SquidgeWorld Archive

Corncob
by Orrymain  

"I love corn on the cob," Ricky opined with longing as he watched Jack shucking the cobs. "I can't wait!"

"Dad, tell us a story," Jenny requested, her feet swinging back and forth as she sat in her chair, watching the dinner preparations.

"Hey, I'm workin' here," Jack replied in fun, holding up the cob he was shucking.

"Multi-task," Jonny ordered, sitting down on one of the chairs.

"Jonny, wanna ..." Little Danny called out as he entered the hospitality room where Jack and the children were.

"Little Danny, Dad's gonna tell us a story."

"Okay," the child prodigy said agreeably, walking over and taking the empty chair next to Jack.

"I didn't say that."

"Didn't say what?" Lulu asked, having just finished practicing her newest ballet routine.

"Dad is going to tell us a story," the middle Munchkin informed his older sister.

"How was practice, Lil' Bit?" Jack questioned, trying to steer the conversation in a direction other than story telling.

With a smile as she thought about the difficult dance move she'd been working on it, Lulu proudly answered, "I got it, Dad!"

"That's my girl."

"I'm ready for story time," the curly-haired dancer said, getting herself a glass of milk and sitting down at the long, rectangular table.

"Choiceless, eh?" Jack smirked as he looked at his children. "Okay, well, corn for the corn."

"Huh?" Jonny asked, confused.

"I'm gonna tell ya a story about SG-1."

"Yah!" Jonny cheered, always happy to hear another story about the SGC's flagship team, especially since his parents were relating their adventures with less fictional elements these days.

"Okay, well, there were these bad guys," Jack began.

"The Goa'uld," Jonny surmised.

"Yeah, but they're not the ones I was thinking of," Jack responded. "These guys were called the Lucian Alliance. They were a band of badniks -- smugglers and thieves -- and they wanted to dominate the universe."

"Bet the Goa'uld didn't like that," Jenny commented.

"They were pretty much gone by then, Sweetheart," Jack replied. "Actually, that's what gave these guys a chance to do their stuff. So, SG-3 came back from a mission one day with this corn."

"Corn?" several of the children questioned within seconds of one another.

"Technically, it was called kassa, but it sure looked like corn. The problem was that when one member of SG-3 tasted it, they became a little ... let's just say, they weren't themselves. They called the stuff, 'sweet corn heaven'."

"I don't understand," Ricky admitted.

When Jonny shrugged and Little Danny failed to clarify things for his siblings, Jack spoke, "Like a drug. It made ole' Mooney mighty happy."

//Flashback//

"What's his condition?" Hammond asked about Lieutenant Mooney.

"He's still craving it, Sir. He didn't even wanna leave the planet. I had to restrain him to get him back here," Colonel Reynolds answered.

"That's amazing," Daniel opined.

"Obviously, you've never had my grandma's cornbread and black-eyed peas," Jack teased, happy to see Daniel's confused stare.

"No. Um, what about the rest of the population? Were they demonstrating any of the same addictive behaviors?"

"Everybody was fine when we first got there. A fight broke out in the marketplace when supplies ran low, and my men and I had to move in to restore order. That's what made Mooney wanna taste it in the first place," Reynolds reported.

//End of Flashback//

"Your pal Ice felt a bit guilty about letting a member of his team taste the goods," Jack chuckled to the children, using Reynold's nickname as he looked over at his namesake.

"You'd never do that, huh, Dad?" Jonny asked, certain he knew the answer.

"Me?" Jack coughed, focused on his shucking, and said, "No. Never."

"What happened next?" Lulu inquired curiously.

"We looked for reasons why someone would be selling drugged corn to the universe," Jack answered, somewhat amused by his own remark.

//Flashback//

"In the last session of the interim council, several Jaffa leaders complained of erratic behavior on several planets. We did not suspect tampering with the food supply," Teal'c stated.

"Colonel, were you able to determine where this kassa came from?" Hammond asked.

"Ah. I pressured one of the vendors for a Gate address, but to be honest, I don't know if it's accurate," Reynolds answered.

"It's worth checking out, Sir," Jack put forth.

"Well, find out what you can, but try to stay under the radar," Hammond ordered.

"Will do," Jack chirped.

//End of Flashback//

"We went undercover," Jack explained. "Grandpa told us to lay low, so we thought we'd go for being as sedate as possible."

"You dressed like nuns?" Little Danny asked.

Jack stared at the little boy, certain he had to be teasing, but afraid to ask and verify the fact.

"We dressed like the residents of the planet ... aaaaah, P6G-452, I believe it was, but Gate addresses was always Daddy's thing, not mine," Jack stated. "It was kinda cool. Leather. Carter showed skin and ..." He stopped suddenly, smiling nervously at his young children. ~Did I just say that out loud? Well, she did. She definitely showed a little skin.~

"Aunt Sam showed what, Dad?" Jenny asked, not sure what her dad meant by the use of the word 'skin'.

"Intelligence. Calm. You know -- all those things we love about her," Jack answered, confident he'd covered his tracks. "So, there we were ..."

//Flashback//

"Jack, what are you doing?" Daniel asked.

