Daniel was well aquainted to the constant beeping sounds coming from the heart monitor. The SGC was his home, the infirmary was his second home, and his real home, well, that was just some place he visited occasionally. Doctor Frasier was standing behind the curtain while he changed. He was finally cleared and good to go. At least physically. There was no telling what kind of effect this could have had on him, considering the fact that he was carrying the mind’s of a dozen of the ship’s passengers.
Daniel opened the curtain, he was dressed and looked anxious to get out of the infirmary.
"Wait, before you go.." Doctor Fraiser paused, "Are you sure you’re doing all right?"
"Yeah, I’m fine, you even said so yourself." He said matter of factly.
"You know what I mean."
"Don’t worry about me, after all, it’s only me now, I don’t have to share my body anymore. Speaking of which, I’m going to grab something to eat... of my choice." And that was it, he left somewhere to be alone with himself. It was understandable why.
Jack was already in the cafeteria when he saw Daniel come in. He grabbed something to eat but Jack couldn’t see what it was, he seemed to be in a rush to get out once Daniel noticed him.
"Hey Danny boy! Over here." Jack waved his hand in the air. "Come on."
"Sorry Jack, I have a lot of catching up to do.: He made further advances to the exit.
Jack found it odd how urgent Daniel was to get away from him, well, a little. "Okay, so I’m a pain in the..."
"Colonel" Sam sat at the table and interrupted his train of thought. But hey, at least someone wanted to sit with him.
"Carter." Jack took a sip from his coffee.
"I heard Daniel is out of the infirmary. Have you seen him at all?" She worried. The whole team worried about Daniel, and it wasn’t anything new, he always seemed to be in some kind of predicament.
"Actually, he was just here. Grabbed a bite to eat, didn’t stay long actually. He had something better to do than eat here with me."
"I wonder why." She looked down.
"Was that sarcasm?" He sounded offended.
"No sir," she smiled "Do you think it’s too early for him to be going off world tomorrow?"
"Well I don’t see why not. Doc said he’s in perfect health as usual." Jack knew Sam was expecting a deeper answer, but he wasn’t prepared to give it to her, so he left it at that, and thankfully, so did she.
Daniel tightened his watch around his wrist and walked into the briefing room. Everyone was already there, he was normally the last to arrive anyway. He sat down right away. He was feeling a little tired because he didn’t sleep well. All his dreams were not really his. He felt like he was dreaming for somebody else. He was not really familiar with the people and locations he dreamed of and yet it felt familiar. He even caught himself daydreaming more often, again, it was all familiar yet unfamiliar.
"Good morning Doctor Jackson." General Hammond greeted. Daniel didn’t respond.
"The lights on the stromos kept flickering and the engines grunted. Debris from the ship fell from overhead. Martice protected himself by ducking his head under his arms.
"Sovereign, all the people aboard the Stromos are in cyrogenic suspension, you must do so as well. Please, save yourself. I am willing to sacrifice myself for you and all your people."
"I will join the others, but Officer Pharrin, do not wait any longer to do what you have to do. Go at once!"
"Doctor Jackson." General Hammond as well as the others were all staring at him. Daniel realized he missed out on most of Sam’s presentation about P4F-239 and whether it was safe to visit or not.
"Yeah?" He asked.
"What do you think?" General Hammond asked. Teal’c raised an eyebrow at Daniel’s uncharacteristic manner.
"About what?" Now Daniel was raising his eyebrows.
"Were you listening to any of this?" Jack asked.
"Yeah, I was." Daniel lied defensively. "I just missed the question. Were *you* listening?"
"I was! Teal’c thinks the technology we can see on the screen from the MALP is..." He waved his hands in the air thinking.
"I believe it to be of Goa’uld origin." Teal’c finished for him. Daniel observed the objects on the screen.
"I agree." He answered to Teal’c and gave Jack ‘the look’. Jack sneered back at him. Sam was actually relieved to hear the usual banter between the Colonel and Daniel. It meant things were going back to normal.
Teal’c was the first to be geared up for the mission. He closed his locker door and glanced at Daniel Jackson. He was tying up the laces on his boots. He was concerned for Daniel’s well-being. He personally never experienced such a situation in which he had to share his body the way Daniel did. He wondered if he was aware of his surroundings while being imprisoned his his own mind.
"Are you well Daniel Jackson?" Teal’c noticed Daniel gazing off into the distance for a moment.
""Now, we don't have a lot of time. And you're the first personality to emerge, so far, that's been helpful. So, I need you to think, all right? How could this happen?"
"A cryosleeper's consciousness is stored in the same memory module that maintains the sleeper's body. There is simply no way to separate them or... send the consciousness to any other than it's corresponding body unless...Oh, no... unless the sleeper's bodies are dead."
Daniel wanted to speak, he wish he could say something, the voices were increasingly getting louder....
"Can you hear that?"
"No, I can’t hear anything." Janet responded.
"The others.. their voices, I can hear them. They’re getting louder."
"Tryan, I need you to stay with me, all right? We need to work together on this" Doctor Fraiser pleaded desperately.
"They’re pulling at me now.. I don’t know how.. how.."
Daniel was terrified, he took his first few short breaths in a long time on his own.
"Janet?"
"Daniel?"
"What goin’ on?" Daniel knew there was something wrong, with all the voices and the things he was hearing his body say, but he didn’t get it. He was confused. Then he was pushed back further to the back of his mind.
