On Our Way: An Ode to Kara Thrace and Zak Adama

by apodixis

A history of Kara Thrace and Zak Adama. How they met, who they were, and how they fell in love, told through a series of glimpses into their lives. Brief Kara/Lee interactions.

Author's Notes: Story has been abridged to conform more with FF guidelines. Hopefully too much isn't lost with a few paragraphs removed. Original (R/NC-17) version posted on my livejournal account under the same username I have here (apodixis).

The first day Kara's no longer just a pilot but also a flight instructor, she tries to channel the tough-as-nails Major that had been hers years before. There'll be no nonsense, she decides, reminding herself that though she's only a few years older than most of her cadets, they're not her friends. Never will be. She's their superior and what she needs to have is their respect. This is the end of the line for her. Her ass still stings from the figurative boot she felt kicking her off the Triton. Though she loves to see how far she can push the rules, the system, or someone else, this time Kara knows she's gone too far. If she fraks up here, there's no question that she'll be dishonorably discharged for a file far too full. Her abilities in the cockpit are the only reason she's still hanging on by a thread.

She hesitates outside her classroom, and though the door's closed, she can hear the rumble of raucous voices. They're all kids still. It was only a few years ago that she was in their place and was the loudest and the worst of them, but she tries to build a wall inside, a way to detach and see them less like her and more like strangers. She tugs on the bottom of the top of her duty blues, straightening it though it doesn't completely remove the deep and set-in wrinkles that come from sitting in a wrinkled heap in the bottom of her closet instead of dangling from a hanger. 'Lieutenant Kara Thrace' she tells herself, takes a deep breath, clutches her folder of papers a little bit tighter, and finally opens the door to step in.

They hardly notice her presence, some in their seats and some with their backs to the doorway as they continue to fool and joke around. For a second she considers letting it go, after all she's never been the best of students, but she knows it isn't how she should start her tenure as instructor. Instead, she makes it to her desk and slams the stack of folders down into the bare desktop, the slap of paper and her palm echoing in the room. Without even looking up, she knows she's got their attention, can catch in the corner of her eye that some are standing and saluting, but without the respect she deserves. "On your feet," she orders, her best impression of that old Commander of hers from the Triton, Myron Ruth, the person she can blame for being here to begin with. At least that frakker's good for something.

They obey her orders, but she isn't happy with it. "At ease," she says and waits until they're sitting comfortable. "Now get on your frakking feet and give me a real salute." The second time is better, and while the faces of her cadets are serious, aware that they've already started off on the wrong foot and trying desperately not to draw attention to themselves individually, there's one who doesn't wear even the hint of fear on his face. While the others stand tall and somber with eyes dead ahead, he smiles and lets his eyes follow her. Trouble, she thinks. That one's going to be trouble.

"I'm Lieutenant Thrace, call sign Starbuck, but you can call me God. I'm here to decide who doesn't have what it take to fly Vipers. Not all of you are going to finish this course. Not all of you are going to pass your final flight test even if you do manage to finish. Some of you may get a second shot at Raptors, and some of you are going to end up mopping the deck. If you think I'm a push over because I'm young," she smiles to herself, though when her eyes rise she finds them meeting the pair that belong to that student in the front row, her grin returned over his dark features, "I want you to abandon that idea right now."

"Attendance," she shuffles through her papers until she finds the list of her students and retrieves a pen from the pocket of her slacks. "…is mandatory. Now, Adama, Zachary?" Her hand is poised, tip of her pen beside the first name on the list.

"Here, God, Sir."

Kara glances up to put the name to the face and voice, and for the third time, she's staring back at the fresh-faced cadet with dark brown eyes and a head of hair to match. Definitely trouble.

—

They spend the first few weeks immersed in textbooks and videos, diagrams and protocol. Though there's nothing more Kara would love than to take them into the simulators on their first day, she knows they need to earn it. Kara's heard it all already, the complaints are never ending as each of her students pass through various stages of frustration with her. Some have already earned their own call signs from her because of it, and she takes comfort knowing that the reminder of their first few days of basic flight will follow them around for the rest of their careers. An ode to the man who named her Starbuck, perhaps. There's one she's never heard a hint of complaint from, though, and at first Kara thinks maybe he's just the smartest when it comes to not being caught in the act of badmouthing her. In the end, she's wrong.

He's one of the last to leave, day after day, and on his way out he stops by her desk to say goodbye on his own. At first, she's puzzled by it, and files away his face in her head on the list of brown nosers. It doesn't take long for it to become routine, and on the days when his fellow students have caught him in conversation as they walk out and he can't escape, he raises his hand to her in silent goodbye. After awhile, she starts to return it.

She's taking things slow in first introducing each of her cadets to the sims, a contrast to the coming months ahead as they each get used to the controls in front of them. Each cadet reports for their one-on-one meeting with her after their normal class hours, and Kara begins to realize that maybe she just doesn't have the patience for this kind of gig. She throws out two cocky nuggets before they even get halfway through their first scenarios, and with enough groveling she may give them a second chance. By the end of the week, she's like a candle burning at both ends and all she wants is to do hit the bar and drink herself into tomorrow afternoon. There's one left, though, the poor sap who landed the very last time slot and has to spend his Friday night with her rather than out reaching oblivion with the help of a bottle of ambrosia: Zachary Adama, or 'Zak,' as she now knows he likes to be called.

He's early, waiting for her to finish up with the penultimate classmate of his, and Kara finds him sitting on the bench in the hallway, leg nervously bouncing in anticipation.

"Zak?" She asks, holding open the door to the larger room and she can't help but notice the tension running through him.

His head lifts quickly and for perhaps the first time, there isn't already a smile there, though he forces one anyway. He's like a tightly wound spring, not sure when he's going to just let go. "Ready, Sir," Zak says, always observing decorum.

"Let's go, nugget." They make their way inside, towards the cockpit that looks like it was cannibalized straight from one of the new Mark VIIs, the front nose, tail, and wings missing. Here, they're not required. "Your flight suit fit okay?" Though they'd all been fitted for them even before finding out who their instructor was, it's the first time the suits have ever been worn.

"I feel like I'm in a sauna," he admits, pulling at his collar. His suit's not even fully zipped and already he's bordering on heat exhaustion.

Kara barks out a laugh, forgetting for a moment how little she wants to be there. "That feeling of stewing in your own sweat never really goes away." She's been in hers most of the day, but grown used to that sticky feeling that coats her skin. He fidgets with the helmet he holds from one hand as they reach their destination, and Kara, without a thought, reaches forward to where his zipper dangles limply at his waist, and tugs it up to his throat. Their eyes catch, and before Zak can say anything else, she fumbles over some words. "Don't be nervous."

"Me? Nervous?" He laughs, though it only further hints at the truth and both of them know it. At least now he isn't thinking just about how little he actually wants to get into that simulator, but instead about the way her fingers had gently brushed over his abdomen as she pulled the zipper up.

It's alarming to her how she can't stop from smiling when he's near, and for a moment she bites at her lower lip as she puts the metal collar around his neck, avoiding his waiting gaze. She catches herself, forces her lips to purse, do anything else but that. Kara knows her body's unconscious cues, and that—that biting of her bottom lip—indicates the worst. He's handsome, perhaps not in all the traditional ways, and his coloring is a little too dark all over for her tastes, but there's a flutter in her stomach at their close proximity. Kara has to step back, put some distance between them.

Zak takes the hint and climbs into the simulator, pulling his own helmet on until it clicks into place. Kara's there to pull the faux-canopy shut for him, the glass around him made of digital screens that fade into his starting location: an unnamed battlestar somewhere in the deep of space. She pulls her headseat on, connected her to his comm system, and steps a few feet away to where she sits at her computer station. There, she watches the details of his flight as well as a couple computer generated images of his ship from a variety of angles so she can monitor his progress.

The take-off goes smoothly; it's hard to frak up getting shot out of a launch tube. But out on his own, his ship wobbles unsteadily and though Kara knows she would have yelled out a condescending remark by now to any other student, she holds her tone back. "Use both hands on the stick if you're having trouble keeping her steady," she advises. He's new, he's nervous, and for him, she suddenly has the patience. Right now, she'll let him get away with a little extra.

The rest of the session passes, but instead of adjusting to the feel of flying a ship over time, he's still as stiff as he was at the start. She's seen it before. By no means is he a natural, and she isn't sure if there's even promise in him for him to improve from this kind of beginning.

"Why do you want to fly Vipers, Zak?" She asks afterward, both of them walking out together after locking down the hangar.

His hand at his side tremors, but he swings his arm slightly as they walk so she doesn't notice. It's a mix of nerves, fear of what she's seen in his first test flight, and muscle fatigue from gripping that damn stick so frakking tight for the last hour. "My father's a pilot. Well… he used to be. Now he's a Commander."

"That's your father? Commander Adama?" Kara asks, ashamed she didn't put the pieces of it together beforehand. She's neither met the Commander nor heard much about him, but it's hard to be a member of the Colonial Fleet and not know the names of those who sit in some of the top positions.

