Broken Shoes
(#15 in Shoelaces LD universe)
by Jennamajig

SUMMARY: Daniel and Jack try to deal with Daniel being little Daniel. Inspired by the DJsSG-1Lverse yahoo list.

SEASON/SPOILERS: None.

DISCLAIMER: The characters mentioned in this story are the property of Showtime and Gekko Film Corp. The Stargate, SG-I, the Goa'uld and all other characters who have appeared in the series STARGATE SG-1 together with the names, titles and backstory are the sole copyright property of MGM-UA Worldwide Television, Gekko Film Corp, Glassner/Wright Double Secret Productions and Stargate SG-I Prod. Ltd. Partnership. This fanfic is not intended as an infringement upon those rights and solely meant for entertainment. All other characters, the story idea and the story itself are the sole property of the author.

He couldn't get it to fit. It worked just fine when he was bigger, but his smaller hands arms couldn't seem to maneuver it into place.

Close, but not quite.

"Daniel?"

Maybe if he moved it just a fraction more...

"Daniel?"

There! He could reach it. He let out a sigh of relief.

"Now I could say your name one more time, but we both know what happens then, don't we?"

Crap. He turned, trying to make what he was doing look like the most natural thing in the world.

"Yes, Jack?" He purposely brought out the puppy dog eyes in an attempt to look as cute as he possibly could.

"Please tell me that's not a coat hanger you are trying to stick down your cast."

Daniel widened his eyes once again to capture that "innocent look" before pulling the mangled wire coat hanger away from his arm. "It's not."

Jack just stared and blinked. "Funny, because it looks like a coat hanger. Or correction, it used to look like a coat hanger." He reached out and plucked the object in question from Daniel's good arm. "You have anything to say?"

Daniel found his gaze slipping to the floor. "Um...it itches?"

--

He hadn't meant to break his arm. It just "happened." It just "happened" when he was doing something he wasn't supposed to.

It was sunny, as most early August days tend to be and, for once, Daniel had decided to throw all the angst out the window and play outside. Jack's knee was acting up again, so the Colonel was lounging on the couch, knee propped up on the coffee table, ice planted on top of it, watching a baseball game on TV. When Daniel said he wanted to go out, Jack agreed, telling him to take Dannie with him and reminding him to stick to the sandbox and avoid the tree.

The so mentioned tree was a wonderful, gnarled oak tree that Daniel had tried to climb on more than one occasion. But the tree was ancient, which meant the seductive branches were unstable, which made Jack a tad crazy with worry, so the tree was off-limits.

The funny thing was that the thirty-nine-year-old Daniel hated heights. Deep down inside, they made him nervous, stemming back to an incident when he was seven and almost fell off a rock formation while in Egypt with his parents.

But the five-year-old Daniel loved them. He could climb the tree and see the whole yard, even the neighbor's yard if he found the right spot. It was like being on top of world, a wonderful feeling for someone who hadn't even reached four feet in height yet. The creaking branches didn't scare him, they just added to the lure of the forbidden play area.

They sure scared the thirty-nine-year-old though. Which was why Daniel usually listened to Jack.

Usually.

But not today.

Which, of course, meant he had climbed the tree and was inching out onto a shaky branch so he could see into the Petersons' yard. They had a pool that was shaped like a triangle and if he moved just a few feet he could see it in all its glory.

That's when the branch snapped.

And he fell. Hard.

Dazed, and more than a bit disorientated, and surprised at having the wind knocked out of him, all he heard was Dannie barking and the sliding glass door opening somewhere in the distance. Then suddenly the world came into focus and he felt a sharp pain in his arm and tears in his eyes. Jack's face loomed above him, calling his name, asking where it hurt.

"Arm," he managed to say before whimpering, "It hurts."

Jack went to touch the arm in question and he shook his head. "No."

"I have to see if it's broken. I'm sorry." Daniel felt a hand on his head and bit his lip as Jack prodded the arm and sent more pain shooting through his arm. He shut his eyes.

