- 0 -
When the sun sets in this place, you could almost believe that the world is flat.
Cutting into the white of the ice, the patches of pine forests are nearly black in the sleepy landscape. The sky is hanging low above them, the clouds heavy with a promise of snow. Monochromatic against the pale, foggy blue - the beauty of this land is unexpected in its simplicity.
There are lights scattered among the trees, marking the places where people leave the cold outside the door, shed their winter clothes and put the stones onto the heaters. Places where they pour the water and listen to it hiss and burst towards the wooden ceiling. Places where they breathe it, scorching hot, into their lungs.
Outside, there is silence. Outside, there is peacefulness of the nearing night, with the sun already gone and the whiteness beginning to lose its blinding glow.
Outside, there is a shadow skidding with a buzz of engine across the middle of a frozen lake--
Actually it's a frozen sea, Jack, but you won't notice unless you head up north ...
--a single spot of warmth wrapped securely in polyamide, sharp wind licking frostily at his face. The cold air is gluing crystals to his parched lips, and his eyes are watering against the endless gray-white that stole the horizon.
It's not the end of the world, but it feels close enough to the edge.
~
"I can talk to them, Jack."
The wood splits, the blocks fall to the sides. He bends to retrieve one, grimaces at the pain shooting through his back. Grits his teeth, rolls his neck, and puts the block on the stump. Takes a swing.
"It's getting dark, and they must have set up camp for the night. It can't be that far."
Swing, loosen the wrist, use the inertia. Plunk. Thump, thump.
"Sam can help me get there."
Jack freezes, half-bent over the next piece of wood.
It's difficult to straighten now, strangely difficult, his head leaden, his blood hammering in his ears. Is it memory bearing down on him or just age? Hard to tell. He swallows, reaches down to grab the next block. "She tell you that?"
"Yes." A pause. A shuffling of feet. "She's okay now, Jack. We can't keep her here fo--"
White dots leap out at him from the sea of black as Jack staggers, sways, reaches blindly for something to lean on, finds nothing, grasps empty air--
--and there are rough hands steadying him, strong, bony fingers clawing painfully at his arms.
"Easy."
Down, down, sit on the stump, let go of the axe. Bend your head.
Breathe.
"Easy now, Jack. I've got you."
This thundering in your ears, this is your life. Cling to it.
Breathe.
The dots dissipate into blackness, and the blackness fades away slowly, leaving a pulsing ache in his temples. The dizziness is gone, though, so Jack raises his head, squints at the returning vision. Daniel's face is close, but barely visible in the falling night. His eyes are pale, searching. There is something in Daniel's look, something Jack doesn't see that often, because Daniel has now learned to hide it pretty well.
Daniel's hand is smoothing slow circles on the small of Jack's back, and his fingers are not trembling at all.
"You okay?" Daniel asks softly. His breath is sour with that herb tea Carter makes him. Jack reaches up, touches Daniel's forehead with the back of his hand. Daniel's skin feels hot, but he's not burning up any more.
Back in the spring, it was fine, because they still had their med-kits, stocked well enough to last them the next few months, so they gave Daniel a little of everything, working their way up to antibiotics when nothing else was effective. He got better after a few days, and was fully recovered in less than two weeks.
Jack contemplated using up the supply of vaccines they had, just in case they caught something deadly here without even knowing, but Carter convinced him it would be better if they took the medicine when they needed it.
In hindsight, it turned out to be very sensible advice.
"...and we'll be fine," Daniel is saying. He has turned his head a little, letting Jack's fingers slip to his temple, brush the corner of his eye. His voice has dropped to a whisper. "Sam can take care of herself. We'll bring food and something warmer to sleep under. We'll be back before you know it."
A few months' supply was not enough, though, because Carter was next. They didn't know what it was, only that it made her throw up everything she tried to eat or drink, including the meds. Her skin was scorching hot, and he and Daniel took rounds bringing cold water and trying to keep her drugged. In the end, Daniel managed to find the local equivalent of the purple willow. It worked magic, far beyond the ordinary aspirin. Afterwards, Jack thought briefly of building a shrine and composing an appropriate prayer of thanks to whatever gods might listen, but he gave up and slept for two days straight instead.
And then, two weeks ago, Daniel caught the same thing. They already knew how to treat it, but it worked slowly, too slowly, and Jack found himself waking up every morning fully expecting Daniel not to open his eyes.
But he did open them, every damn time, shivering like crazy and more stubborn than death.
The forest is quiet around them - the wind has died, the birds of summer are already gone - and the silence feels heavy to Jack, like a stone he's been carrying too long. There is a slow beat of pulse under his fingertips, and he isn't sure if it's Daniel's or just the echo of his own. He slides his fingers to Daniel's brow, stops over the scar, traces its ragged edges with his fingertip. Daniel winces, but he doesn't move away.
"I'll go with you," Jack says hoarsely. "And Carter should stay at home."
Daniel grimaces. It may be a smile, it may be a scowl - Jack can't really tell in the dark - and he shakes his head. "No," he says, pulling away from Jack's touch. "Sam goes with me. She needs to go, you know that as well as I do. We'll be back in a few hours, I promise."
Daniel's eyes are sharp, but his voice is gentle - it's the gentleness he's learned over the last few months, the newest negotiation skill, necessary when speaking Jack twenty-four hours a day. His hand has moved from Jack's back to the nape of Jack's neck, and his thin fingers slip into Jack's hair.
"You stay here and keep the fire going on for us."
~
"Carter?"
"Sir?"
"Aren't we in desert camo?"
"We are, sir. I really don't..."
