Entry for Greensilver's J/D Stargate Ficathon

[lemon_curry]

Title: Cabin Fever

Author:

FaerieOfMischief aka faerie_mistress

Assignment:
LJ user: karenbear
Requests: First Time, preferably on the more humorous side.
Restrictions: Rated R or under. No major angst.

Summary:
SG1 is off-world on a seemingly deserted planet, they get split up and Jack and Daniel must wait out a storm before rejoining the rest of the team.

Rating:
M 15+ for mild swearing and general pre-slashyness (no explicit content, sorry to those who were looking for smut)

Notes:
My first SG fic, please be gentle. I've tried to keep them in character, not sure how well I've succeeded though. But keep in mind that it is slash, so therefore a little OOC leeway is allowed, right? And cabin fever can make people do crazy things...

~ @}~>~~

"You do realise glaring at it isn't going to make it stop, right?"

Colonel Jack O'Neill turned from watching the sandstorm to fix said glare on the bespectacled archaeologist sitting against the back wall of the natural cave they had found shelter in.

"Well, it can't hurt. Can it? No cave drawings about sentient weather are there?"

Daniel Jackson blinked and glanced at the blank sandstone walls surrounding them.

"Uhh, no?"

"Good." He turned and shook his fist at the beige squall before trying his radio again. "Carter? Teal'c? You out there?" Nothing but static came back. "FUCK! How come we never trade technology with a planet that can send radio waves through shit like this?"

"Look, Jack, I'm sorry... Sam warned us the storm was coming; I shouldn't have gone so far from base camp. I'm just SURE that there has to be ruins or buildings or some sort of signs of life near here, the Gates were always put near civilisation centres of some kind. We usually find them in temples or near old Goa'uld bases, and this one shows no sign of having been moved from anywhere..." he trailed off, his mouth unable to keep up with his inner dialogue.

"It's a giant desert Daniel, how did you expect to find anything just wandering off at random? I thought we had talked about this." He waggled a finger at the younger man. "Who knows if there are even people still here, maybe they all live in tents, no villages or whatever."

"You mean nomads?"

"Yeah... wait, isn't that a type of robot probe thingy?" Too late, Daniel was no longer listening...

"Nomadic tribes... that could explain a lot... why there are no signs of any kind of architecture, no runes around the Gate..."

"Hey, Daniel." Jack snapped his fingers a few times. "Hello? Did Carter say how long the storm would last?"

"What, uh, no... you left after me, shouldn't you know?"

"Oh, she doesn't tell me anything more detailed then 'sandstorm, soon, long one' anymore, I think she knows I'm just nodding and thinking about fishing or something when she gets all technical on me. No doubt she figured she'd be able to update me question by stupid question when it got here."

Daniel bit his lip, yet again he had gotten them into trouble and he knew it was solely his fault. Jack wouldn't hold it against him, he never did, but that never helped the guilt. The handsome silver-haired man may not be his commanding officer but he was still his superior and more importantly, his friend. At least it was unlikely that they would die out here, which made a nice change. They had water and emergency rations, the little he had heard from Sam made him sure the storm wouldn't last more then a day or so before moving onto another area. They had shelter- the strange shape of the cave mouth kept out most of the whirling sand, although the wind generated an eerie hum that made Daniels bones shiver. They just had to find a way to pass the time.

~ @}~>~~

"I spy with my little eye, something beginning with 'S'."

"Sand. I told you Jack, it's not funny any more."

"Well there's not much else to see around here... any other suggestions?"

"Well, since you seem to like sand so much, how about we make a sand castle?" Daniel stuck his tongue out. If Jack was going to act like a child, why shouldn't he?

"Like sand? I'll give you goddamned sand!" With that, Jack seized a handful of the off-white grains that made up their floor and shoved it down the back of Daniels shirt.

"Oh...!" Daniel automatically scrunched up his shoulders and the expression on his face screwed up to match. "You bastard!"

"Watch your mouth Jackson, you're in the company of one of your elders and betters."

