Disclaimer – MGM/Gekko/Double Secret own them.
Spoilers for ‘Shadow Play’. Set in season six.
Suz Notes: This was scary! A mad last minute decision to write a fic together before Sesa left. Eeep! Much frantic e-mailing and “When are you on-line?!?” was done. But it was fun! As a result, it's rather silly. Oh - and I'm sure the SGC has its own cleaning facilities...but so what?
Sesa Notes: It's amazing what you can do when you're supposed to be working. It's currently gone 11pm here and I'm up in 7 hours to fly to Spain... this is a parting gift to you. And especially to Suz who, I think, will miss our VERY frequent work mailings!
*
Friday started as a normal day for almost everyone at the SGC.
General Hammond woke early, relaxed in bed listening to the radio, dressed and then went to his car to drive to the base; he could eat there this morning, while reading yesterday's reports.
Samantha Carter woke, dressed, did three amazing things and then had breakfast.
Jonas Quinn woke, started to head to the mess for breakfast before realising just a split second too late that he *really* ought to dress first, apologised to the SF who has started deliberately taking that route because it wasn't the first time he'd done it, went back to put some clothes on, then headed to the mess for breakfast.
Teal'c awoke from his kel'no'reem, changed into his standard issue army gear and went to join Jonas in the mess.
Jack O'Neill woke...and that was when his problems started.
The first indication that something was wrong was the sensation of something sticking to his butt.
Wait...he shifted...that wasn't quite right. His butt was stuck to that something, not the other way around.
As he awoke further his equilibrium began to fill him in on other details, such as the fact that he was sitting up. Sure, his head was tipping back and his mouth was wide open, but he was definitely sitting up...in a very familiar chair. He shifted some more. His skin tugged on whatever it was caught on, and that was when he realised: leather.
And the only place *he* ever sat on leather was in-
His eyes finally opened, wincing at the artificial light that he'd just known was waiting to attack his eyeballs like millions of tiny little staff blasts.
But yeah. He was there. In his office.
By this point his brain had collected enough information that it began to group it all together. Categories and sub-categories were formed (ranging from '*so* not good' to 'what the hell does that mean?'), until eventually, certain aspects of the information Jack's brain had obtained were compared.
Naked flesh + his office =
He looked down. For some unfathomable reason, he was sitting on his chair, in his office, wearing only the top half of his dress uniform.
What the hell had happened the previous night? He vaguely remember having a couple of drinks, but certainly not so much that he couldn't...oh, wait a second...
Jonas had recommended something. Something his Professor had given him on their visit back to Kelowna. Something that was most definitely *not* naquadriah.
And why the hell had he been drinking with Jonas? He didn't even like the guy. At all. Not one bit.
O-kaaay.
No need to worry, surely. He'd been in worse situations before... yeah... he must have been... at some point...
His mind having finally and completely awoken to the situation, chose the classic panic response - do what you know. Fortunately for Jack, it chose to do something fairly useful - observe, evaluate, prioritise, act.
Observation had already told him everything he needed to know and a lot more that he really wished he *didn't* know.
Evaluation of the immediate situation suggested he'd done something last night that he couldn't remember - oh God, did Jonas remember? - that had left him in his office half-dressed. He needed to find some clothes, find the newest member (possibly soon ex-member) of his team responsible for this fiasco and get some damn good answers out of him.
Prioritisation suggested that the getting-of-clothes should probably be top of that list.
Action was the least pleasant of the four. The only positive thing about having to peel his ass off the chair was that the stinging sensation focused him enough to keep him upright once he got there.
Aha - the door, the hook on the back of it, the coat, and surely the pants too. Slowly, he padded towards the door, thankful that this would all be over in just a few moments.
Reaching the door, he was surprised to find it knocked at him as he leaned on it for support...
No... wait, doors didn't do that...
Looking down to his right, he watched in horror as the door handle began to turn slowly. He could almost imagine the swelling orchestra in the background like in a cheesy horror slo-mo shot... or was that just a percussion section banging away in his head?
The next thing he knew, he was cowering behind his open door with his butt cheeks pressed against the cold wall. He stared alternately into the initially confused then shocked eyes of his 2IC and at the dress pants neatly hung on a dry cleaner's hanger in her hand.
"Colonel!"
"Major!"
"Sir!"
"Carter!"
"I-"
"Just-"
"These are for you," Finally moving into action, she blindly shoved the pants in his general direction and swivelled away, marching out of the room.
Fool that he was, he couldn't let her go. He had to know something. "Carter, wait!"
She turned back, standing in the corridor, watching him as he shuffled, peering from behind the door until it was barely ajar.