"Just playing the part, Daniel," Jack answered, picking up a blade of thick grass and placing it in his mouth to chew on.

"What part is that exactly?" the archaeologist questioned pointedly.

"I ..."

"Sir, someone's coming," Sam interrupted.

The team took cover in the field of corn on the side of the road. They watched a farmer and his wagon approach. The farmer paused, deciding to nibble on some of his merchandise. Jack nodded, and the team walked onto the road, surprising the man.

"Taste testing the produce, huh?" Jack asked the farmer, who was nervous and afraid of being hurt.

"Please, I have two daughters," the man pleaded.

"Don't worry, we're not going to hurt you," Sam assured.

"Who are you? What do you want?"

"We're looking to buy some kassa," Jack answered.

"It is available at every market," the farmer replied.

"We're looking for a sizeable quantity," Jack countered.

"I can maybe spare you one or two carts full," the man offered.

"How much for the whole field?" Jack asked, ignoring the stare of his surprised team.

"This is not the way the Alliance does business," the suspicious farmer accused.

"As in the Lucian Alliance?" Daniel queried curiously.

"How many alliances do we know?" Jack asked his lover.

"Many," Teal'c answered.

"The Lucian Alliance will know you have come. They have eyes everywhere!"

"Great, because we're lookin' to set up a meeting. Maybe you can arrange that," Jack requested.

"Worrel returns this afternoon."

"Worrel is ...?" Daniel prompted.

"This is his land, his crop. He lives in a house just up the road," the man answered, pointing up the road.

"Well, tell him Mister Shaft would like to meet with him. Any specific time, or should I just block off the whole afternoon?" Jack asked, a slight sneer evident in his voice.

"I will arrange it, but I must warn you. He will not take kindly to your request, or to your presence," the farmer stated and then continued to push his cart onward, leaving the team on the roadway.

Daniel feigned a cough and then asked a bit sarcastically of his lover, "What the heck was that?"

"What was what?" Jack answered innocently.

"We're supposed to stay under the radar, Sir," Sam reminded.

"I doubt if this world possesses such technology," Teal'c observed.

"See, when he's right, he's right," Jack responded.

"Sam has a point," Daniel opined. "We're not equipped to take these guys on right now."

"I have no intention of taking anybody on. I'm just gonna pose as a buyer," the colonel responded.

"You?" the archaeologist questioned with some surprise.

"Well, no offense, Daniel, but you don't strike me as the drug dealer type. In fact, you're not even close."

"I think I'm as close as you are!" the younger man argued.

"Come on! You're miles away," Sam refuted as she faced down her CO.

"Teal'c, which one of us is closer?" Jack asked.

Studying the three, the Jaffa answered, "I believe the three of you to be equidistant."

"Oh, please!" Jack exclaimed in disbelief. "Mary Poppins here is not even in the runnin'."

"Hey!" Sam objected loudly.

"And neither are you, because I'm goin'," Jack insisted, glaring at his slightly stunned soulmate. "I'm just gonna ask some questions about the operation, find out what I can, tell them their price is too high, and then hightail it out of there."

//End of Flashback//

"What's eqdest...what's that word?" Ricky asked.

Putting his genius to work, Little Danny beat his father to the punch, answering, "Equidistant. It means they were the same; of equal distance."

"I was gonna say that," Jack answered dryly before smiling at the little boy.

"Did you really go on by yourself, Dad?" Lulu asked.

"Yep," Jack confirmed. "Let's speed things a long a bit," he said as he reached for another cob to shuck. "I went to the meet. I picked myself a nice, comfy spot on the back of a hay cart, just outside Worrel's place. Took him a while to get the message -- four hours."

"Long time," Ricky sighed.

"Gotta have patience to be covert," Jonny told his younger brother, prompting their father to smile.

"That's right, but Worrel and I finally had our moment. We went inside this structure, let's call it a fort, to discuss things. I gave him my pitch, told him I represented a group of seven planets with a combined population of thirty million kassa-hungry souls, and we were looking for a supplier."

"Did he believe you?" Little Danny asked.

"Not exactly," Jack admitted. "I guess I should have brushed up on my acting skills before the meet," he mused. "He had the drop on me."

"Daddy rescued you," Little Danny stated confidently.

"Actually, he, Aunt Sam, and Teal'c had problems of their own. They'd been observing me with binoculars when they noticed some of Worrel's man heading towards them."

"What they'd do?" Jenny asked.

"They evaded capture, and then they rescued me."

"How?" Jonny asked.

"They just did," Jack answered evasively.

"But what did they do, Dad?" Lulu questioned.

"Just ... stuff," Jack answered.

//Flashback//

SG-1 ran through the forest, trying to evade those chasing them. Taking cover at one point, Sam handed her CO a weapon, which he began to prepare to fire.

"What did you say to them?" Sam asked.

"Look, obviously, it didn't go so well," Jack said snarkily.

Still under fire, Sam hurried back to Daniel's position, where he'd been providing cover for the two Air Force officers and Teal'c. Tapping him on the shoulder, Sam took the archaeologist's place and opened fire, while Daniel headed for the DHD and began dialing Earth. As Jack and Teal'c fell back and took cover near by, an unforeseen problem interfered with the dialing of the Gate.

