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The Blonde, the Redhead, and the Archaeologist(s)
Chapter 2
…She watched the beautiful blonde woman approach the man who had his back to her, a delighted smile on her face. Green eyes sparkled as she tenderly wrapped her arms around his waist. The man responded in kind, his lips eagerly meeting his Chosen’s, the fire between them igniting like a flash burn. Annika smiled, "Wasn’t love grand?" The man half turned them both so they were standing in profile…and Annika’s heart constricted. A very familiar voice spoke softly, "Love you, Angel." Very familiar blue eyes shone with pure, unquestioning love...
Annika bolted upright, wrenching herself out of Daniel’s arms, her heart thumping.
"Wh…what’s the matter?" His voice was thick with sleep.
She couldn’t answer him. All her mind could focus on was the premonition she’d just dreamed.
Daniel reached for his glasses and took in her wild, almost accusing eyes and ragged breathing. "Did you have a vision?"
Mutely she nodded. Suddenly the tent was claustrophobic and she fought with the canvas flap to escape. He scrambled out after her.
"My Angel, what did you see?" Daniel frowned when she flinched at the endearment. Tentatively he searched their bond and what he found more than worried him. Overwhelming hurt, disbelief and anger; and it was all directed at him…no, the anger was also at herself. "What did you see?" he pleaded.
"I WON’T share you with ANYONE!" Annika growled. "And I sure as fuck WON’T be HAPPY about it."
Daniel gaped in shock at the outburst. "What are you talking about? Share me with who?"
"You’re MINE, do you hear me?" she stormed, almost roughly grabbing his face giving him a desperate, searing kiss and despite his total confusion Daniel felt raw desire shoot through his body.
Annika propelled away from him, started pacing like a caged animal.
"Guys? What’s going on?" Jack had been on final watch and had witnessed the couple’s eruption from the tent.
Daniel gave a helpless shrug at the colonel. "Disturbing vision of some sort."
"Gee, you don’t say?"
The two men watched Annika angrily stalking the campsite.
"Care to fill us in?"
"This is not a team vision," Annika snapped. She turned back to Daniel who was still looking bewildered. "You called her Angel." Her voice cracked.
"Called who Angel? What did you see?" His own tone was rising with frustration.
"You want to see? Fine." She strode towards him and almost slapped her palm to his forehead. "This was my vision." She transferred the hateful dream to his mind and the archaeologist’s face turned white, while Annika’s face crumpled. "I hope you’ll be very happy together." Yanking her hand away she stalked away into the forest.
Daniel could only gape after her, dumbfounded.
"Okay, what just happened?" Jack demanded. "What’s with the head smacking?"
Daniel’s voice was hoarse, "She transferred her vision to me."
"Since when can Annika do that?"
"Since long before I met her," he answered absently. "It’s what created our bond."
"And you didn’t think to tell us?" Jack drawled sarcastically.
"Jack, that’s not what’s important." Now Daniel began pacing.
"Not important?"
"She saw me with another woman. Willingly with another woman."
A bark of laughter escaped the colonel’s lips. "Yeah, like that’d ever happen."
Daniel didn’t hear him. "No! It can’t be true," he muttered, "I won’t believe I would ever be with anyone else. Makes no sense." He began scrambling around for his boots and jammed them on bare feet without doing up the laces. "And Annika was happy about it!"
"She didn’t look too happy," Jack pointed out.
"Not here." He flapped his hand around the campsite. "Here." He tapped his head. "I’ve got to go find her. Try and sort this out."
"Okay, we break camp in an hour."
Daniel nodded and took off in the direction Annika had gone. Using their bond it wasn’t hard to track her; he found her crouched behind a tree, hugging her knees. Her head shot up at his approach and he saw tears glistening on her cheeks.
"It’s not going to happen." His voice was firm. "I won’t let it happen."
"You loved that woman, Daniel." Violet eyes gazed sadly up at him.
"I don’t know who she is but I do not love her." He sat down beside her and she let him enfold her in his arms. "I love you. Only you. Nothing is going to change that."
"Our bond was gone. I wasn’t connected to you," she gulped. "But you were linked to her."
"But our bond’s permanent." Daniel felt an inkling of panic. He loved their bond, loved the woman who bonded him. "Your vision must be wrong."
"They’re never wrong." Her voice was barely audible. "I wish to God this time it was."
"Then the interpretation…"
"What other explanation is there for that? You saw it, you felt the emotion…"
"Wait…our bond comes from you, not me…" He was clutching at straws. "And it’s till death do us part. You were alive and I was alive, so it simply isn’t possible."
