Au  Revoir not Goodbye

 

                       

 

Silence.

As Daniel, or whatever it was he had become, left, he left behind him a stunned silence. For a while they all stood, staring at the point in the ceiling where he had exited, transfixed by – nothing.

 

Janet was the first to come out of the trance. She turned and switched off the monitor. Then stood, hands resting on top of the machine, staring at the floor. She let out a great shuddering sigh, and then spoke.

 

“You knew Colonel…how?” Jack shook his head and swallowed a couple of times.

“I don’t… know. I felt someone touch me on the shoulder and...he…Daniel…he… was there…asking me to let him go...to get Jacob to stop…Oma…”

“Oma Desala?” Teal’c looked at Jack.

“Yes…she was there…he said her name before…earlier…. she’s been with him all along…” Another silence descended on the group, broken only by a single sob from Sam.

 

“Sam?” Jacob looked at his daughter, concerned. She stood, tears pouring down her face. Jacob pulled his daughter towards him and wrapped her in his arms, trying to comfort her.

“Oh God…Daniel…” Jacob remained silent, just held her tightly her while she stood and sobbed in her grief.

 

Teal’c spoke.

“Did Daniel Jackson say anything else, O’Neill?”

“That he’d miss us.”  Jack suddenly shook his head, turned and left the room. Teal’c started to follow, but Hammond grabbed his arm and shook his head.

“Let him go son. He needs time…you all do.” He drew himself up. “I’d better go…write a report…” He left the room.

Teal’c hadn’t moved. He still stood staring at the doorway where Jack had left. Without turning round, he spoke. His voice wavered slightly.

“I need to perform Kel’noreem.”  With that he left the room.

Janet was still staring at the floor in front of the monitor. She looked up and smiled at Jacob, but her top lip felt wobbly.

“I’ll…tidy up later.” She slipped out silently, leaving the two alone.

 

Jack strode through the corridors, unsure where he was going, until he got there. Daniel’s lab. He stood in the doorway. It looked like Daniel had just left for a moment – gone to the commissary for a coffee refill perhaps. The light was still on, the desk littered with Daniel’s notes from the translation he was in the middle of when they had gone on that mission…Daniel’s last mission. Daniel’s last translation.

Jack stepped into the office and sat down in Daniel’s chair. How many times over the years had Daniel come into his office, refilled coffee cup in his hands, to find Jack waiting for him, just like that? Only he wasn’t going to come back this time – he was gone.

Jack let out a disgusted snort. His best friend had just left, possibly forever, and he had managed to tell him that he “admired” him. Daniel had understood what he was trying to say, but even at the end, in that strange place, he still hadn’t managed to tell him how much he really cared. Sam had. Teal’c had. But not him. Not Jack. Not after all that they’d been through together, how long they’d known each other.

Perhaps it was because their friendship had taken some knocks recently. Daniel had said that he’d understood why Jack had shot Reece, but somehow Jack knew that Daniel hadn’t managed to move that understanding into recognition of why it had been the right thing to do. Not that Jack had acknowledged that it might not have been the right thing to do. In the past they might have got together over a beer and thrashed it out until they each could recognise the other’s point of view, but ever since Jack had come up with that line about their friendship not having any foundation, they hadn’t been anywhere near as close. Daniel had struck back with his “we drew straws” response, but he had been hurt, and Jack knew it. Daniel had withdrawn – everything the same on the surface, but the deeper connection between the two of them had been severed, and now it was lost forever.

Jack sat alone, staring at pieces of paper covered in Daniel’s familiar scrawl, hurting. He picked up the picture that sat on Daniel’s desk of Daniel sat on a camel in front of the great pyramid at Giza. Finally, a lone tear escaped, and tracked down his cheek.

“I did care Daniel. More than you ever knew” he whispered into the silence.

 

 

Back in the infirmary, Jacob released Sam from their tight embrace. She had stopped crying a while back, but hadn’t loosened her hold on her father. Once she had stopped hanging on so tightly, Jacob felt safe to step back.

“You okay Sam?”

“No. Not really.” She wiped her hand over her face. Looking around, she realised they were alone. “Where’s everyone?”

“They all need time alone, to think over what’s happened.” Sam nodded.

“Dad. Will you stay awhile? Stay at my place?”

“Of course I will honey. I’ll just have to let George know…will you be okay if I leave you?”

“Yes. I just want to tidy up a couple of things before I go home. I’ll meet you in my lab in a while…?” Jacob nodded, patted his daughter’s arm, and the two of them left the room, leaving an empty bed with rumpled sheets behind them.

 

 

Sam walked into her lab, leaving the lights off. The screen from her PC was the only source of light in the room. She glanced at the screen, and saw the ‘new message’ box. Opening her email, there was one new message – but it had no title, and no details as to who sent it. Curious, she opened it.

 

“I always knew. Love you too. Dx”

 

 

 * fin *

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Athene