Chapter 7 - Casualties and Survivors

Two more days passed. Two ungodly long days. I gave up on playing cards, gave up even on pacing. Just stood and stared. A lot. Don't really remember what I was staring at, although I'm sure it was gray and muddy. Didn't even think much. The next day would be the day we would be "allowed" to go home, although I had no doubt staying and continuing to wait wasn't an option the Karievesh were going to allow.

It was night, well after dark, and I was lying fully dressed down to my boots, wide awake on top of itchy wool blankets, when there was a commotion out in the encampment. Not a returning soldiers kind of commotion. Not even an imminent attack commotion. Subtly different, more fractured and confused, Tristan's name liberally sprinkled throughout. Then my breath caught as I picked up one other word, the most important word in all that gabbling - Butcher. I never thought I'd be happy to hear that term, knowing it was being applied to Daniel.

I was up and out the door in a matter of seconds, leaving Fraiser cursing at herself for having taken her boots off. I knew she'd be right behind me, bootlaces flying and medical bag in hand. I hoped she wouldn't need the latter, but alive was alive. I'd take it however bloody and banged up it was.

I dodged, shoved and wove my way around the rapidly accumulating mass of spectators. The epicenter of the forming vortex of bodies was a pair of figures clad in black plating - Thellok Tristan; and the one with the helmet, visor pulled down, had to be Daniel. There was something in his build, in his stance, in his presence that told me it was him. He was still in there, inside that body and skull, just waiting to be let out again.

I wanted to run in and yank him back, haul him straight to the Stargate, willing or not, injured or not, brain-fried or not, but there was no way I was going to get through that press of bodies without causing a serious ruckus, and that might not be met at all kindly. So I waited. Again. Just a few minutes longer. I had waited this long. I could handle just a few more minutes.

Fraiser skidded to a halt beside me, and I put a hand on her shoulder, pressed down and squeezed firmly. It was finally going to end. Maybe not be resolved or dealt with, but at least over and done with.

The illumination was dim - silver from the chain of moons, blue-white from the compact light sources carried by some of the soldiers - and further diffused by the wet, clinging mist hanging in the air. Making everything ghostly, uncanny, surreal.

Daniel had something in his hands, was holding it out toward Tristan, some kind of bundle wrapped in mottled cloth - splotched black and white like the skin of some animal. He let go, let it drop, but hung onto a corner of the wrapping. Three objects fell out and made a muted thunk on the wet ground - one large and round, two smaller and oddly lumpy.

Daniel took several steps backwards, started to turn. Then slowly, so slowly I thought I was imagining it at first, he began to lean forwards. The movement rapidly gained speed, and he sprawled face-first into the mud. And lay there, unmoving.

Fraiser jumped forwards ahead of me, pushing and shoving with a ferocity most would never suspect was in her, but I knew her well and was only a few steps behind her. We closed the short distance rapidly, dropped to Daniel's side, rolled him over carefully. I cursed and fumbled at the helmet's chin strap, hindered by the armor rising up from the chest plate to protect his neck. Janet checked his pulse, made a quick visual assessment of what she could see of his body. No idea where he got the armor. Didn't want to know, quite frankly.

"Oh God." Fraiser's voice sounded small and lost, muffled by the heavy air. I jerked my head up, heart racing even faster than it already had been. She wasn't looking at Daniel, though. Her eyes were fixed on something else, her breath coming in short, foggy pants. She was looking at the ground down past Daniel's feet. I followed her line of sight, my head turning slowly, reluctantly.

Imaga was there now, crouched near the ground, examining the objects that had fallen from the bundle. Tristan was at his shoulder. "Well?" she demanded impatiently.

"That's him," Imaga replied quietly.

That's him? Him who? I squinted, leaned over a little further. Winced as the light Imaga was holding played over what he was scrutinizing so carefully.

The mottled cloth - the dark spots were blood. And the objects - a severed head and a pair of hands, one hand cleanly separated at the wrist, the other one looking as if it had been wrenched off, jagged bone fragments translucent and shining wetly in the light. Oh my God.

I pulled my eyes away. Tried to abort the images that were flooding my mind. I couldn't help it. I knew firsthand how things like that happened. It was inevitable that the how and the who would try to come together in my head, but I'd be damned if I'd just let it happen. It wasn't him that had done it. I didn't want images that were nothing but lies.

