Archive of Our Own

By the clock, it's nearly two hours past sunset, but I can't see the stars from here. The moon is new tonight and by now Cassiopeia and Ursa Minor are rising, Cygnus is descending towards the northwestern horizon, and the Milky Way is sprawled across the blue-black arch of heaven. The weatherman said it's clear, so it's an amazing winter sky. Blue, white, yellow, and orange, ancient light against black, looking into the past, spinning, dizzy, with a crick in my neck. And that cold, dark air that makes my nose sting, my lungs ache, and always makes me want to throw back my head and shout.

Too bad then, that the railing and the curtain and the bed next to mine are in the way, and that the blinds are drawn, and the window is dirty, and it faces out on an air shaft with a brick building across the way, and that I can barely get out of bed anymore, even if none of any of the rest of it were true.

Yeah, Matt, too fucking bad. About everything.

"Oh, you're awake. I'll go get your father."

Awake? I wasn't asleep, even if my eyes were closed. It's not like the ceiling is all that interesting, once you've counted the tiles (two hundred and twenty-one), estimated the average number of holes per square inch (five point three), and have done the Rorschach's thing with the water stain a few thousand times. Besides, who could sleep through that goddamn hockey game that Cirrhosis Of The Liver in the next bed over is watching at volume nine?

"Wait." I sure as hell don't want to see Dear Old Dad again but it's too late. My voice is a croak and the nurse is gone, her white shoes squeaking on the floor. I hate that fucking sound. Squik-squik-squik-squeeak-squik. Hell is a room full of nurses dancing on a linoleum floor.

So I'm lying here, tangled in IVs and wires, my books are stacked by the wall where I can't get at them, it hurts to fucking breathe, and my father is coming.

Time to take bets. Will Gil Lowry be hearty and up-beat tonight? Must present a positive outlook for the cancer patient, it says so right here in the pamphlet, Martha. Will he ooze the sympathy and charm of a used car salesman? I know how hard it is, Matt, but hang in there. We're pulling for you. Or will he just be his usual prick self? Mustn't keep coddling the boy, Rachel, that's why he's a goddamn fairy now. No, I can't stay, I have flight to catch, oh, and remind me to leave a check for the expenses. I never know which is worse. They all pretty much suck, and tonight, I guess I'm just too tired to decide.

Where is O'Neill? Jack versus Gil is always a good show, and hockey practice should be over by now.

Out in the hallway, there is the brisk click of high heels, a whiff of perfume, and then, "Oh Matthew, dear! The nurse said you were awake!"

And fuck, it's not my father, it's The Wife: Martha Kensington Lowry-- "Of the Grand Rapids Kensington's, dear"--dressed in floor-length mink, gloves, and a stupid Russian-style fur hat. Her pale, fat cheeks and upturned nose are red from the cold.

At least she left the Other Family, Tipper and Chip and Little Baby Pip, with the nanny. I remember last time, those pig eyes staring, damp, stubby fingers pulling on the tubes, pointing at the blinking lights, and when my father's back was turned, saying: "When are you gonna die, Matt? We never knew anybody who died before."

Fuck them.

"How are you feeling, dear?" She leans down to kiss my cheek and pretends not to notice when I wrinkle my nose and turn my head. Why is it so hard to move tonight? Like swimming with weights.

"Your father is parking the car and will be along in a moment," she continues. "While you were sleeping, he picked me up at the hotel and we went to the most lovely little restaurant in town. Le Soir. Wonderful food. Have you been? The pastry chef is a genius. I think that Gil even plans to sneak you in a little treat, now how is that?"

Le Soir. As if me and my mom ever eat anything except Hamburger Helper, as a nice change of pace from macaroni and cheese.

Fuck Martha, too.

She bustles away to hang up her coat chattering all the while about some stupid thing. The bitch has one redeeming quality: when she talks, no one else in the room has to. The side effect, though, is that Cirrhosis turns up the volume to ten.

6:48. No Jack yet, but Gil rolls through the door like a fat brown bear on Wild Kingdom. Martha is raising the head of my bed and plumping up the pillows behind my back, despite the fact that I like them flat.

When we were kids, Jack used to make fun of me about it. "Scared of heights, Lowry?" Now he just smiles a little, which makes him seem old and sad somehow, and flattens them out again for me when no one's looking.

I wish he were here.

Gil sheds his Martha-matching coat and hat and settles into one of the yellow naugahyde chairs. "Hi there, son! How are you feeling tonight?"

So hearty and up-beat it is. For now, at least. There's still time for any, all, or a new variation on an old Gil-theme to appear. My mom is working double shifts tonight and she won't be here until late, so I'm stuck with Gil and Martha until Jack shows. If he shows. Maybe he's busy tonight. Homework, friends, a party. He probably has something better to do with a Friday night than watch me die a little bit more at a time.

Is it too selfish to hope that he doesn't?

"Matthew, dear. Your father asked you question."

I blink them both back into focus. "I'm fine, Dad."

"I can barely hear you, son, speak up. You look tired. Have you been eating? Have they brought you dinner tonight? They're charging me for three meals a day. You need to be sure that you eat them."

I can't seem to swallow around the sudden lump in my throat. There is a glass and a pitcher of water on the bedside table, but it's too much effort to reach for them. My eyes itch and I turn my face to the side. Maybe it's weak, but I don't want to see his frown or her scrunched and disapproving face if my tears do fall. Real Men don't cry, after all.

Too late. "Really, Matthew." The disgust is clear in his voice. "How can you ever expect to...get better if you don't eat?"

I watch the wall across the room. "Being gay didn't give me cancer and eating won't make me straight."

The semi-silence drags while the Blackhawks score another goal and Cirrhosis--whose real name is Dave--and his two drinking buddies cheer and clink can. There's no alcohol allowed in the rooms but what's the curtain for if not privacy? Dave slides me a couple of cans a week and I keep their secret. Karen, a candy-striper doing community-service for shoplifting, brings me pot from her boyfriend. Either way, when the nurses get stingy with the morphine, I've got backup.

Martha laughs nervously. "Well, Matthew, not eating certainly makes you cranky. I'll go get the orderly to fix you up a snack. And Gil, why don't you give him that pie you brought to tempt his appetite? It's apple, your favorite." She heaves herself out of the chair and makes her escape into the hall.

Too fucking bad my favorite is pumpkin.

Gil plunks a paper sack on the table then he and I stare at one another; I feel a prick-moment coming on.

"Listen to me, you stubborn little faggot. I don't know what you're playing at but--", he begins, but I'm saved by the squik-squeak.

"Mr. Lowry, Matthew." Dr. Healy arrives, accompanied by The Wife, the nurse from earlier, and an orderly named Mike. He always pretends not to find my stash. At least the social worker isn't with them too. I can't take any more get in touch with your feelings shit.

Gil rises, all smooth and manly charm now, and thrusts his hand out to Healy for a strong and manly shake. I feel sick. Well, sicker.

"Doctor. Good evening. How is Matthew doing?"

Healy--funny name for a doctor--is about sixty years old. Tall, thin, gray hair and glasses. Supposedly one of the best oncologists in the state. Standoffish but nice enough. He doesn't bullshit around or talk down to me and my mom, and always gives me the real score. But tonight, I can't take his honesty. I don't really want to hear what he has to say about white and red cell counts, bone scans, tumor growth, or whatever.

"...Honestly, Gil. There's no need to be quite so dire. Surely if your son would just eat something.."

"..cachexia is not uncommon in advanced cases like these..."

"...Don't interrupt me when I'm talking, Martha..."

Tonight, I just want to pretend. That it's all happening to someone else. That it's a dream and I'll wake up any minute now. That I've just swum ten thousand yards and that's why I'm so fucking tired and everything hurts. That I'll look up and Jack will be slouched against the door frame, hands in his pockets, wearing those tight jeans that always make my mouth go dry, and that smile, the barely-there one that tilts up at the corner, lightens his eyes, and makes my stomach drop.

"...I'm not pleased with the progress that we're making here, Healy..."

"...Mr. Lowry, we're pursuing the most aggressive course..."

So I count the ceiling tiles again, note that the Blackhawks have scored another goal, and pretend not to hear Healy recount my vitals, my blood work, how much I've eaten and drunk today, and how many cc's or grams I've pissed or sweated or crapped. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to know that the drugs aren't working, that nothing is working. Which is probably good, since I'll never be a rocket scientist now. Or anything else.

"...as it is, this commuting is costing me a fortune. I'm planning to transfer him to a facility closer to..."

"...is a state-of-the-art cancer center, Mr. Lowry. Matthew is receiving the most up-to-date therapy available. Moving him is inadvisable at this..."

That makes me sit up straight. Moving? "No," I say, and have to say it three more times and slap my hand against the metal railing before they notice me. The nurse rushes over to reseat the IV and Martha clucks at me to calm down. Fat cow.

"No," I say again, and this time they all hear me. "I'm not going. I'm not leaving." Not like this, not without my mom, without Jack. Not and then go somewhere they don't know me and don't care, where they'll stare and poke and measure and count and wish I would just get on with it and fucking die already.

Gil crosses his arms. He's wearing a new gold watch. "Given some of your recent...choices, I hardly think that you're a very good judge of what you need, young man."

"We're just thinking of you, Matty, your best interests. We just want you to be well." Martha takes my hand and gives it a squeeze. I snatch it away and wipe my palm on the sheet. Whatever that nurse did to my arm hurts like hell.

"What's best for me is to stay here." Tired as I am, I can still be stubborn. I guess I'm my father's son after all; not exactly a pleasant thought.

Gil is itching to say something else but won't air the Lowry family laundry in front of Healy. He settles for a glower. "We'll discuss this later."

Healy gives my father a dirty look behind his back and it's all I can do not to laugh.

"Yes," Martha says into the pause. "We'll discuss everything after dinner. Did the orderly already bring dinner, Dr. Healy? Matt, did you try the pastry your father brought? I'm sure it's delicious. And why doesn't that man turn the TV down? Gil, go ask him to please shut that thing off."

God I hate her. "I'm saving it for later," I lie. "I promised Jack I'd wait and eat dinner with him." I hate eating around her. She acts like I'm her new bouncing baby son, Perry--Pip, for short, wanting to cut everything into pieces and feed me. It's not like I can't use a fucking fork or knife by myself. I've got cancer, not brain damage. And who the hell is she anyway? She's not my mom and never will be.

"Oh." She looks like she's swallowed a fly. "Gil? You didn't tell him earlier?" There is something in her voice.

The faint background beep of the heart monitor speeds up and I clutch the railing. "Tell me what?"

"About Jonathan," she says, and I can see red streaks of lipstick on her teeth. "Jack's not coming tonight, dear."

"Not coming?" I can hardly speak. "Why? Why not? Did something happen?" I'm thinking rogue pucks, skate blades, concussions, lacerations, a bad hip check into the boards and paralysis. "Is he alright?"

"He's fine, Matthew," Gil says gruffly, sounding pissed that I would worry. Well fuck him. I can worry about my best friend if I want. "But tonight," he continues, "We need to...to discuss some things privately."

"What kind of things?"

He slants a glance at Healy. "Family things."

And then I know. The move is not an If, it's a When.

It's not fair, but then, of course, it never has been. Suddenly, there's this image in my mind of me, dangling from a rope above a chasm, just like in an action movie. It's a long way down. My hands are bloody and burned, I'm so tired, and I wonder if it would hurt any less if I just let go.

"Matt."

"Matty, look at your father when he's speaking to you."

She knows I hate that fucking nickname. "What?" I'm cold and shaking and my chest hurts and I don't want to look up because then I really will cry and I just can't, not now.

For some reason, Dr. Healy comes to my rescue. "Mr. and Mrs. Lowry, we need to check Matthew's vitals and change his bedding. Would you both be willing to wait outside for a little while? The cantina is open. Perhaps you can get some coffee."

Gil glares at Healy--I know that this conversation is far from over--but they do as he asks. Mike pulls the curtain around the bed closing it off from the rest of the world.

The three of them go about their business, taking my blood, my temperature, adjusting the drip, and scribbling on their clip boards. They ignore my tears and I try to ignore their cold, probing fingers and unwanted sympathetic half-smiles.

At last, they are finished and my weak, unmanly tears have dried to itchy tracks on my cheeks. Dr. Healy clasps my shoulder briefly. "I'll be back to check on you later," he says.

Then I'm left alone, in clean pyjamas now, bundled in a blanket and sitting in the chair watching Mike make up the bed. His long black fingers snap and smooth and tuck the sheets like a silent dance. I asked him once why he worked here, why he wasn't at home, retired, tinkering in a basement workshop or playing with his grandkids. He just laughed and explained: a late marriage, a sick wife, a plant that closed and a pension that ran out, then tuition for his son at college, for what the scholarship didn't cover. "Why am I working here? Just life," he told me. "Nothing but life."

Maybe when I'm dead my mom won't have to work so hard. Maybe she'll get to finish school.