"He was one of the best, flew way back in the cylon war."

"So it's a family thing then, father to son?"

"My older brother, too. Lee definitely follows in our Dad's footsteps."

Zak's more sullen than she's ever seen him, although she can't miss how he perks up at the mention of his brother.

He stops at the exit, the final doorway before they're plunged out into the chilly darkness outside. "I bet he'd even give you a run for your money, Starbuck." Zak uses her call sign, a gamble if he ever made one.

"Nugget, I'd like to see him try. I know for a fact I've got most of the sim records, so I hate to break it to you and your hero worship, but your brother's been beaten by a girl."

"You're just as bad as him," Zak jokes and smiles wide, the seriousness from only a moment before gone.

An hour before, all she'd wanted was to find a quiet corner of a bar, but as her eyes slip down to the glimpse of his chest not hidden by the set of double tanks beneath his open flight suit, she doesn't care. "You've got no idea, kid, no idea."

He walks her to her car even though the parking lot is in the opposite direction of his housing. In a clearer head, she would think something of it, but for the time being she allows herself to get lost in the conversation that fills the quiet. They're about to say goodbye for once and for all when Zak disrupts the small talk.

"I know I was frakking pathetic in there, but I'll get better, all right? Just give me a shot." He's heard the stories. A frak up so bad at the start is all it takes sometimes. The fleet isn't exactly hurting for pilots in the time of peace, so they've got the right to be choosy. Already, he knows that his father pulled strings to get him there at all. He can't bear to stutter and fall just out of the gate.

There's pain in his voice, and coming from anyone else she would think it's pathetic. A horribly ploy to get her to go light on him, not that she didn't already do so on her own. But, she'll help him, she decides. Go the extra mile and spend her nights beside his simulator if that's what he needs to get him there. So long as he's willing to work, Kara will continue to give. Maybe this is the second chance she'd so often wished others had shown her. "We'll work on it," she says, such few words for the complexities she feels. "I'll get you there, Zak. I promise."

They share a smile together, and his free hand gently rests over hers on the hood of her car. Neither of them want to move, just like neither of them want to acknowledge the touch. "I've heard from some of the other guys that they've seen you at a couple bars downtown. You're not going to happen to be at one of those tomorrow, are you?"

It's more than just a simple question, but she fools herself into playing dumb and lives in denial as he asks. "I might not be at Silversmith's tomorrow with a couple friends. It might not be at around 2300 hours."

Zak lets his hand slip from hers and backs away a few steps, never taking his eyes from her. "I won't see you there then. And I won't buy you a drink."

Her head shakes as she glances away to open her car door. When she glances back up he's further, but still looking to her, his hand raised in the gesture between them that's become far too familiar.

Kara returns the wave and after a moment of watching his back retreating towards the heart of campus, she heads home.

—

She gets there after midnight, on the arm of a marine she knows from bootcamp. Zak Adama is the last thing on her mind, her body already buzzing from alcohol consumption. Life on Caprica and off a battlestar has some merit. At least here there's no superior officer breathing down her neck, counting her drinks and goading her into a fight. Still she insists half of those fights she found herself in on the Triton weren't hers alone, despite the fact that she always ended up in the brig by herself at the end of the night.

Kara returns from the bar with a bottle of something and a couple of shot glasses, laying them out over the table her group has called for themselves. She does one, then two, her laughter loud as she eggs her comrades on for a third. There's no seats left, so she drapes herself across the lap of the man she came in with, not bothering to swat his hand away when it creeps up the thigh of her jeans and his thumb slips beneath the hem of her shirt, drawing circles over the skin he finds there. It's familiar to her. The two of them, they've done this before, as long ago as when they were both listening to their drill instructor shout at them as they lapped around military property, and as early as the weekend before when Kara had an itch that needed to be scratched and he'd come over on a phone call in the middle of the night.

Her arm loops around his neck when she finally spots Zak across the bar from over the marine's shoulder. He's there with friends as well, or at least she thinks so by the company beside him. It doesn't stop his eyes from rising to her a moment later, and she chooses to believe it's her head's cloudiness that makes her not look away, even as the man beneath her starts to kiss and suck at the flesh of her neck. She feigns the necessary noises of pleasure to keep him satisfied as he works, her fingers tangled in his hair, but not once does her eye contact break from the cadet across the crowded room. As always, Zak just smiles, even raises a questioning brow to her, but there's amusement on his face. He's the one to turn away from her in the end, laughter on his lips even though she can't hear it from the distance.

Frak him, she thinks, and shuts her eyes for a second to try to drown herself in her eager little marine. A moment later she reopens them and there's Zak again, this time cutting through the crowd with a beer in each of his hands, a smirk of satisfaction over his lips. She's alarmed by it, certain that he'll turn towards someone else at the last minute, but he doesn't, just continues on his path towards her, only halting at the edge of their table.

"Kara," he uses her first name and tilts one of the fresh beers towards her in offering even as the other occupants of the table eye him for his intrusion.

He's never called her that before, and for a moment she wonders how he knows her first name at all. It can't be hard to find out, but she sure as shit never told him. She likes it though, likes the way it slips from his tongue like he's been saying it his whole life. He's out of uniform, not a surprise since so is she, but still it's a change from their day to day and Gods, he looks better even dressed like a civilian than he did as the dutiful soldier.

"Zak," she returns it and pulls away slightly from the marine, who groans beneath her in disappointment. Had it been any one of those other nuggets using her first name, she would have torn them a new one for it. But for some reason she isn't yet ready to admit, she doesn't do it to him. Kara accepts the beer and nods her head, tipping the neck of the bottle towards his until they clink, a show of thanks.

"Where do you two know each other from?" The marine asks, irritated.

"Old friends," Zak answers for her, his voice raised over the volume of music and people talking. He's covering for both of them. There might not be a specific rule against it, but it's in neither of their interests to be caught together sharing drinks as instructor and student. The answer seems to satisfy the man she's come with, but Zak doesn't back off. "Mind if I steal her away for a bit? Haven't seen her in years, need to catch up."

Both sets of eyes are on her and in a moment of panic, Kara just shrugs her shoulders towards the marine and stands quickly from his lap, unsteady on her feet and nearly toppling into Zak. He's careful, hand on her arm as their chests brush together, and she's not sure if it's the drinks in her system or something else that makes her feel lightheaded and like a shock of electricity is tingling over her skin simultaneously. Without a word, Kara waves off the people behind her and follows him off. Gods, what the frak is she doing? Half of her gives a silent warning, a plea to keep the distance, but the other half of her doesn't give a frak for any manner of sense. She's got tunnel vision and all she sees is the muscle of his shoulders through the back of his t-shirt.

They find some space at the far end of the bar, a pair of stools recently vacated against the wall. It's secluded in some ways, the bodies of others around them acting as a shield from the rest of the world, or at least enough of one to Kara's slightly intoxicated mind.

"Shouldn't mess with that guy," she says, referring to the marine he's stolen her from, "he fights dirty."

"Oh yeah?" Zak isn't worried. He turns himself in towards her. Their thighs touch, two bodies fighting for space together.

"I should write you up just for calling me by first name, you know." There's no seriousness in her words, and though she tries to make her face stern and threatening, she just breaks into warm laughter that is accompanied by his own. "Can't let you kids think you can walk all over me."

"Well I won't tell anyone." He takes a long sip from his beer then places it on the counter.

"I've been thinking," she finishes off her own bottle and abandons it on the bar top, next to his. "If you need extra help with getting practice in, need some advice, I could make time—"

"I don't really want to talk about flying right now, Kara," he says her name again and it flows from his tongue even smoother than it did before.

"What the hell else is there?" It's been her life for years now, a replacement for pyramid she lost to a bad knee, something to fill the void left by every other aspect of her disappointing life. She feels his hand stroking over that clothed knee in question, the one that was shattered years before and still bears the scars of all the surgeries done just to give her the ability to walk again. Her heart nearly skips at the touch, body warming to temperatures she's only ever felt in a flight suit. "Zak…" She starts her protest half-heartedly. It isn't like her to say no, but she's trying as hard as she can.

He doesn't hear her, at least not her words. He hears the pleading behind the way she says his name, like it's meant to be a warning though it's closer to begging. It only takes a second, but he leans across the small gap between them and with the eagerness of a teenager—which she reminds herself that he only barely isn't one anymore—he presses their mouths together.

Kara can't resist him then, parting her mouth invitingly, feeling his tongue desperate to explore and learn. Learn the way she tastes, the temperature of her mouth, the feel of her full lips against his thinner ones. She grabs into his arm on impact, fingers digging in to his skin as she channels away her urge to tell him to stop. He's warm and soft, strong but not forceful. Zak started the kiss, but there's no expectation in it, no demand for more, and for once it's nice to let things just be what they are.