"Guys?"

"What's taking so long?" Sam asked when she didn't hear the explosive kawoosh of the Stargate as anticipated.

"We got a problem!" Daniel exclaimed anxiously, shocked after both the Stargate and the DHD had just disappeared in front of his eyes.

"Just hurry up and open the ..." Jack began sharply. He turned, stunned to see the Stargate was no longer there. "... Gate. Okay, here's an obvious question."

"You're surrounded! Drop your weapons," Worrel yelled as his people appeared all around the Tau'ri team.

//End of Flashback//

"This is a funny story, Dad," Jenny said with a frown.

"Funny, as in ha ha?" Jack asked.

"Na-huh," Jonny answered. "It just ... funny."

"Yes, well, okay. So, as I was saying," Jack said, continuing the story. "We were captured and taken back to the fortress. Worrel knew who we were at that point, so he did a bit of posturing, strutting his stuff like some peacock."

"Ptolemy not peacock," the family's hyacinth macaw rang out.

"I wasn't talking to you, bird brain."

"Daaaaad!" Little Danny objected.

"Jack loves me. Loves me do," Ptolemy squawked.

"That's a Beatles song," Jack groused.

"Beetles? Where?" Lulu asked, looking all around with widened eyes.

"I'm old; so old," Jack muttered. "Little Bit, the Beatles were a musical group from when I was a kid; you know, back in the Stone Age when we lived in caves."

"Oh," Lulu responded, nodding her head with acceptance, causing Jack to groan.

"Worrel thought he was hot stuff, huh, Dad?" Jonny surmised, ready for the story to continue.

Finishing up another piece of corn, Jack nodded as he continued, "He thought we'd stolen the Stargate, which, of course, told us that he wasn't as powerful as he thought he was.

//Flashback//

"We were here on a reconnaissance mission," Sam insisted.

"Oh, so you were done slaying System Lords and decided to move on to more pressing agricultural concerns?" a skeptical Worrel questioned.

"That's exactly it. Corn patrol," Jack stated dryly.

//End of Flashback//

"That's funny, Dad," Lulu laughed.

"What's funny?" Aislinn asked, joining the shucker and his listeners.

"SG-1 went on corn patrol," Lulu answered, still giggling at the phrase.

Just then, the corn Jack was working on made a crackling noise, and Aislinn responded in song, singing, "Jimmy crack corn, and I don't care," with her siblings joining in. Jack added his playful voice to the final line of the chorus as well, causing everyone to laugh in merriment.

"Then what happened, Dad?" Jonny asked, ignoring the tiny voices as Lulu quickly brought Aislinn up to speed on the story.

"Worrel may have been high on corn, but he was short on brains," Jack opined. "Ash, why would we make the Gate go bye-bye before escaping through it?"

"You wouldn't, Dad. That's silly," the youngest Munchkin answered.

"That's exactly what Daddy thought when he asked Worrel that same question, but the idiot just thought it was bad timing," Jack sighed. "Daddy thought it was the single stupidest thing he'd ever heard," he mused as he replayed the event in his mind. "It got a little physical after that, though."

"You beat them up?" Jonny asked, his eyes smiling in his childlike pride for his fathers' feats.

"Not exactly," Jack answered. "We got the worst of it for a while until the Lucian Alliance sent a message and recalled Worrel and his elves."

"Elves?" Jenny questioned in confusion. "Santa was there?"

"It's just a phrase, Red," Jack responded with a smile. "Worrel's men had to leave. They were gonna kill us. It was rude, very rude."

"How'd you escape?" Lulu asked, fascinated by the story.

"The Odyssey: our brand spankin' new spaceship. They beamed up us," Jack answered with a proud smile.

//Flashback//

"SG-1, I'm Colonel Paul Emerson. Welcome aboard the Odyssey," the commander of the new starship greeted as he stood up from his command chair.

"Thank you, Sir," a smiling Sam replied.

"How 'bout that timing, Daniel?" Jack teased, nudging his lover slightly in the arm.

"Good timing," Daniel sighed, grimacing at the pains his body felt from the beating he had taken on the planet.

"Airman, let's get these people out of these bindings and to the infirmary," Emerson ordered.

//End of Flashback//

"And they did, and we all went home and ate ... corn," Jack teased, getting up from the table and carrying his shucked corn to the sink to rinse it down before putting it into the boiling water.

The assembled children stared at one another, and Little Danny just shook his head. It was Jonny who decided to speak up for the doubting brood.

"Dad, that's not a real story, and it's not done, either," the boy accused.

"What'd I miss?"

"The Stargate. Where'd it go?" Lulu asked.

"Oh, nowhere special. Someone stole it, and we got it back, of course. Just another day at the office," the general mused. While the other children decided to accept the incomplete ending, Jonny scowled, causing his father to ask, and a bit defensively at that, "What?"

"Dad, you would never call Aunt Sam 'Mary Poppins'," the oldest Munchkin insisted.

As Jack chuckled, Little Danny commented, "And Grandpa told you to stay under the radar."

