Dark, Still Water
Rated TEEN

25. Twenty-five

Teal'c watched as O'Neill circled the village in what might appear to be a random pattern generated by his own boredom. However, his random path intersected each shadowed corner or possible cover in the dusty square where Daniel was sitting cross-legged in the dust talking to Lianch of the Tol people.

Daniel explained the Tau'ri war against the Goa'uld, and as usual, the villager's eyes went to Teal'c. This world was poor, a collection of stone huts huddled around a communal fire pit, but even here they knew of the Jaffa who served the gods. Teal'c stood very still and tried to appear non-threatening as Daniel started on that oft-used explanation. After weeks of not working as the others were weaned from the light on P4X-347, the familiar words were a comfort. With SG1 unable to leave the world where they had grown addicted to the light, Teal'c had spent time with Bra'tac, following his former master to the rebel world where he was training new warriors to fight the rebellion Teal'c had started. When Teal'c had followed O'Neill's lead on that day years ago, when he had turned against Apophis, he had never expected that others, including his own former master, would follow him onto his path. To know that others had followed you onto your path was far more daunting than the quick death Teal'c had expected.

The thought of paths brought Teal'c's musings back to the other person he had spent time with. Blair Sandburg had happily taken on the establishment, sweeping away decades of research and redefining Hyperactive Sensory Awareness. The term was less spiritual than Sentinel, and Teal'c still did not know if that meant the young shaman was on the right path. His small room in Bethesda was thick with books and charts and printouts, but Teal'c had seen not a single candle. It was most unsettling. Only the knowledge that Blair continued daily communication with Jim Ellison gave him hope that the young shaman would eventually seek out his true path. Only a tao qua ca tec'ma'te i cal mah would feel such need for an anchor. And now, his work with military personnel with HSA had become a second anchor.

However, despite his desire to encourage Blair's spiritual quest, Teal'c had resolved to follow Master Bra'tac's advice. One might be assisted in finding the path, but once that path was opened, one must choose to walk it alone. Teal'c could help in this no more than Ellison could.

"So, the mining rights?" O'Neill prompted from the far side of the nearly-empty square, his arm resting on the end of his weapon.

"Working on it," Daniel said in a tone that warned O'Neill to not push at this juncture. O'Neill subsided, returning to his previous task of patrolling the area. Carter shifted, her eyes scanning the village, either watching for enemy or searching for evidence that the people of this planet used the rare iridium alloy her samples had yielded. The heavy rocks that made the foundations of the buildings had veins that gleamed dimly, but they did not appear to mine or work the metal and the Goa'uld did not use this alloy although Carter had been most excited by her tests.

"Your people are great indeed if they fight the untrue gods," Lianch suggested slowly, his long grey-white hair catching the bright sun as he nodded. He looked over at Teal'c, and Teal'c simply looked back.

"My people are only as great as the allies who assist them," Daniel offered carefully. "This metal in your ground would help us stand up against the Goa'uld."

Lianch leaned back on his heels and picked up a stick to poke the fire that burned in the huge central cooking hearth that dominated the center of the village square. "To ally ourselves with you is to stand up against the Goa'uld," he said slowly. Teal'c could tell from Lianch's body language that the man had fears regarding taking such a step. Clearly, Daniel saw the same thing.

"We could offer you help building defenses, additional resources in the way of food or technology. My people have a plow that never needs sharpening. You could till your fields in half the time." Daniel leaned forward, stopping just short of touching Lianch's knee.

Lianch was nodding. "The offer seems fair since we have no need of rocks." He smiled. "I often have need of fewer rocks in my fields. However, to take such an action that would affect the village is a matter of importance to everyone."

Daniel was nodding in perfect time with Lianch. "I understand. I'm only asking for a chance to make our case in front of everyone."

Lianch frowned at him. "Are you Bermiddlt that you would speak with everyone?"

The ones who had built the Stargate built into it technology that eased the communication between peoples and cultures; however, the word bermiddlt defeated their technology, suggesting that the word had cultural ties which did not allow it to translate directly from one language to another. Teal'c had noted the same phenomenon with "kree" which was never translated. In fact, when Daniel had attempted to explain "kree," he had used many different words, because the cultural meaning did not exist in English.

Daniel leaned back. "I don't know that word."

Lianch looked immediately disturbed.

"We may use another word for it," Daniel hurried to explain. The circles in which O'Neill wandered grew tighter as the colonel closed the distance between himself and Daniel. "Can you explain what the word means?" Daniel looked at the leader of the Tol people with wide eyes and empty hands.

Lianch tilted his head and leaned all the way back on his heels as though so surprised that he couldn't quite catch his balance. "A bermiddlt speaks to all."

Daniel nodded, but didn't say anything as he looked at Lianch expectantly. Lianch opened his mouth, as though confounded by the need to explain such an obvious term.

"He speaks of a shaman," Teal'c offered. He now remembered having heard his term for tao qua ca tec'ma'te i cal mah in the distant past.

Daniel looked over to Teal'c in surprise, but Lianch was nodding, clearly relieved that the Tau'ri knew of the idea even if the word was different.

"Do you know one?" the old man asked.

"Yes," Teal'c offered at exactly the same time O'Neill offered a curt, "No."

O'Neill glared at him, and Teal'c amended his original answer. "No."

Unsurprisingly, Lianch was staring at them all as if they had turned into men driven mad by the sun.

"We don't generally talk about our shaman," Daniel tried to ease Lianch's fears, telling a version of the truth that he could accept. Teal'c doubted the man would appreciate the whole truth--that the Tau'ri did not talk about their shaman because, for the most part, they believed such men and women to be insincere or insane. Perhaps that was why Blair Sandburg was so reluctant to walk the path open to him. Teal'c did not believe that Blair cared that much for the good opinion of others, but perhaps the good opinion of Jim Ellison was enough for him to abdicate his position as a shaman.

"It is a wise people who hold their bermiddlt close," Lianch agreed, obviously comforted by the answer. "But to make this agreement would require all the tribe's approval, the living and the dead. We share a bermiddlt with a great many villages, so it would be many seasons before ours could return, but if you have one with such talents, we would be glad to share the Bermid'cate."

"No need to wait, we can go to this Bermuda thing right now. Daniel's good with talking to people," O'Neill said with forced cheerfulness. O'Neill understood the tactical value of deception, but on the issue of the soul and those who spoke to the soul, deception came with such danger that Teal'c could not allow his friends to walk such a treacherous path out of ignorance.

"You are a bermiddlt?" Lianch asked Daniel, awe in his voice.

"No," Teal'c said firmly while O'Neill said, "Yes." This time Teal'c did not amend his answer.

Daniel looked at O'Neill for a moment in desperation before he turned back to Lianch. "I have talked to shamen and have been offered the path, but I'm not actually a shaman myself," Daniel said slowly. "I haven't gotten any farther than speaking to a person who..." Daniel stopped, and Teal'c suspected that he was struggling with a way to define "ascended" to these simple people. The translation the Stargate technology provided could cause confusion with such complex terms.

"Exists in another reality?" Lianch provided.

Daniel smiled. "Exactly. But if that is acceptable, I would be happy to speak to the others in the Bermid'cate."

Lianch had dropped his stick earlier, and now he picked it up and resumed his stirring of the embers of the communal fire. "The Bermid'cate is a place of great danger for those who walk the path. I would not wish to risk a new friend on such a perilous journey."

"Dangerous?" O'Neill abandoned all pretense at boredom. "How is it dangerous?"

With a shrug, Lianch stirred the embers to life. "It is no danger to those of us not touched by the path of the bermiddlt. I do not pretend to understand the dangers posed to those who walk the shadowed paths of life."

O'Neill frowned, and Teal'c could almost feel the frustration radiating from him like heat from the summer sun. "Would you mind us checking it out, you know, just to make sure that we understand any possible dangers?"

"We don't want to offend your ancestors or break any taboos," Daniel hurried to offer before Lianch could speak, "but if you want us to trust one of our bermiddlt, you have to understand our concerns."

"I do, and it speaks well of your people that you show such concern." Lianch tipped his head so that his long, white braid fell off his shoulder and swung free. A young boy with bare feet came darting out of a low building. "Tehsee will show you to the place, but I would ask that Daniel not go." Lianch jabbed his stick into the fire, allowing the flames to capture it. "If your feet have been shown the path but you do not walk it, you should not go to this place."

"That's okay, Danny's going to stay here with me." O'Neill walked over and dropped a hand onto Daniel's shoulder, his knee pressed to Daniel's arm. "Teal'c, you and Carter check out this place and make sure that whatever shaman we bring these people, he isn't going to get lead poisoning."

"Yes, sir," Carter answered. She smiled at the boy Tehsee, and Teal'c could tell that the boy was smitten by her smile. He was verging on manhood, and Carter would be featuring prominently in his dreams for many weeks judging by his flush. He scrambled, tripped over the end of a piece of firework, and then used the momentum to dart forward.

Carter smiled, and Teal'c had difficulty restraining a smile himself. It would not honor the young man to make jest of his awkwardness, but Teal'c remembered the day when Carter would have had the power to make him trip over his own feet. Amused by the boy and worried about the danger this Bermid'cate posed, Teal'c followed far enough behind to provide adequate cover as he escorted Carter to this sacred place.

~ ~ ~ ~

"Well, sir, it looks like we just need to pony up one shaman, and we can have that iridium contract," O'Neill opened the debriefing. The general was not fully seated before O'Neill made his announcement, and for a second, General Hammond hovered an inch above his seat.

"One... shaman, colonel?" General Hammond pushed aside the folder with the technical information on P3X-116.

"One tiny, little shaman. We don't even have to give him away, we just need to loan him to the Tol long enough for the Tol's dead ancestors to give us the okay on the mining rights."

"Jack," Daniel warned with the deliberate pronunciation of just his name. O'Neill smiled smugly at Daniel. An expression that would have provoked rage in most people just caused Daniel to roll his eyes.

"It's a little more complicated than that," Daniel started to explain.

"Not really. Actually, we could have already gotten the approval only Teal'c had to go and ruin it when I tried passing Daniel off as our local bone, rattle and drum guy."

Teal'c raised his eyebrow at such an incomplete description.

"I'm not a shaman," Daniel pointed out.

"Ah, but you're as close to one as we get. I mean, the quality of geeks around this place does not inspire confidence. We are low on any sort of geeky type who can understand people. We have geeks for gadgets and rocks, but precious few we can pass off as a shaman. Felger would suck, and Nyan doesn't exactly have the whole lying thing down. He's never going to get laid if he doesn't learn to..."

"Colonel!" General Hammond interrupted. He took a deep breath. "Do I understand that you agreed to have our shaman contact their afterlife to ask permission to mine the iridium?"

"It makes you miss the good old days when we just wanted to bomb the Russians, doesn't it, sir?" O'Neill raised his coffee mug and stared at it morosely for a second before drinking.

General Hammond didn't answer, but from his sigh, Teal'c assumed that the man would agree if he politically could. In many ways, enemies such as the Goa'uld were to be preferred over those, like the NID, who acted out of good intentions and stupidity. The loss of Makepeace had particularly bothered Teal'c. A warrior who had followed O'Neill into battle and risked his life many times had been tempted into cooperating with an enemy because he had believed their lies, and Teal'c had no doubt that Makepeace had believed the NID lies only because the NID themselves did.

"I thought we might ask Dr. Coombs..." Daniel started. Surprisingly it was Carter who interrupted him with a derisive laugh which she quickly cut off.

"I'm sorry, sirs," she offered, "but Simon Coombs? He's..."

"He's good with math and he could do it... probably." Daniel's mouth twisted into an expression which did not communicate confidence.

"He'd start talking about Romulans or warp drives." Carter turned her attention from Daniel to the general. "Sir, I don't think Coombs can handle this. After Daniel, Nyan is our best with first contact."

"No, Nyan is the best with hieroglyphs," Daniel argued.

"He did handle his own with the Gamali," O'Neill mused.

"Because he had to. He's not trained," Daniel insisted, his tone making it clear he did not want to discuss this farther. The linguists and social scientists were, ultimately, under Daniel's leadership, and O'Neill nodded, accepting Daniel's decision. Teal'c had to agree that Nyan was, after Daniel, most skilled in first contact, perhaps because he did move so slowly and carefully when working with others. However, Daniel was loath to allow the young man too far into dangerous territory.

"He's better than Coombs," O'Neill slipped in, but by doing so after acknowledging Daniel's domain, he received only an annoyed look in return. "But since we actually do have a shaman on the payroll, I say we bring in Sandburg. He is on the payroll now, right?"

"You want to pull Blair into this?" Daniel said with a laugh. "Ellison will gut you and hang your body out for the crows if you even suggest taking Blair through the Stargate."

General Hammond ignored the outburst. "Colonel, I don't see why we need to bring in outside personnel for this. What exactly do the Tol want out of this shaman?"

"They want him to go to a sacred spot and shake a little rattle, say a few words, ask the ancestors for permission to dig," O'Neill answered. "And frankly, after the mess with the Salish, I'm voting that we actually do check in with the ancestors first. I don't expect the ancestors to talk back, but you just never know, sir. SG11 has never quite been the same after getting zapped on PXY-887."

General Hammond leaned back in his chair, silent for a moment. "Colonel, is there any chance that, like the Salish, the Tol might be hosting a more powerful species?"

O'Neill made an exaggerated shrug and turned to Carter, inviting her to give her opinion on the question. She made a face that clearly indicated her own ignorance on the issue. "There were no signs of advanced metalwork or power sources, and the sacred Bermid'cate is really just a lake with heavy concentrations of carbon and a dense dinoflagellate population that causes it to be almost black."

"Is it dangerous?" General Hammond opened the planetary file, his pen jotting notes now that they were not discussing shamanism. It remained a mystery to Teal'c how a leader as wise as Hammond could discount the power of shamanism.

"I wouldn't drink it, sir," Carter said, opening her own file and studying the test results from the samples she had taken. "Long term exposure would probably cause a rash or mild respiratory problems if you breathed in the organisms, but its concentrations are only slightly higher than on Earth when we have red or black tides in the coastal regions. So, no sir, it's not dangerous."

"See? It's safe. So I say we 'gate in, introduce them to Sandburg, have Sandburg beat a drum or something, and then pop back home. All good."

"We don't even know if Mr. Sandburg is available," General Hammond pointed out.

"He was finishing up his dissertation when I talked to him last week," Daniel offered. "Knowing Blair, it's already done and perfect, and he's stressing over the placement of captions on his tables."

"Blair?" O'Neill gave Daniel an incredulous look. "I saw his quarters. The kid leaves his shit everywhere, so I'm guessing he's not exactly the type to stress out over captions."

"You have no idea." Daniel reached over and patted O'Neill on the arm as though reassuring a particularly young or stupid child. "This is his research, his life's work. He wants to change the world with this. He's stressing over every period."

Teal'c frowned. "But has he not already caused great change?"

"Some," Daniel agreed. "Not as much as he'd like."

Teal'c nodded in understanding. He was in much the same situation. He had changed much for the Jaffa, but having the task of overthrowing the System Lords only half-done, he had left the world most disordered and dangerous. He wondered if Blair felt the same. "But we should also consider that Lianch claims that this place is dangerous for those who are true shaman. If we take Blair Sandburg, we should also take Jim Ellison."

"Oh no, that is just a bad idea," O'Neill said surprisingly quickly. Teal'c raised an eyebrow in a tacit request for an explanation. "I don't care if you call it Post-Combat Hypersensitive Disorder or Hyperactive Sensory Awareness, it comes down to the same thing--he's not reliable in the field."

"I have to agree with the colonel," the general added. "If we invite Mr. Sandburg in, that does not change military policy on having those with P... HSA in active combat. Detective Ellison is not eligible to go through the gate."

"Sir," Carter cleared her throat, "I hate to point this out, but Blair was able to see Daniel after he was shifted out of our dimension, and he clearly contacted Oma Desala at least once. It could be that the Tol are talking about a danger that is in an adjacent dimension that only a shaman would be able to perceive."

