Thoughts of Daniel – Jack O'Neill
by Maureen Thayer

Categories: Thoughts, Angst
Rating: PG
Content Warning: Mild Profanity
Spoilers: Stargate the Movie, Children of the Gods, The Broca Divide, Fire and Water, Meridian, Abyss, Full Circle, Fallen/Homecoming
Author's Notes: The first in a series of inner thought fanfics about Daniel Jackson. So far, only Jack's and Sam's have been written, but I eventually plan on writing ones from Teal'c's, Janet's and General Hammond's POV's. This one takes place around the middle of Season Seven, before Evolution.

The first time I saw him, the word that popped into my mind was "dweeb".  There he was, wire-rimmed glasses, long, shaggy hair hanging over his eyes, looking totally bewildered and confused when I came in and told everyone that the project had just been made classified and need-to-know.  At the time, I hadn't read the dossier on Daniel Jackson since he had only just been brought in on the project.  My opinion didn't change after I had read it.  Yes, he was obviously brilliant.  Multiple PhD's, fluent in twenty-three languages, but he was still a dweeb, a smart dweeb, but a dweeb nonetheless.

I have to admit that I was grudgingly impressed when, in only two weeks, that dweeb came up with the answer that Catherine Langford and her team had been unable to find after two years.  Even so, I was not happy when General West decided to allow Daniel to come with us through the Stargate.  What in the hell was I going to do with a geeky, way too smart scientist who'd probably accidentally shoot himself in the foot if he came anywhere near a firearm?  I hate scientists.  A pain in the ass, one and all.  I thought for sure that, if we did run into trouble, this particular scientist would prove to be the proverbial albatross around my neck.

Boy, was I ever wrong.

From the moment that things went bad, he showed me a completely different side of his character, one that I'd never have believed existed.  He died for me.  That long-haired, bespectacled, allergy-ridden geek deliberately threw himself in front of a staff weapon blast that was meant for me.  Afterwards, when Ra's men tossed me into that water-filled pit with the surviving members of my team and Kawalsky asked me where Daniel was, I couldn't answer for a moment.  I was still in shock over what had happened.  The man I'd labeled a dweeb had just done what many trained soldiers wouldn't have had the guts to do.  When I told my men what had happened, they were all as stunned as I was.  I could tell that both Kawalsky and Ferretti were regretting how they'd treated Daniel.  He had died as bravely as any soldier, and he deserved to be honored as such.

Then I received my second shock when I saw Daniel alive and uninjured.  I didn't have a lot of time to ponder on how the archeologist could possibly be alive since it looked like the rest of us were going to be dead very soon by his hands.  I could tell that Daniel didn't want to shoot us.  I could see it in his eyes as he approached us with that staff weapon.  But I also knew that he had no choice.  Ra was forcing him to kill us.  Though I didn't know for sure, I'd guessed that Ra had given Daniel the choice of either killing us or watching as Ra's men killed everyone else.  He really didn't have a choice.  Oops.  Wrong again.  Damned if that dweeb didn't turn Ra's own weapon against him and help us and the people of Abydos escape.

Throughout the events that followed, Daniel showed that underneath the geeky exterior was a core of iron, a strength and courage that belied his outward appearance.  He never panicked, never once even showed fear.  In fact, he leapt into situations that many soldiers wouldn't have, like when he grabbed Sha're's body and ringed up alone to Ra's ship so that he could put her in the sarcophagus, risking his life for her even though they'd only known each other for a few hours.  Of course, at the time, I didn't know that they were married.

But there was something else about Daniel as well, something that wormed its way into the yawning chasm where my heart used to be and somehow found there a tiny spark that still wanted to live, to survive.  And that's what shocked me most of all, that this man whom I wouldn't have looked twice at under normal circumstances had somehow managed to do what no one else could.  He helped give my life and my will to survive back to me.

It's been around seven and a half years since the day I said goodbye to Daniel Jackson on Abydos and walked back through the Stargate to tell everyone that he was dead.  That day, I was positive that I'd never see him again, but life has a funny way of throwing all kinds of surprises our way.  A year later, there he was again.  He didn't look quite so geeky this time.  His hair no longer hung into his eyes, and there was more of an air of quiet self-confidence about him.  Even so, I was not going to let him get past my barricades again.  No way, no how.  Not gonna happen.

So much for my resolve.

