• SPOILERS: Window of opportunity, tiny ones for politics, legacy, just shoot me if I missed any out…
• A little pre-Window of Opportunity looping
• PG-13 [Hu]

Daniel yaps.

I mean, he never shuts his mouth. The only time he pauses is when his mouth can’t keep up with his brain and he has to hit reboot. A little harsh maybe? "Naa…"

"Colonel?" Carter frowned over her shoulder at O’Neill.

"Huh? Oh, nothin’. Just thinking aloud."

She shrugged and continued to scan the atmosphere, the wind was picking up a bit .

There he goes again, Jack sighed inwardly. Daniel stood at the end of the obelisk-lined path to the gate in front of an altar of sorts, yadda-ing away about something. Probably knee deep in some fascinating discovery and managing to bore the other guy to death. Well, at least it’s not me who has to listen to…

"What the hell.!?"

"Sir?" Carter yelped suddenly, her eyes turned to where the colonel was looking, dumbfounded. An intense light emerged from the altar; tendrils of blue lightening licked the sand swept pillars up to the gate.

"DUCK!!" The gate swooshed open without apparent reason and the blue light grew in intensity.

Carter’s eyes widened as she looked toward the altar, a bright light appeared from it engulfing him Malachi in an instant.

"Sir; Daniel!"

"Anyway, that’s not the point. That’s just the way I feel about it. What do you think?"

"Huh?"

"What do you think…?"

"Uhhhh…"

"You weren’t listening were you?"

"Um, fruit loops are nice."

Daniel sighed, "Jack, haven’t you already said that?"

"What? About the fruit loops?"

A glare.

"Did not."

"Did too."

"Not"

"Too"

"Uh, Colonel, Daniel?" Sam offered, "we’re gonna be late for the briefing."

Jack glanced at his watch, "Damn." Taking one last mouthful of fruit loops he leapt up, followed by Sam and Daniel in tow, grudgingly leaving their argument till later. Fruit loops would have to wait he told himself as he resisted the urge to grab the bowl and take it with him.

Daniel tapped a tad impatiently on the table. Was it just him or were Sam’s briefings starting to all sound the same?

"Uhh, haven’t we already been through this bit?"

"This?"

"Yeah, the bit about the solar flares and stuff?"

"No."

"Oh."

"You ok Daniel?" Jack offered.

"Yeah," Daniel looked up, "I think."

Sam continued after a shrug.

"Offworld activation." Red lights and sirens interrupted her this time as the four followed Hammond into he control room, "no-ones due back yet."

Daniel frowned, "it’s, uh, SG-12…just a broken leg…" he trailed off when met by the surprised looks of his friends.

"Its, SG-12 Sir…" the technician gawped. SG-12 appeared on the ramp carrying one of their team members with an awful limp.

"How did you know that?" Sam was amazed.

"De ja vu.."

Jack stared, confused at the ramp. The gate room was now swamped with medical personnel and technicians taking bags – the usual drill. He turned to Daniel, "Would you care to explain that?"

"Um," Daniel stuttered, "I dunno Jack, I feel like I’ve well, been here before."

O’Neill rolled his eyes, well that’s specific.

"Indeed, we are here every day, Daniel Jackson." Teal’c spoke from behind O’Neill.

"Uh, yeah." Daniel was mildly taken aback by Teal’c’s apparent sarcasm. He’s been hanging around O’Neill too much.

Daniel sat in the canteen staring at his mug of coffee. All morning he’d been subject to questions, medical checks, sarcasm (ok, that was mainly from Jack). Worst of all is that since Daniel had spoken up in the briefing room every thing had changed. Hammond had postponed their mission to the planet where this began and, well, maybe it was just him after all. Weird dream or something. Going mad are we Daniel?

He swilled the remainder of the luke-warm mixture in the bottom of his mug.

"Hey Daniel." He heard a voice above him and looked up. God, I hate Mondays.

"Hi Jack."

"Good coffee today?" He was clearly stuck for words.

Daniel glanced down at his mug, stopped swilling and put it down on the table. Come on Jack you can do better than that, he sighed to himself.

"Yeah." He said simply.

Jack just thought he looked pissed. Well, why not? Its not every day you get laughed at by half the SGC. Well actually we are talking about Daniel here…

"Sooo, what happens next?"

Oh, wait. Let me use my psychic powers! How do I know?

"I dunno Jack. You tell me. General Hammond has all but cancelled the mission to P4X639 and that’s where we where about now."

"When the whole radiation thing that Carter said happened, right?"