"Aw, crap. You just had to go and bring up the shamanic powers, didn't you, Carter?"

"Yes, sir," Carter answered without even an attempt to look apologetic for O'Neill. "We should have some TER's on hand in case there is something more than just a lake there."

O'Neill got a thoughtful look on his face. "Would a TER really stop someone like Oma?"

"No." Daniel said the word firmly, and no one at the table contradicted him.

"Dr. Jackson," the general interrupted the silence that followed Daniel's answer, "could I get a report on any in-house personnel you think might be able to handle this situation? I don't want to bring in Mr. Sandburg unless we need to."

Daniel nodded. "I'll get that together by five."

Teal'c listened as the remainder of the debriefing covered mineral deposits and logistical realities on a world with very little rain but rare thunderstorms and floods that swept the land clear of all but the hardiest structures. He did not doubt that Hammond would call in Blair Sandburg. Teal'c did not approve of impersonating a shaman, but even if General Hammond decided to perpetuate such a fraud, Teal'c did not believe that anyone at the SGC could, realistically, convince the Tol people. O'Neill had not lied about Nyan's unfortunate inability to lie well, and most of the scientists were not used to interacting with living cultures. Ann Foster might do well, but with her pregnancy, she was banned from gate travel.

No, Blair was clearly the right choice if the Tau'ri wanted the mineral rights. Teal'c was simply not as convinced that it was the right choice for Blair. Unfortunately, Teal'c had no other alternative to offer.

26. Twenty-six

"Oh man, this is... whoa." Blair bounced as he threw his hands up.

Teal'c had seen many reactions to the Stargate, but he had never seen one who was so childlike in his delight. O'Neill looked at Blair oddly. But then, O'Neill had not seen Blair since he had left Dr. Fraiser's care. In Cascade, and even during recovery, Blair had been quiet and given to difficult moods, but when Teal'c had visited the young man in Bethesda, he had noted a definite change in behavior. The sheer energy Blair Sandburg generated had concerned Teal'c enough for him to call Jim Ellison to request his advice. According to Ellison, this Blair who could not physically stand still was the true Blair Sandburg. While he had been surprised at first, Teal'c found himself drawn to this energetic version of the man whom he had met. However, faced with this new incarnation of Blair, O'Neill appeared to be having less charitable thoughts.

"This isn't a game," O'Neill said, leaning an arm on the butt of his weapon before catching Blair's arm in his grip.

"Totally. I get that." Blair nodded his head so enthusiastically that his ponytail bobbed. Since Blair was going to represent Earth as a shaman, General Hammond had encouraged him to wear clothing that would be appropriate for that role. His vest was as bright as the tapestries the women wove to honor fallen warriors, and his shirt was a deep blue. Bone and wood beads strung on leather lay against the hollow of his neck, and woven red string encircled one wrist.

"We need this agreement," O'Neill said as the fourth chevron locked in place.

"Chill, man. I get it. I worked with the police, so I know that sometimes you have to get a little creative with the truth to serve the greater good. Just as long as you don't ask me to lie outright, I will obfuscate their socks off. The Goa'uld are so not cool, and we need the mine. Got it."

Teal'c watched as Carter bit the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing. Daniel didn't bother. "Oh yeah, great plan Jack. You're right, Blair is so much more stable and controllable than Coombs."

"Whoa. He said I was controllable?" Blair asked, a look in his eye that made Teal'c vow to check the food supplies when they stopped. If O'Neill were not careful, he would have Tabasco in his dinner.

"I said you weren't an idiot like Coombs is," O'Neill disagreed. Blair smiled and bounced on his toes. From O'Neill's expression, he was starting to second-guess his own judgment.

"Blair, are you sure you want to do this?" Daniel asked again, although he had already voiced his concerns several times. However, Teal'c could not fault Daniel because Blair did not seem to be taking the danger seriously.

"Totally sure. How often am I going to get an offer to visit another world... another people... a whole different way of life? This is an anthropologist's wet dream. I mean, I know you archeologists are all over ruins, and they're good and all, but this is... this is people, man." He looked over and smiled at Daniel. "Of course, I might be a little biased. Hey, I wonder if they have stories about Sentinels." Blair's eyes got a distant look but then the last chevron locked in place and Blair jumped as the field rushed out toward them.

"Whoa. Wild ride." Blair was nodding again. "Man, Jim is going to be so jealous. After he gets over wanting to kill me for doing this," Blair added with a shrug that made it pretty clear that he was not concerned about Ellison's anger. At least Teal'c no longer worried about Blair's penchant for yielding to Ellison in all things. However, it did disturb Teal'c that he was not more concerned. Teal'c would have preferred to have Ellison with them, if only to function as an anchor for Blair. But he had voiced his concerns and the others had not understood his logic.

"You ready for this?" O'Neill said over the sound of the Stargate. It did not escape Teal'c's notice that O'Neill looked more hesitant than Blair.

"Oh yeah!" Blair said as he started up the ramp. O'Neill reached out and grabbed his arm, pulling him back.

"Teal'c, take point."

Teal'c nodded at their leader and walked up the ramp, entering the Stargate and stepping out under the bright sun of the Tol homeworld. Lianch was waiting, a huge hat shading his face as he squatted beside a large rock. Two other elders stood beside him.

"Does your... shaman come?" the woman asked. Her hair was only just now turning white, a mark of great distinction in this culture.

"He does," Teal'c agreed, tilting his head to them in respect, and just then O'Neill and Blair appeared through the gate.

"Oh man. That was... whoa." Blair looked around in awe.

"You might want to step forward before Carter and Daniel flatten you," O'Neill suggested as he headed down the stone steps.

"Oh, yeah." Blair laughed and darted down the steps, past O'Neill and to Teal'c's side. Teal'c took great honor in the fact that Blair had chosen to stand by him as he looked at the Tol elders.

"Oh wow. Um, hi."

O'Neill did not even hide his derisive snort. Teal'c suspected that Blair had impressed O'Neill more when he had been depressed, but Teal'c preferred this less inhibited version.

Lianch lowered his head in respect. "Greetings, I am Lianch of the Tol, and these are Urgat and Alatia." He gestured toward the man and then the woman who stood with him.

Blair lowered his own head. "Greetings. I am Blair of the Tau'ri. I am friends with Teal'c and O'Neill and Carter and Daniel."

Carter and Daniel had come through the gate and it shimmered for a second before the field vanished. Daniel pulled on his sunglasses and watched.

"They are honorable people," Lianch stated as he stood up straight again.

"Very honorable," Blair agreed. He stood up and then bounced on his toes. "As are your people." He looked across the land at the stunted trees and deep furrows created by the intermittent floods. "Your people have grown strong enough to consider challenging the false gods even though this world is a difficult home."

"Difficulty breeds strengths," Lianch countered, but Teal'c could see the way the man's body relaxed and the way the other two exchanged smiles. These people recognized Blair as a bermiddlt.

"And your people have survived great difficulties," Blair said, and then he was moving forward, away from the sphere of Teal'c's protection. "Is that hand carved?" he asked, his eyes on Lianch's necklace.

Teal'c moved forward, unwilling to let Blair get too far from him even though Lianch showed no sign of aggression.

"It is," he agreed. "My grandfather spent many years on it."

"Oh man, that is a work of art."

"Here," Lianch went to remove the string that held the carved disk to his neck.

"Whoa, no. I just want to look at it."

Lianch frowned for a second. The woman whispered a word.

"Oh man, I just totally offended someone. I'm really sorry. I didn't want to touch it because if I broke that, I would never forgive myself. That is art, man. Total art. I've never seen anyone work with the grain of the wood like that."

Lianch smiled and spoke an unfamiliar word back to the woman. "Among my people, it is luck for a bermiddlt to touch a personal talisman."

"Oh." Blair nodded. "I would never want to deny someone luck," Blair said as he stepped forward. He did not take the wooden disk from Lianch's hand, but he ran a finger over the curve of it reverently. For a second, the nervous energy drained from him as he studied the wood.

Teal'c had not noticed the decoration, but it was obviously of great value to Lianch. Looking at the others, Teal'c realized that each had a smaller but similar talisman hanging from various parts of their clothing. The woman wore it from a leather cord that held her thick hair back in a ponytail streaked brown and white. The other man had a wooden triangle hanging from his belt.

"Oh man, beautiful," Blair said as he finally backed up a step. "Some of the same designs are in that one," he said as he looked at the woman's talisman. "May I?"

"Please, bermiddlt," she answered, tilting her head toward him. Blair moved slowly toward her, his fingers coming up to lift the wooden disk away from her hair. He ran his thumb over the designs.

"The same swirl twisted to the right," Blair said softly.

"The world was created by great beings, but the evil ones flooded it, and like when the water reached the cliff face or when the women pour water into bowls, the world was spun until all reality--truth and lies--were mixed together," Lianch offered.

Daniel stepped forward. "Our people also have stories of the great flood."

"Do you?" Lianch looked surprised. "We are truly brothers."

"Yep, and brothers share," O'Neill offered with more cynicism than either Daniel or Blair.

Daniel took a moment to glare at him, but Blair moved to the last man, his fingers reaching for the triangle-shaped fetish hanging from his belt. "But this is all about straight lines," Blair said, clearly confused. Blair looked up at the man. "You plan to be a shaman."

Teal'c noticed that everyone appeared to be quite shocked at that revelation. O'Neill and Daniel exchanged concerned looks, Carter looked to him in shock, and the three Tol all traded alarmed looks.

"I had not planned it," the man said slowly. "My aunt was a bermiddlt. It was she who made the talisman."

"My bad," Blair offered as he pulled his hand back. "I would love to see where you live, how these are made..."

"Which is why it's really too bad that we don't have time for that," O'Neill interrupted with a sharp look in Blair's direction.

Lianch laughed. "It is always so with the bermiddlt. They do not listen to the seasons, and would starve before remembering to take in the grain. It is why I could not promise you that our own bermiddlt would return in time to speak with the spirits."

"Hey, I'm not that bad," Blair objected, but Teal'c could tell from his smile that he was not offended.

"Of course not, bermiddlt," Lianch said, but his voice carried no tones of apology, and the look he gave O'Neill was one of sympathetic understanding.

"Maybe we could go to the Bermid'cate before dark," Daniel suggested although night was still many hours away.

"We shall," Lianch agreed.

"Lianch, I think I must remain behind," the elder standing to his right said, his eyes on Blair. For a moment, Teal'c feared that Blair had somehow offended him, but Lianch smiled warmly.

"It is a great thing to be touched by a bermiddlt, but to have one's feet put on the path is dangerous as well, friend. Stay here. I would not risk you at the Bermid'cate." The man nodded and turned to walk the opposite direction.

The elder woman reached out, her palm pressed against his chest. "Walk well," she said.

"Firm footing and solid land," he agreed. She withdrew her hand and he started walking toward a distant line of ragged trees.

Blair watched, his eyes darting from one person to another, but then O'Neill started to walk, and he reached out and caught Blair's arm, pulling him along. "Come on, professor. You need to go talk to some spirits."

"Hey, that's Dr. Professor to you, bub," Blair teased. "And you so owe me a celebratory drink when we get back, but I will overlook your rudeness if you can find a way to lose me here for a few weeks, you know, just long enough to look around and see the sights."

Lianch smiled. O'Neill did not.

"Don't even think about it, Sandburg."

Blair gave O'Neill a pleading look. "Come on, man. Think of the research possibilities here."

Daniel gave a dark laugh. "Give it up, Blair. Trying to get a purely research-based mission approved through these guys is next to impossible."

"Hey, just find a way to pay for it, and the Stargate is all yours, Danny-boy," O'Neill fired back.

"That might be a little difficult given the inherent cost of trying to power our Stargate without a DHD," Carter added. "But if it makes you feel any better, Blair, I can't get approval for my large-scale research on the various radiation levels present of different worlds due to the variety of star types and distances from the relative sun."

"The radiation will wait. Jack won't even get the general to approve a mission to retrieve hieroglyphic rocks that are being washed out to sea with every tide on P3X-901." Daniel sounded most aggrieved.

"There's a little thing called a war, people," O'Neill said.

Lianch laughed. "It appears that you have more than one member of your team who would forget to bring in the grain, Colonel O'Neill."

"You have no idea," O'Neill answered, but his look focused on Daniel. Daniel crossed his arms and glared.

"Our people say that a tribe cannot thrive without hands to gather the grain and eyes to see beyond the field," the woman offered. "It is a great gift if you have put Urgat's feet on the path that leads beyond the field." She looked at Blair.

Blair threw his hands up in the air. "Oh man, I am not passing the way of the shaman to anyone. I just thought I understood the whole swirls and lines symbolism, and I so should not have jumped to that conclusion. Bad science." Blair grimaced, and the woman looked at Lianch in confusion.

"You do not wish to pass on the gift?" Lianch asked.

Blair stopped walking in the middle of the path, and since O'Neill still had him by the arm, O'Neill stopped as well, and he gave Blair a most unpleasant look.

"It's not that I wouldn't want to pass it on..." Blair stopped and looked around. For a second he looked confused. "Man, that is something you have to decide for yourself. Just because a shaman touches you, that is no reason to call yourself a shaman." The energy fell from Blair, and for a second, he was, once again, the quiet and withdrawn person Teal'c had met in Cascade. Weariness clung to him. Even O'Neill, who had been disturbed at the new Blair, was clearly bothered by this return of his old self. O'Neill looked at Daniel in confusion, his expression clearly demanding that Daniel do something to fix this.

Daniel stepped to Blair's side. "Hey, I bet you could get the command to listen to you if you got Carter to put all the shamanistic ideas into her science-talk. You should have read her report on Oma Desala."

"It was all scientifically valid," Carter defended herself. "A little... fanciful maybe, but possible within the rules of physics." She smiled. "Some of the messes we get into do make me glad I took a creative writing course during my undergrad years."

Blair shook his head as though shaking off the bad mood like it was water. "Man, I bet." He looked at the two Tol elders. "Oma Desala is the bermiddlt who touched Daniel. She could do some wild stuff that not even bermiddlt are supposed to be able to do. Totally unbelievable stuff." Blair nodded, and then he was walking again, rushing down the trail leaving the rest of them to get in position around him. O'Neill growled his frustration and nodded for Teal'c to take point. Teal'c had to trot to get ahead of Blair, but at least the heaviness had left the young man.

"Our people have stories of great bermiddlt who walked the other world more than this one. They could wield terrible powers."

"Oh, that's Oma," Daniel said softly. O'Neill cleared his throat loudly, and Teal'c could just imagine how O'Neill was going to yell at both Daniel and Blair for revealing classified information.

"Man, that is so not something I want to discuss," Blair said, holding his hands up. "I mean, some power is just better left laying right where you found it. Walk on by, my friend, walk on by."

"Would that not put the power at your undefended back?" Teal'c asked over his shoulder.

"Way to take a metaphor way too literally," Blair snorted.

"Wait," Lianch stopped them when they reached a small and twisted tree whose roots clung to the edges of an outcropping of red rock. "This is the border of the Bermid'cate. Daniel should go no farther."

Teal'c turned and looked back at the group. O'Neill was frowning. "I know you think there's a danger..."

"Prodigious danger," Lianch corrected him. "We cannot allow him to face this danger."

"Yeah, yeah. I'll look out for Danny," O'Neill said with a dismissive wave of his hand.

"Jack," Daniel warned.

"Daniel," O'Neill shot back. Daniel's glare did not abate. "We are not splitting up," O'Neill said firmly.

"You can't ignore the customs of anyone who doesn't agree with you."

"Sir," Carter interrupted before they could get fighting. "There may be energy levels that affect Daniel differently because of his exposure to Oma Desala. I could wait here with him." Carter was essentially offering the same explanation that Lianch had, but her words reached O'Neill, making him frown. Teal'c wished to point out that any energies that posed a danger to Daniel would also pose a danger to Blair, but he had no new arguments to add to the ones he had already spoken.

"You two wait here. We'll just be a minute," Blair said as he started down the path. O'Neill reached out and grabbed his arm, pulling him back. "Geez, enough with the manhandling. I feel like I'm hanging out with Jim again."

