Stargate -- "In His Kiss"
slash_100, prompt 068: Loss
big damn table
Also written for au100, prompt 037: Sound
half-sized damn table
If you wanna know
If he loves you so,
It's in his kiss.
In His Kiss | Prompt 068: Loss | NC-17 | 6000 words
When Daniel Jackson appeared, naked, on an alien planet after being dead for about a year, he knew he was in trouble. And when he was found some ten minutes later by a trio of blue-robed natives and realized he was unable to speak, he know that ‘trouble’ wasn’t nearly strong enough a word. Actually, none of the many languages he knew had quite the right word to fully explain the mess he was in. So he followed the men back to their camp situated in the ruins of an Ancient city, smiled myopically and nodded when they handed him robes and called him Arrom, and tried to make the best of things. At least the planet was populated.
He had a vague recollection of his time as an Ascended, and he knew he’d been sent back mute as a punishment, not that it did him much good. He had no way of knowing where he was -- beyond the knowledge that the Ancients had been there once -- and couldn’t even ask his hosts if there was a ‘gate. None of them could read, so he got by on gestures and sketches in the sandy ground, and he was more interested in a tent over his head and food in his belly than a potentially fruitless quest to return to Earth. The nomads did not recognize the symbols for Earth or the Tau’ri, so he largely gave up.
Daniel wove baskets from the brittle grass to trade for food and the material for his own tent and clothes. He listened to the elder’s stories and shared mythology from Earth the best he could. And two months after his descension, when he saw SG-1 enter the city, he thought it was a mirage.
***
“Colonel, we found something you might want to see,” Reynolds said as he rounded the corner into the nomad’s central space. I turned to face him, expecting some tablet for Jonas to wax poetic over, but I saw a hallucination.
The blue-robed figure had his head up, a familiar look of excitement on his face. “Daniel?” I asked incredulously, voice un-manfully breaking, and the man grinned. “Spacemonkey!” I cried, running forward to pull him into a hug, heedless of out audience but aware that he and I had been in a similar situation before. I was, if possible, even happier to see him now than that last time in the ‘gate room almost five years ago. Absence really does make the heart go fonder and other clichés like that.
Unlike the last two times I’d seen him, Daniel was corporeal (though I’d never admit to knowing that word), warm and solid in my arms. He hugged me right back, and I could have stayed there forever, but I knew there was only so much I could get away with. I pulled back reluctantly and held him at arms’ length to get a good look at him. He looked good, if a bit squinty, and I let him go with a grin so Carter and T could get to him.
“We call him Arrom,” the younger leader said, as T greeted Daniel with a bow thingy, which Daniel returned before Carter swept him into a hug.
“It means ‘naked one’,” the elder said.
“That's how we found him in the forest, two moons ago,” the younger one added.
“He didn’t tell you his name?” I asked, walking away as they scrambled for an answer. “Danny, you ok?” I asked him, interrupting something Carter was saying. Daniel opened his mouth to speak but no sound came out, and he closed his mouth again, lips twisted into a frown. He waggled his head a bit, trying to smile.
“He doesn’t seem to be able to speak,” Reynolds said from behind Daniel, and I wanted to hit him for such a blithe restatement of the obvious.
“Let’s get you home,” I said, and Daniel grinned. Holding up a finger in a gesture I knew meant wait, he slipped out of Carter’s embrace and hurried to a tent off the main courtyard. He appeared a few minutes later, a leather satchel hanging over one shoulder. I threw an arm over his shoulders, and we headed back to the ‘gate and home.
***
Daniel was smiling even as he walked through the ‘gate into the SGC. The blaring klaxons and guns aimed his way couldn’t touch his good mood and he looked around the embarkation room and up into the control room, taking in the familiar sights while Jack talked to the general. “It’s good to have you back, son,” George finally said, drawing Daniel’s attention back to the conversation. Daniel smiled in a way he hoped would convey his thanks, making a mental note to teach himself sign language and carry a pad and pencil wherever he went. His smile slipped slightly at the thought.
“Ok, time to see Fraiser,” Jack said, seemingly oblivious to Daniel’s slight change in mood. He handed off his pack and P90 and lead Daniel out of the room with a hand on the small of his back. Normally, Daniel would have protested, fully aware of the Shakespearean irony of it, but he let his lack of words be his excuse and left it alone. Jack’s hand stayed in place until they were in the elevator, and Daniel sighed slightly at the loss.
Like everyone else he’d passed in the hallway, Janet did a double-take when she saw him. “The general said...but I didn’t believe...” she said as she hugged him. Daniel plucked a tissue from her desk and handed it to her when she started to cry a bit and Janet laughed shakily, leading him to a bed. “Tests now,” she said as Daniel sat down on the bed. “Out, Colonel.” Jack started to protest, but Janet gave him a stony glare and he fled.
***
There’s no denying it, I was fidgeting where I stood in the hall outside the infirmary. Carter and Teal’c joined me after they’d showered and changed into BDUs, and despite Carter’s less-than-subtle hints about hot desert planets, I couldn’t leave and do the same. I could see the curtained-off space where Fraiser was doing her exam from where I stood, and I was afraid that Daniel would disappear if I let him out of my sight beyond that.
Fraiser eventually tossed back the privacy curtain, revealing Daniel seated on the bed, dressed in scrubs and holding a gauze pad to the crook of his elbow where Fraiser had obviously drawn blood. She handed off a couple of labeled vials to a nurse and stripped off her gloves. “Well, I’m done,” she said once Carter, Teal’c, and I had hurried into the room. “It’ll take half an hour before my test results come in and we meet to debrief, so why don’t you escort Daniel down to the showers so he can get cleaned up and changed, Colonel?” I had the good sense to look away innocently when she tossed me a look.
Carter handed me something and I grinned, presenting Daniel with his glasses. He put them on and grinned back, touching his right hand to his chin and then pulling his hand forward. I shot him a confused look and he mouthed ‘thank you.’ “We’ve got to get you something to write with,” I said as I helped him hop off the bed, and he got the same wistful look I’d seen in the ‘gate room. Filing it away for later thought, I linked my arm with his and we left the infirmary. Normally even I wouldn’t touch Daniel this much, but I couldn’t help it. He was back!
***
“I’m still waiting for one last test result, but I can say pretty conclusively that this is Daniel Jackson,” Janet said, and everyone around the table smiled in relief.
“What about his voice, Doc?” Jack asked, even as Daniel scrawled the question on his pad.
“I’m not sure,” she said, and Daniel’s face fell. “From what I could see his vocal chords appear to be fine, but he has absolutely no control over them. I have no way of knowing if this is only temporary, or if it’s permanent.”
Daniel frowned and wrote something on the pad, poking Jack in the arm. “Daniel says it’s punishment,” he said after reading the hastily-written words. “For trying to stop Anubis.” He cursed softly and Daniel hit him on the arm.
“Dr. Lee has a device he wants you to try,” Sam piped up. “It’s a handheld keyboard that will read out whatever is typed. He says he’s got most of the bugs worked out of it.” She grinned sardonically.
“Daniel says he knows you’ll fix the rest of them,” Jack said after Daniel wrote something else. “General, may we?”
