Disclaimer: STARGATE is a registered trademark of MGM/UA and SHOWTIME-Online. This fanfic is not intended as an infringement to those rights and is written solely for entertainment. No copyright infringement intended. I'm only borrowing the characters and will give them back when I'm done writing. I derive no profit from this story other than the satisfaction of letting my imagination roam around in someone else's universe. So, on to the story…
Colonel Jack O'Neill watched the fourth member of SG-1 follow Carter and Teal'C down the corridor of the SGC from the briefing room. Daniel Jackson walked without his usual grace, with no life in his step at all. It had been like this for months.
Since that awful day on P5NJ665. Since the day Sha're had died.
P5NJ665. Where his life had ended. Daniel Jackson unconsciously echoed Jack O'Neill's thought. Daniel couldn't help himself from replaying that day over and over in his mind. The discovery of Apophis' base on the planet - hell, they didn't even know the name. It just had a coded designation. And an awful description - the place where his wife had died.
He saw it over and over - Sha're/Amonet and her "Pharaoh", the sudden attack of the SGC troops - and Sha're being tragically caught in the crossfire. Amonet's arrogance had caused her death - she did not believe, until the moment it happened, that the Ta'ri were a real threat to Apophis.
Daniel remembered nothing of his headlong rush across the room to where Sha're fell. He just remembered holding her broken body as the life drained out of her - and hearing her whispered words, "Dan-yell, my husband. I knew you would come for me."
The scream that ripped from his throat as she died in in his arms seemed to come from someone else - surely he had not made that animal sound of misery. Dimly, he heard what seemed like an echo to his wail of pain - and looked up to see it was Apophis echoing his grief. For a moment in time, the two men were united in their loss, until Daniel remembered who had been the architect of his misery these last years, who was the final author of the horror that lay before him now.
With a snarl of hatred, he advanced on the Goa'uld, fully intending to kill the man with his bare hands, or die trying. Apophis had been taken aback by the naked savagery in the archaeologist's eyes, and had fled.
The following days were a jumble of half remembered moments - taking Sha're home to Abydos, to her father Kasuf. The fresh pain of seeing her child - the child that should have been his, but was instead that of the man who had caused her death. And knowing that now, there was nowhere in the world that he wanted to be.
Daniel moved through life like an automaton - he did what was required of him, but there was no joy in it. The only time he showed any animation was in planning sessions, like the one that had just ended. Planning sessions where it might be possible to find the place where Apophis was hiding. Daniel lived only to see Apophis dead. There was nothing else for him now - his life had ended on P5NJ665.
Aby looked up from her desk in the bay window of her apartment, into the street below. Two men were talking on the pavement outside the building next door. The conversation was growing, well, heated.
It was Daniel Jackson, and an older man she had sometimes seen with him. She knew Daniel as a casual acquaintance, as her neighbour for the last year or so. She had always found him rather appealing, in a quiet sort of way. Actually, she found him physically irresistible, but he had made it fairly clear from the start that he wasn't interested. Not in an unkind way, just . . . didn't respond. She had wondered about him, and now she speculated further as she watched the discussion on the pavement. Could it be . . .? Damn, she thought to herself, what a waste if it is.
Jack was trying, for the umpteenth time, to get through to Daniel - to break through the walls Daniel had put up around himself since Sha're's death. Jack knew a thing or two about walls, had built them himself in the past, but it tore at his heart to see Daniel doing it. He wanted Daniel to know that he had a family, people who loved him, in the rest of SG-1 - hell, the whole SGC for that matter.
But Daniel was having none of it. He looked blankly at Jack, waited patiently for him to finish speaking, and turned and walked away. Jack watched him go, and then threw his hands up in the air in defeat. He returned to his car and drove away.
Daniel was aware of nothing. He entered his apartment and locked the door behind him. The apartment was stuffy from being shut up so long, so he threw open the windows. And sank down on the sofa, staring blankly into space, as he had almost every evening since his life had ended with the blast of a staff weapon on P5NJ665.
Aby sang softly to herself as she ran up the stairs to her apartment. These late meetings with her publisher were usually a pain, but tonight she had treated herself to a trip to a club after the meeting was over. She had enjoyed a number of drinks - Jack Daniels on the rocks - and had danced for hours. Now, she was wide awake, happy and bubbling with ideas for her new book.
It was a warm night, so she threw open the windows to her apartment before opening a bottle of red wine and settling herself at her desk to get some ideas down before they escaped her. She grabbed the remote control to her stereo unit and turned on the CD player. Music filled the room - her favourite CD at the moment was the soundtrack to the City of Angels, and it flowed out of the speakers like warm benediction.