"I'm starting to understand Ellison a lot better," O'Neill countered. Blair crossed his arms over his chest and gave an exaggerated sigh. Teal'c noticed that neither Lianch nor Alatia seem surprised by the exchange. In the stories Teal'c knew, tao qua ca tec'ma'te i cal mah were great men and women who guided the path of warriors and worlds. Had Teal'c seen this version of Blair first, he would have doubted to put such a powerful name on one who had such childlike joy in life. However Lianch and Alatia appeared to have a very different expectation of a shaman. It occurred to Teal'c that these people had real experiences with those touched by the spiritual world while Teal'c had only stories.

Teal'c waited as O'Neill looked around, his face calculating. "Carter, you and Daniel wait here."

"Yes, sir," Carter agreed. She shifted her pack and dropped it to the ground next to the rock.

"How far is it?" O'Neill asked.

Teal'c stood at the bend in the path where the scraggly trees opened to show the first hint of black water. "It is a hundred yards from where I stand," he offered. O'Neill's body language screamed of his discomfort.

"Keep open radio contact. Sandburg, if you wander more than two inches from my side, I'm going to cuff you and drag you back through the Stargate. Got it?"

Blair rolled his eyes and held up a hand which he used to mimic the opening and closing of a mouth.

"Listen--" O'Neill began angrily.

"Stay with you, got it. Geez, you're worse than Jim."

"Oh yeah, I'm really starting to have a lot more sympathy for Ellison," O'Neill said, his hand still on Blair's shoulder. "Just remember we're on another world here."

Blair snorted. "Man, so far this world is looking way safer than ours. I live in D.C. right now if you remember, and that isn't nearly as bad as Cascade when all the crazies come out of the woodwork. Remind me to tell you about the time these far-right wack-jobs took over the police station. Although, let's be honest, the cops who fell for the emergency evac were not exactly on the bright side. Man, when you convince people that following orders is more important than common sense, that is one serious-ass problem in the making, ya know?"

O'Neill did not look reassured. However, he tightened his hold on Blair and escorted him down the path, past the twisted tree and jutting rock. It reassured Teal'c that O'Neill was finally recognizing the danger.

Blair was, once again, bouncing with energy, his eyes studying the land ahead of him. Lianch and Alatia fell in behind O'Neill, no doubt offering him a position of honor, but Teal'c knew O'Neill well enough to know that the man would be annoyed by having those he did not trust at his back. Between Blair's energy and the frustration of having people at his back, O'Neill was not going to be in a good mood tonight.

Teal'c led the group to the shore of the dark lake. The water was still, a slight lapping of tiny waves against the pebbled beach. Teal'c took a position near a tall, ragged rock and watched as Blair walked into the clearing. His bounce stopped immediately, and he got that same look of concentration as when he had touched the talisman of the Lianch.

"Oh wow. Okay, the landscape is slightly alien, but this... this is..." Blair simply allowed his words to trail off.

"My people believe this is the place of a great battle fought between the gods. The world was blasted in their fury."

"Trust me, getting blasted by fury is better than having these snakehead crawling all over your planet," O'Neill offered with his normal pragmatism. This world had so little to offer other than the alloy the Tau'ri wanted that no System Lord since Anubis had claimed it. Teal'c had to agree with O'Neill, though. To live a hard life where one battled the land was far more honorable than to live in slavery to false gods. Teal'c would happily lay down his own staff weapon in favor of a plow, were he to be given the choice. However, as long as there were Jaffa enslaved to ignorance, he would not dishonor his name or the name of his fallen father or master Bra'tac by turning his back on the fight.

"Oh man, it's beautiful," Blair said reverently.

"It's dirty water, Sandburg."

"O'Neill, you must just drive Daniel insane. You, my friend, need to open up your inner eye and see the beauty around you," Blair counseled. This time it was O'Neill who rolled his eyes.

"Bermiddlt are... unique," Lianch offered with some humor.

"Yeah, that's one word for it," O'Neill commented in a dry tone. "I could come up with one or two others." O'Neill allowed Blair to pull him closer to the water.

Looking at the mirrored surface, Teal'c could see the light reflecting, catching glimmers of red and purple beneath the surface. He had found other worlds more restful, more aesthetically pleasing, but he could understand why Blair would call this place beautiful. The shores were lined by twisted trees and tall grasses, but this beach that led in from the path was only pebble and rock. Blair moved forward until the edge of his boots touched the water.

A shudder went through his frame, and Teal'c took a step closer, alarmed by his physical reaction to the water.

"Whoa, someone just walked over my grave, you know?"

Teal'c did not know; however, the metaphor was disturbing.

"Chill," Blair said as he looked over to Teal'c. "It just means I got a shiver that I couldn't control. People used to believe that when that happened, it meant that someone had just walked over the place where you were, one day, going to be buried."

"Is that true?" Alatia asked, her eyes wide with wonder.

"No way. People like making up all kinds of weird shit," Blair said with a smile and a shrug.

"Imagine that," O'Neill said with considerably less amusement.

"Look, do you mind if I bend down here, or are you planning on handcuffing yourself to me?" Blair asked as he looked down to where O'Neill was holding onto his arm.

"Knock yourself out," O'Neill said as he released Blair. "Just make sure you do it within two inches of me."

"Whatever." Blair bent down and let his fingers trail in the water. He created ripples and watched them and fingered pebbles and generally just stared at the water as Daniel might an ancient hieroglyph. Teal'c watched O'Neill shift weight nervously, his hand gripping his gun as he watched the treeline for danger. Since O'Neill watched the perimeter, Teal'c watched the water, and watched Blair as he moved his hand through the water. Rya'c would do that as a child. Teal'c remembered the day when he had come home and found Drey'auc behind their house, laughing as their child pounded his fists in the water and then watched with wide eyes while the rings traveled the surface of the pond.

"So, are you going to make the speech?" O'Neill demanded. The plan had been for Blair to formally present the offer for mining rights, but Blair was totally ignoring the mission in favor of staring at the dark water. "Sandburg?"

"Yeah, yeah. Don't get your panties in a wad," Blair said, his voice disturbingly distant.

"It is always the same with the bermiddlt," Lianch said softly. "The waters call to them."

O'Neill looked up at Teal'c, his eyes warning that he no longer considered this danger to be only hypothetical. "Carter," O'Neill said into his radio. Teal'c's coming back your way to sit on Daniel. As soon as he gets there, I need you to run some energy readings on this water. Double time."

Teal'c nodded and turned to hurry back to Daniel Jackson's position, but then a flash of light and a shockwave rose from the lake in a bubble of white energy that threw everyone to the ground. Everyone except Blair. Blair stood, now knee deep in water—either it had risen or he had walked into the water, but his legs vanished into the darkness, and his hair was blowing free.

"Sandburg!" O'Neill screamed over the wind which now tore through the small clearing.

"Colonel?!" Carter called through the radio.

"Keep Daniel back!" O'Neill yelled at her. "Sandburg, get your ass back here now! Teal'c! Grab him!" O'Neill had scrambled up to his knees, but each time he tried to stand, his footing slipped in the loose rock.

Teal'c struggled to move forward, choosing to remain on hands and knees as he fought against the wind. Dust stung his eyes, and the wind grew stronger as he approached the lake, but he fought his way to the edge. However, the moment Teal'c touched the water, he flew backwards, over O'Neill's head and landed in a short, squat tree. His symbiote screamed in pain, and for a few seconds, Teal'c could do nothing but clutch his stomach as the creature writhed.

"Get to the trees," O'Neill called, his weapon clutched in one hand as he scrambled, one hand on the ground as he awkwardly retreated. Teal'c pulled himself out of the branches of the tree. His staff weapon still lay near the shore, but he did not believe he could easily recover it. Teal'c looked over, and O'Neill was taking a position behind a low hill.

The wind rose, lifting a veil of dirt and sand between them and Blair, but the surface of the lake itself was a dark, still mirror that reflected a bright sun and doubled Blair's presence. Teal'c moved toward O'Neill, and the two Tol leaders had joined him behind the hill, each clutching their loose clothing to themselves lest they be stripped by the wind.

"Was this expected?" Teal'c asked Lianch.

The Tol man shook his head. "Storms sometimes come up when our bermiddlt is here. The village is braced for a flood, but I've never seen anything like this."

Teal'c looked to O'Neill for direction. "Get back to the gate. Request SG3 and 11, and haul Danny back to Earth even if you have to zat him to do it!" O'Neill yelled. Teal'c could hear Daniel protesting that order over the radio, but given the Bermid'cate's reaction to the presence of Blair Sandburg, Teal'c did not want to know how it would react to yet another potential shaman. With a nod to O'Neill, Teal'c worked his way back toward the path, his head hung low to protect his eyes from the blowing dust.

Teal'c had believed this mission to be dangerous, but he had no idea that time would prove him so correct. Once he was within the safety of the trees, Teal'c risked a look back. Blair had moved farther into the lake, and his head was tilted to the side as though listening. Teal'c did not like to think of what he might be listening to. When he got to Earth, he would make another argument to General Hammond regarding the inclusion of Jim Ellison. However first, he had to reach the gate. Teal'c set off at a steady run.

27. Twenty-seven

Carter and Daniel stood near the same tree, and the moment Teal'c turned the bend, he could see that Carter was standing with her body between Daniel and the path to the Bermid'cate. The woman was far too wise to trust Daniel to keep himself out of harm's way when others' lives might be in danger.

"Let us go," Teal'c called, gesturing for Daniel to procede him on the trail. They had to return to the Stargate as soon as possible. So far, the storm was limited to the Bermid'cate and showed no sign of causing death or destruction. Teal'c did not trust that it would remain so.

"We can't just leave them," Daniel protested when Teal'c reached him. Carter looked from Teal'c to Daniel with concern. Teal'c knew that rational discussion or debate would not ever convince Daniel to leave a man behind. Bending slightly, he caught Daniel in the stomach and tossed him over a shoulder and continued running.

"Teal'c!" Daniel yelled.

"Colonel, I'm on my way!" Carter called into her radio, leaving Teal'c to deal with Daniel and his ire.

"I do not have time to discuss this," Teal'c said, reminding himself that Daniel did not wish to be treated as a warrior. He wished to be treated as a cha'til... with respect. One would scoop up a cha'til and remove them from danger. Teal'c was not sure how the respect fit in with that. The sun made him squint as it glared off the rocks, but even more disturbing, a wind now stirred the dust. He could not tell if this was a side-effect of the storm at the Bermid'cate or was unrelated. The Tol elders had said that the weather was often affected by the shaman visiting the holy place, so it was not unreasonable to expect this great disturbance to reach beyond the Bermid'cate itself.

"Put me down!" Daniel yelled, adding a few choice phrases in a language Teal'c did not recognize. Teal'c reached a turn in the path and eyed the slight incline. He would be slower carrying his burden. Stopping, Teal'c bent over and placed Daniel back on his feet.

"I'm not leaving Jack and Blair," Daniel said, crossing his arms over his chest in defiance. He did not attempt to push past Teal'c, but then he had to know that he would not be allowed to pass. Teal'c struggled for a moment with words. He knew what to say to a warrior and what to say to a cha'til, but he was unsure what to say to Daniel.

"Your presence may worsen this energy field," Teal'c began. He could tell by the stubborn look on Daniel's face that it was not enough. "Your argument slows me down in my mission to summon others for assistance," Teal'c added, and that did work.

"This argument isn't over," Daniel warned as he started up the slight hill at a steady run. Teal'c ran at his side.

"Your presence worries O'Neill; you would be safer on Earth," Teal'c said as they jogged to the top of the hill. The Stargate was visible in the distance—a round circle that cast a short shadow in the midday sun.

"Tough. Jack will live. I'm not staying on Earth," Daniel said, but he kept up his running pace.

"You have many skills, but they do not extend to this. You should not be at risk when there is no need," Teal'c countered. Daniel was starting to breathe heavy, so he did not answer immediately. Even Teal'c could feel the dust choking him with every breath, and Daniel had far more breathing problems than he did.

"I'll interview the people then," Daniel wheezed, and Teal'c did not continue the conversation because it seemed unfair to talk when Daniel could not easily use words. The trip to the Bermid'cate had been downhill and the stroll had seemed significantly shorter than this return trip. The sky slowly turned a soft shade of pink as the dust gathered. When he glanced over his shoulder, Teal'c could see a column of dust rising from behind them.

"Colonel O'Neill, does the phenomenon grow worse?" Teal'c called over the radio.

"Not so much, but it's not getting any better, either," O'Neill answered, and Teal'c could hear the howls of the wind through the trees behind him. Teal'c would much prefer to be there still, his weapon trained on any potential threats, but that had not been the mission to which O'Neill had assigned him.

"Conditions out there?"

"A mild dust storm appears to approach," Teal'c said, looking at the gathering clouds in the distance.

"Lianch says to be prepared for flooding. Avoid any areas with cliffs because the water can undercut the ground so it goes out from under you."

"Understood," Teal'c agreed.

"How's Blair?" Daniel called in his radio despite his obvious difficulty breathing.

"He's acting like he's in a trance, but it looks like the center of this thing is the safest place to be," O'Neill answered. Teal'c doubted very much that O'Neill even believed that, but at least the dangers Blair faced were not to be compounded with physical injury as well.

"We are at the Stargate," Teal'c radioed as they finally reached the Stargate. O'Neill did not answer, and Teal'c hurried to the device to dial home. Daniel stumbled, and Teal'c offered a hand, but Daniel waved off his offer and sank to his knees. Daniel might not see himself as a warrior, but his willingness to push himself past physical pain had earned him the respect of one even if he did not want the title.

Teal'c dialed.

"Jack, I'm going through with Teal'c, and then I'm returning to interview the villagers for any historical references to anything like this," Daniel gasped into the radio. Teal'c finished dialing and the Stargate flashed to life; however, he waited until Daniel and O'Neill settled the matter of Daniel's return. For a second, the radio was silent on the matter. Then the signal opened, the roaring of the wind coming through just before Colonel O'Neill's voice.

"Danny, you get caught in this whirl-wind, and I'm going to..." O'Neill's voice petered out, no doubt because he could not think of a threat dire enough.

"I'll keep clear!" Daniel agreed, not allowing O'Neill to finish his threat.

Teal'c hurried to Daniel's side, getting a hand under the man's arm to help him the last few steps. He would not offer a warrior such assistance when the other could clearly manage on his own but, like O'Neill, Teal'c had been trying hard to not judge Daniel by the standards of a warrior. Daniel's breathing was rough from the dust in the air and a cha'til who suffered such would always be assisted. It occurred to Teal'c that he would offer similar help to a tao qua ca tec'ma'te i cal mah.

"Thanks," Daniel offered him a smile, not even protesting the assistance. Teal'c smiled back and the two of them entered the wormhole.

"Unscheduled return for SG-1," the loudspeaker announced as they stepped through. Warriors had their weapons trained on the gate, and Teal'c moved down the ramp with deliberate speed.

"We must speak with General Hammond," he offered the new commander of SG-3.

The door to the Gateroom opened and General Hammond stepped in. "Report."

"Blair Sandburg entered the waters of the Bermid'cate and triggered some sort of energy field. O'Neill requests SG3 and 11," Teal'c offered. SG3 was a military unit, but SG11 were engineering and scientific personnel. Teal'c hoped that they did not need to turn to Tau'ri engineering to retrieve Blair from the waters of the Bermid'cate because he did not believe it would actually work.

"That explains it," General Hammond said.

"General?" Daniel stepped forward and removed his hat, hitting it against his leg so that dust rose like a cloud.

"I just got off the phone with Detective Ellison. I don't know how he found out anything, but he is threatening to go public with the entire program if we don't return Blair to him immediately. According to him, he has collected evidence which would interest the mainstream press. He says that even if no one buys the alien conspiracy story, they're going to get documentation on money, personnel and energy disappearing into the mountain."

"Kelso," Daniel said softly.

"Probably, but right now we don't have time to worry about who helped him collect information, assuming he actually does have something," the general answered.