Realising how stupid he must look, he spoke. "Just a sec," Closing the door he whipped the pants off the hanger and quickly pulled them on, doing the 'pant dance' - trying to put both legs in at the same time whilst standing up - and inevitably, it happened.
He really should have seen it coming but he didn't, losing his balance and much of his modesty along the way as he landed in an undignified pile on the floor.
"Ow..."
The door knocked at him again, hesitantly. "Sir? Are you all right?"
"Ow..."
Opening once again, the door moved to reveal her face - eyes firmly shut as she investigated without any visual observational skills. "Sir?"
Man, that was gonna hurt in the morning... wait. It was the morning. God, he should have just stayed with his butt stuck to the chair... "Hang on." Shuffling on the floor, ensuring that his pants last visit to the dry cleaners was pretty much useless, he eventually yanked them on. His mission complete, he let his head fall back to the floor. Except that hurt. "So Carter...where'd you get my pants?"
"Um - they were just there when I went to pick up my own uniform, you must have put them in recently, sir. I thought I'd, um, drop by. Didn't you put them in yourself?"
"Yeah, probably," he dismissed though he really didn't remember. "Look, have you seen Jonas around this morning? I think I need a bit of a word with him."
"Oh, yes, sir, he was eating breakfast with Teal'c about fifteen minutes ago just before I, er, saw you...sir." And she'd been doing so well and acting like she hadn't just caught her commanding officer half naked.
"Well, look, can you, er, not mention this to anyone and just send him on over, please." He suddenly realised that he was still lying on the floor staring up at her and she was still standing facing his far wall with her eyes shut. "Oh and you can open your eyes now, Carter, nothing more to see here."
She opened her eyes looked down at him and without waiting to be dismissed by her recumbent CO, she turned and practically sprinted out of the door. He wasn't sure whether it was so that she could laugh or scream and he definitely didn't want to know. The look in her eyes when she'd first seen him was going to haunt him for a while.
Hmm - her eyes...that was sparking a memory from last night. He screwed his own shut, laying there and not bothering to get up as he tried to dredge up some memories from the murky bog that was his mind...
~~~
'So what's your favourite colour?'
Huh? Jonas had started asking stupid questions like he was trying to get to know him. The worrying thing was that he was answering them. What *was* in this drink?
'Blue', he grinned like a teenager in love and took another sip of the drink that tasted a lot like rum and black. 'Mmm - lovely blue, the sea's blue, the sky's blue, my uniform's blue, her eyes are blue...mmmm.'
'*Her's*?'
'Yeah,' He grinned happily, and breathed the word on the end of a blissful sigh. 'Carrrttterrr...'
Jonas may or may not have been fascinated - in any case, Jack had been much too interested in trying balance a spoon on the edge of his glass - and usually failing.
'You like Sam's eyes?'
Grumpy now, Jack frowned. That so wasn't fair. Sam. Samantha. He should call her that one day, just to piss her off. Just to get a reaction. But then there were a lot of things that he should do. 'You think I'm not capable of appreciating her eyes?'
'I didn't say that, Colonel.'
'You think dumb old Jack O'Neill can't apprecsssiate beauty when he sees it?'
'Again, I didn't-'
'I'd been starting to like you, too.' Standing up, he stumbled away from the desk. Desk? Or was it a table? Something wooden. And where the hell was he, anyway?
He decided the wooden thing was gonna be great for leaning on so he stumbled back and did that. Jonas seemed good for yelling at so he did that too.
'You just go around calling her Sam all the time. Sam-this, Sam- that...yeah, well *I*-'
He felt something prod him - oh, it was his finger-
'*I* used to call her Samaaannnthhaaa, yeah. And...and she even called me Jaaack once, so there.'
He stared at Jonas, safe in the knowledge his impassioned and well- thought-out speech would have the desired affect... what was that again...
'Colonel, are you feeling okay? It's um, this drink really isn't supposed to affect you like this. Maybe I should get the doctor on call to take a look at you?'
'I'm feeeling jussst fine...never quesstion your soo- soop- co- com- ...me. You, think you're the onnnly one who can call her Sam...I'mmm gonna call her Ssssamm too, yeah, jusst need too doo sssomething firssst.' He had a mission; he had to see the General, now...
~~~
Jack scrunched his eyes further shut as he tried to remember what the damn mission was but it eluded him. Suddenly, for the third time that morning, the door knocked. This time it was a slightly distressed sounding Kelownan "Uh, Colonel, uh, it's Jonas, how are you?"
Ah hah! Finally, some answers. Although, he had to admit, some part of him wasn't sure he wanted to know...but it had to be done. "No longer half-naked, if that's what you're asking. Get in here."