"You know me and orders," Jack answered robotically. He looked over at Little Danny and smiled. ~Forgot who I was talking to.~ With a tiny bit of a cough, he explained, "What I meant was that ..."

"But you wouldn't be a hot dog," Chenoa stated.

"Huh?" Lulu said, looking at her sister in confusion.

"A hot dog. I saw it in a movie," the curly-haired blonde explained.

"She means someone who shows off," Little Danny clarified.

"Yeah, Dad. You don't disobey Grandpa's orders just to disobey them. You always had a reason, right?" Jonny asked earnestly.

Jack sighed, acknowledging that his namesake had a point. Finally, he chuckled.

"Aw, shucks," Jonny whined. "It wasn't a real story."

"I like *real* SG-1 stories," Aislinn complained.

"We've been gypped," Ricky sighed dramatically.

"You have?" Daniel asked, entering the room with David.

"Dad was telling us a fake SG-1 story," Jonny explained.

"About kassa," Jenny added.

"And the Lucifer Alliance," Ricky stated, causing most of the others to chuckle.

Daniel looked over at his lover with questioning eyes.

"I just beefed it up a bit," Jack admitted.

"Beefed it up?" Daniel questioned.

"He called Aunt Sam ..." Jonny said, unafraid of being accused of tattling on his older father. A couple of minutes later, he concluded, "And when we asked him, he said you just found it."

"Another day at the office," Aislinn elaborated.

"I see," Daniel chuckled, completely amused by his lover's rendition of the story.

"Daddy, will you tell us what *really* happened?" Jonny pleaded with hopeful eyes.

"Okay," the archaeologist agreed, taking a seat at the table. "Well, the basics are correct. SG-3 brought a sample of the kassa back after Lieutenant Mooney became, uh ..."

"High, intoxicated, drugged ..." Jack interjected.

"What Dad said," Daniel spoke. "We discussed various scenarios and decided that the," he looked at Ricky as he spoke, "*Lucian* Alliance needed to be checked out, especially if they were dealing with this ... drugged corn for some reason. Using the Gate address that SG-3 acquired, we headed for the planet."

"In BDUs?" Jenny question.

"No, we wanted to blend. The people on that planet wore a lot of leather and fur, so we dressed in leather; not my favorite outfit," Daniel admitted.

"Depends on where you were looking," Jack smirked, arching his eyebrows and smiling.

"Dad said Aunt Sam showed skin," Lulu told her younger father.

"Little Bit!" Jack exclaimed hastily, not wanting to end up sleeping on the sofa.

"You did," Chenoa said in support of her sister.

Seeing Daniel's stare, Jack returned to his meal preparations.

"Her top was a little ... lower than normal," Daniel conceded.

"Daniel, you peeked!" Jack accused.

"Only when she walked," Daniel responded, instantly regretting his response and smiling nervously at the curious children.

"Daddy, you looked at Aunt Sam's ..." David began.

"Assets," Daniel interrupted. "Just once. Gawd, she's gonna kill me."

"We'll protect you, Daddy," Little Danny promised bravely.

"Thank you. Where was I?"

"Aunt Sam's br..." Jack began.

"Jack!" Daniel exclaimed sternly, rolling his eyes as David, Lulu, and Chenoa giggled. "Okay, well, we went to the planet and did some observing. A farmer passed by and stopped for a ..."

"... fix," Jack chuckled, glancing over at his husband and seeing the warning glare. "Sorry."

"We made contact and found out that the ..."

"... corn king, e i, e i o," Jack interjected in a singsong manner.

"Jack, stop," Daniel advised. ~He's so full of it today.~

"Did Dad ignore Grandpa's orders?" Jonny asked, wanting the straight answer.

"Yes, and no," Daniel answered. "The farmer was suspicious of us. Maybe we asked one too many questions, especially after he mentioned the Lucian Alliance, which was confirmation to us that something was definitely up."

"But he was afraid of you," Jonny reminded his younger father.

"Sometimes the people who are the most afraid can be the most dangerous," Daniel taught the military tyke. "We weren't sure what direction he was headed, but when he started to talk about turning us in to Worrel, Dad just decided to up the ante."

"I turned the tables on Farmer Corn," the general chuckled, still pleased with himself after all these years.

"You mean he really said his name was Shaft?" Jonny asked.

"Shaft?" Daniel chuckled, bowing his head for a second and then looking over at his lover expectantly.

"Beefing it up," the older man rationalized.

"Right," Daniel responded dryly. "Uh, no, he didn't use the name of Shaft, but we couldn't be sure they wouldn't know us, so Dad did use another name." He paused and then, while grinning, elaborated, "Homer Simpson."

"Oh, Dad," David groaned.

"Bad one, Dad," Chenoa opined, nodding her head several times for emphasis.

"I only had a second," Jack said in his defense. ~That's why I beefed it up with John Shaft.~

"Okay, so the farmer said he'd let Worrel know we were waiting. Once he was gone, we talked about the plan," Daniel continued.

"Here. Make yourself useful," Jack requested, setting down a tray full of salad fixings in front of Aislinn and Jenny.

As the girls began their work, Chenoa commented, "That's when Dad said, 'Mary Poppins'."