"What makes you so sure about the 'better' part?" Daniel forced a lump of sand down the back of Jack's BDU's and crushed it so it showered down into the other man's underwear, socks and boots. His smirk of triumph was short-lived however, when Jack pulled his knees out from under him and sat on his chest, filled Daniel's floppy hat to the brim before giving him a noogie and cramming it back onto his head.

"You were saying?"

"I believe I called you a bastard, and I stand by that accusation." He shoved Jack back off him and gingerly ran a hand through his hair before sitting up again. It was going to take all the shampoo in the SGC before he felt remotely clean again.

"Now now, that's not very nice Daniel. Justified perhaps, but not nice."

Daniel waved his middle finger and went back to searching the multitude of pockets on the vest he'd removed earlier for a comb.

"I'm really not a good influence on you am I? You used to be such a polite, well-mannered young man ..."

Daniel laughed.

"I was never either of those things. It's just when I first met you, you came off as a little scary..."

Jack looked affronted. "What, I don't scare you any more? I must really need to work on my tough-guy image."

"Nope, you're a big teddy bear. I'd say cuddly too, but you're a bit bony for that really..."

"First you call me a bastard, then you say I'm bony??" Jack affected mock outrage. "I've gotta teach you some manners Doctor Jackson. And give you a haircut too."

Daniel jumped the older man, immobilising him against the ground with the hold Sam had taught him. The colonel struggled briefly then gave up, not going to be able to get out of the archaeologist's grip without breaking someone's arm. He shook his head fiercely, sand raining down on Jack's face.

"Shaving my head could be preferable to being stuck on this planet for however long with half a desert plastered to my scalp." He let go and went back to his search for a comb. Jack rubbed his shoulder where it had been jammed against the wall and followed.

Jack unsheathed his knife and tested the edge on his thumb. "Shave it hmm? I can be of assistance there..." Daniel glared at him and scratched his head. "Hey, I was just kidding, your hair is fine. Really." After a few seconds of exasperated silence, Jack hauled Daniel to his feet and grabbed the vest, unzipping a pocket and handing him a fold-out comb in a matter of seconds. "Here."

"Well that's a stupid place to put... I mean, thanks."

"What do you mean stupid? That's where all your toiletries are. Toothbrush and miniature toothpaste, razor, soap." Daniel stared blankly at him. "What? Military people are generally hygienic y'know."

"We get toothbrushes? I always brought my own."

Jack snorted trying not to laugh out loud. "Do you know what's in ANY of these pockets?"

"Well, uhh, sort of... most of the stuff I use is my own gear which almost all fits on my belt. I've had a look at some of the front ones but I always forget which ones I've checked and start again. I still don't know how they fitted so many pockets on the damn thing in the first place."

"Well here's your chance to find out. Not much else to do." Jack settled down against a wall and spread out his own vest as a table of sorts and began to clean his sidearm. "Let me know if you run into any problems." He winked. Daniel threw a Powerbar at him.

~ @}~>~~

"Argh, I've got to get out of here. I have to DO something." Daniel paced from end of the cave to the other, spun on his heel and paced back again. Jack watched, counting. Four, five, six, twirl, repeat. Almost hypnotic really...

"Whoa, stop that right there. What the hell do you think you're doing?" Daniel had stopped his march and was instead forcibly kicking the rock wall of the tiny cave.

"I. Don't. Really. Know." Each word was forced out between gritted teeth and was punctuated with another toe-crushing blow. Jack bounded to his side in 4 strides and grabbed him forcibly by the shoulders, pulling him away from the wall. "I just... I have to get..."

"Out, yeah, I heard you. And you can't. Other then ending up blind and sand-blasted raw, if you think you'll have trouble getting the sand out of your hair as it is..."

Eventually Daniel stopped struggling and slumped into those hard arms, then slid slowly to the floor.

"You never struck me as the closet-phobic type..." Jack decided to play the dumb military card, it always made Daniel feel better when he had a chance to lecture on something.

"Claustrophobic." Daniel corrected automatically. "I'm not. I just get... fidgety sometimes. Lets just put this down to caffeine withdrawal and never speak of it again, alright? After all, it has been... 16 hours since I last had coffee. Damnit, why didn't I bring my thermos with me?"

