I cringed as I heard the words leave my mouth. That had sounded much better in my head. Lame, lame, lame out loud. Oh man, I hoped that cringe was only in my head. Maybe nobody noticed.
I could feel Teal'c standing behind me, Jackson and Vala sitting on the log pretending to be cowed. Jackson and the girlfriend didn't seem to have noticed anything, but then, they had a whole buncha issues going there. And could they be more obvious with the flirting? Teal'c, though, he noticed; I could tell. In fact, I was pretty sure that Teal'c was standing there doing that eyebrow thing he did. I mean, I didn't know what the eyebrow meant yet, but at least it was a reaction. Better than that stoic, "I am a Jaffa warrior" thing he'd been doing on Dakar.
"That's because I keep a low profile. I like to let my work speak for itself."
Hmmm, mouth working on autopilot now? Oh well, it's keeping the stooges occupied. Hey, they noticed Teal'c is Jaffa, can't get much past them, can we. Musta been the eyebrow thing that gave him away. Ah, little more talking and the bad guys took the bait. Soon, we'd be safe in the ship, me and Teal'c and his eyebrow. I hoped the eyebrow thing didn't mean "I am stunned at the stupidity of my team leader."
And wasn't that just another load of wishful thinking? "His" team leader. The only team I had right now was a buncha folks who didn't want to be there. And throwing out lame ass lines like "Cam Mitchell, bounty hunter" wasn't gonna inspire them to sign up for another hitch with the new and not so improved SG1. Nope, if I wanted Teal'c to stay, I was gonna have to do a lot better than that. I really didn't want to think about losing Teal'c. The man, Jaffa, whatever, was a huge asset to the team, a valuable ally, a talented warrior. The fact that he was also one of the hottest guys I'd ever met had nothing to do with any of it.
Whoa, whoa, whoa. What is up with that? Okay, fine, I've had some hero worship issues with SG1 for a while now. I know that. Hell, I admitted it to the general. Landry, I mean, not O'Neill. Oh, jeez, so not O'Neill. That'd be just great. "Yes, sir. No, sir. Have I mentioned I adore you and your team, sir?" Yeah, just great. And could Jackson and Vala take any longer getting that ship back here? Good thing my mouth was still running.
So. All right then. Hero worship, I've got a serious case of hero worship for Teal'c. That's all. What did it matter if he is probably the best looking guy I've ever met? That doesn't mean I wanna do him, right? Right? I mean, there's no way I wanted him to push me up against the wall and shove his tongue down my throat while I grabbed onto those broad shoulders. Rings! Thank you, rings! Thank you, Jackson! Thank you, Vala!
************
Well, that was fun. I wondered if Vala would let me take this baby for a spin? Once around the Milky Way, I'll have 'er back before supper. Based on the way she'd parked it in the driver's seat, I guessed not. Oh great, not five minutes out of danger and they'd started up again. "Stay there, shut up and let me finish"? Never saw Jackson turn that color before.
"Well, that was better and worse than expected. Guess I'll just go back, in the back of the ship now." And, yeah, that color was just as unattractive on Vala as it was on Jackson.
I was just starting to slide down the wall of the cargo hold, or whatever you called it on a space ship, when I realized Teal'c had followed me.
"Hey, guess that was just like old times, huh? Last minute escape and all that?"
I cringed some more, but this time, I was pretty sure it showed on my face. Yup, definitely showed; I got the eyebrow thing and the head tilt. And man, the head tilt showed those neck muscles in a whole new light.
"Cam Mitchell, bounty hunter?"
"Ah, not my best work. I can do a lot better. With time, ya know, we could, uh –"
"With time, Colonel, you may capture all the prey you seek."
What could I say to that? I sank down to wait for this leg of our journey to end.