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It was a goldmine. It was perfect. It was the sight of Dr. Daniel Jackson sitting in his office, narrating to a camera in front of a portable green screen. Jack O’Neill, General, leaned against the doorframe with a broad grin on his face. Daniel glanced up, saw him, and with direct eye contact gave him a warning look.
Blithely ignoring him, Jack said, loudly, “Whatcha doin’?”
“Jack.” Daniel drew out his name, frustration saturating his voice. “I have three weeks to get these-these orientation videos”—he gestured wildly to the camera and his notes—“finished and sent out for editing. I don’t have time for whatever this”—his gesturing hands targeted Jack now—“is.”
Jack shoved his hands in his pockets and nodded slowly as he stepped farther into the room. “Orientation videos, you say?”
“For people coming into the Stargate program.”
“And they chose…you? To make them?” Jack asked, raising his eyebrows.
Daniel’s eyebrows shot up. “Are you volunteering?”
Jack raised his hands in surrender. “Nope, no thanks. Just one more question.”
Daniel’s eyebrows raise incrementally higher.
“What’s with the green screen?”
“Out!”
____________________
“…are a parasitical race who-”
“Still at it, I see.” The familiar voice came from Daniel’s doorway and was followed by one General Jack O’Neill stepping into the office.
“What possible reason could you have to be here twice in one week?” Daniel paused the camera, resigning himself to the interruption. “Shouldn’t you be in DC?”
“Oh no, no, don’t stop on my account,” Jack said, waving his hand at the camera. “I’m just waiting on a report from Carter. She found some…thing….”
“Some…thing,” Daniel repeated.
Jack made a face at him. “If I wait out in one of the common areas people start asking me things. I just thought I’d hover around here until she’s done.”
“Uh huh.” Daniel looked at him. “Why don’t you hover in Sam’s lab?”
Jack winced. “She kicked me out so that she could focus.”
“So that she could focus,” Daniel said slowly. “You mean after all these years she hasn’t developed an immunity?”
Jack looked at him, affronted. “To what?”
“Nothing,” Daniel said quickly. “If you can ‘hover’ without being disruptive, sure.” Daniel sounded doubtful. “But I have got to get this done. I have such a backlog of artifacts I-”
“Ah!” Jack said, holding up his hands and closing his eyes. “I’ll be quiet.”
Daniel gave him one last look before returning his attention to the camera and the notes he’d scribbled on the notebook beside it. “Oh!” Daniel spun back in his direction. “And do not touch the green screen.”
Jack lowered his finger from where he’d been about to prod the sheet. “Sure, you betcha,” he said with a nod.
“Alright.”
A few minutes later, there was a clatter and a soft, “Oops,” and Daniel repressed the urge to react. A note slid onto the desk. Scrawled on a sticky note in Jack’s sloppy handwriting, It’s not broken!
___________________
“Uh, Daniel.”
Daniel pressed his lips together and closed his eyes briefly before opening them again to see an apologetic Colonel Samantha Carter standing in his doorway. Behind him, there was a soft thump as Jack tripped and knocked into the bookshelf behind him. Thankfully, the thump was not followed by the sound of anything breaking. “Yes, Sam?” Daniel said, much suffering.
“That, um, the science you were just describing isn’t-”
“It’s the notes they gave me!” Daniel exclaimed before she even finished speaking. He ran a hand over his face and paused the camera recording again. He waved a folder at her, the printed page he held pressed to the front of it flapping wildly.
Sam’s eyes widened and she held her hands up in surrender. “Woah, Daniel. I’ll talk to them about it. They were probably trying to simplify it but now it’s just…wrong,” she said, stepping forward and reading over the page. “Oh, wow. Very wrong.”
“I mean, does it matter? No one’s going to watch these, and no one’s going to understand that other than you even if they do,” Jack said, juggling three pads of sticky notes as he leaned against the bookshelf he’d stumbled into.
Sam shot him a look, brow furrowed. “Sir. You do realize that there are other scientists in the program besides me. Other astrophysicists even.”
Jack shrugged. “Betcha they won’t understand it.” He flashed her a grin and she bit back one of her own.
Daniel looked between the two of them. “I have spent hours making these so far and I’m not close to being done yet, so can we please refrain from saying that no one is going to watch them,” he said. “Also, yes they will, because it’s going to be required.”
“Ah yes, required, that’ll force them to pay attention,” Jack said sagely.
Daniel frowned at him, but Sam cut in before they could get too far into their bickering. “Um, actually the reason I’m here is to find you, sir,” she said, nodding to Jack. “I have the report on the-”
“Great!” Jack interrupted, catching all of the sticky note pads and setting them down on the counter beside Daniel. “Lead on.”
“See you, Daniel,” Sam said, giving him a little wave. Then her eyes darted to Jack and back again before she mouthed a silent, Sorry!
Jack turned in the doorway before exiting and shot Daniel a sloppy salute before following Sam out and down the hall. Left in silence, Daniel sighed and dropped his chin to his chest. “God, he’s right, no one’s going to watch a single one of these.”