The nervous looking man pushed open the door and crept inside - looking for all the world like he wanted to leave again. Then looking like his eyes were about to pop out of his head. "Colonel. You're...on the floor."
"Well observed, Jonas. I knew you'd come in useful someday. Help me up, will ya?"
Complying with Jack's request, Jonas extended a hand, an arm, and - due to Jack's dizziness - his entire body to get the Colonel to his feet.
"Uh sorry," Jack apologised, wondering if he would *ever* be seen with
dignity again by an entire half of his team.
"No problem," Jonas responded, making sure Jack could stand before he stepped away. "How are you feeling?"
Moving carefully, Jack shuffled over to his desk and behind that his sanctuary - the chair. "Well, considering what I *do* remember of last night, I feel surprisingly good."
"Speaking of last night..."
Ah, good. Jonas had saved him the trouble of saying it. "Yesss?" He slid down into his chair, and wondered why he'd ever stood up.
Oh yeah - the whole naked butt thing.
"How much do you remember?"
*
"Well, we drank a few glasses of that stuff Dr. Kieren brought you. I remember getting waaay drunker than I should have done and coming up with a mission."
"Uh-huh - and what was the mission about?"
"Damned if I can remember. So what the hell was in that drink, Jonas? And don't mess with me!"
"It wasn't supposed to do that, maybe your bodies are just different or we've built up a resistance or something..." Jonas drifted off as he noticed the 'look of death' he'd heard about from some junior officers. Then it faded and the colonel just looked a little tired.
"Oh, whatever." The Colonel's head sunk onto his hands. "Look, what did I do? I'm going to need to know at some point."
Suddenly, the boots Jonas had been issued with when he joined the team seemed really interesting, hmmm - was that a curry stain on the right one? He spoke to them..."Well, you decided to resign."
"I *what*!?"
Jonas' head sprung up and he saw the Colonel's had done the same.
Then the look of surprise on the man's face morphed into a look of realisation followed by - he couldn't quite tell, but it looked like a kind of sad acceptance. Jonas just decided to fill the silence after it appeared that that was all the guy in front of him was going to say.
"You said it was about time you could call Sam by her first name and then said you were going to resign. Kept going on about her eyes and lips and..." His voice faded away not bothering to complete it as he realised he was already saying way more than he needed to. "Anyway, no-one saw or heard anything, it was only me there."
The colonel was now staring past him, not seeming to focus on anything in particular. Assuming he hadn't dropped into some sort of instant coma requiring immediate medical support - although anything seemed possible - this seemed a good time to make a quick exit. He turned and was almost at the door - what were those two damp round marks on the wall? - when he was stopped by the question he'd been dreading.
"So how did I end up in my office with exactly half my dress uniform on?"
Acknowledging the fact that the Colonel wasn't going to let him leave until he got his answer, Jonas sighed, braced himself, and turned around. "When you were going to...retire...you insisted on doing it properly - you felt that General Hammond deserved nothing less. So, you wrote out your resignation, then insisted on changing into your dress uniform." Why didn't he just shut up? "Knowing that you'd never do anything like this normally, I decided the only way to stop you was to...hide your pants."
Colonel O'Neill sat at his desk with the palms of his hands now resting on the table. "So you sent them to be cleaned." "Yes."
"Just my pants."
"Yes."
"It didn't occur to you to send my jacket, too."
"Well I had to leave you *something*...you wouldn't wear anything else!" Oh geez...realising he was picking up the Colonel's phrases, he shook his head. "Your office was closer than anywhere else so I brought you back here." That had been the scariest mission of his life - getting the Colonel to his office without anyone seeing what was on display. "I was planning to bring you a change of clothes for the morning but I was really tired and I had been drinking myself-"
"You forgot."
"Yeah. I did."
Sighing and moving his hands, the Colonel lowered his head until it rested on the table. His voice was muffled when he spoke. "Okay Jonas, thank you very much. I'd really appreciate it if you wouldn't mention this to anyone. Ever."
No need to even ask. "Of course, Colonel-"
"Colonel!"
O'Neill's head shot up and Jonas spun round as General Hammond thundered into the room.
"General!"
He didn't acknowledge the greeting, which was really more of a fearful cry. Instead, he stomped forward and placed the sheet of paper he was holding on the desk. "I just arrived, and found something waiting for me in my office. Would you mind explaining *this*?"
Dreading what he was about to see, Jonas peered over the General's shoulder even as the Colonel's head thudded back down on the table.
There, in the Colonel's familiar scrawl, were the words 'I QUIT!'
Oops.
He knew he'd forgotten something else.
~FINIS