Dark, Still Water
Rated TEEN

21. Chapter Twenty-one

Jim was sitting in the chair again, and Blair could see the doubt and the hesitation crawling over Jim's features like bugs, but instead of striking out and calling Blair insane, he just tightened his jaw more and listened as Blair finished his story.

"I'm not imagining this," Blair said firmly. Part of him wanted to just curl up and pretend to be asleep, pretend that Daniel was a drug-induced hallucination, but he knew better. Daniel needed him, and no matter how hard it was, Blair was not leaving the man hanging. Or in his case floating might be the better word.

"He's invisible?"

"And Teal'c has an alien in his stomach," Blair shot back, perfectly willing to match sarcasm for sarcasm. The only reaction in Jim was a tightening of his jaw. Blair could practically feel the man struggle to control a less-than-supportive reaction.

"Okay." Jim stopped, like he didn't know what else to say. But then he'd already run out of nicely worded suggestions that Blair might be reacting to the medicine or having more of those weird hallucinations where his brain hadn't woken up with his body, so he was pretty much out of explanations that he *wanted* to be true. Reaching up, he scrubbed his hand over his face. "Okay," he repeated, but this time, it actually sounded like Jim was buying it.

"We need to talk to O'Neill," Blair said, fully expecting an explosion at that name. If anything, Jim loosened up.

Daniel must have noticed, too, because he offered an explanation. "Jack's the only one who hasn't given Ellison grief. He seems to think that Ellison is an ass, but he's just a normal ass trying to survive a difficult situation. Sam and Teal'c aren't buying it, though." Daniel shrugged as though it didn't matter to him what people thought of Jim.

"What do you mean giving him grief?" Blair asked. Jim flinched when, from his point of view, Blair started talking to the air.

"I think the phrase ya'mat'te'ra korami comes closest to what they've been giving him." Daniel almost looked pleased at that, and Blair glared at him. Jim had a hard enough time with his senses and now with IA breathing down his neck; he didn't need any more grief.

"Giving who grief?" Jim asked. It was a reasonable enough question since he was only hearing half the conversation.

"Which means?" Blair asked, totally ignoring Jim despite the fact that Jim's jaw was getting dangerously tight.

"Teal'c and Sam have both told him in blunt terms that he's an ass and that the way he treats you and everyone else borders on abusive."

"Whoa!" Blair practically yelled, and Jim startled in his seat.

"It's true!" Daniel said, holding his hands up defensively. "I understand that he's your friend, and I see why you're defending him because I've defended Jack even when he's done some pretty stupid and shitty stuff. However, you can't claim you haven't noticed."

"He's not perfect," Blair admitted. Jim's head swiveled as he obviously dialed up on hearing.

"Not perfect?" Daniel asked incredulously. "I've heard the Sierra Verde stories. Jack and Kelso have been talking ever since you got shot, and I have heard more than I wanted to know about that little trip to Sierra Verde."

"We both made mistakes with Alex Barnes." Blair growled the words, and Jim's back went iron stiff.

"What about Alex?" Jim demanded. "Jackson, if you plan on becoming corporeal again, drop it."

Blair wasn't sure if it was a step forward or back that Jim was threatening Daniel. At least it implied that Jim actually did believe that Daniel was there.

"What mistakes did you make?" Daniel asked Blair, ignoring Jim totally.

"I didn't tell Jim that there was another Sentinel in town. We could have handled this if I'd told him."

"But what about your ethical requirement to keep Barnes' test result confidential?" Daniel demanded. "As much as Jim deserved confidentiality from her, she deserved confidentiality from him. You had an obligation to both your test subjects." Blair flinched because that had entered his thoughts at the time. But he'd already decided that Jim's friendship was worth more than Alex's confidentiality, at least until he came home and found Jim shoving a gun in his face and freaking out. At that point, a good healthy dose of self-preservation had made him just keep his mouth shut. Wasn't that ironic? He thought that he could keep Jim from freaking out any more than he already was by keeping Alex away from him, and it turned out that Alex was the source of all the freaking out.

"Jim is my primary obligation," Blair said slowly, careful to make sure that Daniel and Jim both heard him clearly. "I should have told him."

Daniel raised his eyebrows. "So, if you didn't, that makes you responsible for his bizarre behavior? Blair, that doesn't sound healthy."

"Oh, and you're just a paragon of mental health," Blair struck back. The second he said it, he wished he hadn't. Daniel's expression just closed down, no emotion at all leaked from around the blank mask that was his face. His arms closed around his stomach, as though trying to physically protect himself from the words. Blair flinched from the guilt that immediately rose up.

"I have issues," Daniel said softly. "It hurts like hell that I've given everything to this program and Jack still doesn't trust me to keep a secret when he goes undercover. He doesn't even trust my assessment of my own team. He gives the skull to Robert." Daniel made a disgusted noise. "But the fact that I have issues doesn't change the fact that you do, too."

"Chief?" Jim reached over and caught Blair's hand, rubbing it between his palms. "It's okay. The second O'Neill is back on base, I'll get him for you," he promised.

Blair closed his eyes and for a half second, he just wanted to give up. Sleep called to him, promised him a peace of mind that he couldn't find when he was awake anymore, but that was the trap. Every time he meditated, he could feel that trap closing around him. Sleep... meditation... death... they were creeping closer every time he closed his eyes. And part of him didn't care. He could feel that woman with the lights pulling at him, promising a peace that he had lost years ago. The bigger part of him, though, thought he was just being a coward for trying to avoid his problems.

"It wasn't like Jim didn't have a reason to be cranky, but I do know that he was..." Blair stopped and glanced over at Jim. He didn't want to say too much; he didn't want to bring back the less-friendly version of Jim that he'd learned to tiptoe around.

Jim caught one of his hands, holding it tightly. "I was an ass, Chief. No one down at the station was willing to say it, but trust me, I've heard it enough in the last three weeks to get the point. Fuck, I read my own report from after that incident with Ventriss and O'Neill, and I want to slap the shit out of myself." Jim sounded so damn serious, and Blair hated the guilt he could feel clinging to Jim's words.

"Oh man, I did plenty of shit to help inspire the assholiness," Blair quickly assured Jim. Jim did not handle failure well, and the last thing Blair needed was for Jim to go off into a guilt-inspired funk.

"You are not responsible for his inability to be human," Daniel insisted mulishly.

"You are seriously getting on my last nerve," Blair warned Daniel.

"He should have already worn it out," Daniel shot right back, poking a finger toward Jim.

"You mean the way O'Neill has worn yours out?" Blair demanded. Daniel gave him a look that would have withered iron.

The fight might have kept going, except Dr. Fraiser stuck her head in through the curtain. "Blair, are you alright?"

"Fine," Blair snapped. He was too tired to get this angry, and he could feel the fury draining him. But he still couldn't let it go. It was like he'd lost his balance and no matter how much he flailed his arms, he couldn't find it again.

Both her eyebrows went up. "Would that be why your blood pressure is spiking?" she demanded. Shoving the white curtain back, she pinned Blair with a sharp look that dared him to just try and lie to her again.

"He's seeing Dr. Jackson," Jim said.

"Traitor," Blair hissed in his direction.

"Chief, if this is real, you shouldn't mind her knowing, and if this is a hallucination, Janet needs to know."

Blair settled for glaring at Jim. The return of the old Jim obviously meant the return of the Mother Hen traits as well. For all his aggravation, Blair had to admit that he was a little relieved.

"You're seeing Daniel?" Dr. Fraiser asked. Blair nodded wearily, fully expecting to get subjected to a wide range of brain scans. "Ask him who the newest hire in his department is," she asked instead.

"Nyan," Daniel immediately answered.

"The guy from the other planet? The archeologist?" Blair asked.

"Yep. From P2X-416," Daniel answered with a nod.

"Cool. But man, don't they have their own name for their planet, something that doesn't involve P's and X's? I mean, I know you archeologists love your numerical designations, but seriously, it's their home."

Daniel had the grace to blush. "Nyan's people call their country Bedrosia."

"Bedrosia," Blair said, rolling the name in his mouth. He looked up and Dr. Fraiser was staring at him with wide eyes, her eyebrows raised high.

"Daniel?" she asked, now looking around the room, her eyes searching the corners and shadows. "I need to go inform the general. Daniel, wait right here," Dr. Fraiser said, and then she was gone, her footsteps clicking sharply against the tile. Jim had stood up the moment Dr. Fraiser came in and now he had a wide-eyed look of shock on his face.

"Chief, this is a general who's coming. Just... just don't piss him off, okay?" Jim asked, and Blair couldn't contain a snort. He wasn't generally the one who pissed people off. For half a second, Jim frowned at him, and then his face was again carefully neutral. That bothered Blair. If Jim were totally back to the old him, he would have retaliated with a few snarky comments of his own, but obviously things weren't all that right between them yet.

"Ignore Ellison," Daniel said. He moved to the far side of the room where a soldier stood next to the door to the hall. "General Hammond's a good man, and if he puts up with Jack, he's a patient one. Just tell him that I want Nyan working on the crystal skull."

"Nyan, crystal skull, check," Blair agreed before yawning so widely that it actually made his eyes water.

"Oh, and if you notice, Janet's reaction--that's how your partner should have reacted. Skepticism is one thing, but he practically made you beg him to believe you," Daniel said, but his voice was so soft that Blair wasn't sure if Daniel meant for him to hear them.

"Whatever." Blair dismissed the whole mess. Yeah, Jim had spent a lot of time trying to find an explanation that sounded more reasonable than invisible people, but he hadn't denied anything.

"Oh yeah, that's healthy. Keep making excuses," Daniel muttered.

"Bite me," Blair suggested. It wasn't the most mature response, but he was seriously sick of listening to Daniel rip on Jim. Yeah, Jim might have a few issues, but he was a good man who deserved better than having people give him shit as if everything was his fault.

"Don't let him get to you, Chief," Jim suggested. He patted Blair's leg.

"He has no right to suggest that you..." Blair stopped and looked up at Jim. He so did not want to cause trouble between Jim and Daniel.

"That I was acting like an ass? I told you, Chief, I already figured that one out on my own."

"No way," Blair said sharply. "Man, your instincts were all over the place, and then O'Neill came in and started playing alpha dog games, so you are not taking the blame for all this. Oh shit. Ventriss. What happened to Ventriss?" Blair asked. The second he asked, he knew the answer. Jim's face just shut down. "Fuck. He got away, didn't he?"

"Not for long, Chief. His father cut him off from the money, and he's not used to living on a Wal-Mart budget. We'll get him."

Blair closed his eyes and silently cursed the universe. It hated him. That was the only explanation. Jim tightened his fingers around Blair's leg, a silent reassurance that he was still there, while Blair struggled with his own frustration and anger. His karma was getting to be a scary thing because he so wanted to see Ventriss flayed alive and left for the ants. Jerk.

"Mr. Sandburg?" a deep voice asked. Blair opened his eyes and found an older, bald man looking down at him curiously.

"General," Jim said respectfully. He was standing stiffly at Blair's side, and for half a second, Blair thought he might salute the older man.

"Detective Ellison," the general said, nodding his head in Jim's direction. "So, Mr. Sandburg, I hear you've found our missing archeologist."

"Not missing as much as... um... invisible." Blair waited for the look of disbelief, but General Hammond actually looked relieved.

"Is he here now?"

"Right by the door," Blair confirmed.

"Blair, tell him I want Nyan on the case. And tell him that the context the skull was found in is at least as significant as the skull itself."

"Is he alright?" General Hammond asked, his eyes going to the door.

"He's fine," Blair answered quickly. "But he doesn't want Robert studying the skull. He says Nyan is his best archeologist."

"Nyan?" The general turned and looked at Blair in surprise.

"He would have known in a second that the area where the skull was found was just as important as the skull. Apparently Robert is a little on the... um... unimaginative... side with his research. Nyan is his best archeologist." Blair yawned.

"Chief, maybe you should worry about all this later," Jim said softly.

Blair waved Jim off. He was tired, but he needed to say this. "O'Neill is an untrusting, xenophobic ass who doesn't trust Daniel's judgment."

Daniel exploded. "What! No. No, you did not just say that. When I get my body back I'm going to..." he spluttered for a second. "I’m going to dump all your notes into one big pile. You'll be spending months trying to sort the data."

"Yeah, yeah, threat, threat," Blair said, holding up a hand and doing the 'talk-talk' thing with his fingers.

"Dr. Jackson is threatening you?" General Hammond asked, and he was starting to look more than a little concerned.

"He's threatening my research notes. Man, he's willing to tell me all about Jim's faults, but let someone point out that O'Neill is treating him like an idiot who doesn't know his own staff, and he just gets all red in the face and splutters."

Daniel wasn't spluttering now. He was saying all sorts of things that Blair didn't understand, but from the tone of voice, he was guessing that Daniel was cursing out many generations of his family.

"And he swears in weird languages," Blair added.

"That he does, son," General Hammond agreed. Blair was getting sleepy, but he was almost willing to swear that the general was smiling.

Dr. Fraiser stepped close to Blair's bed. "Sir, Blair is still under the influence of medication."

"I had noticed, doctor," General Hammond agreed, and now Blair was totally sure that the man was smiling at him... or laughing at him.