"Aren't we carrying stuff with us that is normally used for studying deserts?"
"Yes, sir, we..."
"Then may I ask what happened to the desert?"
Behind them there is a clink and a soft whoosh inwards as the wormhole disengages. In the silence, Carter is standing beside him with a puzzled expression on her face.
"I don't know, sir. Maybe it's beyond this... forest?"
"You mean this oak forest, Carter?"
"Well, I..."
"Guys?"
The voice behind them doesn't sound any different than it usually does. On any other day, Jack would dismiss it with barely a glance over his shoulder.
On any day but this.
"...I think the desert itself might be just fine."
Carter turns around slowly, very slowly, so the light from the dying sunset falls on her face in stages, first illuminating her right cheek, then the left. It flickers briefly in her eyes, then climbs over her forehead and up to the short hair sticking out from under her khaki cap. The angles shift when she raises her chin and her mouth opens as if to catch the fleeting glow.
"Oh, my god."
Jack watches the ‘o' of her mouth, hears the shaky breathe-out. He feels the sunrays licking at his back, a soft, goodbye caress. Goodbye, he thinks suddenly, and then he breaks the thin layer of ice that has already started forming around his thoughts, and he turns to look.
Daniel is sitting on the ground, a patch of yellowish brown against the nearly black carpet of the fallen leaves. Scattered around him are pieces of cloth and paper, plastic and electronic equipment, which must be the contents of Daniel's backpack, except they are not recognizable, not any more, and Jack doesn't know if it's his mind telling him lies, or if it's the darkness falling. He wishes for both, and he knows neither of them is true.
In Daniel's hand there is the hat he was wearing when they stepped through the gate. Jack remembers the moment it slipped from Daniel's head to his nape, as he was shouldering his pack. He remembers he told Daniel to put it back on - there's supposed to be a blast out there - but Daniel just murmured he'd be fine.
Half of the hat is missing. The cut is clean and sharp, like someone has just cut through butter with a hot knife.
Daniel's fingers are shaking.
Daniel is looking at them, at him, and Jack raises his eyes and looks behind Daniel.
Teal'c is not there.
Neither is the gate.
- 1 -
The labyrinth of islands is never-ending. Some of them are big enough to grow a forest, some of them barely enough to stand on, but even the smallest patches of solid ground are littered with houses. Residences, cottages, shacks - human ingenuity knows no boundaries when it comes to inhabiting a land seemly impossible to inhabit. Twenty square meters of rock protruding from the water, and you have a house, a porch and a pier. In the winter you can drive by car, by snow scooter or by tractor - some people get stuck when they don't drive back to mainland before the ice melts - and during the rest of the year, well, everyone here has a boat.
And yet, crowded would be the last word Jack would use to describe this place.
"How do you buy an island like that?"
A pause in typing. A funny look. "You don't," A shrug, then back to work. Click, click, clickety-click. A frown, a bitten lip. "It's something you have to inherit." Light catching in the rims of glasses, flickering in Jack's direction. "Or have a friend lend you one."
There is a man on the ice, gathering his fishing gear. Jack raises a hand in greeting and receives a wave in return. He can't see if the man is smiling, it's too dark already, but he probably is, so Jack smiles too. His lip splits again, and he licks it, tasting the cold.
He thinks that he should probably turn the headlights of the scooter on, but he doesn't want to, not yet.
~
Carter's hands are rough. The tips of her fingers are dry, the skin worn-out and black with dirt she cannot wash off. Sometimes the skin splits when she works. She curses softly under her breath then, and quickly sucks the pad into her mouth. She tries not to abuse the finger for a few days afterwards. Sometimes it's not possible.
She probably thinks they don't notice, because they are men, and they never notice anything.
Jack closes the door, crosses the room on silent feet, and stands behind her by the table. The fire is humming in the stove, the knife is tap-tapping quickly against the wood. Carter doesn't turn around.
Outside, in the dusk, Daniel is whistling. He is pausing only for breath and then a swing, a strain of muscles before the axe falls, thump.
Thump-thump, says the echo.
Jack reaches up, pushes aside a loose strand of blonde hair, touches his mouth to the soft skin below Carter's ear. She tastes good, as she always does, and he inhales her smell, smoke and spices and the tiredness of a long day.
She can recognize them now without looking. Sometimes he walks quietly behind her, just like this, but then he breathes into her ear the way he's seen Daniel do it. He hopes she'll turn around with Daniel's name on her lips, but she never does. If it's her peripheral vision, or her hearing, or her sense of smell, he's not really sure.
By the time the spring came, Jack had already forgotten how it felt to have sun on his face. The snow melted slowly, and it turned out they had mended the roof quite well. There was only one crack and Carter put a bowl on the floor to catch the murky water. Daniel was feeling better, well enough to sit on the porch, wrapped in a thermal blanket, and breathe some fresh air. The sunlight was chasing shadows off his face.
The supply-cellar they'd found in the woods had been almost empty by springtime, so when the birds started coming back, Jack took the zat and told Carter to dig up some veggies from the clamp in the garden, because they were about to relieve the monotony of their diet.
The tap-tapping stops and Carter leans back against Jack's chest. He can see her smiling. She raises her hand, her fingertips brushing his forehead, then slipping into his hair. Her fingers are even thinner than Daniel's.
"Sir."
She never got around to calling him Jack. She said she didn't want it to become a habit, because, when they came back to the SGC - and it was still when back in the summer - she wouldn't want to accidentally slip.
It seemed like a reasonable explanation at the time.
Jack kisses her neck, then props his chin on her shoulder. "Wha'cha got there, Carter?" he whispers, his arms slipping around her waist, palms tracing the curves of her hips.
