Scrubbed - A is for Anaphylaxis

He should have known when he got up that morning that it was not going to be a good day for his allergies. Spring never was, but, with some exceptions, Daniel had normally been able to escape the Colorado pollen off world. Today, however, seemed particularly exceptional.

The fact that the itchy, gritty feeling in his eyes and the springtime congestion his allergy meds barely touched didn't begin to dissipate when they emerged from the wormhole's event horizon should have been a big red flag. The aerial MALP had shown the existence of a spectacular temple-looking ruin less than a mile from the gate, however, and he had been too excited to check it out to pay any attention.

"Good morning, campers! It's going to be a beautiful day here on P12X-597. It's a balmy 85 degrees, the sun is shining, the flowers are blooming, and…." Daniel interrupted Jack with a rather triumphant sneeze.

"…and the Daniel is sneezing. Let's move out. Carter, lead the way." Rolling his eyes, Daniel followed Sam through the grassy clearing around the gate to the overgrown path at the edge of the tree line.

The walk to the temple was uneventful. There were no signs of intelligent life, no current inhabitants of the planet to interact with, save for the twittering of a few birds in the surrounding flora. The temple itself was quite large, giant oaken pillars suspending an ornately decorated façade and a thatched roof with what looked like a sizable hole in the middle from which more trees had begun to grow. Whatever had caused the destruction must have happened a long time ago.

Taking his camcorder from his pack, Daniel filmed the outside of the temple while Teal'c and Jack explored the perimeter. Then, he followed Sam inside. The outer area of the inner part of the temple was also quite ornate. Large carvings of what looked like horses and riders poked out from an overgrowth of vines dotted with tiny golden flowers. The giant oak pillars lined the inside, leading the way to an even more detailed back wall. Still filming, Daniel stepped around the foliage, echoing Sam's footsteps toward a small door behind which, Daniel supposed, was the inner sanctum of the temple. He was about to radio Jack with their current position when he heard him come up behind him.

"Looks like Jumanji in here." Daniel paused in pursuit of Sam and smiled back at Jack, about to comment when Sam's "Whoa! You guys have got to see this!" interrupted any further discussion.

The inner sanctum was covered with a thick layer of white particulates. Had it not been a temperate climate, Daniel would have thought it was snow. Based on the way it rose in clouds around their feet, rising up and floating lazily back in slow, meditative cascades, Daniel thought for one wild fraction of a second that it could have been some sort of alien volcanic ash. Then, he breathed in and, in a sudden panicked epiphany, realized that the white something coating every surface of the inner sanctum and now coating them was in fact pollen.

Violent sneezing had him bent over at the waist, camcorder lost into the pollen pillow of the temple's floor. Each sneeze was more vicious than the last and he lost his footing, falling, completely swallowed in the thick white cloud. He felt a hand grab him by the scruff of his neck, dragging him to his feet and, still sneezing and gasping lung-fulls of white, hauling him back through the temple into the outside clearing with a firm grip on his vest.

He dragged his hands over his face, realizing with rising panic that they, too, were covered in the sticky white pollen. He wheezed, sneezed, and tried to blink the pollen out of his eyes which were running with tears and making it impossible to see.

"Breathe, Daniel. Calm down." Jack was on his right. He looked like he was moving at a different speed than the sound coming out of his mouth. Daniel's chest felt tight, his hands and feet tingly. Were the edges of his vision starting to gray out or was it just the pollen caked into his eyelashes?

"Daniel… Daniel, hey, look at me. I need you to swallow this, okay? It's Benadryl. It'll help." Daniel tried to move his hands to accept the tiny pink pills Jack was freeing from the first aid kit's blister pack, but his body wasn't responding. He tried to say something, to tell Jack what was going on, but his mouth wouldn't comply. His tongue felt thick and heavy in his mouth. The world was spinning far too fast. In another flash of insight, he realized both that this must be what anaphylaxis felt like and that he was about to vomit.

He leaned forward, losing the contents of his stomach as the darkening tunnel of his vision faded to white. He heard Jack swear and felt him push him onto his side in the recovery position, as he ripped open the velcro pocket on the front of his tac-vest. Daniel knew the pouch held an epipen, sending a word of thanks to the wisdom of Janet Fraiser and her insistence that just because none of them had need of an epipen on Earth didn't mean they wouldn't someday need one off world.

"Stay with me, Danny-boy. On three: one, two…" The sharp jab into his left thigh barely registered. He listened to Jack count slowly to ten and then felt the needle withdraw, replaced by Jack's hand holding pressure. Another hand encircled his wrist, taking his pulse. Heavy footfall echoed behind him, followed by a fast, lighter step.

"We need to get Daniel out of here now. Teal'c?" He felt himself lifted up by the armpits, suspended between Jack and Teal'c. Daniel considered how he had never yet been in his position while too unconscious to interact, but conscious enough to be able to know what was happening around him. It was a bizarre experience.

"I'll run ahead, dial the gate, and get a medical team, sir," Sam's voice was in front of them and then her fast footfall disappeared. Daniel felt himself dragged for what felt like miles, but which he knew was less than one, focusing instead on willing his body to continue breathing. He knew the epipen should have helped and may have in fact done so, but he couldn't quite shake the feeling of impending, chest crushing, throat-tightening doom. Stupid pollen.

