The event horizon glittered, a beckoning siren song.
Step through the Stargate, Daniel. Not Doorway to Heaven, but Gate to Earth. Home. Come home...
"You're sure you want to do this."
Daniel blinked, tearing his eyes away from the Stargate, and regarded the Air Force colonel who had strangely become a friend. Jack's words were a statement, not a question, but Daniel could see the doubt in his eyes.
"Yes, I'm sure," Daniel answered calmly. He couldn't quite suppress the small smile at the thought of the marvels that had suddenly opened to him. He'd been granted an entire world to study. A culture frozen in time, one that he could observe at his leisure...
Observe. From the Old French observer, which in turn derives from the Latin observare - watch over, look to, attend, guard. Guard. Proto-Indo-European based: ser is to protect.
He blinked, shaking off the odd distraction. This was not the time for philology, even if the tracing of language and lingual drift had brought them to this moment of triumph.
Jack looked at him, his piercing gaze demanding honesty. "You're gonna be all right?"
Daniel glanced back at Sha'uri, seeing her wide, eager eyes and the excitement in her expression. It seemed almost too good to be true. She'd rescued him from certain death and inspired her brother and his friends to help them. Even more - she'd gifted him with speech and showed him her history, opening his eyes to the marvels of her world. And this woman was actually his wife!
"I'm going to be all right," he assured Jack, who gave a tiny grin before turning his head away. But before the man could step through the Gate, Daniel pressed, "How about you?"
Jack actually took a moment to think about his answer. "Yeah," he said at last, and the tiny smile morphed into a soft, incredulous chuckle. "Yeah, I think so."
They clasped hands, and Jack walked up the last step. But Daniel instinctively reached out, fueled by an impulse to hold him back for a final moment.
"Tell Catherine this brought me luck," he said, and pressed the Eye of Ra into Jack's palm.
"I will," Jack promised, and Daniel felt an unexpected surge of relief that Catherine, who had been touched by the Stargate for nearly all her life, would know. There would be someone else, someone who would understand the marvels that...
What?
He didn't have time to analyze that thought, because Jack had turned at the very cusp of the event horizon. "I'll be seeing you around, Doctor Jackson," he called, and then he was gone.
Gone.
The rippling, blue-white surface flickered.
And vanished.
Daniel couldn't suppress his choked gasp. The Stargate stood stolid and empty. No link to Earth, no tunnel of quantum impossibility beckoning him homeward. Lonely traveler on an alien planet, with no way home…
He stepped back a pace, nearly staggering, as the boys rushed past him. Skaara directed them with eager importance, and a ragged assembly line quickly formed, passing blocks of stone forward to be piled around the Stargate. They had to bury the Gate completely, yes, of course. They didn't dare risk West becoming suspicious and trying to connect to Abydos to confirm Jack's claim that he'd blown the planet together with Ra. He himself had suggested it, and Skaara had organized it at his behest.
So why did he want to wrest the stones out of the boys' hands, fling them onto the ground, and claw at the chevrons, trying to make the Stargate work again?
It's just a little homesickness, he told himself wildly. He desperately wanted to stay here, to become Sha'uri's husband and a native of Abydos. The amazing opportunity, the enchanting prospect of complete immersion in this uniquely frozen culture… There was so much to learn, so much to become, and the act of observing impacts not only the observed but also the observer, and he was here, he wanted to be here but now he was trapped, and an entire world beckoned but also threatened, and he didn't know what -
A gentle touch on his arm, and Daniel, nearly hyperventilating, flung himself backwards, almost toppling down the stairs.
It was Sha'uri.
***
How strange to see him as man and godkiller at one and the same moment. Sha'uri's sense of wonder and pride warred with the stirring of unease.
He was a man, yes, her Danyer. She had seen him uncertain, troubled, confused. He had meekly followed her lead, as even her brother often refused to do. He listened with rapt intent when she corrected his slurring words. He gifted her with the weapon of his people, unashamed to allow her to fight by his side. He had taken her hand, graced her with his embrace, claimed her as his bride.