Come to think about it, he never got around to calling her Sam, either. And he didn't even have to come up with his own explanation.
Daniel teased them about it for a while, trying to make them jealous. He made them both speak his name over and over, and whispered their names himself. He wrote the words on their bodies with his mouth, and breathed them into their skin. He made it his quest, his Holy Grail, for at least a month back in the summer. He lectured them about the meaning of names, and their names in particular; something he said he'd read long ago or - as Jack was more inclined to think - made up as he went, because it was just too colorful to be true.
Finally they had enough. Jack doesn't remember if it was Carter's idea or his, but he did appreciate its brilliance none the less. The next time Daniel went into the lecture mode, Carter and Jack ganged up on him, tied him up to the bed and made him call them ma'am and sir until they were all out of breath. Jack managed to keep it light, though, so before the night was over, they were all collapsing with laughter, as well as for other, much more pleasurable reasons.
It's become one of the things they do when they are really, really bored with the rhythm of their lives.
"...and basil, and thyme." Carter is leaning against him, one hand holding the knife flat on the tabletop, the other slowly combing spices into Jack's hair. She is whispering, and her eyes are closed. "I wanted to try something new."
Jack raises his head and peers over her shoulder into the pots steaming on the stove. "Is that the fish I caught? For crying out loud, what did you do to it?"
She laughs and smacks him on the head with her free hand. She tries to spin around, but he holds her firmly, digging his fingers into her hips. She stops struggling, and he leans in to kiss the corner of her mouth.
"Come back safely," he says, and before she fixes him with that astonishingly excited stare he knows all too well, he turns away, because the night will be cold and there is only the whistling outside, which means Daniel has finished and there is wood to be stacked for the evening.
~
"...would most likely be caused by a solar flare," Carter is saying. "but we did the checking twice, so I'd rule that one out. The MALP reading was normal and we didn't bypass any safety protocols to get there, so the gate wasn't rendered inactive on purpose..."
She knows that she is talking mostly to herself, but she doesn't seem to mind. Jack has turned his face away from the fire, and he lets her think aloud, because if someone figures a way out of this, it's Carter.
The constellations over their heads are unfamiliar. That one, though, that could be Scorpio, and there, a little to the right, that's almost Hercules.
Almost.
"...there could have also been a virus, but if anyone had been tampering with the gate software, we should have been able to detect it..."
Daniel is sitting awkwardly on his half of Jack's thermal blanket. He is patching his journal together, bending over the pieces of paper cut neatly from the spine of the book. He peers at them closely, rearranges their order, smoothes the edges with his dirty fingers. Sometimes his elbow catches Jack in the side, and Daniel murmurs and absent-minded Sorry, Jack, but his hands never stop moving.
Daniel's lower back is warm against Jack's.
They walked for what they thought was the best part of the night, but the forest didn't end. The night didn't end, either, and as far as Jack could tell, it got even darker. There were no lights, no trails, no indications that humans had ever been here. No radiation from any hi-tech energy sources, no naquadah in the soil. There was only the forest - dark, quiet and empty.
"...do some more readings, but until then I'm afraid I can't give a good explanation, sir."
Daniel elbows him again, and it might as well have been on purpose, because this way Jack manages to catch Carter's last sentence. He straightens and looks at her across the fire. She is clearly exhausted, and does her best in trying not to show it, but she's still shivering in the too-thin desert clothes.
Jack clears his throat, manages a tight smile. "It's okay, Carter. We'll figure it out tomorrow, when it's bright and we can climb up a tree and see which way to the castle."
He glances over his shoulder. Daniel has stopped sorting the pages and is listening with his usual half-attention.
"Daniel? You up for first watch?"
- 2 -
They say that on a clear day you can see all the way up to Lapland from here.
On a clear day, which is almost daily. Must be magic, but in this part of the archipelago and on the small scrap of land it surrounds - it almost never rains. Sure, it snows, it snows a lot when it's supposed to, but in the summer, brief and astonishing as it is - it almost never rains.
They call it the sunniest city in Finland, Jack has seen folders at the airport. English, German and Russian - for tourists. He took one. He has it in his backpack now.
"Do they have any normal consonants in this language?"
Blinking. Almost sleepy, but it can't be. Surely Daniel wouldn't be dozing off over a translation..."Yes, as a matter of fact--" And that wasn't a yawn. Oh, that most certainly wasn't a yawn. "As a matter of fact they do, Jack. They even have a few extra. But almost half of them is used only in loans, and there aren't that many--"
"They have no 'w'."
Blinking again. Adjusting of glasses. And then a smile, as if Jack just discovered a carefully harbored secret. "You noticed."
"Well, I pride myself on my observation skills."
Ahead of him, the islands move aside like patches of forests in a fairy tale, and the dark spine of the bridge emerges from the sleepy blue.
~
The traps are empty, and the hens are sleeping in their nests. There are no eggs, which isn't exactly a surprise, at this time of night, but Jack checks anyway. He makes sure that there is enough grain and water, even though he did it twice already, both times he walked around the yard.
He managed not to make himself crazy within the first hour. He is quite proud of that. Daniel never accused him of being overprotective, at least never before.
He keeps the fire blazing, until the side of the stove is almost too hot to touch. He ponders taking a bath, but it's much better with company than alone, so he just brings the water. He leaves it steaming in the two largest pots on the stove and sits on the porch in front of the house, zat in hand. The night is cold, the first chill of the winter already in the air, but the jackets Carter made for them are warm enough.
The stars flicker above him, the constellations now comfortably familiar.