It's him who pulls back eventually, just enough to catch her eyes as they lazily open, his hand already cupping her cheek. "I've thought about that for weeks."

It's a bold confession, and if Kara's cheeks weren't already pink, her blushing would be more than apparent. Her tongue slips out, tip of it feeling over her lower lip, savoring the fading feeling of their mouths joined together. This is wrong, so very frakking wrong. She knows it, and even though he acts otherwise, she knows he knows it as well. No good can come of this, but the ache between her legs starts to tell her something different.

"This can't—"

"Yeah, yeah," he laughs her words off. "Do you want me to stop?"

He's so unlike the boy she saw the night before, unsure of himself and asking for a second chance. Even the person he is in class, there's only a shadow of him with them tonight, and seeing the new side of him makes her pulse feel erratic. She shakes her head to tell him no, and this time she's the one who leans in, her mouth to his, harsher and deeper than before.

"Got to get out of here," she barely gets the words out as his mouth slips to her jaw. She's panting already, feels like a school that's girl never been touched before.

Zak slips from his stool and seeks out her hand, fingers curling into her own as he tugs her from her seat. They're out the door in seconds, Kara leading the way though they aren't very efficient. Every couple of feet one of them pulls the other to a stop, their bodies flush together, and it's more intense than it was in the bar minutes earlier. She pulls them into the alley between two buildings, certain she's unable to take anymore of the game they're playing. Her hands immediately go for his waist, for the belt slipped through the loops of his jeans. He lets her at first, but when she's about to make any real headway, he takes her hands in his own and presses them up against the rough brick facade of the building at her back. She'll have a scrape or two there tomorrow, that's for sure.

"Not here," he tells her, his voice low.

"I can't make it back," she practically begs him as he nips at her neck, the place where the marine had earlier in the night. He's claiming her for his own. "Just—frak." Kara curses, frustration evident in her voice.

"We can grab a cab." He nods into her collarbone, kissing against the sharp cut of flesh.

"No, my place is just a few blocks." Kara's breathing is heavy and she's bucking her hips against his to tempt him. She's doesn't know when things took such a sharp turn, she can't remember much before this moment right here. Zak's hold on her wrists releases, but he scrambles for her hand again, this time to lead her along, their speed increased from before.

"Bet I can outrun you there!" He yells back at her from the few steps ahead he is. It's a game to keep her moving, appealing to her competitive side to keep them heading forward.

Even with the alcohol in her system, she rises to the challenge, pulling away and into the lead. They continue like that, their bodies aching and tired by the time they're four blocks over and in front of her building. Kara slaps her hand into the side of the building, body hunched over, panting and praying to every God she knows that she doesn't empty her stomach onto the sidewalk. That would really put a damper on the mood.

"For the record," he takes a gasping breath, "I let you win—you were the only one who knew where we were going."

"Shut the frak up," she pushes him weakly, but enough to cause him to stumble, slightly off balance. Their eyes meet when he steadies himself, and for a second Kara wonders if the moment really is gone. Maybe that alley had been their only shot at whatever this is, or maybe the Lords of Kobol are looking down at her, giving her another sign to walk away.

Zak, as it turns out, doesn't subscribe to their messages and signs, because he hooks his arm around her hip and all of it starts all over again. Once they make it to the door of her apartment, force her keys in the lock together, and seal themselves up inside, Kara's shedding clothes like only seconds remain. Halfway down the stairs and her t-shirt is gone, flung over the railing to somewhere down below. Her shoes are kicked off at the bottom and Zak does the same, though she's always a step too far away for him to put out his hand and reach her.

"What are we doing?" Kara muses aloud, even as she unbuttons and unzips her jeans.

"Do you need me to explain how this works?" The corner of his mouth rises, but it disappears, obscured temporarily by the removal of his shirt. He watches her turn away to face the couch and for the first time the whole night, he hesitates. "Kara… if you want me to go, I will." He doesn't mean it, doesn't believe the words as he says them, but he will follow her wishes if she's absolutely sure.

Kara shakes her head. Once. Twice. "No."

There's no space between them after that, and Kara feels the heat of his front against her back, reaching her arm behind her to cup the back of his head. One of his hands travels up to her bra, slipping between the underwire and her skin until the item of clothing is pushed up, freeing both her breasts in the process. He's gentle and rough at the same time, caressing then squeezing, a distraction while the other slides down the flat plane of her stomach until he encounters the fabric of her underwear, exposed as her jeans hang open and undone. Zak's fingers are trapped between the cloth and her skin a second later, feeling over the tightly trimmed hair he finds there. Almost like she was hoping for this, he muses.

Kara shudders instantly against him. That touch, right there, she's been waiting for that since she saw him across the bar. It makes her knees weak, but he's got her, not letting her falter for even a moment.

When she grinds herself back against his hips, he knows he can't hold back any longer, and as if she can read his mind, they're both rushing to push down their briefs and pants in one fell swoop. They step out of their tangle of clothing and he can't help but notice the way her legs part further, an inviting sign. She leans slightly over the arm of the couch ahead of them, and Zak pushes himself, hard and aching, inside of her.

They finish a few minutes later, ending up on the couch. Kara's straddling his lap, her body limp against his.

"Frak me," Zak says, laughing softly and satisfied. "You're beautiful."

When her breathing's steady, she climbs off, the quietest of whines released when she feels that aching emptiness of him no longer inside of her.

Whatever's just happened, it's too late in the night to begin considering the ramifications. Instead, she pushes herself to her feet and leaves, heads for the bathroom. By time she finishes using the toilet and wiping away the remains of their frak from between her legs, Zak's no longer on the couch. He's gone, she thinks with a mixture of relief and disappointment, but catches the sight of his shoes still abandoned in the middle of her floor. Kara glances towards her bedroom door and through the opening she catches the shape of another human curled up in her bed beneath the sheets.

Tomorrow, she tells herself while there's the pressure of exhaustion behind her eyes, she'll worry about this all tomorrow. Kara crawls into bed beside him. Feeling his arm pull around her, she falls asleep.

—

He's there when she wakes, and despite the pounding headache, the events of the night before are fresh in her mind. For once, she wishes she'd reached that point of blackout drunk so she could blame her actions on the drink rather than herself. It would be nice to have another excuse. Kara slips out of bed, away from his arm draped over her midsection, quiet as she tiptoes towards her dresser and pulls out underwear and a tank top, anything to cover herself up. It feels strangely more like the mornings she's woken up at someone else's place, excusing herself before dawn, and she wonders if she just disappears for a few hours, will he let himself out, taking the evidence of the night before with him? It's a tempting offer, so she goes to the kitchen to contemplate it, shuffling through her cabinets for a coffee filter.

She's in the middle of folding a napkin for a makeshift replacement when there's footsteps, and she catches the naked form of her cadet striding towards the portion of her apartment that acts as the living room. Kara can't help but watch him, especially when she knows he doesn't see her. It gives her a moment to gawk, to take in the shape of him with a clearer head and light streaming in through the windows across one wall of her place. Like most of the students, he's in better shape than the vast majority of other specimens of human life on any of the twelve planets that make up the colonies. It's a benefit to the mandatory physical fitness requirements and survival training trips. He turns as he pulls on his boxer-briefs and Kara averts her eyes, suddenly finding interest in the coffee filter dilemma.

"Paper towel works better." When he reaches her he tears off a square from the roll on her counter, folds it a few times, and without another word, fits it into the top of the open coffee maker. He pours in enough ground coffee, a no-named brand by the look of the can, for a few cups.

Kara doesn't miss that little fact, and eyes him dubiously. "Don't you have to get back to campus?" It isn't like bootcamp, with officers making the rounds at lights out and morning reveille to make sure the nuggets slept in their beds at night. Still, there's no reason for him to be with her.

"It's Sunday," he says matter of factly and opens her fridge, making himself at home. He's laughing when he looks back to her. "How are you even alive? There's no food here."

She shrugs her shoulder, suddenly self-conscious of the state of her apartment in the daylight. He's right, there isn't much to eat but she usually takes her meals at the academy or grabs take out on the weekends. It's not just the food she now worries over, but the general mess of her place: her clothing strewn about, magazines and papers months old left over her coffee table, blank and painted canvases stacked in a corner.

"You can't be here," she finally says, and her eyes lock with his. "Last night was great," when she says that, it's usually a line, a way to speed things along, but this time she means it. "But we frakked up."

Zak understands her worries, nodding along, but he can't bring it in himself to share her fears. "So what, do people come into your apartment regularly to check if you're frakking one of your students?"

"You don't get it." Kara tears away from the kitchen, picking up his clothing as she goes. She's got his pants, his shirt, and even one of his socks in her arms. "This didn't happen. On Monday, there's no telling your buddies about this or whatever the frak you think you're gonna do, got it?

"Kara, Lords, calm down. What kind of person do you think I am?" He's out of her kitchen, a few steps away from her.

"I don't know. A kid? That's what you are."