The general nodded and SG-1 got up as a group, heading down to Dr. Lee’s lab. The device strapped to Daniel’s wrist and seemed to be held to the band with duct tape, which started Bill muttering to himself when Jack pointed it out. Daniel frowned at Jack and started to type. “Hello, world,” the computer voice said, and Sam and Bill smiled. “This could take some getting used to,” the stilted voice added, interspersed with quiet clicking as he typed. Bill looked pleased that it seemed to be working, but Daniel couldn’t quite match his enthusiasm.
***
“Come on, Doc, let me get him out of here,” I whined, following the tiny doctor around the infirmary. “He’s got an identity again, all the paperwork’s filled out, I promise I won’t let him out of my sight. Hammond says I can take him home if you ok it. Please?”
Fraiser, who I’d noticed years ago seemed to have an immunity to the famous O’Neill charm, frowned. “I’m really not sure, Colonel.” Daniel, hovering behind me, must have turned puppy eyes and that killer pout on her, because she relented. “Fine, but I want you to bring him back at 0800 hours tomorrow. If you have no trouble, I’ll see about some extended leave.”
“Yes!” I cried, pumping one fist in the air, and Daniel’s doohickey started thanking the doc profusely. Grabbing Daniel’s arm, I dragged him out of the infirmary with a wave at Fraiser and we hurried topside. He seemed quite excited to be outside, taking a deep, contented breath of clean mountain air once we were topside.
“Pizza?” I asked once we were in my truck and on our way to my house. Daniel made a pinching motion with his right hand. I squinted at him and he reached for the doohickey on his wrist. “Oh, Chinese!” I said, and he grinned and nodded.
Daniel started fiddling with the radio, frowning when his usual station was playing news rather than the expected classic rock. I reached over and pushed a button, pulling up the station I’d started listening to in his absence after the original one went off the air. Daniel frowned, but he didn’t look like he wanted to talk, so I didn’t push.
“The usual?” I asked as we walked into the house half an hour later and Daniel nodded absently, attention already on the house’s interior. I left him cataloguing the changes he’d missed and went to order dinner. I returned to the living room with a beer in one hand and a bottle of Daniel’s preferred fizzy water in the other to find him holding a framed picture.
It was one Carter had taken on a mission just weeks before Kelowna; Daniel was kneeling in the dirt with one of the natives, positively glowing as the feather-bedecked man showed him some ancient wall mosaic. The look on Daniel’s face was enchanting, and why I’d chosen, despite the argument that had occurred after the picture was taken, to keep it on display after Daniel had...left. Daniel shifted and began the clicking noises that preceded his ‘speech’ now. “I remember everything from before, and a few hints of things from when I was Ascended, but it seems so long ago. Like another lifetime.”
I had no idea what to say to that, so I just sat down on the couch, placing his water on the coffee table and taking a sip from my beer. He put down the picture with an inaudible sigh and turned around, retrieving his bottle and taking a long swallow. I watched him, mesmerized by the way his throat moved as he drank, but looked away before he opened his eyes.
The tense silence was broken by the doorbell, and I went to pay the delivery guy for dinner. We settled on the couch with our cartons, chopsticks for Daniel and a fork for me, and a hockey game. We watched in companionable silence, and I could almost believe that all was right with the world.
Almost.
***
Over the next two months, Daniel’s major project was to teach himself sign language. Actually, it only took him about three weeks to learn enough words to consider himself fluent, and he spent the other five or so teaching Jack, Sam, and Teal’c. Sam picked it up pretty quickly, as did Teal’c, who thought it was positively ingenious, but teaching Jack was rather labor-intensive.
Jack was always in Daniel’s office, anyway, so Daniel had a lot of time to teach him, and be needed it. Daniel knew Jack was playing a bit dumb, though he didn’t know why, but Daniel took secret pleasure in how often he had to touch Jack to readjust his hands or the way he was moving them. Jack could touch just because, but Daniel had never been touchy-feely, so this gave him the chance without being utterly out of character.
One afternoon, though, after they’d gone over the same word five times, Daniel got fed up. Flicking their hands apart, he fled to his desk, working on the translation spread out across its surface. “Hey, what’s wrong?” Jack asked, resting his hand on Daniel’s shoulder. Daniel shrugged it off.
“Are you being purposely obtuse?” Bill’s doohickey -- Daniel hated calling it that, even in his head, but he didn’t have any other options -- said for him. “And I k-now you k-now what that word means, so dnt even start.” He’d learned that the gadget responded best when words were typed in phonetically, rather than merely the way they were spelled, but when he wasn’t thinking about it, the machine periodically garbled what he was trying to say. Daniel took a deep breath and forced himself to focus.
“No,” Jack said slowly. There seemed to be something on his mind. “Let me treat you to dinner tonight,” he said finally, looking up at Daniel’s face.
Daniel quickly looked away, not wanting Jack to be able to read the emotions that were probably highly visible in his eyes. “Jack, I’ve been living with you since I got back, isn’t it a bit late to be asking me to dinner?” the computer said, Daniel’s smile and fluttering lashes lending it the humor the voice could not convey.
Jack seemed to relax a bit, and he was smiling again. “We’ve just got to talk a bit, I think,” he said, almost airily. “I’ll let you get back to work. We’ll leave at 1800 hours?” Daniel nodded, and Jack clapped him on the back and left. Daniel had no idea what was going on, but he guessed he’d go with the flow and see what happened.
***
I honestly don’t know what I was thinking when I asked Daniel to dinner. What was I going to do, sneak him into O’Malley’s and propose over steak and good wine? Steak and wine, maybe but I had no proof that he saw me as more than a friend, and even if he did, there was no way he was as head over heels for me as I was for him. Another cliché, I know, but it fit.
Actually, though, maybe saying something might be a good idea. And the fact that he could joke about the idea of dating was good; I could always test the waters and then back off if the natives looked unfavorable, as it were. Hopefully Daniel wouldn’t pull his genius thing and figure out that something was up.
I caught the ball of paper I’d been playing with and glanced at the clock, surprised to see that it was almost 1730 hours. I signed off on the last few files in my inbox, moved them to the outbox, and hurried down to the locker room.
My civvies weren’t nice enough for what I had in mind, so I showered quickly, got dressed, and went up to Danny’s lab. Surprisingly , he was ready to go, and stood to leave when I poked my head in the door rather than begging me for more time. A good sign, right?
The drive was uneventful, a comfortable silence prevailing in the cab of the truck until we pulled up in my driveway. Even though he’d been back on Earth for almost three months, Daniel was still living with me; the General didn’t want him living on his own, and Daniel preferred staying with me over rooming on base next door to Teal’c. Most of his stuff, which we’d kept because the Pentagon types had been muttering about a museum when the SGC when public, was still in storage, but he’d gotten out most of his clothes and some of his books, all of which were now cluttering up my spare room. I really didn’t mind.
“Change into something nice, we’re going out,” I said as we went inside. He looked quizzically at me, but I didn’t elaborate. I went into my room to change and a minute later I heard the shower start in the hall bathroom. I put on a dark green shirt, black slacks and shoes, and a bit of cologne, and went down to the living room to wait for Daniel.