"Jack should trust Daniel's judgment, but he didn't give the crystal skull to Nyan, and Nyan would have known to look at the skull and the altar together," Blair explained. He closed his eyes. He was just so tired all of a sudden. "And Jack should have told Daniel that he was going undercover. They've been together longer than anyone else on the team, and Jack owed him that. Daniel proved himself. But Jack still doesn't trust him when he says he knows how to handle things like crazy women with killer viruses."

"It sounds like Daniel has been quite talkative," Hammond commented.

"I wasn't that talkative," Daniel objected, but Blair didn't really care to keep up with the rest of the conversation from there because he was watching the lady with the light dancing around her face.

"Her path is only one choice," Incacha said, and either Blair had suddenly learned Quechan or Incacha had suddenly learned English. He supposed it didn't matter in your dreams—dreams weren't supposed to make sense.

22. Chapter Twenty-two

Blair blinked. He was so sick of waking up in this hospital bed. Jim was stretched out on his own bed, one knee bent to support a book.

"Hey, Chief. How are you feeling?"

"Like shit," Blair admitted with a frown.

"That's what you get for asking me to lower the drug dosages as quickly as possible." Dr. Fraiser appeared like magic, shoving back the curtain.

"Sadist," Blair teased. She smiled brightly.

"Oh hon, now shouldn't you get to know me a little better before commenting on my sexual proclivities?" She smiled even brighter, but her eyes scanned the various machines and tubes that surrounded Blair. "Now, are you in too much pain?"

Blair stopped and did a self-assessment. His stomach ached and his head throbbed, but it wasn't too bad. "Nothing a little willow bark tea wouldn't solve," Blair said hopefully.

"I think we'll stick with morphine for a while, yet," Dr. Fraiser said. "But we've lowered the dosage so that you'll be a little more clear-headed. Not that we weren't all amused by you on morphine. It was about time someone told Colonel O'Neill a few truths."

Blair flinched as that memory returned. Oh yeah, he'd opened his big, fat mouth way too wide. "Daniel?" Blair asked, looking around.

"It looks like you aren't the only one who sees invisible people." Jim dropped his book on the bed and came to Blair's side. "O'Neill brought Daniel's grandfather back from the institution, and apparently he sees invisible people, too."

"He does?" Blair frowned. That didn't make a lot of sense to him. Okay, if he was being totally honest with himself, he was feeling a little jealous of Daniel's grandfather. For once, he'd been the one with the special power, only now, not so much. And when he started feeling jealous of the guy from the nut house, he really did need to do a little cleaning out of the karma closets.

"Yep. He'd seen them before or something. So, O'Neill and the team took the old guy through, and apparently the aliens who had turned Daniel invisible turned him back to normal."

Dr. Fraiser stopped playing with Blair's tubes and wires. "You hear a lot for a man who doesn't leave the infirmary. And here I thought Blair was exaggerating your range."

Jim didn't answer, but then Blair didn't expect him to. Jim might have shown off a few Sentinel tricks to make the Bethesda doctors happy, but the man was so not ready to take out any billboards.

"So, Daniel's grandfather played translator. That's good." Blair ran a thumb across his blanket. These people had to have the most interesting military reports on the face of the earth. On the face of any planet, actually. Blair was still having a little trouble wrapping his brain around that one.

"He actually ended up staying on the planet. But if I know O'Neill, he would've had a lot of trouble believing Nick if you hadn't already seen Daniel," Dr. Fraiser offered.

"So, any chance I can do something really exciting today like pee on my own or eat or get pushed around in a wheelchair?" Blair asked hopefully.

Dr. Fraiser gave him an indulgent look. "I'm starting to think you don't like my company."

"Oh man, no way. I never turn down the company of a beautiful woman. But absence makes the heart grow fonder," Blair said with a smile. Dr. Fraiser shook her head.

"Give it up, Chief. She makes that Nurse Ratched you dated look like an absolute pushover." Jim sat on the edge of Blair's bed, and Blair had to stop himself from reaching out and grabbing Jim's leg. He had a weird feeling like this old version of Jim was going to vanish at any time.

"Oh, I don't know. I have a secret escape route or two I might share," a new voice offered. Blair looked up to see O'Neill leaning against the door. With a nod, he sent the guard out into the hallway.

"Colonel," Dr. Fraiser said with all the friendliness of a tarantula. "If you encourage him to get out of bed, I'm going to find an entire series of vaccinations that you need to have redone. And I have the needle waiting with your name on it."

"Chocolate pudding is as deviant as I plan on being," O'Neill told her, holding up a dish of pudding. Dr. Fraiser stood there with her arms crossed for a second before she shook her head.

"Make sure his blood pressure doesn't spike," she warned before she walked out of the room. Funny, Blair always thought of the military as stripping people of personality and reducing them to 'yes, sir' and 'no, sir,' but these people were definitely not light on personality.

"Food, give it," Blair demanded. The feeding tube was gone, so logically the doctor did plan on letting him eat again, but he wanted food now, before she could change her mind and decide he was too sick—or before he could fall asleep. He was so totally sick of being asleep.

"Pushy little shit, isn't he?" O'Neill asked with a smile as he offered the dish.

"Yes," Jim immediately agreed. "So, what can we do for you colonel?"

"What? I can't just visit?" O'Neill leaned against the end of the bed and watched as Blair shoved a spoonful of chocolate in his mouth.

"If you bring food or escape routes, yes," Blair said just as soon as he swallowed. Heaven. "But that doesn't change the fact that you are so on the shit list." Blair poked the plastic spoon at O'Neill before he dug in for another bite.

"I'm on the shit list?" O'Neill demanded with more than a little amusement. "I'm not the one who got someone else's geek all worked up. Besides, you owe me for keeping Daniel away from your research notes. You should know better than to piss off an archeologist, Sandburg. The man has the patience to make revenge really work for him."

For half a second, Blair considered apologizing, but he was fairly sure he hadn't said anything that wasn't true. Oh, he'd said lots of stuff he shouldn't have, but he was almost positive it was true stuff. But then the best defense was a good offense; he'd learned that from Jim. Blair poked his spoon at O'Neill again. "Oh man. You take the cake. You're the one who's pissed all over that relationship, so if someone has to worry about Daniel and revenge, that would so be you."

"Yeah, but my paperwork is so disorganized, I wouldn't know if he raided it." O'Neill stopped and tilted his head as though thinking. "Actually, he may have already tried. It would explain why my personnel evaluations vanished." O'Neill shrugged.

"Colonel, what are you doing here?" Jim asked, and this time, he sounded not even a little amused.

For a second, O'Neill just looked at him. "Okay, let's play this straight. Sandburg, how did you find out about the undercover mission where I didn't tell Daniel about my cover?"

Blair felt the sudden chill in the room. "Um... I don't know. The guys in the warehouse might have talked about it."

"And the incident with Linea?" This time O'Neill crossed his arms, and Blair definitely felt the chill. Jim did too because he stood up at Blair's side, his hands clenched in fists.

"Who?"

O'Neill looked at him for a second as though trying to decide if Blair was just playing stupid. "The crazy lady with the virus. The one who I didn't trust Daniel to handle." It took Blair a second to remember those were his words from the last time he'd been awake.

"You're interrogating him?" Jim stepped up so that he was chest to chest with O'Neill, and if someone didn't do something, Blair was fully expecting to see fists flying. Unfortunately, the doc was gone and Blair did not think he was up for throwing himself between two alpha dogs trying to metaphorically pee on each other. "He's lying in a hospital bed because you pulled him into this crazy world of yours, and you're interrogating him?"

"I’m asking him, Detective. If I were interrogating him, you both would know the difference. I'm asking a friendly question." O'Neill held his palms up in a placating gesture, but Jim was so not into being placated.

"Friendly?" Jim sounded ready to break something.... probably O'Neill.

"Friendly," O'Neill repeated. "Look, I like Sandburg. He's got guts that I wish most of the scientists around here had. Sandburg and Daniel are a rarity, so I’m not looking to give him grief. Now you? I wouldn't mind ordering you to do eighty or ninety pushups."

"Whoa, hey, but there will be no ordering around, right?" Blair could hear his heart monitor suddenly ping along at a pretty fast clip.

"For crying out loud. I'm not the bad guy," O'Neill almost yelled. "I'm not interrogating you; I'm not trying to bully Ellison." He paused. "Okay, I might be trying to bully Ellison, but that's because I had a problem with his behavior in Cascade. It doesn't mean that I'm going to try and get his commission reactivated. I couldn't even if I wanted to..."

"Because he's a Sentinel." Blair watched as O'Neill rolled his eyes.

"Because he has P-chad. But you know, you and the Bethesda geeks can argue over that one. I don't care what you call it; the condition is too dangerous on the front lines where we work. I'm more interested in the source of our little info leak when it comes to my relationship with Daniel." O'Neill took a couple of steps back, and Blair could see Jim inch forward as though he wanted to get back in the colonel's face. Instead, Jim retreated to Blair's side.

"It doesn't take a Sentinel to tell that Daniel's near a breaking point with you," Jim said, and he sounded entirely too smug.

"You mean, like the breaking point Sandburg was near with you? Of course, you tried to help that along by just about breaking his ankle, didn't you?" And O'Neill did smug just as good as Jim. It was a little creepy, actually.

"Man, I thought you two were getting along," Blair said with a frown.

Jim patted his arm. "Oh Chief, this one is giving me less grief than anyone else in this place. Even the lunch lady glares at me."

"Oh man." Blair didn't even know what else to say to that.

O'Neill wasn't going to get distracted, though. "I still need an answer, Sandburg. The general doesn't want anyone else in here, including the Bethesda egghead who came to talk dissertation, until we figure out where you've gotten your information on Daniel. Daniel insists that he didn't tell you most of what you managed to blurt out while stoned on morphine, so we have a leak somewhere."

"So, you'll keep him prisoner?" Jim demanded, and that was not a good tone of voice. O'Neill and Jim glared at each other for several seconds.

"I need to find out where he got the information. Blair—" O'Neill turned away from Jim and focused right on him. "How did you know that Daniel had been angry about me ignoring Nyan?"

"Easy, Daniel called you xenophobic," Blair pointed out. O'Neill made a face, but he didn't try to deny it.

"Okay, but where did you hear about my undercover mission?"

Blair frowned as he tried to remember. "Um, someone at the warehouse?" he guessed. O'Neill didn't look convinced.

"How did you know about Linea and her virus?" O'Neill looked at him with great expectation.

Blair opened his mouth, but then he closed it. How did he know? Looking up at Jim, he found Jim staring at him strangely.

"Chief?"

Blair struggled to retrieve a memory. Nothing. He just knew about her. "Oh man, I can't remember."

"Someone must have mentioned it to him. The NID were leaking classified material all over the place," Jim quickly interjected.

But Blair was already shaking his head. He couldn't remember a name or a face, but he remembered a presence standing beside him. He remembered a moment when he went from not knowing to understanding Daniel's frustration. He couldn't remember words, but he remembered that presence. "It was a woman."

"A woman?" O'Neill demanded. "Who?"

Blair could almost hear a voice, but he couldn't find a name or a face or even a location to put with it. "She thinks you hurt Daniel," he said slowly and carefully, struggling to pull the memory out. "Sha're needed him. He should let go of need." Blair frowned, his memory like an itch at the back of his head. O'Neill was staring at him.

O'Neill took a step closer. "Who, Sandburg?"

Blair shook his head. "I don't know."

O'Neill stared at him for a second, and then rubbed a hand over his face. "Shit. You couldn't make this easy, could you?"

"Colonel?" Jim asked. The tone made the hairs at the back of Blair's neck stand on end.

"Ellison, there's something going on here. I'm not saying that anyone's at fault, but we need to figure out who's talking out of school."

"And until then, you're going to keep him isolated?"

"He's supposed to be sleeping anyway."

"He could be working with the doctor from Bethesda to get his dissertation together or calling his mother or checking in with his friends back home. He has a life." Jim's voice was sharp with anger.

"And I'll get him back to that life as soon as we can. The morphine is probably just clouding his memory."

"Guys," Blair said, but Jim and O'Neill were both pretty much ignoring him.

Jim took an aggressive step forward. "You're trying to convince us that you aren't the bad guy, but then you put Blair under orders to keep him isolated."

"Oh, not just him. I pretty much assume that anything he knows, he's told you, so both of you are under orders to stay away from all phones and outside contact." And that was O'Neill's smug voice.

"Guys..."

"You're a real asshole," Jim snarled.

"You know, if I weren't a mature person, I might say something like, 'It takes one to know one.' But I do understand your position, Ellison. I'm not trying to make this harder."

"Is anyone planning on listening to me at all?" Blair nearly shouted.

"Chief?" Jim finally turned to him.

"To get my dissertation together?" Blair asked. His brain had pretty much stopped at that part of the conversation.

Jim and O'Neill both looked at him oddly.

"The Bethesda doctors saw your research, Chief. That's why they came out to test me. Actually, they came out here to prove you were full of shit, but I think I convinced them to reconsider that." And now Jim sounded way more smug than O'Neill had. Blair was almost sorry he'd missed that show.

"But they're willing to take my research? I mean, I'm not even enrolled there."

