Cultural Drift by Gabolange (PG)

[paian]

Rec Category: Daniel Jackson
Characters: Daniel Jackson, Jack O'Neill, Samantha Carter, Teal'c, Janet Fraiser
Category: Daniel Jackson, Daniel/Jack friendship, character study, drama, Jack/Sam, SG-1, team
Warning: None
Author on LJ: gabolange
Author's Website: nextnonsequitur
Link: Cultural Drift

Author's summary: Six days before the shit hit the fan and nothing was ever the same again, Daniel fell over a tablet on P3X-324. That was two years ago.

Why This Must Be Read:

Gabolange captures the mindspace of Daniel beautifully. Gabolange captures relationships beautifully -- Daniel and Sam, Daniel and Janet, Daniel and Teal'c, Daniel and Jack -- with sharp-eared dialogue and bits of business that always parse on more than one level. She also balances introspection and interaction perfectly, in a fic for which the shift from an emphasis on one to an emphasis on the other is profoundly significant. She portrays a Daniel who's steeped in his work, moving through a medium of history and philosophy and phonology and etymology the way the rest of us move through air, but for whom the abstraction of philology has replaced the interactivity of communication. He's been existing in a kind of stasis of distanced disaffection, and he's been missing things, in a lot more ways than one. In mid-Season 9, an accidental surprise brings into stark relief the depth and breadth of the rift between the-team-that-was and the-people-who-are, between stasis and evolution, and provides the writer with the canvas on which to paint a compelling portrait of Daniel in all his rich, flawed, sympathetic complexity.

This is an achey fic, but ultimately hopeful -- I don't think it's coincidence that the translation that Daniel cracks at the start, and that sends him running to share his 'Eureka!' with Sam, is a creation story, with all that that implies about origins and new beginnings -- and it uses the inadvertent-outting trope as the springboard for a moving exploration of the disintegration of team, the indestructibility of family, and the continuum of Daniel's experience.

5968 words.


( excerpt )

Politics, by Sistermu (G)

[sg-fignewton.livejournal.com]

Rec Category: Teal'c and Daniel friendship
Pairing: none
Categories: Teal'c and Daniel friendship, Teal'c, Daniel Jackson, gen, character study
Warnings: none
Author on LJ: sistermu
Author's Website: unknown
Link: Politics

Why This Must Be Read:Teal'c spent eight years trying to free his people, only to see the Jaffa Council descend into petty squabbling and self-interest in the wake of all his sacrifice. If (like me) you were frustrated by the Jaffa storyline in S9-10, then this ficlet is definitely for you!

When a frustrated Teal'c returns to the SGC after a trying visit to Dakara, Daniel shows up at his door to offer words of empathy and encouragment. The short conversation that follows bespeaks years of friendship and philosophical discussion, as Teal'c and Daniel consider the difficulty of reshaping thought and habit and the challenge of beginnings. With a wry tagline and a light touch, Politics is a lovely look at a friendship that defies expectations and continues to thrive.

( snippet of fic... )

It's Always Autumn (M) and Winter (T) by Kodiak Bear Country

[sholio]

Rec Category: Hurt/Comfort
Pairing: none
Category: John Sheppard, angst
Warning: dark; descriptions of torture (both psychological and physical) and brainwashing; heavy angst; a major rift between the teammates
Author on LJ: kodiak_bear
Author's Website: Master Fic List on LJ
Link: It's Always Autumn in the Old Trees of Despair and Winter (the sequel)
(Full disclosure: I sometimes beta for this author, and was lucky enough to be one of the betas on the second story.)

Why This Must Be Read: The first of these two companion stories, It's Always Autumn in the Old Trees of Despair, is one of the most detailed and believable psychological torture/brainwashing stories that I've read (and that's actually a compliment! really!), and the sequel, Winter, deals with the consequences of having experienced such a deep break with one's normal reality. These were not easy stories to read (especially since, for various reasons, I find emotional torture considerably harder to deal with than physical torture in fiction) but ultimately, I found them very much worth it, especially for their psychological subtlety and the way that they present a complicated world where months of trauma can't be easily wrapped up in a five-minute episode tag.

Sheppard is at the core of these stories, but the rest of the team have their own journey as well, and the world-building is wonderful -- particularly in the first story, which features a disarmingly likable villain and a world/culture that is a character in its own right. There is a ton of hurt and angst in these stories, but it's never angst for angst's sake, and the characters' closeness shines through even when they're all two steps out of sync with each other.