He is so proud of Derrick, who's studying engineering at Northwestern, and was first in his high school class, first in their family to go to college. Mike talks about him all the time. I like to look at the pictures that he carries around in his wallet, picnics and Christmases and birthdays, bunches of cousins and nieces and nephews all laughing at the camera. Sometimes I close my eyes and put myself in the pictures too, sticking out like a sore white thumb among all the brown faces, but I'm smiling just the same. I wonder if my father has a picture of me in his wallet.

"Your friend's not coming tonight, huh?"

"No." I hate my voice when it gets like this, small and hoarse. "Probably not."

"Well, you never know. You never know."

But I do. Gil Lowry has spoken and even had Jack wanted to, even if he didn't have something more interesting to do tonight, my father has decided and Jack won't be coming.

"Ready for bed?"

I look up and suddenly, there's something about that crisp, neat bed that scares me. "No," I say, thinking of my rooftop, my telescope, my room, the posters, the books, the unmade bed, the stars on the ceiling overhead. "I want--I want to go home."

"I know you do," Mike says, and he helps me into the bed anyway. He pulls the blanket up to my chin and smiles a sad Jack-smile. "I know you do," he murmurs, and right then, I realize that we both know I won't ever go home again.

8:25. Dinner, along with dessert--I hate apples--has gone into the trash. The hockey game is over, Dave and his friends are playing cards, and Gil and Martha and I are having The Talk. Or rather, they're talking, I'm sitting with an open physics book on my lap. It's one I've read before, so there's nothing new about the theory or the equations and I've already worked through all the Exercises-To-Try in the back. When I ordered the next volume in the set, the bookstore was out of stock; it won't be in for another five weeks. Five weeks.

I stroke the last page--it's blank--and wish I had a thousand more years, even of this bed, these walls, these useless fucking people, to read the next book and the next and the next. Decades upon centuries upon millennia to follow the story through every unbelievable twist and turn to its conclusion, to not always wonder what happened at the end.

Practical, down-to-earth Jack would say, "We're all gonna die sometime, Matt." But it sucks knowing when. It sucks even more now that I know what I'll be missing, what I can't have again. Stroking across deep, clear water in the early morning; the snap of autumn, the brilliance of summer constellations against a winter sky; books and books and books; and of course, Jack's kisses, his taste and smell, the feel of his hands on my skin.

"It's all for the best," Gill is saying.

And it probably is, right? Nothing ever really lasts. The lake will be filled in a few years to make way for new houses. How many times can you look at the same constellations, how often can you dream about suns and worlds and life on other planets and not get bored? And Jack and I would never have lasted. We'd have ended up at different schools and grown apart. He'd be an officer, I'd be a civilian. He'd get married, have kids, and I'd, what? Find someone maybe or maybe not, but no kids in any case, I'm a dead end after all. And then we'd meet up one day twenty years later at some high school reunion and stand awkwardly around the punch bowl saying, "Hey" and all that would be between us would be the memory of a filled-in lake and some long-ago hormones.

"You'll be closer, it's a better hospital, and your mother, well your mother can visit on the weekends. We'll pack up your things tomorrow and fly out on Sunday morning. The clinical trials begin on Monday. Are you listening to me, Matthew?"

No, I'm not listening. What's the point? I don't know how he convinced my mom...did he pay her? Or refuse not to pay her? The bills for this place are really high. It doesn't matter though, does it? G. S. Lowry gets what he wants; I'm going, and that's that.

The rope is in my mind again and my shoulders and hands are aching. It's slippery from my blood, and I might as well ask. Nothing to lose. So I say, "Tell me, Dad. Did you ever really love her?" I can't sneer as well as Jack, but I try.

It was such a scandal. Up and coming businessman, engaged to a high society girl, falls for a pretty waitress working her way through night school. True love or just a piece on the side, who could tell? But promises were made and then oops comes a baby named Matt. A son, for whatever that's worth. A something to keep hidden except on birthdays and holidays, certainly nothing and no one to want or notice or to take pride in.

Martha turns first white then red and looks more piggish than usual. "How dare you!"

"Matthew, apologize to your step-mother this instant!"

But I can't stop now. "Mom said you did. That you loved her. She loved you, but you married her instead," I say, pointing to Martha. "Was it just about the money? Did you lie to her too?"

Martha looks struck dumb and Gil stands abruptly. The chair screeches across the floor. Direct fucking hit.

"You little shit." He steps up to the bed, grabs the railing, and raises one hand; I can't help but shrink back. "I gave you everything. Everything! Everything you ever wanted and for all I know, you're not even mine."

I think he's going to hit me but then somehow, I'm hallucinating despite the fact that my next hit of morphine is thirty long minutes away. Jack is in the doorway, and beside him is his father.

"We interrupting something?" Mr. O'Neill says.

Gil whirls to face the door and I know then that they're really there. He drops his hand and Martha lets out a wail. "I've tried to like him, Gil. I've really, really tried." Then she's out of her chair and through the doorway nearly running down Jack in the process. She clutches a crumpled handkerchief in one fat hand.

I feel triumphant and sad at the same time.

"I told you not to come tonight." Gil takes one step towards Jack but Mr. O'Neill steps in front of his son. Jack's dad is a little shorter and a lot skinnier than mine, but nobody messes with Mr. O'Neill.

"What do you want, O'Neill?" Gil is breathing hard and his rudeness is a measure of just how pissed off he really is.

Mr. O'Neill cocks his head. "Let's you and me take a walk. Track down your wife. She looked upset."

He seethes for a moment then says, "Fine," and if looks could kill, I'd be dead on the spot. Gil turns on his heel and stalks out the door knocking into Jack's shoulder.

"Asshole," Jack mutters, rubbing his arm. He closes the door but I can still hear Gil and Mr. O'Neill arguing in the hallway. Jack pulls the curtain closed around the bed then throws his coat and backpack on the chair. "Hey." He's wearing those jeans and that smile.

"Hey," I say back, and feel like I'm flying.

He comes over to the bed and lowers the railing. "Sit up."

When I do, he takes my pillows, thumps them flat, then wedges them in behind me again. "Can't have you getting nosebleeds, can we."

We both smile. Somehow, everything hurts less, yet also more, when he's here.

"Move over," he says. When I do, he sits down on the edge of the bed, threads his fingers through my hair, then leans in and kisses me. His lips and cheeks and nose are chilled from the weather outside but his tongue is so hot and his fingertips are cold and I'm the luckiest man alive.

Even so, I pull back. "Jack, what the hell are you doing? Somebody could catch us!"

How can he be so damn reckless with his future? Anybody could happen by and one phone call from Gil to one senator and his chance for the Air Force Academy is history. Sometimes I wonder what ever happened to that cautious, serious kid I met when first moved here. Recklessness used to be my job. Maybe I rubbed off on him somehow.

He leans so close that his lips brush against mine. "Scared?" he whispers, and his whole damn body is a dare.

"Yes, you idiot. What if my father--"

"He's still yelling at mine in the hallway."

"Or Martha--"

"Last I saw was her fat butt headed into the Ladies' Room." Jack likes Martha even less than he likes Gil, hard to believe. But he and my mom are tight, which is nice.

"--comes back and sees us? Sees you. They already know I'm a fucking pervert. They'll think I corrupted you or something."

Although they've never gotten along, Jack is exactly the kind of Real Man that my father likes. Varsity athlete, smart, good-looking in a kind of tough-guy way. Compared to Jack, I'm everything almost, but not quite. Jack plays the right sports, is smart in the right subjects, and most importantly, he likes girls. There are times when my father goes on and on and fucking on about "upstanding young men like that O'Neill boy, he'll go far." If I didn't love Jack so much I think I'd hate him.

"Can't corrupt the willing," Jack says, but he puts some space between us anyway and settles for holding my hand. The small embrace of our fingers feels almost as nice.

"What the hell are you doing here anyhow? They said you weren't coming."

"I knew you were just pining away, languishing for my company. Didn't want to deprive you of your only entertainment of the day."

"Pining? Languishing? Pulling out the big college words now, Jacky-boy?" I know it's a joke, but it's scary how right he is, even without knowing. "As for entertainment, Dave and his brother had a farting contest today."

"And here I was stuck in chemlab all afternoon." Jack's interest in chemistry is limited to blowing things up. Beyond that, he couldn't give a shit less.

"Seriously though. I didn't think you were coming. My dad said that you weren't."

"I wasn't, at first, after you father called. But." Jack looks away uneasily and shrugs. "I don't know. I had a feeling...I guess just really wanted to see you tonight."

There's more to it than that, I think--enough to convince his dad to come, too--but I'm too tired to think what it might be. He's here, holding my hand and that's more than enough. "I'm glad you came."

"So am I," he says, and then I guess to hell with caution and career, because he grins and kisses me again. And again.

Time falls away and there's an infinity of images and sensations and feelings. I remember that summer morning, on the rock by the lake, when we first kissed--I couldn't have been more stunned. I remember our first night together in my bed, and the last, when we both said things that would sound terminally corny in daylight. I remember each and every afternoon and evening in between.

For a while, I thought it might be pity. "C'mon, Lowry, what are the odds?" I'd say to the mirror. "You get a hard-on for your best friend, you tell him you're dying, and suddenly he's not quite so straight anymore? Yeah, right." Jack and I even argued about it, several times. "Don't tell me what I want, Lowry. I know what I want, and I want you," he said, sounding so pissed that I'd finally dropped it. I was skeptical but desperate, and eventually--Jack's nothing if not persistent when he really wants something--he convinced me; nobody on earth can lie this well. Or if he can, I don't want to know about it.

He releases me finally and I lean back against the flattened pillows feeling dizzy. He's gotten bigger from weightlifting, but I'm skinny and weak and tired now, like an old man.

I don't know what comes next, though the priest who stops by every so often assures me that I won't burn in hell if I sincerely repent of my Unnatural Proclivities. But whatever it is, assuming it's anything at all, I know I won't miss school. I sure as hell won't miss Martha or her kids. Maybe I'll miss my dad, because he's my dad right, and aren't you supposed to miss your dad? And I don't really have many friends. But I know for sure that I'll miss my mom. And I'll really miss this, I'll miss Jack.

"I brought you something." He's wearing that grin again. It makes my heart stutter.

"Yeah?"

He pulls a paper sack from his pack, puts it on the wheeled bed table, and rolls it over. "Go ahead, open it."

I do and I can't fucking believe it. "Nehi Blue Cream soda." And a bag of chips. "Christ. You remembered!"

Jack looks supremely smug and god, but I really can't believe it. A long time ago when we were kids, on our way home from school, we would stop by the dime store, buy Nehi pop and chips, then sit on the steps of the church, make fun of the nuns and stare up the girls' skirts. Even back then, the whole skirts-thing was academic to me, I just did it to make Jack laugh. Jack was fickle. One day it was grape, the next peach, the next orange. But I was always true Blue Cream, every time.

"C'mon," he says, putting two plastic cups on the table. "Crack that baby open and start chugging."

So I do, although my hands shake a little when I pour. Jack knocks his back with one swig. "Mmm. Nectar of the gods," he says, and I really want to lick the light blue foam off his upper lip. But we could be interrupted at any time, so I don't.

I do say, "Thanks," though, not just for the pop and the chips, but for everything. He brushes some salt from my cheek and gives me that smile again; Jack understands. We're experts at speaking without saying a word.

A few minutes later, there's a knock on the door and a nurse, Jack's dad, and mine enter. Mr. O'Neill immediately laughs when he sees us. Jack is pitching chips at my open mouth and I'm trying to catch them, without much success.

"Don't think much of your hand-eye coordination, son," Mr. O'Neill says to Jack.

"Blame it on him. He's the one who keeps moving the target."

Gil looks pissed and I should probably sit up straight and clear away the chips but it's just so much easier not to.

The nurse comes to the bedside to add the morphine to the drip and Jack moves the table aside and shifts out of her way.

"We need to go now?" Jack looks up at his dad and I try to read what happened out in the hallway from Mr. O'Neill's face. But he shakes his head. "No, son. I just stopped in to say good night to Matt," he says, and leans over and clasps my hand. He has hands like Jack's.

"'Night, Mr. O'Neill," I say, and am very surprised when Jack's dad pulls me in for a quick hug. "Take care, Matt," he says, ruffles my hair a little, then steps back. I can't ever remember my father giving me a hug like that; my eyes sting a little. "See you at home, son," he says to Jack, and I realize that they both must have taken separate cars tonight.

My father looks ready to burst but Mr. O'Neill puts a hand on his arm. "C'mon, Gil. Let'em say good-bye," he says softly, collects my dad's coat and hat from the chair, then guides a very reluctant, but silent Gil Lowry out of the room. What the hell did Jack's dad say to him?

When they're gone, I slowly brush the broken chips away and wait for the explosion. Jack turns to me, stunned. "Good-bye? What is he talking about? What the hell is going on, Matt?"