"Sure you are," O'Neill said cheerfully. "The senses are classified material, you have top clearance, and you will be defending your dissertation at a military school where the material will remain classified. We need good people working on P-chad, Sandburg. You're the best, and even Daniel is impressed by your documentation, and this is coming from a man who would record how many steps it took to walk from the Stargate to the equator on every planet if I let him. The doctor from Bethesda just wants to talk about you adding a section where you compare Ellison to the more traditional P-chad patients and finalizing the formatting, and it looks like you're going to have a 'doctor' in front of your name faster than you thought. Of course one or two of those eggheads might hate you for poking holes in their theories, but they'll be hating Dr. Sandburg."

Jim smiled at Blair. "You deserve it, Chief. I should have encouraged you to publish before... but..."

Blair held up a hand to stop Jim. "Oh man, I hear you. You didn't want your privacy destroyed, and you so had a right to worry about that." Blair could feel hope like a bright light pulling at him. His dissertation. If he was being totally honest with himself, he'd just about given up on it. Alex had been his last chance to prove that Jim wasn't a fluke, and his relationship with Jim was so close that he had totally blown any objectivity if he wanted to do a single-subject dissertation. Years of work had pretty much gone out the window when he wasn't paying attention, and now he was getting it all back.

Jim smiled at him for a second before looking over at O'Neill. His smile quickly turned to a scowl. "I'm not worried about anything right now except O'Neill here keeping you from finishing."

"Oh for Pete's sake. He's in a hospital bed. Fraiser is an unforgiving ice queen when it comes to overworking patients, so she's not going to let you do the work here, anyway. This is not open for negotiation, Ellison. Teal'c agreed to sit in for a while, but until Sandburg remembers where he heard classified information, we need to keep an eye on him."

"Why?" Blair asked. "I mean, if I'm not talking to the outside world, then why would you have to keep an eye on me?"

"Good question." Jim crossed his arms and got that look on his face that usually made Simon pull him out of an interrogation room before he could hit someone.

"You were able to see Daniel when no one else could, right?" O'Neill asked. Blair frowned, but he nodded in agreement. "We already know there are races like the Re'tu that have other types of technology to hide their existence."

Blair hissed in a breath. "You think I saw someone else. You think someone was here, but no one else saw her." Blair looked over, and that possibility even made Jim look a little concerned.

O'Neill shrugged. "I think something strange is going on. We've swept the base, but until I know what brand of strangeness you're in the middle of, I think we need to keep a close eye on you and see if you start talking to other invisible people."

"Oh man. Okay, this is weird, even for me." Blair reached up to push his hair back from his face, trailing tubes as he moved.

"Welcome to the Stargate program, kid. Teal'c is going to keep you company for a while. Play nice, people." O'Neill backed up to the door and pulled it open. Teal'c was standing on the other side. He tilted his head to acknowledge those within, and Blair could hear Jim sigh in frustration. Unfortunately, there was no way they were going to win this fight. Besides, if Blair were perfectly honest, he didn't mind getting to spend a little time with... Blair tilted his head.

"Teal'c? That's your real name?"

"It is," the man Blair had known as Murray agreed. "It means strength."

"In alien," Jim added softly.

"Whoa. Oh yeah, the next time Jim accuses me of having a Sandburg zone just because I talk fast or get kidnapped a lot, I am so pointing out that there are stranger things in the universe," Blair said firmly. Teal'c almost smiled. Jim didn't.

23. Chapter Twenty-three

Teal'c was grateful to see that Blair Sandburg was both awake and happy to have his company. People sometimes reacted strongly to deception, and after seeing the recent conflict between Daniel and O'Neill, he had feared that his own deceit with Blair would lead to difficulties. O'Neill touched his arm briefly and then left the room.

Teal'c would have approached; however, Ellison still appeared agitated. Teal'c settled for walking to a spot near the curtain and waiting for Ellison to make some overture.

"Oh man, did it just get cold in here or is it me?" Blair asked.

"I can request additional bedding," Teal'c suggested.

"He's talking about the lack of love between us," Ellison said before he sat on the edge of his own bed. Teal'c did not understand why Ellison felt the need to point out that there was a lack of amorous feelings because, as far as he knew, no one had ever suspected or suggested there were.

"Man, is this you playing nice?" Blair asked his partner.

"Yes," Ellison quickly answered. "I haven't shot him for suggesting that I haven't taken care of my partner."

Teal'c noticed that Blair's hands fluttered as if he were disturbed by Ellison even mentioning the past. "Oh man, this is so not the time."

"Time is about all we do have," Ellison said with a sigh. A guard came into the room and took up position inside the door and Ellison went to the curtain and pulled it closed, allowing the three of them privacy. He then glared at Teal'c long enough to make it known that he wished for Teal'c to leave.

"Shit. Simon has to be climbing the wall by now," Blair sighed. It did not escape Teal'c's notice that Blair focused only on Ellison's problems. Blair had very successfully caused conflict and a clearing of the air between Daniel and O'Neill, but he appeared unwilling or unable to do the same for himself. Part of him wished to provide equally insightful truths for Blair to deal with. However, Teal'c was not certain that Blair would hear them from him. When Blair had spoken to General Hammond, the general had the authority to make O'Neill understand the depth of his fault. Teal'c did not have similar authority with Blair or Ellison.

"Until today, I was making daily reports, so he was handling it. IA is giving birth to kittens, but that wouldn't change if I were there," Ellison shrugged. "The only difference is that the military is stonewalling them so I don't have sit in an interview room and stonewall them personally."

"That is so not helping." Blair glared at Ellison, but Ellison reached over and ruffled Blair's hair as though he had said something endearing. It was a gesture Teal'c had seen O'Neill use on Daniel, and one he had used on his own son. The relationship between Blair and Ellison had clearly shifted. When Bra'tac had left without speaking to Blair Sandburg about his shamanic path or Jim Ellison and his duty on the warrior's path, Teal'c had worried. Hopefully, his worry was misplaced.

"It's not hurting. I'm probably going to end up with a suspension, so I'd rather they just get it over. That way I could be using up suspension days instead of my leave."

"At least Simon won't be nagging you to take your leave this year," Blair said with a half-smile.

"At least I won't have you dragging me off to a monastery," Ellison countered. Teal'c was not surprised that a tao qua ca tec'ma'te i cal mah would seek the comfort of a place of reflection and religious contemplation, but he was surprised Ellison had accompanied the man. Blair smiled.

"Do you plan on just standing there all day?" Ellison asked. He turned to Teal'c, and the friendliness vanished from his tone and expression.

"Unless Blair begins speaking to a person or persons unknown, yes," Teal'c confirmed. Ellison stood, his arms tight against his body as though Teal'c had said something offensive.

"Chill. It's not like he has a choice, any more than we do," Blair said quietly. Jim stared at Teal'c for a second longer before slowly settling back onto the bed. Interesting. When Teal'c had seen them in Cascade, Ellison had appeared unwilling to take any action Blair requested, but now he appeared willing to even forgo his animosity. "Are you going to sit, because I don't mind telling you that it's feeling a little creepy having you look down on us," Blair suggested.

Visitors' chairs sat next to every bed, and Teal'c chose the one closest to Ellison's, assuming that the man would not want Teal'c near Blair. He still could not determine if his larval goa'uld disturbed Ellison or if the man simply disliked Teal'c. Teal'c had noticed that humans often developed an irrational dislike for anyone associated with an action which they found objectionable. Daniel still railed against all politicians even though it had been only Robert Kinsey who had attempted to shut down the program.

"So, you're from another planet?" Blair asked. Ellison tightened his lips into a thin line.

"I am," Teal'c agreed.

"Whoa. Seriously freaky. So, is there a significance to the tattoo?" Blair turned slightly onto his side, and Ellison got up and immediately helped to rearrange pillows and covers.

"It marks me as the First Prime, the head slave, to Apophis."

Teal'c was prepared for the wide-eyed stare from Blair. Humans often reacted so to news of Teal'c slavery.

"You were a slave?" Ellison asked, and for the first time, Teal'c noted that the man did not seem to direct anger toward him.

"I was. My people are used to incubate the immature goa'uld larva." Teal'c made no move toward his own primta, but Ellison's eyes went immediately to Teal'c's stomach.

"That's what I smell... what I hear moving around? An alien?" Ellison moved into a defensive position in front of Blair, and Teal'c was grateful that he had chosen a chair far from Blair. Blair reached out and wrapped fingers around Jim's arm.

"It cannot hurt you."

For long seconds, the room was silent, all three frozen in place. Teal'c watched Ellison for signs of a coming attack, but Ellison seemed most concerned with remaining in position between Teal'c and Blair.

"Oh man, that must suck," Blair said softly, breaking the spell that had fallen over the three of them. "All that stuff about your people... they're slave to these aliens?"

"They are," Teal'c agreed. "My own tec'ma'te was here weeks ago, but he was unable to stay and discuss the path of the tao qua ca tec'ma'te i cal mah because Apophis had attacked and caused great damage both among those who would follow him and those who would oppose him." Teal'c watched as Blair tightened his fingers around Ellison's arm. Ellison reached over and placed his own palm on Blair's hand.

"That is... that is hard to wrap the mind around, you know?" Blair asked.

Teal'c considered that. He did not know why humans had difficulty understanding the concept of a world in slavery, but he knew that he often had trouble understanding a world that assumed the right of a person to be free. There were free worlds within the System Lord's realms, but these were worlds too worn down or too poor to bother with. And these free worlds lived under the shadow of slavery and oppression, aware that they could fall to a System Lord at any time. But in America, even sharing a planet with those who enslaved their fellow humans, the people often could not fathom a reality where slavery was far more common than freedom. Teal'c still was not sure if this self-delusion was a source of strength or weakness. It certainly gave many warriors a sense of inevitable victory, despite the fact that the System Lord and Jaffa armies outmatched them in both technology and numbers.

"Man, I guess you wouldn't know, huh?" Blair asked before Teal'c could frame a proper answer. "So, the tao qua ca tec'ma'te i cal mah—alien shamans?"

"Indeed," Teal'c agreed, pleased to enter a conversation which he felt more sure of his answers. "My people believe that one must remove the primta, the goa'uld larva before attempting the shamanic path because the goa'uld will poison the unguarded mind, but the old or those who have not yet received their first goa'uld have travelled that path."

"The goa'uld, it's a snake," Ellison said, tilting his head and squinting at Teal'c. "But it has the same poison in it that the man I shot did. Is that the naquadah they were talking about?" he asked.

Teal'c nodded.

"So it's poisoned? Why not kill it?" Ellison asked.

Teal'c measured his answer, wishing to respect Ellison's request for information since this was the first time he had engaged in conversation that was not confrontational. "I have considered it, but as I have no immune system without the primta, I would have little time to complete any work I deemed worthy of my attention. Since I wish to see my people free and the false gods destroyed, I have decided not to."

"You'd die?" Blair asked, his voice small.

"I would."

"That's whole new levels of karma," he whispered.

"It's sick," Ellison disagreed. Teal'c could not disagree with either judgment. "And now we have that thing in here until you can remember where you heard that woman talking." Ellison looked toward Teal'c, but Teal'c noticed that the man's glare was reserved for Teal'c's stomach, and no longer appeared to encompass Teal'c himself. Blair's awakening appeared to have changed something significant. Either that or one of the others had spoken words harsh enough to reach Ellison as Blair Sandburg's words had reached O'Neill through the general.

"This might take a while," Blair said, great weariness in his voice.

"You have no idea from where this information came?"

"None. I would so say if I did because the not being able to call friends is going to drive Jim up a wall." Blair gave Ellison a sympathetic look, once more ignoring any discomfort to himself.

"And what of you?" Teal'c asked. He kept his gaze on Ellison, making it clear that Ellison should have been concerned about Blair, even if Blair showed no concern for himself. Surprisingly, Ellison returned his look with none of the aggression Teal'c had expected.

Blair gave a disbelieving snort. "Right now, I'm not sure how many I have. As long as the Chancellor is out to hang my hide on the wall, most of my friends are going to avoid me just out of a healthy sense of self-preservation. I guess since I'm transferring, it doesn't really matter, but..." he shrugged, and Teal'c could tell that it did matter.

"I'm sure that's not true, Chief," Ellison hurried to say. He moved to lean against Blair's bed once again.

"Oh, it totally is. Starving students learn to be practical."

Teal'c tried to understand that logic, but when one was most vulnerable, one had to rely most on alliance and friendship. While he was willing to respect Blair's judgment in most things, on this issue, Blair appeared to be confused. "To turn your back on a friend is not practical," Teal'c said firmly.

"When it means you keep the job that allows you to eat and pay tuition, it's more practical than you think. It's not cool, but it's practical." Blair sighed.

"We'll be fine, Chief," Jim said softly. Blair let his fingers tangle with Ellison's in a touch Teal'c would have thought romantic on another, but he did not know the path of the shaman well enough to make such judgments. Ellison was an anchor to this world, a point which prevented Blair from vanishing into the void where the shaman walked. Such a relationship was not to be defined by the relationships of those who sought a connection only in the visible world.

Blair turned to him with a smile. "Where you're from, it's a lot more important to have someone watch your back, isn't it?"

"It is," Teal'c agreed.

"You need that here, too." Ellison quickly added.

"Then why did you jeopardize your claim to Blair Sandburg's loyalty?" Teal'c asked curiously. If the animosity and confrontation had vanished, perhaps Ellison could explain this phenomenon which Teal'c could not understand. However, Ellison simply stared at him, his face void of any emotion at all.

