Sequel to SNAFU WIP 3/? rated [MA] Jack/Daniel

[mockturle06]

Title: Wild Boys
Series: Stargate SG-1
Status: WIP
Part: 2/2 Sequel to SNAFU
Author: Hellblazer
E-mail address: havisham06@yahoo.com
Rating: MA
Category: Slash Angst Action/Adventure Hurt/Comfort
Pairing: Jack/Daniel
Date: September 2001 – September 2003
Disclaimers: Don't own these characters, MGM, Showtime and the rest do. No copyright infringement is intended or inferred.
Warnings: may contain slash, H/C, violence, m/m hanky panky, sex scenes, drug use, nudity, coarse language, horror, dodgy research, adult themes, general silliness, etc.
Spoilers: Season Three
Summary: Jack and Daniel go native.
Notes: Yes, yes, it was rather fated as to what my next fandom du jour would be, but the bulk of this was fuelled by a lazy Summer night, two hours of the Lost World and left over Xmas booze.

o0o

It watched him for a long while, then scuttled forward at alarming speed, legs everywhere, then stood and watched him again, considering how best to approach the little fly that had so carelessly walked into its web.

Slowly, without making any sudden moves, Jack hacked away at any hair and cloth the dangling web was attached to, stealing himself to tear and cut away the skin at the last moment, knowing full well the monster could feel every twitch upon the line. Hell, it was probably working up an appetite just from watching Jack's pathetic little struggles.

Jack swore he could see himself reflected in every one of the creature's black and beady little eyes and of all the horrors he'd faced, this had to be the worst. There was just something so alien and cold in those eyes. There would be no reasoning, no tricks. He was food and nothing more. Of all the stupid ways to die, he cursed himself, as he ripped the sticky vine from his arm, barely able to suppress the hiss of pain that rose up within him.

The creature heard him, took several steps closer and rose up, front legs flailing like some terrible stallion, ready to crash down on him and deliver the coup de grace with its terrible fangs.

Jack didn't even have time to think of Daniel one last time as the creature reared back, hissing and angry, several spears sticking out from the joints between its legs and its thorax. Jack was pulled free, taking some of the sticky silk with him and leaving some thin layers of skin behind, too busy stumbling free out of the cave mouth to care.

The creature charged at them through the open hole in the rock and Jack spun, bringing up his MP-5 and firing off a burst, the bullets cracking through the exoskeleton. It fell back, struggling wildly, and the tribesmen gathered around it, stabbing down hard again and again through the cracks in its hard shell until it moved no more.

Jack sank down on the ground, his knees giving way now that the danger was over for a moment. One of the young boys threw a piece of a leg at his feet, a trophy of his kill. They were busy breaking apart the spider, good God, not to eat it, surely, when Jack remembered the unhappy guys with the blow darts from the other bank and he marshalled his guides turned enthusiastic butchers into some semblance of a patrol and got them marching again. The cut off leg in his pack stank but he knew Daniel would never believe him without proof. He tied the remains of his shirt around his bleeding arm and marched on.

The first thing Jack saw as the trees thinned, breaking into scraggly brush then thin grasses in short stubby tufts as they broke over the rise of the small arid and pebbly plateau, leaving the jungle behind, was the Stargate. The second thing Jack saw as he scouted the treeless and therefore completely lacking in cover plain with his field glasses was that the MALP was no longer there. He looked up and down and around but it just wasn't there any more.

Closer examination once they'd reached the foot of the Stargate revealed the scuff marks in the dirt where it had been dragged off by many feet. It was probably installed as a little metal god somewhere by now. Daniel would be amused. Jack clearly wasn't.

He tried dialling home but even if his GDO had withstood its mandatory blessing, and he really hadn't been looking forward to testing that out, he never got as far as making a connection. Each time he just got the intergalactic equivalent of a busy signal. Which meant something was up back home. Something seriously bad was up back home. His mind ran over invasion, destruction, epidemic or some cosmic shift in quick succession. He didn't like it, he wasn't happy but he'd tried twenty times and nothing was happening. There was only one thing for it and that was to go back and try again next week. And the week after that, and after that, until Carter had jerry rigged some way of rescuing them. He'd give her a hundred days, and if he hadn't seen or heard anything by then he'd assume he and Daniel were stuck here. Permanently.