Daniel just shook his head as he recalled what had really happened.

//Flashback//

"I will arrange it, but I must warn you. He will not take kindly to your request, or to your presence," the farmer stated as his conversation with SG-1 concluded.

As the corn dealer pushed his cart onward, leaving the team on the roadway, Daniel mused, "Homer Simpson, Jack?"

"Brain freeze," Jack acknowledged.

"We were supposed to stay under the radar, Sir," Sam reminded unnecessarily.

"I doubt if this world possesses such technology," Teal'c observed.

"See, when he's right, he's right," Jack responded. More seriously, he added, "I know this wasn't the plan, but you saw how squirrely he was getting."

"So what are we going to do?" Daniel questioned. "Like you said, we're not equipped to take these guys on right now."

"You're right, which is why I'm just gonna pose as a buyer, see what I can learn, and then get out of Dodge," the colonel responded.

"Maybe one of us should go," the archaeologist suggested, pointing at himself, Sam, and Teal'c.

"Daniel, you aren't exactly the drug dealer type," Jack scoffed in a joking manner.

"Thanks ... I think," Daniel responded.

"I could do it," Sam piped up, a bit of a smile on her face. Seeing the stares of all three of her teammates, she insisted, "I could."

"Carter, come on!"

"Actually, uh, I think I could do it," Daniel asserted.

Frustrated, Jack looked at the Jaffa and questioned, "Teal'c, which one of us is *the type*?" He smiled in anticipation. ~We're brothers in arms; warrior and warrior. He won't let me down.~

Studying the three, the Jaffa answered, "I believe the three of you to be equidistant."

"Oh, please!" Jack exclaimed in disbelief.

"It means we're all the same," Daniel stated under his breath.

"I knew that," Jack replied, clearing his throat as a distraction. "Look, Daniel, you look more like Gilligan, and Carter," he reared his head back and smiled, "come on, you're Dorothy!"

"Sir!" Sam objected loudly.

"Let him go, Sam," Daniel said calmly. "Jack's right. He's more the despicable, unconscionable, immoral, and slimy drug dealer type."

Jack stared at his lover for a couple of seconds and then smirked, "Why, thank you, Daniel. I take pride in my grease."

Daniel shook his head rapidly and closed his eyes for a brief second before asking again, "So what's the plan?"

"I go in, ask a few questions about the operation, find out what I can, tell them their price is too high, and then we get out of Corn Nation."

//End of Flashback//

"That makes more sense," Little Danny opined.

"Then what happened, Daddy?" Aislinn asked while continuing to work on the salad.

"It didn't exactly go as planned," Daniel answered. "It took Worrel about three hours to show up."

"Four," Jack corrected.

"Are you sure?" Daniel questioned. "I mean, you were sleeping half the time," he teased.

"I was in character," Jack groused. "It may have looked like I was sleeping on that hay, but I was just waiting. It was *four* hours later when the badniks showed."

"Four," Daniel agreed. "Anyway, things didn't exactly go as planned."

"They weren't buyin' my story," Jack stated while checking on the boiling corn. ~Nice and soft, that's how we want you.~

"Apparently, Dad looked more charming, cute, and sexy than he did despicable and slimy," Daniel said as he looked at his husband, his eyes twinkling.

"What about unconscionable?" Little Danny asked.

"I don't even know what that means," Ricky admitted.

"Sometimes it means not having a conscience, but in this case ..." Daniel began.

"It means he exceeded the boundaries," Little Danny chimed.

"You mean he broke the rules?" Jonny asked.

"He means those guys didn't believe me and decided to beat the crap out of me, but they didn't get a chance," Jack clarified.

"This is where Dad thought we were dumb," Chenoa giggled.

"Yeah," Jenny agreed.

"Daddy, if the bad men had Dad and more men were after you, Aunt Sam, and T, then how did you rescue Dad and escape?" Jonny asked curiously.

"How?" Daniel questioned.

"Yes, Daniel -- how?" Jack smirked, glad he wasn't the one answering the question.

"We managed to circle around the men who were searching for us," Daniel answered. "We made it down to Worrel's place. He had Dad in a large courtyard area. We were outnumbered."

"You always were," Lulu pointed out.

Daniel chuckled nervously, "You're right. We were ... a lot." Aware the children were waiting for him to continue, he spoke, "Uh, well, we ..."

"You what, Daddy?" David inquired.

"We ... well ..."

"What, Daddy?" Jonny sighed, his patience quickly running out.

"Jack?"

"Oh, for crying out loud," Jack responded, wiping his hands on a towel as he moved to the table. "Your old man was a wise guy. I was flapping my lips with rhetoric, and they weren't buyin' it. Daddy, Aunt Sam, and Teal'c were trying to get into position, but they weren't having much luck. Every time they settled in, Worrel's men would go in their direction. Worrel was getting a little agitated with my smart mouth. He was about to get a little more physical than I wanted, so I went Twilight Zone on him."

"What did you do?" Little Danny asked, totally hooked into what his older father was saying now.

"I acted wacko, and I ..."

"Tell them, Jack," Daniel said, grinning as he urged his lover on.

"I mooned him."

"Huh?" Jenny questioned, stopping her salad making.