Fraiser was evidently going through her own struggle, although I can't really guess what it might have been. She just about never sees the shit actually being done, after all. Just gets to put the pieces back together again after the fact. She blinked hard and slow a couple of times, twitched, shook herself, then went back to digging in her bag.

I finally got the helmet off, tossed it to the side, not caring where it landed. Thunk in the mud. Like a severed head. Christ.

Daniel's face was dirty, bruised and blood-spattered. Muscles slack, eyes closed and mouth open. But he was breathing, thank God. And there were flickers of movement behind his eyelids.

I let Fraiser take over, sat back on my heels, looked back toward Imaga and Tristan. He was saluting her in fist across the chest fashion. She returned the gesture, brisk and efficient, then turned and stalked back toward the admin building. Back to her sanctuary. Her room of brightly colored windows into hell.

Imaga returned his attention to the trophy - the gory proof of Tristan's victory. Already shoved to the back of the great Thellok's mind, no doubt, chalked up on the scorecard and then dismissed in the way death and brutality can only be dismissed when you're in the thick of it. It would come back to haunt her later, though. I sincerely hoped it would. Maybe one day she'd even truly regret how crassly she'd used a man she didn't even know to take down her enemy.

But Imaga wouldn't forget. The look on his face - akin to what I'd seen on the faces of men and women alike, trailing their fingers lightly across the thousands of names inscribed across a black granite wound in the earth, frozen in a moment of silent grief as they come to the one name they're seeking. In the same way those men and women had touched the Wall, Imaga reached down and gently drew his fingers across the surface of Volish's face, pulling the eyes closed. Then he straightened up, looked one more time at what was left of his former colleague, and spat on it.

Fraiser didn't take long to determine Daniel was unconscious - yeah, I caught that one myself - but stable enough for travel. I think she wanted to cut and run just as urgently as I did - before someone who didn't know who Volish was or why parts of his body had been toted back to the Karievesh camp decided Daniel still needed to be lynched as payment for Karievesh body parts scattered on Feloren soil.

Oddly enough, it was Imaga who helped us bug out. Got us over to one of the ground cars - even helped carry Daniel the couple of hundred wet, mushy yards to get there - then took us back to the Stargate. He didn't say a single word the entire time, just took care of business with a minimum of looks and gestures. I didn't try to get him to talk, and neither did Fraiser. There was really nothing left to say - to him, about him, about his world or his war.

Imaga didn't get out of the vehicle when we reached the 'Gate, but he did stay there with the door open until we got the wormhole established and lugged Daniel up the steps to the event horizon. We set him down there and paused to catch our breaths and to get a better hold on him before we went through. Didn't want to loose our grip and have him get tossed out the other end. That would've been one insult too many.

Before we picked Daniel up again, I turned back toward the waiting ground car, squinted until I could see through the mists and scattered patches of fog to Imaga's face, dimly lit by the soft illumination of the control panels. I gave him a half-wave, half-salute - a thank-you for doing what little he could. He seemed to understand. He crossed his arm over his chest and inclined his head in a slight nod. Then the door of the transport slid closed and the vehicle hummed off over the battered and broken terrain.

I took one last breath of Torrhenan air and blew it out in a long plume of steam. A few short steps across the event horizon, bodies split apart and sent screaming across the galaxy, and we were home.

Home, but still very much in the woods.

Daniel's final visit to Feloren territory had left him with some additions to the collection of minor injuries he'd already amassed, which Fraiser diligently cleaned, stitched and bandaged. More worrisome, though, was the fact he wasn't waking up. He was in a coma of sorts - caused, Fraiser surmised, by a combination of factors. Exhaustion, dehydration, shock. The end of the secondary programming after he'd brought the evidence of Volish's death back to Tristan. Possibly a conflict between the overlaid programming and the original programming, ending up with the chip stuck in the "on" position even though it no longer had anything to react to - no Karievesh, no Adren Volish, no Torrhena.

Bottom line, the fiber network still seemed to be blocking the real RAS. Blocking input to and output from the real Daniel. He was still trapped inside his own head, and the only way to liberate him seemed to be to remove the chip. But that was no big deal. Doc Fraiser was on the case. Simple procedure. Right?

A whole slew of tests later, every body function measured and checked and rechecked, Fraiser finally went ahead with the surgery. As thoroughly as she had studied the Karievesh medical files, and grilled Dr. Kadina on top of that, she still seemed apprehensive. That's really not like her, but I guess it's understandable considering the last time there'd been an attempt to surgically remove something alien from an SGC member's brain, it hadn't turned out well. One gravestone with the name "Kowalski" can attest to that.