"Man, total taboo territory," Blair said softly. Teal'c's realized that it was Blair who had taken offense, and then he nodded his head, accepting that Blair had placed such topics off limits.

"God I'm going to get glad to get out of this madhouse," Ellison offered.

"Oh man, yeah, but our lives are pretty fucked up right now," Blair answered. Teal'c frowned, not understanding how their lives were damaged in any way. Blair would get recognition for his work and Ellison was no longer acting like a ha'shak.

"Just get some sleep, Chief. We'll worry about this when you're more rested." Ellison rested his hand on Blair's shoulder, and it gave Teal'c great comfort that whatever anger Ellison might have, he was no longer making Blair the target for his ire. After reading Daniel's report on how Blair reacted during the kidnapping, Teal'c was greatly concerned that the young man still needed an anchor to his world or he would get lost in his own seeking.

Blair yawned, but he also argued against sleep. "That's all I've been doing... sleeping."

Teal'c thought about Blair's words for a minute. Even when Blair had been awake, as when General Hammond had visited, he had remained more in sleep than in wakefulness. O'Neill insisted that Daniel could not carry out his threat against Blair's research notes because Blair had been drugged and half-asleep and was, therefore, not responsible for his actions or his words. Personally, Teal'c suspected that O'Neill would have found another excuse to protect Blair's notes if the young man had not been so ill out of gratitude for opening a discussion that O'Neill had failed to elicit from Daniel earlier. Neither he nor O'Neill would ever have guessed that Daniel wished to be treated less like a warrior. For Teal'c being a warrior and being respected were largely related, but Daniel wished to walk his own path where he was not warrior or shaman, but had respect while still remaining within a status that came closest to what Teal'c thought of a cha'til. A respected cha'til. The logic was confusing, but at least now Daniel and O'Neill were talking to one another without the anger that had laced their words recently. However, if Blair had been sleeping for most of his time, could he not have come across the information while asleep?

Ellison was standing over Blair, watching him with some great emotion in his eyes that Teal'c could not fully understand. He cleared his throat, waiting until Ellison looked over at him. "My people believe that a shaman may gain knowledge through dreams and meditation. Could you have learned this information while sleeping or meditating?" he asked Blair.

"While sleeping?" Jim interrupted.

Blair made a little snort. "You and spiritual things are really not on good terms," he said with a tone that suggested fondness for another's shortcomings. "But I have to agree with Jim on this one. Dreams are the brain's way of rehearsing behavior learned during the day. No way could I just make up classified information. Trust me, after seeing the weird shit you guys have around here, my imagination is not that good."

"Dreams involve neural activity," Teal'c said calmly.

"They're dreams," Ellison said curtly, his temper clearly fraying.

"Precisely," Teal'c said, intentionally misunderstanding Ellison to avoid conflict with him. Let the man wonder how to explain a truth that Teal'c already understood. Teal'c focused on Blair, standing up so that he might make eye contact with the man. However, Blair was not paying attention. Blair's eyes had lost their focus, and the machine that measured his heart steadily speeded up.

"Blair?" Jim asked, grabbing Blair's hand.

A nurse appeared at the curtain. "Is there a problem?"

"It was a woman," Blair said slowly. The nurse looked at Blair with great confusion.

"Call O'Neill," Teal'c said quietly, not wishing to disturb Blair's returning memory. The nurse turned and vanished.

Jim was now sitting on the edge of Blair's bed. "Who? You're not making sense, Chief."

"She told me that Daniel was unhappy. She wanted to teach him to be happier, but the aliens interrupted them."

"Who?" Ellison repeated. "Teal'c, is any of this making sense to you?"

"I have sent for O'Neill." Teal'c was unwilling to say more, especially since he did not understand her motivation for seeking contact with Blair. While Daniel believed in the inherent goodness of all they met, including Oma Desala, Teal'c found himself concerned with the more practical and cynical realities of meeting new beings. Bra'tac had believed her to be the great tao qua ca tec'ma'te i cal mah of Jaffa legend, but Teal'c still found himself wondering why the woman had taken Sha're's child and why she had shown such interest in Daniel. If he were O'Neill, he might even comment on the inherent foolishness of believing in the goodness of any woman who showed interest in Daniel. The man did attract women who would make the gods themselves quake in fear.

Blair was shaking his head slowly, a look of great confusion on his face. "This woman who had light all around her, she was in my dreams." Teal'c straightened up, not sure what he could do to protect Blair Sandburg from such a powerful creature.

Ellison, however, still did not believe. "Chief, morphine was in your dreams."

"Oh man, don't I know it. And I'm writing off the talking soda bottle as total morphine-induced weirdness, but the woman was there."

"Maybe you heard some nurses talking when you were asleep. The brain could have created a fantasy around that, but O'Neill needs to know which nurses have loose lips." Jim looked at Blair, clearly begging the man to accept that as the most reasonable explanation. Teal'c frowned at the evidence that Ellison still did not understand the nature of those who walked the path of the shaman.

Shaking his head, Blair turned away from them.

"Chief?" Ellison walked to the other side of the bed so that he would, again, be in Blair's sight, but Blair was staring off at nothing, his breathing slowing.

The door to the infirmary opened. "That was fast. What'da we have, kids?" O'Neill asked cheerfully.

"I believe Oma Desala has spoken to Blair," Teal'c offered without waiting for Ellison or Blair to explain the young man's great distress. O'Neill stopped mid-stride, his face registering first shock and then a weary resignation.

"Who is that?" Ellison demanded. Teal'c noted that for all Ellison's anger, his hand was resting on Blair's arm, making it very clear that while he was unhappy, he would stand by Blair.

"Aw, crap." O'Neill ran his hand over his short hair. "You can't just overhear some chatter, no, you have to talk to an ascended spirit from another fucking plane of existence. Sandburg, heal fast. Between you and Danny, I'm turning gray way faster than I should. I'm starting to think you two should be separated by at least ten miles at all times."

"Colonel?" Jim asked. He left Blair's side to stand at the end of the bed, right between O'Neill and Blair. Teal'c remembered how Blair had once described Ellison as a Mother Hen and had discussed his overdeveloped sense of protectiveness in his papers. At the time, Teal'c believed Blair Sandburg had written what he wished to be true rather than the truth. However, right now, Ellison appeared ready to enter battle with anyone in order to defend Blair.

O'Neill sighed. "She's a being who helps people ascend. This is Daniel's shtick, not mine. Personally, the only part I care about is that these ascended beings can burn a man to a crisp without a weapon."

Blair flinched when Ellison grabbed Blair's ankle. Teal'c stepped forward to remind Ellison to show greater caution, but Ellison's fingers immediately loosened. "How do we stop her?" he asked, emotion buried under a need to act. It was a familiar emotion to Teal'c, one that he had seen on O'Neill's face a great many times. It did not denote the lack of emotion that one might assume from a cursory examination, but an overpowering emotion hidden behind the need to act.

"Good question. If I figure that out, I'll let you know," O'Neill said. His words caused Ellison to tense up even more. "Danny insists she's one of the good guys—that she would never hurt anyone because she's ascended into some plane of higher happiness where all the good little hippies go when they die."

Blair opened his mouth to say something unhappy, but Ellison tightened his hand on Blair's leg.

"However, she's not supposed to be on this planet at all. I'll need to tell the general," O'Neill finished.

Teal'c stepped forward. "She contacted Blair Sandburg through a dream. A shaman may travel without his body in dreams, so she is not necessarily on this planet." Jim and O'Neill both stared at Teal'c as if he had just suggested that the world should rotate backwards. However, Teal'c knew that his words were the truth. "Is that not true, Blair Sandburg?"

Blair stared at him, his mouth open and his face slowly darkening with a blush as Ellison and O'Neill turned to look at him.

"Teal'c, you do know that sounds crazy, right?" O'Neill asked, ignoring Blair's discomfort.

Teal'c tipped his head toward O'Neill. "She exists as energy. We have seen related phenomenon." Dr. Jackson's grandfather was only the most recent case of an alien attempting to contact humans through means that did not include spaceships or Stargates.

"But why would she target Blair? This doesn't make any sense." Jim tightened his grip on Blair's ankle again.

"Sir?" a new voice asked. Teal'c looked over to see Major Carter and Daniel standing just inside the door. "Did Blair remember something?" Carter asked.

"Oh man, I'm so sorry, Daniel," Blair quickly offered, his blush deepening. Daniel blushed himself, ducking his head. He shrugged as though Blair's words had meant nothing, but half the base had been able to hear the fight between Daniel and O'Neill that had followed General Hammond's briefing. "I'm so not even going to blame you if you screw with my research."

"I wouldn't do that," Daniel quickly interrupted, despite the fact that he had been ready to do just that when O'Neill had stopped him in the hall. Daniel's anger had turned from Blair to O'Neill in a flurry of emotions that Teal'c still did not fully understand. However, O'Neill had agreed to no longer assume Daniel was a warrior or that he was part of any command structure other than O'Neill and General Hammond--Daniel did not care what diplomats or politicians wanted. He wished for their friendship to take precedence over another's preference that he remain in ignorance. Teal'c suspected that the fight might have ended sooner had O'Neill not attempted to defend his actions during the NID investigation. In the end, O'Neill's inability to give any reasons for keeping his mission secret other than he had been given orders had caused much anger. A warrior received orders and followed them. However, as Daniel had said in a suprisingly loud voice, he was not a warrior and he would not accept such explanations. By the end of the fight, even O'Neill had been reconsidering the wisdom of following that order. Perhaps that was why he had agreed to listen more to Daniel's words. He had not agreed to act on them; in fact, he had called himself many names, including xenophobic and old, but he had agreed to listen more often.

"You were telling the truth," Daniel said, and Teal'c could tell that it hurt for him to say that.

"All well and good, and I’m glad that we aren't going to have another geek war like when Fraiser and MacKenzie were butting heads, but I'm wondering just why you think Oma Desala is poking around Sandburg's head." O'Neill looked around the room, looking for someone to explain the situation.

"Oma Desala?" Daniel asked, stepped forward so that he was at O'Neill's side. The unconscious positioning made Teal'c believe that things might be mended between them yet. The stories of his youth suggested that a shaman had great healing powers, and the evidence of that was growing.

"I don't know that I saw this woman. I know I saw a woman with lights all around her head."

"Sounds like good old Oma," O'Neill pointed out.

"Did you see a baby?" Daniel asked hopefully. Teal'c noted that O'Neill shied from that question, no doubt feeling his own failure in the fact that he had been unable to bring home either Daniel's wife or her child. Teal'c could feel his own guilt. He would give much to retrieve Sha're from death or return her child to Daniel, but he did not believe he would have a chance to do either.

"Um, no baby." Blair studied Daniel, obviously confused about why Daniel would ask, so Oma Desala was limiting the information she passed to Blair. Blair shook his head before continuing. "She was telling me about you, telling me that you were unhappy, that she wanted another chance to teach you happiness."

Daniel took a step backwards, and O'Neill's hand found his back.

"Forget it, Danny. She can't have my geek." O'Neill reached out and swiped his hand over Daniel's head, ruffling his hair.

"Knock it off, and she's probably just pissed with you for getting her temple shot up," Daniel said, retaliating with a shove. Teal'c smiled at the evidence that their old competitiveness had returned. Carter caught his eye, and she was smiling widely and not even trying to hide her happiness as she watched Daniel and O'Neill tease each other.

Jack held up his hands in mock surrender. "Me? Hey, it wasn't me that took the kid to her planet or shot up her temple."

Daniel rolled his eyes, before turning back to Blair. "What else did she say?"

Blair appeared distracted for a second. "Um, nothing. She was there, but then Incacha was, too."

Ellison turned around to face him. "Incacha? That had to have been a dream." Ellison was starting to look a little pissed, and Teal'c could see Blair squirm in response to his partner's mood.

"Maybe," Blair admitted. "It was all pretty dreamlike. Incacha was speaking English, and unless they have language classes in the afterlife, that doesn't make a lot of sense." Blair stopped, clearly unwilling to say more, and Ellison, even though his hand still rested on his partner's leg, was clearly unhappy. Teal'c turned to look, and the others were just as concerned. Daniel appeared openly angry.

"Incacha was the shaman from Peru," Teal'c said calmly in case O'Neill had not had time to read the file.

"Another shaman?" Daniel asked. "If becoming a shaman is a process similar to ascending, they might be accessing some other form of communication."

"An alternate dimension," Carter said. She stepped to O'Neill's other side. "We know there are many dimensions that we can't see, so it makes sense that there could be one that's accessible if humans could develop a sensory awareness of it."

Blair opened his mouth, but he said nothing before he again closed it.

"There are stories of shamanic rites in most cultures and on most planets," Daniel supplied.

Carter was nodding. "But what makes a person a shaman? On the planet, we know that Oma Desala was helping people ascend, so she might have exposed them to some sort of energy field, but Blair hasn't ever been exposed to her. Why could she contact him and not you directly?" she asked Daniel. That one seemed to stump Daniel.

Ellison didn't seem to care for Carter's explanation. "How do we get her to stop contacting Blair?"

"Good luck getting her to do anything," O'Neill snorted.

"Oh man," Blair breathed. When he noticed that people were looking at him, he took a deep breath. Teal'c noticed that he deliberately avoided Ellison's gaze. "Incacha passed the way of the shaman to me. I thought it was a load of crap because being a shaman takes years of study and apprenticeship, but...."

