Dee had been looking forward to this night for weeks, it would be the first night that Lee had been able to sneak away from his duties on board the Pegasus to meet her for dinner and drinks on the Cloud Nine. Ever since his father had given him command of the other battlestar, it had been difficult to find time alone together. Lee had been insistent on keeping their relationship under wraps; apparently pretending that somehow they had successfully managed to keep their relationship under wraps so far. Sometimes she was amazed at how naïve such a jaded man like Lee could be.

Once again she considered trying for a transfer to the Pegasus, so they could be together all the time. As soon as the thought entered her mind though, she tried to quash it as she'd done before. Lee would never go for it; he was too by the book, and while the crew weren't outlawed from relationships together, issues of rank aside, it wasn't exactly encouraged either. The problem was, in a society as small as theirs, there was no way to keep anything secret. It was more or less common knowledge who was sleeping with who, who was fighting with who, the existence of a Cylon prisoner on board, nothing was sacred private information.

The other thought that drifted into her mind was Starbuck. How much of Lee's reluctance to publicly admit to their relationship was because of his feelings for Starbuck? There was just no way of knowing. The two were close, very close, sometimes too close for Dee's comfort. And the Admiral loved Kara like she was his own daughter, but he only respected Dee as a competent soldier.

Shaking herself out of her melancholy thoughts, she looked at her reflection in the mirror. She was going to totally knock Lee on his ass, she grinned. At just that moment, Lieutenant Gaeta walked into the head. He stood there quietly for a moment, just looking at Dee's reflection too.

"Is there a problem, Sir?" she asked, finally noticing where his attention was centered. He cleared his throat, stepping forward and looking decidedly uncomfortable.

"Uh, Apollo, that is, Commander Adamaasked me to get you a message," he said quietly, conscious of other crewmembers coming and going from the head. "He wanted me to let you know that he was going to have to cancel tonight, something came up….. unexpectedly," he finished lamely.

"That's all he said?" Dee asked turning and meeting his eyes.

"The Admiral called a meeting on the Pegasus; they're planning a rescue mission to retrieve the survivors still on Caprica."

"And he told you this?" Dee pressed.

"Well, not exactly," he replied, unable to meet her eyes. "That was the rumor floating around CIC after the Admiral's Raptor departed for the Pegasus."

"Sir, please, just tell me exactly what Lee told you."

"Dee…."

"Tell me!"

"He asked me to make his excuses and let you know he was going to have to cancel your dinner plans tonight, something important had come up and his father was already on the way to the Pegasus."

"Make his excuses," Dee said bitterly.

"It's just a figure of speech Dee, you know that."

"Is Starbuck there?"

"I don't know."

"Come on sir, she's Galactica's CAG now, don't give me that line of crap that you don't know whether or not she was under orders to attend."

He didn't meet her eyes for a long moment. "Do I need to remind you of the number of times when Apollo was CAG and managed to slip away undetected?"

She knew he what he was referring to, Apollo had told her a little bit about his mission to bring the black market operations of the fleet under control. The rest of it she heard about through the rumor mill, something to do with a whore and a little girl. All Lee had told her though, was that it had been a top secret mission at the behest of the President and his father.

"But this is different," she insisted. "Those were top secret missions that we couldn't afford to let leak. It would have put a lot of people in danger."

"Right. And that makes any planning sessions, possibly top secret planning sessions different how?"

She looked away, feeling like ten times the fool for her jealousy over one Captain Kara Thrace. "You're right," she muttered. "I was just really looking forward to tonight, you know? It just figures that of all the nights for the Old Man to call a top secret meeting this would be the one."

"Um, sure," Gaeta mumbled uncomfortably. There was no way he'd ever do another favor for Apollo again he swore to himself, knowing he was lying to himself as he did, he'd have to be out of his mind not to. "Look, if you're okay, I really need to get back to CIC."

"Wha? Oh, yeah, sure, go."