They named them all, once, lying on their backs in the grass. Carter insisted on fairy-tale creatures, while Daniel, of course, came up with a mixture of names borne by people and things that existed a long time ago, or maybe didn't exist at all. Lulled by the warm wind and the whisper of the meadow at night, Jack listened to their resulting quarrel, sometimes throwing in a name that made them pause while they pretended to consider, until he slept, safe and relaxed, and they kept arguing, their voices drifting slowly into silence.
Jack stifles a yawn, stretches his legs, and leans back against the wall. He feels a little thirsty, and he thinks about getting a bottle of wine from the cellar. Carter made it from some wild berries she'd dried on the window sill, and those yellow flowers Daniel had said were close enough to dandelions. It's yellow and sweet and a little sparkly, and it has made them all happy and warm on more than one occasion. But to get to the cellar he'd have to get up, and he's quite comfortable sitting, thank you very much.
Besides, he wants to be able to aim effectively should anyone but Carter or Daniel emerge from the blackness around the house.
Not that they have that many visitors around here in the fall.
When the snows melted and the first traders came, trudging in small groups along the trail, he and Daniel welcomed them armed to their teeth. Jack told Carter to stay in the house, and not even breathe louder, and that's an order, Major.
Daniel did what he's always done best, and soon they were haggling like they've never done anything else in their lives. Whatever the traders thought of two men living together in a hut in the middle of the forest, they never said. Apparently it wasn't a reason enough to kill them, or to refuse doing business with them, for that matter. Gold was still gold, and it still bought flour, salt, a bowlful of sugar and a few good meters of soft, thin linen for Carter's dress. Daniel scowled a little at that, told Jack she probably wouldn't wear it - not with the gold that had bought it - but it turned out Carter not only accepted the gift with relish, but thought is suitable for sheets and pillows as well.
The second hour of his waiting comes and goes, the numbers blinking at him in faint blue from his wrist. They say it's twelve PM, but the hours are all messed up in this place, just like the months are. How much time has it been already, back on Earth? Jack remembers he used to count that, before. Now he just glances at the watch when he feels the need. It's not very often.
He lays down the zat, presses a button on the watch. Squints into the blue.
January the second. It's winter on Earth already, and they missed Christmas again.
Jack smiles and clicks off the calendar.
They will have their own Christmas. The traders will pass by their house once more, heading to spend the winter in the cities, and Jack still has some silver left.
Lemons, he thinks, for Carter's hands.
And do they have coffee here?
~
The marks in the mud are fresh. Jack crouches, traces a hoof print with his finger, judges the shape and depth.
"Three men on horseback. Traveling light."
"Bandits."
Flat and hard, and it's not a question, so he raises his head. Carter's mouth is a sharp, thin line. She is shivering a little in the cold.
He nods. "Or soldiers But not the conquering kind."
His knees protest when he stands up, but he's long since decided to ignore them. He fights not to pull the jacket a little tighter around him, not to rub his hands together to make them warmer. He'll do that when Carter's attention is somewhere else.
Behind them, tiny wisps of smoke are dying in the cold air.
Back by the road, Daniel is a statue, motionless against the cutting wind.
"Sir?"
Carter is looking at him questioningly.
Jack sighs. "They were in a hurry," he explains quietly. "They only took what was the easiest to take. They didn't do a good job of putting the fire. And they didn't stay to watch it burn."
Carter's look doesn't waver. Then she nods sharply, once, and turns back to look at the house. It's small, built from stones and wood, and it's definitely seen better days. The broken roof is damp, and covered with moss.
Daniel starts when Jack lays a hand on his shoulder. "Oh... sorry, Jack, I was, um..."
"It's okay."
The wind has picked up, and the cold is now tugging painfully at Jack's collar. Daniel's body is warm under his fingers, so Jack doesn't take his hand away.
"We'll have to do some digging," he says.
Daniel nods, a tight little nod, with his jaw set and his shoulders squared. "I know." He sounds tired, but it's not the tiredness of their long walk along the trail. "We can probably find a shovel here somewhere..."
There was not much they could do for the man, except for closing his eyes, cutting off his blank stare at the wintry sky. One of the man's hands is still clutching the stained fabric at his throat, the other is flung uselessly to the side, the axe a few feet away from his curled fingers. The blood is nearly black on his chest and neck.
Clean and short and professional. No time for toying with the victim. Just take what strikes your fancy and be back on your way.
God, these people had never even stood a chance.
They found the women near the house. The older one had died by the door, the last guardian of their home, face down in the rotting leaves. The younger one had been dragged outside. Easier this way, and with a wider arena to watch from. Daniel pulled the remains of her dress back over her body. Jack turned away. Carter didn't.
They shovel in the dusk. The wind is sharp against their bare hands. They don't speak much, and between the three of them, they have the graves dug and the bodies buried before the last of the sunrays disappear behind the ragged line of the treetops.
"Is the winter coming or going?"
Jack looks up, arms still propped on the shovel. Daniel is looking at the sky, his expression blank, his arms wrapped around his body in a protective self-hug.
Jack swallows. "Why?" he asks, unnecessarily.
Carter is crouching on the ground, crushing a small leaf in her hands. She is looking at Daniel, but she doesn't say anything. There is a black smear of dirt across her forehead.
The empty house is a black shadow in the clearing behind them.
Daniel grimaces, turns to Jack. "Because we are not going any farther," he says quietly. "Not tonight, not tomorrow, and not in a week from now. And you know that."
Yeah, I know that, Jack thinks. He scrubs a little at the handle of the shovel. The wood is smooth beneath his fingers, and the handle fits in his hand like it's been made exactly for him.