The morphine has kicked in which is both a blessing and a curse; the constant pain will ease, but it will be so much harder to focus, to order my thoughts, and I don't want to miss a moment of Jack. "They're taking me to Michigan on Sunday."

Jack sits down heavily on the edge of the bed. "You're leaving? What do you mean? Why?"

That damn lump is back in my throat again. "My dad's not happy about flying out here all the time. And he said...there's some new clinical trial at a hospital there."

Jack's expression hovers between "Fuck him!" and hope. "Is there a chance...do they think...Matt, do they know if it will help?"

I want to say yes, I want to tell him that there's some new miracle drug that can rewrite the future. But I don't believe it, not really, and honestly I don't even care.

"Don't you want to help people, Matt? To further science?" Martha, of all people, had said, appealing to my humanitarian and geek sides at once. "Even if...even if you're not cured, it could help other children in your...unfortunate situation."

But she didn't understand and there was no way for me to explain it: Jack's future isn't worth the risk. And anyway, the slimmest possibility for a cure isn't worth losing even a second of this. All that's keeping my fingers clenched around that damn rope is Jack's hand over mine.

"What do you think?" I say to Jack, daring him to dispute what we both know is true. I run hot and cold on the whole death thing. Monday I'm okay with it, Tuesday I want to scream, but Jack...no matter what he says, I don't think that he's ever accepted the truth.

"You've got to fight it, Matt," he'd say, and bring me books and clippings, crazy stuff about diets and support groups and visualizing armies of healthy cells defeating the cancer. He's fearless where there's an enemy to see--after all, he stood up for me against McConnell's overgrown pals--but this, silent and invisible, is something else.

We sit together for a long time. My eyes keep trying to slide shut and Jack's expression becomes distant and sad, as if somehow he is seeing a time when I'm just a face in a faded photograph. What will he remember of me then? "I don't want you to go," he says finally, and his eyes are watering, just like mine. Without another word, he pulls me into his arms and we hold each other tightly.

I want to promise. That I won't go to Michigan, that I won't die. But. All I can do is savor this moment, this feeling, Jack's prickly outer edges, his smooth contours, like river rocks, that lie far beneath the surface, that have always supported me without question.

Long moments pass and then he draws back, searching my tear-stained face. For some reason, Jack has never teased me whenever I cried, not that it was all that often over the years, but still.

"I don't want you to, but," he says very, very softly. "But, I'll understand, Matt, if you have to...if you have to go."

And suddenly, I know we're not talking about Michigan. We're talking about that rope. I think that Jack can see it somehow, too. Perhaps it's reflected in my eyes or maybe he can feel the burns and blood on my palms.

"Jack--"

"No Matt," he says hoarsely, and it's as if I'm seeing a much older Jack, an echo from the future, a man who has known more heartache than I can possibly imagine. They say that grief ages you, is this what they mean? "No," he repeats. "I mean it. I understand."

He wraps his arms around me again and I feel something inside me, something that I didn't realize was clenched, finally relax. It's so easy then to close my eyes and let myself drift. The pain is nearly gone and all that is left is a sensation of flying. Night flying and the air is so clear and I'm up so high that the stars--millions of all colors--don't even twinkle, and the earth is a blue and green sliver below.

Sky and earth. They'll put me in a box in the earth.

"You can't cry, Jack. At the funeral. You can't cry. You can look sad, but you can't cry. If you do, then they'll know. They can't know."

"Hush." Jack shifts and I awaken with a start. Did I fall asleep?

"Jack? Are you leaving? Do you have to go now?"

"Shut up, Matt. Okay? Just rest. I won't leave until your mom comes."

Visiting hours will be over soon but they always let my mom drop in if she has to work late; the nurses understand. "Okay," I say, something, maybe the drugs, makes my tongue feel stubborn and thick. "Okay."

Space and time twists, elongates leaving me dizzy and the star field behind my eyes dissolves to reveal a sandy-haired boy sitting at the bottom of the stairs. "You like fishing? You gotta bike?" the boy asks. I don't know shit about fishing but I say, "Yeah", anyway, why the hell not? I like his smile. And in an instant, I'm up on the roof at midday, hammering nails into a board. Building a platform for my telescope. The hammer slips, hits my thumb, and I say, "Shit!" Someone much older--my dad, maybe?--pokes at my finger, then says, "Well, I think you'll survive. Don't think much of your hand-eye coordination, though," and for some reason, it's both the funniest and nicest thing I've ever heard. Then, it's night and we're both running past the wax museum to the photo booth at the edge of the fairgrounds, cramming into the booth.

Click

"I can't believe you did that!"

Click

"That is the stupidest face I have ever seen."

Click

"You oughta know, ya freak!"

Click

"Shit. We have to hide these."

No one can know, no one can find out.

"Matthew?" This must be a dream because somehow, my mom is here in the tiny booth with us, I know her perfume. "Sweetheart?" she says, and her voice sounds funny.

I want to answer but it's too hard to speak. I nod instead, pressing my nose against her neck. Someone is holding my hand, Jack I think, I can feel his fingers flex lightly against mine. While the camera shutter whirs and clicks, I squeeze and squeeze back. Until I can't.

There is a word in your language now, a word that sprang into being one thousand years ago: langeldr, the long fire.

It evokes many things: the bright, jagged path that lightning travels; an endless spear of flame that sears through the blackness of space, that pierces your body from sole to crown, flowing ever onwards from an unknown, inexhaustible source towards an equally obscure conclusion. Langeldr is the memory of a bakki's touch or the cry of a child. It calls to mind the brilliant, full-body flash at the moment of inspiration. It is all those things and more, forever and beyond, spanning an immense distance in space as well as in time.

Langeldr, the cold fire of the stars; it is an immortality of sorts.

But at what price?

Before langeldr, your people had smarhiti, the small, hot flame, passed from parent to child in the act of love. You once knew it well on the shores of Alfheim, and saw it reflected in Kyrr's smile, the shape of Afl's fingers and Angan's dark eyes. Smarhiti, the close, smoky fire that lay on the hearths of your distant ancestors, the fire that was never allowed to die. A gentle warmth around which families gathered at the end of a cold day's work. A place where children were taught, stories were chanted, and plots were hatched. A kind, yellow glow against the darkness, a space where dreams were shared and prophecies spun, long before your progenitors thought to seek the frosty stars and the abyss of space.

But langeldr is neither gentle nor subtle nor kind. Instead, it warps and consumes, it is the burn of ice on bare skin. And but for the unwise meddling of your people, langeldr would never have come to be. Your ancestors would be horrified.

"Commander Thor."

"Councilor." You pause beside the window in your quarters to await the rest of the communication from Freyr. One luminous length of your home galaxy spills its suns outside the window, just beyond reach.

"Commander. The Council agrees with your threat assessment. Please ready your ship and proceed to the research facility, authorization code Oth-Daga-Odn."

"Acknowledged."

It is the work of a moment to contact your assistant and request that he see to the final preparations; you ordered that your ship be readied some time ago, in anticipation of the decision to relocate Heimdall's laboratory. Afterwards, you quickly proceed to your workroom. In the short time remaining, you have much to accomplish.

Long ago, like Heimdall, you studied biology and genetics. The clarity of science was enough in your youth and in the bloody years afterwards, the language of duty, war, and command more than sufficed. But lately, your thoughts and feelings are muddled and indistinct, you've discovered that their shape cannot be expressed in the modern vernacular. There is a...distance...between what you know to be true and what common words can express. So it has become a bit of recreation for you--to the amusement of your peers--a diversion in the midst of war, to study language and history. To seek out linguistic elements that have passed from relevance and into myth, some of them in the space of your own strained lifetime. To search among them, to finally put name to your discomfort.

Your distant ancestors had a word, skuldhofferaeth, the debt of pride. They were a fierce, cunning people. Arrogant, passionate, quick to love and to war, willing to die in battle, for honor, to protect those they loved.

As you clear your work table and initiate the program that will fulfill your last item of personal business, you wonder: Exactly when did it come pass that we became afraid to die?

Primitive by modern standards, those ancient Asgard still possessed their own visceral, planet-bound wisdom. They knew: there is a natural law above that of the people. And it is more than clear, when one studies the sagas and ballads in the archives, that your ancestors knew beyond doubt that any act, minor or great, motivated by pride exacts a price.

Who pays the debt of pride and when?

In the old songs, the more profound the act, the more blood that was required to pay. No one was exempt; even the gods, with their petty and mean squabbles, always paid the price of pride eventually. There was no escape, the youngest of children knew these truths.

Without smarhiti, we have no parents to guide us, you realize. Our gods are dead. We have ignored the lessons of our ancestors, and we are afraid to die. How then, do we settle the skuldhofferaeth that has now come due?

The matter generator hums briefly then deposits several objects on the table. In addition to the two important items, it has created a strange cellulose sheet, a similarly constituted cube, and a short, thin length of something called string. You double check the archive and confirm that indeed, the materials and their shape are to its specifications. How odd.

Sometimes, a canny hero might slá kaupi, strike a bargain with the gods and deflect or transmute his debt, but there was always some payment exacted. It might be backhanded and sly, much to the woe of the hero, but always something. Even so brilliant a scientist as Heimdall cannot be expected to transmute the debt incurred by thousands of generations of Asgard before him.

Our race is dying. But perhaps, this is our skuldhofferaeth. The price we pay for seeking and attaining the stars, for destroying the idea of gods--the very idea of some thing greater than ourselves. Perhaps it is the price we pay for allowing the hearth-fire to die.

Many on the Council would be scandalized if they knew of your thoughts, so you've wisely kept them to yourself.

Your fingers tremble slightly as you slide open a compartment in the adjacent table, withdraw the small case, then place it beside the other two items. After a moment of reflection, you begin to pack the cube. Each of the three pieces fits neatly inside and it is a simple matter to fill in the empty spaces with what the archive calls popcorn.

What will he think when he receives this gift? Which suite, of the myriad emotions that human physiology supports, will he experience? Will he smile? Laugh? Cry? Will he be offended or feel violated? What did the osk'dreyma truly mean to him? As you discovered, gifts--no matter how sincere their motivations--do not always translate well across cultures, civilizations, and species. But your children are long dead, as are your bakki and your beloved Agaeti, and you have no one else. There is no one else whom you would rather have bear these memories on your behalf, to whom you would rather give this awkward yet hopeful gift.

Perhaps this is a new eldr, a subtle and warm orange fire that is potent enough to span galaxies, to cross the rift of biology to find its home in a distant and strange, but very much beloved utlendrbræthr. Perhaps this is what the dying Asgard must learn to cultivate for the future.

The door chimes then slides open and Freyr enters your quarters. "Your ship is ready, Commander," he says neutrally, though you easily sense his impatience.

You do not look up from your task. "One moment, Councilor."

He comes to stand near the work table and watches with interest as you wrap the package. It is strangely final yet soothing, this wrapping. The folding and tucking of the rough brown paper, the taping down of its ends, the careful inscribing of the words on one side.

Freyr's eyes widen when he recognizes the symbols and he inhales as if to speak. But you stay his words with a raised hand then return to your work, tying the package with string and knotting the ends tightly, as the archive indicated is proper. It is not something you have ever done or ever imagined doing. Your colleagues might consider it laughably quaint or peculiar. But like so many things associated with him, you have chosen not to question, but instead to savor it all, even the sting of the paper cut on your thumb.

Perhaps especially that.

Freyr waits silently, although he seethes red, gold, and green with curiosity, impatience, and something else. Disapproval? No matter. He will do as you ask. He must. There is no time to see to it yourself.

"Before I depart," you say, meeting his eyes finally. "I need your assistance. When there is time, take this to O'Neill."

He blinks in surprise. "Why not deliver it personally?"

"I may not return."

"You will, of course. And why not?" He sounds honestly puzzled. "One Goau'ld ship cannot stand against us."

You wish to reply but again, there are no modern words in which to voice your unease. Perhaps those ancient Asgard, in whom smarhiti glowed so brightly, might have known how to read your dreams, to pull into focus and dispel--through chanting or fasting or tossing marked sticks--your cell-deep sense of disaster nearly come. Perhaps they knew words. Jack O'Neill might have called it a premonition, he might have said: "I've got a hunch," or "I've got a feeling," and his team would have understood. But in this time, in your language, there is no space for such imprecision, and so you merely restate your request.

"Nevertheless. Will you please see to it, Freyr?"

He holds your eyes a moment longer and you can feel the pressure of his interest, though he is far too polite to openly push, and you are much too skilled to let private matters become public. After a moment, he nods. "I will deliver it Thor, as you have asked."

"To O'Neill alone. The other Tau'ri must not know."

Once the norm, premeditated deception amongst the Asgard is now unusual, shocking even. Freyr inhales sharply as if to question but reconsiders when he senses your displeasure. After everything that has transpired, you--and O'Neill--deserve this small indulgence.

"Very well, "he says finally. "Shall I inform the Council that you are ready to depart?"

"Yes. Thank you."

With that one worry banished, you power down the matter generator, gather your things, and turn to exit the chamber. You've exited these rooms countless times before, but something is different this time.