Daniel nodded. Episodes… Doctor Mackenzie…O dear. His mind went back to the last conversation of this kind he and Jack had in the infirmary. That hadn’t turned out well.

"Daniel?" Jack pulled him out of his detached thought. He started to get a bit freaked out when Daniel just sat staring at the table.

"OFFWORLD ACTIVATION."

A look of mild surprise passed across Daniel’s face. The two of them left the commissary for the gate room.

They arrived just in time to see the open gate, tendrils of blue light hugging the huge ring with vengeance. The General stood, shocked, "What the hell is that?"

"It’s an unknown error, Sir."

"Woah! What…??" O’Neill gasped.

"Jack!" Daniel’s face lit up, "Jack! I remember this; it’s the same as on the planet! And the, the things and…" he leapt up and down pointing at the gate but was suddenly cut off by…

******************************

"Where ya goin Daniel?" Jack called after him. Daniel had started down the other corridor on the way to the briefing room.

"Getting a little bored of hearing the same briefing over again, so I figured I’d carry on with the translation…"Daniel mumbled, "you’re right Jack, croissants are boring." He finished more audibly and headed off towards his office.

"Hey, hey! Wait a minute!" O’Neill ran after him, "what do you think you’re doing? Briefing, Daniel. Non optional."

Daniel spun to face him "What would you say," you’ve been through this before Daniel, you know what he’s going to say, "if I told you that time were repeating itself?"

"Um, you’ve been watching too much TV." O’Neill offered while Daniel mimed along with the response.

"I’m serious Jack. I need to do this translation, I think you can turn it off…"

Jack gave Daniel a worried look, "You ok, Daniel?"

Daniel looked up with a resigned expression, "yea…" he frowned, "actually no. I’m not."

He walked off down the corridor to his office leaving the Colonel rather confused.

"Okay…"

For a while he just stood in the corridor, deep in thought, then headed off to the General’s office mumbling to himself. "Definitely something wrong with Daniel…"

Gorge Hammond was confused. Colonel O’Neill had come into his office some ten minutes ago saying something about the mission, the briefing, life, the weather etc. he had just been about to set off to the briefing and was already late by now. Something was wrong, he just couldn’t get more than reams of non-information out of the man.

"I just think we should wait, that’s all."

Hammond sighed, "Just what is on your mind Colonel?"

O’Neill paused, then gave in, here we go again. The old Daniel dilemma.

"General, I’m worried about Daniel." O’Neill finally admitted. Hammond tilted his head slightly,

"What seems to be the problem Colonel?"

"He’s acting, well, weird Sir. Said something about a translation and"

"Go on." Hammond prompted.

"Time repeating itself?" O’Neill finished dubiously.

Sirens and a voice interrupted their conversation, "Unscheduled off-world activation."

Hammond turned to leave, pausing briefly as he looked through the window of the briefing room at the rotating grey circle, "Have him looked over in the infirmary Colonel, just in case. I’m postponing your mission to P4X 639 until after then." He turned again heading to the control room.

"Infirmary," O’Neill repeated to himself, "De ja vu."

~~~~~

"There isn’t anything wrong with me, I feel fine."

Janet Frailer fused around Daniel, professionally ignoring his impatient comments; "You just let me be the judge of that, here hold this…"

Daniel sighed in Jack’s general direction; O’Neill returned the glare.

"Okay." The Doctor broke the silence, "That’s about it, as far as I can tell there’s nothing wrong with you. We’ll…"

"Told you."

"We’ll know more when the test results come through though." She shrugged, the brewing tension between the pair was begging to get to her. "Till then you’re free to go." And take your atmosphere with you, she added silently as the two of them left. Argument a-brewing.

Daniel sighed audibly as he paced down the corridor from the infirmary. Too much of this day had gone already.

Jack shook his head, "Daniel, what is wrong with you?" he stopped walking and waited for Daniel to do the same before continuing. "You look like you’ve got a grudge against the world, croissants, briefings, generally everything" he paused, no reply, "what’s with the male PMS already??"

Daniel whirled around to face him, looked to the floor, took a deep breath and looked up again.

"Why," he began frustratedly, "is it so hard for you to believe what I’m saying?"

"Daniel, it’s not that I don’t believe you, it’s just"

"Jack, you never believe me!"

O’Neill looked perplexed, then looked at his feet, "Look, Daniel…"

"Jack, I’m telling you, I’ve been here before, I’ve done all this before".

"What, like what was it? P3R 233?" He added, voice laden with scepticism.

"Exactly!!" Daniel practically leapt through the ceiling.

"…and?"

"And I was right Jack! I was right remember?!"

O’Neill put his hand to his head and sighed. Daniel persisted "and what? You saw it all happen and you still didn’t believe me, just like you didn’t believe me about Machello and the Lindris, and when Shauri…"

Jack understood. So it was a little outlandish – how many times had he been right about seemingly absurd theories and they’d never trusted him. Ok, he told himself, so maybe he’s right, maybe he’s gone nuts. No harm in humouring the kid huh? "Okay Daniel, so what happens next?"

Daniel seemed slightly stunned by the opportunity, "Off-world activation" he sighed when he glanced at his watch.

"When?"

"Now." an even longer sigh.

"UNSCHEDULED OFF-WORLD ACTIVATION." The words rumbled down the corridor.

O’Neill shot Daniel a surprised glare, "Well I’ll be…"

"Anyway…Oh."

"Daniel?"

"Huh? Oh never mind Sam."

Jack admired his spoon full of fruit loops briefly, happily munching he became aware of the silence and two pairs of eyes. "What?!"