"It *was* a load of crap. I shouldn't have even translated it," Jim insisted firmly.

"What happened when Incacha passed the way to you? How did you meet him?" Carter asked. Teal'c could almost feel her curiosity like a living creature.

"He was a Peruvian shaman who taught Jim how to handle his senses." Blair cleared his throat, and Teal'c wondered if it had anything to do with the fact that Ellison's hand had withdrawn. "He was in Cascade, and he was bleeding, dying. He found Jim and passed the way of the shaman on to me."

"He had no business telling you stories like that. I was an idiot for translating his stupidity," Ellison said, his voice quiet, but heavy with condemnation. Humans never failed to confuse Teal'c.

"So, this Incacha might be another ascended. If he touched Blair, that would explain it."

"It could be something blood-borne or an energy field," Carter agreed, her tone already distant as she considered the options.

Daniel was clearly just as lost in thought as Carter. "A lot of shamanic rites include an exchange of blood. It's common for the new shaman to offer his blood or his flesh."

Ellison stepped to the end of Blair's bed. "He wasn't an alien or ascended or whatever you want to call it." Ellison sounded angry now.

It was O'Neill who answered. "Ah, but how do you know?"

"I met his mother."

"Really? Did you get DNA testing on that?" O'Neill's question might have been valid, but even Teal'c could hear the sarcasm, and Ellison narrowed his eyes at the challenge. His body language screamed his desire to strike out, but at least he had Blair at his back, safely away from the direction of his anger. It just concerned Teal'c that Blair had grown so silent. The absence of Dr. Fraiser suggested that his vitals remained steady, but Teal'c was unsure that the young man's emotions were equally steady.

"Look, Ellison, Oma Desala went crawling around in your partner's brain," O'Neill said, and Teal'c noticed the shiver go through Blair. Obviously Ellison did too because he stepped back to Blair's side, and rested his hand against Blair's shoulder, close enough to Blair's face that his fingers tangled with his curls. O'Neill continued, "Why him? Who knows? But the idea that this Incacha guy might have altered Blair's energy to allow him to see something we can't... it makes sense. It makes more sense than anything else, and things that make sense make superior officers and oversight committees happy. You want them happy because they have the ultimate say about what happens around here."

"So, we go along with you or you keep us prisoner." Ellison didn't look at O'Neill. He had his eyes focused somewhere around Blair's knees.

"For the love of god! Daniel, you explain this. If I talk to him anymore, I'm going to shoot him." O'Neill threw his hands up in the air and turned his back. For a second, Daniel just blinked in shock at having the responsibility thrown to him.

"Whoa, hey, let's play nice here," Blair said before Daniel could say anything. "Man, and that's the one you get along with?" Blair demanded of Ellison.

For a second, Teal'c thought Ellison would hold onto his anger, but then the man sighed. "I told you I wasn't exactly popular around here."

"Blair, Jim," Daniel started in his most diplomatic tone, "Jack's being an ass, but he's right. We don't know how, but Blair did see me when alien energy had turned me invisible. It makes sense that he can see other beings, like Oma Desala."

"How do we turn this off?" Blair asked. Teal'c frowned at that question. A shaman did not simply turn his powers off; however, Ellison smiled at Blair as though relieved by the other's words.

Daniel looked over at Carter, but she shrugged. "I have no idea. I could do some tests and look for energy sources."

"You want to turn this off?" Daniel just sounded confused. "People spend years in meditation just trying to take the first step toward ascension."

"Do your tests," Jim answered for Blair. Blair closed his eyes and sank back into the pillow, his face even more pale than when he had first awoken.

"Will this prevent him from working with the Bethesda doctors or getting released?" Jim's voice was tight with fear.

Daniel turned around and looked at O'Neill who was now standing near the doorway. O'Neill was not pleased with how this conversation had gone. "We need to figure out if she's here or if Blair is visiting la-la land in his sleep. Teal'c, keep watch. Carter, get some equipment in here and run some scans."

"Yes, sir. I'll get a Transphase Eradication Rod set up, and I have a couple of TER's I've modified to scan for different signatures." O'Neill gave a nod, indicating his permission for her to leave. She hurried from the room. Ellison finally looked up from his examination of Blair's knees and stared at O'Neill, his body finally losing some of the stiffness that had carried it through the whole conversation, but Teal'c guessed that had more to do with resignation and weariness than acceptance. Blair's hand was clinging to Ellison's arm, so Teal'c imagined that Blair could see his partner's distress just as easily.

"The first goal is to make sure she isn’t here. If she's not, he'll have to sign an agreement that he won't reveal anything she says," O'Neill said slowly, "but he already has clearance, and he'll be working with the P-chad program which is also highly classified, so I don't see that this makes any difference. Just... keep the kid away from any good drugs because his lips are entirely too loose when he's stoned."

"No problem," Blair answered before Ellison could. "Oh man, I am so not ready to be locked up for talking to my hallucinations, so no problem at all."

"It's no fun," Daniel seconded him. Blair looked at Daniel in confusion, but the other man just shrugged without offering any other explanation. O'Neill walked over and slapped Daniel on the back, a brief contact that indicated his support. A warrior would not need such reassurance. Were O'Neill to reassure Teal'c in such a way, Teal'c would be insulted at the suggestion that he needed such gestures or concerned that O'Neill did not trust his emotional strength; however, O'Neill had agreed to stop treating Daniel as a warrior, and from the grateful look Daniel gave O'Neill, he was far more comfortable with this return to an older pattern of behavior.

"Man, no offense, but I'm exhausted," Blair told them all. "If you don't let me get some sleep, I'm siccing Dr. Fraiser on all of you."

"I'm leaving." Daniel immediately raised his hands in surrender and headed for the exit.

"Coward," O'Neill accused him.

"Yes," Daniel agreed quickly, "which is why she uses the small needle on me."

O'Neill didn't answer, but he did follow Daniel out of the room. Teal'c retreated to the far side of the room and watched. Blair's eyes were closed, but his hand still clutched Ellison's arm, and Ellison was watching Blair with confusion and affection and concern. Teal'c could understand the confusion. The rest he did not understand nearly as well.

24. Twenty-four

Fatigue pulled on Teal'c. The Eurondans and their belief in genetic purity had led him to read a number of books Daniel and Blair had recommended, and Teal'c found himself emotionally wearied by the knowledge. The people of Earth were inexplicable to him on most days, but the depth of the human capacity for cruelty had gone beyond what Teal'c had expected. The Jewish Shoah of the Nazi period was understandable, as was the Eurondan belief that they should eliminate the breeders. While Teal'c condemned both actions as deplorable, they were no different from System Lords who would destroy entire planets in order to prevent a physical trait or mutation from spreading.

Humans outside of Earth and the other protected planets were largely bred for an appearance that pleased the Goa'uld, so such things were repugnant, but not shocking or even particularly unusual to Teal'c. Apophis had once decimated an entire city because the number of albinos had grown large and people had started whispering that Ra had walked among them, touching the women and making them give birth to children whose skin was as bleached as the white robes the people would hang in the sun. At the time, Teal'c had been a warrior still learning under the tutelage of Bra'tac, so it had been Bra'tac's hand and not his own that had ended tens of thousands of lives, but had Teal'c been promoted earlier, it would have been his hand on the control crystals.

Teal'c was far too used to the idea of maintaining genetic purity. However Daniel and Blair had confronted him with dozens of other examples from Rwanda to Cambodia, Darfur to Haiti, Armenia to the Native Peoples of America. The sheer numbers and the vast range of excuses had shocked Teal'c. He often wondered how a people who carried such evil could also carry such good, but he rarely shared that thought. Teal'c had found that humans rarely appreciated being reminded that their own species could be as evil as the Goa'uld.

Siler walked by, offering a smile, and Teal'c inclined his head toward the other man. And yet, despite the great potential for evil, humans were equally as capable of good, a trait which could not be said of Goa'uld. Siler and others on this base had forgiven him the most heinous of crimes. Many times, the warriors of Earth had chosen human rights and dignity over tactical positioning. And yet again, his thoughts circled back to the Eurondans.

O'Neill had wanted the technology the Eurondans offered. He had wanted it badly, and yet he had placed the value of the breeders' lives above the strategic advantage the technology offered. The technology carried the taint of the Eurondans' sins, and yet O'Neill never hesitated to claim that Teal'c himself carried no taint. Humans were inexplicable. Teal'c wondered if O'Neill would still have made that choice had he and Daniel not reconciled. Daniel had certainly been the first to reject the spoils of such a corrupt society.

"Teal'c," Carter offered as she sat down next to him. "Long day?"

"The number of minutes remains the same," Teal'c said, not smiling. She opened her mouth to explain and then closed it again, jabbing him in the side with her elbow to let him know that she did not appreciate his humor. Teal'c enjoyed feigning ignorance with Carter because her attempts to explain often proved far more humorous than one might expect. Daniel and Blair were far more facile with words, but Carter was more amusing.

"I saw that huge reading list Daniel and Blair dropped on you."

"It was daunting," Teal'c agreed.

"It was enough to drive a sane person to anti-depressants. I need to take you on a Disney movie binge next time the colonel and Daniel have one of their nights featuring beer-drinking and arguing over stupid science fiction movies."

"I preferred Star Wars over Bambi." He had actually enjoyed Star Wars significantly more. He found himself both bored and strangely disturbed by the storyline of Bambi.

Carter shrugged. "I'll watch anything, just as long as it does not involve hundreds of dead bodies. I get enough of that at work." Carter fell silent, but Teal'c knew she was thinking of the man whom O'Neill had essentially ordered killed by having the iris closed. The Eurondan leader had been evil, and the NID would, no doubt, have found in him a likely ally if he had come through. Teal'c did not question O'Neill's decision, but he suspected that Daniel and Carter did. Rather, he had suspicions in the case of Carter. Daniel had been quite vocal in his objections. It was strange, but the more Daniel and O'Neill fought, the stronger their relationship became.

"I really hope you skipped some of those books," Carter said as she plunged her fork into the lasagna.

"I did not."

"Some days, Teal'c." She shook her head sadly. "Some days I really think you're a masochist."

Teal'c considered that. "Pain does not lead to my sexual stimulation or completion," he assured her.

She looked at him strangely for several seconds, chewing her food before swallowing. "Um, good to know." She shoved an even larger bite of food into her mouth, and Teal'c wondered if he had transgressed another taboo. He would ask Blair later.

After having the shaman around for over a month, Teal'c had found that he had grown quite used to having someone even more adept at explaining human behavior than Daniel. Daniel understood Jaffa culture better, even if Blair was quickly learning, but Blair could explain human culture in a way that Daniel could not. Blair insisted that his unconventional upbringing and anthropological training had prepared him better than an archeologist, but Teal'c did wonder if the shamanic powers of a tao qua ca tec'ma'te i cal mah did not also influence him. However, that was a subject Blair did not wish to discuss. He claimed that he had had no more dreams, and he had even turned down Teal'c's offer to meditate with him.

Teal'c did wonder if Ellison's discomfort with the subject didn't exert undue influence on the young man's choice to not actively pursue the path of the shaman. However, that was not a path Teal'c walked, and he had no advice to offer.

"Look who's here," Carter said softly.

Teal'c watched Jim Ellison walk across the cafeteria, his eyes studying the room for a safe place to sit. That probably meant that Blair was, once again, working with the doctor from Bethesda. When Ellison's eyes met his, Teal'c inclined his head in an invitation that he did not expect Ellison to take.

"Don't..." Carter started saying, but she cut herself off when Ellison surprised them both by heading over to their table.

Walking over, he set his tray down before sinking into the chair with a weary sigh. "I promised myself that I wouldn't ever get used to military food again."

"It's not that bad," Carter said in a tone of voice that suggested she planned on disagreeing with anything Ellison said. Ellison simply pursed his lips.

Teal'c recognized small talk, and even understood Daniel's logic regarding the necessity to form connections and bonds, no matter how fleeting. However, he had no idea how to respond. On most worlds, a feast such as this would be cause for great celebration, so Daniel's suggestion that Teal'c simply agree with the person who was attempting to make small talk felt disrespectful--as though he was belittling those starving worlds and their needs. Teal'c could not do so. And while he did not wish to join Carter by shunning the man because of the stress that placed on Blair, he did not want to convey any sort of approval either. He just remained silent.

"I should go... fix something... somewhere else," Carter said, not even attempting to make her excuse sound plausible. Most of her food was untouched, but, without waiting for any sort of acknowledgment, she took the tray and dumped most of the food in the garbage before leaving.

"So, are you as pissed at me as Carter?" Ellison asked, stabbing several vegetables with considerable force.

"I am not."

"Does that mean you're even more pissed, up near Daniel-levels, or that you haven't caught this most recent case of Ellison-hatred that seems to have swept the base?"

Teal'c blinked at the metaphor of hatred as a disease. It suggested that Ellison blamed something outside himself for others' negative reactions rather than acknowledging the true source. In the weeks following Blair's injury, Ellison had admitted that his behavior was hurtful and cruel, but now he seemed blind to the more subtle forms of abuse that still defined his relationship with Blair.

"Daniel really is a mean little shit when he decides to hold a grudge," Ellison observed.

