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On Tony's fourteenth birthday, shortly after he woke up, he started feeling lightheaded. His teachers had warned that this would happen, and it was the reason that all students were excused from classes on the day of their fourteenth birthday. For children like Tony, who were born during the summer vacation, they were supposed to go to their family doctor, but since his school was year-round, it didn't matter that his birthday was in June. Tony huddled in his bed and pulled his blanket over his head, trying to muffle the distant sounds of the world outside his dorm windows.
A few minutes later, his vision began to gray, like it did when he hit his head really hard. Tony squeezed his eyes shut and concentrated on listening. Finally, with a pop like the kind that happened on a plane, his ears stopped hearing the dormroom and connected him to a distant place.
"Hello, and, uh, welcome, everyone; I'm Professor Jackson."
Everything was silent for a moment, and then the noise of his dorm room came rushing back. Tony repeated the words to himself several times before crawling out of the blankets and grabbing the pen and pamphlet he'd been given off of his bedside table. Carefully, writing as neatly as he was able, Tony filled in the sentence he had heard on the correct blank. Then he filled in Professor Jackson's name next to his own, which the school nurse had filled in yesterday.
That done, Tony began flipping through the pamphlet. He had been aware, peripherally, that people heard the Listening — the first words that their soulmate would one day speak to them — on their fourteenth birthday, but he had been so focused on other things that he didn't pay it much mind. Now that he had heard his soulmate, now that he had a name, it felt a lot more real to Tony. It was only a partial name, unfortunately, but many people had less than that to go on — the pamphlet was quite clear on that! He reread the introduction, just to double check.
At some point on their fourteenth birthday, every child will hear the voice of their soulmate speaking. This is known as the Listening. The phrase they will hear is the first thing their soulmate will say within their presence, upon their first meeting. All soulmates are destined to meet before their twenty eighth birthday, and will do so barring two events, known as complicating factors. It is important for a child to write down the phrase they hear exactly as they heard it; this ensures that they will recognize the phrase when encountering it again, later in life.
Tony had done that, writing down the phrase just as he heard it. He had no intention of missing his soulmate, just because he'd screwed something up! He kept reading.
Now that you have heard your phrase, fill out the rest of your pamphlet with the information you can gather from it. Most children will not be able to fill out every section, so do not get discouraged! If you were unable to understand the phrase, see Section 7b: What to Do if You Do Not Speak The Same Language As Your Mate.
Tony's phrase had been in English, so he didn't have to worry about that, so he went through the next section instead. For 'name' he already had Professor Jackson. He didn't have a first name, unfortunately, but it was better than nothing. Gender was easy — male — and so was profession — Professor.
In the blank for 'speaking to' Tony debated for a moment before writing, class? lecture? meeting? — gathering of some kind that he seems to be hosting. While his first inclination was to think that Professor Jackson was addressing a classroom, reviewing the phrase had shown that his words weren't that specific, and Tony didn't want to fall into the trap of making assumptions that led to him looking in the wrong place!
Most of the other blanks, like 'location', 'topic', and 'tone', Tony couldn't fill in, and soon he was looking at the next section header: Complicating Factors.
If you are turning 28 and do not think you have met your soulmate, then one of three things has happened:
1) You did meet, but neither one recognized the other. This often happens in instances where both initial phrases are extremely simple and common, such as "hello," "excuse me," "sorry," "no problem," etc. In this instance, both parties will experience a second Listening on their 28th birthday, foretelling the next time they will meet.
2) One of the pair has died. If this has happened, then the living soulmate will not experience a second Listening.
3) A Major Unforeseen Event(MUE) occurred, causing the couple to miss their initial meeting. This is extremely rare, but a few notable examples have been documented through history. In this case, both parties will experience a second Listening on their 28th birthday as well. If two soulmates have detailed or unique phrases, and experience a second Listening, they are encouraged to report to the Department for Soulmate Regulations (DSR), where an attempt will be made to determine if they experienced a legitimate Major Unforeseen Event.
Tony shivered. He hoped that didn't happen to him. He had a very distinct phrase, so he would do his best to find his mate and avoid MUEs. The one thing he did know about his soulmate was that he was a professor. That meant that Tony should try to spend more time around professors, didn't it? Most of his teachers didn't use the title — wasn't it more of a college thing? Maybe high school? Tony figured he should ask the nurse, or maybe the librarian; they might have a good idea. One thing was for sure, if he needed to go to college to find his soulmate, then he needed to keep his grades up!
o
As soon as the sun rose, Daniel slipped out of his room and out to the yard. He quickly scrambled up to the top of the large mulberry tree behind the house, where his body was fairly well hidden from view. He'd only been sitting there, reading, for about an hour when the words started to blur on the page. Taking a deep breath, he tucked the book into his large cargo pocket and then wrapped his arms around the thick branch he was sitting on. Some people reportedly were so shocked by what they heard that they toppled over, and he had no intentions of falling out of this tree.
Soon enough, his vision completely greyed out, and the mild noises of wind, birdsong, and distant traffic faded away. Daniel braced himself.
"So Doc, I gotta ask: Aliens?"
The words, when they came, were indeed shocking, but Daniel didn't fall. As his vision cleared, he pulled out the ubiquitous pamphlet he had been using as his bookmark and began to fill it in. He supposed he was lucky, having a birthday over the summer holidays — there would be no prying classmates or well-meaning teachers to ask pointed questions about what he had heard in his Listening.
Once he finished filling out the routine questions, Daniel leaned back against the tree trunk and tapped his pencil against his lip. He didn't get a name, but that was pretty common. He had gotten a very unique phrase, which boded well for his ability to remember and recognize it in the future.
Assuming the question was aimed at him, then he would become a Doctor, as planned. However, the implication that he would be talking about aliens was a little disturbing. Aliens weren't real, were they? And even if they were, what did they have to do with archaeology or language — his passions?
Suddenly, Daniel was reminded of his grandfather, Nick. Nick had refused to take Daniel in six years ago when his parents died. Nick had also made some waves recently with his stories about meeting great aliens inside a Mayan pyramid. God, Daniel did not want to be associated with some crackpot alien theory because of Nick! He would need to study hard to find a way to make a name for himself that wouldn't make him a laughingstock.
"So Doc, I gotta ask: Aliens?"
But what if Nick's alien theory was the only way to find his soulmate? For that matter, Nick had a doctorate, and Nick was heading for a sanatorium, from what Daniel had overheard the last time he was in his caseworker's office. What if the first words he heard his soulmate speak were directed at Nick, or at one of his doctors?