As Gaeta hurried out of the head, Dee turned to the mirror again. She took in the sight of her carefully made up hair, the dress she'd borrowed from a friend of a friend, and her heart silently broke. Without much care, she began to tug the pins from her hair, watching as it fell carelessly to her shoulders in a jumbled mess. She peered at her reflection again in the mirror, sighing heavily as she did. A look of determination crossed her face as she decided what she was going to do.

A scant hour later, she was onboard a raptor headed towards the Pegasus with a bunch of new pilot trainees. Gaeta had had to pull a couple of strings to get her on the ride, but she was going to pay him back for it some day. Besides, it wasn't like she didn't have an actual purpose for being on the Pegasus now; she was supposed to be picking up some Dradus components for maintenance of the Galactica's. So what if she wasn't one of the tech's that would normally be handling the equipment maintenance, it wasn't like anyone would ask. Once she made it to the Commander's quarters on board the Pegasus nobody would even know she was there, just the way Lee liked it.

With that in mind, she still couldn't shake the butterflies in her stomach. What if Lee wasn't happy to see her? What if the meeting was over, and he and Starbuck were together? What if there had never been a meeting at all?

After the Admiral, the President and her staff, the Marine Commander and the XO's of both battlestars had left, Lee found himself alone with Kara. There were butterflies in his stomach when he thought about the crazy suicide mission she was about to embark on. She could never take the easy road, not Kara; it had to be full throttle into danger all the way. It was actually the thing he both loved and hated about her most. Sometimes he wished he had her crazy, unrestrained courage. But usually he wished she had a little less of it. He finally couldn't procrastinate with pouring their drinks any longer. He turned, smiling as he presented it to her.

"You know…" he started, just as she began to speak too.

"Look Lee…"

They both looked away from each other, unsure of what to say. Lee leaned back against his desk, looking at her carefully.

"Go ahead, what were you going to say," he prompted.

"No, you first."

He grinned, shaking his head. Of course she had to have the last word. "I just wanted to say that I really hope you find him." Anders, the resistance leader. The man Kara Thrace loved enough to risk everything for. Still smiling, Lee felt a sharp pain in his heart as his thoughts flew in that direction. "And I hope you'll make it back here safe."

"Wow. Lee, you've gotten so sentimental since you took command," Kara smirked. It was exactly the kind of answer he expected from her. Tough as nails Starbuck, that's who she wanted everyone to see her as anyway.

"Well, it just won't be the same without you around. Who else am I gonna have to bail outta the brig?"

"Right, that's your reason."

"Of course."

"You can be a real ass sometimes, you know that don't you Lee?" He just smiled at her, setting his glass of ambrosia on the desk beside him. "But thanks. I'll try to make it back in one piece."

They looked at each other again, and neither of them knew for certain who moved towards the other first, or if the movement had been done spontaneously together. Either way, they were both hugging each other fiercely before they new it.

"I'll be back before you know it. Sharon and Helo know the lay of the land pretty well, and I remember it like I was just there," she said softly.

"I'll try to keep Colonel Tighe on his toes until you get back then," Lee answered, his arms tightening around her briefly before they broke away, meeting each others eyes for a brief moment as they did. Everything they wanted to say to each other but were too afraid to was in that look.

"You do that. I should probably get going. There are a few more details I want to work out before we take off."

"Well, I should probably be getting back to CIC anyway," he told her, following her towards the door. As they stepped through the portal, they paused, pulling each other into another brief hug.

"Take care Kara. I meant everything I said."

"I will. Don't worry, you won't be getting rid of me that easily," she said before walking away down the corridor. Lee stared after her for a few moments before turning and heading the opposite way. Neither of them noticed Dee, watching them from the shadows. She wiped a stray tear from her cheek before moving away from the wall.

She wasn't sure what she was going to do now, but before long she found herself on board a raptor and on her way back to the Galactica, the Dradus parts sitting in a case beside.

That had all been over a year ago, before the colonization of New Caprica, but it all came rushing back to Dee at the sound of Starbucks voice. Turning towards Lee, she thrust the communications receiver towards him. "It's for you."