~~~~~~

"…Resulting in massive solar flares which…"

"Humm…"

"Something wrong Doctor?" General Hammond was mildly surprised by the interruption. On the Jackson front briefings were usually peaceful. Debriefings on the other hand were a different story , it was quite usual to have anything from mild random 2-peneth giving to complete uproar from the young scientist.

"Hum?" He looked up vaguely, "just thinking."

Hammond frowned. "About what?" he shot a look at the colonel who, equally confused looking, just shook his head.

"…if you could do absolutely anything you wanted without ever having to think about the consequences, what would it be?"

"Anyway," Daniel grinned, "that’s just jelly, fruit and ice-cream to you ‘cause you’re not listening to a word I’m saying, so, what do you think?"

"Huh?" the oblivious Colonel looked up from his latest, most riveting spoonful of fruit loops.

"What do you think?"

"uhhhh…"

Daniel smiled, "I know."

"Know what?"

"Fruit loops are nice."

Sam cut in, "you don’t like fruit loops, Daniel."

"I never said I did" he said.

Jack’s mouth opened, then closed again, "How’d you know I…?"

"Uh, Colonel, Daniel," Sam looked briefly at her watch, "we’re…"

"Going to be late for the briefing." Daniel finished for her, "I’ll meet you there." Abandoning his uneaten croissant he leapt up and headed out of the canteen.

With a puzzled expression, Jack firmly placed his spoon back in the bowl. "Something strange about him today, or is it just me?"

Daniel stood facing his friends, a hastily typed wad of translations in his hand. Now, if only they would believe him…come on Sam, he prompted inwardly, you know what I’m talking about better than I do.

"Sir," she turned to General Hammond, "we already know time travel is possible using the Stargate, I mean, the ancients built the gate system, it would be foolish not to think that they could time solar activity and use the system to time travel to different periods."

Hammond sat up slightly, "what are you saying Major?"

Feeling uncomfortable under the close scrutiny of the four other members of the briefing, Daniel shuffled the handful of papers and tried to avoid O’Neill’s glare. He thinks I’m nuts.

After a slight pause Sam continued, "If Daniel is right, and we are caught in the effects of a ‘time loop’ of sorts, then we could live the same day over and over and not remember anything."

"Sooo…" O’Neill leapt in, voice full of scepticism, "if they built this, time machine," geese this sounds corny, "how come it just loops and loops and loops all the time?"

Daniel took his chance, " that’s just it Jack," he said, waving the scripts around mid-air, "it says that they built it to try and prevent some kind of catastrophe, but it didn’t work. It just repeated the same few hours over and over, so eventually they gave up and turned it off."

Teal’c had watched the exchange with interest, if indeed he were correct, it would not be the first time one of Daniel Jackson’s strange theories had been proven true. Teal’c was an expert at evaluating a sequence of events from just a handful of evidence, it was this very intuition that master Bra’tac had often praised him for as a young student. Daniel Jackson on the other hand had seemed to have perfected the art of drawing conclusions from evidence that appeared non-existent, yet his ideas were often justifiably true. This puzzled Teal’c greatly, yet he had come to trust his team mates as much as he himself was trusted.

"Assuming you’re right Dr. Jackson," Hammond began, "How can you prove what you say is true?"