This close to the trail, it's probably not safe.
Farther in the woods, it's probably not safe, either.
So much for peaceful exploring.
Sweat is drying at the small of his back, and the is cold licking up his spine. Jack straightens, pulls the shovel from the ground..
"We'll have to fix the roof first," he says, and starts walking.
He doesn't look back, but he knows Carter and Daniel follow him in the darkness.
- 3 -
The bridge looms above him now, graceful and eerily quiet.
It's not that big, considering the bridges Jack has seen, but it stands out in this place, the one and only discernible landmark in the archipelago. A ridiculously alone piece of architecture, among fields and fields of ice and rock, an awkward long-spined creature, stretched over plains of white, its teeth and tail catching at the black on both ends.
It looks like an artifact of a civilization long gone, left behind for the rest of eternity to fulfill its duty - the important task of propping up the sky.
"Raippaluoto," Daniel says, a bit uncomfortable and a little awkward and utterly crazy, breathing the vowels into Jack's ear. "A bridge to nowhere."
Daniel's glasses are askew - because Jack has just bumped his nose against them for the umpteenth time - and Daniel reaches up to adjust them, but he catches his elbow on a shelf and curses softly, scowling, so Jack untangles his fingers from Carter's hair, and raises his hand to Daniel's face to finish the movement.
He knows that it isn't exactly nowhere, there are people living on that island, and there will be a harbor here, at some point, because the bay is getting more shallow each year. And he knows there are plans already, they built the bridge now to be prepared later, because the traffic will surely be a problem, so no, it's not exactly nowhere.
And it's not even that far, they could still head up north, there's a lot of land up there, untouched, black and white, with nights even longer and the sun even lower on the horizon.
But Daniel said it was safe here, they were safer here than anywhere else, and for Jack, it is more than enough.
~
"Stay still, Sam."
"Or what? You're gonna make it look ugly?"
She grins, and Daniel bites his lip, concentrated. The firelight plays with warmth and shadow across his face, catches at the furrowed eyebrows, at the faint red of his short beard.
"No," he says slowly. "But I am going to make this more pornographic than you'd like, and you won't even be able to see it." He puts the smaller brush between his teeth. "And the man thaid this thuff ith permanent..."
"What!?" Carter is faster than light when she uncoils and slips from under his body, heaving him upwards and to the side. Daniel lands on his back, and the brush slips from his mouth, raining tiny black spots of paint on his chest.
They came back after three hours. Not that long, considering they had to walk the whole way to the traders' camp and back. Daniel said he'd counted on buying a horse, but they'd helped with the crops during the summer mostly in exchange for food, so they hadn't earned enough; the animals are quite expensive around here.
Jack heard them long before he saw them. Daniel was saying something in a language Jack couldn't understand, and it was probably a joke, because Carter was laughing out loud. They were both carrying bundles over their shoulders, and their backpacks were filled to the brim.
Nobody followed them. Jack clicked the zat gun shut and helped them carry the packs inside.
Later, when Daniel unpacked their treasures and lay the brushes in a neat row on the table, Jack just raised his eyebrows. Daniel answered with a leer at Carter, who in turn smiled and turned to drag their wooden tub to the middle of the room.
They used up all the hot water, but Jack said he would bring more, and he let them have their fun.
Daniel is clutching the brush in his hand, the black trickling down his wrist. His body is shaking with silent laughter. Carter is standing in the middle of the room, hands on her hips. She looks furious, but then her expression slowly turns into a grin.
"You bastard," she says.
"Yeah," Daniel admits quietly. He puts the brushes aside, letting the paint stain the fur and linen. Then he props himself on both elbows, and the dragon on his shoulderblade stretches and folds its wings. "That I am."
Carter licks her lips.
From his warm spot beside the stove Jack watches her climb, graceful and catlike, back onto the bed and then onto Daniel. She straddles his hips and reaches to pull him by the neck and press his face between her breasts. Daniel gives a low murmur of approval, and turns his head to catch her nipple between his lips. Carter cranes her neck. "Oh, yeah..."
The first time they did it with Carter watching, Daniel closed his eyes and gripped his hand so tight Jack thought his bones would break. Daniel was softer back then, his body lean and smooth, his skin dark from the sun, and pink from the blood rushing to the capillaries. His mouth was open around a sound he didn't quite make, and when Jack finally pushed in, Daniel whipped his head to the side, bumping noses with Carter, and reached for her mouth with a strangled moan. Jack watched them kiss, his body suspended above them, reduced to seeing, feeling and pressure, and forgot the world.
"Jack?"
He blinks. He looks up, trying to focus. It's not easy - he's just too warm and too sleepy right now.
Daniel is holding his hand out, palm open and fingers spread. He keeps his other hand at the small of Carter's back, not really guiding her, just holding her close.
"Jack?" he repeats, urgently, wriggling his fingers, and then he sucks in a breath, because Carter just pressed a little harder down, and it's better than any movie, Jack thinks, even more so because it's interactive.
But as much as he likes watching them like this, he doesn't feel very interactive tonight, himself.
"Keep going," he whispers to Daniel, and drags his sleepy limbs from his warm nest by the stove. The fire has almost died down, and he didn't bring enough wood. He has to go outside, and get a few armfuls, so the wood can dry up through the night, because in the morning they'd be biting their heads off over who should go out into the chill and bring the kindling.
Daniel smiles at him and turns back to Carter, reaches up with his hand to pull her down into a lazy kiss.
~
In a quiet, empty forest, on a brink of the night, Jack is running.
He is running, and he never thought he could run this fast, but he heard the horses from a mile away, and then he heard the shouting.