Daniel came down exactly 23 minutes later, and I almost choked on my tongue. He was wearing grey slacks and a form-fitting blue shirt that really made his eyes glow. He looked amazing. I managed to choke out a “hey” and he gave me the funny little wave he’d started using as a greeting.
Before I could gather my melted brains, Daniel started to type. “You look great, Jack,” the computer said, accompanied by a brilliant smile that did nothing to help my mental state. “So, where are we going?”
“This new Italian restaurant on Pine Street,” I said as we went out to the truck. “It’s called Como or something.”
Daniel’s eyes widened. “Sam told me about that place,” the computer said, Daniel’s expressive eyebrows raised. “Expensive. What’s the occasion?”
”Do I need one?” I asked, aiming for nonchalant and merely getting nervous. Daniel, of course, saw right through it, and crossed his arms with a distinctly Jaffa-like raised eyebrow. “It’s a surprise, then,” I said defensively, but Daniel’s face relaxed into a smile. “Let’s go.”
***
Daniel resisted the urge to bug Jack during the drive to the restaurant, or when they were looking over the menu. He surprised both Jack and the waiter by tricking Bill’s doohickey into ordering in Italian for them both. His slightly smug smile got them through a very nice dinner and a decadent chocolate mousse for dessert.
They fought over the check, but Daniel finally let Jack pay and they left the restaurant. “Aht, don’t even start,” Jack said as Daniel raised his fingers to the device’s keyboard, but he was smiling softly when he said it and rested a hand on the small of Daniel’s back to lead him to the truck. Daniel shivered at the unexpected touch but didn’t move away. Now that he thought about it, Jack had been acting differently over dinner; if it’d been anyone else, he would have called it flirting. But this was Jack, so that couldn’t be right.
Jack even opened the door for him when they got to the truck, which really got Daniel thinking. As an experiment, he let his hand brush Jack’s arm as he got in, and was fascinated to see Jack blush slightly before he closed the door and hurried to the driver’s side. They ride home was silent, but only because Daniel was deep in thought.
***
I knew I was damn lucky to not have to fend off questions on the ride home, and I’m not one to question that kind of thing, even if Daniel’s expression didn’t bode well for later. We pulled up in front of the house and I got out and circled the truck to let Daniel out on his side.
I expected him to protest and was surprised when he didn’t. He didn’t even seem to notice, actually, but he had that distinctly thoughtful expression that usually preceded either a brilliant idea or a really stupid action. I had no way of knowing which it would be, so I just followed him into the house. I turned away for a moment to lock the door, and when I turned back I found myself pinned to the door by my shoulders. Daniel looked intently at my face, as if searching for something, and then leaned in.
For a moment, I thought Daniel was aiming for my mouth, but his lips landed to the side of my chin and then trailed kisses up my jaw. I moaned, glad we seemed to be on the same page at last, and wrapped my arms around his waist, pulling him close against my body. He shivered and went back to feasting on my neck.
I could do nothing more than hold on for the ride as Daniel explored my neck and jaw with his mouth, or when he attacked the buttons of my shirt, giving an inaudible sigh of frustration when only my undershirt was revealed. He pushed it up to my underarms and curled his tongue around my right nipple.
I let myself float in a haze of pleasurable sensation for a while, letting Daniel explore my anatomy with fingertips and lips and teeth and tongue. I moaned in protest and opened my eyes when Daniel pulled away, only to see him slip to his knees and go for the fly of my slacks. “Stop,” I managed to gasp out. I didn’t want a blowjob against the door, at least not the first time. “Bedroom.” Daniel gave me a slow smile that made my blood burn and stood, taking my hand and pulling me down the hall.
***
Daniel led Jack into the bedroom and gently pushed him back to lie on the bed. Jack scooted back, stripping off his shirts as Daniel settled between his sprawled legs. He went back to what he’d been doing in the hall, namely trying to get Jack out of his jeans. He undid the fly and pushed Jack’s jeans and boxers down, smiling when Jack’s hips arched up to help, and then got up off the bed to help him out of his shoes and socks and then slide the rest of his clothes off.
Daniel stripped absently while he looked his fill of Jack’s body. He’d wanted Jack laid out like this, naked and aroused, and because of him, for a long time, and now that he had him, Daniel wasn’t sure what to do first. He wanted to do everything.
“Danny, why’re you so far away?” Jack asked plaintively, and Daniel smiled. He wanted to kiss Jack, but that could wait; he’d missed Jack’s mouth when they’d first started, and Jack hadn’t remedied that, so Daniel assumed it wasn’t something Jack wanted. Maybe he could try again later.
Daniel slipped off Bill’s device and put it and his glasses on the bedside table. He settled back on the bed between Jack’s legs and went back to kissing and nibbling Jack’s neck, fingers gently scratching through Jack’s chest hair. He’d stopped mouthing responses to questions months ago, and hadn’t been using his mouth for anything other than eating. Even if he didn’t actually get to kiss Jack’s own mouth, he’d found a much better use for his own.
Daniel’s hands moved farther down, over Jack’s flat stomach and hard abdomen before smoothing down Jack’s thighs and back up. He leaned up to try kissing Jack again, but at the last moment he turned his face into the pillow so Daniel caught his ear. He nibbled the lobe, filing the slight feeling of rejection away for later, and then kissed down Jack’s body. Without further warning, Daniel licked a stripe up Jack’s cock from base to tip and then took as much of him into his mouth as he could.
It had been a long time since he’d done this, but it only took Daniel a moment to get a good rhythm going between his hand on the base of Jack’s cock and his mouth. His other hand was involved, too, playing with Jack’s balls, massaging his perineum, rubbing his nipples. It was obvious that Jack was close, and in a few minutes he was coming, crying Daniel’s name. Daniel swallowed him down, licking him clean when he’d collapsed back against the bed, sated, and then sat back up with a Cheshire cat grin on his face. Definitely a better use for his mouth.
***
It took me a couple minutes to come down from that orgasm, and I was grinning so hard my face hurt. Daniel smiled back, kissed my hip, and then started tapping on my thigh. It took me a minute to figure out what he was doing, but when I did, I had to smile at his ingenuity.
short-long-long-long short-long long-short-long-short long-short-long. J. A. C. K. Morse Code. “Yes, Daniel?” I asked, and Daniel gave a silent chuckle, tapping again. O. N. Pause. Y. O. U. R. Pause. S. I. D. E. I groaned happily and complied, before lifting the leg on top and placing my foot flat on the bed. Daniel pressed up behind me and I felt his intake of breath as his erect cock lined up perfectly against my ass.
He thrust against me once, twice, and then pulled back just enough to fit a hand between us. He cupped my butt, and then trailed his fingers down the cleft to press against my hole. P. L. E. A. S. E. he tapped out with his other hand on my shoulder, but I was already pressing back against his fingers and felt him smile against the back of my neck. I felt him tap out a request for lube and leaned over to get it out of the drawer. Daniel trailed his fingers up my arm to take the tube from my hand. I heard the click of the tube opening and then cool, wet fingers pressed against my opening and I gasped.
