"Who says that working for the marines sucks? I chose for it. I’ve even done black-ops, done Iraq time, spent time in a foreign prison for 4 peachy months and I even done some SWAT operations. Now I have to stop telling you about my military time otherwise I’d have to kill you Danny.

I was a captain when I met him… the love of my life, before you came into it, Leroy Jethro Gibbs. Despite of his silly given names - what mother calls her son "Leroy" or "Jethro" anyway? - we hit it off pretty quick. I wouldn’t call him Leroy or Jethro though… How I met Gibbs?

I was hanging out in a bar with a few colleagues of mine, we were drinking some beers and had fun. Until a woman - probably working at the bar - ran screaming out of the men’s room - if she was working there, she was probably trying to clean it, if not… - and said, not as in many words as I do, that Colonel Jack Saunders was laying on the floor in a puddle of blood.

Jack Saunders wasn’t really the favourite Colonel, he was tough, had no sense of humour and he was clumsy enough to shot himself in his foot but his sarcasm always saved him. Yes, he had no sense of humour and yet he could be sarcastic. You never know… But he was *my* commanding officer, ever since John died.

Soon, the Military Police was crawling over the place, we never went to see what happened in the toilet, or how bad the blood was because the MP were ruthless. But Gibbs… he had a different look in his eyes than the older guys. He was still innocent and this was probably the first real case he had to investigate. When he walked into the room, time was standing still for a moment and my heart missed a beat. And I knew that I was married but Sarah wasn’t here anyway and wow was he hot. He was assigned to collect everyone’s names and ranks, asking what happened and that sort of nonsense. Not only did I notice him, he noticed me too but he didn’t ask my name first. He went to the others in the bar, and as last he chose me. And he seemed to stick around longer with me than he had done with all of the others. "Can I have your phone number?" I asked him out of the blue.
"Huh?"
"Well you’ve got mine, I want to have yours so I can call you for having coff… eh… in case something pops up in my head while I’m sleeping."
Then he smiled. The smile was amazing, warm and all that kinds of romantic stuff you normally say about someone’s beautiful smile. He chuckled shyly and scribbled down his phone number on a beer mat.

When I got home, I decided to wait for a few days. I decided to think about how I should call him, what I would say and I had to do it without Sarah in the house. But despite my choice to wait, he called me.
I was up my roof watching the stars and Sarah came up and gave me the portable phone. I remember thinking to myself that it must have been an important call otherwise she would have called me down.
"O’Neill."
"Hey, it’s Gibbs, I was wondering, would you like to have a cup of coffee?"

We would go and have a drink every Saturday if we didn’t have to work. We grew to become good friends of each other, sharing what we had done at work, as far as that could be done. Gibbs told me all the ins and outs of the Colonel Saunders’ case, who were suspects and who eventually would be prosecuted by JAG. Gibbs even had a promotion to "star" interrogator for the MP which was fun because he could always pull certain information out of me which I really didn’t want to tell anyone, like my love for star gazing.
"So Jack, what do you do for a hobby?" He handed me my beer and I just laughed at him.
"I like to clean guns." I snorted.
"Do you do that at home too?"
"What is this? Am I a suspect? What did I do?"
"You committed the crime of not telling a lot about yourself." He shifted his chair towards me a bit. "I told you what I like to do when I’m home. You can’t tell me that you like to clean guns at your house."
"Well I do."
That was followed by a 10 minute silence with him just staring at me right in my face. He didn’t laugh, frown or twitched. Normally, I could stand this. I had been trained in hostile interrogations, I had been interrogated when I was in Germany and didn’t say a thing. I had been tortured during my time in prison and I didn’t spill any information. But his piercing blue eyes just did something to me.
"Alright already!" I threw my hands in the air as if surrendering which surprised him.
"Am I really that good?" Gibbs said surprised.
"I guess." I muttered. "I love astrology. I have this amateur observatory on my roof and with clear skies I like to watch the stars at night."
"Ow, Captain Jack has a soft side." He taunted.
"Yeah… just keep it to yourself will ya."
"I like stargazing."
"You do?" I said surprised. "You don’t think it’s dorky?"
"No, not at all. It’s some how giving me a sense of peace with myself."
"Liar."
"Alright, it’s dorky, but it can’t be dorky if you like it."