"I get the feeling you're not that much older than me." There's no way of knowing, she could just have an exceptionally young face, but he's heard details of her past, knows the age gap can't be much despite her position of authority.

"You've frakked your teacher, fulfilled that fantasy, now move on like nothing's changed. Not all of us have Commanders for fathers to help us if we get into trouble. Maybe you won't get discharged if he pulls some strings for you, but me? I'm barely hanging on here. Teaching's my punishment, Zak, if I frak this up—I'm done."

The nudge about his father stings. Zak knows Bill Adama's already done what he could to help him get here with his less than stellar grades and test scores. Would his Dad stick his neck out again for his son? Probably. Kara's right in that regard. "I'm not," he emphasizes, "telling anyone about this."

"Good," she huffs her word out and approaches him only long enough to transfer the contents of her arms to his. "Now get out."

The argument's over, he knows. So as in class, he obeys, tossing his clothing on to the couch to pull each item on one by one. That damn sock's still missing in the end, though, so he puts on his shoes without it. "If you find a sock," he says from the foot of the stairs.

"Yeah."

With that, he finally goes.

—

He doesn't stop at her desk on his way out anymore, doesn't hold his hand up in goodbye. Zak doesn't even smile to her across the classroom. He's doing exactly what she asked, and yet for some reason she's wondering why she asked for it at all. There's logical reasons, a world of them, but none of them count for anything anymore when she's watching the profile of his face as he leaves the room, her head haunted with the image of him beneath her, the twist of his face as he comes. She's got a frakking stain on her couch from that encounter.

Their sim sessions are in larger groups the following week, and she interacts with him as little as possible, but keeps enough of an eye on him and his scores to know he's struggling. She promised she'd help turn him into a pilot by the end of the course, and now through her own mistake she's done anything but assist in the ways he actually needs. A frak, he could have gotten that anywhere. He's a good-looking enough guy, and from what she's seen of him, he has a way when it comes to grabbing the attention of whomever he wants. What he really needs is her help, so when he's on the way out of his latest sim session, she asks him to stop by her office.

He obliges, interrupting her test grading when he arrives, and sits across from her, eyes blank.

"Your sim scores, test scores—frankly Zak, they all blow." She watches him shift in his chair, unsure of how to reply. "I said I'd help you, so if we can just… put everything else behind us, I still will."

"Sir."

Kara hates the way it sounds coming out of him now that she's heard him say her name, called it out when he was inside of her.

"I appreciate what you want to do for me, but what if I don't want to put it behind us?"

She tries to hold her ground. "That's not an option."

Zak becomes more animated, sitting on the edge of his seat, his hand resting on her desk. "You can't tell me no one in the history of the worlds has ever done this before. I'm not going to tell, you're not going to tell." It's like he's practiced his speech before, prepared a list of reasons why and why not, a counter argument to every defense she can give. "I don't know about you, but… I don't just want a repeat of the other night. I want to get to know you." Then he's smiling at her, the way he's done for weeks now, free and unrestrained.

When did she become a sucker for a frakking smile? A quiet laugh? It's pathetic how little her resolve holds up against him. Before she knows it, she's biting her lower lip and it's over. She's lost the war because of the little creases at the corners of his eyes. "Sims are empty at 2100 hours tonight if you want the practice."

—

They meet, but he doesn't log any time in the simulator. He doesn't even wear his flight suit to keep up the illusion and neither does she. Instead they lock themselves up in the hangar together and Kara finds the Gods again with her back to the wall and him deep inside of her.

—

Time passes and it's much of the same. Zak's sim scores steadily improve, but it's nothing to write home about. If it was anyone else, she would have forced them out of the course by now, but for him she finds the encouragement. Their nights and weekends are usually spent in the private of her apartment, or at a bar on the far end of town, where the locals go and not the military. They spend their time in a corner booth, hiding their faces away from anyone who passes, but it's a controlled risk at least. Zak knows his roommates have started to raise eyebrows and ask questions. A girl is always the answer to sudden disappearances like his. He just smiles and never answers.

"Will you paint me something one day?" He asks from the living room, looking through the finished pieces that have steadily grown in the time he's known her.

"Just take whatever one you want." She returns and sets both bowls of noodles down on the coffee table, taking a seat on the floor as she begins to eat.

Zak shakes his head as he sits beside her and grabs his own bowl. "No, I want you to paint something with me in mind."

"I'm not that good," Kara insists, her mouth half full as her chopsticks twist around new strands of noodles she's preparing to eat.

"In the words of Kara Thrace," he smiles and looks to her, straightening his form a little like an actor before a performance, "'Shut the frak up.'"

She giggles, narrowly avoiding choking on her food before she swallows it down. "You make me sound so eloquent when you put it that way."

Everything's changed, and Zak isn't quite sure when or how it did. He knows she sometimes still worries, especially after that time they'd nearly been caught in her office, his hand up her shirt, her mouth on his neck. They haven't attempted anything on campus since then, and though they both sorely miss the nights in the hangar, it's a change that he welcomes. It's not just a frak anymore, and though Kara's never said it, Zak knows she feels the same.

"Kara?"

"Hm?" She raises a brow and sets her empty dish back on the coffee table, sipping from her beer before she returns that, too.

He knows he should be nervous, but he's not. "I love you." It feels like a natural high almost, or as close as he'll ever get to it without the aid of something to smoke, inject, or ingest.

Her eyes widen, cheeks blushing the warmest she's ever felt, and she can't begin to imagine what color they appear to him. This was just supposed to be dinner. Dinner and a night of her helping him study for the exam coming up. Maybe a quick frak if they're in the mood, though they never aren't.

"You don't have to say it back," he leans in to kiss her hot cheek. "I've never said it to someone before. I just wanted you to know."

For a moment she thinks about how young he is that he's still having firsts, and then she remembers that she's never said it and meant it herself. When she was younger, years younger, she'd foolishly said it a few times in the heat of the moment, a false declaration she couldn't even begun to understand the meaning of. What's more is that she's never heard it parroted back. No, this is a first for her as well.

"Why?"

"Because," he starts and stops, resting his bowl on the floor before looking down to his empty hands then back to her. "I can't explain it. I just know." And it's the surest feeling he's ever had in his life.

It doesn't take long for them to get to her bedroom, although it's started to become his as well with the small accumulation of his clothing and belongings that fill her drawers and closet. Kara's lying back on the bed, slipping her clothes off as she watches him do the same, fevered anticipation spreading over the surface of her skin. Zak's over her in no time, kissing at her breasts, her stomach, and hips. He nudges her thighs apart with his hand and kneels between her open legs.

"I've never done this before," he admits and leans down to kiss at the soft skin of her inner thigh.

"Never?" She watches, her head against one of her pillows. Her stomach feels weightless, like she's stuck at the highpoint of a roller-coaster.

"I want to, though," Zak insists with a nod of his head. She's had her mouth around him more times than he can remember and he wants to return it, wants to taste her for himself. "Just tell me what you like."

Kara suddenly feels shy and it's strange and foreign to her. She's been on the receiving end of this particular act before, but not regularly, and not as anything but a prelude to sex, something just to warm her up. What it would feel like to have a man learn her that intimately and keep coming back for more, Kara's never even thought about.

She can feel his warm breath exhale against her, his wet lips trailing nearer and nearer until finally, he kisses to the slit in her flesh. He's touching nothing directly, but her body reacts anyway, fingers twisting into her sheets to calm herself down.

Zak breathes in the heady scent of her and takes his first taste, his tongue stroking upward. On his tongue, her taste is faint, but distinct, far softer a flavor than he ever imagined. So long as he lives he knows he'll never forget just what it's like. He lets himself be guided by the sounds she makes, encouragement found in her leg hitched over his shoulder, drawing him closer and nearer to her.

He kisses her thighs when it's over, feeling the tremor and twitch of them even when they're powerless and weak. Zak can hear her pants and soon that's not the only sound of the room. It's something much more full of life. She's laughing, quiet at first, then without control as the seconds tick by. He lifts his head to watch her, smiling proudly as she's reduced down to pieces in the wake of the orgasm she felt.

"That was…" Kara starts, but doesn't finish.

"I would've done that years ago if I knew that's how girls reacted to it." Zak crawls up until he's above her, his weight on his hands.

"I'm keeping you," she shakes her head and looks up to him. "I forbid you from doing that to anyone else."

He loves how playful she can get when her guard's down, something he's been seeing with increasing frequency outside of the bedroom. He doesn't know the story of her life, the things she's endured, but he knows there's a whole world to her that he hasn't seen. One day, he thinks she'll tell him, and already he's afraid for what she could admit. Sometimes there's pain in her eyes when he asks her a question about her past, a pain so severe it sends an ache into his chest to grow there for her. Already he wants to help her bear that burden. If she'll let him, that is.

"I don't want anyone else," Zak says faintly, and means it. "I'm yours, you know that, right?"