There is little enough here that your ancestors would consider to be of value. Tools and technology are important, but they would say that real value lies in ákafaehjarta, the heat of the heart; Freyr now bears yours in a box for delivery to its destination so many light years distant. Nonetheless, it feels as if you are leaving something behind.

Is it hope, perhaps?

Duty beckons and you dismiss your unease, dim the lights, then walk quickly into the hallway allowing the door close behind you.

A short while later, as stars fill the view screen and your ship accelerates towards its destination, you are finally able to give name to the unpleasant sensation beneath your ribs. Jack O'Neill might call it cold dread.

Like all Asgard who have entered the langeldr, you share in a collective--but collectively unacknowledged--skuldhofferaeth. But, you realize that after so many centuries of war, where the Goau'ld are concerned, you also have your own personal debt of pride to pay.

Your ship is well-equipped and it is statistically likely that, no matter what your peculiar premonitions, you will prevail.

Like the langeldr, those assurances are a very cold comfort, indeed.

It is a damn sorry state of affairs when a man takes to hiding out in the john to avoid his 2IC. Over the course of an hour, Jack blitzed through eight requisition forms, skimmed four personnel files--replacements for Daniel, as if--and slogged through six months' worth of mission summaries from SG-4 and SG-10. It should have been plenty of time. Had it been anyone else but Carter, anyone less pain-in-the-ass-terrier-with-a-bone stubborn, he'd have been safe. Who knew she'd lie in wait around the corner, ready to nab him when he set foot off holy ground. Christ.

"Colonel O'Neill, sir!"

"Carter--"

"Sir, I want to talk to you about Daniel's office."

"Carter--"

"General Hammond is talking about either turning it over to the geophysics department or maybe moving Jonas in there. I don't think that we should--"

"Carter."

"I'm just saying, sir, that we shouldn't assume that Daniel isn't coming back, and that we shouldn't pack up all his things yet if we don't know for certain that--"

"Major Carter!"

"Sir?"

"You've been stalking me."

Her lips thin. "You haven't exactly made yourself available to chat, Colonel."

"That's not the point."

"That's exactly the point. Sir. If you'd answered my email or returned my phone calls or replied to any of the memos that I sent I wouldn't have needed to--"

"For crying out loud, Carter. We're short on space and Daniel is gone god-knows-where for god-knows-how-long. What exactly do you want me to do? Set up some kind of shrine in there?"

Carter's eyes widen then narrow and something--tears maybe, and god, he hopes not, she'll really never forgive him--glitter in their corners; she's mad as hell. "With all due respect, sir, and begging the Colonel's pardon. But you can be a real asshole. Sir." She turns on her heel and stalks off down the hallway. A group of armed marines wisely steps to the side as she passes.

Jack sighs. No point calling after her or trying to explain--he'll only look even more like an idiot--and a reprimand is out of the question. Carter, cussing? Up the command chain, even? The big guy downstairs must've taken up bobsledding.

Besides, she's right, he is an asshole.

Meanwhile, he has an audience. "What're you lookin' at?"

The three gaping marines remember something, anything they need to do as far elsewhere as possible and within moments, Jack is alone in the hallway. He leans against the wall and pinches the bridge of his nose.

It used to be that dead was, well, dead. Disease, accidents, deliberate acts of mayhem, cancer, car crashes, gun shot wounds, whatever. People died, you cried, you got pissed, you vowed to beat the shit out of god if you ever met him in a dark alley, but no matter what, people stayed dead.

Then Daniel unlocked the Stargate and every definition of deadness went straight to hell.

Now, you're only dead if there is no convenient sarcophagus nearby. Or if no symbiote happens to live in your skull or your...pouch. Or if a compatible host or clone or robot isn't available for your consciousness (or your symbiotic self) to inhabit. Or if the Nox aren't around and in a giving mood. Oh, and not to leave out, of course, if you manage to ascend, whatever the hell that is.

No blood, no body, no nothing. Leave it to Daniel to out do himself in sort-of, kind-of death, as well as in life.

The really dead guy. The semi-dead alien guy in a coma. And Daniel. You sure can pick'em, O'Neill.

Jack tucks the files under his arm, pushes off the wall, then continues towards his office with a heavy step. The blurred vision is caused by the headache pounding behind his right eye, right? Right.

"Colonel O'Neill."

Halfway down the hall, Hammond's voice brings him up short. What now? "General?" George is not smiling.

"My office. Now."

Hammond is shorter but he's a man with a mission and Jack has to lengthen his stride to keep up. A short elevator ride and another few hallways later and he's in Hammond's office.

"Shut the door."

He does and braces himself for whatever comes next.

"Sit down, Jack."

"All things considered, sir, I think I'd rather stand."

That gets a faint smile. "I rather expected that you would."

"General?"

"I just spoke with Major Carter."

Shit. "Sir, I--"

"Save it, Colonel. SG-1 is on stand down for the next five days."

Not what he is expecting. He feels off balance, irritated. "What?"

"Don't force me to make it an order, Jack."

"General, I--"

Hammond stares at him steadily and his protest degenerates into lame mumbles.

"Go home. Water your plants, mow your lawn, pay some bills, dust the china for all I care, but go home. And deal with this. You're not doing anyone any good by staying here."

Jack exhales and runs a hand through his hair. All at once, he feels every bruise, every torn muscle and strained ligament, every year over forty, and every phantom ache from the bits and pieces of himself that are permanently missing but not really...dead. The mountain above has never seemed quite so heavy. It's fortunate that the chair is here to catch him.

"Carter won't leave," he says, by way of warning. I won't leave, can't leave, is what he really means. In the next moment, he wonders: is this some kind of bizarre vigil? Wait around until the next stray breeze, that fleeting sense of presence, and then the next, hoping, hoping, and never going home again?

"Like you and Teal'c, Major Carter will be locked out of her laboratory until 08:00, next Thursday."

Ouch. Carter without her white board. There's a recipe for unpleasantness. "Living dangerously, General?"

"Jack." Hammond eyes him reproachfully. "Dr. Jackson was a valued member of the SGC. And a good friend," he continues. "But he wouldn't have wanted this and I can't allow it." No sense voicing what this is, just three people struggling--unsuccessfully--to make sense of something totally without precedent, something wondrous and wrenching. Ascension.

"Teal'c has opted to stay on base for the time being," Hammond continues. "But you and Major Carter, I want you both out of here. Now."

The silence drags and Jack nods reflexively. No, of course Hammond can't allow it, morale, diminished performance, the SGC is all stands between earth and the Goau'ld threat after all, of course not.

"When you all get back, we'll discuss a replacement to SG-1 for Dr. Jackson."

And pigs will fly. "General--"

Hammond speaks over him and apparently the possibility of ever completing a full sentence today is right out.

"Jack. We both know that Daniel cannot truly be...replaced. But."

No, you don't know, Jack wants to say. You have no fucking clue. But he instead, he passes his hand over his face and forces himself to his feet.

"In any event, nothing final will be decided until after you return." Hammond's voice is far too gentle.

"I appreciate that, sir," Jack says, turning away, hand on the door knob, all too ready to get the hell out even if he has to go home. No more sympathy, no more fucking sympathy.

"He was a good man, Jack. I'll miss him. We'll all miss him."

"He is a good man, General," Jack replies, then makes his get away before his face or voice reveals anything incriminating.

He has cleared away a surprising amount of work in the last few days while trying to out-wait Carter--pathological avoidance has some side benefits after all. As a result, it only takes a quick trip to say good night to Teal'c, then on to his office for his keys and jacket, a moment to send out some final email, log off his computer, then he is ready to leave.

Once out the door, his steps automatically take him to Daniel's office. Not that long ago, he would have been pouring over some tome or tablet, complaining loudly when Jack would come to drag him off to lunch or dinner or home or some damn meeting or other.

"Ja-ack. Go away. I've got to finish this. Go on without me. I'll catch up later."

Instead, Daniel had gone on without him, left him, left everything behind, to go where? To do what? Can you even do archaeology without fingers, hands, without a body?

Jack catches sight of Jonas inside, head bent over one of Daniel's notebooks and backs away quickly, heading for the elevator. Quinn is a big, slobbery puppy--yap, yap, yap--but Jack can't help but want to kick him until he squeaks. Better to remove himself from temptation.

"Colonel O'Neill!" Too late, he's been spotted. Yap, yap. Step fast, O'Neill. It takes all his will power to pretend not to hear, but the enamel on his back teeth is none too pleased.

As luck, or Murphy, or the gods of the perverse, would have it, the elevator door slides aside to reveal Carter. A less foolhardy man would have waited for the next car, but with Jonas two steps behind him, Jack picks Guilt Trip over Possible Homicide and steps right in, jabbing at the Door Close button with his thumb. The satisfaction of closing the door in Jonas' face is far too sweet.

"Colonel."

"Major."

She meets his eyes with far less hostility than he expects and a fleeting bit of amusement. "In a hurry to get home?"

His jaw relaxes at the weak joke. "Not particularly. Jonas just drives me nuts." And it's not really Jonas' fault exactly, but it is his fault and he's not being fair but doesn't really give a flying fuck.

A smile ghosts across her tired face. "Yeah. Me too."

They ride in silence for a while until Jack finally gives in to his conscience. "Look, Carter. I'm sorry."

She clears her throat twice before she speaks. "I know, sir. So am I. I shouldn't have said--"

"No. I mean, I'm sorry." And his state of sorryness encompasses everything, from their earlier argument to his decision to let Daniel go.

"I know that, too, sir," she says with a sigh, then firms her chin against some emotion. "And it's okay. Really."

It's not okay, of course, odds are that it never will be again, but when their eyes meet she smiles and he knows that regardless, it's all right between them again.

On their way topside, people get on and off the elevator, with a nod here and a greeting there, but the activity swarms around him never quite penetrating his nullness. And how else to define this feeling of everything winter, summer, spring, and fall all so mixed together that the net sum is nothing? Feeling the relentless weight of everyone else's grief as well as his own. Knowing that Daniel is out there somewhere, healthy and alive-ish and yet always, forever, feeling the empty place inside. It makes his chest ache despite his near-smile.

He and Carter pass through the security checkpoints then head for the parking lot. For some reason, he walks her to her car, one row over from his. Procrastinating, probably, avoiding the drive home, avoiding home, period, with its too-loud silences and raw, gaping spaces for remembrance.

It crosses his mind to invite her to dinner but thinks that all things considered, it might be a bad idea. Don't be such a wuss, O'Neill, go home. "Good night, Carter," he says, then heads towards his truck.

"Sir. Wait."

He turns and Carter is standing with her keys in one hand and the other on the open car door. The last of the afternoon sunlight streaks her hair red-gold. "Yeah?"

"I've been wanting to ask you something."

"Yeah?"

"About Daniel."

Oh. He closes his eyes for a moment then nods. "What about him?"

"I was wondering. That is. I." She bites her lip and turns her face away. He can feel her frustration and the implacable, desperate need-to-know that lies just beneath the acid green of her obvious anxiety. Damn Thor and his bio-aware shit to hell. Most days he can ignore it, but not now. Not tonight.

Jack walks the few steps back, shoves his hands in his pockets, then leans against the car. "Carter, we've known each other for how long? Just spit it out, willya?"

It takes her a while but she does. "How did you know?" she says, the stress plain in her voice, like a raw, wet wound. "How did you know what Daniel wanted?"

He's expected the question for a while now but it still hits him like a rifle butt to the gut. How many times has he relived that strange, timeless moment? First, the light touch on his shoulder that was more intimate than any caress they'd ever shared, feeling that second, unseen presence behind him. And then standing with Daniel before the gate, somehow knowing that the address locked in wasn't a planet but an entirely new way of being. Watching Daniel leave him, twisting, glowing strands flowing upward through the ceiling, and the cold darkness, the frost-bite of absence and loss that followed.

That vision sure as hell didn't go into any official report and he's tried hard not to remember it. To remember is it to relive it, and every moment, from their ill-fated arrival on Kelowna to Daniel's...departure. When he does so, it's simply too hard to breathe for too many hours afterwards.

"He told me," Jack says finally, and his voice isn't any more steady than Carter's.

"Before? Like a living will?"

"No. I mean," and Christ, but he's going to have to remember it. "I was standing there beside his bed and yet, I wasn't, and he was there. I saw him. In my mind. And he asked me to please tell Jacob to stop, that he--Daniel--had to go. And I said that I would. That I'd tell Jacob. I don't know how else to explain it."

They stand in the lot, not quite looking at one another until the last light fades from the sky and the stars come out, one by one. He can almost feel her remembering Orlin--what really happened on that planet, Carter?--and wondering about Daniel, trying to make sense of it. Don't bother, he wants to say, rolling with the weird is far easier. But Carter is the type that has to know, even when knowing won't make a damn bit of difference in the end.

"Did he. Did he say where he was going?"

He wants to say something flippant, funny, something comforting maybe, but he has nothing but the truth. "He said that he didn't know."