The rest was a blur, but soon enough he was pressing into me, fingers clenched on my hips. He must have prepped me well because I felt no pain, just that strange fullness I hadn’t felt in far too long. I groaned when Daniel started to move, jerking my hips to match Daniel’s slow, deep strokes. I was amazed to realize that I was ready to go again already, especially after Daniel reached over my hip to wrap those long fingers around my cock. I could feel him mouthing words I couldn’t understand against my back as his thrusts became more erratic, and he bit down on my shoulder as he came, which set me off as well. Not as explosively as the first time, but still enough to make me a little cross-eyed.
I came to with Daniel half on top of me, pressing me into the bed. I slipped out from underneath him, smiling when his hands scrabbled across the sheet, looking for me. I limped to the bathroom -- it had been a long time, even if Daniel had prepped me well -- to grab a wet washcloth and came back to the bed. I cleaned us both off and then Daniel sleepily pulled me back down into the bed, curling up against my side. I smiled sleepily, pulling the covers up over us, and kissed him on the head. It was the closest I’d gotten to his mouth, but for now, with Daniel drifting off in my arms, I was content.
***
Over the next few months, Daniel became intimately acquainted with a practical application of the term “friends with benefits.” On the outside, nothing appeared to have changed, but they had sex and slept in Jack’s bed most nights Jack wasn’t offworld with Sam, Teal’c, and their rotating new fourth. They never talked about what they were doing, and they never kissed. At least, not above the neck.
As amazing as it was to have Jack in his arms every night, Daniel wasn’t satisfied. Something was missing. Daniel had no doubt that Jack cared for him as a friend, but he needed more than that. He needed Jack to love him. He’d thought having Jack would have been enough, but he was starting to long for what he didn’t have. And he was deathly afraid it would ruin what he could lay claim to.
So he didn’t say anything to jeopardize this relationship of sorts they now had. It might not have been exactly what he wanted, but he was going to hold on to it with both hands for as long as he could.
***
I had really thought it would be enough. I had Daniel in my bed, and up my ass at least once a day when I wasn’t stuck on PX-whatever with Carter, T, and the bunch of incompetent archeologists, linguists, and anthropologists we got saddled with. Even the best of them didn’t had the same charisma that Daniel used time and time again to get us out of dire situations. Used to, at least; mute Daniel wasn’t allowed offworld. As much as I missed his presence on SG-1, I missed his voice even more. There where times when I couldn’t quite remember what it sounded like, and they chilled me to the bone.
I never expected Daniel to love me; I had thought lust and a strong friendship would be enough. But, I was quickly discovering that it wasn’t. Hell, I knew it from the second day, when I felt almost used after he fucked me, but I tried to ignore it as long as I could. It was getting hard, though, and I had to do something before this lack spoiled our friendship.
I waited to say anything until Daniel had been back on Earth for about six months, and Daniel and I had been together, if you’d call it that, for about three. The general had sent me a memo that he was releasing Daniel to live on his own, and wanted me to tell him, as Daniel’s supposed CO. I decided it was as good a chance as any as I would get at a clean break and decided to take advantage of it.
I happened to have some downtime after a mission -- standard recon in an attempt to break in yet another of Danny’s geeks -- so I had the house to myself all day. I took advantage of that, too, and decided to cook dinner; this wasn’t something I wanted to talk about in a public place. Steaks grilled to perfection, home-made mashed potatoes, salad: all of them prepared and on the table with matching plates and good beer when Daniel got home at 1800. “Dinner’s ready, come in and eat it while it’s hot!” I called when I heard the door open. Daniel’s head appeared quizzically in the kitchen door a moment later, and then he disappeared, returning without his laptop case and usual bag of books in tow. We ate dinner in silence, but from the way Daniel kept glancing at me, I knew he knew something was up. When we’d both cleared our plates, I took a deep breath and started. I’d delayed long enough.
***
Daniel knew he wasn’t going to like whatever Jack had to say. Was he dumping him? Had he decided that Daniel wasn’t worth the risk? Or, even worse, had Jack just gotten bored with him? The very thought gave Daniel chills.
“The general called today, while you were at the mountain,” Jack began, toying with his beer bottle, not meeting Daniel’s eyes. “He’s talked to Fraiser, and they’ve cleared you to live on your own. He even said that the Air Force would help you find and pay for an apartment.” Jack seemed to center himself, and Daniel tensed even more. “I really think you should take him up on the offer.”
“Do you mean...” Bill’s device began, but Jack cut him off.
“I thought it would be enough,” Jack said, “you and me, together like this. I really thought it would be enough. But it’s not, and it’s tearing me apart. I’m sorry, Daniel.” Jack stood, but he seemed to be leaning on the table for support. “You can stay here until you’ve found a place, of course, but I think you should stay in the spare room.” He stacked the dishes and carried them to the sink.
Jack’s words rolled around Daniel’s head for a long moment, almost devoid of meaning, as he stared unseeing at the tabletop. Not enough, Jack had said, but what wasn’t enough? That thought trickled through his brain and when it clicked Daniel’s eyes went wide. They’d been such fools! He and Jack wanted the same thing.
Daniel flew up from the table and across the kitchen to where Jack was silently washing dishes, hunched shoulders forbidding. Ignoring that, Daniel grabbed him by the shoulders and spun him away from the sink. Confronted with Jack’s dull, pained eyes, he suddenly didn’t know what to say, so he tenderly took Jack’s face in his hands and kissed his mouth.
Jack didn’t move for a moment, and Daniel almost thought that he’d been wrong, but then he responded passionately, bringing his arms up to press them close together. Daniel didn’t care that the hands in his hair and on his waist were wet and soapy; for the first time, he and Jack finally understood each other. He delicately trailed his tongue over Jack’s lips, requesting entrance, and they opened for him. The first touch of their tongues was almost sweet, and then there was a burning sensation in Daniel’s throat and he drew back with a gasp.
An audible gasp. Daniel’s hands flew to his throat. “Jack?” he asked tentatively. His voice was soft and creaky with disuse, but it was there. He knew his smile must have been as blinding as Jack’s own.
“Danny!” Jack said happily, pulling him close into a hug. “Your voice! What happened?”
“I don’t know,” Daniel whispered. He was in shock; after so long without his voice, he’d almost forgotten what it was like to speak. Making a quick decision, he looked Jack square in the eye. “I love you, Jack,” he said, smiling slightly at Jack’s expression. “Just in case this is temporary, I just want to tell you I...”
“I understand,” Jack said, silencing him by laying a finger against his lips. “I love you, too, Danny. I’m so sorry I never said anything before.” He cupped Daniel’s jaw and kissed him again. This time, there was no pain.
“We should probably call the mountain,” Daniel said sometime later, when they’d stopped kissing for a bit. “The general will want to know, and Janet will want to take a look at me.” His voice was already stronger.
“Can’t it wait until morning?” Jack asked, almost petulant. “I want your voice to myself for a bit first.” Daniel looked at him quizzically and Jack reached down to cup Daniel’s half-erect cock through his jeans. Daniel groaned. “Yeah, like that.” Daniel smirked in understanding, took Jack’s hand, and led him to the bedroom.