It was the summer of 1985 that I decided to invite Gibbs and his wife over for a barbeque at my place with Sarah. He had told me that he had some issues with his wife, even though they weren’t married that long. I figured that Sarah could talk to his wife as she and I weren’t married that long either and we seem to handle things well other than that little secret I didn’t tell her yet. I *really* liked Gibbs. Maybe he’d go stargazing with me.
I had fun handling the barbeque, I had fun in overseeing Sarah and Gibbs’ red-headed wife talk and it was fun to see the look on Gibbs’ face when my German Shepard actually liked him very much.
"You didn’t tell me you had a dog!" he cried out when Sparky jumped on top of Gibbs, knocking him and the chair he sat on over.
"Some things need to be experienced to be known…" I said. "Or something like that." I added slowly. "He likes you."
"Get him off Jack." He laughed and tried to push Sparky away.
"Sparky! Get off!" I yelled at him and threw a raw piece of meat towards the house so Sparky would go after it.
It was getting late and I had intentionally given Gibbs too much to drink to prevent him from driving home. Then Sarah asked Gibbs’ wife and Gibbs to stay over in the guestroom I didn’t know we had as Gibbs’ wife didn’t have her drivers licence. Sarah showed Gibbs’ wife the guestroom and I looked at Gibbs as I sat down next to him. "Want to go stargazing?"
"I know you fed me too much beers to make me stay here Jack." Gibbs said sternly.
"I’m sorry."
"I don’t mind." He laughed and got up. "But if I fall off that ladder…"
"Don’t worry, I’ll catch you." I laughed.
Up on the roof, in my amateur observatory, there wasn’t really enough space for two persons to be there. I didn’t mind. Gibbs would be close to me which was a good thing because he really had too much to drink and I was afraid that he would fall off.
"Maybe it’s a better idea if we were up here when you’re not drunk." I said when I helped him to sit down.
"I’m not that drunk. I’m just not steady on my feet anymore." He giggled.
"You giggled." I stated. "You’re definitely wasted." I sat down behind him so he could watch through the lens and so I could hold him in case he would fall off.
"Just put your arms around me to secure me." He said simply.
Knowing that I shouldn’t let him tell me that for the second time I did. I put my arms loosely around his waist. It felt nice though, even though I didn’t hold him that tightly I could feel his muscles. But I didn’t want to get my hopes up. Friends looked out for each other. Friends did this as well. "The scope is focused on the Big Dipper, if you look through the lens you should see a figure, it looks a bit like a frying pan."
"I’m not up here with you to actually do some stargazing Jack." Gibbs leaned into me a bit. "I wanted to be away from my crazed out wife and be with you."
"Your wife doesn’t appear to be that crazed out." I said with an husky voice. Oh yeah, I became nervous.
"Believe me, she is." I felt how Gibbs started to stroke my legs slowly with his hands. A tinkle ran up from my legs to my head and it felt … normal. Just like when Sarah did it, although she never really knew the real soft spots on legs. She wasn’t a leggy person. Suddenly Gibbs started to laugh.
"What?"
"I don’t understand you Jack." He tried not to laugh out that loud. "You make all this effort of getting me up here with you and you’re not doing anything."
"I don’t know what you’re talking about." I said with a husky voice.
"I’m the drunk here. I’m taking the first steps up here now. You should be doing that and take advantage of me." He hiccupped.
"I never take advantage of drunk people."
"Shut up and kiss me."

Not long after that, Gibbs left his wife for unknown reasons. The only thing he said about it was that she was going insane and that she didn’t like him to spend a lot of time with his friends - meaning me.
Change was coming for me too, I took a few steps up and went to the air force and Sarah told me that she was expecting our child. It was incomprehensive for me, having a baby with her. It was weird. Why would she still want to be with me? I wasn’t home that much (I told her I had to stay at work for some secret stuff but in fact I was with Gibbs) and I wasn’t a happy camper most of the time when I was home. She loved me and I loved her but I loved Gibbs too. I wanted to leave her at first, when I didn’t know about the baby but then I probably would have been kicked out of the air force because … well just because.
Nevertheless I had less time for Gibbs now because of work and a nasty pregnant Sarah (she wasn’t the angel while being pregnant). Gibbs was too busy with his work too but we tried to see each other at least once a week. Even if it was for only 5 minutes. I needed his touch and his kisses to continue.
Our "affair" continued for a long time. He was there for me when Charlie killed himself with my gun in 1993, he was there when I returned from Abydos the first time that we used the Stargate. He was there when Sarah finally decided to divorce me and I even lived with him for a few months until he went to Washington D.C. to work for the NCIS."



