasses. "Colonel O'Neill, your tone is becoming hostile."
"I'm not being hostile," Jack snapped back. "You're asking stupid questions."
"Calm down, Jack," Daniel said. "It doesn't mean anything. It's just a question."
"Are you going to answer the question, Colonel?"
Jack turned his head and looked back at Daniel across his shoulder. Daniel reacted immediately and walked around the bed. He took up a position directly across from Jack, behind MacKenzie.
"I'm right here, Jack. Just look at me and answer him."
"Our memories were altered," Jack answered, never taking his eyes from Daniel's face. "Nem ... an alien being wrote a false memory for us. He made us think that we'd watched Daniel ..." Jack swallowed hard and closed his eyes.
"I'm not dead, Jack. You said it yourself. What you saw didn't really happen. It wasn't real then, and it's not real now."
"He made us think that we'd watched Daniel burn to death right in front of us." Jack flinched as the visions played against the inside of his closed eyelids again: Daniel being swallowed by the flames; Daniel's voice, screaming his name, begging for help that Jack was powerless to give, as the flames began biting into his flesh; Daniel crying out in terror and agony-"Jack! Help me!"
"Jack! Help me!"
Jack's eyes shot open as the sound of Daniel's cries reached his ears. The sight he saw froze his blood in his veins.
Daniel was standing behind MacKenzie, eyes closed, breathing heavily. Tears were running down his cheeks and his face was a mask of incredible pain.
He was still screaming.
"It hurts, Jack! God, help me! Jack!"
"Daniel!" Jack jumped to his feet and pushed his way past MacKenzie, all attempts to convince the psychiatrist of his sanity forgotten.
Daniel collapsed to the floor, writhing in pain. "Jack!"
Jack ignored MacKenzie's shocked stare and fell to his knees at Daniel's side. "Daniel! Open your eyes! Look at me!"
"Colonel O'Neill!" MacKenzie shouted from behind him. "What are you doing?"
Jack shook his head quickly. "I don't know. I don't know what's happening. Daniel, what's wrong? What hurts?"
"Jack! Help me! Help!"
Daniel's voice, screaming his name, begging for help that Jack was powerless to give, as the flames began biting into his flesh ...
The secrets of the universe floated above his head, filling the air with the undeniable truth that they existed ...
A huge black shadow loomed behind Daniel's back, and before Jack could shout out a warning, it had wrapped itself around Daniel's chest and arms and was pulling him into itself ...
Where did Earth and Oannes diverge?
Where did Daniel end and Jack begin?
"Oh, Jesus!" Jack shouted as he finally understood. "No, Daniel, it's not real. It's not real. It was a dream. It was just a dream."
Daniel still writhed on the floor in front of him, and still he screamed.
"Daniel!"
"Colonel O'Neill!"
"Shut up, MacKenzie!" Jack bellowed without turning around. He heard the huff of indignation behind him, and he heard the psychiatrist moving away and picking up the phone to call Dr. Fraiser, but he paid him no mind. He was focused solely on Daniel and on convincing him that the pain he was feeling wasn't real, had never been real, had never been anything but a vision in Jack's mind.
"Daniel, listen to me. It's in my head. It's all in my head. It's not real. Wake up!"
The screaming stopped.
Daniel still lay on the floor, but he'd stopped thrashing against the flames that didn't exist. He was shaking and panting, but he wasn't screaming any more.
"My God," Daniel gasped.
"Daniel?" Jack reached out to touch Daniel's face, but pulled his hand back, afraid that touching him might cause the vision to start all over again. "Daniel, you with me?"
"That's what ..." Daniel swallowed hard and drew another harsh, quivering breath. "That's what he made you think? That's how you thought I died?"
Jack nodded slowly. "Yeah."
"No wonder you ... no wonder you didn't tell me."
"You okay?"
Daniel nodded and opened his eyes. He looked around slowly, almost as if he were looking for the flames to flash up again. When they didn't, he pushed himself up from the floor and leaned back against the side of his bed.
"What the hell was that, Jack? Why did I see that? Feel that?"
Jack moved over to sit beside Daniel and leaned back against the bed next to him. "Remember what you said about our minds being linked somehow? That the beam did something to our minds, and that's why I can see you?"
Daniel nodded.
"I think it's a bit more than that, Daniel."
"Colonel?"
Jack looked up and found a worried Janet Fraiser kneeling beside him. "Hey, Doc."
"Colonel O'Neill needs to be restrained and sedated," MacKenzie snapped from where he stood behind Dr. Fraiser. "General Hammond needs to be informed of just how severe the situation is. This man is clearly suffering from hallucinations and can no longer be entrusted ..."
Fraiser waved MacKenzie off and turned back to Jack. "Colonel, what's going on? Are you all right?"
Jack smiled. "Oh, I'm fine, Doc. I'm just fine. Daniel was having a rough time of it for a while, but we're both okay now."
Janet closed her eyes and shook her head sadly. "Colonel, Daniel is ..."
"No," Jack interrupted. "He's not. But I know why the EEG says he is."
"You do?" Daniel asked, his voice full of hope.
"You do?" Janet echoed the question, but her voice held only shock.
"Yep," Jack answered with a nod. He looked at Daniel and continued. "It says he's brain dead because he's not in his own head any more," he explained.
Daniel's face lit up with understanding, and Jack smiled.
"I'm in yours!"
"He's in mine."