But then, how could I have guessed back then that Daniel Jackson would become the best friend I've ever had, that that dweeb would turn out to be the strongest, most courageous, most amazing person I have ever met?  I was wrong before when I said that Daniel had a core of iron.  It's made of solid Naquadah.  That indestructible core was formed over a lifetime of loss and pain, enabling him to survive witnessing the death of his parents, the rejection of his only other living relative, a childhood spent bouncing from foster home to foster home, the ridicule of his peers, and the loss of his reputation and career.  Later, it saw him through madness at the hands of an alien device, addiction to another alien device, the violation of both his mind and his body, and pain and death more horrible – and more frequent – than most people could imagine.  That inner strength carried him through the loss of his wife, his brother-in-law, a good friend, a woman he had once loved, and, finally, the destruction of the world that had been his home for a year, along with the race of people whom he had loved and called family.  Through it all, he has somehow managed to carry on, to keep right on fighting, to not let it break him.  How many people could go through all that without totally losing it?  I know for a certainty that I couldn't.

And what makes it even more amazing is the fact that Daniel actually made it through all that without losing his principles, his sense of honor and morality, his desire to do the right thing no matter what the cost.  Daniel has suffered through more things than any ten men should have to go through, yet his moral compass never wavers.  No matter how horribly he's treated, he is still willing to hold his hand out in friendship to almost anyone, including an enemy.  I swear that when God was handing out the qualities of forgiveness and mercy, He must have given Daniel more than what you'd find in a hundred other people put together.  He has more compassion, empathy and understanding than I'd ever have thought possible.  He is a far better man than I could ever hope to be.

And he is so damn smart it's scary.  I swear he makes my head spin sometimes.  I don't even try to keep up with him.  He's got so much knowledge crammed into that brain of his that I honestly don't know what keeps it from bursting open from the pressure.  But it's a whole lot more than knowledge that makes Daniel so smart.  His ability to see things that the rest of us mere mortals don't have a clue about is beyond belief.  Without any effort at all, he can make these intuitive leaps of logic that leave the rest of us way, way behind, stumbling to catch up.  I'd shoot myself before I'd ever admit this aloud but I felt more than a little satisfaction when Daniel won that battle of the brain cells against Carter during their argument about whether or not the gate traveled to other planets besides Abydos.  There was Carter, the astrophysicist, the one who was supposed to know all about that kind of stuff, being reminded about stellar drift by an archeologist.  Sweet.  Fortunately, she wasn't the least bit resentful or angry about it.  In fact, she actually looked pleased, probably because she'd figured out that Daniel was her equal in regards to brain power and wouldn't have to talk down to him, unlike she does with the rest of us poor, dumb slobs.  She's probably delighted by the fact that Daniel doesn't blow a mental fuse whenever she starts speaking all that technobabble, even if it isn't his field of expertise.

I said before that Daniel was the best friend that I've ever had, and that's true.  Despite the fact that we have almost nothing in common in regards to our personalities and lifestyles, somehow, someway, Daniel Jackson burst right through all those emotional barriers that I'd erected and implanted himself deep in my heart.  I didn't even figure out what was happening until it was way too late to rebuild the walls and keep him out.

The first time I began to realize that I really cared about Daniel was when the Touched grabbed him on P3X-797.  I was really worried about him.  I hated the idea of what those beast men might be doing to him, and I was bitterly ashamed of how I'd hurt him.  Nothing was going to keep me from finding him and getting him out of there.  In the months that followed, there were several times when my heart told me that Daniel was more to me than just a teammate.  But the thing that really woke me up to the truth of my feelings was when I thought that Daniel was dead.  God, even now, years later, the image of him burning to death, calling out to me for help, haunts my nightmares.  I didn't think that any pain could even come close to what I felt when Charlie died.  Was I ever wrong.  I felt like my heart had been ripped open.  The days and nights that followed were an unending torment.  I'd finally realized that I had come to love Daniel like a brother and a friend, and, now, he was gone.  Thank God it was all a fabrication on the part of that fish guy, Nem.  I really think that I would have retired if it had been real.

A lot of years have passed since then, and, as much as I hate to admit it, our friendship has gone through a whole lot of rough spots.  There have been times when I really didn't like him much, times when I was so angry with him that I wanted to punch his light out.  I mean, the guy could try the patience of Mother Teresa, even now that she's dead.  He is forever getting into trouble, rarely knows when to shut up and let us soldier types handle a situation, and he continually insists on defying me, disobeying my orders whenever they go against what he thinks is the way things should be done.  I admire the man's sense of morality, but, for cryin' out loud, does he have to be so damn stubborn about it?  Can't he give even an inch?  No, he can't, not when it comes to that.  He cannot, will not, ever sacrifice his principles, that undying belief that might does not make right.  He will forever seek to do what is just, to hold his hand out in friendship to those we encounter, even if it gets bitten off in the process.