Carter nods slowly then looks off into the distance and wipes one knuckle across her eye. "Thank you," she says finally. "Thank you."

Though for what, Jack honestly can't imagine.

The ride home is a forty-odd-minute distraction, maneuvering through Friday rush-hour traffic--Hammond couldn't kick them off-base at a decent hour, could he?--dodging idiots driving SUVs and sports cars while on the phone or yelling at their kids. Even so, he pulls into his driveway way too soon. He sits in the truck for a while, forehead on the steering wheel, teeth and stomach clenched against the pain. Inside or outside? In the end, he takes the logical, cowardly way out. He backs out of the driveway and goes grocery shopping.

Big mistake. There is too much noise, too many people, too many things that don't really matter and it's suddenly hard to breathe. Numbly, he fills the cart with milk, cereal, brightly colored packages with scribbles on them that he should be able to read but can't.

Shock, O'Neill, you're in shock, a dry, rational voice suggests, and Jack shrugs to himself. Not like this hasn't happened after other missions. Save the world, slap a few backs, a few high-fives, drive home, then lose it in the frozen food aisle. So he skips reading and puts items in the basket based on their shape, texture, or aisle. At the deli counter, he attempts to order some cold cuts and discovers that his facility with spoken language has deserted him as well. Even signing his name on the credit card slip at the checkout is far more of a challenge than it should be.

Get home, O'Neill. Get a beer. Or three. Pass out. But get home. And try not to run over anyone on the way.

Once home again, the mailbox is full to overflowing and there are six newspapers stacked on the porch, but at least the lights inside work when he flips the main switch. Praise be to Carter who got him set up to pay his utility bills each month electronically.

Jack puts the three grocery bags on the living room floor and punches in the code to deactivate the alarm. He bangs the door shut with his hip then freezes, fatigue fled and every sense on alert.

"Daniel?" he whispers, drawing his sidearm just in case it isn't. But there is no answer, no mysterious breeze, nothing, just a sense of displacement, a feeling of something out of order, of something alien.

Okay, so the bio-aware thing is useful sometimes.

Nothing is obviously out of place in the living room--nothing overturned, no drawers opened or ransacked contents--and so he moves cautiously up the few stairs to the kitchen, following his sense of unease. Knees complaining, he crouches down, peers around the doorframe and inhales sharply.

On the counter there is a box. Unremarkable, about twelve inches or so on each side, covered in brown paper and tied with string.

A box in his kitchen and no one has the house key and the security system was still armed. NID? Maybourne?

Curiosity wars with caution. He should evacuate the house immediately, contact the SGC. It could be a bomb. It could be anything. But for a reason he can't fully explain, he flips on the overhead light then approaches the box slowly. There are no trip wires on the floor, none on the counter leading from the box to anything else, nothing that looks to be a pressure trigger. And when he pokes the box gently with a pasta spoon from the dish drain, it doesn't move much but it doesn't go boom either.

Doesn't mean that it won't, O'Neill, just that it hasn't decided to yet.

By now though, he is within inches of it, close enough to read the wording on top. His name, address, and zip code are printed neatly in the middle of the top side, but it's the return address that makes his blood run cold.

Not words but symbols. Eight of them, a gate address. An all too familiar configuration that was burned into his brain deeply enough that he still sees them in dreams.

"Thor," he says aloud, daring to place his hand flat on the box top. He snatches it back again when his palm tingles. "Thor."

The groceries have long since been put away and the science projects cleared out of the refrigerator. Jack has showered, heated and eaten some dinner, and now sits in the darkened living room, working on his third beer. A rerun of Match Game hosted by Gene Rayburn plays on the TV.

The box remains in the kitchen, lurking on the counter top.

A channel dedicated to game shows, who the hell would have guessed? Daniel apparently, who'd dropped by one Friday night with a pizza and commandeered the couch and the remote for a four-hour Jeopardy mini-marathon. Got most of the questions right, too, the little shit, from 18th Century Operas to Rivers of the World. Jack had only stood a chance with history ("Real history, Danny. Not that desiccated archaeology crap.") sports ("Why am I not surprised that you know the country of origin for every guy who's ever played in the NHL?") and pop culture ("Your detailed knowledge of Homer Simpson's snack habits scares me, Jack. It really does.").

At hour two of the marathon, Daniel had offered to arm wrestle him for control of the remote. Jack had eyed Daniel's casually flexed biceps, noted the confident, competitive gleam in his eye, and had given it a pass. Know thy limitations, O'Neill.

They'd shared the couch for the rest of the marathon, arms and legs brushing, intercepting the occasional heated glance. When the four hours were up, Daniel had his hand on Jack's thigh and was just about to make his move, but Jack said, "Not so fast, Casanova. I wanna watch the Newlywed Game." Daniel's expression was priceless.

"Jack. I can't believe. I mean. You actually want to. Watch. Instead of--"

"Pipe down, Daniel. I don't wanna miss the theme song." What's good for one gander is sure as hell good enough for the other one, Danny-boy.

And so it had gone, with Jack rating each of the members of the couples for looks, personality, and charm--or lack thereof, and predicting a dire marital outcome for one couple who got every answer wrong, all to the strangled amusement of Daniel. Jack had been pleased to see that it really was possible to snort Pepsi out of your nose. Repeatedly.

"You are one sick, cynical bastard, Jack."

"What? You're telling me that you don't think couple number one will end up on the Jerry Springer show, women who love men who do farm animals?"

"No." Daniel slid his hand up Jack's thigh and cupped his package. "I'm telling you that you're a Grade A prick-tease, O'Neill."

"Takes one to know one," Jack said, grinning and feeling all of eight years old.

A tussle had erupted then, one that cleared the couch of its cushions--bursting one open in the process--sent the pizza box skittering across the rug, and landed them both half-way under the coffee table, limbs entangled and breathing hard.

"God, Jack. You can be so juvenile sometimes." Daniel was half pinned under him and the table, face flushed and glasses askew.

"That a complaint?" he asked, then leaned in and kissed Daniel, using plenty of tongue, just the way he liked it.

"Mm," Daniel said, and Jack felt the vibration from his lips, to his tongue, all the way down to the pit of his stomach. "Didn't think so," he muttered, and kept Daniel's mouth mostly occupied for the rest of the evening.

Game shows had become a bit of a tradition with them after that. The $25,000 Pyramid, Wheel of Fortune ("C'mon Jack, what're you, dead? Is this what I have to look forward to in my old age? Vanna White is a goddess. Geez.") Hollywood Squares, and Match Game. Whatever. He and Daniel would eat, they'd watch, and inevitably, sex would ensue.

But not tonight. Or ever again.

And exactly how do you feel about that, Jack O'Neill?

Feel? Been trying not to do much of that lately.

It's only 21:30, plenty of time to water those plants, pay those bills, or even dust the china, but he opts for bed instead. After all, those chores will be around tomorrow, and the next day, and the next and perhaps, if he's lucky, tonight he won't even dream.

The box is still on the counter in the morning.

Not exactly a surprise. If nothing else, the dust on the counter and box top indicates that it's been here a while.

He leans against the counter in the early morning light, blinking sleepily, sipping his coffee, watching the box, and wondering. Or perhaps just pretending to wonder, imagining all the people who know that particular long distance gate address and who might also want to play a joke on him, when he knows beyond doubt, that the box is from Thor.

After breakfast, he showers, dresses, and moves the box into the dining room. It's somewhat heavy and the contents inside shift slightly, but whatever it is doesn't explode. His hands tingle afterwards.

Tim, the kid from next door, arrives to mow the lawn and trim the hedges while Jack is vacuuming the living room. He kills a half-hour talking to Tim about filling in some bare spots with grass seed, fertilizing, and spreading some chemicals to kill off grubs. After he leaves, Jack spends another half-hour cleaning the coffee cups, food wrappers, and other trash out of his truck, then sits on the back porch and inhales scent of fresh-cut grass.

Funny thing about space ships, they never smell right. Always sterile or stale or something, despite their much vaunted "unbelievably complex and flexible" life support systems that Carter would go on and on about if nobody stopped her. Only once had a ship smelled...alive, like a planet, dark, wet earth mixed with sharp, spicy, and subtle alien scents. In Thor's osk'dreyma, where pine and sumarsolarsetr stood side-by-side, and where blue-purple grass grew intermingled with green.

From the porch, he can see through the window to the dining room where the box on the table awaits.

Jack takes a deep breath then passes his hand over his eyes. What horror could it possibly contain that is worth the agony of not knowing? He thinks of his friend, his strange gray bakki lying still as death beside him as Anubis turned to fire upon their ship. What might Thor have wanted him to have?

As it is, closed and sealed, the box is every possibility at once. Schroedinger's box, like that damn cat Carter gave Narim. To open it is to know for certain, to make it final, and he has never been fond of confronting irrevocable truths.

By 21:30 that evening, the truck has been washed and waxed, as has the kitchen floor, and god when the hell has he last done that? The bills are paid, five loads of laundry done, and he's salvaged what house plants he could. His financial statements are up to date, he's emptied his inbox, deleted at shitload of spam, replied to twenty-seven messages, returned a few phone calls. He's run errand after errand, dry cleaning, oil change, roamed around a few fish and tackle shops, and he's read five out of the six newspapers.

In short, all the hours since dawn have been killed as thoroughly as possible.

But now, dinner has been cooked and cleared away, he's stretched out on the couch, a second glass of whiskey in hand, and Family Feud is on. Richard Dawson, the host, is hugging and kissing all the guests, including a few guys who clearly want to pick him off like lint but can't because they're on TV.

"Jack, look at that! Dawson just copped a feel on national TV."

"Great work if you can get it."

"You are such a pervert. She must be ninety years old. My god, I don't want to even imagine how hard up you must have been before we got together if you'd even consider--"

"I'll show you hard."

Jack clicks off the TV and briefly closes his eyes; too few tasks for too many hours. Over his shoulder he sees the box squatting reproachfully on the dining room table.

Tomorrow, he decides, heaving himself off the couch and towards the bedroom. I'll open it tomorrow.

And as punishment, that night he dreams.

"I hate hospitals."

Daniel shifted slightly in the bed, as much as his bandages and injuries would all. "Tell me something I don't know." His laughter was a bare, cracked whisper.

"I hate that I can't really touch you," Jack said very quietly. There were too many electronic eyes and ears here, it was too easy for anyone to walk in at any moment.

Daniel closed his eyes. "Yeah, I hate that part, too."

"And you know what else I hate?"

"No. But I'm sure you'll tell me."

Jack closed his own eyes against the sight of the seeping bandages, the agitated flicker of the monitors and the lights overhead. "I hate watching people that I love die." His throat was so choked that he could barely say the words. It was too easy to remember other moments in other hospitals, awaiting the inevitable or turning back a sheet to see a beloved face waxy and still in death.

"Jack. Come here."

He rose from the chair and moved to Daniel's bedside. The few steps seemed to take an age and his joints creaked with reluctance.

"Closer."

Wary of the cameras and monitors and tubes, he leaned a bit closer. Daniel was trying to raise his hand, so Jack carefully untied the restraints and lifted the bandaged fingers with own hand.

"Look at me."

This time, Jack really looked. His friend, his lover was dying. He didn't need the monitors to know that. There was a growing distance in Daniel's presence now, his colors were fading, graying out, as if he were walking away, down a long corridor filling slowly with mist.

"It'll be okay," Daniel said softly.

God, how could Daniel even think that? "No it won't."

"Yes, Jack. It will." Daniel's fingers flexed lightly in his and the motion felt so very familiar though Jack couldn't think why. "I want you to promise me something."

No, no death bed promises, he wanted to argue, but his will had never been fully proof against that intimate and implacable tone Daniel used when whatever it was, was too damn important to him. "What is it?"

Daniel's eyes were watery and red but determined. "Promise me that you'll tell someone sooner this time."

Jack awakens with a start, tangled up in the sheet. He throws back the covers, wipes his hand over his face, but he still hears Daniel's words.

Tell someone, tell who, Danny?

He climbs out of bed and paces in front of the window for a while, debating whether to smash it with his fist or test out the aerodynamics of the clock radio. He drops and does fifty push-ups instead, followed by fifty sit-ups. Afterwards, he lies on his back, breathing deeply and staring at the ceiling. A distorted square from the street light is splashed overhead but it will soon fade; in another hour or so, it will be dawn.

Another dawn, so many months ago, he'd taken a dangerous risk, had told Daniel; Thor's blind courage had both shamed and inspired him.

With a lot of luck and half-truths and evasions, he'd managed to survive the debriefing with Hammond, just barely. Thor had laid the foundation by sending a cryptic message to Hammond right before he'd left orbit. A few hours later, Jack had taken Daniel out to breakfast at an old-fashioned diner nearly sixty miles from base.

"I haven't slept in the past twenty-two hours, Jack. You'd better have a damn good reason for dragging me out to the middle of nowhere for a stale danish and a cup of really bad coffee."