"SG-12 are coming back early," Daniel said confidently, dropping the scripts neatly on the table in front of him, before continuing without taking a breath, "they’re on one of the worlds Sam said, in a previous loop that is, was uh, connected to the time distortion, which is why they can still gate to earth even though we’re out of sink…um…" He paused while his thoughts had chance to synchronise with what he was saying. Ahhh, the precious moments in life! O’Neill thought to himself before Daniel was off again.

"…one fell and broke his leg, so they’re coming home." He finished.

"UNSCHEDULED OFF- WORLD ACTIVATION." The words echoed over the sudden wailing of the siren signalling gate use.

The four rushed to the control room, hanging over the ‘chevron’ man’s shoulder. "Receiving GDO, it’s SG12 Sir."

Hammond turned to face the startled SG1; Daniel wasn’t surprised at all.

He paused for a moment turning again to see SG-12 appear through he gate, aiding a limping member down the ramp.

"You said that Malachi is responsible for activating the devise?"

"Yes."

"Then we must act to prevent the loop occurring again." Teal’c offered.

"I agree," Hammond nodded, the gate whooshed shut behind him, "Major, I’d like you to check out what Doctor Jackson is saying, I’d like to be certain of the facts before I’ll authorise this mission."

"General, we only have a few hours." Daniel interjected eagerly.

"I’m aware of that Doctor." Hammond finished and turned back to the briefing room, leaving SG1 watching the happenings below.

***************

"Hello?" Jack offered to thin air. Cradling his MP-5 in his arms, he trotted down the sand-covered steps from the gate, his company in tow.

A gentle breeze shifted the sands slightly, nothing particularly threatening, it seemed to him. A line of short obelisk-like stones led up to an altar in a sheltered alcove covered in writings like those Daniel had been ranting about earlier. O’Neill hoped he was right, not of course, because he liked the idea of looping forever – he was sure fruit loops for breakfast every morning would drive him nuts. However surprisingly, the idea of returning home with Daniel in a straight jacket destined for another round of ‘Doctor Mackenzie’ was even less appealing.

Teal’c moved forward scanning the area, full of suspicion. "I see no-one present."

Daniel took a step toward the altar end of the pathway, hesitating for a second.

"Daniel?"

"Yeah Jack, I’m just, thinking…" he trailed off.

The Colonel glanced back at Carter; she held a small devise with squiggles all over its screen. "We should be safe for now, Sir." She began.

"Just keep your sun glasses on, right?" O’Neill interrupted, shading his eyes with his hand he glanced up at the bulging yellow mass that was the flaring sun of P4X-639. "Dan…" he looked to where the archaeologist was stood only to find he was not standing there anymore, he was now wondering around the altar as if recalling something.

"Its, uh, the altar is, made of all these blocks which rise and fall in sequence at a specific point as the sun flares…"

"The mechanism that controls the exact point at which the wormhole intercepting the flare is established." Sam interjected triumphantly; she could understand how a race such as the ancients could so precisely fine tune activation, her mind was racing through the possibilities – how did they manage to get an effect that encompasses such a large area? "Previously we thought the effect would only transport a gate traveller to another period, somehow they’ve managed to use the ionisation in the atmosphere…"

"Argh!" O’Neill waved his hands around his head.

The return of the dreaded techno-babble. Stargate; equals, Big, glowy ring. Not star trek voyager!

"Carter!"

Sam nodded and looked a little down cast but soon was back to scanning solar activity again with the little squiggly line devise, probably still mulling over all those possibilities, he thought, rolling his eyes.

"So where’s this Malachi guy, then?" he suggested, after all it would be helpful if we had a culprit here. This was getting dull.

Teal’c casually roamed now, glancing behind the odd pillar now and then.

"I don’t know," Daniel responded, "he should be here, I was standing in front of the altar talking to him when the devise activated."

"Perhaps he anticipated our arrival and is hiding." Teal’c suggested.

Suddenly Carter piped up, she sounded worried, "Sir, I’m detecting an increase in solar radiation, we really should leave…"

Their attention was drawn to the altar, where the blocks had began to move as Daniel had described, making a grinding sound against the rock.

Jack’s expression changed, a brown haired, slender figure he could only guess to be the alien archaeologist, Malachi, emerged from behind the stone walled alcove behind Daniel with what looked like a short metal rod, Bored? What was I thinking?

"DANIEL!" Jack warned, lunging toward the pedestal.

Daniel turned just in time to see the rod fly at him striking him round the head. Losing his balance he fell to his knees.

Teal’c swung his staff weapon round, aim locked on Malachi, "Do not move." He growled.

The man simply smiled and continued toward the altar.