Teal'c found it amusing that Daniel had gone from pure rage at Blair for revealing his inner feelings to some sort of united kinship where Daniel felt a need to defend Blair--particularly from Jim Ellison. Of course, Teal'c did not think it wise to share that amusement, so he did not. He ate his potatoes.

"I can't wait until Blair gets discharged because this place... this is not a comfortable place to live," Ellison settled for saying. Teal'c looked around the room. Most of the personnel in here did not know or care about Ellison. The ones who had seen him with Blair tended to admire the great fondness the men had for one another, and the few who knew of Bethesda hated Ellison. The number who hated him was very small, but it was a group dedicated and united in their dislike. Teal'c frowned as it occurred to him that Ellison did not usually talk this much to anyone other than Blair or the men to whom he placed calls. Either Ellison was feeling particularly isolated and in need of making a connection, or he was trying to gain information.

"The animosity is significant," Teal'c agreed, watching Ellison's reaction. The Sentinel stopped with his fork half-way to his mouth.

"Thank you." The tone actually sounded sincere.

"For what do you owe me gratitude?" Teal'c asked curiously.

"You said something honest. I keep asking Daniel why he's acting like such a shit, and he won't say two words. He was in that hospital bed next to Blair for a week with that appendicitis of his, so I thought he'd warm up at some point."

Teal'c considered that. During his recovery, Daniel had started making complimentary comments about Ellison. When Teal'c and O'Neill had visited him after his appendectomy, Daniel had made pointed suggestions about how O'Neill would serve him as Ellison did Blair if they were real friends. O'Neill had thrown a Nerf ball at Daniel's head. However, he would expect Daniel's animosity to deepen and harden with more recent events.

"Daniel is most unhappy with you," Teal'c agreed, believing that the concessions Ellison had made to Blair's physical wellbeing deserved that much honesty.

Ellison ate in silence for several minutes, but Teal'c could read discomfort in the man's every gesture.

"So, why is it that Jackson so pissed with me?" he finally asked.

Teal'c was not sure how to answer the question without causing strife. Quite frankly, Teal'c agreed with Daniel's dislike for Ellison. Blair was entirely too willing to put his own needs aside for those of his partner, and Ellison did not appear to honor that sacrifice. And now that Teal'c knew them better, that confused him even more. Ellison was not Blair's tec'ma'te. He was not Blair's lover or co-parent, he was not a blood-brother or one to whom Blair had sworn allegiance. And yet, Blair would give up his own goals in order to assist Ellison in achieving his own. Were Blair to show such loyalty to Teal'c, Teal'c would focus all his energy to making sure that Blair did not neglect his own needs in his desire to serve another. Ellison's focus on Blair appeared limited to his attention to Blair's physical well being. Apparently Blair and Ellison both believed their relationship was intimately tied to their roles as Sentinel and guide, but Blair's description of the purpose of a guide had led to a very unfortunate discussion of slavery which had upset Blair to such an extent that Teal'c had dropped the subject.

Ellison sighed and thunked his elbow on the table. "Normally I don't really give a shit what people think about me, but would you like to explain why in the last week, everyone has decided, again, that I'm an ass?" Ellison carefully placed his fork on the tray with the exaggerated caution of a man who wanted to throw it.

Teal'c knew that Daniel had promised Blair that he would say nothing, but Teal'c had not given that vow. "I believe everyone thinks Blair should go to Bethesda."

Ellison frowned. "Those eggheads are giving him shit. Why should he go if he doesn't want to?"

Either Ellison was very foolish or he had elevated self-deception to godhood. "I do not believe his desire is in question," Teal'c said. Blair had attempted to tell Teal'c that he was just tired of schooling, but Teal'c had quickly decided that Blair was a very poor liar.

"What?" Ellison leaned forward, and Teal'c decided that it was Ellison's intelligence that was in question because he very obviously did not know what Teal'c meant.

"I believe Blair does wish to go. Daniel informs me that the school has enrollment and research requirements that would require his presence for at least one semester, and Blair is unwilling to leave your side."

Ellison sat up straight so fast that Teal'c could not prevent himself from searching for an enemy worthy of such an extreme reaction. "No. No, he wouldn't throw away this chance just because he'd have to do one semester somewhere." Ellison said the words, but from his tone, he did not even believe the words himself. Teal'c just looked at the man, watching as Ellison's shock slowly turned to a narrow-eyed anger. "He wouldn't. He won't." Ellison shoved his tray back and was up and out of the room so fast that several airmen had to scramble to get out of his way.

Leaving his remaining food, Teal'c followed, not sure how Ellison would react. While he had been nothing but solicitous with Blair's health since arriving in Colorado, Teal'c could not forget the casual cruelty Ellison had shown in Cascade. If Ellison returned to his old patterns of behaviors, Teal'c would not allow him to harm Blair again.

"Teal'c?" Sergeant Collins asked as he plastered himself to the side of the hallway, attempting to not get struck by Ellison and his precipitous flight through the halls.

"Request that O'Neill come to Sandburg's quarters," Teal'c asked as he hurried after Ellison. By the time Ellison reached the visitor's quarters adjacent to the infirmary, he was showing signs of great anger. He pushed the door to Blair's room open so hard that it hit the wall and rebounded.

"Chief, what the hell are you thinking?" Ellison demanded loudly.

"Jim." Blair had been sitting at a table littered with books and reports, the gray-haired doctor from Bethesda sitting across from him, but now Blair stood up and clung to the back of his chair. "Hey, man. I thought you were going for lunch."

"When did you plan to tell me?" Ellison demanded loudly.

Blair blushed and looked around the room, his eyes lingering on Teal'c and the doctor. "Probably not the time, man," Blair said. His hands reached up as if to brush away his hiar, a nervous gesture Teal'c had noted many times, but this time Blair had pulled back his hair, so his hands simply fluttered for a moment before returning to clutch the chair.

"We need to talk," Ellison said. He stepped forward, but instead of physically crowding Blair, he closed in on the doctor from Bethesda, looming over the older man. "If you'll excuse us." Ellison's voice was tightly controlled, but even the gray-haired doctor who walked as though he had never faced an enemy in his life recognized the danger.

"I should... yes, there are many... um... documents..." he started stammering.

"Oh man, so not cool. Back off, Jim," Blair snapped. And Ellison did; he backed away several steps, but his anger was still coiled beneath his skin, so strongly that Teal'c feared to leave Blair alone with him. Blair might be mending, but he was not fully healed yet.

"No, I really should go. I shouldn't push so hard when you're... um... yes, I'll go." The doctor grabbed several papers and fled past Teal'c.

"What the fuck is your problem, Ellison?" Blair demanded, his own anger flaring.

"My problem? You think I have a problem?" Ellison spoke each word with great deliberation. "You need to have your head examined."

"Pot and kettle," Blair sing-songed back at the man, and Teal'c watched as Ellison fought back an urge to yell. Had Daniel shown such sarcasm and disrespect for O'Neill, there would have already been much yelling. However, while shouting at Daniel caused him to shout back, Blair's reaction to such aggressive communication tended to vary widely. Teal'c had seem him explode in rage and withdraw in great pain. And as of yet, Teal'c had not determined the pattern for the reactions; however, Ellison's control did suggest that he was mindful of his partner. Even more, Ellison's actions suggested that it was not he who had encouraged Blair to turn down the offer from Bethesda.

"You turned down Bethesda because of me." Ellison physically backed up a step, his hands still tightly clenched, but Blair ignored the warning signs.

"Get over yourself. Man, you are not the center of the universe. Did it occur to you that I might have my own reasons? Oh wait, I told you my reasons, but hey, if you want to fucking ignore me, go right ahead." Blair flung an arm out, his palm facing Ellison. "You're the fucking expert on ignoring what I say."

Ellison had already physically withdrawn, and now Teal'c watched as the man emotionally retreated. His face became a careful mask of indifference that poorly hid the strong emotions beneath.

"Chief, tell me you didn't turn them down because they wanted to you move to Maryland for one fucking semester." Ellison chose words to express great anger, but his tone was oddly unemotional.

"I didn't turn them down because they wanted me to move to Maryland," Blair echoed sarcastically, but his words only reinforced Teal'c's conclusion that Blair was a poor liar. "Teal'c, maybe you could give us some privacy?" Blair asked, turning to Teal'c with a pleading expression.

For a half-second, Teal'c considered the request, but the situation was volatile, and to retreat leaving Ellison and Blair alone seemed foolish. "I am awaiting O'Neill's arrival," Teal'c said, tacitly refusing the request.

Anger flashed across Blair's face. "Fuck. Save me from alpha dogs and their fucking alpha dog games. God forbid someone have an opinion that doesn't match theirs." Blair attempted to head for the door, and Teal'c watched in confusion as Ellison's face contorted with pain for a brief second.

Sidestepping, Teal'c blocked the doorway.

"Chief, we need to talk," Ellison said firmly, taking advantage of the fact that Blair could not pass.

"Man, no we don't. I told you. I am sick of academic games. Ventriss is the tip of a huge, fucking iceberg and I don't feel like putting up with it anymore. Do you want me to write up my statement and have it notarized?"

Clearly this time Blair had chosen fury and counter-attack as his response, but Teal'c frowned at the path he chose. The mention of Ventriss caused Ellison great shame; it was a subject Blair normally went to great lengths to avoid. However, he now brandished the name as a weapon. Likewise, the accusation that Ellison did not listen seemed to have struck Ellison far deeper than a random comment should. Teal'c studied Blair—the way he faced Ellison with his lips pressed tightly together. Blair was attacking. This was more than random anger; he was targeting Ellison's most vulnerable spots.

"So, this doesn't have anything to do with you spending a semester away from Cascade?" Ellison's back was stiff with tension, but Teal'c watched another shift as Blair now retreated. The angry glare and tight mouth softened into something more uncertain.

"You need to get back to work." Blair said no more, but the tone of the conversation changed so dramatically that Teal'c wondered what he was not hearing. Clearly these two had the same sort of abbreviated communication Teal'c had once enjoyed with Bra'tac, but that sort of verbal intimacy left others stranded when trying to understand.

"Yes, I do," Ellison agreed. "I'm about out of leave, but that doesn't mean you can't go to Bethesda."

"You want us to split up." Blair said the words with great anger, but his body spoke of fear and pain.

"For a semester, if we have to," Ellison agreed.

"Fine." Blair spoke the word and turned his back on Ellison to concentrate on the table and the assorted reports. "I'll go."

O'Neill approached from the far end of the hall, his face registering confusion as he caught the end of their conversation. "So, what's up?" O'Neill asked with a casual tone that hid something far sharper. He looked around the room. Teal'c knew what O'Neill would take note of. Ellison stood against the far wall, his arms crossed over his chest in anger. Blair leaned against the table, his body stiff with anger, and the two men were not looking at each other. Blair studied the notes; Ellison stared at a blank wall with great intensity.

"You okay, Sandburg?" O'Neill asked when both men ignored his first question.

"Fine," Blair barked in the worst lie Teal'c had heard yet. O'Neill looked over at him, and Teal'c could only raise an eyebrow to indicate that he also questioned the honesty of such a statement.

"Ellison?" O'Neill asked.

"Just have a problem with a partner who's an idiot," Ellison answered.

That made O'Neill frown in surprise. "Sandburg's a pain in the ass and almost as much of a trouble magnet as Danny, but idiot isn't the first word that comes to mind."

"He's not going to Bethesda because he thinks I need babysitting," Ellison glared at Sandburg as if daring him to disagree, but Blair kept his eyes focused on the data the Bethesda doctor had brought on others who had suffered from periods of heightened senses.

"Oh no, I'm going," Blair said without turning around. "You are so on your own, man."

Daniel appeared, hurrying down the hall. Clearly the story of Ellison's anger had reached him because he was moving far more quickly than usual. Usually Daniel walked and read a book at the same time, which had caused some interesting moments when he had lost track of his position within the base and walked into the wrong room. The women never would have believed anyone else who had walked into the women's locker room supposedly by accident, but Daniel was so well known for his habit of walking and reading that no one had questioned him. This time, however, he was walking with strides as purposeful as if the alarms were sounding.

"Blair?" Daniel asked as soon as he reached the door. Blair's shoulders sagged. "What's going on?"

Ellison stepped forward. "Did Blair tell you that he was giving up the Bethesda offer because he wouldn't leave me?"

Daniel ducked his head in guilt. Rather than reassure his friend, Blair scowled at Daniel and mouthed the word 'traitor' at him.

"Hey, let's not go throwing around words that will make us all want to kill each other again," O'Neill hurried to say. He also moved a step closer to Daniel, touching the man's arm lightly. "I've actually gotten used to thinking of everyone in this room as a decent human being. Besides, I'm way too old and cranky to have to change my mind again."

"This is my life." Blair turned his back on the table and faced the room.

"It's your life you're throwing away, you mean," Ellison said. The presence of others seemed to embolden him and he stepped forward. "You've worked years for your doctorate. Are you really going to throw it away because you don't think I can handle myself for six months?"

"Wait," Daniel interrupted before Blair could answer. "You want him to go?" he demanded of Ellison. Ellison gave him a withering look that left Daniel clearly confused. In one way, Teal'c found the confusion comforting. His inability to understand Ellison and Blair was clearly not because of his own incomplete knowledge of human culture and language. On the other hand, he wished Daniel understood well enough to offer advice. However right now, neither O'Neill nor Daniel looked capable of offering advice.

