#4 in the Life's Little Problems Series
Color Outside the Lines A Little!Danny fic by: Maj. Cliffhanger
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Part 2
"Whoa...." The younger of the two Dixon boys was quite ebullient in his appreciation of Daniel's bedroom with it's Egyptian mural and trappings. The older boy appeared momentarily impressed as well, before he masked the look behind a more 'mature' facade, feigning indifference. He closed the door behind them, knowing his father and 'Mitchell' needed to talk about work.
"This is so cool!" Jason continued, glancing around in envy.
Andy's eyes were caught by the computer and his careful facade was immediately threatened. "You've got your own computer?"
Daniel nodded and easily moved forward to turn it on. He frowned and paused suddenly before inputting his password – not because he was afraid of letting them see it, 'though that was a concern as well; no, he paused because he suddenly realized some of the information he had on the system might be considered classified. The other kids probably wouldn't know what it was, let alone understand it, but he still didn't want them messing with it. The really critical stuff was encrypted behind a secondary password but he didn't want to take any chances.
He bit his lip as he debated what to do.
"'Did your dad maybe write your password inside your owner's manual or something?" Andy suggested. "Mom always does that with her system. Or writes it on a piece of paper and tapes it to the bottom of the keyboard." The older boy lifted the keyboard to check.
Writing down an administrative password and putting it somewhere anyone could find was just stupid, Danny thought, but he didn't say it aloud.
"It was probably something easy to remember," Andy prompted him. "Like your birthday or maybe a pet's name?"
Daniel's password was a properly randomized mix of upper and lowercase letters and numbers, carefully memorized – or, more accurately, re-memorized after Sam hacked it for him. He frowned in thought realizing that Sam had also set up his system in the first place, which meant she might have installed a secondary guest area with limited permissions already....
He deftly typed in the word 'guest', which was used at the SGC for non-critical computer access and - voila! He needed to thank Sam again for being so smart. He grinned and quickly checked the menu to see what was accessible. It wasn't much, which was good. He pulled up one of the computer games Mitchell had insisted he get earlier in the week.
"Cool!" Andy declared. "'Can I?" he asked, practically drooling to get at the system.
It was safe enough as long as they were in the guest area, Danny decided. With a shrug, he slipped out of the chair and let the older boy take his place. Jason looked like he was more interested in one of the military action figures Jack had brought with him. He had four. They were all heavy sculpted plastic and not the typical GI-Joe thing – more collector type pieces – except for the Barbie done up in dress blues. Her hair had been carefully cut to resemble Sam's. The rest of them were done up in various combat uniforms. Mitchell had been upset that he wasn't represented and claimed he was going to go online to find a doll to 'complete' Daniel's collection. None of them actually looked very much like SG-1 – the one that was supposed to be Jack looked more like Jonas, and Teal'c's figure was too skinny - but that didn't matter. He thought they were great anyway.
"This one looks like my dad," Jason said, running a gentle finger over the one that was supposed to be Daniel's adult-self. It did look more like Dixon then him – or at least the 'him' he seemed to remember. Action figures didn't come with long hair and glasses. "He's not paralyzed or anything, you know," the other boy continued. "He was for a little bit at first but he's going to be fine now. He's a colonel in the Air Force and got hurt when some equipment he was working with exploded or something." He nodded firmly to himself as he continued to stare at the doll. "He's going to be fine," he insisted.
Danny didn't miss the silent fear that the stubborn words were meant to mask. "You can play with it, if you want," he offered kindly. It must be really scary not to be sure if your father would ever walk again.
The boy picked up the doll and held it tight. He swallowed after along moment and suddenly turned to Daniel, banishing whatever dark thoughts were haunting him. "Want to play Alpha Force Recon?"
Danny had no idea what the kid was talking about but it sounded military. It didn't sound as much fun as pretending he was on a dig with his parents, but he could pretend it was an undercover mission for SG-1 instead. It was nice to have someone his own age to play with for a change. He shrugged and nodded, picking up the 'Jack' doll. "Sure," he agreed.
* * *
Kvasir, of course, came straight to the point. "As expected, we have confirmed that the device discovered by doctors Jackson and Lee is indeed capable of performing various functions beyond the earlier observed ability to reanimate dead tissue and the apparent ability to heal; the latter function being fostered by the unsubstantiated belief that the Goa'uld sarcophagi are based on this technology - a function, which I must hasten to add, we have yet to duplicate."
"The connection between Tel'chak's device and the Goa'uld sarcophagi is well known and not in question," Delek insisted, sounding as if it were something that he'd been forced to repeat many times over the last several days.
"Perhaps it should be."
Delek rolled his eyes and threw up his hands.
"Although the energy traces taken from victims of Goa'uld sarcophagi are similar in certain respects to that produced by the device, there are significant differences. It is quite obvious the Ancients never intended for their creation to be used on a more primitive humanoid life form."
Jack rolled his eyes. 'Here we go with the 'primitive' again!