Turned out that the pastries were fresh and the coffee was, according to Daniel, of the overly discriminating palette, "Not bad." And there, squirming somewhat on the red vinyl seat of the booth, Jack had told the unvarnished truth as he knew it. First, about the osk'dreyma, about Matthew and then, mouth very dry, hands shaking, and face mostly turned to look out the window to the parking lot, he'd explained about Thor as well.

Daniel had just listened, squeezing his hand occasionally or urging him to take a sip of water when necessary. His eyes widened when Jack spoke of Thor, but seemed strangely unfazed with it all, going so far as to append a smug, "I told you so," to Jack's much abbreviated description of that night.

"And I thought that my life took bizarre turns," Daniel had said, smirking at him. "But you, Jack, you take the prize. Now tell me again about..." Who'd've guessed that Daniel would turn out to be such a voyeur?

They sat in silence for a while afterwards and Jack fidgeted, poked at the remains of his breakfast, toyed with the packs of sugar and the salt and pepper shakers. He felt naked and uncertain.

Finally, Daniel pushed the pyramid of sugar aside and closed his hand over Jack's and the salt shaker. "But that's not everything you need to tell me, is it?" he said evenly.

"No," Jack agreed, looking down at their hands through the blur. "But. I can't. I really can't say the rest, Daniel." And he couldn't. This wasn't a moment out of time on a fantastical beach on a planet he'd never seen. It was the real world, and the noon sun was too bright to pretend that military regulations didn't exist and that twenty-five years of silence and inaction could be broken without consequence.

"I think I know anyway." Daniel's voice was low and the brush of his thumb across Jack's knuckles made his skin tighten and tingle.

Startled, Jack looked up and met Daniel's eyes. His friend was exhausted but he was smiling and the heat of it melted the ice in Jack's gut and made his body burn.

"Oh yeah, I know," Daniel said. "Now what are we going to do about it?"

They had argued about It for several months, going round and round about career ("Quit looking at me like that in staff meetings, Daniel. Are you trying to get us both shit-canned?), regulations ("It's not sexual harassment, Jack, if the harassee is willing. Wait, that didn't come out right."), and Daniel's lack of same-sex experience ("Oh for god sake. Just because I've never done it before doesn't mean that I don't understand the principle. And anyway, where's your sense of adventure?"). Jack had cursed Thor's name frequently in those days, for putting the goddamn idea in his head that telling the truth was a good thing.

For his part, Daniel was relentless. "You know that it's going to happen, Jack, don't you? You realize that it's just a matter of time."

"No Daniel. I absolutely do not know that."

Daniel had muttered something about the "inevitability of lust" but let the matter drop, for about a week. At which point he'd stopped by late one night, rousted Jack out of bed, pushed him onto the couch, yanked his shorts down to his ankles, and catapulted their argument out of the realm of theory and into practice. Lots of practice.

"God, I miss you, Danny. I really, really miss you."

The street light is now obscured by the orange splash of the rising sun. Jack rolls to his side allowing the pile of the carpet to catch his tears.

By 15:20 on Sunday, he is completely out of excuses.

No more house or yard work left to do, there are no movies he's wanted to see, Teal'c, who's usually game for some cultural immersion, is incommunicado performing some ritual, and his fishing buddies are on vacation or spending time with their families. To add insult to injury, a howling rainstorm cut short his hike.

Despite the hour, it's dark in the house and rain sheets down from the heavy sky, hammering on the roof and rattling against the windows. Jack flips on the dining room light and goes to stand before the box.

It is regular in shape and perfectly wrapped and tied as if by machine. Jack knows better. The slight tingle in his hands reminds him of the deft gray fingers that smoothed and taped the brown paper and tied the precise knots.

He takes a deep breath. "Okay then," he says aloud, then with one stroke, slices through the string with his pocket knife.

He is not usually the most careful of unwrappers, preferring to get right to it rather than screw around. But this time, he slips the knife under the tape, loosens it gently, then folds the paper and sets it to the side. The box itself seems to be ordinary cardboard. When he lifts the lid, a flurry of Styrofoam popcorn floats out and clings stubbornly to his hands and sweater.

"Too much attention to detail is the sign of an anal personality, Thor."

The packing slip on top has three rows of symbols, seeming to indicate that the box contains three items.

"Too bad it's not in English, or I could actually, maybe read it?"

Then, with a deep breath, Jack plunges his hands into the box and encounters the first object. It's cool, metallic, and heavy.

"Shit." And it's a damn good thing he's near a chair because his knees give out abruptly and he sits, cradling the object in his hands. Even beneath the bright overhead light, the miniature gandreith is nearly invisible. His eyes try to slide away from the sleek black wedge, denying its presence, despite the weight in his hands.

He's visited Alfheim many times over the past year, in dreams. He's dreamt of the turquoise waves, the hum of the Vindrvitr, the double suns, the fine lavender sand of their cove, and of the vast undersea world of the saerfornandi, long since dragged beneath the ocean floor, lost to the inexorable forces of plate tectonics.

Jack hefts the oddly distributed weight, strokes his fingers along the now-complete wedge. "I'll have to buy a black light. It'll be easier to see in the ultraviolet," he says, and his voice sounds shockingly normal to his ears, despite the lump in his throat and the pain beneath his breastbone.

When he can swallow again, he sets the gandreith aside, tilts the box on its side, then scoops more popcorn out of his way. His fingers close around something smooth, rectangular, and about the size of his hand.

Another box, this one though is sleek and made of a cool, rainbow-shot material like mother-of-pearl. The lid springs open to reveal a large stone set in silver and lying upon shimmering coils of silver-gray. The stone itself is a beautiful swirl of purple and green, over turquoise. The arch and sweep of the pattern somehow captures of the effortless grace of the Vindrvirtr.

Jack strokes his fingers over the intricate, and somehow feminine, curves of the setting then tilts the box and pours the necklace into his open hand. The musical chime of the links as they fall and the tingle in his hand makes him smile. But when he rubs his thumb over the polished surface of the stone, his breath catches. There is an initial flare of heat and then an image leaps upward from his palm: three small figures. Smiling, dark eyes, sun-browned faces, the barest echo of Thor's current features in their own. Afl, Angan, and Kyrr. Suddenly, he feels nauseous, remembering Heimdall's reluctant but matter-of-fact explanation of the Asgard's plight. No kids, no future, an endless distortion of selves, looking into the mirror and seeing not-you again and again, always for thousands of years.

Jack closes his shaking fingers over the stone and the image disappears. He slides the necklace back into its box and sits silently for a long time afterwards, his heart pounding with a hopeless ache and longing. It is a parent's eyes-closed, fingers-crossed, first-star-I-see-tonight wish for the safety, health, and long life of their child. Or duthsonnr. A sensation that may not even belong to him, or only to him, that could be also an echo left behind by Agaeti.

He carefully places the small box beside the gandreith then steels himself to retrieve the final item from the carton. It is small, light, and flat, an ordinary manila envelope with the flap sealed, the metal tabs pressed down, and his name written neatly across the front.

Jack carefully slides his knife under the edge, reaches in, and pulls out a strip of slick paper.

He has no words then, to describe it. Hot, cold, falling, flying, sucker-punch-to-the-gut, all inadequate to encompass this incandescent sensation. He presses his hand to his mouth and stares at the strip of the ten photographs that he burned and scattered into the woods years ago: him and Matthew, crammed into the photo booth, mugging for the camera, making faces, making love with their eyes. "My god, Thor. What the hell have you done?"

There is an image in his mind, then, of Thor packing this box, carefully placing each object inside, filling in the spaces with popcorn and wild hope, wrapping, tying and addressing it with quick, graceful motions, sending it earthward in a flash of light to crouch on his countertop, until now.

"But how?" Not the photographs, but the box itself, in his house, on the counter. Then, "Oh." The sudden realization makes his stomach drop. Not Thor, Freyr. Uptight, pain-in-the-ass Freyr left the box on Thor's behalf, believing him to be dead.

And where is his bakki now? Is someone who loves him or cares for him, sitting at his bedside, holding his hand, talking to him, calling him back?

No one gets left behind. It is more than a vow to him, it is a way of life. But something of Thor's was left behind on Anubis' ship that day. A coma, Carter had said, they're not sure if he'll recover.

Jack closes his eyes and the tears that have threatened all day finally spill down his cheeks. "Goddamn you Thor," he whispers. "This is why I didn't want to open the damn box. This is why."

Late night TV is a wasteland, one hundred channels of absolute shit, but it sucks less than going to bed and dreaming. For some reason, the slapstick violence of the Three Stooges doesn't appeal tonight and classics like Casablanca and Waterloo Bridge clash badly with a bottle of Vodka and a raw and bleeding heart. The porn is just too...sad.

Instead, he flips from channel to channel, from infomercials to psychic friends to home shopping, finally settling upon an episode of COPS. He tunes in just as two officers are hauling a guy down a flight of steps and into the waiting police car. A woman stands on the porch haranguing two other officers and the neighbor who apparently called them.

"The Feds have been looking for this guy for twelve years," says the voice-over. "Embezzlement, check-kiting, fraud. He skipped out on bail once and escaped from a minimum security facility in 1990. The neighbor is a crime buff and tipped us off this afternoon."

One cop has the guy turned around, facing the car, and is putting on the cuffs when there is a sudden commotion. The guy knocks down the cop and takes off like a shot, pelting down the street.

"Son of a bleep," one cop shouts then gives chase. His partner, unhurt, picks himself up and takes off after them. The camera follows them, jiggling and swinging wide, down alleys, over spilled trash cans, across lawns, past barking dogs, and finally up and over a chain-link fence.

"I can't believe this bleep guy. Is he some kinda bleep bleep track star?"

And for some reason, Jack can identify with that poor bastard running for his life, desperately fleeing his past into god-knows-what kind of blank future. He tends to run inward though, except when he doesn't. Except when he runs headlong through a pool of shimmering water to a place halfway across the universe, only to find himself back here on his couch in the dark holding the resurrected past in his hand. Beware little gray men bearing gifts.

The man's jacket gets caught and he hangs at the top of the fence for a moment, eyes wide and hopeless in the bright lights. Then he tears himself away jumps down, and keeps on running. But eventually, he slips in some wet leaves and goes down hard. The two cops catch up and swarm over the guy, pinning him to the ground and slap on the cuffs.

As they shove the guy into the car and shut the door, one cop turns to the camera and grins triumphantly. "You can try to run," he says, "But we'll getcha. You can't run forever."

"You sure as hell can try," Jack says, knocking back another shot and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

The next segment is officers "responding to reports of gunfire in a residential neighborhood." Two cops arrive at a house and are met by an older woman who's dry-eyed now, but who has clearly been crying. "He's in there," she says.

The two cops go into the den to find a scene of carnage, most of which is fuzzed out.

"Looks like a shot gun to the head, whaddaya think?"

"Yep. Self-inflicted, I'd say," his partner agrees. "Did he leave a note? They usually leave a note." Then the voice-over cuts in.

"Turns out the guy killed his best friend forty-two years ago today. Something about a girl and a car. He'd gotten away with it for that long. But secrets will eat away at you like that, you know." Secrets.

Jack clicks off the TV and throws the remote across the room.

Whatever the fuck happened to mindless entertainment? No coded messages, no moral to the goddamn story, just good, clean, brain-dead fun.

You promised me, Jack.

"I did not. And if I did, it didn't count. It was under duress."

I knew you'd weasel out of it somehow, you bastard.

"Fuck you, Daniel."

The bottle narrowly misses the picture of him and Daniel on the book shelf and smashes against the wall instead.

Your aim sucks, O'Neill.

"I know," he says, then collapses back on the couch, hiding his eyes in the crook of his arm.

Telling Daniel about Matt had been hard enough; Thor had already known. But telling anyone about Daniel...well, he's already run through and discarded the usual list of suspects, to no avail--"Hey, I at least thought about it, Danny,"--and he really should get up and clear away the broken glass and the vodka stain on the wall. But he's kind of drunk, and the floor wavers uncertainly as he makes his way into the kitchen for the paper towels and a sponge.

Heading back from the sink, he trips over a stack of newspapers meant for recycling. Sheets of newsprint scatter all over the hallway.

"Fuck, goddamn it!" He steps over the papers carefully, trying not to slip and break his idiot neck on top of everything else. A three week old page twelve headline catches his eye, mid-step: Noted Auto Industry Exec and Lobbyist Retires Amid Controversy.

"No way."

Yes way. Try and get out of this one, you prick.

He crouches down and stares at the article with disbelief, then nods reluctantly. "Okay Daniel, fine. You win. You win, okay?"

There are any number of ways to obtain the intel, some of them are even legitimate. But there is only one way he knows of that is quick enough, discreet enough and whose price he is willing to pay.

He throws the sponge in the sink, the broken glass in the trash, then picks up the phone and quickly dials a number from memory.

"Hel--" Jack winces at the painful sounding clatter, crash, and thump that follows."--a minute. Hello?"