"But he signed that agreement."

"I don't think he cares about the agreement or the possibility of a jail sentence right now, and he's promising to have a friend take everything public immediately if he disappears."

"Disappears?" Daniel said the word dismissively, but his incredulous smile slowly faded. "General?"

"If I thought he was bluffing, I would order him picked up until he calmed down enough to discuss this, but right now, I don't think he's bluffing." General Hammond turned to the leader of SG3. "Colonel, you have thirty minutes to prepare your team. Have SG11 recalled, they are to be on deck in one hour."

"Yes, sir," Colonel Reynolds answered with a sharp salute that the general returned.

General Hammond turned to head back out of the departure room, and Teal'c followed. Daniel was cleaning his glasses, wiping them against his dirty shirt as he tried to follow, and Teal'c allowed him to go first so that he might keep an eye on Daniel to ensure that he did not walk into any doors.

"I need to head back with SG3," Daniel told the general.

"What does Colonel O'Neill think?" General Hammond asked. He stopped near the stairs to turn and study Daniel.

"That I need to interview the villagers and stay far away from the Bermid'cate."

General Hammond glanced over to Teal'c, but he remained silent, waiting for Hammond to make his decision on this issue so that he could bring up his own concerns.

"Get new gear," the general said with a sigh. Teal'c suspected that he would rather keep Daniel on Earth, but the general rarely contradicted O'Neill's orders.

"I believe we should send Jim Ellison as well." Teal'c watched the shock on General Hammond's face.

"I don't think that would be a good idea."

Teal'c had to admit that he knew less about Bermid'cate than he did about tao qua ca tec'ma'te i cal mah, but he could no longer ignore his gut-level belief that Blair Sandburg needed his partner. However, discussion of spirituality did not impress the people of the Tau'ri. Teal'c had always turned to Carter to guide him when he was lost, and so he followed her lead this time. "The stories of my people say that those who are influenced by the energies of beings from other dimensions may be pulled into those dimensions."

"Like when Oma Desala helped the monk at her temple to ascend," Daniel hurried to say. "The Tol people think that if a shaman touches you and invites you to become a shaman, the Bermid'cate is dangerous, so it might be a matter of shifting someone just a little out of phase. If the Bermid'cate represents some sort of weakening of the dimensional borders, it would make sense that a person who had already been affected might be affected even more."

The general looked from one of them to the other. "Shifting a person out of phase?"

"Not enough to cause invisibility," Teal'c admitted. The explanation sounded oddly plausible. "The Jaffa stories say that one who has started this shift to another dimension must be called back by someone familiar to them."

Daniel was already nodding in agreement. "Which is not surprising. Most cultures have the concept of a talisman. When a person meditates, this object, usually something that's significant to them and worn all the time, gives them a focus so that they can find themselves again. If a person doesn't have an object which is important enough for them to recognize, even if they're partially phased out of this reality, it may take a familiar person to help them find their way back."

"Jim Ellison is certainly one to whom Blair feels very close," Teal'c finished. He watched as General Hammond frowned in confusion before his expression cleared.

"Have you cleared any of this through Colonel O'Neill?"

"I didn't even think of it until now," Daniel said with a hopeful expression.

"I'm not sure that adding an angry detective to this will improve the situation."

"Sir." Daniel reached out and stopped General Hammond from continuing up the stairs. "Ellison already knew something was wrong with Blair. He was there when Incacha touched Blair, and he lived with Incacha in Peru before either of them met Blair. If Incacha was like Oma Desala, an ascended being, there's a good chance that whatever energy is affecting Blair on that planet, it's also affecting Ellison here."

"Which could pose a security risk if not an actual conduit by which this energy could find its way back to Earth," General Hammond said slowly. "It's possible. You call Ellison and use this act you have to convince him to get to McChord, and I'll get him on a plane. We can have him here in two hours." General Hammond turned and headed up the stairs much more quickly than normal.

"Do you have his number?" Teal'c asked.

"I do," Daniel said before he turned and raced down the hall toward the nearest office area. An airman flattened himself against the wall to allow Daniel to pass, and Teal'c hurried after him.

"Need the phone," Daniel said in way of an apology as he rushed the office of a young, uniformed woman Teal'c did not recognize. Daniel practically lay on her desk and grabbed for her phone.

"Sir?" she asked as she stood up.

Daniel ignored her and dialed. "Come on, pick up Ellison." He punched the speakerphone, and Teal'c could hear the ringing.

"Ellison," an unhappy voice snapped on the other end.

"It's Daniel Jackson from the mountain. I need to talk to you."

"Where's Blair?" Ellison demanded.

Daniel traded a look with Teal'c. To discuss the Stargate over an unsecured line was a security breach that the general would not be able to ignore.

"He is walking the path of the tao qua ca tec'ma'te i cal mah," Teal'c answered, hoping that Blair had discussed such matters with his partner.

"The what?" Ellison demanded.

Daniel sighed. "He decided to take a little trip to see Incacha," Daniel tried. Ellison sucked in his breath. "And we would like to take you to him, but that means you have to get here as fast as you can."

"He's there? In Colorado?" Ellison didn't sound convinced.

"Sort of," Daniel said. "We can get you to him in the blink of an eye from here." Daniel cringed, an action which Teal'c did not understand until he heard Ellison's response.

"You sons of bitches. When I get my hands on O'Neill I'm going to strangle him with his own intestines. Is he there? If Blair isn't alright..."

"He is not alright," Teal'c interrupted before this could go further. "He believed that he was in no danger despite the warnings he was offered. But the path he is walking poses a great danger, and he requires an anchor, someone to show him how to return to himself."

"Fuck," Ellison breathed. "I thought you were going to try to keep him out of trouble." Ellison now sounded more weary than angry.

"I did attempt. He is hard to contain." The rough laugh from Ellison's end of the phone sounded almost like a sob.

"Ellison," Daniel interrupted. "We need you here. If you can get to McChord, we have a plane waiting."

"So, I should throw myself on your mercy? Your brass is going to want me to disappear after that call I just finished making. My captain is about ready to put me in a safe house just to make sure I don't mysteriously vanish, and you want me to turn myself over to the nearest military base?"

"Blair needs it," Teal'c said quietly.

"We aren't trying to trick you. We need you here," Daniel added.

The phone was silent for several minutes. The woman whose office they had commandeered watched in confusion, and Teal'c could understand. He often felt the same. Six months ago, he would have said with great confidence that Ellison did not value Blair Sandburg enough to risk his freedom. Now, Teal'c believed he would. The confusion lay in the fact that Teal'c still did not understand their relationship.

"I'll be at the base in twenty minutes, full sirens running. You get me a pass at that gate or I'll run the fucking thing over with my truck." Ellison hung up on them.

"He's in a good mood," Daniel said sarcastically as he punched the button to disconnect the speakerphone. "Sorry about that," he offered the woman as he sat up and attempted to replace the papers and files he had disarranged on her desk.

"It's fine, sir," she said as she moved forward to rescue the remaining piles. "I had been warned to expect the unexpected."

Teal'c nodded in approval at her calm. "I shall inform the general that Ellison will be joining us while you request new gear," Teal'c told Daniel. Daniel smiled at him and gave him a thumbs up. Hopefully Ellison would arrive in time to help Blair Sandburg.

28. Twenty-eight

Blair watched the colors slide across the surface of the lake like oil—reds and blues and greens so vivid that Blair had to reach out and touch them. But each time his finger touched the water, the color wisped away and Blair had to follow it deeper into the water.

The air had grown strangely still, and the water was a mirror, undisturbed by even the smallest ripple except where Blair's fingers broke the surface. Then rings would grow and spread and then slowly vanish into the mirror.

"Oh man, this is... this is so totally cool."

"The beauty of the universe is deeper than we see," a woman's voice offered. Blair looked over at a nice-looking woman in her forties who was studying him. She was standing with the bottom of her white dress floating on the dark water.

"White?" Blair asked. "So, should I assume you're using the western symbolism of white as purity or the Chinese meaning of white—death?"

"Is there a difference?" she asked, a small smile on her lips. Blair could feel a deep sense of peacefulness drift over him, and he had to shake his head just to avoid falling asleep as his body relaxed.

He cleared his throat and struggled to focus his thoughts. Symbolism, that's what they had been talking about. "Oh man, totally. I remember dead. It wasn't all that pure. Actually, it smelled a lot like chlorine."

"It can be," she said as she looked around. Blair couldn't seem to look away from her. "If you immediately know the candlelight is fire, then the meal was cooked a long time ago."

Blair nodded at her words. "Totally. Truth is found in confusion because life is an illusion, so anything that seems to make sense doesn't." That concept was fairly well established in a number of philosophies going back hundreds of years, but the woman turned and smiled at him as though Blair had just found the cure for cancer. "So, you're Oma Desala," Blair guessed. "You know, I was supposed to be meeting the Tol ancestors. I don't think I actually expected anything other than a trip to a new world, but I really didn't expect to see you here."

"How deep is the river if you cannot see the bottom?"

"Deep enough to fucking drown in," Blair shot right back. The answer seemed to amuse her. She turned to face him.

"I am a Tol ancestor."

Blair narrowed his eyes. "Okay, I'm a big fan of synergy and the universe having meaning, but that would be a little too much coincidence," Blair said with a snort.

"There is more out there. When the mind is enlightened, the body matters not."

Blair backed up a step, and the ripples rose and grew until they surrounded them both in towering walls of black, and when those walls finally dropped, Blair found himself in the New Mexico desert, the distant mountains defining the edge of the desert and gray-green plants dotting the rock landscape.

"I know this place," Blair frowned as he studied a lightning-struck tree.

"To rise above this is to know a new universe, to explore worlds you do not know." Oma stepped forward, her dress blowing in the soft desert breeze.

Blair's chest hurt. He reached up and rubbed his breastbone, aware of a dull aching in his lungs that called to him. The light flashed, as if the sun were a lightbulb flickering and threatening to burn out, and then it turned blue. It stained the desert with blue light, turning the distant mountains a surreal purple.

"Can you let go of that which traps you on this earth?"

A mirage of Jim wavered in the heat and then solidified. "It's not like I need you glued to my side. Sandburg, idiot! It's just getting a little too claustrophobic around here for me, Chief. I don't know if I'm ready to take that trip with you. Perfect for another train wreck in the ongoing disaster that is your love life. Why don't you try using your head for something other than a punching bag, all right? You neo-hippie witch doctor punk, I could slap you right now with larceny and false impersonation. Why did I let you drag me down here?" With each word, Jim stepped closer, his face becoming a mask of anger. Blair backed away, his guts clenching in the face of Jim's obvious wrath.

"Whoa, hey, let's just talk about this," he said, his hands held up in surrender. Blair stumbled back against a rock, and nearly fell on his ass. The rock in question turned and then started standing, and Blair scrambled to get away. Then the rock turned, and Blair realized that it was actually Incacha.

"He carries many wounds," Incacha said, his eyes on Jim. From the floor of the desert, an oasis rose, tall trees and the smell of leaf rot and rain soaked the air even though Blair was still standing on the dry rock of the New Mexico desert. Jim stood for a second, and then he turned and began circling. His civilian clothes morphed into military fatigues, and a red stain appeared on his arm. Blair gasped as bodies appeared on the ground, the smoking skeleton of a wrecked helicopter shimmering into reality.

Jim dropped to his knees and pressed his hand against another man's chest.

"Damn it, Sarris, you do not have permission to die. You hold on, understand?" Jim asked. His voice was rough, and his eyes darted around the jungle. Sarris made a strangled, gurgling noise.

"Cap, Cap," another voice called.

"I'm right here, Peters. We just need to hold on for the rescue team."

"Cap, there's something crawling on my leg," the voice called more desperate now." Jim pulled his hand back from Sarris' chest and the blood flowed. Sarris made a desperate gurgle, but Jim turned and hurried to the far side of the clearing.

"Fuck. Don't move," Jim said as he pulled his handgun.

"Cap!"

"Damn it, Peters, just don't move. Jim waited a second, and then he fired the gun. Peters gave a short scream, and then Jim was moving forward, pulling a huge snake off and throwing its headless body closer to the helicopter. "Look at it this way, soldier, fresh meat," Jim offered weakly before he moved back to Sarris. But even Blair could tell the man was dead. So this was Veronica Sarris' father, the man who Veronica believed Jim had allowed to die. Blair watched as Jim's face contorted with pain. He rubbed his hand over his features and the expression vanished.

"Cap, is he okay?" Peters called.

"He'll be fine, Peters. His breathing has evened out and the bleeding has slowed," Jim lied. He walked over and pulled the blanket out from under Sarris' feet and spread it out over the man, leaving his head uncovered and pressing his head to the side so that the empty eyes faced away from Peters.

"Oh Jim," Blair breathed.

The oasis vanished under a flare of brilliant white light. Oma was standing there, her white dress billowing as the wind picked up. "Pain is an illusion, a trap with teeth to gnaw the bones of the unwary."

"But Jim..." Blair frowned. It suddenly occurred to him that everything the mirage had just said were words Jim had spoken to him. "It's not like that."

Oma tilted her head to one side, either questioning him or trying to understand him, Blair wasn't sure which.

The world shimmered for just a moment, but it was long enough for Blair to catch the outline of the temple of the Sentinels. Jim had to go there alone. Blair looked over at Incacha, waiting for him to explain that, but Incacha only watched him with this expectant look that Blair didn't understand.

"Man, help me out here," Blair asked Incacha. "Why did he leave me behind? Why wouldn't he take that trip with me?" Blair could hear a distant wolf howl, but other than that, it was silent. The wind stilled, and the world slowed to a full-stop. Incacha just watched him silently.

From a distance, Blair could hear laughter. An older man with jowls and a suit that screamed 'middle management' stepped out of nowhere. "This one is interesting," he commented with a look that made Blair bristle and want to defend himself.

"Go away," Oma Desala said sharply.

"Name's Jim, funny enough." The man offered his hand, and Blair took it without thinking. The moment his hand touched, the man's face shimmered and a black jackal's head appeared. Blair backed away from the man as fast as he could.

"You shouldn't be here," Oma said as she stepped into the new man's path.

He looked at her, smiled, and gave a half shrug. "It's not against the rules. Besides, he found his own way here, so it's not like you have any prior claim. So, Sandburg, how are you liking your trip to the higher realms?"

"Not higher, just different," Blair disagreed as he watched the interplay between Oma and the not-Jim. This was familiar. The two eyed each other as adversaries. Not-Jim had the smug confidence of a criminal who knew that the police wouldn't find any evidence; he was Ventriss, only older and somehow more powerful. Oma tried harder to hide her feelings, but Blair could sense the frustration.

"Not higher," Oma agreed as she turned her back on Not-Jim. "But more powerful, less limited by the flesh. Lightning flashes, sparked showers, in one blink of an eye, you have missed seeing."

"Whoa, I'm not missing anything here. Okay, maybe it's time for me to wake up because this is way more than I bargained for. Seriously, this was supposed to be a fun little side trip. Someone slipped me acid somewhere along the way," Blair gave a rough laugh as he backed slowly away from Not-Jim and Oma and Incacha who still watched silently. Oma silently followed, her form sliding though Incacha's, but that seemed fair since Incacha was dead. Then again, Oma was probably dead, too. Blair's head throbbed.

"O'Neill? Feel free to drag me back through the Stargate now," Blair called, but no matter what direction he looked, he could only see the empty landscape of the New Mexico desert.

"Young Blair," a new voice greeted him. Blair turned to find Roland Atole watching him, his dark hair pulled back into a traditional braid. He'd been a friend of the man Naomi had dated when they lived in New Mexico. "It took you a while, didn't it?" he asked with a smile. "I told you that ten was just too young, but you never did listen well. I didn't think it would take you this long to figure out how to get back here, though."

"What?" Blair was fairly sure someone had slipped him a whole lot of acid. Roland smiled at him, brilliant white teeth with one prominently missing.

"I told Naomi that you had more than a touch of the spirits in you. But these two... they aren't telling the whole truth."