Daniel sighed and let his head fall back gently against the tree trunk. He had a lot of thinking to do.
o
Soulmates are destined to come together, but the arranging of such is not without perils, given the concept of free will. On rare occasions, fate encounters an anomaly — what humans have come to refer to as 'complicating factors.' More specifically, Major Unforeseen Events.
Usually, these complications are due to misunderstandings. Some are subject to the foibles of time travel. Others come about through sheer human stubbornness, in one form or another. But the rarest of all are what humans would call self-fulfilling prophecies, but which fate refers to as self-destructing behaviors.
Like the story of the man who attempts to run from death, only to run right into him in a distant land, these soulmates are bound by the cruelest twist of irony. Listening to the first words of their soulmate is what guarantees they will not meet in that Listening cycle.
The odds of this happening are calculable by fate, though the numbers are more than a human could understand. What's more, those same odds mean that, statistically speaking, some soulmates will miss their second meeting through the exact same twist of fate (or, as Fate insists on calling it: the twist of idiodic, self-destructive, stupid, free will).
Between the origin of the species and their end in the cold black of space, there are exactly three couples destined to, purely due to statistics, direct themselves away from their soulmate six different times. One couple in all of humanity's existence will actually experience a seventh Listening.
Of course, every reality is different, and in many of them, Tony and Daniel did not fall into this trap. In some, however, they missed each other twice — ironically, once when Daniel was sucked through a ripple effect into a different reality, missing his chance. But in this reality, they were destined to self-destruct their own first meeting only once.
If Tony DiNozzo had never heard Daniel's first words, or if he had heard a different phrase — the "Hi, hello," that was actually directed at himself some twenty minutes after the first line spoken, perhaps — then he would never have made the choices he did. In hearing his soulmate called Professor, Tony DiNozzo was instantly caught by fate, and his desire to find his mate meant he would fight to go to college at all costs.
If he had not heard those words, then he would have completed his time at RIMA, joined the Air Force, and been tasked with escorting Catherine Langford as she drove around town. He would have heard her listening to a taped lecture that began with the words of his prophesied Listening, and met the man — Doctor Jackson — himself a short while later. He would have been silent until given permission to speak, and ended a briefing with his own attempt at an ice breaker: Daniel's Listening.
Alas, because of his own determination to meet his soulmate, Tony DiNozzo was fated to miss him the first time around.
o
Tony sighed and leaned back in his desk chair. He'd been at NCIS for a year, and he thought he had settled in nicely. He figured he'd give it another year or two and then see what AFOSI or Army CID had to offer, but he anticipated less of a learning curve there, having already acclimated to the military way of doing things.
He'd turned 28 two years ago, just a month after getting his PhD. Despite his years of ongoing classwork in high education, he'd never managed to find the right Professor Jackson, and on his birthday he'd been unsurprised when his vision started greying out. He'd even turned off his phone for the morning, willingly taking the chewing out from his sergeant for missing a call in exchange for not missing his soulmate.
"Hello, hi, I'm Dr. Daniel Jackson; and this is Colonel O'Neill—"
As Listenings went, Tony figured he'd gotten a doozy that time. He had a first name, he knew that Daniel was a doctor of some kind, and he even had an associate with a rank!
The 'Colonel' thing had actually given him pause: when Tony's dad found out that his soulmate was a male, he'd sent Tony away to Rhode Island Military Academy. For a while, Tony had toyed with joining the military after high school, and now he wondered if he might have found Daniel sooner that way, instead of pursuing the Professor angle.
He tried not to dwell on it, but focus on the positives instead. And one big positive was meeting Agent Gibbs. Tony had been unsure how to go about locating a random Colonel without more information, and had been researching and making — and discarding — plans for most of a year when Gibbs stumbled into his life.
In his research, Tony had barely come across the idea of military investigators, but when Gibbs offered him a job, it felt like fate. The Navy (and Coast Guard) might not have Colonels, but the Marines did, and despite the name, NCIS served them as well.
Now, a year into his new job, Tony felt he was settling in well. He paid close attention to every case involving Marines — one never knew where a Colonel (or even a Major who could be promoted to Colonel) might appear. Since Gibbs himself was a Marine, he had no complaints if Tony seemed more interested in those cases, because he was too.
Tony kept abreast of all of the BOLOs and hot sheets from other NCIS units, and read all the reports from their Field Offices abroad. He knew from asking around that most agents tended to skim such things unless they had a case with ties to another region, but Tony wasn't reading them to keep abreast of new terror cells or domestic militant groups. He was looking for two specific names.
Professor Dr Daniel Jackson
Colonel (or Major) O'Neill
He had also discovered and subscribed to several papers and magazines. Defense News, Stars and Stripes, Marine Corps Times, Navy Times, and Federal Times he all had delivered to his desk, and he was able to read them on the job under the guise of research, the same way he worked at learning the UCMJ and the layout of Naval ships.
Not that it was entirely a smoke screen, — Tony wasn't only looking for Daniel and O'Neill — as he'd already managed to link an article from Stars and Stripes to a case, and recognized a defense contractor on another case from Navy Times.
What no one at work knew about was that he also subscribed to Army Times and Air Force Times at home, where he skimmed them for references to O'Neill or Daniel. Tony's Air Force research had also directed his focus at NASA, where scientists frequently mingled with officers, creating an environment with good odds of containing both doctors and colonels. He quickly added several of their publications to his rotation.
In the office, Tony had also developed a habit of looking through cold cases. Many of the older ones that predated things like DNA testing were actually just waiting for someone to officially check them out, put through the testing order, and follow up on the results. Since he was looking through the files anyway, Tony went ahead and ordered the tests, and as a side-effect his cold case closure rate went up.
Of course, plenty of cases didn't have DNA evidence conveniently waiting around, or if they did there were no matches, but Tony also had a good eye for making connections. In many cases, there was something that the initial investigators had thought insignificant, or missed because their focus was elsewhere. Without the emotional attachment or the time crunch of trying to solve it now, Tony could make new connections.
Between the two tactics, he was solving about 7% of the cold cases that crossed his desk, which didn't sound like much, until you figured that he was looking at every cold case involving Marines that he could get his hands on.
Tony knew he was starting to draw the attention of the higher ups, and he didn't mind. His usual tactic, in his other precincts, was to just keep his head down and do his job to the best of his abilities, but now he was on a quest. He refused to be one of those people who needed a third Listening!