Daniel was startled from his contemplation of nothing by the music that drifted into his apartment. It took a moment for his ears to make out the words to the song, but when he did it sounded like a mockery of his pain - "If God will send his angels". God had sent him an angel in Sha're, and then had taken her away from him - first to be a host to a Goa'uld, then permanently with her death. Daniel didn't believe in God anymore - nor in angels.
But the music was somehow soothing. He looked out of the window, and realised it was coming from an apartment in the building next to his. There were two rooms lighted, and from the darkness of his apartment, he could see straight into them. The one towards the back of the building was obviously the bedroom - a soft light showed the outline of a bed beyond light curtains.
The other room with lights on was at the front of the building. From his vantage point, he could see through the side window and make out a figure seated at the desk in the bay window at the front of the building. He concentrated hard, and then realised who it was he was looking at. The writer, Aby, who had moved in about a year ago.
He had spoken to her often, pleasantries between neighbours. She was a pretty woman, with shoulder length brown hair, and extraordinary blue green eyes. And a very fetching smile, too, he recalled. Her reaction to him had been frankly interested at first, and then had waned to pleasant courtesies. He guessed he had given off signals that he was "taken" - he counted it as a sign of the strength of her character that she had taken this in stride and adjusted her interactions with him accordingly.
Now he watched as Aby rose from her desk and picked up a bottle of wine from the coffee table. She swayed to the music as she filled her glass, and her movements were lithe and seductive. Wine, thought Daniel, now there's an idea.
He had resisted the idea of drowning his sorrows - he wasn't much of a drinker as a rule - but now it seemed like a brilliant idea. He wandered into his kitchen and opened a bottle of red wine. Grabbing a glass, he returned to his sofa, and to his observation of Aby. He was not even aware he was doing it.
Aby worked for an hour or so, fleshing out some of her ideas, planning the structure of her book. She knew, deep in her writer's core, that this book would be a good one. She had even decided to base the male protagonist on her neighbour, the delectable Dr Jackson. Hmm, she though to herself as she finished her wine, now he was superb. If he is gay, then that man - she searched her memory and found his name, Jack - Jack was very lucky. Very lucky indeed, she chuckled to herself. She stood up from her desk and stretched out her long limbs.
From his darkened apartment across the way, Daniel watched her move. She was limber and supple - she moved with a dancer's grace, he thought. He, too, had almost finished the bottle of wine, and on an empty stomach, it had made him quite drunk.
He watched her move to the stereo and touch a button. A woman's voice filled the night: "In the arms of the angel, fly away from here, from this dark cool hotel room, and the aimlessness that you feel, you are pulled from the wreckage of your silent reverie, you're in the arms of the angel, may you find some comfort here."
It struck deep into his soul, to the very depths of his being. Another line from the song caught his ear, "this sweet madness, oh this glorious sadness that brings me to my knees". It was all it took - the sobs caught him unawares. He finally wept then, for Sha're, for himself, for the life they had had and the life that they might have had. The tears flowed from him in a flood, and he made no effort to stop them.
A long time later, when his tears were exhausted, he realised the music had stopped. Looking up, he realised the light in the front room of the apartment next door had been extinguished. And that Aby was now in the bedroom. He watched her move around the bed, turning down the bedclothes. And then he watched her undress. A part of him was horrified by his behaviour. But still he watched. She obviously had no idea she could be seen. And she couldn't be, except by him. Why hadn't he realised this before? Because, the remaining rational part of his mind informed him, he hadn't wanted to see before.
He watched as she unbuttoned her blouse and pulled it free from the waistband of her jeans. She unbuttoned the cuffs and shrugged out of it, draping it over a chair. Then she unbuttoned the fly of her jeans and pushed them down over her hips, sitting on the edge of the bed to remove them. She reached behind her to unhook her bra, and then mercifully turned away. She moved out of view then, and returned moments later in a night-gown. And then the light was turned off.
Daniel sat in his apartment, his face hot and flushed. What the hell was wrong with him? Spying on his neighbour like this? He was still blushing with shame and embarrassment when sleep, and drunkenness, claimed him a few minutes later.
The next morning, Aby woke with a screaming hangover. Damn, she thought to herself, it seemed like such a good idea at the time! She dragged herself out of bed and through a perfunctory shower, and then dressed and headed out. There was only one cure for feeling like this - a quick walk to the local coffee shop, and a packet of their specially blended beans, to be brewed in her own kitchen. Before heading out, she grabbed her sunglasses - the light was way too bright this morning.
Standing in line at the coffee shop, she became aware of the person next to her. It was her neighbour Dr Jackson, and damned if he didn't look like he felt worse than she did.
"Good morning," she ventured.
"Good morning, Aby," was the pleasant response. The owner's bellowed "Next!" made them both groan, and then laugh at one another.
"Always seems such a good idea at the time, doesn't it?" Aby chuckled as she moved to the counter.