Feedback is better than chocolate.
big damn table
Also written for au100, prompt 037: Sound
half-sized damn table
If you wanna know
If he loves you so,
It's in his kiss.
In His Kiss | Prompt 068: Loss | NC-17 | 6000 words
When Daniel Jackson appeared, naked, on an alien planet after being dead for about a year, he knew he was in trouble. And when he was found some ten minutes later by a trio of blue-robed natives and realized he was unable to speak, he know that ‘trouble’ wasn’t nearly strong enough a word. Actually, none of the many languages he knew had quite the right word to fully explain the mess he was in. So he followed the men back to their camp situated in the ruins of an Ancient city, smiled myopically and nodded when they handed him robes and called him Arrom, and tried to make the best of things. At least the planet was populated.
He had a vague recollection of his time as an Ascended, and he knew he’d been sent back mute as a punishment, not that it did him much good. He had no way of knowing where he was -- beyond the knowledge that the Ancients had been there once -- and couldn’t even ask his hosts if there was a ‘gate. None of them could read, so he got by on gestures and sketches in the sandy ground, and he was more interested in a tent over his head and food in his belly than a potentially fruitless quest to return to Earth. The nomads did not recognize the symbols for Earth or the Tau’ri, so he largely gave up.
Daniel wove baskets from the brittle grass to trade for food and the material for his own tent and clothes. He listened to the elder’s stories and shared mythology from Earth the best he could. And two months after his descension, when he saw SG-1 enter the city, he thought it was a mirage.
***
“Colonel, we found something you might want to see,” Reynolds said as he rounded the corner into the nomad’s central space. I turned to face him, expecting some tablet for Jonas to wax poetic over, but I saw a hallucination.
The blue-robed figure had his head up, a familiar look of excitement on his face. “Daniel?” I asked incredulously, voice un-manfully breaking, and the man grinned. “Spacemonkey!” I cried, running forward to pull him into a hug, heedless of out audience but aware that he and I had been in a similar situation before. I was, if possible, even happier to see him now than that last time in the ‘gate room almost five years ago. Absence really does make the heart go fonder and other clichés like that.
Unlike the last two times I’d seen him, Daniel was corporeal (though I’d never admit to knowing that word), warm and solid in my arms. He hugged me right back, and I could have stayed there forever, but I knew there was only so much I could get away with. I pulled back reluctantly and held him at arms’ length to get a good look at him. He looked good, if a bit squinty, and I let him go with a grin so Carter and T could get to him.
“We call him Arrom,” the younger leader said, as T greeted Daniel with a bow thingy, which Daniel returned before Carter swept him into a hug.
“It means ‘naked one’,” the elder said.
“That's how we found him in the forest, two moons ago,” the younger one added.
“He didn’t tell you his name?” I asked, walking away as they scrambled for an answer. “Danny, you ok?” I asked him, interrupting something Carter was saying. Daniel opened his mouth to speak but no sound came out, and he closed his mouth again, lips twisted into a frown. He waggled his head a bit, trying to smile.
“He doesn’t seem to be able to speak,” Reynolds said from behind Daniel, and I wanted to hit him for such a blithe restatement of the obvious.
“Let’s get you home,” I said, and Daniel grinned. Holding up a finger in a gesture I knew meant wait, he slipped out of Carter’s embrace and hurried to a tent off the main courtyard. He appeared a few minutes later, a leather satchel hanging over one shoulder. I threw an arm over his shoulders, and we headed back to the ‘gate and home.
***
Daniel was smiling even as he walked through the ‘gate into the SGC. The blaring klaxons and guns aimed his way couldn’t touch his good mood and he looked around the embarkation room and up into the control room, taking in the familiar sights while Jack talked to the general. “It’s good to have you back, son,” George finally said, drawing Daniel’s attention back to the conversation. Daniel smiled in a way he hoped would convey his thanks, making a mental note to teach himself sign language and carry a pad and pencil wherever he went. His smile slipped slightly at the thought.
“Ok, time to see Fraiser,” Jack said, seemingly oblivious to Daniel’s slight change in mood. He handed off his pack and P90 and lead Daniel out of the room with a hand on the small of his back. Normally, Daniel would have protested, fully aware of the Shakespearean irony of it, but he let his lack of words be his excuse and left it alone. Jack’s hand stayed in place until they were in the elevator, and Daniel sighed slightly at the loss.
Like everyone else he’d passed in the hallway, Janet did a double-take when she saw him. “The general said...but I didn’t believe...” she said as she hugged him. Daniel plucked a tissue from her desk and handed it to her when she started to cry a bit and Janet laughed shakily, leading him to a bed. “Tests now,” she said as Daniel sat down on the bed. “Out, Colonel.” Jack started to protest, but Janet gave him a stony glare and he fled.
***
There’s no denying it, I was fidgeting where I stood in the hall outside the infirmary. Carter and Teal’c joined me after they’d showered and changed into BDUs, and despite Carter’s less-than-subtle hints about hot desert planets, I couldn’t leave and do the same. I could see the curtained-off space where Fraiser was doing her exam from where I stood, and I was afraid that Daniel would disappear if I let him out of my sight beyond that.
Fraiser eventually tossed back the privacy curtain, revealing Daniel seated on the bed, dressed in scrubs and holding a gauze pad to the crook of his elbow where Fraiser had obviously drawn blood. She handed off a couple of labeled vials to a nurse and stripped off her gloves. “Well, I’m done,” she said once Carter, Teal’c, and I had hurried into the room. “It’ll take half an hour before my test results come in and we meet to debrief, so why don’t you escort Daniel down to the showers so he can get cleaned up and changed, Colonel?” I had the good sense to look away innocently when she tossed me a look.
Carter handed me something and I grinned, presenting Daniel with his glasses. He put them on and grinned back, touching his right hand to his chin and then pulling his hand forward. I shot him a confused look and he mouthed ‘thank you.’ “We’ve got to get you something to write with,” I said as I helped him hop off the bed, and he got the same wistful look I’d seen in the ‘gate room. Filing it away for later thought, I linked my arm with his and we left the infirmary. Normally even I wouldn’t touch Daniel this much, but I couldn’t help it. He was back!
***
“I’m still waiting for one last test result, but I can say pretty conclusively that this is Daniel Jackson,” Janet said, and everyone around the table smiled in relief.
“What about his voice, Doc?” Jack asked, even as Daniel scrawled the question on his pad.
“I’m not sure,” she said, and Daniel’s face fell. “From what I could see his vocal chords appear to be fine, but he has absolutely no control over them. I have no way of knowing if this is only temporary, or if it’s permanent.”
Daniel frowned and wrote something on the pad, poking Jack in the arm. “Daniel says it’s punishment,” he said after reading the hastily-written words. “For trying to stop Anubis.” He cursed softly and Daniel hit him on the arm.
“Dr. Lee has a device he wants you to try,” Sam piped up. “It’s a handheld keyboard that will read out whatever is typed. He says he’s got most of the bugs worked out of it.” She grinned sardonically.
“Daniel says he knows you’ll fix the rest of them,” Jack said after Daniel wrote something else. “General, may we?”