When we had the memorial service for Daniel after thinking he'd died on Nem's planet, I called him our conscience.  It was true then, and it still is.  The difference is that I had more patience back then.  Over the years, my patience has worn thin.  With increasing frequency, I felt anger whenever Daniel did his "we come in peace" act or, worse, gave his "it may be what you want to do, but it's not the right thing to do" speech.  There were a few times when I got so mad that I was just a hair's breadth away from doing something violent to him.

My increasingly short temper toward Daniel and my growing unwillingness to hear him out did a number on our friendship.  We began sniping at each other with increasing regularity.  I know that Daniel did it mostly out of frustration and hurt feelings.  I don't think he ever understood why I was becoming such a jerk toward him.  I couldn't explain to him that I was angry, that the strain of fighting a war against insurmountable odds was taking its toll on me.  So many good people lost, so much blood and pain, so many times that we've had to watch the enemy escape and kill more innocents.  I realized a long time ago that this was a war we could never win without help and without some really big weapons.  So, yes, whenever the opportunity comes to grab technology that we can use against the Goa'uld, you bet I'm going to do what's necessary in order to get it.  If I sometimes have to do something that may not be morally right to achieve my goals to protect the human race, then that's what I'll do.  We're at war against an enemy of superior strength and numbers.  Sacrifices have to be made.  The last thing I wanted was someone telling me that there was another way, that violence wasn't always the right course of action.  I didn't want someone reminding me of what's right and wrong.

And what really ticked me off was that, way down deep inside me, I knew that he was right, that if winning a war meant sacrificing your honor and morality, then it wasn't truly a victory.  I'd learned all too well the price than comes with that kind of victory when I was in Black Ops.  I still despise myself for some of the things I was forced to do back then.

So, there Daniel was, a man who had suffered far more at the hands of the Goa'uld than I ever did yet never sacrificed his morality, a man who somehow managed to fight right alongside the rest of us without losing even a shred of his decency and humanity.  I have to tell you.  It's pretty hard on the ego of a career soldier to realize that a bespectacled scientist has more inner strength and is a far better man than he is.

And there was something else I couldn't tell him, the other reason for my increasing antagonism toward him.  I couldn't admit that I'd come to care about him too much, that I was scared.  I was afraid that I was going to lose him like I lost Charlie, and, in my stupidity, I started driving him away, distancing myself from him so that, if something did happen to him, it wouldn't hurt so much.

It didn't work.

There were so many times when Daniel crossed the line between life and death, somehow making it back every time.  So many times we had thought him gone forever, only to find out that the old "Daniel Jackson has more lives than a cat" factor was still going strong.  But when Carter revealed the gut-wrenching truth that Daniel had been exposed to a lethal dose of radiation and Janet confirmed that there was nothing she could do to save him, I knew that Daniel's luck had finally run out.  We were really going to lose him this time.  There were no more rabbits that could be pulled out of any hats.

As I watched him slowly die in horrible torment while our government chose to allow him to be used as a scapegoat in order to maintain a good relationship with Kelowna, I was filled with so much anger that I struck out at just about everyone, especially Jonas Quinn and his fellow Kelownans.  There was no way in hell that I was going to let Daniel's name be dragged through the mud, allow him to be blamed for something he didn't do.  I was willing to do anything and everything to make sure that he died with the status of a hero that he deserved.  That was one time that I didn't give a damn what military and technological advantages could be gained.

But underneath all that anger and righteous indignation was a grief so deep that I felt as if my soul had been ripped out of my body and torn to shreds.  The man I still considered to be my best friend was going to die, and I was helpless to stop it.  It was then that it really hit me how stupid, how utterly foolish I'd been.  Daniel was the finest friend that anyone could ever hope to have, and I'd never even told him how much I cared.  Instead, I'd repeatedly ignored his advice, denigrated him, and tried to make him be untrue to himself.  The shame that hit me then was so powerful it nearly brought me to my knees.  It and the grief were too much to bear.  I couldn't handle it.  I didn't know how to deal with it so I shoved it way down deep inside me.  I never let it show.  By the time I came to Daniel, I'd managed to stuff all my feelings into that dark little corner of my heart where I kept my grief over Charlie.  I knew that if I let them out, I'd completely break down, and Colonel Jack O'Neill could not let that happen.  Dear God.  I knew that it was probably the last time I'd ever get to talk to Daniel, but I just couldn't let him see the true depth of my feelings for him.  I couldn't even tell him I was sorry.  My damn, stupid pride wouldn't let me show him my pain.  What did I tell him instead?  That I admired him.  Admired him!  And I couldn't even say that with any conviction.  How utterly pathetic.  What kind of friend am I?  If our situation had been reversed, I know that Daniel would have poured his heart out to me.  He'd have told me how much he cared.  But I couldn't, I just couldn't.  Though, in the end, I succeeded in saving Daniel's reputation and keeping his name unblemished, I still failed him as a friend.

