A/N: Timeline is Criminal Minds Season 3; SG-1 Post Ark of Truth, Pre-Continuum, and Atlantis Season 4

Embassy Suites Hotel, Washington DC

Sitting in the hotel's bar having thank-you drinks with Sam and the young FBI agent who'd saved his ass, Daniel thought back over the past evening and prayed to God that Sam could keep her mouth shut. If Mitchell or Vala heard about this, or God forbid, Jack, he would never live down being saved by a kid.

A finger snap in his face brought him back to the conversation. Sam Carter gestured at their young companion. "Daniel, paying attention? I was just asking Spencer what he does for the FBI."

"Right, I'm here. Drifted off for a minute." Daniel sipped the beer as Spencer answered Sam's question.

"I work for the, the Behavioral Analysis Unit of the FBI." He'd started kind of tongue-tied around Sam, but had relaxed in pretty well after the pair had gotten into a spirited debate about wormhole "theory." Daniel got the distinct impression that Spencer wasn't used to people who could go toe to toe with him intellectually, and was suddenly acquainted with at least one. Of course, Sam wasn't used to it either, and watching them had been fascinating.

Daniel nodded. "Thank God you were armed, Dr. Reid."

Spencer nodded. "I was headed home from the BAU, um, portal to portal carry, required by FBI regulation. And I almost didn't take the Metro this evening, my teammate Morgan tried to get me to let him drive me."

Behavioral Analysis Unit, Quantico, VA - Six Hours Earlier

The BAU team came through the glass doors, tired but pleased with the past three days. Another case closed, another unsub going away for a very long time, and a life saved.

"Reid, you need a ride home?" Morgan was gathering his things, it was almost seven o'clock and Hotch had already decided that reports could wait a little while.

"No, no, I came in on the Metro the other morning." Reid was reorganizing his bag to leave, clearing space to tuck his service weapon inside it. He didn't want another round with the transit authority rent-a-cops about his handgun, and telling them for the millionth time he was an FBI agent from Quantico traveling home from his office and the Glock was a completely legitimate service weapon. At this point, he was sure they did it just to mess with him.

"Which means you need a ride." Morgan said it like it was a given.

Prentiss interrupted at that moment. "Reid likes the subway, Morgan."

"Prentiss, seriously? Nobody likes the subway." Morgan flipped his car keys in the air. "Ready to go, kid?"

"No, I'm fine on the subway, really. I don't need a babysitter, Morgan. And I'll see you guys tomorrow." Satisfied with the arrangement of what he had to take home, Reid unclipped the leather holster, then hesitated and put the holstered Glock back on his hip. His coat would cover the weapon fine, and the Metro transit authority would just have to deal.

Hotch stepped out of his office and called to the bullpen at large. "I don't want to see any of you tomorrow, take a day to rest, but keep your phones on."

Prentiss and Morgan were immediately planning their evenings as Reid walked out of the office, pretending not to hear any mention of being a wing man.

National Mall

Daniel and Sam walked out of the Capital building together, neither in a particularly good mood and planning to have a round of drinks with a former teammate.

With the Ori defeated, the SGC was in another round of defending its budget with even less ammo than last time. Daniel knew it was desperate when Jack had wheedled Sam into coming back from Atlantis to "visit" otherwise known as "remind them how dangerous the Wraith still are."

Jack and Landry had been at the meeting, too, and headed off separately with Jack's driver, Daniel still had to remember to rag Jack about being too old to drive his own car.

Sam re-settled the cover of her dress blues. "First thing I'm doing is going back to the hotel and changing clothes. Then I think I need a drink, even though nothing here could be as strong," Sam checked their immediate perimeter as they stepped onto the National Mall, "as what the Athosians brew."

Daniel nodded absently. "How are you getting back? We rode here with Jack and his personal driver from Dulles this morning, and they've left."

"We did, didn't we? I could call Major Davis." Sam was already getting her phone out from the black clutch that compensated for the pocketlessness of a dress uniform.

"We don't need to bother him. Our hotel's right on the subway lines." Daniel was sure the subway would be faster than the arrangements to get a car.

"I used to work at the Pentagon. You don't want to ride the DC area subway." Sam shook her head, imagining everything bad that could happen on the subway.

"Do I look like a target, Sam? Don't answer that." Daniel knew exactly what the entire SGC would answer with.

Sam laughed. "You, yes. The only person who has a bigger 'kick me' sign on his back to the whole universe is McKay, Daniel."

Pride pricked, Daniel crossed his arms. He had faced snakes with God complexes, religious zealots and congressmen. "I'm taking the subway back to the hotel, how dangerous can it possibly be?"

Sam's continued efforts to talk him out of it fell on deaf ears.

CM~SG1

Reid trotted down the steps into the subway station, alert considering just how many bad things on the job he'd seen happen in subway stations. The train was safer than the station.

He kept his posture tight as he waited on the sparsely populated platform for the next train. It didn't take long for the train to stop and open the doors.