Daniel wished he could stop all the voices in his head. He wished he could reach out to Janet. She was always there to help him when he was sick or injured, now he really needed her help to fix this problem. It felt as if he were taken host to a Goa’uld, the way Sam described it when she was the host to a Tok’ra, Jolinar. It was paralyzing. Daniel had absolutely no control over his body, not one single bit. Only it was worse, because he was stuck with a dozen souls, they were all struggling to surface.
"Daniel Jackson?" Teal’c urged.
"Huh?" Daniel looked over his shoulder at Teal’c, still deep in thought.
"Are you well?" Teal’c repeated.
"Me? Of course, I feel great." Daniel found himself lying again.
"Sg-1 you have a go." General Hammond conveyed. He couldn’t help but smile at his best team as they stepped through the event horizon. They had been to Hell and back - literally, and yet here they were, stepping through the gate time and time again. He worried about when their luck would run dry. It would probably happen sometime, but he wasn’t ready to face it. He hated to admit, but he is a lot closer to SG-1 then he is any other team on the base.
On the other side of the Stargate was their usual encounter. Lush green grass and trees and then more trees. There was of course the DHD and some Goa’uld appearing technology, but after careful inspection, Teal’c had announced it as being useless because it was broken.
"Okay kids, let’s move out. Teal’c, watch our six." Jack commanded. They walked for what seemed like hours through rough terrain.
"Colonel I think we should take a break." Major Carter suggested, slightly out of breath.
"All right, Teal’c, keep an eye on the perimeters." He ordered then took a sip of water. He looked over at Daniel. "How’re you makin’ out Danny?" He wondered because Daniel had been unusually quiet for a linguist.
"I’m holding up fine." He smiled.
"What are you smiling at?" Jack inquired.
"Looks like somebody decided to drop by." He mused. Jack turned around half expecting somebody to be behind him. There was nobody. Then he looked at Carter, she was also wearing that same smile Daniel had on. Teal’c turned around and tilted his head, and he could have sworn he saw Teal’c smiling too.
"What?"
"An airborne varmint has left rejectamenta on the back of your shoulder." Teal’c stipulated.
"I dare you to say that again." Jack leered.
"Jack, I think what he was trying to say is.. you’ve got bird crap on the back of your shoulder." Daniel clarified. Sam let out a giggle.
"Thank you... I think." Then he took off his jacket and started washing it in the creek. Daniel noticed a necklace in the water, it was caught on a jagged stone preventing it from being swept away by the strong current. He suddenly felt like he had been to this planet. The feeling was so strong he voiced it.
"We’ve been here."
"No we haven’t." Major Carter told him.
"Yes we have." Daniel persisted.
"We have not." Teal’c confirmed.
"Yes... we have."
"No." Jack joined in.
"Yes."
"No."
"Daniel, this gate address has been marked on the computer’s database as never been visited.
"That necklace...." Daniel pulled it off the rock and cradled it in his hands. He was soon lost from the world again, back into his own reality of mixed up memories.
‘He ran as fast as his legs would allow him, holding on to Kahlan’s hand tightly, he had just met this woman, and yet he had this strong sense of duty to never let anything happen to her. It was too late. The staff weapon blast had sent sharp pain through every inch of his body, he fell to the ground. He saw Kahlan bending forward in pain, shortly after, she rolled into the creek, and the last thing he saw before darkness surrounded him was her necklace latched on a stone. The necklace he gave her.’
When Daniel was brought back to reality with three concerned looks, he knew right away he was daydreaming again, about one of the passenger’s memories. It was getting worse and he knew it. He didn’t know what to do, if he should tell them or not, but it was slowly driving him to insanity.
"We’ve been here!" Daniel shouted, then later regretted it.
"Daniel I swear we haven’t. I don’t understand why you think we have."
"You’re right, I know we haven’t but I feel like we have." He sighed. "I don’t get it! I don’t get it! I just don’t get it!!" He clenched his fists in obvious frustration.
"Let’s head back for the gate."
"Sir?"
"I should have known, he’s not ready." The team looked over at Daniel who had obviously lost his grip on reality once again.
"C’mon Danny."
"I’m not Daniel! I’m not him anymore!" Daniel didn’t know what to do with himself, he was increasingly getting agitated. "I’m not going back through the gate. I won’t allow you to keep me locked up in that room as if I’m some kind of.. I don’t know.. I’m not crazy! I’m not crazy I swear, you know I’m right, I was right the first time with Machello and you all thought I was schizophrenic. The passengers have not left me!"
"Oh for cryin’ out loud. You are Daniel... Daniel." He paused. "and I’m sorry about that whole Machello thing, I *believe* you this time.
"Why can’t I get them out of my head?" Daniel seemed to calm down a bit.
"The passengers left you but the fact that they were inside of you probably left you with lasting effects. You have their memories. That’s also probably why you thought you came to this planet before, because one of the passengers of Talthus probably has been here." Sam tried to explain.
"What am I suppose to do? I can’t live like this." Daniel rubbed his face with his hands.
"We’ll head back for earth and see what we can do. You’ll probably find a way to cope with it, but in the meantime, we are all here for you Daniel." She gave him a reassuring squeeze on the shoulder.
"Indeed."
"You’ll get through this." Jack ruffled his hair a bit. Daniel felt a lot better, he was beginning to feel glad he told his friends. He knew right then, we was going to get through this.
Author’s note: This is my first time ever writing fan fiction.. for anything. I thought I’d give it a try. This story is a response to Linda’s challenge #6. Any feedback is *always* appreciated. Thanks!
© INSERT DATE IT WAS WRITTEN 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.