But, once again, Daniel defied the odds, this time with the help of one Oma Desala, glowy lady and lightning thrower extraordinaire.  What she offered to Daniel was the opportunity to ascend to a higher plane of existence, to be given immortal life, great power and vast knowledge.  Though his physical body would cease to exist, his mind and spirit would live on in another form, one that would never know sickness or death.  Wow, what a deal.  By the time the moment of the big decision came, Jacob had shown up and was attempting to heal Daniel, but even he knew that there was little hope that Daniel would ever be whole again.  And so, Daniel chose to leave behind his mortal body and go be one with the universe, or whatever it is that those glowworms do all day.

As Daniel and I said what I thought would be our final goodbyes and I watched him disappear through that Stargate on an alternate plane of existence, I felt a deep hollowness take hold of me.  I felt empty, shattered.  Daniel was going to live on in another form, but he might as well have been truly dead.  In my heart, it was like he was dead.  And, in that moment, a part of me died, too.

The year that followed was hell.  I did my job, I remained the good little soldier, but most of the joy was gone.  Oh, I put on a good act.  Jack O'Neill is nothing if not a great actor.  I never let anyone see that a big part of me was dead inside.  And that Jonas kid?  Well, it took a while, but I eventually stopped seeing him as a piss poor replacement for Daniel and began to respect him for his own talents.  He could never come close to equaling Daniel, neither on the job nor in my heart, but he did the best that he could, and he was a good man.

When Daniel came to me on Baal ship, dressed in that oh so fashionable creme sweater, I honestly thought I'd flipped out.  No matter how much he insisted that he was really there, I didn't believe it, couldn't believe it.  Why?  Because I'd managed to bury my grief over Daniel's loss, and I was afraid that, if I accepted that he really was there, the walls around my heart would crack wide open.  No, actually, I was afraid that, if I did accept the reality of him then found out later that he really was a figment of my imagination, the crushing disappointment would shatter my self-control.  I was afraid to hope.

But Daniel, being his usual he-could-convince-a-deaf-man-to-buy-tickets-to-the-opera self, managed to make me believe in him.  Of course, then, I became furious that he wouldn't use some of those cool powers of his and get me the hell out of there.  All he could do was offer me ascension, which I didn't want.  He wouldn't even help me die when things got too hard for me.  Yet, despite my anger and refusal to cooperate with him, he stayed with me.  He didn't leave me alone.  His presence saved my sanity in those last hours.  And, though I have no proof of it, I have a sneaking suspicion that he had something to do with getting me out of there.  Daniel could be pretty sneaky when he wanted to be, and I wouldn't put it past him to have figured out a way to break those stupid rules he was being forced to abide by and do a bit of "interfering" without his fellow glowy people knowing about it.

The next time I saw Daniel, he really did interfere, big time.  He helped us find the Eye of Ra, discovered that tablet with the information about the Ancients' Lost City, then went head-to-head against Anubis.  I don't know what happened, but he failed to stop that half-ascended snakehead.  There's no doubt in my mind that the other glow guys, or perhaps just Oma Desala, stopped him.  After that, I was afraid that Daniel really was dead, that he'd once again sacrificed himself for the sake of others.

Then, two months later, one of my most fervent wishes was granted.  Daniel was given back to us.  As I stared at him, standing there healthy, whole and human once again, it took all of my willpower not to pull him into my arms and squeeze him until his eyes popped out.  Even if I had been willing to let myself do that, I could tell by his expression that he wouldn't have allowed it.  He didn't know who we were.  Though the Ancients had given him back his mortal body, they'd left him with no memory.  Thankfully, he eventually got it all back, except for the majority of that year he was ascended.

God, it is so good to have him back.  When nobody is looking, I often find myself grinning like an idiot.  I'm actually happy again.  Since Daniel's return, our relationship has been pretty good, not perfect, but a lot better than it was before he left us.  He can still irritate me faster than anyone else alive, and I know that I do the same to him, but that's okay.  It's a part of who we are and what makes our relationship so unique.  As long as we accept and respect our differences and have trust and faith in each other, we'll be all right.  I hope it stays this way.  I don't ever want to go back to the way we were just before he died . . . or ascended . . . whatever.

I learned an important lesson from losing Daniel and getting him back.  It's that friendship is a precious thing that must never be squandered, taken for granted or, worse, allowed to die.  Life is far too fragile and way too short.  And I learned something else.  Daniel may be a major pain in the ass sometimes, but he is so very, very much worth it.

THE END