The general nodded and SG-1 got up as a group, heading down to Dr. Lee’s lab. The device strapped to Daniel’s wrist and seemed to be held to the band with duct tape, which started Bill muttering to himself when Jack pointed it out. Daniel frowned at Jack and started to type. “Hello, world,” the computer voice said, and Sam and Bill smiled. “This could take some getting used to,” the stilted voice added, interspersed with quiet clicking as he typed. Bill looked pleased that it seemed to be working, but Daniel couldn’t quite match his enthusiasm.
***
“Come on, Doc, let me get him out of here,” I whined, following the tiny doctor around the infirmary. “He’s got an identity again, all the paperwork’s filled out, I promise I won’t let him out of my sight. Hammond says I can take him home if you ok it. Please?”
Fraiser, who I’d noticed years ago seemed to have an immunity to the famous O’Neill charm, frowned. “I’m really not sure, Colonel.” Daniel, hovering behind me, must have turned puppy eyes and that killer pout on her, because she relented. “Fine, but I want you to bring him back at 0800 hours tomorrow. If you have no trouble, I’ll see about some extended leave.”
“Yes!” I cried, pumping one fist in the air, and Daniel’s doohickey started thanking the doc profusely. Grabbing Daniel’s arm, I dragged him out of the infirmary with a wave at Fraiser and we hurried topside. He seemed quite excited to be outside, taking a deep, contented breath of clean mountain air once we were topside.
“Pizza?” I asked once we were in my truck and on our way to my house. Daniel made a pinching motion with his right hand. I squinted at him and he reached for the doohickey on his wrist. “Oh, Chinese!” I said, and he grinned and nodded.
Daniel started fiddling with the radio, frowning when his usual station was playing news rather than the expected classic rock. I reached over and pushed a button, pulling up the station I’d started listening to in his absence after the original one went off the air. Daniel frowned, but he didn’t look like he wanted to talk, so I didn’t push.
“The usual?” I asked as we walked into the house half an hour later and Daniel nodded absently, attention already on the house’s interior. I left him cataloguing the changes he’d missed and went to order dinner. I returned to the living room with a beer in one hand and a bottle of Daniel’s preferred fizzy water in the other to find him holding a framed picture.
It was one Carter had taken on a mission just weeks before Kelowna; Daniel was kneeling in the dirt with one of the natives, positively glowing as the feather-bedecked man showed him some ancient wall mosaic. The look on Daniel’s face was enchanting, and why I’d chosen, despite the argument that had occurred after the picture was taken, to keep it on display after Daniel had...left. Daniel shifted and began the clicking noises that preceded his ‘speech’ now. “I remember everything from before, and a few hints of things from when I was Ascended, but it seems so long ago. Like another lifetime.”
I had no idea what to say to that, so I just sat down on the couch, placing his water on the coffee table and taking a sip from my beer. He put down the picture with an inaudible sigh and turned around, retrieving his bottle and taking a long swallow. I watched him, mesmerized by the way his throat moved as he drank, but looked away before he opened his eyes.
The tense silence was broken by the doorbell, and I went to pay the delivery guy for dinner. We settled on the couch with our cartons, chopsticks for Daniel and a fork for me, and a hockey game. We watched in companionable silence, and I could almost believe that all was right with the world.
Almost.
***
Over the next two months, Daniel’s major project was to teach himself sign language. Actually, it only took him about three weeks to learn enough words to consider himself fluent, and he spent the other five or so teaching Jack, Sam, and Teal’c. Sam picked it up pretty quickly, as did Teal’c, who thought it was positively ingenious, but teaching Jack was rather labor-intensive.
Jack was always in Daniel’s office, anyway, so Daniel had a lot of time to teach him, and be needed it. Daniel knew Jack was playing a bit dumb, though he didn’t know why, but Daniel took secret pleasure in how often he had to touch Jack to readjust his hands or the way he was moving them. Jack could touch just because, but Daniel had never been touchy-feely, so this gave him the chance without being utterly out of character.
One afternoon, though, after they’d gone over the same word five times, Daniel got fed up. Flicking their hands apart, he fled to his desk, working on the translation spread out across its surface. “Hey, what’s wrong?” Jack asked, resting his hand on Daniel’s shoulder. Daniel shrugged it off.
“Are you being purposely obtuse?” Bill’s doohickey -- Daniel hated calling it that, even in his head, but he didn’t have any other options -- said for him. “And I k-now you k-now what that word means, so dnt even start.” He’d learned that the gadget responded best when words were typed in phonetically, rather than merely the way they were spelled, but when he wasn’t thinking about it, the machine periodically garbled what he was trying to say. Daniel took a deep breath and forced himself to focus.
“No,” Jack said slowly. There seemed to be something on his mind. “Let me treat you to dinner tonight,” he said finally, looking up at Daniel’s face.
Daniel quickly looked away, not wanting Jack to be able to read the emotions that were probably highly visible in his eyes. “Jack, I’ve been living with you since I got back, isn’t it a bit late to be asking me to dinner?” the computer said, Daniel’s smile and fluttering lashes lending it the humor the voice could not convey.
Jack seemed to relax a bit, and he was smiling again. “We’ve just got to talk a bit, I think,” he said, almost airily. “I’ll let you get back to work. We’ll leave at 1800 hours?” Daniel nodded, and Jack clapped him on the back and left. Daniel had no idea what was going on, but he guessed he’d go with the flow and see what happened.
***
I honestly don’t know what I was thinking when I asked Daniel to dinner. What was I going to do, sneak him into O’Malley’s and propose over steak and good wine? Steak and wine, maybe but I had no proof that he saw me as more than a friend, and even if he did, there was no way he was as head over heels for me as I was for him. Another cliché, I know, but it fit.
Actually, though, maybe saying something might be a good idea. And the fact that he could joke about the idea of dating was good; I could always test the waters and then back off if the natives looked unfavorable, as it were. Hopefully Daniel wouldn’t pull his genius thing and figure out that something was up.
I caught the ball of paper I’d been playing with and glanced at the clock, surprised to see that it was almost 1730 hours. I signed off on the last few files in my inbox, moved them to the outbox, and hurried down to the locker room.
My civvies weren’t nice enough for what I had in mind, so I showered quickly, got dressed, and went up to Danny’s lab. Surprisingly , he was ready to go, and stood to leave when I poked my head in the door rather than begging me for more time. A good sign, right?
The drive was uneventful, a comfortable silence prevailing in the cab of the truck until we pulled up in my driveway. Even though he’d been back on Earth for almost three months, Daniel was still living with me; the General didn’t want him living on his own, and Daniel preferred staying with me over rooming on base next door to Teal’c. Most of his stuff, which we’d kept because the Pentagon types had been muttering about a museum when the SGC when public, was still in storage, but he’d gotten out most of his clothes and some of his books, all of which were now cluttering up my spare room. I really didn’t mind.
“Change into something nice, we’re going out,” I said as we went inside. He looked quizzically at me, but I didn’t elaborate. I went into my room to change and a minute later I heard the shower start in the hall bathroom. I put on a dark green shirt, black slacks and shoes, and a bit of cologne, and went down to the living room to wait for Daniel.