Carter, Teal'c and I set up our vigil in the waiting room, filled up the coffee mugs. Even Teal'c sipped at a cup, liberally laced with cream and sugar. Ever since Urgo, he'll partake every now and then, only thankfully in much smaller quantities and at lower temperatures.

We didn't say much to each other - a continuation of the habits we'd developed over the past couple of days. The most talking I'd done during that time was at the debriefing where I laid out the whole sorry mess - while Fraiser evaluated what kind of physical mess she had laid out on the exam table in her infirmary.

I still remember the look on Carter's face when we came back through the 'Gate. Haggard, like she'd hardly slept the whole time Daniel was gone. Relieved he was back, of course. Other things, too - things tied into the filth and the blood, the black plating still strapped onto his body - and what the blood and the armor represented. She'd seen the same cold, hard evidence, after all, and this was a certain measure of confirmation for her. I knew she'd reason herself into knowing it wasn't Daniel who had done those things, but still - it was an image she didn't need.

We were only on the second round of coffee when Fraiser appeared in the waiting room, fully decked out in scrubs, the mask still on her face. My stomach lurched so hard I thought I was going to spew coffee all over the place. She was visibly shaken, and her hand trembled as she hooked a finger over the edge of the mask to pull it down. No. No, no, no, no. Not after all we'd done, everything we'd gone through to get him back.

But then she actually laughed. A nervous grin spread over her face. Shit. Was she losing it, cracking up right in front of us?

"Janet?" Carter said softly, tentatively, impending grief held rigidly in check.

Fraiser waved a hand and shook her head, pulled the surgical cap and mask off and scrunched them up tightly. "It's OK. He's all right. We just moved him to recovery."

I did a full turn, waving my hands at the ceiling and ending with my hands on top of my head. "Jesus, Janet, you scared the shit out of me!"

"Oh. I'm sorry." She turned to toss the cap and mask into a bin in the corridor and wobbled as she nearly lost her balance. "Ah... I need to sit down."

Teal'c stepped forward and took her elbow, guided her to the nearest chair. Carter pushed a mug of coffee into her hands, said, "Decaffeinated," then sat and tucked her hands between her knees. "So what happened?"

Fraiser took a gulp of coffee, dragged the back of her hand across her mouth, blew out a quick breath. "The surgery was successful. The chip was close to the surface, embedded under the skin at the back of the neck. Not impinging on any brain or spinal tissue whatsoever. The fiber network is another matter altogether, but I left that alone, apart from snipping the terminal ends connected to the chip." She paused, took another sip of coffee.

"We used a local anesthetic. Less risky than general anesthesia, and there wasn't a need for it anyway since he was already unconscious. But as soon as I snipped the last fiber...he woke up. Fully alert and very agitated and disoriented. Startled the living daylights out of me. I honestly didn't think the effects would be that immediate. We ended up having to heavily sedate him so we could finish the procedure and close."

"Whoa," Carter said, leaning forwards and then sitting up ramrod straight. "But he's OK now?"

"Yes. Yes, absolutely. Give him a few hours to rest, get the sedatives out of his system, then you can go in to see him. We'll have to keep him under observation a few days, monitor him closely to be sure the fiber network is breaking down and there are no aftereffects, but everything looks good right now."

We were all so relieved, so thankful, felt so much lighter with the lifting of that one burden - he was alive, he would live - that we were lulled into a comfortable illusion for the next few hours. Everything was going to be OK. Everything had turned out fine. Once again. One more hair's breadth escape.

We went to the commissary and ate. We talked, we laughed. Carter even told an offcolor joke, which Teal'c, being Teal'c, raised an eyebrow at. Actually, I think Teal'c was a bit more guarded with his optimism than Carter and I were being. Kind of hard to differentiate that subtle of a shading with him, and I wasn't exactly intent on interpreting facial expressions at the time, least of all those of a customarily stoic Jaffa.

When we all trooped down to recovery at the appointed time, we were a little deflated by Daniel's lack of responsiveness. He was tired, that was all. He'd been through a lot. He'd just had the back of his neck sliced open, for Christ's sake - and woke up midway through. I think that would be enough to drain the yap and yammer out of even me. It was a short visit, closely chaperoned by Doctor Fraiser, her arms folded tightly across her chest, enforcing the five-minute curfew.