Kara nods. Bites her lip. Strokes her hand through his thick, but short hair. Then, she takes a leap. "I love you too." It's a little late, but somehow she doesn't think he'll protest.

Zak crushes his mouth against hers and it's unlike every time they've kissed before. He's sure he's felt this way about her since he saw her, even while she kept that hard-ass facade up for the rest of the class. He'd seen through it then, wanted to get to know who she was underneath.

There are tears in the corners of her eyes as they kiss, as she feels him rest his hips between her spread thighs and slides inside of her. Forget everything else. Forget her mother, her father, her tarnished record, the way her hand and knee still ache sometimes when rain's coming, the fact that she hasn't really flown in months, every one night stand, each person she's been with hoping to drown out everything else. This is what matters, she tells herself. Where every gaping hole once was, pieces of her ripped out by the events of her life, Zachary Adama now fills them so fully it's like there was never anything missing before. He loves her and she knows she's been waiting her life for him, to find someone that makes her feel complete. Not alone. Loved. Safe.

They're slow this time around, neither of them wanting to reach that finish, instead just to feel the movement of their bodies together. When they finally do get there, Kara tells him she loves him again and he returns it. It feels even better than the first time.

—

"When I graduate," Zak starts, his arm around her, Kara's head on his shoulder as he holds her close, "we wont have to hide anymore." He's been dreaming about that day, although there's always been the worry that maybe this only works because it's a secret. Everything about that thought changed tonight, though, both of their bloodstreams swimming with their confessions of how deep their affections run.

"You'll go away." Kara strokes the hand of his arm around her, fingers tracing over the lengths of his own and over the silver ring around his smallest finger. "And I'll be here." There's sadness in her voice at the idea. Never before has she thought aloud about what it'll really mean in a few months when they're torn apart.

"I'll come home when I can. To you." By now, Kara's heard the story of his family, of his parent's less than happy marriage. He doesn't know what the future holds for them, but he promises himself he won't repeat the mistakes he's seen in his mother and father. Zak wants to make his father proud, wants to make Lee proud, and he will. With Kara's help, he'll finally be a Viper pilot, but after that, he'll be hers. Flying will be part of his life, not his whole life. "You won't be stuck here forever, either. They'll give you another chance on a battlestar."

With him, she doesn't feel the need to buck the rules. Maybe once and for all, she can fall in line just enough to put her life back together and get back up to the stars. His reassurance is suddenly all she needs.

"Besides, it was good you frakked up. Never would have met me." There's amusement in his voice.

She tilts her head up to him, smile across her face. "It was worth it."

His fingers dance across her skin to her breast and there's nothing sexual about his touch. It's comforting in a way she never knew existed. Kara turns her head into him a little further, kisses the side of his chest, wherever she can reach.

"My brother's going to be around in a few weeks, I was thinking that maybe you should meet him."

"The infamous hotshot Viper pilot, Lee Adama?" Kara teases the man in his absence.

"Yeah, that jerk." He doesn't mean anything by it and Kara knows. If anything's true about Zak, it's how much he worships the ground his older brother walks on.

"You sure?"

"We can put it off if you want. I know it's a big step, but if you're worried he'd tell someone…"

"No." Kara shifts until she's on her side and can look to him easier. Her arm stretches over his chest, and her fingers trace small shapes across his skin. "I don't think that. I'm not good with families, Zak. I was an only child, my Dad left when I was a kid. Mama—" Kara stops, closes her eyes tight to take a breath, only opening them when she's got the strength to go on. It's the most she's ever talked about her family to him or anyone. "She died a few years ago. I've been on my own most of my life."

"Not anymore." Zak palms her cheek, a reminder of how things have changed.

"Yeah," she repeats, "not anymore."

—

The stir fry's burning on the stove when the doorbell rings.

She heads to the stairs, jogging up. "Coming!" Kara calls and then she's at the door, pulling it open to reveal the man behind it. There's a smile on her lips before she can help it, and it's not just because she's been eagerly waiting for this moment. Lee's handsome, in a way that's so unlike his brother. She's seen a photo or two of him, but the differences were never so apparent as they are now. Where Zak's soft, Lee's is full of sharp angles, a face no man or woman could deny. Zak's skin is darker, caramel in color, and Lee's is an entirely different hue. The most striking of all his features is the eyes, bright blue in a color that barely seems real, especially when compared to how dark Zak's are. Kara's not sure what she expected, but it isn't this.

"You must be," they both repeat at the same time, and they smile a little brighter. Her giggle wins out, feeling like a fool. "Sorry, I'm Kara. Come on in." It's only then that she realizes the flowers in his hands, a gift that makes her feel far too much like an adult for her tastes, but makes her insides warm anyway. "You didn't have to do that. I'll take those and put them in some water."

They make their way down the stairs and Kara's in an overwhelmed haze, her head bubbling with all the little things left to do before they sit down to eat. There's food to stir, places to set, still a small mess to clean up. While she's fluttering about in her own world for the briefest of time, Zak finally makes his appearance from the bedroom, greeting his brother. It makes her smile, a pang of jealousy washing through her at the camaraderie between them. The way Zak looks, though, his arm around his brother and Lee's around him, it's a kind of happiness so unlike to what he shares with her. It's just different.

Over dinner, they get to know each other, the three of them emptying glass after glass of wine, the small stash in the liquor cabinet dwindling down as the hours go. There's something about Lee, Kara thinks, even as he vehemently debates the merits of voting and the system. He's just like a politician, except maybe not yet so jaded and worked over by the process he claims to love.

"Honey," Kara tilts her head back towards Zak, "I think I'm starting to like your brother."

Afterward, they talk Vipers, trading their own little brags about the tricks and stunts they've pulled in the past. It's not a conversation for Zak, so it's good he happens to be a kind of lightweight when it comes to holding his liquor, and ends up passing out across Kara's couch.

On their own and three sheets to the wind, Kara tells Lee how she's not afraid of dying, but afraid of being forgotten. It's a whole lot more than she's ever admitted to Zak in the months they've been together, and even intoxicated, Kara has no idea why she's telling Lee. Just that she is, just that it feels right, just that it feels like he needs to know.

She's vibrant and bold, a force to be reckoned with. Lee's never seen her fly, but he wants to, even if, like he fears, she is far better than he'll ever be. Kara's like a storm, swirling round and picking up things in her wake, and all he knows is that he wants to be part of it. She's alive in ways he's never known before, never even felt a hint of until he'd seen her through that doorway of her apartment, until they huddled together sharing secrets, fears, and shots. Already he's certain he'd give up every other moment of his life if he could have one wish: for her to not belong to his brother.

Lee tries to shove away the attraction, beautiful in a way that is more than skin deep. He pushes away the draw he feels to her… and then she's daring him from her own drunken stupor, to take her, right there on that table. "Double dog dare?" He laughs as he repeats her words. Nothing makes sense, but he lets instinct guide him, crawling over her as she backs up along the table, sprawled out like a Gods damned feast.

Like him, she doesn't know what she's doing. It's like that night in the bar all over again, half of her saying no while the other half is screaming: Yes, Gods yes. Except this time it isn't Zak's hand on her knee, his smile across from her. It's his brother between her thighs and Kara can't think about how only hours earlier, Zak had been there, pounding himself inside of her while she cried out for him. There's just something there with Lee, something she can't explain.

Their lips touch and it's like fire, her body a mix of overwhelming heat and chills, skin breaking out in goosebumps. He tastes like wine and ambrosia, a hint of saltiness leftover from the dinner she'd made and he'd eaten gratefully. Nothing's going to stop her, she wants to feel him inside of her, feel how deep he can go, how his mouth feels pulling at her breast, his hands all over her skin.

Her arm moves back to steady herself a little more, comes in contact with one of their glasses, and even before it hits the floor, Kara can feel the world drop out from under them.

"Something's broken," Zak calls out, half asleep, from across the room after the glass shatters on the floor. He slumps back down, returns to his slumber.

Lee pulls away instantly and so does she, and that heat that was there before is replaced by guilt and shame. They both feel suddenly sober, a stark contrast to only a moment earlier. She gets his coat for him as she wobbles on unsteady legs, her hand extended between them.

"It was nice to meet you, Lee Adama."

"Likewise, Kara Thrace."

They stare across at one another, neither wanting to let the other go, but Zak's sleeping a few feet away. There's no way for it to work or ever make sense, not that either of them even know what the hell it is they feel between them. It's something, though. Something that they both finally and reluctantly let go of.

She listens for the sound of the apartment door shutting after he slowly climbs the stairs, and Kara can't stay still. In seconds, she's in her bedroom, the door closed behind her. Kara's gasping, sitting on her knees, her hands into her floor as she leans forward, trying to make sense.

"What the frak is wrong with me?" She cries without concern for the sounds she makes, just letting herself be. There's something about that man she just let leave, and nothing she does can make her understand it. There's a pull, like they've met before, like in another life they shared a soul and someone cruelly split them in two. It's far different than what she feels for Zak. For this, there's no words.