"I lowered my leather bottoms and let my six shine."

"It stunned them just long enough to give Dad a chance to get away," Daniel expounded while shaking his head in amusement.

"Yeah, I managed to shove one of them back and tackled another. Dang knees almost did me in, but I got up and managed to head for the hills."

"Of course, we were there to cover his shiny six ... barely," Daniel stated, enjoying the pun.

"We headed for the Gate," Jack said, turning to go back to his dinner preparations.

"Which would have been good, except the Gate disappeared while I was dialing the address," Daniel sighed. "Then the DHD disappeared, too."

"Twilight Zone," Jonny agreed with a nod.

"So, we were captured by Worrel and taken back to his place. They sat us down on a bench, tied us up, and began interrogating us. It was about to get very ... unpleasant when we were beamed aboard the Odyssey."

"How'd they do that?" Little Danny queried with great curiosity.

"Locator chips; uh, like the GPS chips that the girls have," Daniel stated about the beagles, seeing the understanding nods of the children.

"Do you still have those?" Jenny asked. "It might be good to know if you get lost sometime."

While Jack chuckled, his husband responded, "No, not anymore."

"Daddy, who took the Stargate?" Jonny asked.

"Oh, that was Ba'al."

"Ball?" Jonny asked. "Like a bowling ball?"

"Or a basketball?" Ricky answered.

"Or a baseball?" David chuckled.

"I always thought of him as a Bocce ball guy," Jack interjected.

"But how'd you find out it was Ba'al?" David queried.

"General Hammond had gotten some intel from a man named Nerus. He wasn't all that reliable, but he had worked for Ba'al a long time ago, so it seemed as good of a place to start as any, and Grandpa was right," Daniel stated, smiling as he looked at the children.

"Okay, who wants to help ..."

"Dad, the story isn't over. The Stargate is still missing," Jonny whined, looking back at Daniel.

"And what happened to Worrel? Didn't you go back? Did you leave the kassa on the planet to drug the people? What about ..." Little Danny asked, barely taking breaths between his queries.

"Whoa, Sproglet," Daniel chuckled. "First of all, it wasn't just Earth's Stargate, but several Gates from many planets that had disappeared. Because of that, Grandpa decided it was a higher priority than worrying about Worrel, so we concentrated on the intel he gave us to try and find the missing Gates."

"Did Nerus tell Grandpa stuff?" Chenoa asked curiously.

"Little Bit, how about setting the table while Daddy finishes the story?" Jack interrupted, watching as the little girl nodded and slid off her chair.

"I'll help, Lulu," Chenoa offered, following her sister to get the dishes.

"Okay, well, Nerus thought he was pretty smart. He'd been captured earlier and was being kept at Area 51. Grandpa had a hunch that Nerus would have information he needed, so he set him up, got the intel, and then kept his promise to Nerus."

"What promise?" Aislinn asked.

"To be set free."

~He knows there's more to this,~ Daniel thought upon seeing Jonny's skeptical furrowing of his brow. He chuckled, "You're right, Son. Grandpa had an ace up his sleeve."

"I knew it!" Jonny exclaimed.

"Yeah, uh, Nerus was a bit of a ... glutton. He loved food, and Grandpa put a beacon inside a cupcake, so when Nerus ate it, he ate the beacon," the archaeologist stated.

The children giggled with delight and pride of their grandfather.

"So, that's how we knew where Ba'al was," Daniel said and then continued his story.

//Flashback//

In the briefing room aboard the Odyssey, SG-1, Emerson, and Major Marks were seated.

"General Hammond received a Tok'ra dispatch, advising us that at least four Stargates had been stolen. One witness confirmed that it was definitely taken with the use of Asgard beaming technology," Sam summarized.

"And because Nerus ate the cake ..." Jack began.

"We can be reasonably certain that it is Ba'al who has the Gates," Sam spoke. "The coordinates that the general sent to the Odyssey takes us straight to Ba'al." Referring to a schematic on the monitor in front of her, she continued, "From what little we know of Ba'al's ship, there's only one cargo hold big enough to store the Stargates, and that's here."

"We beam onto the ship, make our way to the cargo hold, and tag the Gates with these suckers," Jack stated, holding up one of the items in question.

Taking the object, Daniel said, "Locator beacons."

"They only operate through subspace, so they shouldn't be detected. Once we lock onto their signal, we beam back the Gates, beam ourselves out, and hopefully be gone before Ba'al knows the difference," Sam advised.

"But won't Ba'al be able to detect the Odyssey, and even if they don't, how do you beam through his shields?" Marks asked.

Smiling, Sam responded, "Well, let's just say that's been taken into consideration. General Hammond had Doctor Lee program a virus into several of Nerus's devices. As soon as he interfaces one of them with the ship, it should kill all their systems: shields, sensors, weapons ..."

"Colonel Emerson, this is Flight Deck," a voice over the comm system spoke. "We're coming out of hyperspace now, Sir."

"Understood," Emerson acknowledged. "We're on our way," he said as he and the others headed for the bridge.

Once there, Emerson and Marks took their seats.

"Ba'al's ship should be dead ahead, Sir," Marks stated.