"The flesh is a lie, dooming you to walk the path of dust," Oma said seriously, and Blair didn't doubt that she believed that. Roland, however, didn't seem to be buying the company line.

"Some of us like the flesh and the dust." He crouched down and ran his fingers over the desert floor. "Remember when I taught you to spot a snake track?" he asked.

Blair smiled, suddenly feeling ten years old and so proud at finding his first winding trail in the dirt. "Oh man, totally."

Not-Jim gave a mean laugh. "Come on? A snake trail? That's what gets you excited? Oma has picked some real losers, but you take the cake, kid. Then again, she didn't really pick you. You found your way here by yourself, which is a bit of a problem because it means you can't just follow her back. I have better things to do with my time." With that, he vanished.

Roland shook his head sadly. "Did I ever tell you of Child of the Water?" he asked. Blair shook his head and moved closer to the man, crouching down in the dust next to him. "His mother hid him under a fire, afraid that Giant would eat him as he had eaten her other children, as he ate all the deer that Killer of Enemies hunted. She hid him until one day he demanded to go out hunting with his older brother, Killer of Enemies. His mother did not want him to go."

"She thought he'd get killed," Blair said, vaguely remembering the story. Roland nodded.

"He was safe under her fire. But as long as he stayed there, he could not change the world."

"So he went hunting with his brother," Blair said, still uncertain, but hearing the words like an echo in his memory. Roland smiled and nodded. "And when he and his brother had hunted a deer, the giant appeared and took it away from them."

"He did," Roland agreed. Reaching out he wiped out the winding snake trail with his hand. "And the giant insulted Child of Water by asking to see his arrows and then wiping them on his butt."

Blair laughed. "I remember that part."

"You would," Roland said as he reached over and shoved at Blair's shoulder. Blair smiled at him. "So Child of Water challenged him."

Oma stepped forward, her dress once again billowing in the wind. "Though the river tells no lies, the dishonest standing on the shore, still hears them."

Roland slapped his hands on his jeans to clear the dust. "A story is not a lie, and Blair isn't foolish enough to think he's hearing one. I might speak in metaphor, but truth is not as simple or as complicated as you think," he said. Blair looked from one to the other, and all of a sudden Roland aged. Now he wasn't as Blair remembered him, a tall, broad-shouldered man with dark skin and sharp eyes. He was old and withered, his skin faded and his white hair cut short.

Oma stepped forward, offering her hands to Roland. "The path you walk could be stained with stars."

Roland struggled to stand, and Blair stepped to his side, offering the old man his hand. Roland smiled. "This is my land and my people. I don't want to walk the stars. That's not the only path; it's just the only one open to you."

"Oh man, that's it," Blair said as he looked at Oma. "You're trying to convince people to walk your path. You want Daniel and me with you, but what if that's not what we want?"

"You have to make the choice for yourself, I only offer the path."

"Well then, that would be a 'no' vote from me. And man, if you even go asking Daniel, Jack is going to have your head on a platter, and I'm not so sure that's a metaphor.

"You would rather die?" she asked, clearly confused. Actually, it felt good to confuse her for a change.

"I would rather stay home, whatever that brings," Blair said.

Oma vanished in a flare of light. "Okay, my quota for weird is officially full for the day. Where is the exit sign?" Blair asked.

Roland frowned at him. "You are a shaman; it is your task to divide the vision from the reality."

"Man, I am a doctor of anthropology."

"And a shaman," Roland said. "From the time you first appeared on the reservation, those of us with the sight could feel you. Have you so lost yourself to white-man's science that you can no longer walk your path?"

"He has," Incacha said as he stepped forward. "And time runs short, young shaman."

"Okay, that's not sounding good," Blair said, his stomach knotting in that familiar twist he'd felt when he was on that oil rig watching the time tick down on the bomb.

"It is not."

"So, why not show me the exit?" Blair asked. Roland and Incacha just looked at him. "Okay, you two are losing points on the helpfulness scale," Blair said as he looked around at the landscape. The mountains looked equally far in any direction, and there was an odd lack of human structures—no telephone poles or electric lines or handy highways with some helpful trucker passing through.

"When lost, stay put and wait for rescue. When lost in the spirit plane... what? Wait until you sober up?" Blair tried joking. Neither Roland nor Incacha looked amused. "Okay, fine, I get it. I need to stop with the denial," Blair said, holding his hands up in surrender. "Never say you have to hit me more than six or seven times with a really big stick to get me to understand. So, I'm a shaman, and as a real-life shaman, visiting this Bermid'cate was slightly, monumentally stupid. Got it. So, some help please?"

"How does a shaman prepare for a journey?" Roland asked. Blair was a big fan of the Socratic method, but right now, he was about as frustrated as his students got with him when he used it. He silently made a vow to never again torture students with pointless questions. However, Roland and Incacha did not look like they were going to just blurt out an answer for him.

"Fine," Blair sighed. "It often starts with a repetitive sound like a drum or rattle or didgeridoo. The shaman listens to the sound of the tribe, letting the world slowly fall away. Then again, a lot of shamans use peyote, salvia divinorum, psilocybin mushrooms or other hallucinogens, so letting go of the real world is not really that hard. They focus on a goal or a destination and slowly move into a world that isn't all that real." Blair looked around. "Man, I have the imagining the unreal world part down."

"It's not unreal," Roland corrected him, and once again he was the strong man of Blair's memories. "It's just not quite what others see."

"Right," Blair said. "Okay, so at the end of your journey, you return to your starting point, thank the spirits for their help and visualize an exit. I can do that."

Blair walked to the spot where he thought he'd been standing when the wall of water had washed away the real world and he'd ended up in New Mexico. "Roland, seriously man, thank you. Not just for today, either. You were the first person to ever treat me like a human being and not just Naomi's kid."

"You're a good soul. If you and your Sentinel ever want to leave your city, the tribe would be glad to have a Watchman return to them."

"You know Sentinels?" Blair asked.

Roland shook his head. "Aren't you supposed to be focusing on something, young pup?"

Blair blushed. "Oh, right. Incacha, thank you for taking care of Jim."

Incacha nodded. "The night he left you to walk into the temple alone...."

"Whoa, hey, you do not have to explain to me," Blair hurried to say. He held a hand up to stop Incacha because that was one wound that did not need reopening.

"I do, young wolf," Incacha said. "Enquiri is a Sentinel of the tribe, he must see farther and hear more than any other member, but to guide him, you must also see and hear. A guide who cannot follow his Sentinel part of the way on the path of the senses cannot guide."

"I can see that," Blair agreed. He did need to be able to see something in order to tell that Jim had zoned because he had seen details or distances that weren't possible for Blair.

"But Enquiri also had to see. You are the Shaman of the tribe, you just walk farther into worlds which do not exist for others, so to guide you, he must know how to walk those worlds. He will never have the power here that you do, but he must walk part of the way on your path to guide you."

"So, you wanted Jim on a vision quest?" Blair asked, not really sure that made any sense. Then again, he was only 80% sure any of this was real, so there was still a possibility that his brain was clutching at straws and trying to explain away the most painful part of his history with Jim. Incacha nodded.

"Okay," Blair said with a sigh. "On with the thanking of spirits. Oma, thank you for the offer, and please don't take offense that it slightly creeps me out. Guy who is not-Jim, um..." Blair struggled to find anything to thank that guy for. "Thanks for stopping by," he settled for. "and Spirit-Jim, thank you for sharing your memories of the crash, and I totally forgive you for saying all that shitty stuff because, man, you really do have some issues." Blair finished and then closed his eyes and tried to visualize an exit. He imagined the emergency exit at a movie theater with the panic bar on the door and the glowing red sign above it. He opened his eyes and found himself still staring at nothing but desert.

"I have issues?" Jim asked as he appeared next to Blair.

"Yes, you have issues," Blair answered. "Serious issues."

Jim crossed his arms over his chest. "At least I know that the more powerful a shaman, the more he needs to use a talisman so that if he gets lost in the next world, he can find his way home."

Blair rolled his eyes. "Man, you don’t even believe in shamanism, so don't start in with the lecture, Ellison."

Jim looked away with a slight blush on his face. "Chief, I don't believe in witchcraft."

"No shit," Blair answered. Yeah, it might not be the politically correct answer to give a spirit in a vision, but that's just the mood he was in. Jim's biases against the supernatural were pretty well documented.

"I don't believe in it, so if you want to get a wand and start waving it around, I don't care," Jim snapped. "Hell, I'll carve you the wand as long as you don't care that I'm then going to laugh at you. I hate this shamanic crap because I know it's real."

"You... what?" Blair crossed his arms and faced off against Jim.

Jim sighed and rubbed his hand over his face, a gesture that looked so much like when he had rubbed his face in that memory of Sarris' death, that Blair couldn't help it, he reached out and rested his hand against Jim's arm. "Chief, I lived with the tribe, with Incacha. I watched him return from the spirit world with cuts on his arms, so exhausted that he couldn't walk. And all I could do was sit by him and call him home when he was ready. I couldn't protect him." Jim closed his mouth, and his jaw bulged as though the emotions trapped within sought escape only to have Jim swallow them again.

"Oh man, fuck," Blair breathed as he realized what that would do to Jim. "You didn't want me to be a shaman."

"Fuck no. I wanted you safe. I didn't want you here," Jim waved a hand at the desert, and Blair realized that Incacha and Roland had vanished.

"Jim?" Blair reached up and cupped Jim's face. His eyes were shadowed and deep, and he had lost weight. "Jim, are the senses okay?"

Jim gave a rough laugh and then reached up and pressed his own hand against Blair's, trapping it. "My senses are fine. I told you that they're slowly losing strength, but they'll come back when you do."

"Then what?" Blair asked. He studied Jim's face, but the man had shut down. "What?" Blair demanded even louder, but Jim just took a shuddering breath. Blair yanked his hand back and threw his arms wide. "What?!" Thunder cracked overhead and a hawk went screaming into the air.

"You don't get it," Jim said tightly. "Incacha, this isn't fair. This isn't his path."

"It would be if you would stop blocking him," Incacha said as he rose from the ground. Around him jungle plants started growing in the middle of the desert.

"He's a scientist." Jim crossed his arms over his chest, and Blair looked from one to the other. He recognized the echoes of his own words.

"I'm a scientist and a shaman," Blair said as he closed the distance and rested his hand on Jim's back. Jim shivered, but didn't push him away.

"If you are a shaman, then this is your world, not Enquiri's," Incacha told him. Blair frowned in confusion, but the wind came up and Incacha just blew away like dust.

"Whoa, seriously freaky imagery," Blair said with a shiver.

"Blair, let's go home," Jim said, reaching out for Blair. "Just follow me back, Chief."

"No," Blair said slowly. "No, this is my world. You can't keep me under the fire just because you think the giant is going to eat me," he said firmly. He backed away.

"Giant? Chief, do you feel alright?" Jim asked. He honestly looked worried.

"Not really," Blair admitted. He hadn't felt alright for a while now. Jim quickly stepped to his side and slipped an arm around his shoulders.

"I'm not leaving," Blair said firmly.

"Fine, you're not leaving," Jim sighed. "Shit, why do you have to be so stubborn, Sandburg?"

"Because I am," Blair said. "Why are you so worn? What's wrong?"

Jim's jaw tightened, but the landscape started to fade until the familiar outlines of the loft appeared like a ghost image against the desert. A ghostly Jim was up and pacing, rubbing his neck and looking tired enough to collapse. A black panther screamed, and he turned to glare up at the cat. It peered over the railing and screamed again. Jim walked to the kitchen and turned the coffee maker on even though the morning light wasn't even a twinkle in the windows.

"Why is the cat bothering you?" Blair asked. He looked up at the Jim who had his arm around Blair's shoulders.

Ghost Jim answered. "I never thought I'd miss Sandburg's meditation music." He poked a finger at the cat on the second story. "When Sandburg gets back, you're getting banished to the farthest corner of the spirit world I can find. Go haunt someone else." Ghost Jim sat at the table, and the floor turned to water. Rather than look surprised he let his forehead fall to the table. "I hate this shit."

Blair cocked his head and frowned at the scene. "Oh man, seriously? You're seeing thing?"

"I'm not seeing things," Jim said, and Blair could hear just how close Jim was to exploding with anger. Blair fought to clear any hint of an amused smile from his face. But after all those years of Jim doing the whole avoiding of the weird, it was a little amusing. "I can't control the visions."

"Whoa. I can," Blair said softly.

Jim rolled his eyes and looked disgusted, so Blair figured he had the right answer.

"Oh man, you don't need me for the senses, you need me for the visions."

"I need you for both," Jim admitted, and from the tone, he was not happy making that admission. "Unless I turn off the Sentinel abilities, I need you to guide me back if I lose control of the senses, but I just need you around to control the spirit world."

"So, the guide isn't just the idiot who stands behind the Sentinel randomly saying, 'dial it down' for all eternity?" Blair asked. Okay, that felt good. Truth be told, he was starting to feel like a little bit of an idiot because repeating what Jim already knew was seriously less than helpful. And the very fact that Jim's senses hadn't gone on overload in a semester apart was making Blair question all sorts of things, like why he kept trying to insist Jim needed him.

"Says the guy who's standing neck deep in polluted water about ten minutes away from drowning to death," Jim pointed out dryly.

"What? I'm... oh shit," Blair cursed. "Man, I do not want to drown again. Jim, you've got to get us out of here."

"That's what I'm here for," Jim said with a smug smile.

Blair narrowed his eyes and really studied Jim. "Wait, you really are here, aren't you? You know about me going through the Stargate?"

For a second, Jim just glared at him. "Yeah, I know. And just as soon as I know you're safe, I'm kicking your ass for that one. I may need you to control the spirit world, but you need me to keep control of the physical one while you go spirit walking all over creation. And you need me to come after you when you have your version of a metaphysical zone. Chief, the next time you take off without telling me, I'm handcuffing you and telling Simon to drop you in a holding cell and lose the paperwork."

"O'Neill may help you," Blair said as he realized that going back meant facing the other man.

"O'Neill's not going to be in any shape to help anyone," Jim said viciously.

"Is he okay?"

"For now." From the tone, Jim made it pretty clear that he wasn't going to be okay for long.

"Geez, the return of the Mother Hen," Blair complained softly, but he smiled at Jim. Yep, Jim was overbearing, but Blair wouldn't have it any other way.

"As much trouble as you get in, I have to be," Jim pointed out. "You couldn't even limit the Sandburg zone to one planet, could you?" he asked, taking Blair's hand and pulling him forward.

Blair closed his eyes and just focused on his hand in Jim's. Jim felt warm. "Nope. Man, there are other worlds, other cultures, other myths out there. Do you have any idea how many worlds may have Sentinels?"

"I can't say I care," Jim said dryly. Blair started to shiver, and Jim caught him by the arm, pulling him forward on unsteady feet.

"I bet they aren't as fucked up as the poor souls the military has been screwing up with all their gloom and doom." Blair thought about the two men he'd worked with. By the time Blair had reached them, each had been told that they couldn't control their senses, and both were suffering horribly through the process to turn the senses off. Blair had given them a limited control, but neither one had half the control of Jim.

"The military is good at fucking things up," Jim said, and Blair had the feeling that Jim was talking to someone else.

"Man, I am really cold," Blair complained as he really started trembling. He opened his eyes, and he was back at the Bermid'cate. Tree branches were strewn across the land and several trees had toppled, their roots sticking up toward the sky.

"Just hold on, Chief. Let's get you out of this water," Jim said. Blair blinked as the world shimmered in and out of focus for a second. The sun was dim, a faint red that suggested light more than illuminating the dark, but a dozen floodlights lit the lake. Teal'c and O'Neill were standing on the lake shore, their weapons in hand and the Tol elders were there, a dozen more Tol people behind them. Then again, the military people seemed to have multiplied too. Blair didn't remember nearly this many soldiers being around when he went into the lake.

"The whole point of a Sentinel is to have someone with a strong enough sensory link to this dimension that they don't get lost," Jim said smugly. Blair turned his head and saw Sam Carter sitting on a box with a large machine in front of her. Two more strangers with arm patches that said SG-11 stood near her.