Kara's like that for a long time, even after her tears have dried and her eyes have lost focus on the floor. She's never been sure of who she is outside of a cockpit, but now she's even less sure than before. What did she almost do to Zak, to the man who loves her? How betrayed would he feel if he ever knew what she'd practically begged for while he slept a couple of feet away? She's felt shame of various levels all throughout her life, but this takes the cake. Tops the list. Finally, Kara has something good in her life, and like everything else, she ruins it just the same.

Zak comes stumbling in hours later and finds Kara asleep on the bedroom floor. He laughs, still drunk, and rather than try to pull her up into bed with him, he tugs the blanket off her bed, curls himself around her, and falls asleep until morning.

—

Sunrise comes and Kara groans, rolling over into the hard wall of Zak's chest. She lets herself enjoy it for the moment until the night comes back to her in clips. On her lips and tongue, Kara swears she can still taste Lee. So she does the only thing she knows how to do, presses her mouth to Zak's neck, works her hand inside his jeans until he's waking with a moan despite his hangover. Kara straddles his legs.

"Want you to frak me," she says plainly, desperate to bury the thoughts of his brother with new memories of him. Kara continues to stroke, finally popping the button of his pants for an easier reach.

"My head feels like it's going to explode."

"Don't care, Zak."

"Should we get off the floor first?"

Kara shakes her head, trying not to lose her focus as she attempts to get him hard. If he's not inside of her soon, she's going to lose it. Zak joins in the festivities with enough incentive, helping her to pull his underwear and jeans down low enough on his hips to get himself free. Any more movement than that, he doesn't have the energy for. Kara takes her own pants and briefs off, and without preamble, impales herself on him and his newfound hardness. It's slow and lazy and Kara doesn't get release, but for now, it's enough. It has to be.

—

In Lee's absence, life returns to normal. Kara makes a vow with herself not to think of Zak's brother as anything more than a stranger and a Viper jock. The events of that night never happened as far as she's concerned. If she tells it to herself enough times, she's sure she'll start to believe it as fact rather than fiction. Is one brief moment in time enough to ruin what she's been building for months with Zak? It would've been a frak, a quick frak, that's all. She knows it, believes it, and reminds herself of all the reasons why she's in love with the person she sees day in and day out.

Zak insists Lee come to visit a few more times, and Kara's surprised by how little there is between her and his brother. Lee, it seems, is following her own rules as well, and pretending their incident on the table never occurred. For awhile, they're a trio, a group of friends that go to the bar and play pyramid in one of the parks on the other side of Delphi. There's a movie, even a weekend trip to their grandfather's house out by the lake, and somewhere along the way it all stops being so difficult. As long as Zak's near, her mind never wanders, so Kara never lets him stray far from her.

—

They return to her apartment from a late night on campus, a date with the sims in the final weeks before his flight test, and as usual, Zak stays at her place. He'll catch hell for it eventually, for not being around one very early morning when there's a drill or something similar, but until then, he'll continue to take that risk. Kara showers first and when Zak finishes his, he catches her propped up in bed, drowning herself in a small notebook he's seen her with from time to time.

"What're you writing?"

"Mm, nothing," she says sleepily, closing the book around her pen and setting it to the side. Out of sight. Out of mind.

"Can't get away with it that easy." Zak snatches it up in his grasp and she only pretends to put up a fight in trying to grab it away from him. He's determined, though, and Kara relents quickly, though she's looking sheepish when he glances back to her. "Can I?"

She nods in response, and with her permission, Zak opens to the page where the pen is wedged, reading over the freshly inked words. "Methodically smoking my cigarette. Every breath I breathe out the day. With every delicious sip I drink away the night. Stroking my hair to the beat of his heart. Watching a boy turn into a man." At first, he isn't sure what he's seeing, brows furrowing as he takes them in again, this time silently in his own head. When he looks to her, his eyes are watered. "This is about me?"

Kara's afraid of the expression he wears, but soon she realizes it's not sadness, not in the least. "It's always about you," she says quietly, and what happened with his brother has become the furthest thing from her mind. Between that memory and her, she's erected a wall, and she won't let it hurt her or Zak anymore. This is the man she loves.

Zak leans into her, the book tossed aside, and captures her lips with his own. It's hot and heavy, and just as his hand's about to press at her breast, he stops, pulling away as he shakes his head.

"Zak?"

"What am I going to do if I fail basic flight?" Her written words have only been a temporary suspension from the true troubles that plague his own mind. He's at the bottom of the class, he knows it, even with how much work they've put in together. In some ways, he thinks it might be freeing to fail out, to finally be without the obligation and have an excuse to pursue life elsewhere. But that sting of failure, of disappointment in his father's and brother's eyes, Zak knows it's worth a life lived by someone else's rules than to have to actually feel those gazes upon him.

"You won't." Kara inclines herself into him instead, stroking his cheek. She's had her own similar worries as well, but has pushed them aside in the hope that the future will bring what he needs. "You're a good pilot, Zak, you just need to get a feel for it." Kara knows it isn't something one can earn over time, it's something you have or you don't. But if anyone can find it for him, if anyone in the history of the universe can bring it out in someone else, she knows it's her. "Maybe I'm being too much of a distraction."

"I'd have flunked out months ago if it wasn't for you."

"Everything you have, you've earned it." She isn't just speaking about flying.

Zak pulls at her arms until they're chest to chest, mouth open as he feels her tongue trace across his lower lip then dip into him. He can't remember what life was like before her and doesn't want to try. In a few weeks, he'll be finished, whether he passes his flight test or not. Either way, whatever the damage and repercussions, he'll have her. Once and for all they won't be forced to keep their relationship to themselves. There will be nothing to make this any less than what it is.

He watches as she sits up and pulls her shirt off, bare breasted as she lets the item of clothing fall where it may. The way she looks at him, has looked at him ever since that first night, makes him pause. Zak knows how lucky he is. He's always known, even growing up in a house of privilege thanks mostly to his mother's family and the money she comes from. He's not wanted for much in his life except his father, though Lee filled that role for him as best as his older brother could. With Kara though, he's found that final piece of his life, and there isn't a chance in hell he's about to let it go.

Kara's smiling coquettishly, just waiting for him to be tempted to make the first move, something he's proven in the past he can't ever resist when she's taken most of her clothes off. There's a chill in the air and it bathes her skin, but she doesn't care or think about it because just the touch of his hand to her wrist makes her feel warm. "What?" She asks, drawn in.

"Will you marry me?"

Her first instinct is to laugh, and she does, because to her there's no way he could be serious. What they have, it's perfect, and for once in her life Kara knows what it's like to be happy. Genuinely happy. Never before has she thought she'd be the marrying type, the word hardly even existing on her radar. The only examples of marriage she's ever seen up close haven't been the happiest, and Kara knows that even his own parents' marriage suffered a similar fate. Still, there's a feeling in her gut she can't quite place when she hears the word in his own voice in her head, repeating it over and over. Marry.

"I'm serious," Zak sits up and now all parts of their skin are in contact, their legs, their arms. "I want to marry you."

He touches her face, palm over her cheek and thumb under her eye, and Kara doesn't understand his action until she realizes her skin's wet with tears she didn't even know she'd shed.

"Why would you want to marry me?"

"Why wouldn't I?" Her tears are reflected in his brown eyes and he makes no move to brush them away, unable to take his attention from Kara. "I know I'm young—we're young—but I already know. I know I'm going to be with you for the rest of my life, so why do I have to wait?"

"You're crazy," she whispers. It's all the volume she can get out.

"Yeah, but so are you. It works."

Kara laughs again, this time it's smaller and not a knee jerk reaction to the unknown. All she does is nod into his hand still at her cheek. "Okay." If she thinks about it, she'll never agree to it in the end, but this is one part of her life she knows she can't talk herself out of. She just has to feel it. "I'll marry you, Zak. Okay."

He kisses her mouth. Her jaw. Her neck. The patch of skin behind her ear. Each closed eyelid. Even her hair, just listening to her laughter tinged with her tears. "You'll be my wife," he says, elated, and pulls back just enough to take a look at her face. "I'll be your husband."

Kara nods along to each of his statements. She feels detached from herself, floating outside her body as she listens to him prattle on about the future he's been planning without her. She doesn't even care, suddenly she wants it all.

Zak pushes her back until she's lying across their bundle of blankets and sheets and like so many times before, he's above her looking down. "I can ask for leave from wherever I get posted while you're off between classes." He kisses the underside of one of her breasts. "We'll get married down by the river outside Caprica City where my grandfather used to take Lee and I fishing. Go on holiday for as long as we can get away. Somewhere warm?" Zak asks and kisses her navel, eyes on her.

He's like a child, the excitement pouring off of him and it's infectious. "Canceron. Take me to the beaches there." Just like that, she's participating in the dream too.