"Carter. You alright over there?"

There is a surprised pause. "Colonel O'Neill? What time is it? We've been recalled? I didn't get a page from the SGC." She sounds sleepy but far too hopeful. Must be having as much fun on vacation as he is.

"It's late, Carter." God, it's nearly four already. "And no, we haven't been recalled. But."

"But what, sir?"

"Listen, Carter, I need a favor."

The pause is astonished this time. "Sir?"

"Can I meet you somewhere? Forty minutes, an hour, say?"

"Uh sure. Okay. I'll, be. Uh, why don't you just come here?" she says, and it's pretty clear she has no idea what to make of his phone call. He has no idea what to make of it either, so they're even.

"Good. Fine. Thanks, Carter. I owe you one," he says, then clicks off.

He puts on a pot of coffee, collects Thor's box from the dining room table, then heads into his bedroom. The three gifts and the wrapping paper go into his safe first on the shelf beside the osk'dreyma crystal. Then he plunges into the depths of his closet, groping behind a stack of old National Geographics, to the cardboard box in the farthest corner. He tears off the lid then paws through old letters and photos to find the right stack tied with an old, crunchy red ribbon.

"I know they're here somewhere." He rifles through the collection, pulling out a picture here, an unopened envelope there. "Yes! I knew it. Okay, Danny. Now maybe you'll let me get some sleep."

Thirty minutes later, he's showered, shaved, and in his truck with a paper sack of documents in one hand and a spill-proof mug of coffee in the other. The earlier rain has stopped and the moon shines through patchy clouds overhead greasing the pavement and scattering diamonds over the grass. Fifteen more minutes and he's in front of Carter's house.

Last time he was here, it had been to intercept her E.T. houseguest, Orlin, he of the plug-and-play gate; the geeks are still scratching their heads over that one. He'd known a moment of smugness that night, gun drawn and waiting outside, that at least all the alien-related weirdness didn't happen to just him. Two days later, Carter had plunked her expense report on his desk with a challenging jut to her chin. He'd signed it cheerfully, for the sole pleasure of hearing Hammond howl later on that day.

She meets him at the front door barefoot, in jeans, a sweat shirt, and a bad case of bed head. "Colonel. What's up, sir?"

"A favor, Carter. I need you to do me a favor," he says, brandishing the paper bag.

"So you said on the phone. Exactly what kind of favor are we talking about here, Colonel?" She eyes the bag with a strange mix of suspicion and eagerness. God, Carter, you must really be missing your whiteboard.

"I have been given to understand that you've engaged in a little...recreational hacking from time to time."

She looks at him with a dead-pan, near imitation of Teal'c. Only the slight twitch at the corner of her mouth gives her away. "I believe the phrase is, 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell', sir."

You have no idea, Carter. No idea at all.

He spreads the contents of the bag over her kitchen table and sorts through the pile, choosing a photograph and an unopened letter dated October 1976 and stamped Return to Sender, No Forwarding Address On File.

"Do you think you can find her?"

Carter examines the photo, studying the tall, dark-haired woman and the two teen-aged boys standing beside her. His adolescent self is grinning like an idiot, one arm around the shoulders of the 1972 All-State Science Champion.

"Possibly, sir. But..." Her puzzlement is plain. Why not go through proper channels? Why is this important enough to wake me up at 04:00? Who is this woman? Am I really bored enough to bother with this, commanding officer or no?

He can only answer one of those questions. "I used to live next door to her. Will you do it, Carter?"

Carter shrugs and Jack can see her mind already gearing up to work the problem. "Sure, sir. What the heck. I'll see what I can do."

She kicks him out just as the sun is rising, twenty minutes later.

"Sir, go home. Get some sleep. Something. I can't do this with you...hovering over my shoulder. I'll call you when I've got something."

"Call my cell, okay? I might have to go out. You've got the number handy, right?"

"Ye-es, I've got the number." Now get the hell out of my house. Even Jack can read between those lines, so he goes.

He drives around aimlessly for a while and finally pulls into the parking lot of an IHOP for breakfast. No matter how old he gets, he'll always think of it as Prom Food. 4:00 AM, long after the last dance, slightly drunk, a whole lot sweaty, and desperately hoping to get laid. And god, how many years ago was that?

With that thought, he sits up straight and grips the steering wheel hard. It's been decades since their last letter. How old was she when Matt was born? She must be in her sixties now, at least. She could be de--.

The phone rings.

Jack releases his death grip on the wheel to flip open the phone. "Carter? You got something for me?"

"A name, address, and phone number, sir. Along with some recent news clippings and a few photos." God she sounds smug, but he doesn't care one bit, not one bit.

Thank god. "Carter, you. Are. Wonderful. I'll be there in ten minutes."

It takes eighteen, but who's counting? Carter greets him with a big smile, a thick file folder, and his paper bag. In exchange, he hands her breakfast.

She looks surprised. "Thanks, sir."

"Thank you, Carter. You deserve it. Seriously. Now I've got to go." He heads for his truck, narrowly resisting the urge to throw his arms around her first and give her a kiss.

"Colonel!"

He turns and she's standing on the porch with all sorts of questions in her eyes but she doesn't voice them. "Good luck, sir," she calls.

Jack smiles. "I hope so, Carter. I really do."

On the drive home, he rehearses the things that he's going to say, and damn it, but whatever he says sounds lame and inadequate to bridge a span of twenty-five years.

Back at home, jittery with lack of sleep and too damn much coffee and vodka, he paces away the time until 7:45. It's an hour later in Chicago, that's late enough for a Monday, right?

But his fingers are stiff and he fumbles the first two attempts to dial. "Damnit, O'Neill. Get a grip."

He takes a couple deep breaths, steadies his hands, and dials the number on the third try. After a click and a pause, the call goes through.

"Hello?"

It's her, and suddenly he's back in time, standing on a porch, face pressed against the screen, his mother beside him and the scent of a fresh-baked pumpkin pie in the air. He freezes, heart pounding, his prepared speech dried to dust and blown away, unspoken. What the hell to say, really? There's too much and not enough words and trying to say whatever over the phone is an impossible task for someone like him who has always been better doing rather than saying. He hangs up and sits silently, chin on his fists, thinking hard.

Some 'try', there, Jack. Not impressed.

"Shut up, Danny. I've got better idea," he says, then flips through his address book and dials his travel agent.

The spur-of-the-moment ticket costs a fortune, but what the hell else is he going to spend all his hazard pay on anyway?

He dresses in slacks and a nice shirt and sweater, then packs hastily, but with an efficiency born of frequent practice, throwing clothes, his shaving kit, and other odds and ends into his carry-on. The file folder goes in his briefcase, as do a few letters, and a photo album from his book case. He zips the envelope containing Thor's resurrected photograph and another slim album, both taken from his safe, into an interior pocket. Those final tasks complete, he turns off the lights, sets the alarm, and stands on the porch to await the cab.

While waiting, his fingers go numb and sparkles dance across his vision. He realizes that he's hyperventilating and slows his breathing with effort.

What's the worst that can happen?

Bad question, O'Neill. He can think of all kinds of things bad, worse, and beyond. It's been over twenty-five years and a fuck-of-a-lot can go wrong in that time; some might even consider him an expert on that particular category of bad and worse.

Daniel, would tell him to think positive, at which point he'd either give Daniel a look or just tell him to go to hell. Thor, on the other hand, might build an amazing world that had never been, a synthesis of longed for places and times, and he'd offer it, with fervent hope but no certainty that the gift would ever be accepted. Both of them would say, either in word or in deed, to embrace the risk.

Jack presses the heel of his hand against his right eye and wills the pain to recede. He is saved from further internal debate by the arrival of the cab and the subsequent inane, but vastly appreciated, chatter from the cabbie on the way to the airport.

Once through the line at the ticket counter, the security checkpoint, and on the plane, he settles into his overpriced seat in First Class ("Sorry, sir. Nothing left in coach.") and awaits take-off. At least he's alone in the row. And as they taxi down the runway, he stares out the window, counting the seconds to VR and then V2 out of habit, until he's convinced that the pilot won't fly them into a convenient mountain top. A pointless exercise, but it keeps his mind safely occupied for a while.

When they're finally airborne, he's out of excuses, so he opens Carter's folder, and true to form, she's thoroughness personified. Everything's here, including Dr. Rachel Nolan Fischer's social security number, last four addresses and phone numbers, copies of a marriage license and birth certificates, college and grad school transcripts, her most recent CV, email addresses, and a sheaf of photos and news clippings. Thank god that Carter is a force for good in the universe.

Over the course of the three hour flight, he scans the papers one-by-one and everything about Rachel, right down to her real name, is a complete surprise, and yet somehow not.

Each new document reveals another chapter in the Rachel Nolan's story, from her transfer work at Wright Community College, to a BS in biological sciences at Eastern Illinois University. From her MD and residency at UCLA, a marriage to Dr. William Fischer, now a cardiologist at the University of Chicago, then on to prestigious internships and fellowships at the Mayo Clinic, Johns-Hopkins, and Columbia. There is the birth of daughter Louise Nolan Fischer, the adoption of Melissa Anne Fischer, and finally her current professorship in Oncology at Northwestern. It's now no mystery where Matt got his science gene, and like Matt, what Rachel Nolan chose to do, she didn't just do it, she did it well and against the odds.

News clippings chart her moves between institutions, announcements of achievement awards and prizes, there is a list of her publications as long as his arm on childhood cancers and other unpronounceable things, and even a feature article in Time Magazine called Beating the Odds, Women in Medicine Making It to the Top, whose title Carter highlighted in bright orange.

Years ago, she'd just been Matt's mom. Always tired, usually working, sometimes hunched over a book or with notebook in her hand, but willing to lend a hand with their homework when she could, or play chess, or take Matt to a science club meeting. But this, it's amazing and unsettling all at once, to have the indistinct memory of a kind but harried woman expanded, a warm, hazy presence fleshed out, given such amazing depth.

As a child, he hadn't known to imagine what it all meant: a single woman with a kid, little support from Matt's father, trying to make a family, keep ahead of the bills, and plan and work for a better future. He certainly hadn't known about the scandal of Matt's birth, as described in some obscure Grand Rapids society page, about the phony marriage and divorce, or about her aspirations for medicine. He'd been in and around their house for years, how had he not known any of this?

How had he not even known it might be possible?

Early that evening, the rental car agent's directions take him into an upscale Chicago suburb with rolling lawns, enormous homes, and expensive cars in the driveways. A far cry from his childhood neighborhood, with it's modest houses and small, fenced in yards.

Marshall's Landing is on the left up ahead and Jack turns down the wide, tree-lined street searching for number 11437. A few minutes later, he spots the house, white, with black trim and a red door, atop a slight hill. Tim would demand a fortune to mow that lawn and trim the twelve foot high hedges.

At the foot of the long driveway, he slows to a stop, a litany of dire and unpleasant what-ifs running through his head. There's a reason, after all, that she left without a forwarding address. She might have run, like he did, as far away from the scene of grief and failure as she could. She may have wanted to travel light, no entanglements or reminders. And tonight, she might not even be home.

He grits his teeth and turns into the driveway anyhow, passing the point of no return without incident. The walk up the wide slate steps takes more effort than he expects, and his hand shakes a little when he reaches for, but doggedly presses, the door bell.

Shortly thereafter, a young woman dressed in black with spiky blonde hair and a nose ring answers the door. She looks at him suspiciously. Dressed as he is and carrying a soft leather briefcase, he probably looks like a door to door religion salesman. "Yeah?" she says, sounding bored. "Can I help you?"

His heart is pounding and his palms are sweaty. "Yes. Hi, I'm Jack O'Neill. I was hoping to speak with Dr. Fischer. Rachel Fischer."

She tilts her head. "She expecting you?"

"Uh, no. She isn't but--"

"Wait here." She steps back, leaving the door ajar, and yells, "Mo-om! Somebody at the door for you!"

A moment later, he hears footsteps on the tiled entryway and a figure approaches the open door. "Melissa, who was at the d--oh my god!"

They stare at each other for a moment and Rachel says, "Ohmygod, ohmygod," and presses a shaking hand over her mouth.

She's a lot older, but then, so is he. Her hair is completely white now and she's got wrinkles, but she's still tall and graceful, though much thinner than before. Her brilliant smile alone is worth the trip.

"Mom?"

"Jonathan?" She says softly, and reaches out to touch his face. Tears sparkle in her eyes then spill down her cheeks. He can feel the echo of her shock in his own chest, the spike of grief, quickly followed by the warmth of fond remembrance, like a fire laid upon a winter hearth.

"Hi, Mrs. Low--" and he catches his slip and gently takes her hand. "Hi, Dr. Fischer."

"Mom, who is this guy?"

"My god. How long has it been?"

He smiles and squeezes her hand. "About twenty-five years, I think."

Rachel shakes her head. "You're all grown up, now. But of course you are. I can't believe it, I just can't. But, come, don't let me have you stand out there all night. Come in. My god, I just can't believe it."