"Blair, are you alright?" Carter asked, standing up.

"He'll be fine," Jim said. However, Blair couldn't feel his legs and Jim ended up getting an arm around Blair's waist and half-carrying him out of the water. "However, he's never coming back to this place. Whatever happened here, it's dangerous for someone like Blair. I don't even want him on this planet again, got it?" Jim demanded as he turned to O'Neill.

"Ellison, I don't want either one of you leaving Earth again."

"Good," Jim said. Blair finally stumbled onto the rock shore. He leaned into Jim's warmth, his wet hair clinging to him, and his vest weighing him down. Teal'c stepped forward and wrapped a thermal blanket around his shoulders, and Jim tucked it around him before pulling Blair close to his side again.

"Bermiddlt, are you well?" Lianch asked, stepping forward and picking his way over the fallen branches and drifts of sand and dirt that seemed to have randomly appeared since Blair went into the lake.

"Oh man, that was one serious trip."

"Apparently more than even we knew. We would not have exposed you to such danger, bermiddlt." Lianch turned to O'Neill. "You have our apologies that our holy waters have endangered your bermiddlt in such a way."

"No problem, man. It was just..."

"It was necessary," Jim finished quietly. "Which does not change that I hate this shit and you are going to pay for going off without me," Jim threatened him.

O'Neill gave a snort of laughter. "And here I thought Ellison was out of line. It turns out he has every reason to be cranky." O'Neill was giving Blair a look that would have made even Simon proud. But Blair did not back down to evil looks from cranky alpha males. He glared back until O'Neill rolled his eyes. "Let's get packed up and get Sandburg out of here before something else happens," he called. The soldiers all jumped to their tasks. Some started unstringing cables from trees, others started packing equipment, and two even started disassembling what looked like a machine gun.

"Oh man, how long was I out there?"

"About seven hours, Chief."

"Whoa, seven hours and I never got around to talking to the Tol ancestors... well, except for Oma Desala, and I am so not sure she tells the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth."

"Were our ancestors unhappy with the proposal, they would have made their voices heard, bermiddlt," Lianch assured him. "We are most happy to invite your people to come to mine the rocks."

"We appreciate that," O'Neill said. "Right now, I think we need to get our people home."

"Agreed. Our apologies, again," Lianch assured them before backing away and rejoining his people.

"Chief, is something still here?" Jim asked. His hand had been rubbing up and down on Blair's arm, generating warmth, but now he stopped.

"Something like?" Blair asked. He noticed that O'Neill and Teal'c both tightened their hold on their weapons and retreated from the lake a step.

"Air pressure change," Jim said quietly, as though an enemy might be near enough to hear. Then he grabbed Blair and ran for the trees. Others didn't wait for orders, they scrambled for cover, weapons drawn. Lianch and his people fled into the trees, and Blair could only cling to Jim, trying not to throw up. He was obviously not feeling one hundred percent yet.

A light exploded from the lake, tentacles reaching out from a body, but the light shifted, and then turned so black that the light around it seemed to vanish into it like a black hole. The thing flew at the shore, and Jim laid his body on top of Blair. Gunfire erupted, and Blair covered his head. The familiar laugh made Blair look up, and for a second, the jackal head appeared in the black mass. A man screamed, and Blair scrambled to get out from under Jim.

For a second, Jim held on, but Blair shoved at him, throwing him off before Blair stepped out from behind a tree. "NO!" Blair yelled. Distant thunder rang, and lightning came down, only to vanish into the black center of the being. Blair felt Jim grab his waist, but Jim didn't try to pull him down, he just held on. The black mass turned toward them, accelerating toward their position, and a machine gun rattled.

Blair felt his feet tingle, and he braced as the mass came down on him. "No!" he repeated, throwing his hands up. He felt the darkness slide around him, oil slipping through the cracks in his defenses, and that image inspired Blair to visualize fire. Thunder cracked open the night, lightning flashed so close that Blair could feel the heat of it, and then the night was silent. The Jackal-man who had challenged Oma was gone—not defeated, but gone from the battle.

Blair collapsed to his knees, his body falling on Jim who caught him in the cradle of his arms.

"Medic!" Jim called loudly. Voices shouted and hands pulled at Blair.

"Just let me keep contact with him," Jim was saying. Reality floated like water around him.

"Who calls lightning down on their own position, Ellison? Is he insane? Better yet, how did he do that? Carter?"

"I have no idea, sir. Give me some time, and I'll make up something plausible."

"Medic unit, full and immediate retreat. Logistics, vital equipment only. Tactical, cover and take rear." Reality started bobbing and swaying in a way that really made Blair think he was going to vomit. However, Jim held onto his arm, and Blair clung to that as a lifeline. He wondered if this was how Jim felt when he was zoning and struggling to follow Blair's voice back to reality. If so, Blair so owed Jim about a million apologies because as bad as this felt, if Jim felt anywhere near as bad, he deserved to be cranky about it. But he'd worry about that later. Right now he just desperately didn't want to vomit on himself.

29. Twenty-nine

Blair blinked his eyes and found himself staring up at Janet Fraiser. "You know, in some states, this could constitute stalking," she said with a smile.

He couldn't quite descramble his brains fast enough to answer, so he ended up just sort of staring at her owlishly. How had he ended up in SGC again?

"That's my little guppy, always being inappropriate with the women... or the table legs," Jim teased.

"Yeah, yeah, says the man who finds his girlfriends on the most wanted list," Blair retaliated. His throat was raw, and he started coughing. Jim helped him up, sitting on the edge of the bed and urging Blair to lean back against him as he offered a glass of water. Water, shamanic vision, weirdness all around. Oh yeah, he was never living down this. Strangely, Jim wasn't yelling at him... yet.

"At least my women only try to get me put in prison," Jim said dryly. Blair frowned up at him. "Nevermind, I'll fill you in later when you have enough voice to yell at me for not telling you at the time." Jim held the glass against Blair's lips, and Blair brought his hands up over Jim's to steady the glass.

"So, is he going to be okay?" O'Neill asked. Blair opened his eyes and found the colonel standing across the room with a spectacular black eye.

"You didn't..." Blair frowned at Jim, but the man had on his cat that ate the canary expression.

O'Neill gave a huff. "Yeah, you betcha. Of course, on the report I walked into the Stargate because I'm not going to let it be known that a Ranger got a hit in."

"After the stunt with Blair, you're lucky I used a fist. I considered using brass knuckles," Jim threatened. Instead of getting angry, O'Neill shrugged.

"I can't say I'd take it well if someone just about got Danny killed, but I mean it, Ellison. We left our issues on the planet, agreed?"

"Agreed," Jim said, and he actually sounded weirdly okay with that. Blair looked up at Jim suspiciously, wondering what he had planned. A pissed off Ellison could do anything from request an IRS audit to scramble drivers' license information. It might not be exactly legal, but the guys at the station didn't call him Hurricane Ellison because he had a sweet nature.

Blair was still trying to figure out what was going on when he noticed Jim's arm. "Oh man. Shit." Jim's whole arm was streaked red with rough patches of dry, white skin flaking off. "Where are the dials?"

"I have them set low, so it doesn't hurt," Jim assured him, which was not really reassuring.

"No way is that healthy. If you're dialed down, you might not notice how much damage was done."

"No, but I would." Dr. Fraiser stepped closer and held up an IV that Blair just now noticed was taped to Jim's arm. "And before you go off about drugs and holistic medicine, I am using the Sandburg method for irritation in those with Hyperactive Sensory Awareness. Aloe based lotion, low-dose antihistamines to prevent additional irritation and good old-fashioned time."

"She's not a half-bad doctor," Jim said. Blair squirmed around to try and see how far the damage went, but Jim just held on tighter so that Blair was trapped with his upper body mostly leaning back into Jim.

"Why thank you, sir," Dr. Fraiser said with a southern drawl. "But if you gentlemen will excuse me, I have people who are actually sick. An HSA patient with a rash does not warrant medical attention, and I have that from the very latest update of the medical standards and procedures manual."

"My dissertation," Blair breathed. Janet smiled at him and gave him a quick wink before heading out the door. Blair had put that recommendation in his dissertation after one of the HSA patients had overreacted to aggressive medical treatment and nearly died. The historical data showed that it was a much-too-common phenomenon.

"Looks like you're famous, kid," O'Neill offered from his spot against the wall. Blair was afraid that he might be staying away because of some sort of aggression between him and Jim, but Jim seemed pretty relaxed, and considering that Blair was all but laying on the man, he should know.

"So, is this party open to anyone?" Sam asked from the door. She smiled at Blair. "I thought about bringing you some flowers, but I thought you might like this a little more." She held up a small, wooden carving shaped like a fish. Swirls filled the stomach area with straight lines radiating out to his tail and head.

"Oh man, is that...?" Blair held his hand out.

Teal'c and Daniel followed her into the room. "Indeed it is," Teal'c answered for her. "The Tol people regret your injury, but they wished to send this as a token of their respect for the Tau'ri bermiddlt."

"It's stunning. I couldn't." Blair ran his fingers across the finely carved design.

Daniel leaned forward to look. "It's been a long time since anyone on that planet has seen a fish. I wonder how old that is."

"No way," Blair said, closing his hand around it. "You archeologists do things like chip part off to do carbon dating. So not happening."

"I didn't say anything about testing it!" Daniel defended himself.

"Oh, you were thinking it," O'Neill said. "You're always thinking something archeological."

Daniel rolled his eyes.

"And talking about the need to have a story that doesn't sound insane, I thought we might discuss what happened on the Tol world," O'Neill suggested randomly, either that or Blair wasn't tracking the conversation as well as he should. "And let's get the story straight before we have to have one version for the general."

Blair noticed that Sam looked particularly uncomfortable. "Oh man, you have the job that really sucks, huh?" he asked her.

She looked at him in surprise. "I love my job."

"But you have to make really unscientific things seem scientific, and all this stuff with shamanism?" Blair cringed at how they were going to explain this.

She walked over to the bed Jim had been using before and sat down. "Oh, I don't know. We took some equipment in after you walked into the lake, so I can tell you a few things about the scientific data. I detected an unusual number of Kaluza-Klein gravitons when you were in the lake, and the numbers dropped the moment you came out."

"Meaning..." O'Neill prompted her.

"Sir, normally KK gravitons are produced in particle accelerators when atoms crash into each other. They're produced to create a halo effect so that scientists can study the shape of dimensions predicted by string theory."

Blair sat up. "Really? Whoa, I had no idea that kind of research is going on."

Right away, Sam turned pink and cleared her throat. "Well, it isn't exactly officially going on... yet. But the presence of the gravitons and altered hadrons with valence quarks that I can't even explain given the intrinsic parity and the charge conjugation, I can scientifically prove that something happened out there, and it most likely included and interaction with an alternate dimension as predicted by string theory." She sounded really excited.

Blair blinked at her. He didn't even know half the words she had used. Looking over at Daniel, he found the man had an amused look on his face. Daniel shrugged. "We learn to smile and nod and assume that whatever she says is true," Daniel offered.

"Yep," O'Neill agreed.

"Indeed," Teal'c offered. Blair could almost feel the amusement in the room. Jim tugged at him, and Blair let himself be pulled back to the warmth of Jim's chest.

"So," Jim said once Blair had settled back in place, "you know that you had at least a few visitors there?"

"Vistors? How many?" O'Neill demanded, and the casual body language vanished.

"Oma?" Daniel asked.

"Ask Blair, he's the shaman," Jim offered. Blair turned and glared at the man for throwing him to the wolves. Blair had no idea how to explain this without sounding crazy, and Jim had way more experience with actually being around this whole spiritual world. That was odd. Jim had more experience with the spiritual, even though he loved to hate visions and pretend they didn't exist. But if Jim knew about visions....

"Jim, I need to ask you something. Guys, do you think you could give us a second?" he asked the team. O'Neill and Daniel traded concerned looks.

"Chief, does this have something to do with yesterday?"

Blair considered the answer. "Um, sort of. It has to do with Peru... with Sarris." Blair waited for Jim to push him away and stalk off. Jim did stiffen, his body reacting to the words, but he didn't move off Blair's bed.

"It's okay, Chief. Everyone here is in covert ops, and I guess that includes you now. Ask what you need to ask."

"But you hate..."

"I hate talking about it with people who can't understand what it means to do what I've done," Jim cut him off. That surprised Blair because Jim wouldn't even talk about his covert ops days to Simon, and he'd always thought of Jim and Simon as being about as close as guys got. Jim sighed. "You're my partner, and everyone else here... my guess is that they've had to make some choices they pretty much hate."

"We have," O'Neill said softly. "And we'll have to make more in the future." The tone of the room became suddenly somber.

Blair frowned, not sure if he wanted to do this in front of the SG1 team, but he needed to know how much of the vision had been real before the real Jim had shown up. "After your helicopter went down." Blair stopped, hating that he could feel the pain in Jim. "Did Sarris and Peters survive the crash?"

Jim nodded, his body still stiff.

"Sarris, he was bleeding, but you had to shoot a snake that had climbed on Peters, and by the time you got back, Sarris was dead." Blair remembered the scene so vividly. "And you lied to Peters, told him that Sarris was fine and turned Sarris' head so that Peters wouldn't see he was dead." Blair stopped, concerned by the way the color had gone out of Jim's face.

"I did," Jim said firmly. "I thought the rescue 'copter would get there before Peters knew any better. It didn't. The bugs got to Sarris before the fever took Peters." The room was silent. "You had a vision," Jim said softly, no emotion in his voice, and Blair wasn't sure if that was an improvement over anger or not. But Jim was still clutching Blair close to his chest, so Blair imagined there was some sort of emotion registering behind Jim's stoic façade.

Blair nodded. "Incacha showed me."

Jim closed his eyes for a second and then nodded. "Yeah, he would." Jim didn't say any more, but knowing it had happened, Blair could put the pieces together pretty easily. Jim never wanted to do that again, he never wanted to see someone he cared about die, to sit with them when they slowly slid away. And every time Blair wandered too far into a vision, that's what he was asking Jim to do, to sit and watch him—guard him—not knowing for sure if Blair would come back.

"Oma wanted me to drown," Blair suddenly realized. Jim's arms tightened around him.

"Oma Desala tried to kill you?" Daniel asked, clearly shocked.

Blair shook his head. "She wanted to help me find a way to ascend."

"Which would kill you," O'Neill pointed in a tone of voice that made his lack of respect for Oma Desala pretty damn clear.

"Jack," Daniel warned.

"Danny, she brainwashes you trying to convince you that you're evil, and she tries to kill Blair. I think that puts her on the morally questionable list."

"Jack!"

"Which, given her interest in you, is not really surprising."

"Don't even—" Daniel started to say.

"And I'm pretty sure that was her trying to fry us at the end, and if it wasn't for Blair and his sudden and weirdly effective control over lightning, we all would have been bug splats on the windshield of the universe."

"Whoa, hey, NO!" Blair interrupted. He had been afraid Daniel and O'Neill were really getting angry with each other, but they both looked at him with curious expressions that didn't show any sign of aggravation at all.

"Blair?" Sam asked. "What is it?"

"That wasn't Oma at the end. Couldn't you see the jackal head?" Blair looked around and everyone, including Jim, was looking at him like he was just a little bit crazy.

"Jackal head?" O'Neill's tone was a little disbelieving, and Jim's arms tightened a bit, offering a tacit reassurance. "On a jackal or just floating in the white energy person?"

Blair took a second to glare at O'Neill. "Yes, a jackal head. There was someone else there, someone like Oma, who kept popping into my shamanic vision," Blair reined in his temper by trying to pretend that O'Neill was one of the idiotic freshman students he used to teach at Rainier.

"Teal'c?" O'Neill asked.

Blair looked over, and Teal'c had a concerned look on his face. "The jackal represented Anubis, but he was defeated and executed by the System Lords many centuries ago when he became too powerful for any of them to coexist with him."