The tribesmen were obviously a little let down that Jack couldn’t make the big magic happen, and Jack pointed to the sky, swearing furiously, blaming the weather and the alignment of the stars and they all nodded, taking his meaning. Damn, if these last few years of having Daniel by his side hadn’t started to rub off on him. Normally he’d be alarmed but right now he was glad to be a graduate of the Dr Jackson school of bullshitting the locals, and he managed to conceal his worries and bitter disappointment from them. At least, he liked to think he had.

The walk back was a long and sombre one. Jack, weathering a heavy depression brought on by their situation, was really feeling every muscle strain, every cut, scrape and tear, and the stink of the spider forepaw in his pack was really making his stomach turn.

Of all the planets to be stranded on, this one was not at the top of Jack’s list, not even in the top twenty, and he dreaded having to tell Daniel the bad news. He dreaded on seeing the light drop from Daniel’s eyes.

They were nearly back to their own village, rival tribesmen, killer plants and giant spiders left well behind, when the jungle crashed aside with a sudden terrible tearing and snorting. It sounded like a dozen enormous wild boar gearing up to charge and Jack didn't want to know what was louder, heavier and more vicious than a wild boar, but he knew he was about to find out. His guides had taken off in terror, rabbit running through the twisted undergrowth and Jack wasn't about to argue, breaking into a sprint behind them, as the terrible thing behind him put its head down and started charging.

Jack would remember the heavy thump, thump, thump of the thing hitting the ground like a giant heartbeat behind him in his nightmares for the rest of his life as it tried to run him down. His merry little band had bolted down holes like Alice or fled up trees, leaving Jack running for his life out in the open, with that thing pounding and crashing behind him, closer and closer until one of the older boys had reached down like an acrobat on the trapeze and hooked Jack back up into the tree tops. Both of them scrambled up, the boy forcing Jack up higher and faster with desperate and insistent pushes until they clung in the thin swaying topmost branches just above the canopy and that's when Jack saw what had made those terrible footfalls.
It trotted right up to their tree, looked up at them and glared, gave a sniff and snort in derision then sloped off again in a huff, giving them up as too difficult when there was easier, smaller prey about.

Now Jack knew what those big wooden gates were all about. They weren't for King Kong, they were for Godzilla. As his arm dripped bright red blood down onto the oily green leaves beneath them Jack knew exactly how the creature had picked up their trail, too. Only Jack hadn't been as injured as it had hoped. As much as Jack felt like his heart was about to burst there was still no coming down from the trees for at least an hour or two until they were sure it had passed. Jack's legs were like jelly as he tried to climb down, and he was annoyed with himself and his own weakness before he decided to allow himself the excuse that he'd never been nearly eaten by a dinosaur before.

Daniel had always wondered why some of the mega fauna and flora extinct on earth hadn't shown up on planets with less agrarian populations, as the Goa'uld had imported the plants and beasts as well as the people in their terraforming efforts.

Guess Daniel had his answer now, though Jack suspected maybe this wildlife was indigenous, aside from the whole they've been extinct on earth for millions of years argument. Really, who in their right mind, even a Goa'uld, would want a couple of those running about. It explained at least why the attempt to civilise this place by whatever Aztec/Olmec/whatever styled god had been abandoned. It's no fun building monuments to your greatness when your workers keep getting eaten. It puts back schedules, the little guys start demanding danger pay, it's just no good.

Guess the Goa'uld's initial survey of the planet had been as crap as the SGC's one. Though how you could miss a fucker like that, it was beyond Jack.

Jack all but ran through the village upon his return through the blessedly heavy wooden gates, still wired on adrenalin and eager to tell Daniel about his adventures - the bad news about the Gate could wait - but when he called out "Hi honey, I'm home" as he swung into the hut there was no one there to answer.

"Daniel? Daniel!" Jack threw down his pack, spider leg and all, in frustration. For crying out loud. Of course Daniel would pick now, of all times, to wander off.

Damn. Now where the hell was he? Jack stalked through the village, his miming of 'had anyone seen where the crazy guy with the funny glasses had got to' still slaying them in the aisles - he guessed that one never grew old - but aside from cracking everyone up precious little information was forthcoming. Daniel wasn't kicking back with the elders or annoying the women by asking dumb endless questions as they worked and when Jack checked the hut again he found Daniel's pack was gone and the bottom dropped out of his stomach. Please, please, please don't let him have wandered off on his own, but Jack knew deep in his heart that's exactly what the little idiot had gone and done. Common sense and self preservation were obviously recessive genes in the Jackson clan.

Audibly cursing, Jack dumped his own pack on the floor, taking only what he needed: his weapons, a spear and water. He set out again in search of Daniel, hoping Daniel hadn't wandered off too far in search of whatever had taken his fancy, hoping Daniel hadn't run into some of the monsters he'd seen.

