And I say there's beauty everywhere in the universe. Look for it and you will always find it. – Jesus Martinez Kobol, Second Lord of Kobol.
A slender young man hung upside down from the overhead of the Battlestar Galactica's gymnasium. Flexing and relaxing his lean muscles in a regular rhythm of curl-ups, he looked like a silk worm trying to climb back up its thread. The effort and inverted blood flow reddened his face, and beads of sweat rolled through the fine, dark hair on his bare chest to drip off his heaving shoulders onto the deck. Higher up, it had soaked into his only clothing, a stretchy Colonial Fleet standard-issue high-g athletic support.
The young man had more names and titles than a Caprican high society debutante. Back when there'd been a Fleet Headquarters, before the Cylon's devastating attack on the Twelve Colonies, he'd been carried on the rolls as Captain Lee Adama, but the wireless operators always called him Apollo. When the Galactica's Commander addressed him as family and not as a subordinate, he called him "son." The other Viper pilots called Lee "sir" to his face and "Iron Prick," "Apple-ass-ollo" and other less imaginative names behind his back. A few of them even called him "a damned fine CAG."
The young man and a pertly elfin blonde woman in a shiny green flight suit with a "Viper" patch on one shoulder and a "Galactica" one on the other were the only people in the gymnasium. It was oh-three hundred of what Colonial President Laura Roslin had designated New Earth Mean Time in order to avoid inter-colony favoritism and to keep them all focused on their goal. Their fifty thousand plus war refugees had been space wanderers only a week and a half, not long enough to abandon the concept of day and night, and they still preferred to sleep the small numbered hours. For the Galactica's crew it was merely mid third-watch.
The young woman had been listening to Lee quietly counting to himself as he bent and unbent. "Five, six, seven." He paused for a moment and asked, "Enjoying the view?"
"You bet. Enormously," the blonde woman finally said, disappointed that she'd been found out so quickly. "I've always said you have the biggest balls in the Fleet." It was hard to sneaky-Pete someone in the old capital ship. In the larger compartments like the gymnasium, the metal decks and bulkheads rang like bells. And only the burly Marine guards outside CIC, the Commander's quarters and the Presidential office in the wardroom could pull open a meter-and-half wide hatch without a grunt and a heave to go with the typical volley of metallic squeaks.
It had been the mirrors, the young woman decided. Lee had seen her sneaking in. The perfectly polished metal walls reflected each other endlessly, tunneling off into space in four directions, from her angle showing hundreds of nearly naked Lee Adamas. Nice.
Lee managed a glance and grin at the young woman but didn't stop. Her name was Lieutenant Kara Thrace and she was Lee's best and perhaps only friend. Besides "Kara" and "Thrace," she had one more name she used for flying Vipers, "Starbuck," which meant a winning hand in cards. No one had called her "daughter" or "sweetheart" for years. And the other pilots always called her something respectful if they didn't want a black eye or broken nose.
A flight suit lay in an untidy pile on a nearby exercise bench next to a short stack of folded knit shirts, trousers, and socks. A pair of rubber-soled ship shoes rested on the floor. Nudity was out of character for Lee. He packed habitual reserve around like most pilots packed a signal pistol. "So, gym gear in the laundry?"
"Don't have any," Lee gasped between one curl and the next. Fleet Headquarters would never assign a son to his father's command. He'd been on the Galactica for only a one-day ceremony when the Cylons had attacked the Colonies. He'd brought a dress uniform and little else and had been issued basic gear out of ship's stores. "Was hoping I'd have . . . " curl up, curl down, " . . . the place to myself." Lee paused and shook his head. Sweat flew and spattered on the floor. Shifting his feet a little so he could see Kara standing just inside the hatch, he continued, "Could you hand me that pair of weights over there? No, no, the half-k's. Thanks." He took them from her hands. "Just coming off duty?"
"Yeah. You assigned me the Kobol Dream pressure check, remember?" Handing Lee the weights had brought Kara closer to him. Bending back until her short blonde haircut almost brushed the flight suit's puffy collar, Kara looked up past Lee's heaving body, trying to see his feet. "What's keeping you up there anyway?"
Instead of answering, Lee did two more curl ups, probably just to prove to himself that he could, tossed the weights past Kara in the general direction of the equipment rack, then with practiced sliding steps, walked across the ceiling to where he could grasp a pair of parallel bars set about a meter and a half off the ground. Pulling free first heels, then arches and finally toes, he swung through the bars down to the deck and landed in a crouch, arms outspread.
From where Kara stood behind Lee, the scenery had been spectacular, but she tore her eyes away to look down at his thick-soled metallic boots. Lee slapped the sides of the boots, the tops demagnetized and uncurled, and he stepped out. "Oh, I see. Scrounged some E.V.A. boots. Cool."