She noticed with a pang of something very like regret that he was buying coffee to go, and as she left the store, she noticed Jack waiting by his car. Waiting for Daniel, she thought, lucky guy. She smiled at him and continued to her apartment, hoping that the coffee would make her feel human again soon.
Jack watched her walk away from him, admiring the way she moved, her lithe grace. He knew she was a neighbour of Daniel's, had seen her a couple of times talking casually to Daniel. And then Daniel was there, holding a steaming cup of coffee and looking like ten miles of bad road. Actually, more like twenty.
Looks like he got pretty drunk last night, thought Jack, and he hoped this wasn't the beginning of a downward spiral for his younger friend. God knew, it was bad enough that he'd lost his wife (especially in the way he'd lost her), but Jack wanted desperately to convince him that it was possible to go on.
Sam Carter caught up with Jack after the briefing session.
"Got a minute, Colonel?" she asked.
"Sure Carter. What's on your mind?" he responded.
"It's Daniel, sir. Does it seem to you . . . well . . ." she didn't seem to know how to continue.
"I think he got drunk last night, Carter, and it worries me too," he said.
"Actually sir, I was going to say I thought he looked a bit better, despite the hangover. I was wondering if you had anything to do with it. I mean, if you were able to talk to him, as you said you were going to," she said, surprising him.
But, now that he thought about it, Daniel had had more life about him today than he had since, well, since that day on P5NJ665. Despite the hangover, as Sam said.
"Not my doing, Carter, he didn't even hear me," Jack admitted. But then he remembered seeing Daniel's neighbour, coming out of the coffee shop this morning. She looked like she was every bit as hung over as Daniel. Perhaps she was the reason Daniel looked more chipper this morning.
Aby's hangover lifted by mid-morning, to her delight. She spent the rest of the day going over her notes, and by evening had managed to almost finish the first chapter of her book. This book really was going to be great, she thought, very pleased with her progress.
The day had been warm again, and the apartment windows were open. And City of Angels again played on the CD. She thought to herself, with a smile, that it was going to be the soundtrack to her book. She made a light dinner, and then, after a moment's hesitation, poured herself a drink and sank onto her sofa to unwind. She didn't think she'd work anymore tonight. Tonight was for relaxing.
As she sat there, swirling the Jack Daniels in her glass, her mind drifted to Dr Jackson, as it often did. And she lost herself in a pleasant daydream.
When Daniel arrived home from the base, he heard the music from Aby's apartment. These were instrumental tracks - beautiful, sweet, sad, but somehow triiumphant music - filled with strings. The thought of his apartment, and spending the evening alone, didn't much appeal. He stood in the street, letting the music wash over him. And then he found himself at her door.
Aby heard the knock from very far away. She pulled herself back to reality, and the knock came again. She placed her almost untouched drink on the coffee table, and went to answer the door. And was very surprised to find Daniel there.
"Ah, hello, I hope I'm not disturbing you," he said.
It was on the tip of her tongue to respond, "Actually, you always disturb me, Dr Jackson," but she shook her head and ushered him in.
He stood in the centre of her living room, letting the music wash over him. God, it was so beautiful.
She watched him curiously. This was the first time he'd been in her apartment. But why now?
He opened his eyes to find her regarding him with those lovely eyes.
"I'm sorry, I just had to come here. This music," he began.
"I'm sorry, is it too loud?" Aby moved for the stereo, but he caught her arm as she moved past him.
"No, I just wanted to know what it was. It's beautiful," he said in a low voice. She was so close to him now, he could smell the soft fragrance she wore, feel the warmth of her skin under his hand.
"You like it?" she asked. God, he was beautiful up close!
"Very much," he said softly, moving closer to her. And then his lips touched hers, and the universe stood still. Oh my God, she thought, as she melted into his embrace, he's not gay. As she pressed closer to him, and felt his desire against her belly, her mind exulted, 'Nope, definitely not gay!'
Daniel gloried in the feeling of her body close to his, her lips opened to his, the feeling of her hands on him. His hands moved up into her hair, holding her head as he kissed her.
The music followed them as they moved to the bedroom. It swirled around them as he pulled her T-shirt over her head, and buried his head between her breasts. It kept time as she unbuttoned his shirt and pushed it off his shoulders, as her lips traced a line of kisses down his throat to one nipple and then the other.
Her hands came up to the buckle of his belt, and his hands cupped her buttocks as her hands moved inside his pants to caress him. He moaned against her lips, and then he turned her and lowered her to the bed. He stepped out of his pants, and then his hands moved to the waistband of her jeans, unbuttoning the fly slowly, trailing his hands over her belly. He slid them down over her hips, kissing her skin as it was exposed. She shivered with delight as his lips traced their way up her body. She raised up to allow him access to the clasp of her bra, and then lay back against the pillows as he drew it down her arms and tossed it aside.