"Aw, crap. Anyone want to guess what power Annuby went for?" O'Neill asked. "I miss the days when dead meant dead."

"I don't," Jim said softly. He shifted a bit, and Blair had to shift to keep from putting all his weight on one of Jim's arms. It still concerned him that Jim had such a bad rash, but Jim didn't act like he wanted Blair to get off him any time soon. And the truth was that Blair was more than a little comforted by the physical closeness. Once the shamanic vision had passed and Blair realized that he was nearly submerged in water, he had been really bothered by the fact that he had lost all touch with reality. Now he didn't want to let Jim go. He was just lucky that Jim was fairly touchy-feely under normal circumstances and he had his extra-special Mother Hen version of touchy-feeling going right now.

"But Blair." Sam leaned forward, a confused look on her face. "If you didn't ascend, how did you stop Oma or Anubis or whoever it was that went after you at the end? Lieutenant Anderson was badly burned, and you didn't have anything more serious than an electrolyte imbalance."

"No, let's just get the story from the beginning," O'Neill interrupted. Blair looked over his shoulder at Jim. He had a slightly sour expression on his face, but Blair figured that was because he hated shamanistic powers, not because he didn't believe in them. Jim also didn't look like he was going to jump in and do any explaining for Blair. So, Blair started when he first followed the colors into the lake and ended when he'd felt the oil of Anubis sliding over his defenses and he'd imagined fire coming to ignite the oil. By the time he finished, Jim was holding him almost painfully tight and Teal'c was the only member of the SG1 team who didn't look seriously freaked out. When you freaked out people who considered aliens, conspiracies, and alternate realities normal, you really, seriously had issues. The room went silent for several seconds after Blair finished.

"Carter?" O'Neill finally asked.

"Sir?"

"Would you like to translate what he just said into something that isn't going to get us all put on a psych review?"

"Ah..." Carter looked at Blair, took a deep breath, and seemed to brace herself. "Given that we know alternate dimensions were accessed?" she asked weakly. "Okay. String theory postulates that anywhere from six to twenty-six dimensions intersect this one at any given time. Assuming that Oma Desala and this new male you tentatively identified as Anubis are manipulating energy by existing in one of these alternate dimensions, that means it is possible that Incacha and Roland Atole are accessing a separate dimension or set of dimensions. The rules of physics would be different for each, which might explain why Oma identified her form of ascending as being related to the stars while Roland associated his with the planet."

"Then why did Oma need to use a Stargate on Kheb?" O'Neill asked.

"I have no idea, sir." Carter shook her head. "But if I'm right, these other dimensions intersect with and therefore interact with this dimension. Pure energy, like lightning, would probably be one of the easier elements of this dimension to manipulate if you had access to another set of physics rules as sting theory postulates may exist in other dimensions. Maybe. Honestly, I'm making this up as I go, sir."

Teal'c took a small step forward. "Does Roland Atole still live?" he asked.

"Whoa." Blair blinked for a second. "You know, I have no idea. I hadn't thought about him in years, but he'd be pretty old by now." Blair thought about Roland as he had aged in the vision, smiling out of a wrinkled face. "I think he might be."

"If he lives, he may provide answers," Teal'c pointed out.

"Way to go for the obvious answer the rest of us are so totally missing," Blair said. He started pushing himself up to get out of bed only to have Jim pull him back.

"Oh no. You are going to stay here until your heart rate and body temperature are normal," Jim said firmly.

"Okay, the Mother Hen routine is amusing, but seriously Jim, I'm fine."

"Seriously, Sandburg, you're not," Jim said without letting go. "I saw all the signs--the forgotten meals, you setting an alarm to remind you to go to bed, the way you completely ignored injuries and illnesses and just ended up aggravating them--and I just thought that if I could get you to stay as far away from me as possible that you'd somehow be fine."

"What? Oh man, that is the stupidest piece of logic I've ever heard," Blair said, not even caring that the others were there to hear. Jim's manhandling of him was doing serious damage to his male ego. He squirmed again to get loose, and Jim just threw a leg over his thighs and really pinned him down.

"Forget it, Darwin. Incacha used to do the same thing, and now that you're fully on the path, I'm not about to let you ignore your own body's needs."

"Ellison, do you mind explaining why you're restraining your partner?" O'Neill asked, with just an edge of warning in his voice.

Teal'c nodded. "The tao qua ca tec'ma'te i cal mah cares for others better than himself," he said quietly.

"There's a lot of documented history on that," Daniel nodded. "Some have even been known to starve themselves to death by accident or to just forget to keep breathing."

"Exactly," Jim said. "I may need Blair around to control the spiritual side of things, but it's my job to make sure that he doesn't forget the physical."

"Oh man, you cannot be serious," Blair said as he glared at his partner.

"I don't know, he looks serious to me," O'Neill said. "Actually, if you were in my command, I would be thinking very hard about not asking and reminding you to not tell. Ellison, you might want to consider how that looks." O'Neill made a gesture toward the bed where Jim and Blair were. Blair blushed as he realized what it must look like with Octopus Ellison wrapped around him.

"Oh man. Okay, I do not need humiliating here," he hissed.

"Then promise me you'll stay in bed until your vitals are back to normal," Jim said with that thoughtful look on his face, like when he was negotiating with a perp.

"You wouldn't," Blair warned.

"O'Neill, would you have a pair of handcuffs I could borrow?" Jim asked with a smug grin.

"Oh yeah," O'Neill answered. "You betcha."

"Okay, fine, I'll stay in bed," Blair relented. He sagged back onto Jim's chest and at least Jim moved his leg so they only looked mildly inappropriate. Of course, Jim also had a very pleased look on his face. Blair put an elbow in Jim's stomach.

"You have fun kids," O'Neill suggested. "A lieutenant will be around in a couple of hours to take your statement, and let's try to limit ourselves to discussions of energy and ascended beings and dimensions, okay?" He looked at them hopefully.

Jim nodded. "On one condition, Colonel. You need to realize that if you ever take Blair somewhere without me again, I'm going to be a lot less friendly about it than I was this time."

"Hey, you got in a lucky shot," O'Neill said, reaching up to touch his bruised eye. "I'll take you down next time." O'Neill shifted so that he was facing off against Jim, and Blair could feel Jim's body tense in return. Daniel stood, moving quickly to O'Neill's side, but not even that calmed the sudden tension.

"I give you my word as a warrior that I shall inform you if Blair's skills are required," Teal'c offered before Jim could say anything in return. Blair watched as Teal'c, Jim, and O'Neill traded looks in some sort of alpha male way that Blair still didn't have the secret decoder ring for. He guessed that everyone was allotted one power base in life, and his was not ever going to be the sort of physical dominance these three had.

"Thank you," Jim finally offered Teal'c. "And Colonel, you still don't know shit about being a Sentinel. I can see your skin cells contract a fraction of a second before your muscle reacts. I can track the movement of your eye as you search for a vulnerability, and I can smell the shift in the hormones in your sweat a second before you decide to go on the offensive. The senses may pose some... difficulties, but you have no idea what they're capable of doing, and in hand-to-hand combat, you will never win."

For a second, Blair thought they were going to have a confrontation. O'Neill stared at Jim, and not even Daniel's hand on his arm distracted him, but then he shook his head.

"Ya, you betcha, just keep telling yourself that," O'Neill said, passing the comment off as a joke before he turned and headed out of the room, Daniel close behind. At the door, Daniel turned and offered a quick smile and 'bye' before he was gone.

Sam stood up. "You know, detective, this really is all scientifically explainable, everything from your senses to Blair's ability to interact with dimensions most of us can't see."

"Yeah, it's just not science I ever want to explain to my captain at work," Jim said firmly. "So, we are going to keep the strange stuff to a minimum in Cascade.... assuming..." Jim stopped, but Blair could hear the rest of the question pretty easily.

"Of course I'm coming back. I might do some work out of McChord, but man, I am done with Bethesda. They so do not like me just because I poked a few holes in their theories and totally enjoyed it."

Sam laughed. "The enjoying it part tends to annoy people."

"Doesn't it, though?" Blair asked with a smile. Truthfully, he'd been pretty miserable in D.C., and he'd kept fluctuating between believing he needed to get back to Jim and being afraid that Jim would just rather he not come back at all. It wasn't going down as the happiest period of his life. "But man, when you guys called and said you had a top secret mission for me that you needed me for within forty-eight hours... I have never seen a dissertation committee move that fast."

Sam shrugged. "I think the general gave them the idea that we needed you to retrieve information from confidential sources, and he wanted the paperwork signed by someone with 'doctor' in front of their name, but you earned the degree, fair and square. Janet was really impressed by your work, and it's not often that someone who isn't a world-class surgeon or medical researcher impresses Janet. Anyway, I should let you get some rest before your partner chases me out." She reached over and patted Blair on the leg, and Blair smiled at the gesture.

"The lieutenant who was burned..." Blair asked right as Sam reached the door.

"He'll be fine," Sam said with a smile. "You distracted the attacker."

Blair let his head fall back against Jim's shoulder.

"So, Teal'c, I guess next time you visit me, you'll get to see the great state of Washington," Blair said with a smile for the last member of SG1 in the room.

Teal'c inclined his head, accepting the offer. "I shall." Then he turned his eyes to Jim. "And I wish to offer my apologies. My people have stories of those who walk Blair Sandburg's path, but I gravely underestimated the danger to him and overestimated my ability to protect him. I do not believe O'Neill is solely responsible for the decision which placed Blair in harm's way."

"Yeah, but he's the one I'd beat in a fight," Jim said with a shrug.

Teal'c watched Jim for several seconds before inclining his head again and turning to walk out the door without any other words.

"Man, I am tired," Blair said, the fatigue hitting him as the others left.

"No shit, Sherlock. You were feeding off their energy to hype yourself up. You don't have any reserves of your own because you need sleep."

"I... really?" Blair asked, twisting around so that he was more on his side.

"Yeah, really. I hoped that if you weren't around me, you'd stop doing that." Jim sighed. "I don't think it worked. From what I hear, you were the Energizer Bunny of Bethesda. Apparently a couple of the doctors were ready to admit you for bipolar disorder."

"You were keeping track of me," Blair smiled as he settled his cheek against Jim's arm and closed his eyes.

"I always will, Chief. Go to sleep, we still have a mess to sort out when you're feeling better."

"Man, so not the way to inspire pleasant dreams," Blair complained, but he was warm and comfortable, and he could hear Jim's heartbeat and that was enough. The rest of the world would wait.

Epilogue

"Hairboy!" Henri Brown called happily when Blair walked into the bullpen. Blair felt the wave of acceptance and honest joy and he went bounding into the room to exchange a nice manly hug with Henri, complete with arm slapping and shoving. "I guess it's Dr. Hairboy now, huh? Good job, short stuff." Henri shoulder-butted him, and Rafe rolled his eyes at his partner's antics.

"Congratulations, Blair." Rafe offered his hand, and Blair smiled and shook it.

"Thanks, man. It's wild. I mean, I've been chasing that degree forever, and now I have it. Totally wild."

"So, are you back to stay?" Rafe asked, sitting on the edge of his desk.

Blair chewed his lip, and Jim's arm landed on his shoulders. "We hope so," Jim said. "The military picked up Blair's dissertation, something about redesigning units and the personal relationships within them, although it looks like the specifics of Darwin's brain are now classified, but the brass is working on something with McChord." Jim ruffled his hair, and Blair swung his arms around, smacking Jim's hands away and trying to save his hair.

"Man, do you know how hard it is to get knots out of curls? Back off." Blair looked at Jim who now had his arms crossed over his chest and he was smirking. "At least I have hair," Blair said with a look at Jim's receding hairline.

"Ouch," Henri said with a laugh. "Oh yeah, our Hairboy is back. So, if your brain is now classified, does that mean that you can't entertain us with stories of tribal circumcisions anymore?"

"We aren't that lucky," Jim said, but he gave Blair a smile that made it very clear that his Sentinel was teasing him. Blair punched him in the stomach. Unfortunately, Jim saw it coming and tensed his muscle, so it didn't do much good. Henri and Rafe both laughed.

"It's been boring around here without you, well, except for the time Aldo tried to frame Jim for stealing drugs and then his ex set him up for murder."

Blair glared at Jim good for that one. He had been just a little pissed that Jim had gone through all that and hadn't even talked to him. He punched Jim in the gut again, and this time got an "oomph" when Jim didn't see it coming fast enough. "Yeah, I heard about that."

Henri laughed. Rafe hit him on the arm. "You're supposed to tell your partner when you're in trouble, idiot," Rafe said, and from the tone, something was going on with those two.

"Oh man, what's up?" Blair asked.

"Ellison, Sandburg!" Simon called from the office.

"I'll catch you two later," Blair said, but that's all he had time to say because Jim was pulling him toward Simon's office. Since getting back from Colorado, Jim had been at his touchy-feely finest, even in front of the McChord general, which had caused a few eyebrows to go up.

"Sandburg," Simon said as they walked in. "Good to see you in one piece. I hope you know that when you do things as stupid as taking off and disappearing into a military machine without telling anyone, you make your partner do even stupider things." Simon leaned back in his chair and pinned Blair with a very unhappy look. Oh yeah, life was back to normal.

"George said Jim was a little on the out of control and cranky side," Blair nodded as he dropped into a seat. A flash of confusion crossed Simon's face.

"General George Hammond, commander of the Cheyenne Mountain facility," Jim filled in as he settled into place leaning against the wall. Simon's eyebrows went up.

"So, Simon, are they going to approve my application to work here?" Blair leaned forward, his guts tense as he waited for the answer. He knew that Jim could do the day to day work without him as long as Blair was around at night or in case of a zone, but he didn't want Jim out there doing it alone. They were partners.

Simon shook his head, and Blair's guts rolled into another knot. "They wouldn't have, except you have some friends that pulled some pretty big strings."

Blair let out a breath that he didn't realize he'd been holding. "So, I'm hired?"

"The CPD will be paying one-quarter of your rather considerable salary with the Department of Defense covering the other three-quarters, but that means that we agree to give you six weeks off a year at their discretion, and apparently they don't feel the need to give any advance warning about when they might need you."

Blair nodded. "Cool."

"Cool?" Simon leaned forward, his face tight with anger. "What the hell have you done, Sandburg? What have you dragged Jim into?"

Blair jumped, surprised, but Jim was already there, standing in front of Blair and leaning over Simon's desk. "That's enough, Simon," he said sharply, and Simon leaned back, surprise on his face. "Blair has already helped two soldiers through the hell of having their senses go online. He's not going to let some nineteen-year-old kid die, screaming in pain, when he can help."

"But your privacy?" Simon asked, and the anger had drained from him. Blair reached out and rested his hand on Jim's back. He didn't want Jim to ruin this friendship, not when these two were so close. Simon had stood up for Jim when no other department wanted him because he still had his attitude in high gear. Simon had broken the rules and backed Jim during the Veronica disaster when Blair hadn't been there to help.

Jim stood up and shook his head. Blair could practically feel him trying to shake off his anger like water. "They've always known, Simon. They put a note in my records, and if the doctors I went to when I first started having trouble had entered my information into a database search, the Army would have shown up to help me turn the senses off. There's no conspiracy."

Simon looked from Jim to Blair in confusion.

"Instead, I found Blair, or Blair found me," Jim shrugged. "For the military, these senses are a disability no different from a bomb blast partially deafening a soldier. Apparently the large severance package I got from the Army included a pay line that is used to compensate for disabilities related to combat, but I didn't really pay attention to what they handed me. I knew it was bigger than my missing paychecks, and I just deposited it."

"Oh man, they have it so wrong. Simon, they leave these guys in pain while they try to turn off one sense at a time, or even worse, they put them in a chemically induced coma. Way too many of them never wake up out of that. I don't even want to think what would have happened if they'd found out Jim came online." Blair looked up, and Jim moved to his side, resting a hand on Blair shoulder. "My dissertation changed the medical procedures, but there are still lots of old-guard doctors out there who aren't going to listen."

Simon closed his eyes for a second before he started nodding. "So, when a soldier comes in with these senses..."