And he didn't hear even a single shot.
Later, he will thank the powers that be that he didn't go hunting too far away from the house. He will also be grateful that he didn't yet catch anything, didn't fire the zat with it's tin-tinging sound that usually scares the shit out of all birds in the vicinity. And he will be grateful for the weather - clear, crispy air and no rain for a week - because his knees are like steel and sound carries a long, long way through the forest.
He thinks it's going to be quite a long list of thanks.
But the list will have to wait, because now he is running. Stomp, stomp, heavy and god damn it, too loud in the quiet, empty woods of the nearing spring, so he slows down when he sees the house, and he shifts from the fast to the stealthy in a blink of an eye, a smooth transition from the desperate to the measured, to the learned.
He can't quite slow down his breathing yet.
There are four horses in the yard, three of them saddled, and one carrying packs. No riders anywhere, and as far as small mercies go, Jack considers this rather a big one.
Because there is Daniel, lying face down in the grass by the porch.
The blood is black in Daniel's hair, but ridiculously red on the white-painted wood of the doorframe, and Jack can almost see the blow, and the resulting swing of the body, the bounce-back, and the laughter.
Daniel probably tried to talk to them. Christ.
He leaves the shelter of the trees and makes a beeline for the house. The horses snort briefly at him, but otherwise ignore his presence with calm and dignity that is typical for horses alone. Jack creeps along the wall, keeping low of the windows, until finally he crouches near Daniel, and he reaches, like he's done so many, so many times--
--and thank God the pulse is strong and steady beneath his fingers.
His hand comes away red, though, and the blood makes it hard to see what Daniel's face looks like.
Jack hopes there is nothing broken.
He hopes there will be no scars.
He knows no one is ever that lucky.
A string of guttural sounds erupts from the inside the house, followed by a burst of laughter, and the flashing of images in Jack's head is brief and brutal and strangely alien.
He straightens slowly, steps over Daniel's body and walks on careful steps to the door.
Carter's face is white and her head is turned to the doorway. Her eyes meet Jack's when he glances briefly inside, but she doesn't make a sound.
A soldier, he thinks, she's a soldier, god damn it, and she's trained for this, holy Christ she's been trained for this--
A zat or a bullet, the choice is more than obvious. From the looks of things the worst part hasn't started yet, but he won't risk unnecessary pain for Carter.
The men don't even know what hit them. They probably haven't been expecting a third person here. They die fast, and as much as Jack wants to cut them to pieces and watch them bleed to death, he wants them gone even more.
But after he drags the bodies away from the house, one by one, he stops to search them thoroughly before he zats them until there is no trace they've ever existed.
When he gets back, Carter is already sitting on the ground by the porch, with Daniel curled in her lap. She is wiping his face with a bloodstained cloth. Her movements are slow and gentle and her hands are steady. Jack kneels beside her, slips his fingers into Daniel's hair to check for bruises. Carter doesn't look up, and Jack doesn't reach out to touch her.
They let the horses go. No need for stealing something that could easily be found.
They keep the gold, though. And there is quite a lot.
~
The night is brilliantly cold when Jack steps outside. It must be around midnight by now, he thinks, and he really should be sleeping. He pulls the jacket tighter around himself and walks around the house, towards the shack where they keep the dry wood.
The moons are not visible tonight, the sky perfectly clear, stars blinking at him from the black.
They had a golden autumn this year, and Jack's bones were thankful for it. He didn't have much to complain about, anyway, because on the rainy days Carter would keep the fire blazing and Daniel would wink at him, hot water already steaming in a pot, because We have to keep you warm, now don't we?
And Jack couldn't really decline. Daniel is just too stubborn when it comes to things like that.
At first he doesn't notice the faint, unmoving shadow among the trees. But his instincts are not completely lulled by the soft warmth of the fire, so Jack finally looks up, over the armful of wood he was about to gather.
There is a robed figure standing on the path to the house.
He looks a little like Gandalf the Grey, Jack thinks, and hey, Daniel did say they had real castles here, so they probably have real wizards, too--
And then the figure reaches up with one large hand, and pulls the hood back, baring a grim face with a glint of gold on the dark forehead--
--and Jack straightens over the pile of neatly cut wood, over the axe that's given him blisters more than once, over the ground, where red, rotting leaves lie waiting for the first layer of snow.
And, oddly enough, it's not hello that skitters through his mind as Teal'c smiles and bows his head.
It's goodbye.
- N -
The edge of the world is dark when Jack finally pulls to a stop.
He turns off the engine and stands on solid ground. His body is still thrumming a little, the vibrations of the scooter echoing in his muscles. He breathes slowly in the quiet, calming his heart that started racing for no apparent reason at all.
The cabin is small, surrounded by a coppice of pine trees. Painted customary dark red, the walls of the house are black with no outside light on. One of the white-framed windows is lit, though, and Jack can see that there are fresh footprints on the snow by the front door. A glance to the side reveals a snow scooter parked in a small driveway.
Just one.
~
A week after they came back, they were cleared for active duty.
Precisely a day and two hours later Hammond showed them the other gate.
Carter spent the following week in the mountain, catching up with the reports from the team of scientists Hammond had put on the project. She was boiling with enthusiasm, excited beyond belief and there was no stopping her.
"--a traveling Stargate, sir! It's absolutely incredible! To use, to modify the gate technology like this--"
Her eyes were bigger, and her skin was whiter. She had cut her hair, and her body regained that softness around the edges she used to have before. Her desk was littered with chocolate bar wrappings, and she licked her fingers as she pointed to the screen, showing Jack things he didn't even try to understand.
