Decoy
Part I
"Colonel, your call-in is early. I trust it's with good news?
"Yes, sir, it wasn't easy but we got it and we're coming back home."
"Good to hear. We'll debrief upon your arrival. Hammond out."
Yeah, this'll be good, Jack thought, grimacing as he looked behind him at Daniel, limping and holding his arm, shooting daggers with his eyes back at Jack and Jack was sure he heard some grumbling too. Teal'c, close by him, had a look of shame on his face and anger in his eyes also aimed at Jack. Carter though was looking rather proud of herself, yet still sympathetic toward Daniel, and also giving Jack the evil eye. How does she do that? Jack wondered in amazement.
Really wish I could pass the blame on to Hammond, Jack tried to convince himself once again. He'd done that a lot since the game. He had serious doubts that his team would ever speak to him again, especially Daniel.
"You wanna do what?" Jack looked the queen in the eye. There was something she wasn't saying.
"It is a tradition for wining our trust and our patronage toward your causes. It displays strength, bravery, cunning, willingness, and honesty. It begins the work of union between your people and my people. It brings us closer together..."
Oh, that's it, thought Jack; half listening to all the other things this ritual would do from their queen. She, as well as all of her other women soldiers, had been ogling his youngest team member since their arrival, and he'd done all he could to keep him out of their grasps. He had deep reservation about this mission and was ready to about face and leave when something caught his and his teams eyes, especially Daniel, who had begun to move in that direction. One ushered word of warning from Jack and a 'stay-put' look, and Daniel had heeded, taking Jack seriously.
Jack nodded to Teal'c who moved closer to Daniel as he and Carter approached.
"Sir, I think that's a—"
"ZPM, yeah, my thinking as well, Carter. So the trophy for this game is that, huh?"
"Yes, not a bad prize at that, sir."
Jack looked around him and back at the queen, who was leering at Daniel again. "Depends on the cost of the game, Carter."
Once the General had been informed, Jack had been ordered to get the ZPM back to Earth, even if it meant taking part in their ritual to do it.
So here he and his team were, covered in dirt and sweat, more from keeping the raving women on the other team away from Daniel, something Daniel was just catching on too. It always amazed Jack how clueless Daniel was to his looks.
Unfortunately, they were also loosing this game. These women were ruthless and formidable, and these bruisers rivaled Teal'c in strength and brawn. Jack wondered what they ate on this planet. The game was almost over and he had to come up with a way to reverse the odds or they'd loose. Not an option.
Much like football, except played with a star-like metal object that could be thrown, carried, hidden, used as a weapon, or kicked as many times as needed to get it through an obstacle course to the other side to score... an obstacle course that Jack and his team had just met today, and that these women had learned to master all their life.
The wound over Teal'c's eye looked like it was healing already. Carter had remained unscathed. He'd eaten mud, and Daniel... well his hair was mussed, jacket was missing, and he was sporting a hickey on his neck from the last tackle when he and Teal'c had been a bit slow to get to him.
He could kinda understand the attraction for Daniel. The men on this planet were meek and homely. The women were just plain ugly. Some of them had come on to him and Teal'c but not nearly as much as his poor, oblivious, "glaringly-handsome," as the queen had stated, youngest team member.
If he came back without the ZPM, there'd been a dismal welcome home party and he could just imagine the backlash that would cause with the higher ups. No doubt bringing it back on the General. No he didn't wish that. They were down by one goal and out of time. One more play and the game was over, and they'd lick their wounds, literally, and with tails tucked, drag themselves back home defeated.
This was SG1, they were a team... a winning team, and they would win this - for Hammond and the SGC... for Earth.
So Plan A and B hadn't worked. It had to be Plan C. Sorry Daniel.
"Daniel, I need you to do something. You won't want to do it but we gotta win this and this is how we will. It's the only way. It all depends on you, Daniel. Carter, you have a job as well. A very important one. Team, we're gonna do a quarterback sneak.
Part II
Teal'c tackled the approaching women and I passed the ball to Daniel. Daniel gave me a scalding glare and then took off. The women raced after Daniel, eagerly. Daniel can really run when he has a reason, that's when I passed the real ball to Carter and she took off toward the goal.
Teal'c and I ran after Daniel and his posse who were gaining on him. There was a huge roar from the crowd and Teal'c and I stopped momentarily to see why. So did Daniel. Ooo, bad move, curiosity is definitely your weakness, Daniel.
Carter had scored. We'd won. Apparently, that had no bearing what so ever on Daniel's entourage.
Overwhelmed quickly, and plastered to the ground, five writhing, moaning, cooing heavily-built sweaty, ugly women were smothering my archeologist. Daniel was somewhere in there calling out desperately for help, stopped mid-word by a bunch of kissing and sucking noises.
One by one, Teal'c and I pulled them off. They left reluctantly but smiling, nonetheless. They'd thoroughly enjoyed the game and though they'd lost, they'd been thrilled with the consolation prize.
Burrowed into the ground by the aggressively, lusting women one bedraggled, wide-eyed, frantically panting, archeologist, lay flattened. His hair was plastered to his head, face covered in sweat, glasses were nowhere in sight, clothes torn, and lips were swollen. Hickeys covered every part of his exposed body. His right cheek was slightly bruised and he was favoring his left arm, probably from the immediate impact with the ground by the hound of women.
I grimaced as I offered him a hand-up. That's when his gaze centered on me, eyes narrowed, brows furrowed, he huffed, twisted away and took Teal'c's offered hand behind him.
No words were uttered by him or me on the way home, and even now, as I sit by his bed, he refuses to speak to me. That look on the planet told me everything I needed to know. Who could blame him, really? He'd been my ace in the hole. And I'd given him a guilt-trip to see things my way, I'd used him as a decoy. It had worked. Hammond and Earth got the ZPM, we got a new formidable ally, and got out of it fine... well, almost all of us.
We're a team. We've all had to do some pretty tough things, things that challenged our trust. Was this one so bad?
I'll sit here as long as I need to until he gets so fed up with me being here that he finally breaks his silent wall and the words come flooding out. Then we can rebuild this friendship.
It's a resilient structure, our friendship. Sure, it has weaknesses but we find them, deal with them, and mend them to make it that much stronger. One day we'll be able to look back on this mission and laugh. One day.
The End