Because his and Gibbs' regular case closure rate was so high, while they were also maintaining the best cold closure rate outside of the actual Cold Case units, Director Morrow was talking about expanding their partnership into a full team — a flagship thing. That suited Tony just fine: if Daniel had his name, and his college ball career hadn't been enough to get his name out there, then maybe this would. Tony knew the right circles now — Marine, Air Force, and Army — and he was going to do his best to get his name spread.
o
"Sir, this isn't working," Sam said, closing another file wearily. "We just don't know what we're looking for. Sending out our Search and Rescue teams is all well and good provided we know the area they're searching, but at this point SG-5 could be anywhere on the planet!"
"Will someone re— remind me why we don't just read some police officers into the Program?" Daniel complained, taking off his glasses and rubbing the bridge of his nose.
"Because according to the General, that would be a security nightmare," Jack said, without raising his head from the file he had slumped down onto earlier. "Believe me: I know. I already asked."
"But sure— surely the FBI or NID or someone has to have both people with high clearance levels and investigative skills," Daniel protested. "Don't you people have cops in the Air Force? N— not MPs, but… like, detectives?"
Sam sat upright. "We do have AFOSI," she said thoughtfully.
"I— I'm sorry—" Daniel put his glasses back on.
"Air Force Office of Special Investigations," Sam explained. "Basically exactly what you wanted: detectives who are also Air Force officers, and therefore people we could theoretically read into the Program."
Jack sat up. "NCIS would probably be better in this case. These are Marines we're talking about."
"I— I take it that NCIS some— somehow stands for Marine—"
"Naval Criminal Investigative Services, actually," General Hammond said from the doorway, "though they handle Marine matters as well. And that's not a bad idea. Let me make a few calls."
"Oh thank god," Daniel muttered, slumping back in his chair. He had no idea what he was doing, and he didn't think Jack or Sam were that much better off. None of them had the first clue what to look for when tracking Marines who were AWOL with some kind of alien imperative. It was high time that they called in some experts.
o
"Okay, we're just giving them the basics," Jack said for the fourth time. "No mention of the Stargate."
"I know, Jack," Daniel agreed easily.
"As far as we know, they were compromised by a human drug and brainwashing."
"I know, Jack," Daniel repeated.
"And we don't know who they're looking for; we think it's a cult leader."
"Jack, I KNOW!" Daniel burst out. "I helped create this story, remember!"
"I'm just checking!" Jack said, affecting innocence. After three years, Daniel knew him too well for that to stick.
They pulled up to the building a moment later, and found a Marine MP waiting outside the door for them. He ushered them through security, up the elevators, and into a large bullpen that was painted a vibrant orange custard color. The MP kept walking, but Daniel and Jack both paused to take it in before getting their bearings.
"Uh… wow. That's—" Daniel stammered.
"You get used to it," said the MP with a smirk as they caught up to him.
"I will never complain about our nice, boring, gray walls again," Jack said with a small shudder.
"Eh, they grow on you," said a man with a to-go cup of coffee in his hand as he passed them. He had grey hair and what Daniel could now recognize through experience as a military bearing.
"Here you are, Sirs," the MP said, waving them towards the agent who had spoken.
"Thank you, Chief," Jack dismissed him.
Daniel turned to the older agent — clearly their contact that General Hammond had told them about. He had moved behind a desk in a smaller walled-off bullpen, where two other agents were rising from their chairs. "Hello, hi, I'm Dr. Daniel Jackson; and this is Colonel O'Neill—"
"Two l's," Jack said, holding up two fingers and wiggling them.
The younger male agent gasped, and Daniel glanced at him, only to find him staring back at them with his jaw dropped. Before Daniel could ask what was wrong, the first agent stepped back out from behind his desk, sans coffee, and held out his hand.
"Special Agent Gibbs. These are Agents Todd—" he nodded towards the woman at his left, "— and DiNozzo." He nodded towards the male agent, who still looked shell shocked.
"Pleasure to meet you, Doctor, Colonel," Agent Todd quickly shook their hands.
Daniel turned just in time to see Agent Gibbs smack Agent DiNozzo upside the head. "DiNozzo!" he growled.
"Sorry Boss," the agent replied, hunching.
This time it was Daniel's turn to gasp, as DiNozzo's reaction slotted into place. "Oh!" he breathed.
"Danny?" Jack asked, sounding worried. Out of the corner of his eye, Daniel could see Jack's hand twitching, like he wanted to rest it on his sidearm but was refraining.
"Oh wow," Daniel managed to hold his hand out to DiNozzo. "Um, h— hi, hello."
"Tony," he shook his hand, a smile spreading across his face. "I do apologize, I'm usually much better mannered. Welcome to NCIS."
That smile was a dangerous weapon, Daniel realized, feeling his stomach doing flip flops at the sight.
"Oh!" Agent Todd gasped behind him. Daniel vaguely heard her whispering something to Gibbs, but he was lost in the handshake that was going on a little too long for politeness sake.
"Okay, easy Tiger," Jack said, hip-checking him and bringing Daniel back to his senses. He dropped Tony's hand, and offered him a small smile in apology. Tony's eyes lit up.
"DiNozzo, handle this on your own time!" Gibbs growled. "Do I have to bench you?"
"No Boss!" he immediately replied. Then he crisply came to attention and looked at Jack. "My apologies Colonel. But you know how it is." He smiled again.
"I have some vague notions," Jack said blandly, but Daniel could tell from long practice that he was amused. "Anyway, you got somewhere private we can talk, Gunny?" he asked Gibbs.
"Yeah, right this way," Gibbs said, beckoning them forward.
As Jack followed him, Todd darted across the space between their desks and grabbed Tony's arm. "Come on loverboy, focus," she chided him, dragging him after Jack. Tony offered Daniel an apologetic smile over his shoulder, but let himself be dragged. As Daniel followed behind, he heard Todd quietly say, "Aren't you thir—"
"Shut up, Katie," Tony quickly shot back. "Or do I have to remind you how old Abby turned this year?"
"Shutting up," Todd — Kate — said, raising her hands in surrender. A moment later she elbowed him. "If you leave, can I have your letter opener?"
"Hey, I'm leaving — maybe — not dying! Get your own!" Tony protested with a laugh. "And don't you dare give Ducky any ideas! I've seen him eyeing my Mighty Mouse stapler!"
Daniel shook his head — they reminded him of Sam and Jack, though not quite as formal, without the chain of command thing getting in the way of their banter. Okay, so maybe they reminded him more of himself and Jack. Either way, it was giving him a chance to observe while catching his bearings, and Kate seemed to be helping to draw Tony out of his initial shock.