"No one is arguing the fact that the sarcophagus was specifically engineered to modify the energy output so it could be used on humans--"
"—Which presumes that the discovery of the Ancient device fueled the creation of the sarcophagus," Kvasir interrupted. "Historical evidence clearly indicates that the Unas--"
"—Had a device similar to a sarcophagus long before Tel'chak discovered his device. I know!" Delek sighed. "We've been over this."
"It is your continued refusal to acknowledge simple fact which forces me to repeat myself," Kvasir rejoined haughtily, making the Tok'ra grind his teeth.
"Gentlemen!" Landry quickly interrupted the argument before it could escalate to physical violence – too bad, Jack thought; he'd have enjoyed seeing the irritating little schmuck of an Asgard taken down a notch or two. "I think we're getting off track here."
"Not really," Delek sighed again. "It is my belief that we should abandon further study of the device as being too dangerous and find a Goa'uld sarcophagus to study instead--"
"--Which would be a patent waste of time," Kvasir interrupted stridently – or as stridently as any Asgard was capable! "The Goa'uld sarcophagus is inherently flawed. One does not use a damaged tool to repair a broken human."
"At least it's a tool that was designed for use on humans!" Delek countered swiftly.
"It is not the tool used to transform Dr. Jackson," Kvasir rejoined patiently.
This was getting them nowhere fast. Jack lifted his hands for a moment. "Whoa!" he ordered sharply. "Enough!" A warning glare kept the Tok'ra from responding to Kvasir's latest barb. "Bottom line: what have you learned to help Daniel?"
"Nothing," Kvasir answered bluntly.
"We're still trying to figure out how the transformation was accomplished," Delek added a little more helpfully. "The argument now is how to continue doing that. Whether to keep experimenting with a dangerous technology we really don't understand, or to find a similar technology that we do, flawed or not." He offered the Asgard a dark frown.
Jack ignored the look. "The Tok'ra have been studying this device for months. Now, all of a sudden, you're saying it's too dangerous?"
"Our previous studies had been limited to translating the Ancient text upon the device and trying to understand it's physical construction without actually turning it on," Delek answered. "The dialect was quite old and obscure. Unfortunately, it didn't tell us much - leaving us little choice now but to experiment with different settings ... with disastrous results."
Landry frowned. "Disastrous?" he echoed.
Delek grimaced. "One of my assistants was in the room setting up an experiment with mice when the device was turned on by accident. The resultant energy burst caused his eyes to disappear."
"Disappear?" Jack's turn.
Lam sat forward in disbelief. "You're talking about more than blindness caused by the sudden emergence of cataracts or the severing of the optic nerve here, right?"
"It is as if he never possessed ocular organs," Kvasir specified with a nod and turned to Delek. "But, as I have already informed the Tok'ra, I have altered the remote control in such a way that it cannot be triggered by accident again."
"That doesn't help Lor'ak or Truren," Delek argued.
Carter interrupted in surprise. "The symbiote lost its eyes too?"
"As did the mice," Kvasir admitted.
Dr. Lee leaned forward in morbid curiosity. "Did the organs simply vanish from the eye sockets or did the eye sockets vanish as well?"
Jack again lifted his hands. "Uh, uh, uh, uh!" he exclaimed, waving everyone to silence. "This is a briefing, not a verbal debate of everything we do and do not know. Do we all understand what the word 'brief' means?" he asked clearly, being sure to make eye contact with each person at the table to emphasize his point. Teal'c, of course, hadn't said anything so far so merely returned his momentary glance with a nod as if to say 'thank you!'
"Back to why we're here." Jack chose to focus on the Tokra simply because Kvasir was so irritating. Of course, Delek wasn't far behind. "You want to play with a sarcophagus," he surmised. "I don't suppose the Tok'ra happen to know of where one is just laying around unused and unguarded that we can simply pick up for you, do they?" he asked sarcastically.
Delek frowned irritably again. "I might if the Jaffa who keep finding such would refrain from destroying them on sight!" He cast Teal'c a disgusted look as if personally blaming him for the Free Jaffa's rampage against the remnants of their old masters. Teal'c lifted his right brow but otherwise didn't deign to respond.
"The study of such flawed technology is pointless!" Kvasir repeated pedantically. "Such a course of action will only lead the research to equally flawed conclusions – ultimately endangering Dr. Jackson, not helping him."
"And what makes the sarcophagus so flawed?" Jack frowned, then amended the question with a wave of his hand. "Aside from the whole destroying your soul bit, of course." He winced as he heard himself; as if that wasn't enough?
"It does more than 'destroy the soul' or even simply heal the host and symbiote of injuries, O'Neill," Kvasir answered. "It is my belief that the sarcophagus is also responsible for rewriting basic Goa'uld genetics."
Delek rolled his eyes. "I wish!" he replied. "The Tok'ra and Goa'uld are descended from the same genetic tree, Kvasir. As much as it pains me to admit it, our DNA is the same. We choose not to use the sarcophagus because of its deleterious effects on the host – not because it does anything to our DNA."
"I suspect the changes are subtle," Kvasir argued. "When was the last time your scientists conducted a broad range DNA comparison between your two peoples?"