"Open your eyes, Daniel. Did you hit your head? I think I'm going to call 911."

"No!" he screamed before settling back down into a whimper. "Just my arm. Promise. Hurts."

Jack looked unconvinced, but nodded. "ER, then."

He shook his head again. "Can't we call Janet? Go to the SGC?"

"Fraiser's not a pediatrician and she'll just remind me of that the second I call her. Besides the hospital's closer and you're in pain."

"But they will treat me like a little kid at the hospital." He cradled the arm, wishing the pain away. He heard Jack groan and then suddenly he was scooped up into his arms. .

"I hate to break it to you, kiddo, but you *are* a little kid."

"Am not," he argued as Jack placed him in the car and reached for the seatbelt. He gently lifted Daniel's arm around the belt at he latched it, but it still hurt and Daniel still whimpered.

"Sorry," Jack said before laying the arm back down and shutting the door.

At least the car seat had been gone since his birthday. He was still two pounds too light but it didn't matter anymore because he'd finally turned six. The car seat would have hurt like hell.

Thankfully, the ride to the hospital was short and not as horrible as Daniel had imagined. Now the hospital, that was as horrible as he imagined.

And then some.

The ER was relatively empty, but they still had to wait. Daniel was not used to waiting. He didn't want to wait. And neither did his arm. He never waited at the SGC for treatment and he was well aware that patience was a virtue he sometimes threw out the window, especially since fate turned back the hands of time on him. He fidgeted, kicked the backs of plastic chairs, whimpered in Jack's lap - anything to pass the time and more importantly, make him forget about the pain.

He'd broken things before. And they'd hurt. A lot, even. But somehow when he was in his thirties a broken bone was easier to manage. He could manage pain. He'd suffered for a few days before his appendix burst and no one knew. It also almost killed him, but still no one knew. Now the pain seemed to invade his little head and it was all he could think about.

Well, that, and the fact that some doctor was going to treat him like a child and want to touch his arm and stick him with pointy objects.

It was the pointy objects he was most afraid of. It was the doctor's office all over again.

His name was finally called, and the doctor, who couldn't possibly be old enough to have graduated medical school, came in. As Daniel had expected, he treated him like a little kid, but to be honest, Daniel was paying more attention to the pain than Doogie Howser. They took x-rays and the doctor came back to showcase them.

"Broken," he proclaimed. "At the wrist and the forearm." He pointed at the two spots before putting the x-ray down and opening a cabinet.

"You'll be as good as new before you know it," the doctor continued, turning back to give Daniel a smile. "You'll even have a cool cast that all your friends can sign and we'll let you pick the color."

But he didn't care about the color. He cared about the fact the doctor had a very large needle in his hand.

He bolted.

Or tried to, at least. Jack managed to catch him before he made it off the exam table. In the process he jarred his arm and he hissed, sending new waves of pain through his arm and tears to his eyes.

"No needles," he said.

"It will only hurt for a second," soothed the doctor.

"Liar," Daniel accused. This wasn't his pediatrician, so he wasn't anywhere near as charming. At least Dr. Richards treated him like he had a shred of intelligence.

"It's just medicine to make your arm feel a lot better, I promise. It will make you little sleepy so you won't feel anything we put your arm in a cast."

"No," he hissed and looked towards Jack. Jack looked a bit surprised.

"Daniel, we went through this at the doctor's office. They just need to set your arm."

But he shook his head. "No. No Janet. No Dr. Richards. No needles." He scooted further up the exam table to prove his point.

Jack sighed. "Daniel."

"Jack."

"Maybe we can try an alternative," the doctor put in and Daniel was very happy to see him put down the needle. "Has Daniel ever had nitrous oxide?"

Jack frowned. "You mean that stuff they give you at the dentist's?"

The doctor nodded. "It's exactly what the dentist uses. It's a gas that when mixed with oxygen reduces anxiety and even reduces pain to a degree. We've had a lot of success using it with children when it comes to stitching lacerations and setting broken bones. It will make the procedure much easier."