Those beautiful eyes looked up at him, filled with gut wrenching pain and fear, but there was a tinge of hopefulness. "I can’t lose you to another woman. Mentally, I won’t survive it."
"Not. Going. To. Happen." Daniel sent the full force of his love through their bond. "I’m yours forever and a day. There’s another explanation for what you saw. We just haven’t thought of it yet." His lips descended on hers, hoping to banish the doubts from her mind.
Annika fervently responded, possessively claiming her territory over the man she loved. The warmth of his arms clutching her to him, the fire that erupted from their desperately seeking lips, but especially the wave upon wave of the undeniable strength of his love and ardor that enveloped her from the inside out, gradually exiled the vision from her thoughts.
It was with great reluctance that they drew apart.
His bright blue eyes locked with hers and he cupped her face in his hands. "Okay?"
She nodded.
Daniel pulled them to their feet and they started back towards camp. They kept one arm firmly tucked around the other. The vision had shaken them both badly and they needed the physical reassurance.
As they trekked through the trees, Annika’s brow furrowed. "Daniel, did you notice something odd about that vision?"
"Besides the obvious?" He couldn’t help the teasing remark.
She grinned. "Yes. Did the timing seem off to you?"
"Timing? As in this morning?" The puzzlement was clear from his tone.
"No, within the vision itself."
"I don’t know what you mean."
"Well, the…er…image of you, looked like you are now, perhaps even a little younger, but there was an old feel about it, like grandfather old." Annika paused. "Same for her…but I looked and felt no older than I am now…and the room we were in…that was ancient and yet at the same time had no age at all."
"Okay, this vision is just getting weirder the more we talk about it," Daniel frowned. "Are you sure it wasn’t just a nightmare?"
A sad sigh escaped. "If it wasn’t a premonition, then I wouldn’t have been able to transfer it to you."
"Oh. I didn’t think of that."
When they walked back into camp, Jack looked up from his mug of coffee, warily eyeing the couple. The tension eased from his shoulders to see them joined at the hip. "So did you work it out?"
"Nope, we’re even more clueless than before," Annika grinned.
Sam and Teal’c emerged from their tents, with morning greetings. They had heard the mini explosion from the psychic, couldn’t really help it, canvas wasn’t designed as a sound barrier. However they chose not to say anything. From the look of it Daniel and Annika had sorted out the mystery vision, though they took note that the couple were not letting go of each other. Even when they packed up the tents and tidied up the campsite they managed to always have some point of contact.
They headed back to the Stargate and by lunch time had finished up with the debrief and the routine medical check. It was Janet who noticed the flash of panic from both of the civilians when they were forced to separate in the infirmary.
"Everything okay?" she asked Daniel, as she pumped up the blood pressure cuff on his bicep.
He nodded.
Janet knew it was a lie by the way the monitor spiked at her question. The base doctor raised an eyebrow, then pointedly looked at the machine.
Daniel managed a weak smile, when his sight followed her gaze. "That’s just playing dirty." He ripped off the cuff before Janet could take anymore readings. "Annika had a bad vision, confusing as hell, totally unrealistic and unexplainable…it kinda rattled us."
"If you want to talk about it, a fresh set of ears may help find perspective."
The archaeologist was glad he’d removed the medical device. Daniel was positive his blood pressure would had blown through the roof at the offer. There was no way he’d be discussing that vision with anyone. It was bad enough that Jack, (and no doubt Teal’c and Sam,) knew that at some point he was going to be unfaithful to Annika. "Thanks, but it wasn’t work related."
He slid to his feet, once again replaying the horrible vision in his head, wracking his brain to come up with an explanation.
When Annika was given the all clear, she found him leaning against the wall outside the infirmary waiting for her.
"I’ve got it!" His face lit up at the sight of her. "We’ve been drugged. I took a page out of your book and studied the…uh…characters. She and I had something coursing through our veins…"
"Drugged?" Annika concentrated on the vision she’d been trying to ignore for last few hours, probed the bodies rather than the minds of the kissing couple. "You’re right!" She could feel what could only be described as blue sparkles lying beneath their skin. They were dormant, but they were there. A name popped into her head. "Quicker?…no, Quickening? Have you ever heard of it?"
"Nope, and I don’t care!" He spun her around in his arms. "We’re going to be drugged! I can live with that explanation!"
Annika felt like a huge weight had been lifted off her shoulders and she couldn’t help the almost hysterical giggle that popped out. "Whoo hoo! Drugged up to the eyeballs! Thank God for that."
Their kiss expelled the tension of the morning and when they finally came up for air they were almost weak with relief.