Daniel shook his head again. Like Tony, he needed to focus on the case. They had brainwashed Marines to track down; getting to know his soulmate would have to wait.
o
"So we know they're not going to their last command," Tony mused, tossing a stress ball in the air over his head. He was stretched back in his chair with his feet kicked up on the desk, and it seemed to be his preferred pose for thinking — or so Daniel had observed over the last few hours. "And they're not going home… You said there's no local places of significance to the bad guy… where is significant to him?"
Daniel exchanged a glance with Jack. If they were right about which Goa-uld had done this, then they were looking at a female deity. Jack shrugged, so Daniel cleared his throat and said, "We're looking at a cult leader following ancient Hindu traditions that have been warped—"
"India?" Gibbs asked quickly.
"Mmm, more likely the Khmer region encompassing modern Cambodia, Laos and Thailand."
"So what, he might've sent them to Angkor Wat?" Tony joked.
When his two teammates stared at him he smirked. "Hey, I know things."
"I'm just not used to them being relevant," Kate snarked. Daniel had become used to their banter over the course of the day. Still, he felt that he needed to interfere.
"Uh, in— in this instance, our bad guy is p— possibly a bad gal. We're looking at someone — and all our evidence so far points to a woman — who thinks she's basically an ancient god— well, goddess, reincarnated."
"So sending your Marines to meet her at what she thinks is her temple in Cambodia doesn't actually sound so far-fetched," Tony concluded. "If she wanted to relive her 'glory days', what better place to start?"
Daniel glanced at Jack again. From what little they had told him, Tony's assumptions made sense. But they fell apart if he learned the truth. If Lakshmi did intend to subjugate Earth from her last known stronghold, then she would need to come through the Stargate to do it. Which actually begged the question of why she had sent SG-5 back on their own, instead of accompanying them.
But since she hadn't done that, then SG-5 must intend to circle back to Cheyenne Mountain — there was simply no other Stargate on the planet that they could access to bring Lakshmi here. Unfortunately, as best as SG-1 had been able to tell, — and the NCIS team had already confirmed — the Marine team was nowhere near Colorado.
"Maybe," Daniel hedged. "I'm not sure if she had her own temple…"
"Are there any important relics of hers then?" Tony pressed. "If she didn't want to go to a temple, or didn't have one, she might want them to retrieve a relic? Or does she have any supposed descendants who could legitimize her claim? Taking a Marine Recon team actually makes even more sense if you're interested in a kidnapping or a snatch 'n' grab."
"Daniel?" Jack asked. Daniel had spent the last three years learning all the different meanings that Jack could imbue his name with. This one was both asking a question and reminding him of the alien relics they'd already found at ancient sites being excavated.
"Well, uh, it isn't my area of expertise, but from what I recall, Lakshmi was a consort to Vishnu. The time in Cambodian history that we're looking at pre-dates Angkor Wat, so off the top of my head, the most important site related to him at the time was likely near Kbal Spean or Mahendraparvata," he said.
"Say that five times fast," Tony muttered, eyes wide.
Daniel chuckled. "Yes, well, the Khmer rulers of the day built several shrines and temples to Vishnu, and as his consort, Lakshmi would have been worshiped in the same places. Especially since it is said that she blessed her followers with fertility. Uh, th— there are any number of relics that might have been, been found in the area, though they would most likely be, uh, elsewhere in museums at this point. I'd need to, uh, do some research, talk to one of my colleagues who is f— familiar with the culture and time period…"
"We should start canvassing the museums, too," Tony agreed. "They might not need to go to Cambodia if whatever they're looking for is in the British Museum or the Natural History Museum or something. Can you give us a list of the kinds of relics we're looking for?"
"Uh, w— with a little time, yes," Daniel agreed quickly. "I'll need to call a colleague who can give us some broad categories for you to get started on, and then she and I can narrow things down."
o
"Alright, I've got a lead on your Marines," Tony said as soon as he entered the conference room. Kate, Daniel, and the Colonel all looked up in surprise. Gibbs had gone for coffee just before Tony's friend got back to him and he stepped out to take his call.
"I talked to an old RIMA friend who flies a COD for the Seventh Fleet," Tony quickly explained. "One of his buddies, Jeff, who pilots an Osprey, was handed a stack of shady, blacked out orders to run an airdrop for your team. Colonel, you were right about them removing their identifying patches like they were going into enemy territory, but Jeff got your Marine Captain Soong to give up his name when he refused to look at the orders otherwise."
"Because the orders looked so sketchy, our new friend Jeff also called the CO who had signed off on them — a Lieutenant Colonel Tines — who basically told him to keep his mouth shut and follow orders. He remembered it so well because Tines was in the Air Force, not Marines, and the switch between branches caught his attention," Tony said, then checked his notes again.
"Jeff dropped your squad at the coordinates they requested, and he still had them in his log. I took the liberty of looking them up, and they're not exactly where we thought." Tony compared his notes to the large topographical map that Gibbs had requisitioned for them yesterday. "Riiiiiight here," he said, pointing out the drop zone. "They're a bit of a ways from Kbal Spean or that place I can't pronounce; the closest landmark is some site called Koh Ker, which I guess is some kind of pyramid?"
Tony chuckled. "Funny how they had pyramids in Cambodia just like in Egypt. South America, too, if my memory of the Road to El Dorado serves. Great movie, by the way. Kinda makes you wonder if they really were able to sail around the world and compare notes back then, doesn't it?"
"What it means is that pyramids were the most efficient way to build to the height they wanted," Gibbs growled from behind him, startling Tony.
"Boss, warn a guy," he protested weakly, clutching at his heart. Normally, that joke might have earned him a headslap, but Tony had noticed that, since that first one yesterday morning, Gibbs hadn't smacked him in front of Daniel or the Colonel. He wasn't sure if it was because he was behaving in front of a higher ranking officer, or because he thought Tony's soulmate might protest.
Daniel caught the Colonel's eye, and passed some complex message with a series of meaningful looks and eyebrow raises. Tony didn't even try to guess: it had already been made apparent that, wherever Daniel and the Colonel were stationed, the knowledge of it was several degrees above NCIS's paygrade.
Even if Tony hadn't guessed that, just from the caginess of their responses, the stonewalling Kate had gotten when she tried to run backgrounds on the missing Marines told it's own story. It wasn't until the Colonel stepped out and made a few calls that they got anywhere in their digging. Tony was trying very hard not to wonder what the hell an archaeologist and linguist like Daniel was doing at that kind of black site!
"Uh, we need to make a call," Daniel finally said, then grabbed the Colonel's arm.
"Yeah, we'll be… phoning… home," the Colonel said as he was manhandled towards the door.
"You need a secure line?" Gibbs asked before they made it too far.
"Yeah, got one?" the Colonel asked.
