"Daniel ?"

"Go 'way..." Daniel muttered, without moving.

"Daniel ?"

This time, Daniel's name was accompanied by a hand shaking his shoulder, and so the anthropologist could not ignore the summons again. Sighing, Daniel rolled over onto his back, bringing up one arm to shade his eyes from the light that was streaming in the bedroom window.

"What is it, Jack ?" he breathed, still trying his hardest not to wake up.

"What time is it ?"

"You woke me up to ask me what time it is ?" Daniel asked, closing his eyes again, annoyance clear in his voice. "It's Sunday, Jack, so what does it matter ?"

With those words, Daniel rolled onto his side, and tried to burrow back under the covers again, hoping that Jack would leave him alone.

"Nothing's working, Daniel..." Jack said quietly, resting a hand on Daniel's shoulder in preparation for another shake.

"What ?" Daniel asked, rolling back to face his lover.

"I think your power is out," Jack said. "Your clock radio isn't working, and neither is the air conditioning."

"It's probably just a fuse," Daniel said, squinting into the light to try and see Jack's face.

His lover was sitting on the end of the bed, with his back to the window, so all he could make out was a blurred shape - that thought made Daniel reach out for his glasses, his hand finding them where he always put them, on the bedside table.

"I'll take a look..."

As he went to get up, swinging his legs to the side of the bed, Jack reached out a hand and stopped him.

"I thought you wanted to go back to sleep," he said, with a smile, pushing Daniel back gently onto the bed. "I'll take a look."

"I'm awake now," Daniel replied, smiling up at Jack, pleased by his thoughtfulness. Daniel could feel the warmth where Jack's fingers were still splayed across his chest - those fingers, so long and dextrous, had been the source of so much pleasure over the past months that they had been lovers.

Jack's smile turned into a grin as he gazed down at the anthropologist laying sprawled in the tangle of bed clothes.

As the grin widened, Jack recalled the night before, sucking in a breath as Daniel's hand came up to brush his cheek, the fingertips skittering across his skin so lightly he could barely feel it. Then those same fingers trailed gently down the side of Jack's neck, loitering for a moment on his pulse-point, feeling each beat of his heart.

With a movement so swift that Jack had no time to react, Daniel's hand moved, wrapping round the back of Jack's neck and pulling his head downwards, so that Daniel could kiss him, their tongues moving together in a leisurely fashion. When they separated, after a few moments, Jack couldn't restrain the groan of frustration that escaped him, making Daniel grin.

"What... what about the power ?" Jack stuttered, his breath ragged.

"What about it ?" Daniel asked, pulling the colonel back for another kiss.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It was on mornings like this that Jack was incredibly glad to be alive.

Once more, he thanked whatever power had brought this man into his life, thinking back on the time they had first met, his eyes seeking out the lines on Daniel's face that had not been there then, regretting every moment of pain that they had experienced together.

How had he come to be so lucky ?

It had to be luck. Jack knew that his actions in the past meant that there was no way he deserved to be loved so much, but he knew that he was, all the same. He only had to look into the eyes that were gazing up at him now, eyes so blue that he was lost in them, to know that for certain. Ever since he had met Daniel, those eyes had haunted him, even in the times before he could admit to himself that he was attracted to the other man.

Those eyes had always regarded him the same way, filled with trust and affection, even when they had first met, despite the antagonism that had also been so alive between them. Daniel had always trusted him, always looked to him for protection, called out to him when in need. And so far, Jack had been able to answer those calls, meet that need.

It had been just after the incident with Hathor that Jack had admitted his feelings to Daniel, torn by the pain that his friend was living with as a result of the violation she had committed.

Even though Daniel, like all the men of the SGC, had been under Hathor's spell, the anthropologist had still blamed himself for allowing anything to happen, and it had led to the two men getting extrememly drunk together.

Jack had blurted out his feelings for Daniel - in hindsight he knew there was no way he could have done it had he been sober. He would never have been able to look into those eyes and make himself so vulnerable, even though he knew that Daniel would never intentionally hurt him.

The next morning, when they had both woken with hangovers, Daniel had been uncharacteristically quiet, not mentioning the small amount of drunken fumbling that had gone on after Jack had made his declaration.

That silence had chilled Jack to the bone, but he had chosen then not to remind Daniel of what he had said - either the anthropologist didn't remember, or he was chosing to forget all about it. Either way, Jack valued Daniel's friendship too much to repeat himself in the cold light of day.