The next day wasn't any better, though, or the day after that. Or the next day or into the next week. He slept a lot, or at least pretended to. Half the time when I dropped by, his eyes would be closed. I think he was mostly avoiding talking to anyone or even looking at the world around him, limited as it was to gray concrete walls and IVs and medical monitors. Even the few times when I did catch him sitting up in bed, there were still dark circles under his eyes - eyes that refused to meet mine, to meet anyone's. He hardly ate, barely spoke outside of terse, superficial answers to direct questions.

Physically he was improving, although that was hampered by his lagging appetite and the frequent disturbances when he did really sleep. Nightmares. Waking up screaming more than once, but usually just setting the monitors to wailing with elevated pulse and blood pressure and respiration - symptoms that were often present even when he was wide awake. Post-traumatic stress with a chaser of depression.

What did I expect anyway? He'd been through hell, and he looked the part.

Fraiser tried various medications, which he took without protest or comment - and all of which had little to no effect. She brought in a psychiatrist - not MacKenzie - who reported slow progress. Actually, I think calling it "progress" was being optimistic. The only difference I saw was less staring at the walls or ceiling during his rare periods of wakefulness and more staring at his hands. Maybe Fraiser should've brought MacKenzie in. That might've at least gotten a definite reaction out of him.

Carter brought him cookies - which remained untouched or ended up being eaten by the nurses. Teal'c talked to him - a lot, in fact. I don't know what about because he always spoke in very low tones and would stop when I came into the room. That seemed to...I don't know that "help" is the right word for it. It did something, brought Daniel back to the land of the living a little bit - but only to make him feel the pain of his fractured memories, judging from the look in his eyes after Teal'c had been there.

I talked to Daniel, too, about what teams were offworld, doing what, what kind of rocks and various other assorted junk they were bringing back. Even brought him a few pieces that Rothman insisted would be fascinating to Daniel. He did turn them over in his hands for a few minutes, but then handed them back to me without a word. I tried to get him to play cards with me, even resorted to attempting to entice him with chess, but he wouldn't bite. Or speak. He had the rolling over and playing dead part down pretty good, though.

I finally ended up playing solitaire on top of the blanket at the edge of the bed, accompanied by a running commentary of any and all stupid and inane bits of trivia and pieces of gossip I could come up with. I even made up some pretty wild stuff that likely would've gotten me sued or slapped in the face by the subjects of the stories.

Nada. Nothing I could honestly term a reaction or a response. I was staring at the cards, considering throwing in the towel for the day, when his hand appeared in front of my face. He grabbed my wrist, squeezed it hard, whispered, "Jack, please. Get– Get me out of here." I looked up and was stunned to find myself looking into eyes that were actually...alive. Or at least, trying very hard to cling to life. The eyes of a drowning man with one word on his lips. "Please."

I went straight to Fraiser, told her I was taking Daniel home. She gave me a look that said she clearly thought I was off my rocker, but when I told her he'd actually asked me to get him out of there, she paused for a moment - a very long moment - then conceded. Amazing the reaction one little sign can get. A supposedly dead person twitches; a comatose person opens his eyes; a virtually catatonic archeologist begs a favor.

When I went to tell him he was being released, he was already up and trying to dress himself. I guess he was planning on going no matter what Fraiser had to say. Not that he was doing such a great job of getting ready for the great escape. He'd apparently yanked the I.V. out himself judging from the bloodstain seeping through the plaid of his shirtsleeve. His belt was still unbuckled, his shoes were unlaced, and the two shirt buttons he'd managed to get fastened were in the wrong holes. Civvies - that damn plaid shirt, jeans, tennis shoes, all just shy of being ready for the rag bin. Comfortably worn. His favorites. Where they'd appeared from, I had no idea. Probably another Fraiser touch, but I doubt this was quite the release from her care she had in mind.

I asked him if he wanted me to call one of the nurses to help him - I knew he wasn't going to let me do it - but he gave me a terse "no" and doggedly kept at it until he had himself all buttoned up and tucked in. He refused the Band-aid I held out to him. The bleeding had already stopped. Too late for the favorite shirt, not that he seemed to care. He was completely focused on getting the hell out of there, but quite frankly, I had my doubts he'd make it all the way topside unassisted. His face was flushed from the exertion of getting up and getting dressed, and besides that, he'd hardly eaten or slept in days. That's enough to make even Teal'c a little unsteady on his feet.

