Read Online STARGATE SG-1: Do No Harm by Karen Miller - Free Book Online

the garden, a cold beer in hand. He lifted it. “Did you want one?”
    “No. No, I’m good.”
    Jack sighed. “What you are, Daniel, is a pain in the butt. Don’t tell me, let me guess. You drew the short straw. Again.”
    “No, actually. No straws this time. Just me.”
    “Being you,” said Jack. “So. What do you want?”
    He didn’t sound very friendly. Surprise, surprise. Sometimes it felt like simple friendliness wasn’t a big part of their friendship. At least not the kind of easy, uncomplicated camaraderie that other people enjoyed. Him and Sam. Him and Teal’c. Even
Jack
and Teal’c.
They
got along like bread and butter.
    But me and Jack? We’re bread and barbed wire.
    At least that’s what it felt like sometimes. Whenever they butted heads over their diametrically opposed life philosophies, or he was getting in Jack’s face for Jack’s own good. Like now, for example. So. Ask a blunt question, get a blunt answer.
    “I’m worried you’re going to end up going medieval on David Dixon’s ass.”
    Jack choked on a mouthful of beer, nearly spewing it into the air. “
What?
”
    “You heard me,” he said, and sat down again. “Look. Can we talk about this? Like grownups?”
    Jack kept his back resolutely turned. “Says the man who skulked in his car for half an hour, too afraid to knock on my door.”
    “Yeah. Okay. That was dumb.”
    “Ya think?”
    “I was formulating an approach. Working out the best strategy to get the conversational ball rolling.”’
    “There is no ball, Daniel. There is no rolling. There’s nothing to talk about.”
    Daniel let his head fall back against the chair. “Yeah, Jack, there really is. I might not’ve been here for the actual black hole-sucking-the-earth-down-its-gullet extravaganza but I was around for the sequel. And having seen that movie once, I gotta tell you I’m not particularly interested in a rerun.”
    Jack threw a scorching glance over his shoulder. “Daniel, you’re full of crap.”
    “Am I?”
    “Didn’t I just say so?”
    “I don’t care what you said. It’s what you
don’t
say, Jack, that gets you into trouble.”
    “Okay,” said Jack, and turned away from the French doors. “Did you, I don’t know, fall over in the driveway and give yourself concussion?”
    “Not that I noticed. Jack, please don’t stand there and tell me the idea of Colonel Dixon joining SG-1, no matter how briefly, hasn’t rattled you. Please don’t tell me that one point five seconds after Hammond told you he was coming you didn’t flash back to the moment Frank Cromwell died. Don’t stand there and tell me that because I have known you too long and saved your ass one time too many to put up with that kind of insult.”
    Slowly, so slowly, Jack lowered the beer bottle from his mouth. “Daniel…”
    He leaned forward, relentless. “I’m not asking you to spill your guts, Jack. I’m not that stupid. I just want you to face up to what you’re feeling. In the privacy of your own head, admit that Dixon’s secondment to the team is going to stir up some really bad memories. Admit it and deal with it. Because we both know what happened the last time you went trekking in the Land of Despair.”
    The crucible of Abydos. A Jack hell-bent on self-destruction. Pain like a supernova, scorching everyone in his orbit and obliterating his world. Okay, Cromwell wasn’t Charlie… but he’d been the next worst thing.
    A muscle leapt along the side of Jack’s jaw. “That was a long time ago, Daniel.”
    “And this year the leopard’s looking good in stripes,” he retorted. “Jack, how you deal with things is your business. I’m not telling you how to live your life.” He stopped and thought about that. “Yeah. Okay. I am.
But
— ” He raised a finger. “Only because what you do these days affects me and people I care about, oh, and the universe at large, and I’m not interested in getting caught in the crossfire between you and Dixon. And because,