"Follow me," Gibbs said, tossing his now-empty coffee cup in the trash and heading for the door.
When all three were gone and the door closed behind them, Tony turned to Kate, who had been tracking commercial flights into the region. Normally, they might take this chance to go chat with Ducky, Gerald, or Abby, but since neither could share what they were working on, and there were no bodies or physical evidence, the conversation would be pretty stilted. Still, he could do with a break from this tight little room, and the others would probably be in MTAC for a while. "Wanna grab some coffee?" he offered.
"God yes," she agreed quickly. As she closed her laptop, a smirk spread across her face. "And then maybe you can tell me how your date went last night."
"Taking Daniel and the Colonel to a hotel where they could freshen up is not a date, Kate," Tony shot back.
Kate shrugged, "Eh, you say po-tay-to…"
o
As soon as they were in the secure MTAC room, and connected to the SGC, Daniel dismissed the technicians who had made the call. Once the room was empty, he waved at General Hammond, as he replaced the on-duty technician. "Hello. We've got a lead. Are Sam and Teal'c back yet?" Even though the line was supposed to be secure, Daniel didn't want to say too much. If time wasn't of the essence, he'd have waited until they were back in Cheyenne Mountain to give his report.
"They are," the General nodded.
"Good. We know where SG-5 is and we think we know what they're doing. Sam and Dr. Lee need to work their magic, reconfigure a few satellites, and see if there are any signals being broadcast on a frequency that our friends might pick up." Hopefully between the two scientists, they would be able to get it done quickly. If Daniel was right, whatever homing signal Lakshmi might be transmitting needed to be intercepted and blocked or distorted as soon as possible.
"Dr Jackson, when you say friends… you're speaking of Lakshmi and her family?" General Hammond replied just as cagily.
"Yes, Sir." Daniel agreed. Tony might have been joking, but the SGC knew the truth about the pyramids — they were used by the Goa'uld as docks for landing ships from space. If Lakshmi was sending her followers to Koh Ker, it was likely she was having them prepare the pyramid for a visitor from above. Worst case scenario, she wouldn't have to access Cheyenne Mountain if she bypassed the Stargate and landed a Pyramid warship on the planet!
"I'll have them get on it right away," General Hammond agreed, then nodded at someone off screen. Daniel assumed it was someone like Walter — Sam would have jumped in with questions.
"You'll also need to send someone out to find Lieutenant Colonel Tines," Jack said. "He's the one signing the orders for SG-5 and we don't know why. Our sources say he's Air Force, but I don't recognize the name. He isn't one of ours, is he?"
General Hammond frowned, then said, "I believe he is one of Major Davis's commanders. I'll dispatch SG-2 to investigate and bring him in if needed."
"If he hasn't physically met with SG-5, there's a chance he's being manipulated by them, but isn't chemically compromised," Jack pointed out.
"I concur," General Hammond said gravely.
"How did it go getting a hold of Jacob?" Daniel asked. They were attempting to find out everything the Tok'ra knew about the different variants of Nish'ta, and see if they could obtain a little that could be used to essentially inoculate their people against this new strain. One of the things SG-1 had obtained from Seth's compound was a crate of Nish'ta, and they had proceeded to 'inoculate' everyone at the SGC in stages, dosing them and then giving them a mild shock, just as SG-1 had experienced.
Since the incident with Seth took place after Hathor's visit, but Jack and Daniel weren't already immune to Seth's Nish'ta, Janet had theorized that each variant attacked the body in a slightly different way, like each new strain of the flu virus. Since all of SG-5 had gotten the general Nish'ta inoculation, Janet believed that Lakshmi was using a variant similar to the one Hathor had, and their behavior backed up her hypothesis.
But since all five of the Marines of SG-5 were male, they had no way of knowing if the women of the base would be immune to this version, like they had been to Hathor's.
"Yes, Jacob brought a doctor named Kelmaa with him, and they're assisting Dr. Fraser with her research," General Hammond assured them. "You said you know where our missing team is?"
"Yesir," Daniel unrolled the map and handed one edge to Jack to help him display it. "They're in Cambodia, and we believe they're heading to the Koh Ker pyramid," he stressed the word. When the General's eyes widened, Daniel knew that he'd made the connection. If a pyramid ship landed on Earth, then revealing the Stargate Program would be the least of their worries!
Daniel continued, "SG-5 are probably trying to activate some kind of homing beacon or broadcasting device at the pyramid. However, it's entirely possible that whatever device they're looking for has already been removed or broken, so there's a chance we can get there and stop them before it gets too late. Teal'c should have an idea of what they're looking for. If he and the team can get in the air ASAP, they might stand a chance."
"I'll pass that on," General Hammond said. "Are you two coming back, then?"
Daniel glanced at Jack, knowing the decision was up to him. "Unless you need us on the retrieval team, Sir, I think it might be better for us to stay," Jack said, utterly surprising Daniel. "If we're wrong about the… endgame," he mimed a ship landing, "or if the beacon technology is missing or broken and they decide to go with a plan B, we might need this NCIS team to help us fill in the blanks again."
After a brief hesitation, General Hammond nodded. "Good idea. Teal'c should be able to handle things on his own with SG-3 and SG-6."
"Sir, I assume you've already got Doctor Matthews working on this, since she's our expert in Southeast Asian cultures. She should go with Teal'c and the others in case they need translating on the fly," Daniel piped up. Dara was really a much better fit for this mission, since Daniel didn't actually know any of the languages of the region. It had nothing to do with getting to see Tony for a little longer and everything to do with practicality. He still wasn't sure why Jack had volunteered them to remain, but Daniel didn't want to be accused of shirking his duty to SG-5 just for his own selfish reasons.
"She already volunteered to help," General Hammond assured him. "Now, what exactly are these coordinates?"
Daniel quickly read off the numbers that Tony had given them. After double checking them, General Hammond told them to keep in touch and signed off. Before they left, turning the room back over to the NCIS techs, Daniel took advantage of the privacy to ask Jack the question on his mind.
"Jack, why'd you volunteer us to stay?"
"You wanted to go?" Jack asked with a raised brow.
"I told General Hammond the truth: Matthews is the better choice for the region — I don't speak Khmer or Hindi," Daniel quickly defended himself. "But we're not talking about me."
"Same reason," Jack shrugged. "SG-3 and -6 are our Search and Rescue folks. And Teal'c's our expert in everything else. I'd just get in the way. Plus, the NCIS folks are the ones who found them; we might need that again."
Daniel eyed him carefully, but Jack had his best unreadable face on. "So this is nothing about me and Tony and solely about what's best for finding SG-5?" he pressed.