Several desperate hours of searching and scrambling through stinking jungle and Jack found the little fucker at last, just when he was about to give up all hope. The little scrambling track opened out onto a lake front and there Daniel was, like nothing had happened, just perched on a rocky outcrop on the shore of a large volcanic lake, scrawling away and, Jack could barely believe this, birdwatching, completely oblivious to all dangers. Oh yeah, the self preservation gene was sorely lacking in the Jackson family tree

"Daniel!" Jack barked out, sending all birdlife flapping across the lake, earning him a cranky look from Daniel. The notebook was folded away pointedly.

"Didn't you hear me calling you?" Jack started angrily but Daniel just dismissed him with a shrug of a shoulder, returning his attention to the oval shaped lake.

"Yes, but it's so beautiful here, just look -" he indicated the glittering waters with an expansive gesture. "I've been trying to draw some of the waterfowl I've seen, since my camera was ruined. I think I've discovered at least two dozen new species just since I've been sitting here."

As if two prove his point two dazzling emerald and sapphire coloured butterflies danced by between them.

"They can wait, Daniel." Jack was dragging him up and packing him up. "It's not safe out here."

"Not safe - why?"

"I'll tell you later. For now, we go."

Daniel wasn’t making any moves that looked like leaving.

"Daniel," Jack began, warming up to his cautions for dummies speech. "You can't just wander out here by yourself. It's very, very dangerous."

"How dangerous can it be, Jack? I followed the women down here this morning when they did their washing."

Jack sat down beside Daniel, trying to compete with the Discovery special going on around them for his attention.

"Daniel, they know this place, you don't. This planet isn't safe. There are crocodiles, spiders, snakes, poisonous plants and -"

"Jack, I've been in the jungle before."

Jack shook his head. Not like this. He winced for what he was about to say. "There are dinosaurs here, Daniel. Big ones."

"Jack," Daniel shook his head, smiling. "Dinosaurs have been extinct for millions of years. Are you sure you didn't see a komodo, or a cassowary? Dinosaurs were gone long before the Goa'uld started populating these worlds."

"Daniel, dammit, just trust me on this. The bloody thing chased us all up a tree like a grizzly. It looked like a big fucking emu with teeth. You've seen weird critters before, Daniel. You fucking made a pet of an Unas, so don't try to Scully me on this. I know what I saw."

"A dinosaur." Daniel was giving him that smug little smirk of his. "With feathers."

"All right," Jack stood up, peeved. "You don't believe me, then come back with me, I've got something to show you."

"Jack," Daniel complained, wanting to spend more time by the lake birdwatching.

"I'm not leaving you out here on your own, Daniel."

Head hung like a dog, Daniel knew when he wasn’t going to win. He started packing up his gear, fully believing Jack had finally lost it, probably from sunstroke or something.

Jack was standing over him, insisting he get moving faster, when they both heard it, that terrible thundering footfall, the one now permanently etched in Jack's nightmares.

"Jack?" Daniel asked, shoving the last of his books in his pack and slinging it over his shoulder. "What was that?"

"You seen Jurassic Park?"

"Shit."

Jack nodded.

"Run!" He pushed Daniel forward and they scrambled desperately through the roots and vines that clawed at them, trying to hold them still for the monster that crashed through the jungle, having picked up Jack's scent again. They tore themselves free, tearing skin and clothes and uncaring in their mad dash to get back to the bolt hole cut in the wall of the village, falling through for it to be slammed shut behind them, the beast piling into the wooden poles with a terrible crash and angry hissing. The sound of claws scrabbling on wood nearly deafened them as the young men scurried up the fence whooping and throwing spears down onto the angry giant snarling feather duster with attitude. The ancient creature thrashed and struggled and snapped those terrible jaws as it was speared again and again like a bull in a bull ring, one of the boys finally administering the coup de tate, bringing the beast to its knees and then striking it dead.

More whooping followed as the beast was dragged inside the compound by a team of young men and butchered, huge chunks of lizard flesh being hacked off and handed out in a predetermined order, some families having a hereditary right to the tail or the liver.

While all this was going on Jack turned to Daniel with his 'what did I tell you?' face.

Chastened, Daniel said nothing, not needing to promise that he wouldn't wander off on his own again. Not with monsters like that prowling out there in the trees.

Jack was amused as the carcass was quickly sawn down to bloody bones. It looked like there'd be giant, mean, chicken tonight, as well as arachnid.