Daniel came down exactly 23 minutes later, and I almost choked on my tongue. He was wearing grey slacks and a form-fitting blue shirt that really made his eyes glow. He looked amazing. I managed to choke out a “hey” and he gave me the funny little wave he’d started using as a greeting.
Before I could gather my melted brains, Daniel started to type. “You look great, Jack,” the computer said, accompanied by a brilliant smile that did nothing to help my mental state. “So, where are we going?”
“This new Italian restaurant on Pine Street,” I said as we went out to the truck. “It’s called Como or something.”
Daniel’s eyes widened. “Sam told me about that place,” the computer said, Daniel’s expressive eyebrows raised. “Expensive. What’s the occasion?”
”Do I need one?” I asked, aiming for nonchalant and merely getting nervous. Daniel, of course, saw right through it, and crossed his arms with a distinctly Jaffa-like raised eyebrow. “It’s a surprise, then,” I said defensively, but Daniel’s face relaxed into a smile. “Let’s go.”
***
Daniel resisted the urge to bug Jack during the drive to the restaurant, or when they were looking over the menu. He surprised both Jack and the waiter by tricking Bill’s doohickey into ordering in Italian for them both. His slightly smug smile got them through a very nice dinner and a decadent chocolate mousse for dessert.
They fought over the check, but Daniel finally let Jack pay and they left the restaurant. “Aht, don’t even start,” Jack said as Daniel raised his fingers to the device’s keyboard, but he was smiling softly when he said it and rested a hand on the small of Daniel’s back to lead him to the truck. Daniel shivered at the unexpected touch but didn’t move away. Now that he thought about it, Jack had been acting differently over dinner; if it’d been anyone else, he would have called it flirting. But this was Jack, so that couldn’t be right.
Jack even opened the door for him when they got to the truck, which really got Daniel thinking. As an experiment, he let his hand brush Jack’s arm as he got in, and was fascinated to see Jack blush slightly before he closed the door and hurried to the driver’s side. They ride home was silent, but only because Daniel was deep in thought.
***
I knew I was damn lucky to not have to fend off questions on the ride home, and I’m not one to question that kind of thing, even if Daniel’s expression didn’t bode well for later. We pulled up in front of the house and I got out and circled the truck to let Daniel out on his side.
I expected him to protest and was surprised when he didn’t. He didn’t even seem to notice, actually, but he had that distinctly thoughtful expression that usually preceded either a brilliant idea or a really stupid action. I had no way of knowing which it would be, so I just followed him into the house. I turned away for a moment to lock the door, and when I turned back I found myself pinned to the door by my shoulders. Daniel looked intently at my face, as if searching for something, and then leaned in.
For a moment, I thought Daniel was aiming for my mouth, but his lips landed to the side of my chin and then trailed kisses up my jaw. I moaned, glad we seemed to be on the same page at last, and wrapped my arms around his waist, pulling him close against my body. He shivered and went back to feasting on my neck.
I could do nothing more than hold on for the ride as Daniel explored my neck and jaw with his mouth, or when he attacked the buttons of my shirt, giving an inaudible sigh of frustration when only my undershirt was revealed. He pushed it up to my underarms and curled his tongue around my right nipple.
I let myself float in a haze of pleasurable sensation for a while, letting Daniel explore my anatomy with fingertips and lips and teeth and tongue. I moaned in protest and opened my eyes when Daniel pulled away, only to see him slip to his knees and go for the fly of my slacks. “Stop,” I managed to gasp out. I didn’t want a blowjob against the door, at least not the first time. “Bedroom.” Daniel gave me a slow smile that made my blood burn and stood, taking my hand and pulling me down the hall.
***
Daniel led Jack into the bedroom and gently pushed him back to lie on the bed. Jack scooted back, stripping off his shirts as Daniel settled between his sprawled legs. He went back to what he’d been doing in the hall, namely trying to get Jack out of his jeans. He undid the fly and pushed Jack’s jeans and boxers down, smiling when Jack’s hips arched up to help, and then got up off the bed to help him out of his shoes and socks and then slide the rest of his clothes off.
Daniel stripped absently while he looked his fill of Jack’s body. He’d wanted Jack laid out like this, naked and aroused, and because of him, for a long time, and now that he had him, Daniel wasn’t sure what to do first. He wanted to do everything.
“Danny, why’re you so far away?” Jack asked plaintively, and Daniel smiled. He wanted to kiss Jack, but that could wait; he’d missed Jack’s mouth when they’d first started, and Jack hadn’t remedied that, so Daniel assumed it wasn’t something Jack wanted. Maybe he could try again later.
Daniel slipped off Bill’s device and put it and his glasses on the bedside table. He settled back on the bed between Jack’s legs and went back to kissing and nibbling Jack’s neck, fingers gently scratching through Jack’s chest hair. He’d stopped mouthing responses to questions months ago, and hadn’t been using his mouth for anything other than eating. Even if he didn’t actually get to kiss Jack’s own mouth, he’d found a much better use for his own.
Daniel’s hands moved farther down, over Jack’s flat stomach and hard abdomen before smoothing down Jack’s thighs and back up. He leaned up to try kissing Jack again, but at the last moment he turned his face into the pillow so Daniel caught his ear. He nibbled the lobe, filing the slight feeling of rejection away for later, and then kissed down Jack’s body. Without further warning, Daniel licked a stripe up Jack’s cock from base to tip and then took as much of him into his mouth as he could.
It had been a long time since he’d done this, but it only took Daniel a moment to get a good rhythm going between his hand on the base of Jack’s cock and his mouth. His other hand was involved, too, playing with Jack’s balls, massaging his perineum, rubbing his nipples. It was obvious that Jack was close, and in a few minutes he was coming, crying Daniel’s name. Daniel swallowed him down, licking him clean when he’d collapsed back against the bed, sated, and then sat back up with a Cheshire cat grin on his face. Definitely a better use for his mouth.
***
It took me a couple minutes to come down from that orgasm, and I was grinning so hard my face hurt. Daniel smiled back, kissed my hip, and then started tapping on my thigh. It took me a minute to figure out what he was doing, but when I did, I had to smile at his ingenuity.
short-long-long-long short-long long-short-long-short long-short-long. J. A. C. K. Morse Code. “Yes, Daniel?” I asked, and Daniel gave a silent chuckle, tapping again. O. N. Pause. Y. O. U. R. Pause. S. I. D. E. I groaned happily and complied, before lifting the leg on top and placing my foot flat on the bed. Daniel pressed up behind me and I felt his intake of breath as his erect cock lined up perfectly against my ass.
He thrust against me once, twice, and then pulled back just enough to fit a hand between us. He cupped my butt, and then trailed his fingers down the cleft to press against my hole. P. L. E. A. S. E. he tapped out with his other hand on my shoulder, but I was already pressing back against his fingers and felt him smile against the back of my neck. I felt him tap out a request for lube and leaned over to get it out of the drawer. Daniel trailed his fingers up my arm to take the tube from my hand. I heard the click of the tube opening and then cool, wet fingers pressed against my opening and I gasped.