"There's something going on with you and DiNozzo?" Jack affected shock.
"Jaaack." Daniel warned him.
"Fine," Jack huffed. "Everything else is true."
"But…"
"But we could still catch a ride back home and just call NCIS if we needed another consult. Since we were already here, I figured it wouldn't hurt if we stayed put. And maybe ran a background check on DiNozzo."
"You're thinking about reading him into the Program?" Daniel couldn't hide his surprise.
Jack shrugged uncomfortably, the way he did when he was caught doing something nice. "He's got good instincts, and God knows we could have probably used our own Feds when we were dealing with those ATF clowns last month. I know the General has been making plans to bring the Air Force OSI in on things, but since we've got plenty of Marines, there's space for a few NCIS agents too. I certainly like them better than those NID jerks."
"Jack, last week you said you liked the Goa'uld better than the NID," Daniel felt he had to point out.
"And I do! At least the Goa'ulds have snakes in their brains. What's Maybourne's excuse?" Jack shot back.
Daniel shook his head, but he knew better than to try to defend the NID to Jack. Especially when he didn't exactly disagree. Still, "you really think Tony and his team would be a good fit for the Program?" he asked. He couldn't shake the feeling that Jack was doing this just because of his connection to Tony.
"Well it won't be up to me," Jack replied. "It'll be up to General Hammond. If you're really that worried about it, we could leave out the part where you're his soulmate and just try to sell him on the work they did hunting down SG-5."
"Really?" Daniel hadn't expected that. "That would make me feel better. Assuming we can find and retrieve SG-5, of course."
"C'mon, Danny," Jack ruffled his hair. "Trust our people to do their jobs. We don't have to worry unless something goes wrong with them, and Sam and Teal'c are the best."
"Alright," Daniel allowed himself to be reassured. "So now what do we do?"
"Now? I could go for some pie," Jack admitted. "Let's see if our new friends know any good diners in DC."
o
To Daniel's pleased surprise, General Hammond had been very impressed with the work that the NCIS team had done in finding SG-5, and immediately approved reading them into the Program. Things were still moving slowly with AFOSI, and he trusted the NID only slightly more than Jack did, so he was happy to have his own investigative team, and the ability to dump both of those problems on their desks. It had only taken a week for the background checks to come back and all three members of Tony's team were cleared to join the Stargate Program.
And, as far as Daniel could tell, it had all been done without anyone but Jack knowing that Tony was his soulmate. That gave him another proud feeling — that Tony had impressed the General on his own merits, and wasn't just being brought in to keep Daniel committed to the Program or something.
So, barely two weeks after they had left, Jack and Daniel returned to NCIS, this time with Major Davis in tow. He had been cleared of any involvement in the SG-5 incident, and his direct supervisor, Lieutenant Colonel Tines, had been cured of his Nish'ta brainwashing, just as the Marines had.
The group was back in the small conference room they had used to track the team, and after assurances that SG-5 was recovering, and a bit of other catching up, Jack had finally had a chance to give his, 'we're about to read you into a program so classified that if you so much as think of spilling the beans you won't even be able to see the sun from the depths of the hole we'll throw you into' speech. Daniel had been forced to listen to it twice on the plane, and it didn't get better with repetition.
But, it seemed to have impressed Tony and his team, because they all agreed to hear the rest, and Jack had Major Davis pass out the folders with the NDAs in them. They were thicker than Daniel remembered, but then he'd gotten his in chunks as the Program developed. There was something to be said for being one of the people who discovered the things that everyone else was swearing not to repeat.
"Wait, you're reading us into Project Blue Book?" Kate asked when she saw the top of the first page.
"Hang on, isn't that the Air Force's alien research project?" Tony asked.
Major Davis, Kate, and Gibbs all turned to look at him in shock. "What? Abby's obsessed with aliens. I know way more about them than I ever wanted to." He nudged Kate. "I'm surprised she hasn't told you all about it."
"We've agreed to disagree on aliens," Kate said. Daniel did his best to hide his smirk: Kate wouldn't be able to do that for much longer.
"What do you know about the modern Project Blue Book?" Major Davis asked her.
"Oh, well before NCIS I was in the Secret Service. I wasn't high enough to actually know the details, but if anyone mentioned it we were supposed to take them seriously and report it to a higher up as soon as possible. If we were given a Code Blue Book, we were to treat it somewhere between world war three and the second coming."
"And what is the official Secret Service reaction to those two events?" Tony asked curiously.
"Mostly to hustle the President as fast as humanly possible onto Marine One or Air Force One — whichever is closer," Kate replied with a smirk.
"Huh." Tony let that go and began skimming the NDA. "Wait, aliens are actually real? You realize that if this ever gets declassified, and Abby finds out that we knew — and she will find out — she'll kill us all."
"Who, uh... who is Abby?" Daniel finally had to ask. He had vague memories of the name from their first visit, but couldn't put them in any context.
"She's our forensic scientist," Gibbs said. "I don't suppose you need one of those, in addition to the team?"
"She's the best in the business. She's also Kate's partner," Tony added, catching Daniel's eye and subtly tapping his ear, clearly conveying the unspoken clarification that they were soulmates.
Daniel glanced at Jack. "We'd have to check with the General, of course, but I imagine that if we needed an investigative team we'd also need a forensic scientist."
"Makes sense to me," Jack agreed with a shrug. "Davis, you got another one of those NDAs lying around?"
"I do," Major Davis said cautiously.
"Jack, don't you need to talk to the General first?" Daniel asked. He could only imagine what would happen if they showed up with extra people in tow — especially ones who hadn't been cleared first!
"He gave me pretty broad instructions to bring in however many people from NCIS we need. You three say you need a forensic scientist, and you work with the best, then she's in. We already ran background checks on you three, and current partners are included in that. If Todd was cleared, her soulmate should be too…" he glanced at Major Davis for clarification.
The Major quickly opened one of the folders in front of him. "Her name?"
"Abigail Sciuto," Kate said, blushing faintly. Daniel got the impression that she was embarrassed at the idea that her soulmate had also been vetted, even if it would come to work in her favor.
"She's cleared," Major Davis said after a brief check.
"Well, go and get her!" Jack said. "The more the merrier."
"I'm guessing you've got someone from JAG read in, on account of this pile of dead trees in front of me, but does that include prosecutors, defenders, and such, or just contract jockeys?" Tony asked as Kate quickly left the room.
"That's a… work in progress, you might say," Major Davis admitted with a grimace. "If you know anyone who could grease a few wheels…"
"We do," Tony assured him, jotting a note on the legal pad he had brought. "When we're done here I'll make a few calls."