"Of course I want him to go," Ellison answered.

"But... then why wouldn't you go?" Daniel asked Blair directly. It was a valid question.

"This is so not your business," Blair snapped.

"No, but it's mine," Ellison jumped in. "Damn it, Blair, you come wading in after me when you should be taking care of yourself. You pull yourself out of a hospital bed to come traipsing around Mexico, and it almost killed you. That gunshot nearly killed you because you didn't let yourself recover from the pneumonia. And now you're throwing away over a decade of work because you think you have to be glued to my side?" Ellison took another step forward so that he was almost chest to chest with Blair.

"I thought you needed backup, that you needed a partner," Blair said, but instead of retaliating with anger, now he was withdrawing. Some switch had been flipped, and now Ellison pressed his advantage.

"I do need a partner, but I need a permanent partner, not someone who can ride with me only as long as Simon can find excuses to keep the paperwork going."

"Oh, so I haven't done enough to make myself available to you?" Blair asked, the sarcasm surging back.

"Damn it," Ellison swore and then rubbed his short hair. "Guys, maybe you could give us a little privacy?" Ellison asked as he looked at Teal'c and Daniel and O'Neill. They had all crowded in, and given the small size of Sandburg's room, it was an uncomfortable fit.

"Oh, I don't think so," O'Neill said, so clearly not trusting these two in a room alone.

"I'm out of here," Blair said, and he darted between Daniel and O'Neill with far more agility than Teal'c expected from one still recovering from an operation. However, Blair did not move nearly fast enough to get around Teal'c and out of the room. "Oh, come on, man. I am not a prisoner here."

Teal'c looked at O'Neill for direction. O'Neill looked to Daniel, and Daniel just looked confused.

"Look, let's just sit down and talk this out," O'Neill finally suggested.

"Nothing to talk about," Blair said as he turned to face the room. "Jim has made up my mind for me."

"That wasn't what I was trying to do, Chief. I just don't want you giving up something this important." Ellison took a step forward, lifting his arm to reach for Blair before aborting the gesture.

"Hey, call me a selfish bastard for not putting the Sandburg and Ellison show at the top of my priority list, but is anyone thinking about the hundreds of men whose lives are at risk because of these damn senses?" O'Neill asked, neatly avoiding the difficult topic of power and how it lay between Ellison and Blair. "You give up this research, and people will die," he added, shamelessly appealing to Blair's more altruistic nature. Teal'c could tell from the way Blair flinched back that the attack had hit home.

"No way. I'm giving Dr. Nichols all my research," Blair quickly defended himself, his hands held up in surrender.

Now Daniel joined in, following O'Neill's lead, once again working in a partnership that Teal'c had not seen since the death of Daniel's wife. "Blair, as long as you're ABD, they're going to ignore everything you say. You don't have the status to challenge the people at the top, but if you defend your dissertation, that's when you'll earn the right to redefine these senses."

"Like you convinced people that aliens built pyramids?" Blair asked in the most blatant attack Teal'c had seen him use against anyone other than Ellison. "I so don't need that kind of grief." O'Neill reached out and touched Daniel's arm, but Daniel was already laughing.

"Okay, one or two doctorates do not give you the ability to change the world or convince people that aliens are real. That's true. But the right people listened. If I hadn't gotten that doctorate in archeology, do you think the Stargate program would have looked at me twice? Blair, I had a chance to walk into an alternate reality. I saw what happened when I wasn't here to change the course of history, and that was a future I would not want for this world. If you walk away from this, do you know what kind of future you're creating?"

"I do," O'Neill offered. "Without you to teach covert ops commanders how to deal with this, some stupid kid is going to have his senses go haywire, and he's going to reveal his team's position. Men will be tortured. Men will die," O'Neill said with great quietness and intensity. "Some team leader is going to make a mistake and end up killing a teammate while trying to keep him from scratching his own skin off and screaming. That's the future you're creating by not finishing."

Teal'c watched as Blair folded in on himself, seeming to lose inches as he retreated from this. Ellison stepped forward, his hand going to the small of Blair's back.

"That is not Blair's responsibility." Ellison sounded most angry with O'Neill. Teal'c raised an eyebrow in confusion. O'Neill had been attempting to reinforce Ellison's own position, but now Ellison had apparently changed positions.

"No, he's right," Blair said. Teal'c raised his other eyebrow. "When I started this research, I wanted to help people, but Jim..." Blair stopped and pulled the tie out of his hair so that long curls fell around his face only to have him push the hair back nervously. "They want me to work with Sentinels."

"Oh." Ellison sounded calm, but the hand he had placed against Blair's back slowly curled until he was fisting Blair's sweatshirt.

"And, but... so?" O'Neill asked in exasperation.

"Jack," Daniel said softly, warning the colonel away from the conversation.

"Daniel?" O'Neill asked.

Daniel glared at him and, in return, O'Neill gave him an inquisitive look. Clearly the man had not read the briefing notes Daniel had prepared on the conflicts between Alex Barnes and Blair Sandburg.

"What?" O'Neill demanded, ignoring Daniel's warning. Ellison slipped his arm around Blair's shoulders, but Blair simply stood up straighter.

"Man, last time I worked with a Sentinel who wasn't Jim, I ended up dead. So not cool. And I do not plan on doing that ever again, at least not until I'm about a hundred and three and too arthritic to care."

"Am I missing something?" O'Neill asked, looking around the room. "This was the crazy woman with the prison record, right?"

Perhaps Teal'c was wrong. O'Neill did seem to have read Daniel's report.

"Oh yeah," Blair said softly while Ellison gave a terse, "Yes."

"So... you think soldiers are going to go criminally insane at the sight of you and try to shove your head in a fountain?"

"Jack!" Daniel snapped with such fury that O'Neill looked away from Blair and looked at Daniel. "That was not worded well," Daniel said, giving O'Neill a look that would, as the old saying went, frighten a man out of completing his urination. While Daniel might not wish for his teammates to think of him as a warrior, he was no cha'til to stand by and allow the elders to act.

Daniel took a step forward. "Blair, I can understand that you might be wary..."

"Chief, just tell them that you won't work with any affected soldiers," Ellison interrupted. Daniel glared at him.

"Oh man, I wish I could, but I have to replicate the level of initial control you showed in order to prove that Sentinels can bring their senses down to tolerable levels. So not cool. I mean, I could just explain it, but even Dr. Nichols is like way too suspicious of all this to get involved... not until I've proven my theories."

"So, you aren't just afraid to leave me on my own for a few months?" Ellison asked, and Teal'c could not tell if that tone was hopeful or disappointed. Ellison was skilled at hiding his emotions.

Blair shrugged. "There are way too many reasons to not go."

Teal'c did not understand humans or Sentinels or the shamanic path, but he did know many stories of those who were tao qua ca tec'ma'te i cal mah. He took a step forward. "Blair Sandburg," Teal'c began formally, "what path does your heart tell you is the correct one?"

Blair stared at him with wide eyes that blinked with such rapidity that Teal'c was certain that Blair hid something. He tilted his head, inviting Blair to confide in the group who had assembled.

"I..." Blair looked over at Ellison.

"Chief, I don't want you to give up your dreams. Remember that conversation you had with Teal'c the other day? You talked about dedicating your life to this Sentinel stuff, and he asked you the difference between being a guide and being a slave. That's..." Ellison stopped, the muscle on the side of his jaw bulging for a second. "Chief, that's not a good feeling for me. I feel like—"

"No way. No fucking way. That is not how it is," Blair cut him off. He turned and rested his palm against Ellison's stomach. Ellison laid his own hand on top of Blair's trapping it.

"Blair," Daniel said softly, "it would be one or two semesters. The way you tear through work, probably one. And after that, you can make some choices. You could train officers out of McChord or take research assistants of your own and train them in how to deal with Sentinels while you walked away from the military."

Teal'c watched, but he had no doubt which path Blair Sandburg would take. Ellison reached around Blair, hugging him closely to his chest in a display of affection. Teal'c averted his eyes, allowing Ellison and Blair some privacy. However, O'Neill and Daniel did not do the same. They watched. O'Neill's face was full of calculating curiosity, but in Daniel's eyes, Teal'c could read the loneliness and pain. Humans were so odd. They required much more privacy than a Jaffa would ever dream of, and yet they allowed so little privacy to others in their daily lives. Clearing his throat, Teal'c turned his body to allow Ellison and Blair more privacy.

Daniel looked over and caught his eye. For the first time in many months, Daniel graced Teal'c with a small smile, just enough to let Teal'c know that Daniel did understand what Teal'c was thinking, just enough to suggest that maybe Daniel might still find a way to forgive Teal'c for the death of Sha're. "Come on, Jack," Daniel said, shoving at O'Neill's arm to get his attention. "You were going to annoy me with fish stories as I tried to translate the hieroglyphs on the altar from P3X-491."

Daniel herded O'Neill from the room, and O'Neill allowed himself to be herded. Teal'c followed, closing the door to Blair's quarters behind him. He could only hope that the young shaman was making the right choice. It bothered Teal'c that he was following the path of science since shamanism and science were rarely associated in American culture, but a tao qua ca tec'ma'te i cal mah's heart would not lead him astray. If Blair's heart told him that he had to walk this path, Teal'c would trust that.

25. Twenty-five

Teal'c watched as O'Neill circled the village in what might appear to be a random pattern generated by his own boredom. However, his random path intersected each shadowed corner or possible cover in the dusty square where Daniel was sitting cross-legged in the dust talking to Lianch of the Tol people.

Daniel explained the Tau'ri war against the Goa'uld, and as usual, the villager's eyes went to Teal'c. This world was poor, a collection of stone huts huddled around a communal fire pit, but even here they knew of the Jaffa who served the gods. Teal'c stood very still and tried to appear non-threatening as Daniel started on that oft-used explanation. After weeks of not working as the others were weaned from the light on P4X-347, the familiar words were a comfort. With SG1 unable to leave the world where they had grown addicted to the light, Teal'c had spent time with Bra'tac, following his former master to the rebel world where he was training new warriors to fight the rebellion Teal'c had started. When Teal'c had followed O'Neill's lead on that day years ago, when he had turned against Apophis, he had never expected that others, including his own former master, would follow him onto his path. To know that others had followed you onto your path was far more daunting than the quick death Teal'c had expected.

The thought of paths brought Teal'c's musings back to the other person he had spent time with. Blair Sandburg had happily taken on the establishment, sweeping away decades of research and redefining Hyperactive Sensory Awareness. The term was less spiritual than Sentinel, and Teal'c still did not know if that meant the young shaman was on the right path. His small room in Bethesda was thick with books and charts and printouts, but Teal'c had seen not a single candle. It was most unsettling. Only the knowledge that Blair continued daily communication with Jim Ellison gave him hope that the young shaman would eventually seek out his true path. Only a tao qua ca tec'ma'te i cal mah would feel such need for an anchor. And now, his work with military personnel with HSA had become a second anchor.

However, despite his desire to encourage Blair's spiritual quest, Teal'c had resolved to follow Master Bra'tac's advice. One might be assisted in finding the path, but once that path was opened, one must choose to walk it alone. Teal'c could help in this no more than Ellison could.

"So, the mining rights?" O'Neill prompted from the far side of the nearly-empty square, his arm resting on the end of his weapon.

"Working on it," Daniel said in a tone that warned O'Neill to not push at this juncture. O'Neill subsided, returning to his previous task of patrolling the area. Carter shifted, her eyes scanning the village, either watching for enemy or searching for evidence that the people of this planet used the rare iridium alloy her samples had yielded. The heavy rocks that made the foundations of the buildings had veins that gleamed dimly, but they did not appear to mine or work the metal and the Goa'uld did not use this alloy although Carter had been most excited by her tests.

"Your people are great indeed if they fight the untrue gods," Lianch suggested slowly, his long grey-white hair catching the bright sun as he nodded. He looked over at Teal'c, and Teal'c simply looked back.

"My people are only as great as the allies who assist them," Daniel offered carefully. "This metal in your ground would help us stand up against the Goa'uld."

Lianch leaned back on his heels and picked up a stick to poke the fire that burned in the huge central cooking hearth that dominated the center of the village square. "To ally ourselves with you is to stand up against the Goa'uld," he said slowly. Teal'c could tell from Lianch's body language that the man had fears regarding taking such a step. Clearly, Daniel saw the same thing.

"We could offer you help building defenses, additional resources in the way of food or technology. My people have a plow that never needs sharpening. You could till your fields in half the time." Daniel leaned forward, stopping just short of touching Lianch's knee.

Lianch was nodding. "The offer seems fair since we have no need of rocks." He smiled. "I often have need of fewer rocks in my fields. However, to take such an action that would affect the village is a matter of importance to everyone."

Daniel was nodding in perfect time with Lianch. "I understand. I'm only asking for a chance to make our case in front of everyone."

Lianch frowned at him. "Are you Bermiddlt that you would speak with everyone?"

The ones who had built the Stargate built into it technology that eased the communication between peoples and cultures; however, the word bermiddlt defeated their technology, suggesting that the word had cultural ties which did not allow it to translate directly from one language to another. Teal'c had noted the same phenomenon with "kree" which was never translated. In fact, when Daniel had attempted to explain "kree," he had used many different words, because the cultural meaning did not exist in English.

Daniel leaned back. "I don't know that word."