"You’ve never seen him again Jack?" Danny looked up to me. We were laying in the grass in Carter’s backyard. The sun was shining and I had decided to tell Daniel about my life before him. The story I had hidden from everyone, afraid that they would think differently of me. They wouldn’t have accepted me and Gibbs together. Not like they have accepted Danny and me.
"A few times on TV." I caressed his hair. "We don’t have much involvement with the NCIS because we are a different branch of the army."
"That… and that we have a Stargate right under their noses."
I snorted a bit. "Yeah."
"Ever thought about paying him a surprise visit?" Danny rolled over so he was laying on his stomach. "I mean, you’ve been lovers, but you’ve also been friends."
"Nope."
"I’d like to meet him."
"What?!" I said surprised and looked at him in amazement.
"Well I’ve met Sarah, you’ve met Sha’re and every other alien woman I loved… I want to meet him."

The next day we took the plane to Washington. Danny wanted to meet my ex-lover, Gibbs, the one I hadn’t seen in years, so it would happen. Anything for my little archaeologist. The thing was… I wouldn’t know what to say to Gibbs. "Hi, nice to see you again." Or… "Hi, Daniel, this is Gibbs, Gibbs this is Daniel the one that stole my heart, bye." I wouldn’t like to barge into his office either. I wanted to meet him on the street. Just spontaneous, care-free. Danny and I would be tourists and just bump into Gibbs accidentally.
We sat down in a coffee bar near the NCIS office, Danny and Gibbs weren’t alike, but they shared a common addiction to caffeine.

"You have a zit growing there." A voice sounded.
"Gibbs!" a woman voice complained.
"DiNozzo!" a familiar voice replied.
Do’h! He was here! I felt how my heart missed a beat.
Danny looked at me, reading me like a book. "Go to him."
"What? No." I was scared. He was with company. I was afraid of how he would react. No.
"Jaaaaaaaack!" Danny complained. He could complain like the best. His "Jaaaaaaack!" sounded even better when he was tired. "Get me another cup of coffee." To let me notice that he really meant it he kicked me under the table against my shins.
"Do’h!" I got up, throwing an angry look towards my lover and went to the counter to get him another cup of coffee. Getting him hyped up on caffeine wouldn’t do any harm tonight in the hotel room…
"Jack?" a familiar voice sounded. Gibbs. I turned around and looked him straight in the eye.
"Gibbs?" I repeated the intonation of his voice.
"What are you doing here?" he laughed and gave me a hug. A HUG!
"Sight-seeing. Nice to see you."
"You look old."
"You look old too."
"Ha." He looked at me sternly. "Why didn’t you call me Jack?"
I shrugged as an answer. "You could have called me."
"Yep, you haven’t changed a bit, haven’t you?" Gibbs patted me on the cheek. I saw Danny look at me and Gibbs and he was shaking his head. Ok, so I wasn’t co-operative. It wasn’t my idea in the first place.
"I’m sorry. I’m taking a short holiday… I hadn’t expected to see you." I admitted.
"Hold on." Gibbs turned around to his company. "DiNozzo, Kate and Abby, don’t you have work to do?" Three people rose up immediately and left the bar. There was still an older man sitting at the table and Gibbs pointed to a now empty seat for me to sit down. "Jack, this is Dr. Donald Mallard. Ducky, this is Jack O’Neill."
"THE Jack?" Dr. Mallard said with a British accent. "Dear God, I’ve heard so much about you!" he shook my hand as I sat down.
"Really?"
"Ducky and I are together. We’ve known each other for 25 years and I had never told him about you. I’m good at keeping secrets." Gibbs chuckled. "Anyway, he was curious about you. We were about to go look you up in the system to see where you live."
"Ah." I smiled a bit. "Hold on." I turned around to Danny and waved to have him come over.
"Daniel, this is Jethro Gibbs and his partner Dr. Donald Mallard." I said.
"Ducky." Gibbs said quickly.
"A doctor? Really?" Daniel said perky. "Nice to meet you."
"He’s our chief medical examiner." Gibbs said proudly.

We talked for a while, and Danny and I went home the same night. Of course I had said goodbye to Gibbs, told him to stay in touch, but this time I really couldn’t tell him the full truth of what I was doing. We had different lives now. He had a hard time believing that I was into "Deep Space Telemetry" and was already raising question marks for the use of an archaeologist/anthropologist for this sort of work. "Hope you’re satisfied Danny." I muttered.
"I’m sorry for hurting you Jack… I know how much this must have hurt you."
"Not hurt. Upset. I shouldn’t have taken you to Washington."

Upset… because I realized that I was an ass for letting Gibbs go out of my sight, to some place else. I should have followed him. I should have taken a desk job or retire for good.

But then… I wouldn’t have met Danny and then I wouldn’t have gone to different worlds with him - literally.