The cold rush of gate travel was a welcome relief, as were the all too familiar sounds of the medical team meeting them on the ramp. He felt himself lowered onto the metal grating just as he lost all touch with reality.

The next thing he knew he was lying on a bed in the infirmary. Without opening his eyes, he could tell that there was an oxygen mask on his face and he was strangely cold. Was his hair wet?

"Daniel, are you coming back to us?" Janet's voice and, he assumed, her hands appeared at his right shoulder. He turned his head and tried to open his eyes. They felt heavy. In fact, his whole body felt heavy and tingly as if he'd managed to sit in a way that caused not just his foot to fall asleep, but every part of him.

"I can imagine you're feeling a little strange. You're very allergic to that pollen. It took a couple rounds of epi to bring you back to baseline."

It took all of his strength to open his eyes and he immediately regretted it. The room spun like a tilt-a-whirl. His head pounded and his stomach protested. He raised a shaky hand to move the oxygen mask. Janet's hand guided it back into place.

"You need to keep that on for now. You're not entirely out of the woods yet. Can you tell me your name?" Daniel closed his eyes again and breathed deeply, thankful that at least his chest was no longer tight.

"Daniel Jackson, July 8th… Janet, I'm going to…" The oxygen mask was off, his bed was raised, and a basin was in his lap before he finished his sentence. Focusing all his energy on both holding and aiming into the basin, he was only vaguely aware of Janet calling for a nurse and a warm sensation spreading from the IV in his left hand. He realized he must have stopped throwing up when the basin was no longer in his hands and he was instead lying down, a blanket tucked up to his shoulders.

"Try to rest, Daniel." With the last of his thoughts before falling asleep, Daniel mentally rolled his eyes and concluded that, it seemed, he didn't really have a choice in the matter.

Pulling back a wheelie chair next to General Hammond, Janet Fraiser took a seat at the table in the debriefing room. All conversation about P12X-597 stopped immediately.

"Any news?"

"How is he, doc?"

"How's Daniel?"

"What is the state of Daniel Jackson?"

All four individuals around the table spoke at once, demanding information before she had time for so much as a greeting. Janet smiled and rearranged the folder in front of her.

"Daniel will be fine. He's a bit uncomfortable at the moment, but no more than is normal after this type of allergic reaction. I've given him something to help with the nausea and I fully expect him to sleep for the next few hours. It goes without saying that, given that this is an alien form of pollen, we can't precisely predict how Daniel will react, but I would be surprised if he's not back to normal within the next few days." The relieved looks surrounding her at the table were always a welcome sight.

"Your fast thinking with the epipen made a world of difference in that, colonel." Jack looked a bit chuffed at her praise.

"Can't let you have all the fun with the needles, doc." Janet smiled.

"I suggest Daniel not come into contact with anything from P12X-597, nor should he venture there again as he is likely to have another severe reaction if he comes into contact with the substance in the future. I also would like to offer a refresher course on epipen administration and self-administration now that it is proven to be part of SG1's off world medical needs, at least for Daniel." All four heads around the table nodded.

"Consider it done, doctor." With a nod, Janet excused herself from the debriefing and returned to her patients in the infirmary.

48 hours later, Daniel sat slumped in his desk chair, blinking sleepily at incomprehensible symbols on his computer screen. He'd finally been discharged from the infirmary, but not before SG3 had come in hot and he'd been up all night listening to the loud, frustrated sounds of marines being triaged.

Jack considered knocking on Daniel's office doorframe. He'd been standing there almost thirty seconds without a response. The younger man looked pale and exhausted, but considerably less swollen and definitely not dead, so the zombie visage was a move in the positive direction.

"Hey." Daniel shifted his gaze toward Jack with a speed that made Jack thankful he was not yet cleared for active duty. A sloth would react faster.

"Hey." The raspy voice and subtly blood shot eyes made Jack feel a bit guilty for the sloth comparison and definitely thankful that Daniel was still confined to base.

"I thought about bringing flowers, but decided more pollen was probably not going to help. Carter managed to clean this off, though. She thinks that it shouldn't have anything from P12X-597 stuck to it anymore. These, too," Jack plopped Daniel's camcorder and a pair of his glasses atop a pile of papers. Daniel grinned.

"Thanks and, uh… thanks." Jack smiled and nodded.

"Oh, anytime. I'd never pass up the opportunity to stab you." Daniel rolled his eyes.

"Carter is heading back with SG11 later today. She said they'll get more footage of the temple and anything else they find." Turning the camcorder over, Daniel retrieved the memory card to begin the downloading process, not exactly sure if he wanted to learn more about P12X-597 and definitely sure that he didn't want to relive his own experience there.

"So, it turns out Teal'c has never seen Jumanji. He's got it all set up, making popcorn and everything. Are you game? It's bound to be more fun than whatever that is." Nodding his head and tossing the memory card aside, Daniel followed Jack out of his office. At least the vines on that screen wouldn't be covered in pollen that could kill him.

Not twenty minutes into the movie, Jack had to restrain himself from heading back to Daniel's office for his camera. Teal'c was completely engrossed in the film, thoroughly invested in the plot, and Daniel was fast asleep, head lolled back onto Teal'c's shoulder, mouth open, snoring faintly with the popcorn bowl forgotten between the two of them. Reaching across the slumbering archeologist for a handful of popcorn, Jack smirked. This sort of drama was definitely superior to the kind that involved needles.