So he had said nothing, ruthlessly smothering the feelings when they threatened to erupt, telling himself that he could be just friends with Daniel, that he could do this, when Daniel had turned his world upside down.

Jack had gone in search of his friend, and had found him in his office, as he had expected, intently studying some rock they had brought back - Daniel had swivelled on his chair when the office door opened, and the smile that had burst onto his face when he saw Jack had sent a surge of heat straight to the colonel's groin.

Jack had perched on the edge of Daniel's desk, trying to look interested in what the anthropologist was saying and all the while thinking hard about Antarctica.

Just when the concept of endless ice seemed to be having the desired effect below Jack's belt, Daniel had glanced up at him without stopping the flow of words. Then he had pushed his chair back so that it rolled in front of the office door, reaching out behind him with one hand, turning the key without looking.

Before Jack could ask what was going on, Daniel had pounced, coming up from the chair where he was sitting in one fluid movement, and wrapping his arms round Jack. One hand had come up to cradle the back of Jack's head, fingers threading through the short hair, while the other stroked the small of the colonel's back.

Then Daniel had kissed him, with a certainty that had stunned Jack for a moment, making the younger man do all the work.

The lack of reaction from the colonel had surprised Daniel, who had pulled back from the kiss with a question on his lips.

"Jack... ?" he had begun, but then the older man had silenced him effectively.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Just thinking 'bout your office," Jack answered.

"What about it ?" Daniel asked, then realised he knew the answer to his own question. "How about a repeat performance ?"

Jack grinned then, as he settled down onto the bed, his weight going onto his elbows, his mouth brushing across Daniel's chest until it reached one of the younger man's nipples. As he latched onto it, licking gently around the nub, Daniel arched up into his mouth, a wordless moan making Jack chuckle.

As he thought back to their first sober encounter, Jack kissed and licked his way down Daniel's chest, tasting the sweat on his lover's skin.

'It's so hot in here,' Jack thought absently, as he continued to lick the saltiness from Daniel's stomach, his tongue tracing patterns across his lover's flesh. 'We're going to have to get that air conditioning sorted out.'

Daniel was really moaning now, his back arching off the bed as Jack's mouth reached his pubic hair. Trying to prolong the torture as long as possible, Jack made a detour, trailing kisses across the skin that covered Daniel's hip bones and then down to the inside of his thighs.

One of Daniel's hands unclenched itself from the sheets and came to rest on the back of Jack's head, trying to guide that tormenting mouth to where he needed it to be.

With one swift movement, Jack acquiesced to that grip, swooping down and taking Daniel's length into his mouth, then just as swiftly moved away again.

"No !" Daniel exclaimed, his voice a howl of anguish.

Jack could feel himself hardening, feel the warmth that was pooling as the blood rushed from his brain to lower parts. He could still recall the first time that he had ever done this.

Then, it had been in Daniel's office.

Once he had recovered from the shock of Daniel pouncing on him, realising that the younger man was choosing action instead of words, uncharacteristic as that was for him, Jack had returned the kiss with all the passion he could muster.

Growling, he had pushed Daniel back against the wall, kissing his neck with fervour while his fingers freed Daniel's already stiffening shaft from his trousers. Without a thought but that he needed to do this, as if somehow it would prove the reality of the feelings he had spoken of before, Jack had gone down on the younger man there and then.

He remembered Daniel's fingers in his hair, clutching his scalp as he spasmed with the orgasm that had come so quickly, even as he had allowed the younger man to fuck his mouth.

Not even the throes of passion had stopped Daniel from having enough self-control to hold back slightly, though it must have been torment for him not to thrust into the heat that surrounded him. But his kind nature had been in control, the long fingers that were in Jack's hair had been restrained even as they gripped, and the colonel had somehow managed to swallow everything.

This time, Jack's fingers wrapped around Daniel's shaft, his thumb caressing the sensitive under-side - then his mouth descended once more, taking Daniel to unexpected places.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Both," Jack replied, nibbling the younger man's neck just behind an ear.

"I'm serious..." Daniel began, squirming slightly as Jack's tongue whisked it's way around his ear.

"And I'm not ?" Jack growled, fastening his teeth gently on the curve of Daniel's jaw bone.

"Jack..." Daniel began, and then the colonel knew that it was serious.

That tone alone was enough to tell him that even his most passionate assaults on the anthropologist's virtue would go unrewarded, at least for the time being. With a sigh, Jack kissed the place his teeth had been and settled back onto the bed, his arms still wrapped around his lover.

"Earlier..." Daniel began.

"Hmmm ?"