"Canceron." Zak nods in affirmation and the decision's made. Whether they're married in a month or a year, Canceron is where they'll go. "We can get our own place, Kara. A little bigger. A house maybe." How they'd afford it, he doesn't know. Pilot salaries don't exactly pay a ton, especially low ranking. But this is the dream, and money doesn't matter right now.

"A house?" She strokes over his hair.

"Mmhmm." Zak dips his head down and kisses low on her belly, just above the waistband of her underwear. "We'll have children, too." They've never talked about it, not in the slightest except the brief moment in time a few months earlier when she'd mentioned having to get her birth control shot again.

"You want them?" There's a thread of worry in her voice, but she keeps it back. For the whole of her sexually active life, her priority has been avoiding that outcome altogether. It's an odd thought to consider anything else, all her issues with her mother and her father aside. For now, the hurt that's been brought on her in the past doesn't matter. Being with him is like starting over.

"Only if you do."

She doesn't want the idea to die out just yet so she smiles and pushes him on. "Girls? Boys?"

"I don't care. A million of them. I want them to look like you, want to hold them in my arms, fall asleep night after night with my hand on your stomach, fight with you about names." He's known from a young age that he wanted to be a father, but it surprises him how easy all the details come out without no prior conscious thought. "I won't miss their lives like my father did." Zak moves back over her and it's almost like he's drunk, intoxicated on the decision they've made.

"No, you won't."

"Frak," he says all of a sudden, and sits up, straddling her hips on his knees. "I'll get you a real ring, Kara, but for now…" Zak pulls at the ring on his pinky, the plain silver band he's worn with him for most of his life.

"I don't need another," she protests.

"You deserve it." He takes her left hand and slides the loop of metal onto her ring finger, but it's far too loose and with a large gap of space remaining. "Frak that," he laughs, embarrassed for how little he's prepared.

Kara finishes the process for him and moves it over to her thumb where it fits snug. She won't lose it if it's there. Her hand forms into a fist and her other one curls around it, holding it to her chest like it's something precious and to be protected.

Zak takes her in, sprawled across the bed, her short hair in disarray around her. This is the woman he's going to spend the rest of his life with. "Kara Adama."

All she can do is smile. "Zak and Kara Adama."

—

On Monday, she finally gives him a call sign. She calls him River in honor of part of the dream he's painted for them. It's a name, that unlike most others, he doesn't mind to bear.

—

The rest of his classmates are celebrating, rushing out the door to head to the nearest bar downtown. It's the middle of the day, but it's tradition, their superior officers turning the other way, allowing the moment of happiness where they can get it. Graduation is around the corner for those who have passed, and soon enough they'll all be learning of their assignments, however far away from home it may put them.

Zak's on the phone as soon as it's free, dialing up the number of where he knows he can reach his mother. She's happy, although Zak detects that hint of something else in her voice. Another man in her life she's lost to the fleet. His father's the next one to call, and he waves off his friends as they yell and beg with him to get going, but in the end he just blindly promises to meet them there when he finishes. There isn't a beer in the world good enough to make him miss out on the call he's making. He's not surprised that he can't connect to his father in the end; the call to his quarters on Galactica goes unanswered. He tries for the ship in general, but he's informed his father's in the middle of a shift in the CIC on the battlestar and can't be interrupted by private calls. It's a familiar disappointment.

He's talking with Lee when there's a knock at the door, and his eyes lift up to catch the sight of the one person he didn't expect. Kara. "Listen, Lee, I've got to go. You know how it is—got to meet some friends. I promise not to get picked up for a drunk and disorderly." Zak's focus is on the woman that's been his fiancee for all of a few weeks as she approaches. Everything he has right now, he owes to her. "Thanks, it means a lot," he continues, "Maybe I'll start breaking your records now. Love you. See you at graduation."

Zak sets the phone on the receiver and without hesitation, throws his arms around Kara, lifting her feet off the ground as he hugs her tight. She squeals in his arms, laughing, her head tossed back as she shares in his jubilation. "We did it," he finally says, lowering her to the ground as he kisses her hard. When he pulls back, she's smiling so bright it's like all the suns of the Twelve Colonies combined into one. It's a sight she reserves for him. This is why he loves her.

"You did it," Kara corrects him and there's a softness to her eyes that Zak immediately recognizes: pride. "How's it feel, River?"

"Let's get out of here," he whispers against her ear, kissing the lobe.

"You've got to celebrate."

His hand seeks out hers, fingers tangled together as his thumb soothes over her own and the metal band that now sits there, the same one that he used to wear. In a show of bravery, she's not removed it since she put it on. Though there's little chance someone will notice that the ring he wore is gone and has since reappeared on her hand, it still means the world to him to see it. "I'm celebrating with you first. I can be late."

Kara glances to the door and the empty bunk beds around them. Before she can look back, he's already undressing her.

They make love in the time that follows. Afterward, still breathing heavy, Zak drags his finger along the edge of her ear, memorizing her exactly as she is. He needs to commit this, all of this, to memory. Kara pushes him onto his back and supports her weight on her arm as she participates in his process too, her fingerprint brushing against his lower lip before she kisses between his brows in the gentlest move of the afternoon.

"I want you to tell me the truth about something," Zak says as he watches her cross from his bed towards his open locker. This is the very first time she's seen where he sleeps and spends his time when he's not with her.

She knows what he's asking before he even finishes. Kara drinks from his bottle of water, turning away from the picture hanging in his locker of her and him and his brother. "You passed," her wrist rubs away the extra drops of water from her mouth, shoulders shrugging as she tries to play it cool. "By the skin of your teeth, but you passed."

"I don't want any special treatment. Not from my father, certainly not from you." As he thinks back to the day before, specifically the minutes of his final qualifying test, Zak knows he shouldn't have come out with a passing mark. At least on his end, he's counted the mistakes he felt in his own flying. He can do the math, add them up. There were one too many maneuvers gone wrong for him to ever have earned his wings on his own. If she tells him otherwise, though, he'll believe it. Chalk it up to a head too cloudy with nerves to remember it correctly and trust her judgement.

Kara doesn't even hesitate as she returns to his bed, kneeling beside him. Thank the Lords that he's got the bottom bunk. "Zak, I'm a flight instructor. I'm not going to send you to Vipers if I don't think you've got the chops, okay?" This happiness he's wearing, she knows he's earned it and that she's given it to him. She's already replayed back his flight test in her head and on video a thousand times the prior night when making her final grades. It was close, she knows. On the cusp. How could she break his heart for something so close? How could she spend her life with him, knowing she was the one to take this away? Before she'd fallen asleep alone the night before, she'd made peace with her choice. She would pass him, give him what he deserved. Maybe this is the one thing in her life she's ever done right.

Zak nods, and like her, he's found his own peace with it. "Okay."

With both of their consciences cleared, Zak makes love to her again and fills his head with the sounds of her crying out around him.

—

While she gets dressed afterward, Zak writes a letter to his father and gives it to her to take a look at. In it, she reads, he invites his father to his graduation, confesses the nature of their relationship, and mentions that he and her have a surprise for him. He'll tell him about it when he sees him next.

Zak bends down to where she sits, kisses her cheek as she folds up the letter for him. "He'll love you."

—

Bill Adama misses his son's graduation in the end. It breaks Zak's heart that his father can't find the time to see him get his wings. It isn't just that burn, though, it's the sting left by the fact that his father isn't there to meet the woman to be his wife either. He settles for introducing her to his mother and an evening of drinks between him, Kara, and Lee. They'll celebrate without the Commander. His absence doesn't ache so much with her and his brother beside him.

—

Zak gets his assignment to serve aboard the Battlestar Solaria the week after he receives his wings and Lieutenant Junior Grade pins. It's also the same day he and Kara go out together locally for the first time, unconcerned with being caught for their relationship. He's not her student now, and she's sure they've covered their tracks enough so there's no proof that their relationship started long before his graduation. They celebrate together and Kara tells him about her days on the Triton and just what she did to get kicked off. Zak promises not to follow in her footsteps.

They have a few weeks before he has to leave and she has to start training her new class of nuggets, so they let themselves just get lost in one another as long as they can. If they're going to be spending months apart, they have to make up for the time missed now. For awhile they consider eloping, making their marriage permanent before he goes away, but even they don't tempt the Gods. Being caught at dinner together shortly after graduation is one thing, but to laugh in the faces of their superior officers with a marriage certificate is another thing entirely.

They'll settle for the ring on her finger and the promise that when he returns home, they'll do it then. Nothing big, she makes him promise. Something small with a priestess to bless their union. It isn't something Zak or his family really believes in, but he knows how much it means to her, and he would give her anything she asked for, whether it was within his means or not. If she wants a blessing from the Lords of Kobol for their marriage, she'll get it.

When the day comes for him to leave, Kara can't make herself begin to consider the reality of it. She lays in bed watching him pack—he's long since moved in all his belongings and even started chipping in on the rent—unable to help him along. If she does, she rationalizes, it's like she's getting rid of him, and the last thing she wants him to do is go.