"So how's the old Dream coming along? She 'bout ready to go catch us some water?" Lee asked as he grabbed a gray towel from the unwashed pile in the corner. Water had been restricted to drinking and basic sanitation. Despite daily sprays of disinfectant, the gym smelled like a major league Pyramid locker room. Crew quarters smelled almost as bad. Lee tried not to think about it as he rubbed down.
"Tyrol says oh-nine hundred, but their fat ass commander says noon. I think your Dad's about ready to knock him into the next quadrant."
Kara had a bad case of helmet hair. Oily, unwashed blonde strands lay forlornly tight on her head. Her arms had folded across her chest and her eyes kept flicking around the compartment, looking at the empty towel shelves, the exercise benches, the endless parade of Lees and Karas in the polished walls. She looked uncomfortable in her skin, and it wasn't just the profound need of a shower. "Uh, Lee. I got a question. You can tell me I'm a booster short of orbit, but I promised the . . . I said I'd ask."
Lee sat down on a bench a half-meter away and began pulling on his pants. When he stood to zip up, Kara's eyes drifted down. "Kara," Lee said and with two fingers of one hand pointed at his eyes, "up here, Kara. Eyes up here."
Kara snorted and grinned but looked back up. Lee turned to grab his knit shirts. "Let me guess, the pilots want to know about the gunship."
The need for an FTL-capable Colonial scout ship that was bigger and better armed than a Raptor had become apparent almost immediately after the first jump away from the Ragnar ammunition depot and into the Prolmar sector. Today the Kobol Dream would be flying unarmed and unprotected on her water foraging expedition so Lee didn't blame her Commander for being hesitant to leave. He'd been a brave man to volunteer. But the Dream's mission would be only the first of many jumps away from the fleet's direct Earth-bound route to look for food, fuel or water.
Behind Lee's back, Kara said, "Yeah, yeah, the gunship. You know, you're spooky sometimes."
"I've been hearing the scuttlebutt too." Slipping into his shoes, Lee picked up his flight suit (he was still too hot to put it on) and turned towards the hatch. "Walk me to the wardroom and I'll tell you what I know."
Out in the empty side passageway, Lee began, "I've only been invited to one of the meetings, but the way I get it, Dad wanted to conscript the Tall Doll, 'cause she's got gun mounts and her commander's ex-Fleet. President Roslin thinks if we start snatching private property, the commanders, especially the owner/operators, will feel the Galactica's as big a threat as the Cylons and scatter. So . . . "
"So?"
Lee laughed. Kara was going to love this. "So when the Dream gets back from her water run, we're going to throw a party and see how many of 'em we can talk into voluntarily putting on Fleet colors."
Kara's funny bone had indeed been tickled. She skipped a step. "A party? You're kidding, right?"
Lee shook his head, feeling as silly as Kara. It was nice to have something to laugh about after all the loss, loneliness and surly subordinates he'd put up with the last few weeks. "Could this face lie to you?"
"You're not kidding? Let me guess, it's going to be hot tub party so everyone can scrub down."
That brought a full laugh out of Lee. "No, the President wants it semi-formal, ladies in evening dresses, men in evening wear or dress uniform. Something like that. I think she's got something up her sleeve. Maybe she'll finally give Dad his double rocket." Double rockets were admiral's insignia.
They'd reached the door to the wardroom. Lee stopped and turned to face Kara. "That brings me to a favor that I've been meaning to ask."
Kara's lips twisted and she snorted. "Here it comes, always the catch. Who do you want me to beat up, boss man?"
"No one, you idiot. It's just that the President has asked me to be at this marvelous party . . . with a date. I was wondering if you'd like to go?" Suddenly Lee's heart thundered.
For a long beat, Kara froze. She finally came out of it to say, "Something tells me that beating up someone would be easier, but, okay, if you need a date, I'm game."
"Great! That's great." The air had become very thick for breathing. Lee turned towards the wardroom door trying to act normal. "Going to breakfast?"
"Nah, think I'll turn in. Thanks for the scoop. I can pass it on, right?"
"It's probably going to be posted in the morning or evening news broadcast, so no big secret. Sleep tight."
"You bet, Lee. Have a good day."
Lee watched Kara walk away down the passage. That hadn't been as hard as he'd expected. Of course, she could still change her mind. In the meantime he had to eat and outline the new duty roster before his patrol began at oh-seven hundred.
Another day of exile and exodus had begun.
:w:o:w:o:w:o:w:o:w:o:w:
If I chance to talk a little wild, forgive me;
I had it from my father. (Shakespeare,
The Tempest, Act I, Scene iv, line 26)
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