"You've got some sort of IT or cyber department we can use for running computer searches and the like?" Gibbs asked next, as Tony went back to his reading.
Jack and Daniel exchanged a look. "Not exactly," Daniel said. "Most of our scientists are focused on Program-related research and I don't even know if any of them specializes in computers in the way you're talking."
"Good thing we're bringing Abby, then," Tony muttered.
"It'll do for a start," Gibbs agreed. "If it ends up being too much we can see about adding someone."
Tony nodded. "What about… I'm sure you've got Logistics folks who could fold in our supply requests?" Jack and Major Davis both nodded. "Right, but for the rest of it… uh, records clerks, pencil pushers… what's Air Force speak for Yeoman?"
"Yo-what-now?" Jack asked.
Tony just gestured at Major Davis. "One of him."
"It isn't a separate ranking system, like in the Navy," Major Davis broke in quickly, clearly understanding what Tony was talking about. "In the Air Force, you simply chose administrative support as a career track, the same way you would choose to become a pilot, operations tech, or JAG. I'm one of the administrative people involved with the Stargate Program, and function as the liaison to Washington DC. There are several more on the Base, and if you need someone full time that can easily be assigned."
Gibbs nodded at that and returned to perusing his NDA.
"What's this I hear about a secret meeting?" A new woman asked, bouncing into the room. Kate followed behind with a small smile, and retook her seat. The woman — Abby, presumably — was wearing a white lab coat, but her outfit beneath it was very different from the other three. Danny wasn't sure what to call the look, but different seemed a safe enough word: maybe he could ask Tony later.
Gibbs waved at the empty chair between Major Davis and Kate's seat. "Sit down, Abs. It's a job offer: and it comes with the biggest NDA I've ever seen. You think hard before you agree to look at it; if you break this, none of us could help pull you out of the pit they'd drop you in."
Tony snorted, but kept his eyes down on his form.
"You were gonna leave without me?" Abby asked woefully, switching emotions on a dime.
"Of course not," Tony said easily. "You're here getting the scary NDA speech, aren't you?"
"You'd better believe it, Mister," Abby scolded him. Given the amusement on the faces of all three agents, this was a fairly typical scene.
"Well, you'd better do your 'Here's the red pill, no going back now' speech again," Tony suggested to Jack as he turned back to his NDA. He was the furthest along, from what Daniel could see, despite his banter with Abby and earlier questions.
Daniel sighed and sank back into his chair as Jack launched into his speech yet again. He really needed to make himself scarce the next time this happened, or at least bring some earplugs!
o
A few weeks later, Daniel found himself snuggled up with Tony on the couch, enjoying his commentary on the cultural significance of The Irony of Fate. Tony didn't speak much Russian, — though they shared Italian, Spanish, and Arabic if they got tired of speaking English — but he insisted on watching foreign movies in their original languages with subtitles, instead of the dubbed versions. Daniel had learned that Tony was quite the film snob, but he didn't mind: especially when he spoke the language in question and so could follow along either way.
So far, Tony hadn't just tolerated Daniel's tangents on archaeology and linguistics, he'd actually paid attention and asked questions. It was so different from the glazed eyes and prods to hurry up that Daniel was used to from Jack, Sam, and the others. In turn, he did his best to pay attention to what Tony said about movies — not that it was too difficult, as for the most part the information was very interesting.
"It's kind of funny to think about, isn't it?" Tony asked suddenly. "The way fate happens?" He gestured vaguely at the screen, where Zhenya was attempting to call his fiance, and then at the two of them. "You ever wonder about how we were supposed to meet the first time?"
"Sometimes," Daniel admitted. "What was your original Listening?"
"Hello, and, uh, welcome, everyone; I'm Professor Jackson." Tony instantly recited.
"Well I suppose that's better than just 'hello,'" Daniel decided.
Tony chuckled. "Yeah, I wasn't really planning on going to college at the time. Not that I was planning to not go, but I was at year-round boarding schools, and they weren't exactly my idea of fun. Or my idea at all. I preferred being active — that's how I ended up with the sports scholarship, actually — to sitting in a classroom, but then I figured, if you were a professor, how else was I going to meet you?"
"What would you have done if you didn't go to college?" Daniel asked.
Tony shrugged. "Maybe tried to go into the minors instead. People only really talk about that in terms of baseball, but a bunch of different sports have tiered leagues, including basketball and football, which were my best sports. I also might have joined the service.
"After I turned fifteen and was old enough, my dad sent me to Rhode Island Military Academy, which is what made it so easy for me to fit in at NCIS and then the SGC. I can't say what branch I might have picked — RIMA was kind of generically Army, so that or the Marines would have been the most familiar, probably. I dunno, I might have chosen the Air Force, and then I might have joined the Stargate Program that way, I suppose."
They were both silent for a few minutes before Tony shifted to look up at Daniel. "What was my original first greeting?"
Daniel gave him a wry grin, but replied, "So Doc, I gotta ask: Aliens?"
Tony laughed. He had said that once the two were alone for the first time after what he jokingly called the Great NDA Signing of Aught-Four. "Well I got there eventually, didn't I?" he joked.
"I guess you did," Daniel agreed, giving him a gentle squeeze.
"So did the idea of aliens freak you out back then?" Tony asked, unaware of the potential minefield he was entering. Daniel made the snap decision to tell him the whole truth.
"Well, my parents died when I was eight," he began. Tony sucked in a breath, but didn't say anything, so Daniel continued. "I ended up going into foster care, because my grandfather was too busy with his own archaeological digs to take me. He was on a dig site and experienced what he claimed was an alien encounter. He refused to recant his story, and was finally put in an asylum over his theories."
"Wow," Tony said quietly after a long pause. "So aliens were a pretty sore subject for you for a little while, there?"
Daniel snorted. "That's one way of putting it. I tried not to discount the fact that you could have been talking to or about Nick — my grandfather. He also had a Doctorate of Archaeology, like my parents and I, so it wasn't impossible. And he was in an asylum, so you could have been speaking to a psychiatric doctor about his delusions."
"Even though my own research pointed towards aliens in our past, hell, even after I joined the Stargate Program, I didn't believe him. It wasn't until SG-1 found the planet he had visited, — though we didn't know that until later — and needed his help getting me out of a sticky situation, that I finally believed his story. He's back on that planet now, as a kind of ambassador; I'm scheduled to check back in with him in a few months. I haven't seen him in a year and a half and it's the best our relationship has ever been."