Daniel’s low chuckle rumbled through his chest. "Only we could be happy about being drugged."
"It’s a damned sight better than the alternative," Annika smiled, resting her head on his chest. "I didn’t feel that Quickening stuff in me, but maybe I had something else pumped into me."
"Here’s hoping," he grinned. Arm in arm they headed topside, more than ready to go home and put the last few hours behind them. "Do you think we should tell Janet? See if she can find any information about this drug?"
Annika considered it. "Nah, let’s leave it for now. I don’t want to spend hours trying to explain the components of the drug to Janet. I don’t think ‘blue sparkles’ will be all that much help. And the Norettens don’t seem the type to drug their visitors." She referred to their next mission in two days. "All I want is to go home and tumble into bed."
"Tired?"
She felt that wonderful tickle beneath her heart. "Who said anything about sleeping?"
They never made it to the bedroom, at least not in the first hour of arriving home. In fact they barely made it through the door before they let the ever present need for each other consume them. When they did finally manage to get upstairs, they hardly left the room, only emerging for the occasional cup of coffee and food. Two days later when they reported back in they were rested and relaxed.
A A A A A A
"So, did our invitations get lost in the mail?" Jack asked slinging his P-90 strap over his shoulder.
This mission was going to be a nice easy one. They were revisiting the Norettens to reaffirm their friendship. Normally another team would be sent through rather than the SGC’s flagship team, but they had been promised an introduction to Annika. The inhabitants had only seen her in astral form when she’d inadvertently projected to Daniel on the planet before Christmas. They were most eager to meet one who was both spirit and earthly body.
"What invitations?" Daniel asked, helping Annika on with her pack.
The colonel rolled his eyes at Sam and Teal’c as if the answer were obvious. "Wedding invitations."
The engaged couple exchanged mischievous grins. They had their wedding all planned out, however it wasn’t going to be on the fifth of March like their teammates thought. Their wonderful bond was a more solid and permanent commitment than any sort of legal ceremony. So rather than going with a traditional ceremony they had something much more fun up their sleeves.
"Oh, those," Annika feigned innocence. "I thought you meant the ones to our house warming party."
"You’re having a house warming?" Sam asked, rechecking the spare clips of ammo clicked on her belt. "When?"
The Stargate started spinning.
"Three weeks from Saturday," Daniel replied. "Remind me to give you your formal invitations when we get back."
Sergeant Harriman’s familiar voice echoed through the loudspeaker. "First chevron locked…second chevron locked…"
Annika tilted her head quizzically. "What would you say if we told you we had already paid a visit to the Justice of the Peace's office and gotten hitched last week?"
"…third chevron locked….fourth chevron locked…"
"Nope, don’t believe you." Jack was waiting at the base of the ramp for the Stargate to finish dialing. "There’s been no paperwork come through requesting a name change for you."
"…fifth chevron locked….sixth chevron locked…"
"Perhaps I’ve decided to keep my name the same for work purposes." Annika kept her face serious. "It could get quite confusing when someone calls out ‘Hey, Jackson’. We," she gestured between herself and Daniel, "wouldn’t know who was being called."
"…seventh chevron locked…wormhole engaged."
The event horizon billowed out but the colonel had more important things on his mind. He studied the redhead and then his best friend and honestly couldn’t tell if they were joking or not. "Have you been taking poker face lessons from Thor?" he groused.
"Good luck and God’s speed, SG-1." General Hammond’s traditional send off fell on virtually deaf ears.
Jack gave a half-hearted wave of acknowledgment, but none of the team actually moved towards the waiting Stargate.
Sam frowned at the couple. "So are you married?"
Daniel and Annika managed a full five seconds before their mirth escaped to their lips.
"Nope," Daniel chuckled. "But we had you going there for a minute."
"Is there a problem, Colonel?" Hammond demanded to know.
Jack scowled. "Only if you count the lovebirds sick sense of humor."
"After you…" Annika swept her hand towards the wormhole and gave a mock bow. It wasn’t often they could successfully hoodwink Jack.
"Oh, no, after you," Jack ungraciously insisted, giving his own arm sweep and bow.
The loudspeaker came to life again and the base commander sounded partly frustrated but mostly amused. "Are you going on this mission or will I have to call your parents into the principal’s office?"
Daniel grabbed Annika’s hand and ran up the ramp. "Last one through buys dinner at O’Malleys."
"Wonder if they have lobster?" Annika grinned, throwing a glance over her shoulder to see Sam and Teal’c overtake Jack in their race to avoid footing the bill.
Laughing Daniel and Annika leapt through the event horizon.
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