"I need to go wherever he is and help him," Blair finished. "And I'll be working days off over at McChord—training commanders on how to recognize the signs and help men in the field if they can't immediately evacuate someone who shows signs of hyperactive sensory awareness."

"How are you doing with the idea of Blair working with other Sentinels?" Simon asked Jim. It was a fair question given that he'd been around to see the whole Alex fiasco. However, the two men Blair had worked with hadn't shown any signs of trying to shove his head in a toilet and drown him, and Jim hadn't lost it back in Cascade. The more Blair thought about it, the more he realized that Jim had gone off the rails with Alex because of his visions. It wasn't the Sentinel's job to control the visions, it was the Shaman's. Of course, that didn't let Jim totally off the hook because Blair might have found control over his own powers a whole lot sooner if Jim hadn't been trying to keep him away from it.

Jim didn't answer. Then again, he never did when it came to Alex. Blair figured that he carried that guilt right next to the guilt of having watched Frank Sarris die and the guilt of not protecting Incacha from the real world of Cascade. "Man, I was only seeing half the picture," Blair started. Jim's fingers tightened on his shoulder. Blair reached up and patted Jim's arm reassuringly. "Yeah, Jim did his own share of screwing up by trying to keep me clear of the spiritual shit, but I was supposed to be doing half the work in this relationship, and I was trailing behind him saying 'dial it down' when he so already knew he was supposed to be dialing down." Blair rolled his eyes at his own stupidity.

"I wasn't letting you do your job, Chief," Jim said, his guilt showing up right on schedule. Simon frowned at both of them.

"Spiritual shit?"

Blair couldn't help it; he started grinning. He looked up, and Jim was fighting with a smug grin of his own.

"Spiritual shit?" Simon repeated a little louder.

"Oh man, I could do a vision quest for Ventriss. No way is that little shit going to know how to defend against that kind of trace." Blair bounced in his seat at the very idea.

"Vision quest?" This time Simon's voice was so very soft.

"You'd find him in no time, Chief. Do you want to try tonight?"

"I just have to find my drum music in my boxes," Blair said with a huge grin. Ventriss was so going down.

"That may take a while. You brought back entire trees of paper, Chief."

Blair waved Jim away. "Oh, and I can use the fish fetish as a focus."

"I'd feel safer if you just used me like you're supposed to," Jim said, and the joking was gone from his voice. Blair looked up and smiled.

"No problem man, you're in charge of this half of the trip."

"The trip?" Simon stood up. "No, I don't want to know."

"Simon," Blair said playfully as he saw the alarm on the captain's face. Blair stood up and started edging toward the door because Simon was so primed to blow.

"No, get out, Sandburg, and take your partner with you. I do not want to hear any of this."

Jim laughed. "Come on, Chief, let's leave Simon alone before we turn the last of his hair gray."

"Too late. I have to dye it because of you two," Simon complained, but Blair noticed he didn't look particularly angry. "Just..." Simon held up his hands in a gesture of surrender. "Just, whatever you do, find some excuse that at least looks possible on paper." He frowned. "And let me believe that excuse, got it?"

"Yes, sir," Jim answered with a smile. He pulled at Blair's arm, and they both headed back for their desks sitting in the middle of the bull pen. Rafe and Henri were working at their desks, and Conner walked in the door. "Sandy!" she shouted happily as she hurried over. Jim's expression wasn't nearly as happy. Yep, all the pieces were back in their proper place.

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Ficlet

Still a Little Off

"Jim woke, his body instantly on alert. Casting out his hearing, he found Blair's heartbeat. He wasn't in his room, though. The pre-dawn air was still and dim; gray light filtered in through the windows. Clearly, Blair should still be in bed safely snoring and drooling on his pillow. With his guts tightening with worry, Jim trotted down the stairs.

Ever since Blair had embraced his role as guide and shaman, he had become more and more likely to lose himself in visions and dreams where Jim couldn't follow him... couldn't protect him. And a little part of Jim felt guilty because he liked the fact that the visions that had plagued him had vanished—had migrated over to Blair, official guide and shaman. The balcony doors were open, and as the sunrise just started to stain the sky with pink, Blair stood staring out over the city, his curls blowing in a gentle wind.

"Blair?" Jim grabbed the blanket off the back of the couch and padded out onto the balcony. He could dial down the chilly morning air so that he didn't feel the ache of it in his bones; Blair couldn't. "Shit, Chief, your arms are covered in goose pimples." Jim slung the blanket around Blair's shoulders and then pulled his guide close, hoping to warm him. But Blair's eyes remained fixed on some distant spot of sky even as he leaned back into Jim's frame. Jim's Sentinel vision couldn't see anything, but then Blair had a way of seeing things that not even Jim could see. For a second, Blair remained utterly focused, his body stiff in Jim's arms as he stared out into the sky, the purplish blue of which reminded Jim of a healing bruise.

Rubbing his hands up and down Blair's arms, Jim could only wait as Blair wandered the spiritual world. A shiver went through Blair's frame, and then another, and then his teeth started chattering.

"Jim?" Blair asked, his voice confused.

"Shit, Chief, you really need to tell me if you're going to go off on some vision quest. For that matter, staying in the heat might be a good idea, too." Jim pulled Blair backwards into the loft, kicking the door closed with his foot so that he didn't have to let go of Blair.

"Oh man. Damn, that's cold."

"No shit, Sherlock," Jim said, but he carefully guided Blair to the couch, and then pulled Blair down as he sat. For a second, Blair was stiff, and then he curled towards Jim's heat, his hands reaching around Jim's waist, probably trying to defrost. "Blair, you have to tell me if you're going to go do your thing."

"My thing?" Blair sounded amused.

"You know, where you see dead people and shit that I don't even want to think about?" Jim tightened his arms, and Blair made a little huffing noise as he squirmed around a little. The fact was that Jim was grateful that the visits from Incacha and the visions of spirit guides and even the blue dreams had faded. True, he didn't like that Blair was now on the supernatural front lines, but after Blair had left to finish his PhD, Jim had nearly gone mad as the visions spiraled out of control. He'd wake up to find illusionary water flowing through the living room or his black jaguar spirit guide chewing on the furniture. Blair's absence had made the task of keeping the visions at bay impossible. He couldn't control visions any more than Blair could control his body temperature. And sometimes—just sometimes—Jim felt a little guilty that he now got to have a life that came a whole lot closer to normal only because he had passed all that shit over to Blair. "Chief, I'm not going to stop you from doing whatever vision walk crap you need to do, but you need to tell me so that I can be here to look after you."

Blair laughed. "Oh man, do you have any idea what that sounds like?" He shifted around again so that his head rested against Jim's chest, the shivering finally vanishing.

"What?"

"You sound like me... like the old me when I was always nagging the shit out of you to not try and do everything yourself."

"Chief," Jim warned, his tone making it pretty clear that the two things were not the same. He got a poke in the ribs.

"It is the same damn thing... only not. Man, I did not mean to do a vision walk. I was just..." Blair pulled a hand out from under the blanket to wave it at the universe in general. Then he quickly pulled it back under again. "Damn, it's cold. Anyway, you used to go charging off without me, so you were like intentionally obstreperous. I was just...." Blair shrugged.

Jim frowned. This sort of confusion wasn't normal for Blair. In fact, it was a little disconcerting how quickly and easily Blair took to his spiritual duties as shaman, but now he sounded lost... confused. "Blair?" Jim asked. Just days ago, Blair had tried to use a vision quest to track down Ventriss. Since Blair and Jim had been busy in the SGC at the time of the Ventriss investigation, the little shit had given Joel the slip and disappeared. But Blair's quest had been neatly repelled, so maybe that had thrown him.

"I know, I know," Blair said wearily. "I'm not nearly as thick as you are, though. I would have come to you if I knew I was going on a vision quest. Unlike some people, I don't have some god complex that makes me think I can do this by myself."

"I thought I had a guilt complex," Jim teased. Blair raised his head long enough to glare at him. Jim couldn't keep from smiling just a little.

"Dick."

Jim didn't disagree with that. "What happened, Chief?"

Blair shrugged and then went still for long minutes, but Jim remained silent, waiting for some sort of answer. With a small noise, Blair tried to pull away, but Jim just tightened his arms around Blair. Blair was in charge of the spiritual world and all the shit that entailed, but this was the physical world, and this was Jim's territory.

"I can't protect you if you don't talk to me, Chief."

"There's nothing to protect me from. If anything, I’m the one who needs to protect you." This time, Blair did shove him away, scooting to the far side of the couch where he clutched the blanket that Jim had put around his shoulders and stared, wild-eyed, at the room.

"Blair?" Jim leaned forward. If there were some sort of spiritual problem, it would be Blair's job to protect both of them, but after watching Blair channel lightning, Jim had no doubt that Blair could. He just hated the feeling that there were enemies around that he couldn't see or fight. A huge part of him wanted to protect his guide. "Blair, talk to me," Jim asked.

Blair finally looked over at him, his blue eyes troubled. Then Blair dropped his eyes to the floor and scrubbed his face with a hand. "I don't know. I mean, I know there's something wrong, but I don't just don't know what."

Even though Blair had just pulled away, Jim reached over and tugged on Blair, urging him back. Without even a token resistance, Blair leaned heavily into Jim, his head resting against Jim's shoulder.

"Did you ask Roland?" Jim asked. In real life, the old man was an invalid with Alzheimer's so severe that he couldn't tell you his own name, but on the spirit plane, he had become the mentor who guided Blair through the intricacies of understanding his powers. Sometimes Jim wondered who Blair would have become if Naomi had stayed in New Mexico and allowed Roland to teach a young Blair to embrace his powers from the start.

"He told me that I'm being stupid."

"He called you stupid?" Jim frowned. That didn't sound right.

Blair snorted. "He told me that everyone with eyes could see the truth, but the man who stares at the truth can't see anything." Blair's arms slipped around Jim again, and Jim settled back into the couch so that he was half-laying down, Blair on top of him. The sunrise was starting to send stripes of light through the blinds on the windows, and Jim could see every mote of dust floating in the air, each a tiny world filled with tiny landscapes and mountains and valleys. Blair's heart beat slightly out of time with Jim's heart so that the two created a complex rhythm that filled the air.

"Is there danger?" Jim asked.

"I don't know. I don't think so, but I can feel things... I feel like everything is just a half an inch off... like someone snuck into my office and moved the books over just far enough to make everything feel alien." Blair's arms tightened around him, and Jim held Blair close. Whatever was coming, they would deal with it together. Never again would Jim allow their friendship to be destroyed by fear or some misguided attempt to keep Blair clear of trouble.

"You could have woken me," Jim said softly.

For heavy seconds, Blair didn't answer. "I just thought I was going to watch the sunrise. I totally did not expect to get pulled into that conversation. Man, it is too damn early in the morning to have someone call me stupid."

"Next time wake me up. Otherwise, I'm going to start sleeping on the couch just so that I don't have to worry about you. Keeping your body in one piece and free of pneumonia is my job," Jim pointed out. Besides, Blair hated the military doctors at McChord and if he took Blair back to the student health clinic, Nurse Ratched was going to gut him with a spoon. The woman knew how to hold a grudge, and she just could not get over Jim's case of temporary assholedom a few months back.

Blair didn't answer, but he yawned so wide that Jim could swear he could hear the man's jaw muscles popping.

"Do you want to go back to bed?" Jim asked. It was still early for Blair, especially since he usually didn't get to bed until well after midnight. Instead of answering, Blair's body stiffened for a brief second, and then he was pushing himself away.

"Yeah, I probably should. I totally need the sleep. Man, I have to deal with Colonel Pissy tomorrow, and if that man does not stop making stupid comments about Sentinels, I'm going to have to have you kill him and hide the body."

"Hold on, there," Jim said, reaching out to catch Blair's wrist just as Blair was ready to make a run for it. "Blair, what's going on?"

"Nothing." Blair tried to put on his best innocent face, but Jim wasn't nearly as naïve as the guys on poker night who bought the innocent look from Blair every single time.

"Don't do this, Blair," Jim warned.

A frown darted across Blair's face, and his gaze flicked to the open door to his room.

"Chief, is there something wrong with your room?"

"What? No. No way. Everything's fine; I'm just tired." Blair tried to retreat, but Jim held onto his wrist.

"Don't shut me out, Chief." It went against every instinct Jim owned, but he let the fear and the dismay show through in his face. Immediately, Blair moved closer and sat on the edge of the couch.

"No way would I ever shut you out, Jim. That's not ever going to happen, and this is really embarrassing, so could you maybe just let it drop?"

Jim studied Blair's face from the way his cheeks were slightly pinked to the capillaries in his eyes contracting so that the tiny red webs in the white of his eye thinned. In the morning light, the blue of his eyes was brighter than normal, and the black was so dark that Jim could see the reflection of the window in it. His curls were a wind-blown mess, and one stray hair was caught in the eyelashes of his left eye. Jim reached up and used his thumb to trace the outer edge of Blair's brow, pulling the hair loose as he went.

"Chief, you've seen me at my worst, emotionally and physically. You never made me feel anything but safe admitting some pretty fucked up shit. Please trust me enough to do the same for you." Jim whispered the words, but they hit Blair hard enough that the black of his eyes widened with emotion.

"I do. I totally trust you, Jim."

"Tell me what you're thinking, then."

Blair sighed and looked away for a half second before meeting Jim's gaze. "I can't sleep. This feeling that something is slightly out of step gets worse the longer I lay there. I try to not think about it, but that's not happening."

"Is there something I can do to help?" Blair's face turned much pinker almost immediately.

Jim leaned forward and caught Blair's second hand so that he held both. "Blair?"

Closing his eyes, Blair whispered, "This is so stupid."

"Chief?" Jim knew he'd won when Blair's shouldered sagged and he took a deep breath, letting it out with a huge sigh.

"It's better when we're close. Could I maybe..." Blair bit his lip, but Jim wasn't a stupid man. He sometimes acted like an idiot, but he wasn't stupid.

"Come on, Chief, let's go to bed," Jim suggested as he stood. From the grateful smile Blair gave him, Jim had guessed right. Jim held Blair's wrist and led the way up to his bedroom. If Jim were perfectly honest, he felt better having Blair a little closer. Sliding into bed, Jim pulled Blair in after him, not giving his guide a chance to freak out and panic over having to ask for this.

When he first slid under the sheet, Blair was stiff and Jim could smell the distress. "I'm not some kid who has to climb into bed with a parent during a thunderstorm," Blair finally announced.

Reaching over, Jim put his arm around Blair's waist and tugged on him until Blair lay close. "First, I'm not your father, Chief. I'm your Sentinel, and you're my guide, so let's leave any father issues out of this because we couldn't afford the mutual therapy bills. And second, I've seen you call down lightning on our position while doing battle with an alien. Trust me, you don't have to defend your manhood with me, Sandburg."

Blair didn't answer, but he did turn and curl towards Jim's heat, his arm slipping around Jim's waist. Jim didn't have time to do more than smile before Blair's breathing deepened as he slipped into a deep sleep. "Good night, Chief," Jim whispered, stroking a few stray curls of hair as he settled in for a late morning.

If you enjoyed the mystical twist to this story, you might want to consider supporting your hard-working fanfic writer's professional work by buying a novel

Urban Shaman

New York City cop Miguel Rassin's life is going downhill fast. He's got a spotty record from the Army, a one-night stand who won't go away, and a flock of reporters trying to crucify him for shooting a civilian waving a toy pistol. Now kids are turning up missing in the Bronx, and he's partnered with by-the-book Detective Rob Jackson, a man with problems of his own. Their first suspect is a local shaman, Nikolai Adelman, who is either the strangest holy man ever or a con working his own angle.

Miguel's trying to navigate a baffling case that has more questions than answers, caught between a surprising physical desire for Nikolai and his new partner's suspicions about a shaman who claims supernatural forces are at work. Miguel has always tried to avoid relationships out of guilt and fear, but Nikolai sees the darkness in Miguel's heart—and the fortitude Miguel has hidden deep inside, a strength that will help him solve the case and reclaim his life.

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