Yet she had also seen him wield the great spears of Ra that spat the sun's flame. She witnessed how he dared to strike against Ra, and urged others to battle. She saw him dare to contradict Kasuf, to lay his hands on Ra's dead emissary and reveal his human face. She watched him kill the men clad in the armor of Ra, and then he -
She shuddered at the memory of terror and fire and pain and spiraling blackness.
Her Danyer had brought her back to life.
And then he and O'Neer had vanquished Ra.
Man and godkiller. Lifebringer. Husband. Her apprentice in speech, and her guide to redemption.
She was his.
He was hers.
But what she saw now, as he clenched his fists and stared at the chappa'ai, was a man in need of comfort. She saw his eyes grow wide behind their glass circles, watched his chest heaving, and knew that something had caused him alarm. He had assured her that he wished to stay on Abydos, but might he still be uncertain? Did his ka falter, seeking a link to his heart and shadow? She did not know his beliefs, his fears, his customs. What potter shaped his body and breathed life into his flesh?
She suddenly longed to know. She wished to learn everything about him: redeemer and man, mighty in deed but still needing comfort and human touch. She craved to be the one to speak his name, to be the first person on Abydos to grant him what Ra had always forbidden and carve his ren in stone. She wanted him to take her hand again, to speak not only of the past they had uncovered, but also of his own journeys that had led him here to Abydos. And she wanted to forge a future together for Danyer and Sha'uri.
She reached out and touched his arm. He cried out and flung himself back, eyes wide and staring.
Uncertain of her welcome, she only murmured, "Danyer?"
"Sha'uri." Alarm softened to welcome in his face.
"Danyer, are you well?"
"I - yes. Yes, I am." He blinked rapidly, and tried to smile. "I am fine, Sha'uri."
"You grieve," she observed, and something in her faltered at what she percieved as pain and regret for his choice to stay by her side. "Do you wish now you had returned with O'Neer?"
"No!"
She found comfort in the speed and strength of that denial.
"No," he said again, more softly. "Sha'uri, it is no easy thing to walk away from a world." He gestured at the chappa'ai and the growing pile of stone that drifted upwards, much like dunes of sand rising in the hot winds. "But I made this choice, Sha'uri, and I'm glad of it."
Sha'uri nodded slowly in understanding. He had walked his rite of passage, her Danyer; and it was not mere childhood he left behind, but all he had ever known. She had seen boys become men, hunting the mekati and earning their place, and many had wept when the sun went down and they understood that loss and gain must always walk hand-in-hand.
"Grief is allowed for your loss," she dared suggest. "You have given us much, Danyer. And we have taken more."
He smiled at her, and her heart warmed at the pleasure in his eyes. "I have you, Sha'uri," he said, and his words were soft with sincerity. "I have your world to explore, and you to show me its beauties. Should I not be happy?"
"Perhaps you should," she agreed, smiling in return. "And if grief will pass for you, you may join us in celebration." She gestured at the laughing, chattering boys, bent industriously to their task. "Soon they shall be finished, and we will return to Nagada to rejoice in our great victory."
"A Nagadan celebration? I would like very much like to see it!" His eyebrows arched high over the thin frames he wore on his face, and Sha'uri felt a sudden spark of anticipation in knowing that she would have the time to ask him about the wires, and learn what they might mean.
They would have a lifetime to learn things together, she realized. And it was good.
"What of your own world, Danyer?" she boldly asked. "Will you speak of its beauties, so I might know it as you will learn of ours?"
He took her hand in his, and turned his back on the chappa'ai. The pile of stones was nearly man-high already. It would be wholly buried soon, but he no longer seemed to pay it mind.
"I will speak of my world, and you will speak of yours," he promised her. "And we shall make a new world for us both."
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Grounded
by Fig NewtonStory Bemerkung:
Happy birthday to Random, the queen of betas!
Random asked me for Daniel and Sha're, right after Jack leaves - when Daniel realizes that he really is staying, and Sha're realizes that she's married to the man who killed Ra.
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