A/N: There's a loop of 45 minutes between Lee's good-byes with a smiling and playful Dee and the heart-wrenching morgue scene. Somewhere within that timeframe Lee must've contemplated the idea of personal hope and happiness, alongside that of humanity's, for the very last time.

Disclaimer: None of the characters, situations, plot-lines mentioned and/or alluded to belong to me. BSG belongs to Ronald D. Moore et al. Scarlett O'Hara belongs with Rhett Butler and to Margaret Mitchell.

And all our yesterdays…*

He didn't quite exaggerate confessing to Dee of having no idea what to do next. The shock will wear off by tomorrow, together with the soothing lull of his rhetoric, and the panic will settle firmly in. To say, that managing the Quorum, the media gang and the entire Gods damned fleet in the combined state of impending doom, frustration induced anger and shattered dreams fueled depression is gonna be a royal bitch, was an understatement of the millennium.

Nor had he the foggiest where they were supposed to go from here – navigation-wise, that is. He's been contemplating their political and cultural route for quite a while now. The Twelve Colonies were gone for good. The Thirteenth Colony – a post-apocalyptic wasteland. There was literally nothing left, to ground state and society on henceforth. And therein lay the danger. Shining beacons of hope have been proved severely overrated lately, but if Dee believed he could guide them to safety, be it military or political, he sure as Hades could believe it too.

Dee… He felt himself grin at the inward image of her smiling and waving coyly before disappearing into the hatch. She was a bit tipsy and kissed him. And said she was proud. He made a mental note that he rather liked tipsy and proud. Coy and kissing too, if he were honest. More honest still, he was a bit tipsy himself, and, from the overall feel of it, more than a bit infatuated. Gods, he missed that woman! And needed her back now more than he's ever allowed himself to admit. But above all, he was awed by her apparent willingness to consider them back… It felt… tantalizing.

He reminded himself to furrow – he was not supposed to feel tantalized upon witnessing humanity's ultimate hope in irradiated ruins, was he? A sigh escaped unwillingly, followed by a barely concealed yawn, fatigue of the last hectic days finally getting to him. He'd better call it a night, for, Earth or no Earth, tomorrow will be a new and busy day.

He'll have to initiate the extra-curricular Quorum meeting. Maybe, once President Roslin has slept on it, she'll summon the will to address the delegates and the media gang, to second his outlined prospect to start searching and rebuilding from scratch. If they got it right this time, it might not even matter all that much if they even had an actual world to settle onto. They might, in fact, become the first vagabond civilization out there, a fleet-society of explorers making it to the universe farthest frontier ever.

He stifled another yawn and stretched, musing dreamily what Dee would've said to this. Right, he'll run the idea by her tomorrow. Over a drink, or a dinner together, perhaps. She'll regard him pensively, with a knowing smile, tilt her head and call him on having roamed his Old Man's adventure classics library far too studiously for far too long. He'll grin sheepishly, guilty-as-charged, and will make a lame pun out of being that easy to read. She'll fall into their little interplay and score him another smile – affectionate and laced with mischief. Which will have been the whole point right away… Yeah, tomorrow is another day…


*Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow

Creeps in this petty pace from day to day

To the last syllable of recorded time,

And all our yesterdays have lighted fools

The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle.

Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player

That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,

And then is heard no more. It is a tale

Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,

Signifying nothing.

(W. Shakespeare, Macbeth. Act V, scene v)