Jack sighed in relief as he watched Daniel finally sleeping quietly on the soft mattress beside him. Daniel’s first trip outside the soundproof room that had been his haven since his return to Earth and life as a flesh and blood human again hadn’t gone as well as Jack had been hoping.

Everything was fine, a quick meet and greet in a Jack-powered wheelchair, a chance for all Daniel’s friends to see him, and know he was all the way back at last. They’d dropped in on Carter, then Teal’c, then finally the general before heading to Daniel’s lab to let him pick up some books.

The entire base staff had been warned to keep things subdued, and their restraint had been downright admirable, but nothing could subdue the quiet pleasure and looks of heartfelt welcome in their teary eyes and joyous smiles. Even those who hadn’t seen Daniel ‘leave’ knew the circumstances of his ascension and far too many had witnessed his return from Colona, so desperately afraid to touch anyone lest he somehow transmit the death he carried in every cell of his body. The love and respect Daniel had earned over the years had never been more apparent than when every man and woman, from hardened Marine to teary desk clerk, stood and saluted as Daniel entered a room.

Jack knew Daniel had trouble taking it all in, every emotion in his heart, as always, was clear to see in Daniel’s eyes. He still had some trouble expressing himself verbally; Janet likened it to the situation of a stroke victim. The neural pathways of Daniel’s newly descended brain had to relearn how to transform idea to thought to action. Whole Daniel’s learning curve was much higher; it was still a very frustrating process for a man who had devoted a good portion of his life to words.

Jack tried to ease things as much as he possible for Daniel, assuring him the long hesitations and sometimes quite pronounced stutter were only temporary, promising he’d be there with Daniel every step of the way.

The general had greeted Daniel with a gentleness even Jack was surprised by. While he knew the general held a special place in his heart for Daniel, Jack had never seen such a blatant and unashamed example of General Hammond’s regard for ‘our boy’. Then again, it wasn’t as if they lost someone they cared about every day, thank God, much less got him back. They’d tried to grieve but never really accepted the loss, then one day to have them drop, literally in Daniel’s case, back into their lives whole again. Well, it was as close to a miracle as Jack ever expected to come.

Technological miracles were a dime a dozen where the Stargate was concerned, but this one, having Daniel back, was a miracle bought at an almost impossible to imagine price.

After George and Daniel’s visit, Jack had escorted a misty-eyed and rapidly tiring Daniel to his office. Quinn had been busy, the room was almost exactly the way Daniel had left it, even down to personal items Jack knew had been packed in storage on the lower levels of the base. Jack wondered for a moment if Carter and Teal’c had suggested it, but knew Quinn wasn’t nearly as clueless as he sometimes acted and Daniel was high on the man’s list of real live… hell, yes, alive!... heroes. The sheer pleasure on Daniel’s face was more than worth it and Jack made a mental note to thank Quinn personally.

They’d stayed in the lab a long time, Jack mostly watching quietly while Daniel reverently touched every surface and artifact he could reach from the wheelchair. He’d paused only once at the corner of his desk where the picture of Sha’re and their wedding bowl had once rested, but Jack had been quick to reassure Daniel that both the treasured objects rested safely in his home, sharing mantle space with a framed picture of Daniel among Jack’s other treasures.

The tears Daniel had been holding back all afternoon had finally flowed freely as Daniel reached out to Jack, wanting and needing  the comfort of touch to help him release the burden of feeling so much all at once. Daniel had nearly calmed, raising his head to meet Jack’s lips in a tender salty kiss when the alert klaxon had gone off.

The sudden loud noise had sent Daniel into paroxysms of pain, his hold on Jack the only thing keeping him from crumbling back into himself entirely. Jack had tried to hold Daniel close, to block his ears from the punishing assault of sound. Helpless to do more than hold on to the man he loved while praying the noise would end soon. And had caused no permanent damage.

Daniel had withdrawn a little by the time it ended, but not nearly in the same way he had upon his return. Instead of retreating inward, he had clung to Jack as if he were a lifeline and would not let go. Daniel attached himself, shivering and tense, to Jack who managed to call Janet one-handed. Together they’d managed to get Daniel back to the shielded room, lightly sedated but mostly aware.

Neither Jack nor Janet said a word about the fact that Daniel refused to loose his hold on Jack. Janet had only smiled in that irritatingly knowing way she had, helped them settle into bed, then left… making a point of locking the door behind her. What she might think or know didn’t really matter, but the fact she obviously didn’t have a problem with it, which was a huge weight off Jack’s shoulders.

So now they lay together, enfolded and enfolding. Jack’s entire world consisted of the warm length of the other man’s body as it pressed as closely as possible to his own. It felt more right than anything Jack had ever known, more real than he knew he had the right to expect.

Daniel had been ‘dead’ for months before they’d met again in Ba’al’s fortress. Not dead, but close enough, the occasional breeze in the corridor didn’t begin to cut it with Jack. It always made him smile, certainly, to know Daniel was near in dome form or other, but afterward Jack was left empty and depressed in greater awareness of all he had lost.