The rest was a blur, but soon enough he was pressing into me, fingers clenched on my hips. He must have prepped me well because I felt no pain, just that strange fullness I hadn’t felt in far too long. I groaned when Daniel started to move, jerking my hips to match Daniel’s slow, deep strokes. I was amazed to realize that I was ready to go again already, especially after Daniel reached over my hip to wrap those long fingers around my cock. I could feel him mouthing words I couldn’t understand against my back as his thrusts became more erratic, and he bit down on my shoulder as he came, which set me off as well. Not as explosively as the first time, but still enough to make me a little cross-eyed.
I came to with Daniel half on top of me, pressing me into the bed. I slipped out from underneath him, smiling when his hands scrabbled across the sheet, looking for me. I limped to the bathroom -- it had been a long time, even if Daniel had prepped me well -- to grab a wet washcloth and came back to the bed. I cleaned us both off and then Daniel sleepily pulled me back down into the bed, curling up against my side. I smiled sleepily, pulling the covers up over us, and kissed him on the head. It was the closest I’d gotten to his mouth, but for now, with Daniel drifting off in my arms, I was content.
***
Over the next few months, Daniel became intimately acquainted with a practical application of the term “friends with benefits.” On the outside, nothing appeared to have changed, but they had sex and slept in Jack’s bed most nights Jack wasn’t offworld with Sam, Teal’c, and their rotating new fourth. They never talked about what they were doing, and they never kissed. At least, not above the neck.
As amazing as it was to have Jack in his arms every night, Daniel wasn’t satisfied. Something was missing. Daniel had no doubt that Jack cared for him as a friend, but he needed more than that. He needed Jack to love him. He’d thought having Jack would have been enough, but he was starting to long for what he didn’t have. And he was deathly afraid it would ruin what he could lay claim to.
So he didn’t say anything to jeopardize this relationship of sorts they now had. It might not have been exactly what he wanted, but he was going to hold on to it with both hands for as long as he could.
***
I had really thought it would be enough. I had Daniel in my bed, and up my ass at least once a day when I wasn’t stuck on PX-whatever with Carter, T, and the bunch of incompetent archeologists, linguists, and anthropologists we got saddled with. Even the best of them didn’t had the same charisma that Daniel used time and time again to get us out of dire situations. Used to, at least; mute Daniel wasn’t allowed offworld. As much as I missed his presence on SG-1, I missed his voice even more. There where times when I couldn’t quite remember what it sounded like, and they chilled me to the bone.
I never expected Daniel to love me; I had thought lust and a strong friendship would be enough. But, I was quickly discovering that it wasn’t. Hell, I knew it from the second day, when I felt almost used after he fucked me, but I tried to ignore it as long as I could. It was getting hard, though, and I had to do something before this lack spoiled our friendship.
I waited to say anything until Daniel had been back on Earth for about six months, and Daniel and I had been together, if you’d call it that, for about three. The general had sent me a memo that he was releasing Daniel to live on his own, and wanted me to tell him, as Daniel’s supposed CO. I decided it was as good a chance as any as I would get at a clean break and decided to take advantage of it.
I happened to have some downtime after a mission -- standard recon in an attempt to break in yet another of Danny’s geeks -- so I had the house to myself all day. I took advantage of that, too, and decided to cook dinner; this wasn’t something I wanted to talk about in a public place. Steaks grilled to perfection, home-made mashed potatoes, salad: all of them prepared and on the table with matching plates and good beer when Daniel got home at 1800. “Dinner’s ready, come in and eat it while it’s hot!” I called when I heard the door open. Daniel’s head appeared quizzically in the kitchen door a moment later, and then he disappeared, returning without his laptop case and usual bag of books in tow. We ate dinner in silence, but from the way Daniel kept glancing at me, I knew he knew something was up. When we’d both cleared our plates, I took a deep breath and started. I’d delayed long enough.
***
Daniel knew he wasn’t going to like whatever Jack had to say. Was he dumping him? Had he decided that Daniel wasn’t worth the risk? Or, even worse, had Jack just gotten bored with him? The very thought gave Daniel chills.
“The general called today, while you were at the mountain,” Jack began, toying with his beer bottle, not meeting Daniel’s eyes. “He’s talked to Fraiser, and they’ve cleared you to live on your own. He even said that the Air Force would help you find and pay for an apartment.” Jack seemed to center himself, and Daniel tensed even more. “I really think you should take him up on the offer.”
“Do you mean...” Bill’s device began, but Jack cut him off.
“I thought it would be enough,” Jack said, “you and me, together like this. I really thought it would be enough. But it’s not, and it’s tearing me apart. I’m sorry, Daniel.” Jack stood, but he seemed to be leaning on the table for support. “You can stay here until you’ve found a place, of course, but I think you should stay in the spare room.” He stacked the dishes and carried them to the sink.
Jack’s words rolled around Daniel’s head for a long moment, almost devoid of meaning, as he stared unseeing at the tabletop. Not enough, Jack had said, but what wasn’t enough? That thought trickled through his brain and when it clicked Daniel’s eyes went wide. They’d been such fools! He and Jack wanted the same thing.
Daniel flew up from the table and across the kitchen to where Jack was silently washing dishes, hunched shoulders forbidding. Ignoring that, Daniel grabbed him by the shoulders and spun him away from the sink. Confronted with Jack’s dull, pained eyes, he suddenly didn’t know what to say, so he tenderly took Jack’s face in his hands and kissed his mouth.
Jack didn’t move for a moment, and Daniel almost thought that he’d been wrong, but then he responded passionately, bringing his arms up to press them close together. Daniel didn’t care that the hands in his hair and on his waist were wet and soapy; for the first time, he and Jack finally understood each other. He delicately trailed his tongue over Jack’s lips, requesting entrance, and they opened for him. The first touch of their tongues was almost sweet, and then there was a burning sensation in Daniel’s throat and he drew back with a gasp.
An audible gasp. Daniel’s hands flew to his throat. “Jack?” he asked tentatively. His voice was soft and creaky with disuse, but it was there. He knew his smile must have been as blinding as Jack’s own.
“Danny!” Jack said happily, pulling him close into a hug. “Your voice! What happened?”
“I don’t know,” Daniel whispered. He was in shock; after so long without his voice, he’d almost forgotten what it was like to speak. Making a quick decision, he looked Jack square in the eye. “I love you, Jack,” he said, smiling slightly at Jack’s expression. “Just in case this is temporary, I just want to tell you I...”
“I understand,” Jack said, silencing him by laying a finger against his lips. “I love you, too, Danny. I’m so sorry I never said anything before.” He cupped Daniel’s jaw and kissed him again. This time, there was no pain.
“We should probably call the mountain,” Daniel said sometime later, when they’d stopped kissing for a bit. “The general will want to know, and Janet will want to take a look at me.” His voice was already stronger.
“Can’t it wait until morning?” Jack asked, almost petulant. “I want your voice to myself for a bit first.” Daniel looked at him quizzically and Jack reached down to cup Daniel’s half-erect cock through his jeans. Daniel groaned. “Yeah, like that.” Daniel smirked in understanding, took Jack’s hand, and led him to the bedroom.
Feedback is better than chocolate.