Written for the multi ship war on bsg epics on livejournal but for some reason never posted here.
Dislaimer: I own nothing, everything belongs to the creators of Battlestar Galactica.
Absolutely everything eventually ends.
It's one of the most important lessons Boomer learned over the last few years. That no matter how much we might wish that things were different, all stories come to an end. That, Boomer has learned, is simply life, and denying it, trying to change it, just makes everything worse. (Another thing she learned.) Some stories, love stories or other ones, end in silence. Like the end of her friendship with Helo, just staring down in silence at him standing there, knowing she'd never see him again. (And of that, she was right. Not because he died like she thought he would but because she did.) Some end in anger, others in tears, some end with broken hearts and others just end.
Some stories, even end before they begin.
(She's pretty sure that's what happened to her and the Chief. Because they never, ever, could have been happy. They never, ever, could have had a happy ending. They were doomed before they laid eyes on each other.)
But at least at the end of every story lies the beginning of another one.
That's something she learned before the world fell apart.
The first time she saw him, standing on the deck surrounded by his friends and crew, laughing madly at some stupid thing, her heart had suddenly started beating faster. Her story as the only child of her parents, the orphan who'd just lost everything, was suddenly at an end. Now, she was an officer of the Galactica, and she was in love with a man whose name she did not even know. But then he'd walked up, staring at her – while his crew snickered behind him – and introduced himself. That was the beginning of everything – and though at times she wishes she could turn the clock back, she knows she never would if she were given the change because to have never been a part of that story would be far worse than it being over.
(The end, their first end, came in anger, with him accusing her of being a Cylon.)
There's a first time for everything – a beginning – and a last time – an ending.
Even if you don't want it to be that way.
That's life.
The first time she kissed him, because she was the one who kissed him, not the other way around no matter what he said at the time, he'd stammered and reminded her they could not be. The second time they kissed was a week later. That time he'd kissed her.
(The last time they kissed they'd been happy, still able to see a future. And then everything had ended.)
They began on a Wednesday, they began when she saw him standing on that deck, laughing. It was the first time she saw him, it was the first time that anything had truly mattered to him. The last time she saw him, the end of everything, was in the same spot, when he was helping her escape. She'd kept staring at him as she closed the door of the Raptor and he'd smiled at her (it would be the last time.) He loved her then, but she'd known the truth, and she'd known that no matter what happened next that was the end. That was the last time.
Although, if she's completely honest, their story ended in a crowded hallway, with a shot and a whispered 'I love you.'
That was the true end.
Not that they ever accepted that.