Lianch looked immediately disturbed.

"We may use another word for it," Daniel hurried to explain. The circles in which O'Neill wandered grew tighter as the colonel closed the distance between himself and Daniel. "Can you explain what the word means?" Daniel looked at the leader of the Tol people with wide eyes and empty hands.

Lianch tilted his head and leaned all the way back on his heels as though so surprised that he couldn't quite catch his balance. "A bermiddlt speaks to all."

Daniel nodded, but didn't say anything as he looked at Lianch expectantly. Lianch opened his mouth, as though confounded by the need to explain such an obvious term.

"He speaks of a shaman," Teal'c offered. He now remembered having heard his term for tao qua ca tec'ma'te i cal mah in the distant past.

Daniel looked over to Teal'c in surprise, but Lianch was nodding, clearly relieved that the Tau'ri knew of the idea even if the word was different.

"Do you know one?" the old man asked.

"Yes," Teal'c offered at exactly the same time O'Neill offered a curt, "No."

O'Neill glared at him, and Teal'c amended his original answer. "No."

Unsurprisingly, Lianch was staring at them all as if they had turned into men driven mad by the sun.

"We don't generally talk about our shaman," Daniel tried to ease Lianch's fears, telling a version of the truth that he could accept. Teal'c doubted the man would appreciate the whole truth--that the Tau'ri did not talk about their shaman because, for the most part, they believed such men and women to be insincere or insane. Perhaps that was why Blair Sandburg was so reluctant to walk the path open to him. Teal'c did not believe that Blair cared that much for the good opinion of others, but perhaps the good opinion of Jim Ellison was enough for him to abdicate his position as a shaman.

"It is a wise people who hold their bermiddlt close," Lianch agreed, obviously comforted by the answer. "But to make this agreement would require all the tribe's approval, the living and the dead. We share a bermiddlt with a great many villages, so it would be many seasons before ours could return, but if you have one with such talents, we would be glad to share the Bermid'cate."

"No need to wait, we can go to this Bermuda thing right now. Daniel's good with talking to people," O'Neill said with forced cheerfulness. O'Neill understood the tactical value of deception, but on the issue of the soul and those who spoke to the soul, deception came with such danger that Teal'c could not allow his friends to walk such a treacherous path out of ignorance.

"You are a bermiddlt?" Lianch asked Daniel, awe in his voice.

"No," Teal'c said firmly while O'Neill said, "Yes." This time Teal'c did not amend his answer.

Daniel looked at O'Neill for a moment in desperation before he turned back to Lianch. "I have talked to shamen and have been offered the path, but I'm not actually a shaman myself," Daniel said slowly. "I haven't gotten any farther than speaking to a person who..." Daniel stopped, and Teal'c suspected that he was struggling with a way to define "ascended" to these simple people. The translation the Stargate technology provided could cause confusion with such complex terms.

"Exists in another reality?" Lianch provided.

Daniel smiled. "Exactly. But if that is acceptable, I would be happy to speak to the others in the Bermid'cate."

Lianch had dropped his stick earlier, and now he picked it up and resumed his stirring of the embers of the communal fire. "The Bermid'cate is a place of great danger for those who walk the path. I would not wish to risk a new friend on such a perilous journey."

"Dangerous?" O'Neill abandoned all pretense at boredom. "How is it dangerous?"

With a shrug, Lianch stirred the embers to life. "It is no danger to those of us not touched by the path of the bermiddlt. I do not pretend to understand the dangers posed to those who walk the shadowed paths of life."

O'Neill frowned, and Teal'c could almost feel the frustration radiating from him like heat from the summer sun. "Would you mind us checking it out, you know, just to make sure that we understand any possible dangers?"

"We don't want to offend your ancestors or break any taboos," Daniel hurried to offer before Lianch could speak, "but if you want us to trust one of our bermiddlt, you have to understand our concerns."

"I do, and it speaks well of your people that you show such concern." Lianch tipped his head so that his long, white braid fell off his shoulder and swung free. A young boy with bare feet came darting out of a low building. "Tehsee will show you to the place, but I would ask that Daniel not go." Lianch jabbed his stick into the fire, allowing the flames to capture it. "If your feet have been shown the path but you do not walk it, you should not go to this place."

"That's okay, Danny's going to stay here with me." O'Neill walked over and dropped a hand onto Daniel's shoulder, his knee pressed to Daniel's arm. "Teal'c, you and Carter check out this place and make sure that whatever shaman we bring these people, he isn't going to get lead poisoning."

"Yes, sir," Carter answered. She smiled at the boy Tehsee, and Teal'c could tell that the boy was smitten by her smile. He was verging on manhood, and Carter would be featuring prominently in his dreams for many weeks judging by his flush. He scrambled, tripped over the end of a piece of firework, and then used the momentum to dart forward.

Carter smiled, and Teal'c had difficulty restraining a smile himself. It would not honor the young man to make jest of his awkwardness, but Teal'c remembered the day when Carter would have had the power to make him trip over his own feet. Amused by the boy and worried about the danger this Bermid'cate posed, Teal'c followed far enough behind to provide adequate cover as he escorted Carter to this sacred place.

~ ~ ~ ~

"Well, sir, it looks like we just need to pony up one shaman, and we can have that iridium contract," O'Neill opened the debriefing. The general was not fully seated before O'Neill made his announcement, and for a second, General Hammond hovered an inch above his seat.

"One... shaman, colonel?" General Hammond pushed aside the folder with the technical information on P3X-116.

"One tiny, little shaman. We don't even have to give him away, we just need to loan him to the Tol long enough for the Tol's dead ancestors to give us the okay on the mining rights."

"Jack," Daniel warned with the deliberate pronunciation of just his name. O'Neill smiled smugly at Daniel. An expression that would have provoked rage in most people just caused Daniel to roll his eyes.

"It's a little more complicated than that," Daniel started to explain.

"Not really. Actually, we could have already gotten the approval only Teal'c had to go and ruin it when I tried passing Daniel off as our local bone, rattle and drum guy."

Teal'c raised his eyebrow at such an incomplete description.

"I'm not a shaman," Daniel pointed out.

"Ah, but you're as close to one as we get. I mean, the quality of geeks around this place does not inspire confidence. We are low on any sort of geeky type who can understand people. We have geeks for gadgets and rocks, but precious few we can pass off as a shaman. Felger would suck, and Nyan doesn't exactly have the whole lying thing down. He's never going to get laid if he doesn't learn to..."

"Colonel!" General Hammond interrupted. He took a deep breath. "Do I understand that you agreed to have our shaman contact their afterlife to ask permission to mine the iridium?"

"It makes you miss the good old days when we just wanted to bomb the Russians, doesn't it, sir?" O'Neill raised his coffee mug and stared at it morosely for a second before drinking.

General Hammond didn't answer, but from his sigh, Teal'c assumed that the man would agree if he politically could. In many ways, enemies such as the Goa'uld were to be preferred over those, like the NID, who acted out of good intentions and stupidity. The loss of Makepeace had particularly bothered Teal'c. A warrior who had followed O'Neill into battle and risked his life many times had been tempted into cooperating with an enemy because he had believed their lies, and Teal'c had no doubt that Makepeace had believed the NID lies only because the NID themselves did.

"I thought we might ask Dr. Coombs..." Daniel started. Surprisingly it was Carter who interrupted him with a derisive laugh which she quickly cut off.

"I'm sorry, sirs," she offered, "but Simon Coombs? He's..."

"He's good with math and he could do it... probably." Daniel's mouth twisted into an expression which did not communicate confidence.

"He'd start talking about Romulans or warp drives." Carter turned her attention from Daniel to the general. "Sir, I don't think Coombs can handle this. After Daniel, Nyan is our best with first contact."

"No, Nyan is the best with hieroglyphs," Daniel argued.

"He did handle his own with the Gamali," O'Neill mused.

"Because he had to. He's not trained," Daniel insisted, his tone making it clear he did not want to discuss this farther. The linguists and social scientists were, ultimately, under Daniel's leadership, and O'Neill nodded, accepting Daniel's decision. Teal'c had to agree that Nyan was, after Daniel, most skilled in first contact, perhaps because he did move so slowly and carefully when working with others. However, Daniel was loath to allow the young man too far into dangerous territory.

"He's better than Coombs," O'Neill slipped in, but by doing so after acknowledging Daniel's domain, he received only an annoyed look in return. "But since we actually do have a shaman on the payroll, I say we bring in Sandburg. He is on the payroll now, right?"

"You want to pull Blair into this?" Daniel said with a laugh. "Ellison will gut you and hang your body out for the crows if you even suggest taking Blair through the Stargate."

General Hammond ignored the outburst. "Colonel, I don't see why we need to bring in outside personnel for this. What exactly do the Tol want out of this shaman?"

"They want him to go to a sacred spot and shake a little rattle, say a few words, ask the ancestors for permission to dig," O'Neill answered. "And frankly, after the mess with the Salish, I'm voting that we actually do check in with the ancestors first. I don't expect the ancestors to talk back, but you just never know, sir. SG11 has never quite been the same after getting zapped on PXY-887."

General Hammond leaned back in his chair, silent for a moment. "Colonel, is there any chance that, like the Salish, the Tol might be hosting a more powerful species?"

O'Neill made an exaggerated shrug and turned to Carter, inviting her to give her opinion on the question. She made a face that clearly indicated her own ignorance on the issue. "There were no signs of advanced metalwork or power sources, and the sacred Bermid'cate is really just a lake with heavy concentrations of carbon and a dense dinoflagellate population that causes it to be almost black."

"Is it dangerous?" General Hammond opened the planetary file, his pen jotting notes now that they were not discussing shamanism. It remained a mystery to Teal'c how a leader as wise as Hammond could discount the power of shamanism.

"I wouldn't drink it, sir," Carter said, opening her own file and studying the test results from the samples she had taken. "Long term exposure would probably cause a rash or mild respiratory problems if you breathed in the organisms, but its concentrations are only slightly higher than on Earth when we have red or black tides in the coastal regions. So, no sir, it's not dangerous."

"See? It's safe. So I say we 'gate in, introduce them to Sandburg, have Sandburg beat a drum or something, and then pop back home. All good."

"We don't even know if Mr. Sandburg is available," General Hammond pointed out.

"He was finishing up his dissertation when I talked to him last week," Daniel offered. "Knowing Blair, it's already done and perfect, and he's stressing over the placement of captions on his tables."

"Blair?" O'Neill gave Daniel an incredulous look. "I saw his quarters. The kid leaves his shit everywhere, so I'm guessing he's not exactly the type to stress out over captions."

"You have no idea." Daniel reached over and patted O'Neill on the arm as though reassuring a particularly young or stupid child. "This is his research, his life's work. He wants to change the world with this. He's stressing over every period."

Teal'c frowned. "But has he not already caused great change?"

"Some," Daniel agreed. "Not as much as he'd like."

Teal'c nodded in understanding. He was in much the same situation. He had changed much for the Jaffa, but having the task of overthrowing the System Lords only half-done, he had left the world most disordered and dangerous. He wondered if Blair felt the same. "But we should also consider that Lianch claims that this place is dangerous for those who are true shaman. If we take Blair Sandburg, we should also take Jim Ellison."

"Oh no, that is just a bad idea," O'Neill said surprisingly quickly. Teal'c raised an eyebrow in a tacit request for an explanation. "I don't care if you call it Post-Combat Hypersensitive Disorder or Hyperactive Sensory Awareness, it comes down to the same thing--he's not reliable in the field."

"I have to agree with the colonel," the general added. "If we invite Mr. Sandburg in, that does not change military policy on having those with P... HSA in active combat. Detective Ellison is not eligible to go through the gate."

"Sir," Carter cleared her throat, "I hate to point this out, but Blair was able to see Daniel after he was shifted out of our dimension, and he clearly contacted Oma Desala at least once. It could be that the Tol are talking about a danger that is in an adjacent dimension that only a shaman would be able to perceive."

"Aw, crap. You just had to go and bring up the shamanic powers, didn't you, Carter?"

"Yes, sir," Carter answered without even an attempt to look apologetic for O'Neill. "We should have some TER's on hand in case there is something more than just a lake there."

O'Neill got a thoughtful look on his face. "Would a TER really stop someone like Oma?"

"No." Daniel said the word firmly, and no one at the table contradicted him.

"Dr. Jackson," the general interrupted the silence that followed Daniel's answer, "could I get a report on any in-house personnel you think might be able to handle this situation? I don't want to bring in Mr. Sandburg unless we need to."

Daniel nodded. "I'll get that together by five."

Teal'c listened as the remainder of the debriefing covered mineral deposits and logistical realities on a world with very little rain but rare thunderstorms and floods that swept the land clear of all but the hardiest structures. He did not doubt that Hammond would call in Blair Sandburg. Teal'c did not approve of impersonating a shaman, but even if General Hammond decided to perpetuate such a fraud, Teal'c did not believe that anyone at the SGC could, realistically, convince the Tol people. O'Neill had not lied about Nyan's unfortunate inability to lie well, and most of the scientists were not used to interacting with living cultures. Ann Foster might do well, but with her pregnancy, she was banned from gate travel.

No, Blair was clearly the right choice if the Tau'ri wanted the mineral rights. Teal'c was simply not as convinced that it was the right choice for Blair. Unfortunately, Teal'c had no other alternative to offer.

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