She takes Jack's arm and leads him through the spacious foyer and into the well-appointed living room beyond. Melissa, who still looks a little suspicious, closes the door behind them.

"I really can't believe it's you. After all these years." Rachel embraces him suddenly, holding him tightly enough that he can feel the pounding of her heart against his.

"It's really me," he says, holding on just as tightly. It seems like so long since he's held anyone; she feels small and very fragile in his arms. He's suddenly glad that Daniel insisted that he make this visit.

"Mom!"

Rachel pulls back and wipes the tears from her cheeks. "Melissa, this is Jonathan O'Neill. He lived next door to me years ago, on Chestnut Street. Jonathan, this is my daughter, Melissa."

Jack turns to Melissa and tilts his head. "Colonel Jack O'Neill, USAF, at your service, ma'am."

The daughter is a tough sell. She gives him a once-over, mutters, "Whatever," and then is out the room.

But Rachel is smiling and shaking her head again. "An Air Force Colonel. So you went all the way to the top. I'm not surprised." She makes her way to the sofa and sits down, pulling a pillow into her lap.

"Not quite to the top, Dr. Fischer," he says, sitting beside her. "But close."

"Close enough, and call me Rachel, please. My god, Jack, just look at you, a Colonel. You won't believe me, but I could see it when you were just a boy, from the day we moved in. You were so polite and serious and respectful, so responsible, always looking out for Matthew, a born leader, I thought. Matt would have followed you anywhere." Her smile is sunlight through rain, wistful but somehow satisfied.

Jack grins to himself, imagining Carter or Daniel or even Hammond's reaction to the words 'polite' and 'respectful' ever being used to describe him.

"Have you been flying any of those 'hot, sweet' planes that you and Matt were always talking about?"

He can't help but laugh then. "You still remember that?"

"Remember? How could I forget? There were models and pictures of every air force jet on every flat surface of the house and hanging from the ceiling for months!" She slaps his knee. "Of course I remember. I even still have one or two of them up in the attic."

"I get out for a test drive every so often," he says, recalling his disastrous encounter with the X-301.

"Well, I'm very glad to hear it. It's a wonder when a childhood dream comes true, isn't it?" Her eyes go a little distant and sad for a moment, but then she brightens. "Now tell me. What brings you to my doorstep? How are you? Where are you stationed these days? Are you married?"

So many questions and no easy answers, but before he can answer, a balding man with glasses enters the room, frowning. "Rachel? Melissa said we have a guest."

"You must be Dr. Fischer." Jack stands and offers his hand. "I'm Jack O'Neill, a friend from Dr. Fisch--Rachel's old neighborhood."

"Bill Fischer," the man says. They clasp hands and Bill looks him up and down, no doubt wondering exactly what the hell he's doing here. It occurs to him that Melissa does a damn good Bill Fischer imitation.

"Bill, Jack lived right next door to me on Chestnut Street. He was Matthew's best friend."

"Oh." Bill's eyebrows rise a bit and he nods. "Well then," he says finally, as if some matter is satisfied. "Pleased to meet you, Jack. Can I get you a drink? A martini? Scotch and soda? Coffee?"

"Coffee sounds great, sir." Never hurts to throw in a 'sir' or two to placate the suspicious and territorial doctor in his own home.

"Two, please," Rachel says, shooing Bill off with one hand. "This is truly amazing, Jack. Lately, for some reason I've been thinking about...that time, and wondering what became of you. And then, to have you just turn up, out of the blue on my doorstep!"

"And a very fine doorstep it is."

Her wry grin erases decades from her features. "A far cry from Chestnut Street, isn't it? All those years and all these changes. Sometimes it amazes even me."

Bill Fischer returns with the coffee, takes the chair to the left of the couch, and the conversation drifts to slightly less personal matters--name, rank, and serial number, sir--and all things medical. Fischer seems like a nice enough guy, but Jack really couldn't give two shits about innovative techniques for pace maker implantation.

Rachel rescues him by telling the story of how she and Bill met ("Then he actually rolled the ball down my lane, Jack. All because he was too vain to wear his glasses and wanted to impress me. At least he got me a strike!") much to his embarrassed squirming. She also relates a few of her own medical school mishaps and triumphs, from the time that she and her lab partner chased a cadaver eyeball under the tables after it had rolled from its tray, to the satisfaction of getting a perfect score in genetics, when the rest of the class failed.

It's an odd sensation, though, seeing this laughing and carefree Rachel; he never remembers Matt's mom being so funny.

Not long afterwards, she segues into the inevitable, but in this case welcome monologue of the proud parent. First, there's Louise, who's twenty-five, graduated from Northwestern three years ago in political science, summa cum laude, who is now working in the Hague, and is engaged to "a wonderful French gentleman." Then there's Melissa, their adopted daughter, studying sociology at UPenn and who is home for spring break. Rachel pulls out the family albums and guides Jack through the girls' first steps, baby teeth, school pageants and piano recitals, and finally to on to graduation.

Jack follows along gladly, enjoying the grinning faces, braces, and fly-away hair, but there's a bit of sadness as well. There are, of course, no pictures here of Matt, and Jack can't help but imagine his face amid the photos and wonder. Where would he have gone to college or graduate school? What would he have studied, physics, astronomy, mathematics? Would he have smiled in his graduation photo or played the serious student or blown it off altogether for a party at the beach?

Rachel feels it too because her tongue stumbles a little sometimes, her fingers drag over certain pictures, and he can feel a twin ache to his own.

Finally, Bill excuses himself to catch up on some journals in the study.

"I think that we've bored him, Jack," Rachel says sotto voce and winks at him conspiratorially. "But here. We've done nothing but talk about me and my family. What about you, tell me what you've been doing with you life. Tell me everything!"

"Everything?" he says, taking a deep breath. "Well, for that, we need...this." And he pulls out his own set of photos and opens the album across their laps.

For the next half-hour, she eagerly follows his life in pictures, from his appointment to the Air Force Academy, to graduation, and on to his first assignment, with photos of his parents and grandparents mixed in. Then it's on to his marriage, honeymoon, and various vacations and moves, a string of promotions. And finally, to Charlie.

"A handsome boy, Jack," she says, touching the photo lightly. "How old is he now?"

The lance of pain catches him off-guard and he has to pause before he can speak. "He died. A few years ago. Sara and I split up not too long afterwards."

"Oh, Jack. I'm so sorry."

"It was an accident," he says, and even after all this time, he still sounds like he's trying to convince himself.

"But you feel responsible?" She places her hand over his.

He nods once. "He managed to find my gun and. I should have. If I had just."

"I know. I understand how you feel," she says, then continues when he looks over at her, puzzled. "For years, I thought that. I felt that Matt was paying, had paid the price for my...mistake. My sins."

"But--"

"Not very logical, is it?" She says, with a twist to her smile. "For a scientist, a doctor to believe. But being a parent has little to do with logic I think, and everything to do with, I don't know, love maybe? The fiercest love there is. But you do your best to keep them happy, keep them safe and then, the rest is out of your hands."

Her hand is steady and warm on his and he finds the courage to ask. "The pain never goes, does it?"

Rachel sighs. "No. Not after five years, ten years, twenty, or ever. No parent should have to bury their child."

"Is that why you went into cancer research?"

She smiles at the change of topic. "Yes and no. I always wanted to be a doctor, Jack. But in those days, what were the chances of an orphan and a girl going to college, let alone medical school? And then, I met Gil and, well things got even more...complicated. But, knowing that I can help other parents, well, it's a comfort of sorts. A way to, to honor his life, I suppose."

The door bell rings into the small silence and somewhere else in the house, Melissa yells, "I'll get it!"

"It's probably just Janice," Rachel says, just as Melissa gets to the door. She walks past a moment later with another shorter, but just as spiky girl also dressed in black. The two disappear down the hallway, holding hands.

Jack blinks.

Rachel notices his surprise and smiles. "Ironic isn't it? But I suppose sometimes lightning strikes twice. I had to work on Bill a bit, but, I'd like to think that I was a little more understanding this time around."

"You weren't so bad the first time."

"Nice of you to say so, Jack, but. There were so many things I did, well, maybe not wrong but, not quite right, either."

"We do the best we can, isn't that right?" Jack says, quoting her advice right back at her.

She laughs at that. "Yes, I suppose that we do. So what made you think to look me up, Jack? And fly all the way from Colorado to visit."

"I almost didn't," he admits quietly. "I wasn't exactly sure that, after all this time, you wanted to be found. I sent this letter, before." He reaches into his briefcase then places the unopened envelope in her hand.

Rachel runs her fingers over the Return to Sender stamp then sighs. "I don't think I wanted to be found in those days. The year after Matt's death, I managed to get a scholarship to finish up my degree across state and I took it. I think had to get away, put some distance between me and, and everything that happened. I'm so glad to see you now Jack, it's like a miracle. But back then..."

He think of Abydos. At least she hadn't run clear across the galaxy. "I know the feeling. But, I saw this in the paper the other day." He hands her the news article about Gil Lowry's resignation from Chrysler and possible indictments for pandering and racketeering.

"Ah, yes. That. I saw it, too. Gil always did talk fast and walk a fine line. I suppose it's caught up with him at last."

They sit for a moment while Jack gathers his nerve. "And," he says, then clears his throat. "I was cleaning out my closet and found this mixed in with some old photos."

She takes the strip of photos and strokes her finger over their grinning faces pressed so close together. "I had always thought that maybe." Rachel looks over at him and smiles. "I guess I was right."

His mouth drops open. "You knew?"

She shakes her head. "I suspected, I wasn't certain. And when we found out about the cancer, well...I just wanted him to be happy. For as long as, for as long as he could. And I liked you, Jack, and trusted you. You always looked out for him. So I thought that maybe. Maybe it would be okay."

The scope of her trust leaves him breathless and weak. "And you never said a word."

She smiles a little and squeezes his hand. "Oh Jack, I always did know how to keep a secret 'til it died of old age."

Jack closes his eyes against the blinding flare of yes that flashes through his body from sole to crown.

"He was the most amazing friend, Rachel," he says into the darkness behind his eyes, dizzy with the familiar pre-flight, pre-mission flutter in his stomach. "For so long, we were like peanut butter and jelly."

Her hand closes over his again. "Yes, Jack. You really were."

He should really stop now, but the words are inexorable, like water flowing downhill. "I still miss him. After all these years."

"I know. I do too."

"I never hoped to ever find another friend like him again. And after Sara," he says, and his voice is a scratchy whisper. "I never expected to love again."

"But you did, didn't you Jack," she says quietly, and somehow he knows that they're not just talking about friendship, that she's read between the lines that he can't ever speak aloud and has found the truth.

"Yes," he says, opening his eyes and reaching for the final set of photographs in his case. He opens to the first page and places it across her knees. The familiar face pressed close to his own seems to smile just for him. "Yes, Rachel, I did."

The night is unseasonably warm and Jack rolls down the window on the drive back to his hotel. He feels light and settled in some undefinable way; the cold and persistent ache beneath his ribs has eased and his chest is now suffused with warmth. Street lights are few and far between in this section of town and he can see dozens of stars overhead. As he drives, three stars seems to follow him, around corners, along the interstate, and finally back to his hotel. Once there, he climbs out of the car and leans against the door looking up. The lights are brighter here, but those three stars still shine clearly in the darkness.

He has the oddest feeling then, that somehow, they will follow and keep following, pouring their light over and through him, forever. The thought makes him smile.

Glossary

Afl, Angan, and Kyrr: Thor's three children.

Ákafaehjarta: an ancient Asgard expression denoting the warmth generated in the heart by bonds of love, affection, and passion.

Agaeti: Thor's 'female' partner.

Alfheim: the name of the planet where Thor's family was killed by Ra.

Bakki: the inner cutting edge of the traditional Asgard honor blade (hjartsaema), also a term of endearment roughly equivalent to lover. A bakki is an unwise, perhaps illicit, but nonetheless essential beloved.

Duthsonnr: a prepubescent Asgard child.

Eldr: the principle of immortality.

Gandreith: a sorcerer's chariot, the name that Branrefr gave the alienspace craft found embedded in the rock on the sea floor of Alfheim.

Langelder: Asgard term denoting immortality gained through the process of cloning and consciousness transferrance.

Osk'dreyma: literally a wish-dream, the Asgard equivalent of a hologram.

Saerfornandi: the name Thor and his partner gave to the technological advanced creatures that once inhabited Alfheim.

Skuldhofferaeth: a debt incurred as the result of an act of hubris, tempting fate, or defying the gods.

Slá Kaupi: to strike a bargain, especially with a stronger opponent.

Smarhiti: denotes immortality gained through the process of procreation.

Sumarsolarsetr: a plant native to Alfheim that flowers in late winter.

Utlendrbræthr: a sibling of foreign or alien origins

Vindrvitr: the Wise Wind, Thor's lifsiglaskip, designed by his partner Agaeti.