Daniel gutted it out, though, walking along as steadily as he could manage, eyes straight ahead, faintly nodding at those who greeted him, ignoring those who stared at him or avoided looking at him. Kind of made me wish, not for the first time, that there was some kind of weed killer for grapevines.

Once he'd settled into the passenger seat of my truck, he slumped back and took a deep, shuddery breath. He was sweating, a thin sheen on skin gone pale. I didn't comment, just let him be as I pulled out of the parking space and headed for the guardhouse and the open road. Sunny day, the occasional cloud scudding across the sky, light breeze stirring through aspen leaves, cool outside but warm and quiet inside the cab of the truck. The only sounds were the hum of the wheels on the road and the wind sweeping around the truck, catching with a whistle in the cracks of the doors and windows.

I was beginning to think Daniel had fallen asleep when he asked where we were going.

"I kind of assumed you'd want to go to your apartment," I said, glancing at him as he opened his eyes and sat up, facing forwards, staring at the road ahead of us.

"No," he said softly, with a hint of what I took to be sadness. "Can't... I just can't."

"OK. My place then. I think I've got some Campbell's Soup in the cupboard."

He snorted, a harsh and bitter sound. "No thanks. All I really want is a good, stiff drink. Make that several."

My eyes flicked from him to the road, trying to assess if he was serious. Seemed like he was. "Umm, I'm not sure that's such a great idea."

"I don't care," he said with a bit more force, leaning his head back against the headrest and closing his eyes again. "I just need...something. I don't know what. Some way to just...stop thinking for a while. I can't stop thinking about it."

Not surprising, Daniel being who he is, but still - it wasn't easy to hear him say it. Another confirmation. But I guess you don't get anywhere until you face up to what's twisting your gut in knots. There's only so long you can shove pain back down before it ends up hell-bent to strangle you.

Booze wasn't going to help him, though. I've been there. I know. But I had a feeling I wouldn't be able to convince Daniel of that. Not with words. He'd just have to find out for himself, find his own way of coping. So we went back to my place, but before I let him near anything that could be classified as alcohol, I insisted he eat something. He didn't even argue. Just headed for the kitchen and started rummaging through the cabinets, managed to find some crackers and peanut butter I didn't realize were in there. He sat down at the table and started munching away, his jaw working mechanically, each swallow hard and slow.

I think he probably would've gone on like that until he gagged. Not like peanut butter is the easiest thing to swallow on a good day. I went and opened the refrigerator door, looking for something to offer him to wash it down. Plenty of beer. An open can of Coke, definitely flat by now. The remains of a gallon of milk, two weeks past the expiration date. OK, so it'd be beer. One or two bottles, he'd be zonked, and that would be that. He'd end up with enough of a hangover to realize there were no answers to be found either in a drunken haze or its aftermath. He always catches on lickety-split. I was hoping this would be no exception.

I set a bottle down on the table next to him, took one of my own, twisted the cap off and leaned back against the counter as I took a swig. Daniel barely paused between bites of cracker as he absently popped the top off his bottle and took a long pull - several swallows worth. And then he slammed the bottle down on the table so hard I'm amazed the glass didn't shatter. His hand flew up to his mouth and he was up and sprinting down the hall toward the bathroom a split second later, the chair he'd been sitting in hitting the floor like an afterthought. The sound of gagging and retching was quick to follow.

I just stood there, strangling my bottle with one hand and gripping the edge of the counter with the other. Damn it all to hell. What had I been thinking? The smell, that taste...reminiscent of the water on Torrhena. Fraiser had explained to me at some point during the past few days that Daniel was likely to have strong reactions to smells associated with what had happened to him. Taste as well since that's closely related. Even more so than a person would normally have. Seems that smell bypasses the thalamus on the way to the brain, so that was the one input that wasn't blocked by the implant Volish put in Daniel's head.

Cursing at my stupidity, I emptied the contents of both bottles down the drain and ran several gallons of water from the tap, then disposed of the carcasses in the trashcan in the garage. By the time I'd done that and opened the window over the sink to clear the last of the smell, the gagging coming from the bathroom had stopped. There was a flush followed by the sound of running water. I walked down the hall slowly, wanting to give him time to compose himself, so by the time I poked my head around the edge of the open doorway, he was sitting on the closed toilet lid, head in his hands.

"Daniel?" I asked gently, not sure what I was wanting from him. I was damn sure he wasn't going to say he was okay.

"I'm sorry," was what he did say.