Tightening his arms around Daniel, Jack sent a silent, grateful prayer to whoever might be listening for giving him… them… another chance. As Daniel stirred restlessly, Jack stroked little circles across the smooth skin under his hands. Once almost coltishly untouchable, the newly reborn Daniel needed to be touched almost as much as he needed to breather. And Jack was only too happy to oblige. Hell, he needed it too.

“J-Jack?” It was a whisper of sound as Daniel jerked fully awake, raising his head as he spoke to confirm Jack’s presence.

Not pausing in his gentle massage, Jack nodded reassurance. “You okay?”

Daniel’s eyes searched Jack’s face for long moments before he nodded with a slight smile. “Just a dream…N-needed to be sure…”

Needed to be sure it was real, Jack completed the thought in his head. It wasn’t the first time Daniel had wavered on just what was real in his renewed life, but it never failed to tear a little at Jack’s heart. So close. They’d gone from no hope at all to where they were now… wrapped in one another’s arms and taking comfort as easily as they offered it, leaving every past barrier behind without so much as a thought to consequences or appearances. Whatever the future might bring, what they’d regained was all that mattered.

Jack wanted to tell Daniel, to let the other man know just how completely he was loved, but there just weren’t enough words to cover it. All he could do was touch, to caress every healthy solid centimeter of the beloved body nestled so closely to his own… so he did.

From nape to earlobes, from collar bone to broad chest, from ribs to hips to lean thighs… Jack let his fingers speak the language his limited vocabulary could not. Every emotion in his heart found a voice through fingertips aching to express the devotion Jack thought forever denied them. Every heartbreak of their long separation found healing in gentle strokes across skin so highly sensitive that even a whisper of touch left Daniel breathing hard and moaning in the sheer sensory delight of feeling again.

For long minutes, Jack let his had repeat all the things he’d said, or hadn’t been able to say, while waiting for Daniel to find his way back after descending. All the while Jack watched his lover’s face, gauging carefully the reception of his devotion, making sure he wasn’t moving too far too fast.

Daniel seemed more than okay with it all, uttering soft breathy encouragement as Jack moved along his body, lips joining hands in gentle worship. There would be time later for the rough edged need Jack knew both of them felt, but now, this moment, was for Daniel. For the treasure beyond price Jack had discovered too late, then found again beyond all expectation.

For Daniel, who watched Jack’s every move with eyes filled with wonder and adoration, a look once…so long ago now… reserved for meaning of life stuff. Smiling, Jack realized this was meaning of life stuff, every doubt, every question, every evil in the universe meant nothing when compared to the rightness of being with Daniel this way.

Bending low, Jack touched his lips to Daniel’s, a bare brush of sensation that sent his pulse racing as Daniel reacted so strongly it almost made Jack pull away. Until he realized it was pleasure not pain that had Daniel so near the edge.

Pulling back enough to meet his soon to be lover’s eyes, Jack let his own gaze ask the question he was sure he already knew the answer to. Was Daniel ready?

A tender smile and sure questing fingers sliding down Jack’s torso toward his cock.. almost but not quite touching…was an unmistakable yes. Keeping Daniel’s highly aware state in mind, Jack moved over the other man carefully, barely brushing their bodies together, each point of contact between them seeming to spark with all the explosive potential Jack knew lay between them like a microscopic cushion of air and heat and desire.

Up and back Jack moved his body, resisting the urge to crush Daniel to him, to give in to the fire just beneath the surface. It took all of Jack’s control to hold back, to not do what came so naturally and just focus on Daniel. It was incredibly erotic… Jack couldn’t remember ever being so totally focused on a lover, so totally committed to another’s needs that every part of him wanted only to give, knowing that in giving he received so much more. Every ghostly contact intensified a hundred-fold, each stroke of his chest hair over Daniel’s smoother torso seemed an agony of sensation, every slow glancing connection between his weeping cockhead over Daniel’s straining length seemed to ignite every pleasure synapse in Jack’s body.

It was too pure, too unsettling, too incredibly surreal to last…

Dipping his head low for another delicate kiss, Jack felt his arms shake with the effort of control, but he couldn’t push, couldn’t take the chance….

Then Daniel’s hand closed over both their cocks and did something that had to be magical as Jack felt his world implode in a shower of color behind his suddenly closed eyes, the warm rush of fluid between them and Daniel’s joyous whisper of completion. Carefully, Jack let his body slide to one side as his muscles lost all semblance of control. Breathing deeply, Jack opened his eyes to look at Daniel, entranced by the utter beauty of the man he loved.

Slowly, Daniel’s eyes opened, bright with emotion but so much at peace Jack felt his heart catch in his chest. Daniel seemed almost to glow with a power far more earthly than ascended. The same power that had crossed a forbidden line and brought them back together again, the same power Jack wielded with all the strength in him to reconnect Daniel’s body and spirit. The very real and, to them, necessary power of love.