| Rape is thankfully not a subject I have first-hand experience of. Nor is it something that is dealt with on your average sci-fi show, especially not male rape. "Hathor" skimmed the surface of the issue when it showed a dazed and dishevelled Daniel after his experience with the Goa'uld queen. Pough takes the next steps in that story. The myriad of unanswered questions regarding how Daniel might respond to such a traumatic event, and how the rest of SG-1 will react to Daniel's behaviour begin to be answered here. We see both Jack and Daniel's thoughts throughout this short piece, which I think is essential to understanding their fear, despair and wildly fluctuating emotions. Concerned about Daniel's haunted and depressed manner, Jack decides to push Daniel into opening up by telling him “You don't get this out in the open, you don't go off-world”. On the surface it's a harsh comment, but we know that Jack is all too aware of the risks of being off-world with a team member whose mind isn't on the job. The author treats the subject matter with care and sympathy. I could empathise with both men during their extremely difficult discussion, and the realistic way in which they let secrets come out is painful and emotive. The two men take very different paths in navigating the minefield of reaction and feeling that the attacks have created, but there is absolutely no let-up from the author in getting to the heart of the matter – if Daniel can't talk about this then he can't move on and won't begin to heal. There were a few times when I felt the author said too much, appearing not to trust the reader to be able to follow Jack or Daniel's train of thought. For example, "'Why would Sha're be angry with you?' Jack asked. He couldn't understand the jump in reasoning." The fact that Jack asked the question already shows his confusion and I didn't need it pointed out. But those examples are few. I had a wonderfully clear picture of both Jack and Daniel as this story unfolded. Daniel is reticent, angry and emotional; Jack is forceful yet sympathetic. Although I generally don’t like to see Daniel – strong as he is – crying, this story works because of the traumatic nature of the events Daniel is dealing with. The story is well-written, compassionate and too short! I wanted to listen in to the rest of the conversation, to discover what happens next, to see how Jack and Daniel deal with the issues that they’ve raised... and that's a classic sign of a good story. If you don't mind the dark subject matter, you should definitely give this one a look. |
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