I skirted around whatever larger issues he might've been referring to and stuck to the here and now. "Hey, no big deal. I should've known better. I mean, Fraiser told me..." I trailed off, thinking maybe it would be better if we just didn't talk about it at all.

He shook his head, looked up at me briefly, his eyes quickly jerking away from my face and darting all around the room as he spoke. "It's just that I remember the smells. Really, really well. Stale water, a fermented smell, like the - like the beer. Cold air, wet, damp. Musty, moldy. Blood. Lots of blood. Vomit, rotting bodies, burnt flesh. God. All mixed together." His shoulders heaved and he shoved a knuckle into his mouth and bit down. I reached out and grabbed his shoulder, but he shrugged away from me, lowered his hand to his lap, took a few deep breaths.

"So how much do you really remember? Other than the smells?" It was a difficult question to ask, and I was sure it wouldn't be easy for him to answer, but with Daniel, the quicker you can drag something out in the open, the better. Otherwise, he'll stew on it endlessly, let it eat him up inside for so long it becomes a part of him. I wasn't about to let this become part of him any more than it had to be. I'd already let it sit too long.

"Bits and pieces mostly. Before I was captured. Then with you and Janet in the prison cell. The recordings. A little bit when I was searching for Volish. There was someone following me. I think I helped him even though there was something - from the chip, I guess - telling me I shouldn't. And then there was the other stuff the Karievesh added on. I remember the compulsion... It was overwhelming. I had to find him, had to kill him, had to..." His hands were clenched in his lap now, shaking, his thumbs rubbing back and forth across the joints of his index fingers. "I know what she wanted - the evidence. I remember that. I don't remember actually doing it, but I can fill in the blanks." He paused for a moment, caught his breath. I put my hand back on his shoulder, and this time he let it stay there. "God, I hated him so much, and it wasn't all the programming in that damn chip. I hated him - I still hate him - for what he did, what he was doing, to me, to other people, to all the victims. The dead and the dying. The ones I killed with my own hands."

Watching him tear himself up like that wasn't easy, even though I knew it was necessary. To be perfectly honest it made my blood boil. Because of Volish, the sick, sadistic bastard. Because of Thellok Tristan and her part in the whole awful mess. Plus I was plenty angry - rip-roaring angry - at myself for letting her manipulate all of us like that. Oh, and for thinking that another mindfuck - and a Tok'Ra one at that - was a good idea. I might've even been a little bit angry at Daniel, God knows why. Maybe for insisting on using the memory device.

Somehow, though, I was able to put all of that aside and managed to say in a relatively calm and controlled voice, "It wasn't you, Daniel. You didn't do those things. You're not responsible. No more than Sha're was responsible for what Ammonet did."

That shook him, just as I'd hoped, kicked him right in the heart and the gut. He looked up at me with a wild and terrible grief in his eyes, but it burned bright and fierce like a flash of gunpowder and was just as quickly gone. He slumped over, buried his face in his hands. "You're right." The words were muffled, barely touched by conviction, but at least they were there. "I know you're right. But that doesn't make it any easier to live with."

"I know. It hurts like hell. It'll keep you up nights, maybe on and off for the rest of your life." He looked up at me, the shadows slipping and slithering all around his eyes. Some new ones in the collection, painfully dark. "You know, a very good friend of mine once gave me kind of a strange answer when I asked him if he was OK. He said he wasn't - but he would be. That's probably one of the most honest things anyone's ever said to me. Not pretty, not terribly reassuring, but the truth. You'll be OK, Daniel. Trust me on that one. Trust yourself."

He stared at me for a long moment - dumbfounded, confused, hurting, upset, scattered and uncertain - but he finally nodded, let the barest sliver of a sad smile creep into his face for just a few seconds. It was a start.

I gave his shoulder a quick shake and let go. "How about we go sit out on the deck, get some fresh air? I could order some pizza. Or some Chinese. I think there's even something left in that bottle of scotch Carter gave me for my last birthday. Real smooth stuff. That should go down easier."

So we went and sat under the wide, clear sky, bright and achingly blue, washed with sunlight and wisps of cloud. Sipped at the last of the scotch, ate fried rice and moo goo gai pan, listened to the radio - classical stuff, nice and soothing and noncommittal. Didn't talk. Just shared the solitude, the feeling of life going on all around us. Watched the sun set and the stars come out, one by one. Simple things. Everyday things. Meaning of life things. The things that let you know it'll be OK, if you're just willing to let them. I believe that. I really do. And I think Daniel does too. That's just him. The real him.

The End