"Have they detected us?" Emerson questioned.

"Negative, Sir, but I am receiving a subspace locator code," Marks informed.

"It was programmed to transmit when the virus went active," Sam explained.

"Nerus didn't waste time for a change," Jack muttered.

"Why wait when you're having fun?" Daniel quipped.

"No time like the present?" Jack asked.

"Better sooner than later," the younger man opined with a smile.

"Time's a wastin'!" the team leader exclaimed. "Let's go!"

====

SG-1 beamed onto the ha'tak undetected and swiftly made their way to the cargo bay. Leaving Teal'c to guard from the doorway, the others entered the room and were immediately taken back by what they saw.

"Oh, boy," Daniel said. "One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve ..." he counted.

"We're going to need more locators," Sam reported, stating the obvious since the room was full of Stargates.

"O'Neill," Teal'c called out, seeing a patrol of Jaffa organizing themselves at the end of the corridor.

Seeing the Jaffa readying his weapon, Jack stated, "We've got company. Ideas?"

Before anyone could answer, Teal'c opened fire in the corridor.

"Keep crackin'!" Jack ordered, hurrying to the corridor and opening fire as well.

With their teammates trying to keep the Jaffa at bay, Daniel and Sam hurried to get the beacons on the Stargates.

~Not good,~ Jack thought when he emptied his clip. Crouching down, he called out, "Odyssey, we have a problem."

"What is it?" Emerson asked over the radio, hearing the gunfire over the comm system.

"Sir, another three mother ships just dropped out of hyperspace," Marks reported at the same time.

"What?" the commander queried in surprise.

"Intercepting a hail, Sir."

"Ha'tak vessel. This is Netan of the Lucian Alliance. Surrender now, or you will be destroyed," Netan ordered.

//End of Flashback//

"Was Netan Worrel's boss?" David interrupted.

"We think so."

Jack cackled, "I'll bet he wasn't happy when he found out Worrel had *the famous* SG-1 and lost us."

"Probably not," Daniel agreed.

The general looked over at the children and said not so modestly, "We're famous, you know."

"We made up a cheer," Jenny announced. "Done, Dad," she added, referring to the chore she had just finished.

"Thank you, Princess," Jack acknowledged with a smile. He saw Aislinn was just about finished as well and added, "And you, too, Princess." Looking back at Jenny, he asked, "Cheer?"

"Yeah. Come on, Ash, let's show them."

The two girls walked into the recreation room where they could have more space and proceeded to do a cheer, with tiny jumps, lots of hand movements, and ending by doing the splits. The simple cheer went:

He's our dad!

He's our daddy!

She's our aunt!

And he's our T!

SG-1! SG-1!

Rah! Rah! SG-1

The parents and children cheered.

"You need more verses for Grandpa and Uncle Lou and Mister Jeff and ..." Little Danny began, about to list most anyone they knew who worked at the SGC.

"I think they get the idea, Son," Jack interrupted, smiling at the youngster. "Danny, better finish 'er up. Meat loaf is done in five."

"Okay, well, I helped Dad and Teal'c to fend off the attackers, while Aunt Sam finished tagging the Gates with the locator beacons," Daniel continued. "Oh, David, let's have some garlic bread. It just needs to be heated."

"Okay, Daddy," the boy acknowledged, getting up to complete his assigned task.

"So, Ba'al's ships were also hailed by the Lucian Alliance, wanting their cargo -- the Stargates. They began firing on one another about the same time Aunt Sam put on the last beacon. Unfortunately, Ba'al was able to restore his shields right then, too, so the Odyssey couldn't beam us out," Daniel sighed as he recalled the chaotic mission. "They were all firing on one another, and we had no place to go."

"Star Wars?" David asked as he began to slice the bread.

"Apparently," Daniel confirmed. "It was crunch time for us, and we knew it."

//Flashback//

Putting his last clip into his weapon, Jack spoke, "That's it. It's time for find another way off this ship."

"Don't look at me," Daniel responded, having no ideas at the moment.

Jack saw Sam staring at the DHD with a smile on her face.

"Carter?"

"I have an idea," the blonde colonel responded.

"Sweet!"

"Jaffa," Teal'c called out in warning.

"Let's get out of here," Jack said as the team stood and fired at their attackers.

====

"Welcome home, SG-1," Hammond greeted at the foot of the ramp in the gate room. "I'm a little surprised to see you come through the Gate."

"ColonelCarter successfully reprogrammed one of the DHDs in Ba'al's cargo hold, so that we could, in fact, escape," Teal'c reported.

"Well done," Hammond praised.

"With your permission, Sir, we should let the Odyssey know that we're okay. They probably fear the worst," Sam stated.

"The worst?"

"Uh, that we were blown up on Ba'al's ship when the Lucian Alliance attacked, Sir," Daniel explained.

"So the Stargates were destroyed?" Hammond asked.

"No," Sam answered. "Hopefully the Odyssey managed to beam the Gates off in time."

"An eventful few days," Hammond opined. "Debrief in one hour," he said as he walked out.

"Well, that was fun," Jack quipped. "It just never gets old. Where's the next adventure ride to, Carter?"