Considering the time of night, a surprising amount of people got off, most of them he knew tangentially at Quantico. Reid got on the train and grabbed a ceiling strap with his left hand, years of training made him kept his right hand free for his weapon.

The older man sitting down managed to surprise Reid when he spoke. "Is there policy against sitting down? I'm just in from Colorado."

"No rule against it." Reid was surprised his voice was steady as he let go of the strap and sat down, his bag in his lap. A transit authority cop was sitting down well away from them.

The man, wearing a good suit that looked like he'd been trying to impress someone today, nodded toward Reid. "Daniel Jackson."

Reid gave his small wave, while thinking of the statistics of how many unsubs came across as harmless strangers. "Spencer Reid."

Minutes later, it was the book that Spencer pulled out of his bag that got Daniel's attention. "If you're getting into Egyptology, Budge is a horrible reference to use. Years out of date."

Spencer Reid looked up at him. "Oh, I'm not really getting into it, I just read everything, the oddest things end up being really valuable in my job. What would you recommend?"

As Daniel launched into lecture mode, with the rare commodity of someone who would listen without cutting him off, the younger man was rapt and writing down the texts that Daniel was recommending.

He'd shifted from Egypt to Babylon when Spencer looked up at the map of the Metro. "You're staying in the hotels, Daniel?"

"Embassy Suites, why?"

"This is your stop." Spencer got up and pursed his lips. "And mine was about three stops back."

Daniel chuckled a little bit. He could see himself in the younger man, a whole lifetime and some ago it felt like now. But as Spencer straightened up, Daniel decided maybe they weren't so different. And he knew he'd been around Jack far too long when he was able to glance at the young man's waist and identify the "print" of a concealed semi-automatic. Idly, he noted it was probably some model of Glock, it was too blocky under the coat for the Beretta 9mm Daniel was used to carrying.

They both got off at the station under the hotel, Spencer making hand motions. "I'll circle around and catch the train on the return, it's no big deal."

"At least meet my friend Sam, just a few minutes." Daniel wanted to see if Sam tripped on anything when she met the armed stranger.

Reid both did and didn't wish he could honestly beg off with having to work tomorrow. There was no telling who 'Sam' was, and killer teams were far from uncommon. Even with his training, Reid had the feeling that Daniel was far more dangerous, with or without a gun. "Really, I ought to get home. Me and my team just got back from a case kind of late."

"A case? What do you do?" Daniel was curiously studying Reid.

In his head, Reid was seriously considering that he should have accepted that ride from Morgan. He was about to give more of an answer than Jackson was counting on when two men came out of the shadows, blocking the steps upward on the deserted subway station.

"Dr. Jackson, your presence is requested by Lord Ba'al. We'd recommend coming quietly."

Reid took a wide step backward away from Daniel and brushed his scarf aside and got his hand carefully under his coat, ignored by the two heavies focusing on the man who had not mentioned having any medical or doctoral degree.

"Or what? Do you guys somehow have snipers positioned in a subway station? Unfortunately, I don't have a coffee cup for anybody to shoot this time." His hand reached unconsciously for his thigh. Daniel wished desperately he had his Beretta, and wondered at what Spencer would draw the Glock he was surely carrying illegally in DC.

Reid gawked at Dr. Jackson's flippant defiance, even while noting that the older man was used to having a weapon on his leg. And he got his right hand around the butt of the service pistol, unfastening the safety strap and preparing to draw if he had to.

Daniel was weighing his options. He'd rejected Jack's numerous suggestions to apply for a Colorado CCW permit, not that that would do any good here anyway. DC was draconian about handguns. Though apparently nobody had told Spencer that. If he managed to let the young man not be swept up by the Trust goons, maybe, but no, he didn't have a chance to tell him in detail how to find and tell Sam what had happened. And when the hell was the younger man going to draw his sidearm? Was he waiting to see a weapon from Ba'al's lackeys?

"Don't make us use force, Dr. Jackson. You're outnumbered and outgunned. You are coming with us." They reached under the demure suit jackets and were about to haul out what Daniel would guess would be zats. And he was right as the weapons became visible, and snapped open with the telltale sounds that Daniel was far too familiar with.

"How do you plan to haul two unconscious men out of a DC subway station? I mean, you'll have to take my new friend along, won't you? Otherwise he'll tell Colonel Samantha Carter I was kidnapped." While hoping the kid with him got the message (and wasn't taken), Daniel heard the telltale sound of a gun clearing leather, and hoped that Spencer could do more than threaten with it. The Trust operatives raised the zats all the way, preparing to have to zat both men.

"FBI! Put your weapons down and back away."

Daniel turned to see his new friend, who he'd assumed to be a college student at Georgetown carrying illegally, aiming a drawn pistol and covering the two men while keeping the line of fire clear and watching that Daniel didn't accidentally move into it. Of course, he'd spent way too long on a military team to do that, but there was no way Spencer Reid could know that.