God, she was so lovely, Daniel thought, as he bent to claim her lips in a passionate kiss. So very lovely, and his lips moved down her throat.
Aby shivered with delight as his lips traced a fiery path across her skin. And then gasped as he took one nipple in his mouth, sucking firmly while his fingers caressed its neglected twin. Her breath began to come faster, and he responded by trailing his tongue down her body, flicking it in her navel before travelling further down.
Her hands came up to tangle themselves in his hair, as she encouraged him in his downward exploration. Her thighs parted, and he lowered his head to taste her. She threw her head back as his lips and tongue explored her. She moaned with pleasure as he loved her gently, and then his lips were moving back up her body. She mourned briefly, until she felt him move between her thighs. She looked up into the depths of his blue eyes, and murmured, "yes, please".
It was all the invitation he needed, and he moved to enter her. Aby gasped as he began to thrust into her willing body, and her arms wrapped around his neck to draw him closer to her. Their bodies moved as one, and dimly he heard that beautiful music as a counterpoint to their moans and sighs.
The he heard nothing but the rushing of the blood in his veins, and her steadily increasing gasps. And the universe exploded around him. As his release flooded through him, he heard her cry out her pleasure as well, and he collapsed into her arms.
Some time later, Daniel roused himself from her arms. She looked so beautiful, he thought, her brown hair spread across the pillow, her blue green eyes observing him through half lowered lids.
"You've made me all sweaty, Daniel," she pouted, her tone light and teasing.
"I could say the same for you, Aby," he responded, matching her tone. He ducked his head to take one tawny nipple in his mouth.
She moaned at the feel of his lips on her. He looked up into her eyes, and she was delighted to see a dancing light of desire there.
"I need a shower," she announced, sliding out of his embrace and standing by the bed. "Care to join me?" she challenged him.
Looking up at her naked body, Daniel felt his desire rising.
"Lead the way Aby," he chuckled, bouncing off the bed.
The shower recess was roomy enough for two people, and he chased her into it. As the warm water streamed over their bodies, he grabbed her. His lips sought hers, as his hands pulled her close to him.
"Not so fast, buster," she laughed, when the kiss ended. "You need to earn your way here," she said, handing him the soap.
He soaped up her body, scrubbing her back, and kneading the muscles in her shoulders, as she relaxed under his hands.
"My turn," she said suddenly, turning to face him and reclaiming the soap. "Turn around," she ordered, and he did so, smiling. Her hands caressed his broad back, and his buttocks, and then she surprised him by reaching around in front of him. He gasped as she caressed him, arousing him further. Then suddenly her hands were on his shoulders, turning him back to face her.
He looked down into her face, which was turned up to his with a cheeky smile playing on her lips. She said nothing, simply lathered the soap between her hands, and then began to wash his chest. He leaned back against the wall, enjoying the feel of her hands on his body, the warmth of the water. And then her smile turned positively wicked, and she moved to kneel in front of him.
Daniel gasped as she took him in her mouth, her lips and tongue exploring him. His hands moved to her head, stroking her wet hair as she made love to him. Suddenly, he could stand it no longer. He grabbed her shoulders and pulled her to her feet, leaning down to capture her lips in a bruising kiss. She met his kiss with a passion that equalled his own.
He turned her so that she was now leaning against the wall, and pressed his body against hers, all the while ravaging her willing mouth. She wrapped one leg around his waist, and he held it there as he entered her. He drove into her again and again as the warm water streamed over their bodies, as they both gasped and moaned and writhed together. He kissed her again and again as they moved together, until she was trembling and gasping, murmuring incoherently. He stared deep into her eyes as her orgasm overwhelmed her, as she trembled in his arms. Moments later, his own orgasm rocketed through him and he cried out as it overtook him.
They stood together, panting, under the streaming water, until its slowly cooling temperature chased them out.
He dried her body gently, and she did the same for him. And then she led him back to the bed, turning back the covers and drawing him into her embrace.
She turned off the light, and they lay together companionably in the darkness. Suddenly, she spoke.
"Who is she, Daniel? Who is Sha're?" she asked gently.
"My wife, Aby. She died," and then the tears came again. Not the scalding flood that had poured from him the night before, but gentle tears of loss. She held him as he cried for his wife, the one whose name he had called out in the shower. She understood his pain, his grief, and her heart went out to him.
"Aby, I . . . " he began.
"In the morning, Daniel. We'll talk in the morning. Sleep now," she soothed.
His breathing evened out as he lay in her arms. She fell asleep first, her breathing coming in deep shallow waves. And as he lay there, he became aware of the music still coming from the living room. The words washed over him as he fell asleep, the first night of peace since he had lost Sha're - "You're in the arms of the angel, may you find some comfort there."
Fini
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