With a grimace, Sam ignored the questioned and said as she headed for the exit, "I'm gonna hit the shower."

"I'm going to find the doctor," Daniel said as he headed for the opposite door.

"You're not hurt," Jack called out. **Are you?**

**Two days of torture? Nah. I just need an aspirin,** Daniel replied snarkily.

"What's their problem?" Jack questioned. "This is our job, and we do it well."

"We are indeed suitably employed, O'Neill," Teal'c agreed with a subtle smile before leaving the room.

Jack stood at the foot of the ramp, contemplating the Stargate and the SGC for a moment. Then he smiled and went on his way.

**Danny, about that adventure,** Jack began, using the couple's unique form of communication.

**Jack ...**

**I was thinking Chinese, rose petals, and a spa.**

**Now that's an adventure I'm up for, Babe,** Daniel responded from another floor of the SGC.

**Up is the right word, Love. Up, up, and away!**

//End of Flashback//

"So Ba'al died?" Jonny asked.

"His ship blew up, but he escaped, but that *is* another story," Daniel stated.

"What about Nerus?"

"Dead," Jack answered. "Probably Worrel and his buddies, too."

"Daddy, was the corn drugged?" Little Danny asked.

With a nod, Daniel answered, "Doctor Lam did the research on that, and she found out it contained a highly addictive psycho-stimulant. It didn't occur naturally, so it was something engineered by the Lucian Alliance."

"Why did Ba'al want all those Stargates?" Chenoa asked. "You can only 'phone home' on one at a time," the little girl laughed, as did her siblings.

Smiling, Daniel answered, "Before this incident, Ba'al was pretty much just another minor player in the game. He'd lost most of his territory. He was ... starting over. Apparently, he'd made contact with Nerus a long, long time ago, asking him for help in rebuilding should the Goa'uld ever be defeated. After studying the Stargates, Nerus found a way to relocate a Stargate without having it transmit its new position to the rest of the network. If he'd succeeded, it would have been a ... big problem."

"A big, big problem," Jack agreed.

"Is dinner ready yet?" Jennifer asked, walking in with JD.

"Just about," Jack answered, making faces at the youngest Jackson-O'Neill.

"Corn on the cob?" the young woman asked with hopeful eyes as she looked into the hospitality room where the cooking was going on.

"Kassacob," Jonny chuckled.

"Not drugged kassa," Ricky clarified, confusing his eldest sister greatly.

"We were just telling the kids a story, and it was a corny one," Jack smirked as several of the children groaned.

"Corn's corn," Jennifer said with a shrug.

"Na-huh," Little Danny refuted, turning on his photographic memory and high intellectual skills. "Corncobs have furfural in them; that's a nice odor that turns dark when exposed to air. It's used lots for industrial processes. They can be used as fiber in ruminant fodder, too. Corncobs make smoking pipes, too, and ..."

"Like Frosty's corncob pipe?" Jenny asked.

"Uh huh," Little Danny affirmed. "They'd take corncobs and let them dry for a long time, for months, even years, and then cut them into cross-sections. Then they'd use a lathe to make them into the bowls for a pipe. They'd use a thin hollow reed to ..."

"Little Danny," Aislinn whined. "Tell us about corncobs, not pipes."

"Sorry," the little boy responded. "In the olden days, corncob was used as toilet paper, too."

"Okay, that's where I draw the line," Jack interrupted. "Son, your corncob lesson can continue during homeschooling tomorrow, but I *so* don't want to be talking about using food as toilet paper two minutes before we eat."

"Yes, Dad," the child genius chuckled.

"Little Danny, why do you call it a corncob? Isn't it just a cob?" Lulu questioned.

The boy started to answer, but stopped, glancing over at his older father, who sighed, shrugged, and nodded his permission to answer the question.

"The actual plant is called maize, and the very middle of it is the corncob. Little baby ones, called ears, can be eaten without cooking," Little Danny stated.

"Ewww. I want mine hot!" Jonny said demandingly.

"Me, too," Ricky agreed.

"With butter," Chenoa added, licking her lips.

"The older the plant gets, the harder the corncob gets, and then you can't eat it raw. After that, only the kernels are edible. When the maize is harvested, only the corncob is taken, leaving the ..."

**Do you think he'll get to the actual answer soon?** Jack asked his husband.

**By dessert,** Daniel mused.

**That's what I thought,** Jack replied as he began to whistle to the tune of 'Jimmy Crack Corn'. He paused long enough to say, "David, I'll finish that. Go round up whoever's missing," he chuckled and then began to whistle again. ~This is the *real* life, the real thing that just never gets old. Geez, I love it.~

**Babe?**

**Yeah?** Jack responded, looking over at his soulmate.

**I love you.**

**I love you, too.** Jack grinned, thinking, ~Oh, yeah. This is definitely the life!~

Their life might sound corny to some people, but Jack and Daniel didn't care. They were amazingly happy, and they planned to keep it that way, forever and ever.

~And that I do care about,~ Jack determined strongly as he continued to whistle and sing to himself -- ~Jimmy crack corn, and I don't care.~

~~Finis - Finished - Done - The End - But is it ever Really?~~