"What exactly are you trying to get at, Jack?"
It had been two and a half days since SG1's real.. well, flesh and blood, counterparts had left them on PX3 989 to eke out what existence they could. Daniel missed himself - his other one - the other him - the... whatever. The half hour they'd talked had been the most fascinating conversation of his entire life, and both of him had been reluctant to end it. And now there was just Jack, even surlier than usual, though tonight oddly fascinated by a new idea. Lying on his back, head two feet from Jack's, Daniel tried to focus on his friend's words to distract himself from Harlan's chatter that still rang in his ears.
"C'mon," Jack continued. "I mean, aren't you a little bit curious about what these bodies actually do? I didn't think I'd be the only one wondering about my new... fluid production capacity."
Daniel squeezed his eyes shut. It didn't help, so he opened them again.
"Fluid. Production. Capacity. That sounds so... clinical."
Jack sat up and cocked his head at Daniel, who didn't meet his eyes.
"Okay, what would you prefer I called it? 'Spoojability'? Come on, I'm just wondering. We don't bleed, and we don't get hungry, but we do salivate, at least enough that my mouth doesn't feel weird."
Daniel sighed, and gave in. He swung his legs around and sat up to face Jack's wide-eyed innocent look. The good Colonel was getting disturbingly good at that look.
"So let's look at this logically. These bodies were created by Harlan to contain everything about our memories and personality. They look and feel real, they move naturally, and we think and even emote in familiar ways." Daniel was taking on his annoyed-lecturer tone, and Jack folded his hands in his lap, every inch the attentive student. "Now, theoretically, one of the things that separates human from beast is our conscious and emotional attachment to sex - though cases can and have been made that we're not alone in that. But it's pretty clear that human sexuality, at least, is not just physical and instinctual, it's psychological, and social. Therefore, again theoretically, a person couldn't be himself without some ability to be sexual. I don't know just..."
Jack joined in the last bit. "... just yet. Me neither." He smirked.
"What made you so interested in this, anyway? I thought you were sustaining yourself on pure miserable venom at Harlan."
"Oh, I am," said Jack. "But that only lasts so long, so when I came up with something that made it a little more bearable, I went with it."
By now Daniel was actually intrigued by the topic. He frowned.
"Of course, up until now science has never had the ability to fully separate the conscious mind from the chemical and hormonal influences of the physical body, so we won't know for sure what that does until we test it."
Daniel cut off, realizing that that sentence had ended up in a different place from where it had started. After a moment, he snuck a deep breath and a sideways glance at Jack. Who was staring at him. With one eyebrow raised. Damn.
"Test it, huh? Now you're starting to sound like Carter. By the way, it looks like you can blush, or at least do something that looks like blushing, so that's encouraging."
Daniel sighed. He could also, apparently, do something very like getting a headache.
"Are we interrupting something?" Sam's voice carried a hint of the same headache as she and Teal'c entered, shucking jackets. She plopped down on what passed for her bed and lay there, one arm slung over her face.
Jack shook his head, opening his mouth to speak, but Daniel beat him to it.
"No, Jack and I were just discussing whether we could have sex."
Then he wished he hadn't. Everyone stared at him.
"I was unaware of any new restrictions placed..." said Teal'c.
"Um..." began Sam.
"Shut up, Sam," said Daniel.
"I didn't say anything," protested Sam.
Jack just grinned, at Teal'c of all people, who hadn't quite finished his sentence - a small mercy, perhaps. Daniel tried again.
"All of us, I mean." That wasn't any better. "Theoretically..." No, that wasn't it. "Um, physically, with our parts and the capabilities we have now and the fact that we don't bleed or get hungry but we react emotionally to being stranded on a planet on the other side of the galaxy—" Sam raised a finger — "I don't care how far it actually is because it doesn't matter, we're never getting home anyway so we might as well be in the Gamma Quadrant!"
Sam lowered her finger.
"I didn't know you watched Star Trek," was all she said.
"Fuck," said Daniel.
