I'm completely new to BSG, and have spent the past fortnight watching all four series at marathon pace. Now, I do see the point of Daybreak. It had to happen. But the shippy side of me was less impressed, and this story popped into my head and demanded to be written. All feedback welcome, although I rather expect a few lynches in the process.
Disclaimer: Everything you recognise belongs to Universal Studios. The story is mine. No copyright infringement intended.
Bill took a deep breath as he sat on the hillock he'd chosen as the spot for his - their - cabin, and allowed his eyes to travel over the vista before him. His own personal mound of earth rippled and undulated into a valley, and from thence more hills could be seen. The long grass showed every prevailing mood of the wind, and after nearly half a century in the void of space, the sight soothed a sore place in his soul.
"This was a good idea of yours, this cabin," he said aloud. There was no reply, but he had expected none. All the same, he liked to imagine that she was there, and that she could hear him.
He took a long draw from his pipe. He'd carved the pipe himself, his hands initial clumsiness turning to dexterity. It was a long time since he'd whittled anything. On Galactica his only creative outlet had been the model of the toy ship. He still winced as he remembered how he'd knocked it over after Kara died. Fortunately, the damage had been minor, and Laura had helped him to pick up the pieces.
"I think you'd have liked this place," he said. He chuckled a little, without humour. "Or I hope you do, 'cause this is it. You're stuck here for all eternity."
Sometimes he wondered if he was going mad, if grief and loss and sudden relief from a lifetime of tension had slipped loose the bounds of his sanity from their mooring. He found he didn't care. Even if he had become a crazy old man, there was no-one to see or hear. His visitors were few and far between, as the remnants of the Twelve Colonies tried to put space between their new lives and the hell that had gone before.
He exhaled his smoke slowly, relishing the fact that he could take his time, and draw smoke-pictures in the air. That was a circle, now a series of circles ...
"Didn't anyone ever tell you that's bad for you?" a voice said behind him.
He smiled. That confirmed it; he'd truly become a crazy old man. "Not even Cottle ever tried that. He'll drop before I do, thanks to the demon weed."
A soft hum of amusement. "And now there's no Cottle anywhere in sight."
"Not a soul within five miles. Only me and my ghosts."
"Bill," the voice said. "Look at me."
A chill washed over him. He knew the voice, but had deemed it as nothing more than an auditory hallucination caused by the herb he was smoking. The first time it'd happened, he'd got quite a shock. But it had only rarely taken the form of her voice, and ... never had it sounded so real, so near.
Carefully, he extinguished his pipe and turned. His eyes fell on the long mound of stones with its simple marker, and then rose. His breath caught.
"No," he said, denial and disbelief mingled in one short word.
"Yes. I'm here, I'm really here. You're not imagining it."
He waited for the murderous rage to sweep through him. Waited for the desire to scream and shout and put his fingers about her neck. Waited in vain. He was out of practice, he thought. Once those emotions had come as easily as breathing, needing only the flick of a mental switch. He had been a soldier in a time of war, after all.
He chuckled. Maybe they weren't so very different after all.
"Bill?" the voice said, sounding uncertain. He couldn't attribute it yet, couldn't place it as belonging to her.
"I'm here," he said, leaving the but I don't know if you are unspoken.
The quick flush he remembered swept up her cheeks and she tossed her hair in a gesture he knew, before cancer and drugs had taken their brutal toll. "I didn't know," she said evenly. "I never had the faintest inkling. Saul and Ellen never said..." Her voice seemed to hitch. "The first I knew of it was when I woke up in that frakking bath of goo." She gave a delicate shudder. "I don't think I'll ever take a bath again."
"Better not die a second time," he returned acerbically.
"Wouldn't matter if I did," she said. "I'm not a full Cylon, Bill. I'm like Hera; half-human, half Cylon. I only got one chance at resurrection, and this was it."
And there in a few simple words she'd pinpointed why he hadn't immediately leapt at her in outrage. He'd had only a few visitors since building his cabin, but Helo and Athena and Hera had been among them. How could he hate what she was when he remembered his affection for Saul, when he thought of Athena's unflinching devotion - as a parent himself, her one lapse had convinced even while it disappointed. And Hera, with her vivid smile and dark curls and the face of an angel ... the child he'd risked so much to save, she was half-Cylon too.
Another thought occurred to him and he looked straight into her eyes for the first time. "Hera."
"Hera," she echoed, coming closer. "Didn't you ever wonder, Bill, why it was Hera's blood that saved my life that time? Why I shared those visions of her with Caprica and Athena?"
A smile tugged at his mouth. "I put those down to your drug habit."
She looked at him over her glasses, the look that reminded him that once she'd been a teacher, but he could tell from the way her lips quivered that she was trying not to laugh.
He looked at her for a long moment before struggling to his feet. Odd how his body felt stiffer and creakier now that he was at rest than it had ever done on Galactica.
She extended a hand. "Need any help, Old Man?"
He snorted. "I'd pull you over. Besides," as he straightened, "I managed just fine."
She looked at him, and her gaze flicked away, skimming over the mound of stones and lingering on the cabin he'd built. "You did all this?"
"I did. Our cabin, just as you wanted. Like it?"
Her eyes gleamed behind her glasses. "Love it. It's perfect."
He stepped closer. "It's good to see you, Laura. Missed you."
"Me, too. Oh, me too." Her face crumpled and he opened his arms to her, and it was as if she'd always been there, as if he hadn't watched her die and buried her in earth and granite. "I love you," she whispered.
He smiled and blinked away his own tears as he tightened the embrace. "About time."
-fin.