"--didn't know the true purpose of the gate, or didn't care. The point is, they figured out how it operated and they actually modified it. We don't have a lot of material yet, sir, but based on the ruins discovered on several planets in that system, we're guessing that the gate served as their interplanetary transportation device--"
The Asgard hadn't been responding, and it had taken a while to contact the Tok'ra. It had taken a longer while to procure a ship, and finally to find the correct planet, once it had been established that SG-1 hadn't made it to their original destination.
They had been declared missing, and the necessary resources had been committed to the search operation. After five months Hammond had been forced to stop.
But Teal'c had never given up his own search.
"--any place within their galaxy, except that the last thing that was transported was the gate itself! It worked as a ferry, or... or an interplanetary elevator, if you will. Now with an incoming wormhole we probably caused some kind of overload, enough for the gate to become unstable and be transported here after we went through--"
It wasn't like Edora, not even close - though he'd missed playoffs this time, too - but Jack dealt with it exactly the same as before. So there was the joy of rediscovering central heating, air conditioning, hot showers, opera and cold beer, and that was everything he needed in order to get back to normal.
At least until two weeks and a day after they came back--
"--determine what modifications were made, we would be able to use this design, maybe to create our own teleportation system! Sir, this research will push our science and technology further than we ever imagined going on our own!"
She was looking up at him, her fingers still glistening from where she licked the chocolate off her skin. Her eyes were bigger, red-rimmed with the lack of sleep, he realized, and he found he wanted--
He wanted to stand behind her and puff a breath into her ear, but he couldn't.
"I see you're glad to be home, Carter," he said instead, and she nodded, but she didn't say anything to that.
She didn't say anything, and two weeks and a day after they came back, he opened the door to find Daniel standing on the doorstep, head bare, a winter coat pulled tightly around his body. Carter was a few steps behind him, glancing around nervously, wearing a too-thin leather jacket and - of all things - high heels in two-foot snow.
They didn't say hi, didn't ask to be let in. Neither of them said a single word.
Daniel smelled of cold wind and fresh cigarettes when he passed Jack in the doorway. Carter smelled of something different, something sweet - like a night in a club, with violent lights and a few drinks too many.
Later, Daniel was speaking words with not enough consonants in them, whispering and laughing into Jack's neck, while Jack braced his hand on the shelf and tried to keep himself upright. Carter was on her knees, and he thought it was wrong somehow, because for God's sake, Carter on her knees in his hallway, but then her mouth did that wonderful thing she did only a few times before, and he forgot the reason it was wrong.
When they finally made it to the bedroom, Jack had Carter on her back, and Daniel was watching lazily from the foot of the bed, stretching like a big, sleepy cat. They kept the light low, and the blinds closed.
And later, when they were lying astride the bed and each other, Carter's head against Daniel's chest, and Daniel's head against Jack's thigh, Carter asked, with eyes half-closed and her voice just this side of sleepy.
"Daniel? This place you told us about...Where exactly is it?"
The next day, Daniel brought them the first folder.
~
Daniel opens the door after three knocks. The warmth of the room is a pleasant wave of air on Jack's face.
"Jack," Daniel says with a smile and steps aside to let him in.
The smell of the cabin is nothing like the one Jack knows from Minnesota. It's lighter, sweeter, a little cleaner somehow. Maybe it's the wood, or the fact that these houses are made from prefabricates, Jack isn't really sure. The fireplace in the corner is small but looks quite efficient. There is electricity, water, a small kitchen, and two beds by the window.
Behind him, Daniel closes the door. "So, how was the trip?"
Jack makes a face, starts unwrapping the layers of clothes. "Long. Boring. A lot of tossing around. Yours?"
"Oh, quite smooth, actually. We got here by land all the way up from Turku. Left the car in town, so we could borrow a scooter..."
Jack stops unwrapping, and Daniel stops talking.
In the expectant silence Jack turns around very slowly, and there is Daniel, grinning, that little son of a bitch. Jack tosses his gloves onto one of the beds without looking.
"Sam is outside," Daniel says, and steps closer. "She wanted to show me how one properly rides a snow scooter, and I let her, a thing I will probably regret for the rest of my life..." Closer, and Daniel is in his space now. His breath is spicy and bitter against Jack's cold nostrils. "She told me to give you something when you finally get here."
Daniel's mouth is warm and soft against Jack's, and oh yeah, it feels good, so good after the biting cold outside. Daniel is pushing a little against him, and Jack finds this obvious hunger oddly flattering, so he lets himself be kissed for a moment, while his limbs warm up slowly, his blood coursing just a little bit faster--
--until he pulls back, licking his lips, and narrows his eyes at Daniel.
Daniel is looking at him with his best innocent expression, but there is a small smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. Jack narrows his eyes a little more.
"You taste funny," he says finally.
Daniel's eyebrows shoot up. "I do?" He holds Jack's stare a little longer, and then reaches into his pocket, like he's just remembered. "Oh, it must be this." He pulls out a small box, much like a pack of cigarettes, shakes it into his palm, then holds up a small black... something up to Jack's mouth. "Want some?"
Jack sniffs the thing. On closer inspection it looks like a candy, except that it's black. Jack slowly opens his mouth and lets Daniel feed him the thing.
The taste of it melting on his tongue is pleasant at first, a little sweet, a little spicy--
--and then the salt explodes and it's worse than anything Jack has ever tasted, it's like a really, really bad tea with both sugar and salt in it, and isn't that just the worst combination of all-
"Oh fuck, Daniel!" It's all he can do not to spit it right onto the floor.