Jack again quickly intervened, all too easily seeing where this was heading. "Uh, uh, uh, uh!!!" he interjected again, lifting a hand to silence Delek before he could answer. He then turned back to Kvasir. "Briefly!" he repeated. "What's wrong with the sarcophagus?"
"I do not know--"
Jack grit his teeth and fought the urge to wring one little gray neck!
"--but the evidence that something is wrong is undeniable."
"What evidence?" Delek pounced, his patience stretched even farther than Jack's.
"Simply: Ra was over ten thousand years old when the Tauri killed him, correct?"
Delek shook his head and shrugged in exasperation. "Closer to twelve, we think; why?'
Kvasir noted the information with a nod. "And in all that time, he never took another host."
"Human host, you mean," the Tok'ra allowed. "He was the one who started the migration away from the Unas."
"Why?" Kvasir asked pointedly.
"Because, despite the Unas' great strength and own regenerative powers, the use of the sarcophagus meant that the human host was easier to repair."
"Goa'uld 101 here, Kvasir," Jack interjected again. "Your point?"
"Ra's sarcophagus was different than that of other Goa'uld."
"You're saying he had an Unas sarcophagus?"
"No," Kvasir denied. "I am saying that the technology he passed on to his children was purposely flawed. Lord Yu proves this."
Jack was getting a headache! "Come again?"
"Lord Yu may have been the oldest of the System Lords at the time he was killed by replicators, but he was considerably younger than Ra. If Lord Yu's sarcophagus were the same as Ra's, he should have been as healthy and vital – yet he suffered from senility and had reached the point where he could no longer take a new host."
"You're saying Ra purposely sabotaged the technology to keep the other Goa'uld from usurping his power?" Dr. Lee surmised in surprise.
"Goa'uld genetic memory is passed through the maternal line," Kvasir pointed out. "He had only to pass on the misinformation to his Queen at the time."
"Hathor." Jack grimaced as if simply saying the name left a bad taste in his mouth.
Kvasir offered him an understanding nod. "One cannot blame him for failing to trust her."
No one at the table could argue that.
"Okay..." Jack allowed after a long moment and reached up to rub at his left temple as he thought. "So ... the two of you can't agree on anything. That about it?"
"We agree that a device very similar to that which we are presently studying was used to transform Daniel Jackson into a child." Kvasir naturally had to correct this too generalized statement. "The idea of experimenting with something else does not make sense to me."
"You weren't the one who lost your eyes!" Delek answered.
"Fine!" Jack interrupted pointedly. "This is what we do: You--" he turned back to Delek, "--ask your Tok'ra buddies to find you a sarcophagus you can play with – Maybe ask the Jaffa very nicely to help out as well, instead of berating them all the time! – and, in the meantime," he added firmly, "you keep working with what you've got!" He sat back in his chair and folded his arms. "See? That wasn't hard, was it? Oh, yeah!" He sat forward again to slap his hands on the table in front of him, more than impatient with the childish squabbling that was apparently keeping everything stalled. "And since you two obviously need a babysitter in order to get anything done, Carter's in charge! Understood?"
Kvasir blinked overly large black eyes in surprise. "I do not see how that will improve the current situation."
"I don't care!"
Landry's hand came down on Jack's shoulder, keeping him from actually rising from his chair. The other general turned his eyes back to Kvasir and Delek. "I'm sure you don't want us having to tell the Tok'ra High Council or Asgard High Command how the two of you have completely failed to cooperate with each other and thus failed to make any headway whatsoever in this matter now, do you?"
His words were delivered in a calm but deadly cold voice that would brook no argument.
"The treaties between our respective governments gives us clear ownership of the device in question," he continued easily, "and, therefore, the right to oversee everything that is being done. Legally, we can take it back anytime we want, but something tells me you'd both be in a little bit of hot water if we did."
The Tok'ra sat back in his chair, glaring a hole through the tabletop. "Additional precautions must be put in place before the Tok'ra will continue to work with the device," he declared adamantly and then turned his glare on Kvasir. "And the Asgard must be more forthcoming with their own research and analysis. We cannot continue to operate in a knowledge vacuum wherein he thinks he knows better than everyone else!"
"I do," Kavsir insisted calmly.
Landry shook his head. "As a great man once said, 'Knowledge alone is not enough to get desired results. You must have the ability to teach and to motivate. This defines a great leader.'"
Jack frowned, suddenly becoming the picture of calm pensiveness. "Roosevelt?" he guessed.
"John Wooden, basketball Hall of Fame," Landry supplied with a slight smirk.
"Ah." Jack nodded, pretending a familiarity he didn't have. He was more a hockey man himself.
"Point is," Landry continued, "I don't care how many brains you think you've got, you're not getting the job done. Either one of you! Therefore, Lieutenant Colonel Carter will relocate to the Omega Site effective immediately. You have a problem with each other, take it up with her; but her decision is law. Keep fighting about everything and we'll ask that you be replaced. Any questions?"
He smiled pleasantly as the question was met with silence.