Jack looked at Daniel and raised an eyebrow. Daniel frowned, not sure if he trusted this "child." But his arm hurt and he wanted it to go away.

And he wasn't about to let Doogie poke him with that long pointy thing.

"No needles?" he asked.

"We'll try," Jack offered, stroking Daniel's forehead.

"Okay," he whimpered.

Ten minutes later there was a nurse and another doctor in the room. The new doctor was sitting a stool fiddling with something out of Daniel's eye line. He couldn't stop the feeling of anxiety that was creeping up on him. He looked up and saw Jack smile and squeeze his good hand.

"This will teach you to stay out of the tree," he said.

Daniel gasped. Jack squeezed his hand again. "Over before you know it, kiddo."

The new doctor had pushed her stool up next to Daniel. She smiled at him. "Which do you like best? Strawberry, grape, or orange?"

She was talking to him like he was six, but he found he didn't really care. He just wanted this over with so he could go home. "Um, strawberry."

"Okay." He watched her smear something over a clear object. After she was done, she lifted the object and he saw it was a mask

He swallowed. He hated hospitals and wished again that he hadn't climbed the stupid tree or that he was in the infirmary where he may have been able to let Janet give him a shot to numb him or put him out or anything.

"This is pretty simple," the doctor told him. "I'm going to put this over your face and you're going to breathe in some special air that may make you a little floaty or even a little sleepy. Then we'll set your arm."

"Hurt?" he asked, even though his brain told him it wouldn't, shouldn't. But pain was a six-year-old's number one concern.

She smiled again. "Nope. That's the best part. You probably won't even notice."

He swallowed again and she lifted up the mask. "Tell you what," she said. "Why don't you try holding it at first?" She looked toward Jack. "Your dad can even help."

She handed him the mask and he looked up at Jack, who gave his hand one more squeeze, before reaching up to help him guide the mask to his face. "Over before you know it," he soothed and Daniel hoped he was right.

The artificial smell of strawberries hit his nose, but it wasn't unpleasant. He saw the doctor watching him and felt Jack stroking his hair with one hand and helping him grip the mask with the other. The next thing he knew, someone was guiding his head down to a pillow on the gurney and moving his good arm to his side. He could still hear and was still awake, but the room seemed to blur in front of him. He thought he felt the jab of something sharp and someone pull his arm, but he couldn't be sure. He just laid back, closed his eyes, and breathed.

"All done," he heard and he opened his eyes. The room started to come back into focus. The mask was still there, but it was now hovering slightly above his face and the strawberry smell was almost gone.

"Jack," he asked and smiled when he saw Jack standing next to him. A glance towards his arm revealed a bright white cast.

Jack shrugged. "White is easier to write on," he explained. "How do you feel?"

He looked at his cast a moment longer. His arm still ached just a little, but the immense pain was gone.

"Over before I knew it," he told Jack and Jack smiled and ruffled his hair.

"Told you it would be."

--

"Um...it itches?"

The tree was officially off-limits, although Daniel doubted he'd be climbing it anytime soon. Jack deemed the broken arm punishment enough, although now that he'd caught him trying to stick a coat hanger down his cast, it could be a different story.

"It really does itch! You, of all people, should know how much it itches."

He watched Jack turn the wire over in his hands.

"You're right, it does itch." He straightened the wire out more. "But you are going about it all wrong. You can't reach anything when it's all crooked."

Daniel smiled. "Does that mean I'm forgiven, then?"

Jack thought this over for a second. "Maybe."

"Can I have the hanger back?"

"No."

"But why?"

"Because you still climbed the tree."

"But you said the cast was punishment enough."

"Ah" Jack raised a finger. "I did. But that means the cast in all its glory. All its heavy, hot, itchy glory."

"But Jaaack..."

Jack shrugged. "You shouldn't have climbed the tree."

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