"So at the time, yeah, aliens were a sore subject. Then, without meaning to, my work just sort of naturally landed me at the conclusion of 'aliens used the pyramids as landing pads for their spaceships.' No matter how much I fought it, those were my findings. And just like Nick, I was a laughingstock, but I couldn't help where the evidence pointed me."
"And you were right. That's what SG-5 was trying to do in Cambodia, right?" Tony asked. The NCIS team had only gotten bits and pieces of the full story after the fact, since they hadn't been fully read in during the search.
"Yes, they were, and yes, I was. But for a while, I was worried that you — not you you, but whoever I was hearing — would be another archaeologist or historian, deriding my work, or some kind of alien groupie, focusing on the least respectable part of it. Before I joined the Stargate Program, before I learned that I was right, I had a lot of mixed feelings about my own work."
"I don't blame you," Tony said sympathetically, gently rubbing Daniel's arm where it crossed his chest. "For all we know, though, if you hadn't joined the Stargate Program, that might have been how I met you. Abby's dragged me off to alien things a couple times before — she might have heard you were giving a talk and wanted to find out about your theories."
After a long moment's thought, Tony added, "She wouldn't have mocked you, though: just asked about the scientific process behind your conclusions. If that's where the evidence was pointing you, she would have been totally on board with that. She was highly invested in proving that aliens were real, before, you know, being handed the proof that they were. You saw how she was when she found out."
Daniel chuckled, remembering Abby gleefully rounding on her partner for doubting her beliefs. She lorded her vindication over Kate for several minutes — with Tony occasionally chiming in — before Gibbs had gotten sick of it and told them all to shut up.
After a few more minutes of watching the movie in comfortable silence, Daniel finally gathered his courage. "Are you— are you happy with the— the way we met, ev— even if it took us a few extra years?" Daniel asked hesitantly. He knew it was possible that either one of them had made the choice that changed their fate, possibly even both of them — hell, he'd traveled in time himself, so he was well aware of how malleable such things were! Still, he worried that Tony wasn't thrilled about their meeting. He certainly hadn't been all that eager to learn about aliens before, as his stories about Abby showed!
"I'm not thrilled about the aliens brainwashing our people thing," Tony drawled, "but I'm so glad to finally have you in my life that I can't help but want to thank Lakshmi a bit. Before, you know, killing her with prejudice and all that," he added quickly. "I mean, the whole alien thing takes a while to wrap your head around. It wasn't that I disagreed with Abby: I always kinda figured they were probably out there, but why would they visit Earth just to beam up some yokel on a back road and probe him? Have you guys gotten an answer on that yet, by the way?"
"Not yet," Daniel admitted. "We've figured out who the Roswell Greys probably were, but no clear explanation for the whole alien abduction thing. Other than, you know, the usual suspects: alcoholic hallucinations, mental illness, mass delusions."
"Right," Tony nodded. "Anyway, the alien stuff's probably still gonna keep hitting me in waves, I'm sure. But being here? At Stargate Command? Ever since I decided I was going to help people, I've wanted to be a cop. But I joined NCIS specifically because I was looking for you." Daniel looked at him in confusion, so Tony elaborated, "I had a Colonel O'Neill in my second Listening. I figured he had to be Marine, Army, or Air Force, and I was gonna work my way through them all: NCIS just fell in my lap first.
"Anyway, I could be a cop anywhere. I could even work with service members anywhere, if I wanted. But I don't care about those things. I would have given up being a cop in a heartbeat if it meant finding you," Tony admitted quietly. "I've completely overhauled my plans for my future twice before, and I could do it again if I needed to. But the idea of waiting another fourteen years for another maybe clue? I couldn't do it.
"If the Brass had decided not to read us in, I still would have followed you here. I'd have gotten whatever job I could in town, and I'd be here at the end of the day very carefully not asking you how your day was, at the risk of making Jack drop you in some deep dark hole on P3X-Whatever."
That startled a laugh out of Daniel. "He would do it, too!" Then Daniel tilted his head back, gazing at the ceiling instead of meeting Tony's eyes, as he processed everything. He couldn't believe the gift that Tony had just given him: willing to give up everything in his life just to find Daniel! It was a far cry from Daniel's previous experiences!
Nick couldn't be bothered, and even Daniel's memory of his parents was tainted by that damned Keeper on P7J-989. He couldn't recall them now without the associated pain of trying over and over to save them while they dismissed his concerns. Even Sha're, when she regained her mind while pregnant, hadn't contacted Daniel. He had discovered it by accident, when they could have had nine months together! Being put first by those he loved was just not a scenario that Daniel was used to.
He couldn't find the words to express his love for Tony at the moment, so Daniel settled for a wholly inadequate "thank you."
Tony heard his whisper and shifted in his arms so that he was lying on his stomach in the v of Daniel's legs. Pulling himself higher, Tony hovered for only a moment before ducking down to kiss Daniel.
What started as loving and reassuring quickly turned passionate, and Tony ground his hips against Daniel's as he nipped kisses along his jaw. The story of the ill-fated Zhenya and Nadya faded into the background as Daniel seized the moment with his own star-crossed lover.
They soon tossed their shirts aside, and eventually wiggled out of their pants. Daniel revelled in the way that Tony seemed intent on learning every inch of him, like he was an artifact Tony had discovered and was determined to examine minutely.
Finally, several hours later, sweaty and sated, they lay entwined on the couch in the opposite position. Daniel thought he'd never get tired of the feeling of Tony's arms wrapped around him, and foresaw many more evenings cuddling on the couch like this in their future. Tony idly tapped out a pattern on Daniel's ribs as he reached out one last time and then finally gave up his half-hearted attempts to snag the blanket from where it had fallen. Suddenly Tony chuckled, the vibrations rumbling his chest beneath Daniel's cheek.
"Hmm?" Daniel made a questioning noise. If Tony was laughing at his attempts to cover them, he was going to tickle him or something. Definitely make him give up his comfortable position to fetch it. (Daniel conveniently ignored the fact that he'd lose his own comfortable position if that happened.)
"I forgot this DVD replays if you leave it on the menu long enough," Tony murmured. "Look."
Daniel glanced at his TV and saw that Ippolit was yelling over the phone.
"We're right back where we left off," Tony pointed out with another chuckle.
Throwing his mind back to the last scene he remembered before their conversation grew too distracting, Daniel realized Tony was right. They'd circled through the entire three hour movie and back to the scene they had been watching.
"Must be fate," Tony suggested, pulling his arms a little tighter around Daniel.
"It must be," Daniel agreed. With the way their paths had finally crossed, Daniel wasn't nearly as skeptical of fate as he had been of aliens.