"You said the air conditioning was off..."

"Uh huh."

"You were going to look at the fusebox..."

"And you want me to go now ?" Jack asked, knowing the answer even before he spoke.

With a theatrical sigh, the colonel untangled himself, first from Daniel's embrace and then from the bed clothes that had wrapped themselves round his feet. Looking back, he was in time to catch Daniel smile and pull up the sheet with one hand, before the younger man curled up on his side and went back to sleep.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It was then that he realised how quiet Daniel's apartment was.

There was no underlying hum from the fishtank, though the fish did not seem unduly concerned at this. The kitchen was equally silent, though he noticed that a small amount of water had begun to pool in front of the fridge.

Damn, he thought, pulling the fridge door open.

Though Jack had noticed that the air conditioning was off, he had failed to remember that the fridge would be off too. And now it was defrosting, water dripping steadily onto the floor, as the contents of the freezer compartment began to thaw.

Surely Daniel can't have too much in there, Jack thought, as he opened the freezer compartment door. He's not here often enough....

As he had suspected, it was nearly empty, the only occupant a large tub of chocolate ice-cream, Daniel's secret weakness.

In an unguarded moment, Daniel had once confessed that there were two things he had thought about more than anything else during his time on Abydos, and chocolate ice-cream had been one of them. When Jack had asked about the other, Daniel had just reddened and refused to say any more, his embarassed silence giving Jack all the answers he needed.

Reaching in, Jack pulled out the tub of ice-cream, feeling it's weight as he deposited it on a nearby counter. It was maybe half full, at the most, but Jack knew that Daniel would complain if his favourite indulgence went to waste - there was no way that Jack would be able to smuggle the container out of the apartment without the anthropologist suspecting something. There was only one alternative, it would have to be eaten !

A thought entered Jack's brain and an evil grin appeared on the colonel's face. Taking the lid of the tub, Jack crossed the kitchen to throw it into the bin, then turned back to the counter.

As he did so, his eye fell upon a stack of unopened mail, dropped there by Daniel when they had come in late the previous night. The top one bore the logo of the local electricity company, and another thought joined the first one, this one more suspicious than anything else.

With a quick glance towards the bedroom, Jack picked up the envelope and opened it. When he had read the letter that was enclosed, he frowned slightly, then decided on a plan of action.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Jack grinned evilly - he had kept his hands wrapped round the tub of ice-cream until they were cold enough to cause a stir with his sleeping lover.

"What the hell... ?" Daniel began, scowling at Jack as he tried to untwist himself from the sheet.

"Your power is off."

"I knew that," Daniel said, still wrestling with the sheet. "Not a fuse, then ?"

"Nope."

"So what was it ?" Daniel asked, looking at Jack for the first time since he had woken, finally free from his confinement in the bed clothes.

"You forgot something," Jack replied. "I knew you were forgetful, Danny, but this is a classic..."

"What ?"

"You've been cut off," Jack answered, producing the letter from behind his back with a flourish. "You forgot to pay your bill, so they cut you off !"

"You've got to be kidding," Daniel groaned, taking the letter and skimming through it. "I'm sure I paid that one..."

"You're sure ?"

"Well," Daniel conceded after a moment's thought, "I think I paid it...."

"You think ?"

Jack began to laugh, as the annoyed expression on his lover's face grew, and Daniel scowled at the letter, as if that expression alone would change the situation.

"You realise," Jack continued, once he had got his laughter under control again, "there're a couple of things you need to do..."

Daniel looked up from the letter, a puzzled expression on his face.

"For starters," Jack said, moving further onto the bed from where he had been perched on it's side, "there's that ice-cream you need to eat."

Please, he thought fervently, please be thinking what I'm thinking....

Their eyes locked, and that look was enough to transmit Jack's idea straight to Daniel's brain. Crumpling the letter up in one hand, Daniel threw it into the corner of the room, reaching for the spoon that Jack had put in the tub of ice-cream even as Jack crawled across the bed.

The sensation of ice-cream landing on Jack's chest just moments after he had laid down almost made the colonel scream, even though he had been expecting it.

As he lay there, Jack could feel it beginning to melt, small trickles of coldness starting to inch their way across his ribs, moving ever downwards. Then Daniel was there, his mouth busy, tongue and lips moving to sweep away the coldness and replace it with a touch that seemed to burn Jack's skin.

The warmth of Daniel's breath, let alone the heat of his mouth, was a strange counterpoint to the coldness before, making Jack shiver with delight and anticipation.