The Trust operatives mutually decided that avoiding official inquiry was more important than taking Dr. Daniel Jackson right now and dropped the zats as they fled. They had no people in the FBI at present to cover this.

As Agent Reid (Daniel was still comprehending that one, and he had an ingrained distrust of all the three-letter agencies), covered the fleeing Trust operatives, Daniel swooped in and grabbed up the zats, making them disappear into his suit pocket before the FBI agent could ask questions that would require a signed NDA to answer.

Reid almost went after the wannabe kidnappers, but securing the would-be victim had to take priority. He lowered his semi-automatic and looked at Dr. Jackson. "It's okay, I promise I'm actually an FBI agent."

He put the service weapon back in the holster and fished his credentials from his bag, flipping open the wallet to show Dr. Jackson, and figuring that the man needed to hear the FBI agent part over the doctor part right now. "Special Agent Spencer Reid."

"You left that out before, Agent Reid. Let's get up to the hotel before they find a way to deal with kidnapping an FBI agent with me."

Reid almost made the correction 'Doctor,' but Daniel was gone up the steps, moving with an experienced wariness that made Reid wonder what the other man did for a living that would have people attempting a kidnapping. And he looked around the area, but the strange weapons the kidnappers had drawn were gone. He knew he'd seen a gun, or something gun-like, that was why he'd gone through with drawing his Glock. They'd dropped them, Reid was sure of it. He looked at the stairs, adjusted his bag and ran after Daniel, hoping for some damn answers at this point.

Daniel shook his head as they climbed the steps up into the Embassy Suites Hotel. Sam would have to hear the story as she was coming towards them with a concerned expression.

But he would keep this from Vala, Mitchell, and Jack as if his life depended on it, because it did, or at least their hard won respect for his skills.

Sam was in a dress. "Where have you been, Daniel? Ja- General O'Neill called for you and I got a concerned earful when I told him you took the subway."

Daniel sighed. "It's . . . a long story. Oh, Sam, this is Special Agent Spencer Reid with the FBI. Agent Reid, this is Colonel Samantha Carter, United States Air Force."

Sam blinked as she really paid attention to the twenty-something year old just a bit behind and to the side of Daniel. He shifted the messenger bag and gave her a small wave and a smile. "Actually, it's Doctor Reid. I am with the FBI, though."

Daniel turned and blinked. "You cannot possibly have a PhD."

The full bird Air Force colonel gave Daniel the kind of look she'd perfected on Sheppard and McKay. "I think I need to hear this long story, Daniel."

Daniel gestured at the visible hotel bar as he spoke. "Short version: Doctor Reid is with the FBI and interrupted some wonderful guys in the subway station making a forceful play for my attendance at the behest of a mutual 'friend' of ours. Long version includes things we can't talk about in a hotel lobby, and I don't want to have Doctor Reid signing a NDA tonight."

Sam blinked again at the skinny kid who really reminded her of Daniel a decade ago. "Right. Thank you for saving him, Doctor Reid."

"Spencer, Spencer's fine, Colonel Carter."

Sam nodded. "Call me Sam, why don't you join us? I think Daniel owes you a drink for the save. Unless you're still on duty, Spencer."

Daniel nodded and smiled. "I don't think he is. You were headed home right?"

"I'm, I'm not actually, I was headed home when I met Daniel." Reid weighed the options, profiled the two people in front of him and finally decided one thank you drink was probably safe. And Morgan was always pestering him to get out more anyway.

Present

". . . while wormholes are hypothetically possible, travel through one would be colossally dangerous." He rolled his eyes on 'colossally,' certain he was right.

Reid had been surprised that Colonel Carter held a PhD in theoretical astrophysics, and that Daniel held two of them in archaeology and linguistics.

And he'd stunned them with his three of them.

Sam sipped her beer. "Not if it was stabilized with an exotic substance."

"Well, when we start talking about theoretical exotic substances that could stabilize the event horizon of a hypothetical transversable wormhole, we might as well start making knots out of string theory, Colonel!"

Daniel had lost the train of Sam and Reid's wormhole debate ten minutes ago, but neither hard scientist noticed. If they were talking about the Egyptian Fourth Dynasty, maybe he'd have followed it.

"Would you like to see some of the reams of articles and papers I've written backing up my work on wormholes, Doctor?"

"It's all theoretical!" Reid sipped at his drink and wondered just how lost everyone at the BAU would be by this conversation. Morgan and Prentiss would have found anything else to do within the first two minutes, and JJ would smile and nod. And he wanted desperately to know just what he had interrupted in that subway, besides a kidnapping attempt.

Sam knew they couldn't go any farther without her wanting to say that it wasn't theory. So she changed the subject. "What exactly does someone with PhDs in mathematics, engineering and chemistry do for the FBI?"

While the young man chose how to answer that question, Sam made sure she got Daniel's attention back in the present, and remembered where Dr. Reid named as his section. Someone like him was perfect for the SGC, and obviously wasted no matter where he was in the FBI.

Now, how hard would it be to pry the young doctor loose from the FBI?