"I didn't know that was physically possible for you. I thought the mug was surgically grafted to your hand."

"Ha haha ha. Do you know what else that means?" Jack blinked twice then blinked again and stuck out his tongue. "Well, we arrived this morning and set up base camp, did a rudimentary analysis of the area and I examined this planet's Stargate for inscriptions before, stupidly, going in search of signs of civilisation. We've been on-world for 19 hours and it's still light outside."

"So?"

Daniel sighed. "So, the storm won't last more then two days. But the days here are obviously much longer then the ones back home. We've only been stuck in this cave for a dozen hours, and I'm already going nuts."

"Yeah, which is driving me nuts. So stop it. That's an order." He stared meaningfully at the younger man.

"I'm sorry Jack, but I can't. I don't want this, it's decidedly uncomfortable in fact. I just have to do something, get all this energy out. At least when it happens at home I can destroy something or get drunk or jerk off or..." he trailed off. "Damnit, I talk too much."

Jack grinned. "Yeah, you do. But as it's one of the things I love about ya, I won't hold it against you."

"Umm, thanks, I think." Was it just Jack's imagination, or did Daniel seem even more... closed off... then usual? And he had that cute little wrinkle in his forehead that he got when he was... Jack wrenched himself from that train of thought as he realised Daniel had gotten out his knife and was alternating between hacking away at the sole of his boot and cleaning his fingernails.

"Hey! Whoa, stop that right there Danny. You could get hurt."

"I could get hurt? Gee, how unexpected for an SG1 mission." Daniel stopped none-the-less, choosing instead to practice flicking the knife into the sand between his feet blade first. Not much of an improvement in Jack's opinion. He waited till the point of the knife was buried in the ground before wrestling the handle away from the archaeologist.

"If you don't cut that out I'll zat you! Damnit Daniel, I've never seen you like this..."

Unfortunately, by the look Daniel gave him, he seemed to be seriously considering a zat blast as an option. Jack dumped Daniels knife and his own, as well as the zat on the other side of the cave and dropped his jacket on top... out of sight, out of mind... and sat down beside his friend. It really seemed an occasion for a hug but he couldn't bring himself to give more then an awkward pat on the shoulder. Daniel's skin gave off a searing heat through his black t-shirt and Jack wasn't sure whether to flinch away at the unexpected warmth or give into his innate desire to prolong the contact as long as possible. After all, it couldn't get much more awkward then this anyway, right?

Daniel sighed into the contact like a cat, leaning against the older man and resting his head on Jack's shoulder so he had no choice to put his arm around Daniels, not wanting to set him off again by moving. OK, maybe it could get a little more awkward...

"I'm sorry Jack, so sorry, you're such a good friend, don't know what I'd do without you..." Daniel mumbled into his chest, the last of the tension flooding out of his body.

"Yep, aha, good friend, that's me... you'd do the same." Jack tried to pat Daniel's shoulder again in what he assumed was a comforting manner but the angle was too difficult and he ended up stroking Daniel's hair instead. Not that said archaeologist seemed to mind. He seemed quite comfortable in fact, almost asleep.

"Mmm, good friend. Love you. Night night."

"Goodnight Danny." Jack swallowed all his worries. It was finally getting dark outside. And the discordant hum of the wind seemed to have lulled slightly. He knew that sound. This would all be over in a few long hours.

Comments

[indelicate-dark.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah. s.u.b.l.i.m.a.t.i.o.n Love it. Just like the program only more blatant, because hey, you're a slash writer. The world is a brilliant, brilliant place *bg*

This was great!

[nocturnali.livejournal.com]

Heh heh. Great song... and great fic.
I have no idea about Stargate, and I still enjoyed your story. It was funny and romantic. Excellent combination, and you do it so well.
Just one thing, there needs to be more and there needs to be smut. LOL.

People should go and read Faerie of Mischief's other work, and also the wip by NocturnalFaerie. *pimp pimp*