"We can go play tackle pyramid. Break your leg, get you some time off."

Zak does his best to neatly fold both sets of his duty blues up so they won't wrinkle while in transit. "Are you going to take care of me?"

"In every way." Kara smiles and keeps her eyes on him as their closet slowly empties out. He won't be taking everything with him. There's no need for him to have any civilian wear while he's up there, but there will still be a gap of space where he used to belong.

"What if I'm pregnant? Can't you tell them I'm bed ridden and need you?"

"You're not, are you?" He knows she's joking, but still has to ask.

"No, but we've got twenty minutes. We could practice… a few times."

It gives him pause, and pushing another set of tanks into his bag, the corner of his mouth quirks. He pulls at his belt, releasing the piece of metal that locks it into place. "Let's hurry then."

—

Kara can still smell both of them on her skin when they pull up at the transfer station. He'll have a long few days ahead of him, traveling from one planet to the next before he finally ends up on the Solaria with the other new additions to the ship's crew. They've cut it close and there's no time to waste, so they gather his duffel and cut across the parking lot to where the other bodies linger, waiting to board the military ships sitting on the airstrip.

"You'll be okay," she reassures him, straightening the collar of his green fatigues for him. It's mostly for her benefit though, and when she looks up to Zak, her eyes are coated in a thick sheen of tears.

"I will. And so will you." His fingers push through her hair, resting against her scalp. "I'm coming back. Just a few months." It's become their mantra over the last few days, a way to cope with the inevitable. He takes one of her hands with his other, repeats the familiar pattern of stroking over the ring at her thumb. "I'll always be with you. You've got my ring."

Kara's fingers curl into a fist around his, squeezing his hand tighter than she's ever held the stick of a Viper. He'll be safe. She trained him herself. He knows what he's doing. He'll be safe. "I've got something for you," she chokes out and releases his hand to pull something from her pocket. It's a small sheet of paper, folded in half.

Zak doesn't have to read it to know what it is. It's that poem she wrote months ago. "I'll keep it with me every time I fly," he says and folds it again, slipping it into the breast pocket of his shirt. "So you'll be with me too."

She breaks at that, her face crinkling as she loses what little restraint she once held over herself for the day. There's no stopping the heavy sobs, the tears, the sound of her cries from the back of her throat as she buries her face into him. He pulls her close and it only makes it worse, reminding of the feel of his arms around her that she won't have until Gods know when, until the powers that be grant him leave to return home. There's an irrational fear inside her, created by the experiences of her past, that if she lets him go he won't ever come back. But Zak isn't her father. He keeps his promises, and in six months time at most, he'll be with her again. They'll have phone calls and letters to tide them over in the mean time. It'll have to do.

They're stuck like that until the intercom makes the call for the ship he's been waiting for. He's the one to pull back, but it doesn't last long because he has to feel her lips against his one more time.

"You've got to go," Kara uses the sleeves of her shirt to wipe at her eyes.

"I've got to go." He says the words but doesn't follow through, kissing her again until the final warning sounds. "I love you Kara Thrace."

She raises her voice and shouts, hoping it carries over the distance already between them. "I love you Zak Adama."

Zak smiles, lifts his hand, and waves. Then, he's gone.

—

She gets a call from him when he arrives on Solaria, but he doesn't have long. They're sending him on a mission in a few days, he says, to break him into the fleet. Kara wishes him luck, and because it's tradition, she doesn't tell him to be safe. She tells him good hunting.

Later in the week, Kara wakes in the middle of the night, her heart pounding for a reason she can't explain. On the fringes of her mind she can remember an unsettling dream, recalls the feel of her skin burning and the pain accompanying it. The sweat coating her skin suddenly makes sense. She cuts across her bedroom and pulls one of Zak's shirts off the hanger in the closet, slips her arms through the sleeves and buttons it up over her otherwise undressed form. There's no falling asleep even with the scent of him surrounding her, so she takes out a pad of paper from her nightstand and starts to write down her current stream of thoughts. Another letter to seal up and mail like the few she's already written in the week he's been gone. They're in the mail and won't reach him for days, but it offers relief, like he's there beside her even when he's not.

Kara tells him about the painting she finally started for him. He'd requested it so long ago and only in his absence has she found the time to start painting what comes to her when she dreams about him and the promise of the life they've got coming to them both. The letter keeps her up until morning when Kara finally abandons it and rests her head into the pillow Zak had been using as his own.

Just as she's about to reach sleep, she hears the distant ring of the phone. Though she tries to ignore it, she can't. It isn't the loud shrill of the ringer that's keeping her awake, it's something else, a sudden queasiness in her gut as she listens. She forces herself up, limbs heavy with exhaustion carrying her out towards the kitchen where the phone rests on its cradle. On her way, the fingers of her left hand curl up, rubbing against the metal of his ring, a comfort she finds herself seeking more and more since Zak left her behind.

She picks up the phone and tries not to notice the tremor in her hand. "Hello?"

There's silence on the other end until she hears the quiver of a shaky breath. "Kara?"

It's Lee and just by the one word, she can tell something's wrong. There's strain in his voice.

"Yeah, Lee?" She hears it but it doesn't sound like her voice. Kara's not sure how she knows. Maybe it's the hour at which he's calling or the fact that he's calling at all when he knows his brother isn't there. They've become friends, but mostly by way of the person they share in common. Something's happened. She wishes to the Gods she didn't know, but she does. One by one, every dream she and Zak talked about is ripped away. First the children, then the house. There's no trip to Canceron, no priestess to marry them. 'Down by the river,' he'd argued for. He won't be coming back in three months or six months or a year. Kara's body knows he won't be coming back. Not ever.

"There's been an accident. Zak… He's dead, Kara. His ship crashed four hours ago. He's gone."

She doesn't bother to hang up the phone and later she'll wonder how she didn't cry. As she steps away from the phone dangling from its cord, she can barely hear Lee's voice fading out, his words lost on deaf ears. To her right she sees his painting on the floor, half finished. It'll never be done now, because she always saw it in the hallway of whatever apartment or home they'd claim for their own. Now there's no reason for it, no purpose if he isn't there to hang it himself.

Beside it there's an older painting, concentric circles of yellow and red and blue, the familiar mandala she's painted her whole life. At the top of her stairs there's a painting of similar design, and rotting in garbage dumps across the Colonies there's more. She's left a trail of them her entire life.

Kara grabs a few small containers of paint in her arms, carries them to the nearby table. Her movements become less controlled, more frantic as each second ticks by, and as she's pouring globs of thick paint into old metal take out trays, her hands are shaking. She doesn't dare stop, and on the barest wall of her apartment, Kara draws a large sweeping circle of yellow paint with the biggest brush she owns. The edges are uneven but she pays it no mind, it isn't about precision here. The brush isn't fast enough for her, so she dips her hand into the yellow paint, completes the path she wants. Red follows. Blue. Swirls of color drip on her floor, down her arms and bare legs, and on the white shirt that belongs to Zak and is buttoned up around her. She sees nothing else.

She outlines each inner circle in black and before she knows it, she's stretching her arm as high as it will go, the tip of her finger smearing letter after letter in black paint along the wall. Kara steps back, drinking in the mix of color and letters, words belonging to the poem she's written long ago and the only other copy of which is crushed against Zak's corpse somewhere. Wherever he is.

To her left, Kara sees someone beside her and she tilts her head in their direction. How they got in without her hearing or why they're there at all, she can't even begin to think about. This slip of time won't be in her consciousness later anyway. He's a man of average height, thin and wiry. Blue eyes and blonde hair. A face she doesn't know, but in the years to come, she will. She's not alarmed by his presence, doesn't even care, just relaxes in the calm he seems to give her.

"He'll be waiting for you," the man says, and nods his head towards the fresh paint on her walls. "When you go, don't be scared, Kara Thrace, he'll be on the other side to take you."

Kara looks towards the wall, then back to where the man stood, but he's gone now, like he never existed at all. All at once she can see the next few years of her life before her eyes. There's a funeral. An old battlestar, long past her prime. Tears in her eyes every night she falls asleep. There's Lee, back from the dead himself. The end of the worlds, but she doesn't even care. The feel of flying. An ache in her knee. Making love in the sand and dirt to a man she already knows, felt was torn from the same cloth in a previous life. A marriage down by another river on a grey planet she doesn't recognize. The cage of a familiar prison and blood spilled at her hands day in and day out. Then there's the mandala, swirling and churning, alive before her. Kara closes her eyes and she can feel herself go in, a pull at every inch of her skin as she's drawn to it. And on the other side, Zak's there, smiling just like he has a million times before. Welcoming her home.

The tears finally fall when she can feel his arms around her, hear his voice in her ears. There's nothing about any of this she'll remember tomorrow, but she wants to take it with her. She falls to her knees and with her eyes clenching tight and her chest heaving, Kara finally finds the words.

"I'm coming Zak, I'm coming."