Teal'c raised an eyebrow. He did it much better than Jack did.
Daniel rolled onto his back and squeezed his eyes shut. "Could you just... be quiet for a while? I'm going to try to get some sleep."
"Uh, Daniel?"
"Shut up, Jack."
"Right."
Of course, he didn't exactly need sleep, any more than he needed food, but resting there in the near-silence and the approximate darkness (once someone, probably Teal'c, bothered to get up and turn the light off) was nice. Daniel heard his companions get up and back down every once in a while, and after a particularly long stretch of silence he blinked his eyes open. Only to find the upside down face of Jack O'Neill staring at him.
"Gah!" Daniel tried to roll off the bed, but Jack's hands on his shoulders trapped him in place. "What the hell are you doing?" He tried, and largely failed, to keep his voice calm, and utterly failed to stifle a squeal when Jack's lips descended onto his for an oddly wet kiss that tasted wrong. But felt about as right as it should have under the circumstances. Huh. "Mphbt thrz?"
Jack pulled back. "Conducting an experiment, like you said. And the others are elsewhere." He nodded, satisfied. "So. What did that feel like?"
Daniel blinked and sat up to face Jack; this time, he was allowed. "Clinically?" He cleared his throat. "Well, you don't exactly salivate, but it seems to work just as well." He licked his lips. "Mildly salty. You?"
Jack shrugged. "Try again?"
Daniel shrugged. "Science, right?"
This time the kiss was slower and less startling, but it was still rather unexpected when, several long moments in, Jack's hand darted out and snaked inside Daniel's waistband. This time it was more of a whimpering moan that Daniel failed utterly in his attempt to stifle, as he slid along the bed to give the exploring hand better access to what appeared to be an erection, or something rather like it. The hand found it, and wrapped slowly around it. Daniel pulled back an inch.
"Well. I guess that answers that," he said, psychosomatically breathless.
Jack cocked his head. "Not really. Shut up, I'm busy."
"Right. Sorry." Jack's hand began moving. Daniel's right hand came up in a fist and rested on Jack's shoulder as Jack continued to stroke him firmly. Daniel dipped his forehead to rest on his fist and rocked slightly into the rhythm Jack found. It certainly... felt real enough.
Trying to clinically analyze his own neurological sexual reactions to being given a hand job by his best friend might have seemed like an odd thing to the old Daniel Jackson. But the new Daniel Jackson was sliding rather easily into his new roles... a testament to the impressive adaptability of the human animal especially to new circumstances like sliding his cock in and out of Jack's fist pumping away inside his pants and feeling just like the old Daniel had a hundred times before and recognizing the euphoria slowly rising in prelude to biting his fist and - this time more successfully - stifling a shout as he climaxed. Or did something like it.
Jack's hand and Daniel's hips both slowed to a stop, and Jack drew his cupped hand out. Daniel peeked over.
"So, uh, what is it?"
"It's like our spit. I think it's the same, actually." He held his hand out, and Daniel touched the small amount of nearly clear fluid with a finger before thinking. Then he shrugged, and touched it to his tongue. He nodded.
"Yeah. Definitely the same. Weird."
"That's one word for it."
"And another would be?"
"Well, I think we've answered the question."
Daniel tried and failed to raise one eyebrow and settled for raising both. "But after all, the key to scientific research is repeatability of results."
"Shut up, Daniel."
"Right."
Footsteps approached, and Daniel hastily fixed his pants as Jack wiped his hand on the bed and slid a discreet distance away. Teal'c entered first, followed by Sam.
"Did we miss something?"
Daniel flopped onto his back and flung an arm over his face, copying Sam's pose from earlier that night.
"Teal'c, I think Daniel is grinning. And possibly glowing," said Sam.
"Glowing, Captain Carter?" asked Teal'c.
"Never mind."
"So," came Jack's voice, a little too brightly. "What have you kids been up to?"
Daniel was definitely grinning. It might turn out to be a very interesting sort of existence after all.