Looking up at Daniel, who was half-lying on top of him, he smiled when Daniel raised his head, revealing a small trickle of chocolate that had escaped his mouth. Jack watched fascinated as Daniel's tongue came out to sweep it away, imagining that agile tongue in action elsewhere.

With a devilish glint in his eye, Daniel reached for the spoon again.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

He had wanted Jack for so long.

Daniel had resigned himself to a life of yearning, a life filled with things he could never have - a wife taken from him to who knows where, and a man he worked beside every day who he wanted more than anything else he could imagine.

He had never thought, never dared dream that anything could happen between the two of them. And then a few drunken words from Jack had turned Daniel's greatest source of frustration into the experience of a lifetime.

It had taken him a while to figure out what he should do next. Jack had seemed more nervous than anything else the next morning, and Daniel got the feeling that any mention of what had occurred between them the previous night would send the colonel running. So the younger man knew that he would have to pick his moment, planning carefully to minimise the chances of it all going horribly wrong.

Jack appearing in his office a couple of days later had given him the perfect opportunity to make his move, and Daniel had not regretted his decision for a single moment since.

He had watched Jack carefully, noting the way that one of his hands was clenching and unclenching onto the edge of his jacket as he perched on the edge of the anthropologist's desk - if it had not been for that tell-tale sign, a casual observer might have thought Jack was perfectly calm.

Daniel knew his moment had arrived, and he acted instinctively, locking the door before he pounced.

For a long moment, the colonel had not reacted, and Daniel had been afraid that he had misjudged everything, that Jack had changed his mind about his feelings, maybe even that his declaration had been just drunken rambling.

He had pulled back from the kiss he had fantasised about for so long, wanting to ask yet dreading the answer, only to find that Jack's eyes were filled with the same lust he had always dreamed of seeing there.

Then it had happened, that moment that he thought back on with fondness, that figured large in his reminisences when he and Jack were apart - Jack had gone down on him.

All his thoughts, all his preconceptions about what it might be like with Jack were blown apart by that experience. He had hoped for passion, and found himself swept off his feet - he had imagined that Jack would want to make all the running, and found that he was a scrupulously considerate and imaginative lover.

That encounter had been their most serious one on base.

Both men knew the consequences for the colonel's military career if they were discovered 'in flagrante', so, despite the allure of making love where anyone might walk in on them, they had confined their activities to home.

Some days that policy was a torment to both of them, making each glance a source of torture, but they knew that it had to be that way if they were to carry on working together while also pursuing a relationship.

Somehow, so far, they had also managed to keep their relationship a secret from the other two members of SG1. This decision had been something the two men had argued over in the past - Jack had maintained that it was unfair to expect their friends to share the burden of their secret, while Daniel had felt it was equally unfair that their friends could not share in the happiness they had found together.

In the end, they had reached an understanding on the subject, more like an uneasy truce than anything else, with the possibility of disclosure to Carter and Teal'c still out there.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"I'm not sure that this was such a good idea, Daniel," he said, rubbing his hand across his chest and feeling his palm stick in a number of places. It had been fun, he had to admit, but the stickiness was a definite negative. "I need a shower."

"Uh... Jack... you know you can't..."

"What ?"

"No showers, Jack," Daniel explained patiently. "The power's off, remember ?"

Jack groaned. "So why did I let you cover me in chocolate ice-cream ?"

"Well, it was your idea, remember ?" Daniel said. "Didn't you say there were a couple of things I needed to do ?"

"Well, you've done one," Jack replied, turning onto his side to study his lover as he lay bonelessly in the bed beside him.

"So ?"

"Well, if there's no chance of a shower, let's head over to my place and I'll let you figure out what the other things are..." Jack growled, smiling as he saw Daniel close his eyes with a poor attempt at a resigned expression. "I've got hot water, remember ?"

For a moment there was silence, then Daniel spoke again, his eyes still closed. "Got any ice-cream ?"

"Nope. I have got peanut butter, though." Jack said.

Daniel's eyes opened, and the anthropologist turned his head to look over at him, eyebrows raised.

"I don't like peanut butter," he said.

"I do..."

~fin~

Disclaimer : Stargate SG-1 and its characters are the property of Showtime/Viacom, MGM/UA, Double Secret Productions, and Gekko Productions. This story is written for entertainment purposes only - no money whatsoever has exchanged hands. No copyright infringement is intended. The original characters, situations, and story-line are the property of the author - not to be archived elsewhere without permission.

This page created by Graculus - last changed 30/4/2000.