Teal’c fired, the blast disappeared – an energy shield. "O’Neill!" he shouted in warning but was too late, Jack ran into the field and was thrown back toward Sam stunned by the shield’s intensity. She caught him and checking his pulse, lowered the Colonel to the ground.

She could see Daniel struggling to stand, his eyes glazed, blood began running down the side of his face from a gash above his ear.

She and Teal’c were powerless to help him, he had to do this alone.

Pain throbbed in Daniel’s head, he staggered, forcing himself to his feet. I think I’m going to be sick, he thought, swaying.

Why me? Why not Jack, or Teal’c? I’m sure they could have dealt with all this looping stuff way better.

He could see the moving blocks on the pedestal, knew the combination. Despite weak knees he leapt toward it fighting with Malachi over control of the devise. The wind was rising, his vision blurring. Lighting bolts of blue energy weaved in and out of the surrounding obelisk-like pillars and wrapped themselves around the Stargate.

Malachi grabbed Daniel by the shoulder, pulling him away from the altar. He tried to focus on the object in the other man’s hand, a weapon?

"I don’t want to fight you," the older man was saying, "but you must not interfere!"

there was something in his voice, something told Daniel the man was desperate, something bordering on madness that would do anything rather than give up.

Daniel fumbled for his zat gun, "What is it you’re trying to do?" his voice sounded weak, he couldn’t concentrate, his head swam and his surroundings grew eerily more and more distant. ‘Not now Daniel!’ he inwardly chided himself and tried to grab a hold of deteriorating consciousness like it was the most precious thing one could ever loose.

Through hazy vision he saw a light appear from the end of the gun and dodged sharply to one side and down, colliding with the stone altar. With speed that surprised himself he caught hold of the Zatnikatel, raised it and fired. Malachi Dropped, though for how long Daniel wasn’t sure, in his experience zat blasts seemed to be more painful than debilitating, unless of course you were a serpent guard, gets ‘em every time…

Propping himself up against the pedestal Daniel squinted hard. This is definitely not the time for triple vision…

He found the first block and pushed down hard, his strength ebbing. He heard a shuffling behide him . Not now.

Another block, one more to go…

"Doctor Jackson." he heard from behind him. Malachi. Go away.

He reached for the last block hardly noticing anything else, not the rapidly accelerating blue electrical storm, not the orange light emerging from the front of the altar, not a bedraggled Malachi standing behind him, irritation and anger etched across his features. You must not interfere…

"DANIEL!"

Sam?

Looking up he saw her eyes, saw their agony, saw a bright light out of the corner of his eye.

Shit! I’m sorry. I screwed up…

He bit back the need to cry out in pain and defeat. Heat soared through him, flooding his senses, he tried to inch his hand forward – the movement didn’t come. Instead he felt himself falling…

****************

"Y’know, fruit loops are so much better than croissants," O’Neill half spoke, half munched, "not half as boring."

"Really." Daniel rolled his eyes, Sam grinned to herself.

"Oh, yeah." He continued, "The purple ones are the best, don’t ya think?" picking a loop from the top of the pile he held it up, "I wonder if they’ll ever make blue ones…" putting it on the table he flicked it idly in Daniel’s direction.

"You don’t have to do that y’know." he huffed, dodging the oncoming fruit loop.

"Said you, O boring food eater."

Sam couldn’t contain a small chuckle.

"It’s nice!" Daniel protested, obviously Jack had no idea of the cultural history of croissants or the fact that millions of people actually prefer them for breakfast to corn flakes and such.

"Yeah, yeah, tell it to the judge."

Sam simply smiled, she enjoyed some of the little debates they had at the breakfast table, she enjoyed just being among friends.

Daniel looked mildly indignant and proceeded to leap headlong into one of his spiels, getting lost half way and veering off subject.

"…well yeah, exactly." he agreed with Sam, "Anyway, that’s not the point. That’s just the way I feel about it. What do you think..?"

Feed back welcome! Pity me, its my first attempt! Thanx all you avid fic writers for the inspiration! =) xxSooxx

June 21, 2001 © The characters mentioned in this story are the property of Showtime and Gekko Film Corp. The Stargate, SG-I, the Goa'uld and all other characters who have appeared in the series STARGATE SG-1 together with the names, titles and backstory are the sole copyright property of MGM-UA Worldwide Television, Gekko Film Corp, Glassner/Wright Double Secret Productions and Stargate SG-I Prod. Ltd. Partnership. This fanfic is not intended as an infringement upon those rights and solely meant for entertainment. All other characters, the story idea and the story itself are the sole property of the author.