"What? Who?" Lee asked, but Dee just shook her head, waiting for him to take the receiver from her hand. "This is Commander Adama."

"Lee? It's Kara. I need your help."

Lee fought hard to keep the rush of emotions that suddenly swept through him at the sound of her voice from showing on his face, in his voice as he replied. "My help," he said a tad bit stiffly.

"It…it's Anders. He's sick Lee, real sick. The Doc says he needs antibiotics but we ran out of them a long time ago."

"What do you want me to do?"

"Come on Lee, I know you. You've got to have a store of antibiotics up there for your pilots."

Her words almost brought a smile to his face, if Dee hadn't been watching him so closely, and pretending not to, he probably would have. "I don't know Kara," he hedged, knowing he would do anything she asked of him, even if it meant keeping that idiot jock she'd married alive.

"Lee….he could die."

"Is that what the Doc said?"

"He didn't come right out and say it, at least, not in so many words. He said that we're out of antibiotics. And that all he could recommend was lots of bed rest. But you know Anders; nothing's going to keep him down, not even pneumonia." A long silence greeted her words on the other end. Silently she pled to the gods that he'd agree. She could probably count on one hand the number of times when he'd failed to come through for her, and have some fingers left over. Sure, they'd fought a lot through the years, they'd come to physical blows, refused to speak to each other for weeks, but they always came back to each other in the end, had always been there for each other.

"I'll see what I can do, that's all I can promise Kara," he said at last. Her eyes closed briefly in relief.

"Thank you."

"I'll be in touch, in the meantime, take care of that big lug you married."

"Lee….."

"I'm here."

"I just wanted…what I mean….I guess I just wanted to say I've missed you."

"Yeah. Me too."

"You promise me you'll get the antibiotics?"

"I said I'd do my best." With that, Lee ended the transmission and met Dee's sad eyes. Sighing he began to come up with an excuse for helping Starbuck out of yet another jam, but then stopped. He'd broken things off with Dee months ago; he didn't need to give her excuses for his relationship with Kara any longer. In fact, it was Dee's preoccupation withKara and their friendship that had led him to break things off with her all those long months ago. He wouldn't let anyone come between him and Kara.

"Problems on the planet, sir?"Dee asked, not even bothering to hide the malice in her voice.

"No. Just an old friend wanting to say hello," he couldn't stop himself from answering automatically. He couldn't help but think about their last big fight, when he'd ended their relationship. She'd accused him of being unable to commit to her because he was still so in love with Kara. He'd told her she was crazy, that Kara was practically a sister to him. Had Zack lived, she would have been. But Zack had died, and the world had fallen apart after the Cylon invasion. And he'd lost his heart to her instead. With those thoughts filling his mind, he wasn't prepared for Dee's next words.

"Dradus! Reporting multiple contacts, they're……they're Cylon Basestars!"

"Get the Admiral on the comms."

Kara was slow to replace the receiver on her end. It had been a long shot contacting Lee, but she knew he'd come through for her. No matter how infuriating he could be, no matter how much of a rule following tight-ass he was, she could always count on him to save her. Even though she knew deep down inside how much it had hurt him when she'd married Anders and left the Galactica behind.

Sometimes she wished Anders was a little more like Lee, at least Lee would never be playing games in the mud when he was sick with pneumonia. But that's what had drawn her to Anders in the first place; he was like her, the adventurous one. A wild card, the antithesis of Lee. So why was it now, when she was happily married, trying to start a new life on this new world, she dreamed of Lee.

"You're losing it Starbuck," she muttered, reaching for the hatch. As she pushed it open she heard a sound she knew far too well. Fighters, hundreds of them, thousands even, were flying in formation overhead. Cylon fighters. "Oh frack," she said more loudly, scrambling out of the ship and moving fast back towards the center of the settlement. Already off in the distance the sound of the Cylon ground troops marching towards the settlement filled the air.

"Frack!"