CHAPTER 20

    

 “I really don’t see how hard this could be,” Jack said in such a way as to not hide the fact that his patience had worn thin. “Come on, we’ve taken down Goulds before. You know, snake in the head System Lords with death rays, death gliders, and even, dare I say, death stars? How hard could one Las Vegas king pin be?”

Carter, Dana, and Janet were all bunched up at the van’s only real computer monitor. The disk they had received proved to be nothing less than detailed blue prints of the Casino. There were also files on everything from hotel personnel to mundane things like operating shifts. It was everything they needed.

“Sir,” Carter respectfully replied, “this isn’t like raiding a Goa’uld strong hold. We can’t just go in and shoot the place up.”

 “Why not?” Jack asked. He got some very strange looks from everyone in the van. In return Jack simply shrugged, “well why not?”

Mulder was laughing, but apparently not at Jack’s choice of tactics. “So which is it? Gould or Goa’uld? You people really expect me to believe all this? I mean I’ve heard disinformation in my time but, this is worse than that TV show Wormhole X-Treme.”

Jack thumbed towards the door, “you want to step outside pretty boy?”

Dana raised her voice, “could you two please show a little restraint here?”

Janet was less polite when she stomped in between them, “my daughter is in that building! Now if you two aren’t going to help I suggest you keep quiet and let us work!”

The two men grew quiet and exchanged puzzled glances. Mulder was the one to say what was on both of their minds, “something about red headed doctors I guess?”

Jack agreed, “must be.”

“Sir,” Carter grunted, “don’t you think you should check on Daniel?”

 “On Daniel?” Jack replied whimsically, “on Daniel, on Prancer, on Vixen, Comet, and Gilmo,” and on that note he left the van. Janet bowed her head with a slap to the forehead. She moaned, “he’s been waiting to use that one for a while, hasn’t he?”

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The place was noisy, bright, crowded, and he could not decide if the casino floor was more neon or plastic. Daniel had never really been in a casino before. As he wandered around and checked things out it made him reflect a bit. It was strange how he had spent all of these years studying other people’s culture when he knew almost nothing of his own. These days it almost seemed as if Teal’c knew more about Earth‘s culture than Daniel. Then again, when you thought about it, this wasn’t really T Man C’s culture after all. So in essence he was doing the same thing Daniel had always done.

 The beeping on Daniel’s belt got his mind off of such lofty self reflections, thankfully. Daniel stopped at the end of a row of slot machines and answered the two way radio on his phone. Teal’c stopped behind him and took the time to examine one of the curious machines they had been walking past for hours.

Daniel quickly let it be known, “Jack I don’t think we’re doing much good in here. This place is built like a dungeon, all the doors are generic, and if they moved her I doubt we would even notice.”

“Roger that,” Jack replied over the radio.  “We think we got her location pin pointed, over.”

Those must have been SOME plans that FBI agent came up with! She was smart and sexy! Daniel wondered if she liked nerdy  archaeologist types. He said none of this on the radio of course, “can we get to her from here, over.” 

 Jack's reply came back on the radio, “not that simple from what Carter tells me. She’s probably in this special suite up on the VIP level. The place is guarded like Fort Knox.”

Before Daniel could respond he was tapped on the shoulder. He turned around to find Teal’c standing there with a metal pole in his hand. It took Daniel a second to realize this pole was in fact the “one armed” part of a “one armed bandit.”

The expression on the face of the Jaffa was as calm as ever, “Daniel Jackson, it would appear that the coin return mechanism on the machine in question is not functioning properly.”

“Uh,” Daniel had no idea what to say, “you tried to fix it, right?”

“Indeed.”

On the radio, Daniel quickly let it be known, “Jack we’ll meet you guys at the van in five minutes.” Daniel then politely held out his hand and Teal’c surrendered the pull lever. Daniel tossed it in between two machines and they beat a hasty retreat for the main doors. Once they were back across the street, at the van, Daniel breathed a little easier. That place had camera’s watching everything!

Of course, Jackson had only seconds to relax before Jack promptly asked him, “ok where’s the kid?” ‘The kid,’ could mean no one else but Little Jack. The original O’Neill never called him by his name. Daniel looked around as if the boy would magically appear, “what? I thought he was with you guys.”

Jack slapped his forehead, “doh!!!”

Carter stepped out of the van with the rest of the party in tow. She gave them the bad news, “guys. I don’t think we’re going to get in that place.”

Mulder snickered, “that’s easy. Just make a reservation.”

Sam was not really sure if he was joking or not. It was almost impossible to tell. “No, I thought of that. That’s not a regular part of the hotel. You’d have to be a celebrity to get a room on that floor. You don’t happen to have one handy do you?”

Daniel raised a finger, “um, excuse me Sam, we do.”

She was surprised more than anything else, “we do?”

Daniel tossed his phone to Teal’c, “T Man C, call the station and get them to book you a room.”

At that point Janet began to wonder, “and just suppose Teal’c can get that, then what?”

Now Jack took over and decided it was time for a Full Bird Colonel to do what it was that Full Bird Colonel’s do. Jack had never been too sure of exactly what that was but he did know special ops. He laid out his plan.
Naturally it was Mulder who pointed out, “why don’t you just use your magic mirror to get in?”

“Mulder!” Skully scolded him.

 “You know what Special Agent Mulder,” Jack said the word “special” like he was gay.  “When this is all over with, I’m going to show you.”

Fox laughed, “I’ll get to go to other planets? Just like that?”

Jack nodded, “Just like that.”

Carter was nervous, “sir do you think…”

 “Excuse me Carter,” Jack gestured to himself, “does it, or does it not, say Colonel on my uniform?”

“Um Jack,” Daniel thoughtfully pointed out, “you’re not wearing a uniform.”

“Ok bad example,”  then Jack mumbled to himself, “and if Hammond doesn’t go for it I can always get my good buddy Thor to beam him up.”

Mulder winced, “Thor?”

Daniel answered, “he’s an Asgard. A race of aliens from another galaxy that are friends of ours.”

Jack added, “yeah you know the Roswell Gray types.”

That caused the FBI agent to laugh, “friendly? I hardly think so.  Besides everybody knows the grays are from Zeta Reticuli.”

In unison Jack and Daniel replied, “no they’re not.”

Before the conversation could proceed, Teal’c handed his phone to O’Neill, “Wicked Wanda wishes to speak with you O’Neill.”

“Um,” Jack took the phone. He tried to shield himself from the looks he was getting, “yeah, ok.”