Daniel steps back from him, and he is laughing, an honest, untamed laughter, his eyes shining with tears. "Oh... oh God, Jack," he sputters between shallow breaths. "Oh God, you look even better than Sam..."
Jack scowls, manages to swallow, and then scowls even more. He knows he should be angry right now, but he can't be, not really, not when Daniel is laughing so hard. So instead he peels off his jacket and throws it over a chair. The taste of the not-candy lingers in his mouth, salty and bitter.
"What is this stuff?" he asks, looking around. There is a bottle of water on the counter, and he grabs it, grateful to wash down the salt.
Daniel is still chuckling a little, the corners of his eyes crinkling. And when Jack has finished drinking, Daniel kneels on the floor and begins to unlace Jack's boots.
"Essentially, it's ammonium chloride," he says. "It's a known poison, but harmless in this form. People around here eat tons of it every year. It's called Salmiakki. I kind of thought you should try something traditional."
Jack puts the bottle back down on the counter. "Embracing the local customs, Daniel? Thanks, but no thanks."
Daniel finishes unlacing, tugs sharply, and the boot comes off. Jack leans back against the sink.
"That's why we prepared something better for you." Daniel throws the boot under one of the beds, winks up at Jack. "And you get to lose all your clothes."
Daniel stands up then, so Jack takes the other boot off himself. He throws it under the bed as well and then pauses to watch, because Daniel has just unzipped his polar jacket and is now tugging down his pants.
Behind Daniel, on a low bench by the door, there is a small stack of towels. Jack narrows his eyes.
"Why do I feel like I'm also gonna be freezing my nuts off in that snow, later?"
Daniel only smiles at him and pulls his own pants all the way down.
The smaller cabin is near the water, close to the pier. There is no light indicating that someone is there, or that something is burning inside. An electric stove, no doubt. The frozen surface of the sea is blue-white beyond the cabin, and the air is ice-cold everywhere on Jack's skin except his face, which is still a little numb.
Daniel is making little hissing sounds, walking in that funny way, as if he were stepping on burning coal. The towel is wrapped tight around his waist, and his back is naked.
The skin over Daniel's shoulder blades is clean and smooth.
Jack stands on the doorstep for a moment, getting used to the cold, and then steps into the snow and follows silently in Daniel's footsteps.
The blast of heat when Daniel opens the door to the small cabin is like a hot, heavy blanket hitting them both in the face, and it's not even the main room yet. Inside, beyond the steamed glass door, Carter is already lying on the upper shelf, her feet propped against the wall. She turns her head when they enter and throws Jack a lazy salute. He smiles back a greeting.
"You want to start from the bottom," Daniel says, discarding the towel and reaching for the wooden bucket with a scoop in it. He pours some water onto a shelf, and only then he sits, careful not to touch anything but the sodden wood.
The seat is burning hot to the touch, so Jack follows Daniel's example, first pouring the water and then sitting on the shelf below Carter's.
It's difficult to breathe at first, and almost impossible to talk. The thermometer on the wall indicates an eighty, and Jack has an awkward moment until he realizes that of course, it's Celsius around here. He ducks his head low, where the air feels less scorching, so he can take a breath and not pass out from the heat.
A hand touches his arm, fingers stroking across his shoulders.
"How was the trip, sir?"
Jack leans back into the touch. He's already found a way to breathe efficiently, small, careful breaths, his lips and tongue lessening the heat before it flows into his lungs.
"Bumpy," he says, and then, "Yeah, right," he hears Daniel mutter.
"Stop complaining or you won't get dinner," Carter snaps, but Jack can hear the smile in her voice. Then her calf bumps against Jack's shoulder. "And speaking of dinner, I should go warm it up."
Jack traces her leg with his fingers, then her arm, her shoulder, her neck, and she's sitting beside him, leaning in to kiss him lightly on the cheek.
"What are we having?" Jack asks.
"Pea soup," she smiles in answer, and then climbs over him to get to the door.
"Pea soup?" And then, because he suspects something else is at play here. "Daniel?"
Daniel is chuckling from his bench. He has already leaned back against the wall, and from the looks of things, made himself comfortable enough to switch into lecture mode. "Jack, you can't come to this place and not have pea soup. It's an integral part of the cuisine in this region--"
"Daniel," Jack interrupts, scowling. "You don't want to give me pea soup."
"--and, since there is quite a long fishing tradition in the area, everyone has a boathouse," Daniel finishes smoothly. He pauses, blinks innocently at Jack. "There's no heating, but we can get you a blanket."
Carter laughs from behind the glass.
"We'll consider ourselves forewarned, sir," she throws over her shoulder, and then opens the door and steps into the cold with a yelp of delight. A wave of cool air sweeps over Jack's legs, so he props his feet on the opposite shelf, beside Daniel.
Daniel is still smiling that amused little smile, but his eyes have turned serious, and Jack thinks he should say something, something along the lines of a Thank you, perhaps.
"Teal'c says hello," he says instead. And then, because it sounds empty, that statement alone, "I promised to bring him a reindeer hat."
Daniel nods, but he doesn't say anything. He leans forward on his bench, reaching for the scoop to pour some water onto the stones, and as the steam bursts towards the wooden ceiling, and a wave of humid heat descends onto their shoulders, Jack closes his eyes.
Outside, Carter is humming a tune on her way to the house, and all around, the world is sleeping.
~*~
December 2004 / February 2005 / September 2005
Notes:
For agentotter, because I promised it would be.
The Raippaluoto bridge exists and is quite well.
Beta readers:
Many thanks here go to the wonderful ev_vy, fabulous tafkarfanfic and amazing paian.
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