Author's Note: Thank you again to everyone who leaves comments – you folks are great. And now we're on to Episode Five…
It is completely M-Rated for violence, death, sex, adult themes etc. Also, there's a trigger warning for the beginning of this chapter, which covers the topic of suicide.
It's mainly focused on Lee and Starbuck with Romo as a secondary focus, and the characters will be going to some (relatively IMO) dark places, which is always fun :D
This chapter and some/all of the others will be much shorter than my previous chapters, because if I don't cut them in half they total 8,000 words or more each and it would take forever to get them finished and posted with the slow state of my writing at the moment. I've only just finished chapter two, instead of being my usual episode ahead and it grates on me *headdesk* Posting this way you'll get updates more often, at least. I'm still writing the episode in the format of six separate parts, but each part will be divided in two when I post. Anyway,
Enjoy!
# # #
Setting Up the Pieces – Part OneLeon's breakfast sat untouched beside him as his fingers quietly shredded the sheet he had stripped from his bed. The threadbare material parted easily in long strips, and his lips moved as he worked, murmuring prayers, over and over and over. He sat on the cold floor with his back against the door of his cell, so that if a guard looked through the small window set into the door they wouldn't be able to see what he was doing.
"Father, why have you forsaken me? I have tried, tried so hard to make…make her see. But you won't tell me what it is she needs to see. Won't tell me what to…what to say." Leon pleaded with the air in a thin whisper as his fingers nimbly braided the sheet into a short rope, eyes fixed unfocusedly on the growing plait.
The strips were stronger when they were bound together. That was a good metaphor for life. A very good metaphor. Stronger when they were bound. Leon had tried to bind her to him, but she had resisted. He wove the strips quickly, not knowing if or when an LPO might check on him. Starbuck always resisted. It was in her nature; burning in her eyes like fire, searing her from within. It would burn her up one day if she didn't learn to control it, to temper it – it would consume her in a righteous holy conflagration.
Leon sighed and shook his head, the small gesture full of regret. Starbuck would never go quietly, not with him. Never surrender. She had always fought. But then sometimes that had been part of the fun. Leon smirked, humming tunelessly under his breath as he wove his hangman's rope. His mind wandered, skipped and danced over the stepping-stones in the stream, watching the shimmering reflections in the water.
"Prophecy is never wrong. Except… Sometimes maybe it is…mistaken?" Leon asked, head tilted to the side, but no answer came. No answer ever came anymore, no matter if he was alone where no one else could hear. It was all just silence, a dreadful, unbearable silence, and so he filled it with his own voice. Sometimes Leon got lost and couldn't remember what was real anymore; what he had been told, what he had seen, and what his own mind had made up. It was a terrible problem. But not for much longer. He smiled, down at the thin dirty greyish strips of sheet, weaving in and out and around and through. Remembered.
"You're going to hold me in your arms, you're going to embrace me, you're going to tell me that you love me. I've seen it."
He snorted softly, humour laced with the sharp sting of failure. He had been so sure at the time, so determined and convinced. But it was never going to happen, not to him. Not to Leon. He had seen wrong. It can't have been prophecy. Or if it had, it must have…he didn't know any more. Anyway, now, at the end – the true end, the forever end, it didn't seem to matter so much anymore. The longing had faded from a consuming obsession to a simple, bittersweet sadness.
Finally the rope was finished and Leon nodded, jerked on it vigorously to test its strength. The thin material, bound tightly together, held strong. Was it the binding or the together that made it strong? Could you even have one without the other? Intrinsically linked. He fashioned a slipknot, smiling to himself.
"I loved you, Kara Thrace."
Leon tied one end of the short homemade rope around the high, round door handle. It was the highest thing in the room that would hold his weight, and he could rig the rope to a length that meant simply sitting down would cause enough tension to kill him. Only two kilos of pressure were required to compress the jugular veins – five kilos to compress the carotid artery – and compression would cause loss of consciousness within around fifteen seconds. Death could occur at any point within a range of two to twenty minutes.
It would be rather undignified, dying by hanging himself off a door handle, but it would do. He would not be here to see the indignity, would not be here to care. He would be gone – a salmon, swimming up the stream perhaps. Returning to the stream. Or at least, that was what he hoped.
Leon went up on his knees and carefully placed the noose over his head, snugged it around his neck. He wished he could leave a suicide note, but he had nothing to write with. It was a terrible thing, to have to leave this world without saying your parting farewell. His fingers twitched over a short length of rope on the floor.
"My gift to you." Leon said to the stale, empty air of his cell, the image of Kara in his mind's eye. He tried to picture her happy, smiling at him, laughing – the joyous unrestrained sound that he had overheard a handful of times. But all he could summon was the image of her glaring at him; her eyes alight with loathing as she mocked him out on the plains. Yeah, to get killed by me a whole bunch. Some destiny, Leoben. He had held the gun, but she had held the power. She always held the power, she just didn't realise it.
"Is it you killing me this time, Kara? Or this time is it me? Am I making this choice, or is it you? Did you drive me to this? Is this my destiny? Or a mistake? Or just a way out? Forgive me, God. I can't do this anymore. I can't carry your word…she won't listen to me…won't…." Leon muttered muzzily to himself as he shifted on his knees; the floor hard and uncomfortable beneath them. Soon enough he would leave all bodily discomforts behind. Floating down the stream.
Leon wished he could tell Kara this wasn't her fault. He didn't want to hurt her if she blamed herself, and if she was glad…then he didn't want her thinking his death was her achievement. This was his destiny. It was a secession of the pain and the confusion that kept growing in his mind, and a welcomed sinking into oblivion. Permanent rest.
Leon smiled softly.
He sat down.
The rope tightened and pressure wrapped around his throat and throbbed up into his head, built and built; he could feelthe braid of thin, dirty cloth compressing his jugular veins, cutting off the blood flow to his brain.
Lights flashed behind his eyes…ringing sounded in his ears.
It felt…
Everything went…
Dark.
# # #
"Oh gods…oh gods…" Starbuck's fingers slipped over the lean muscles of Lee's arm, curling up over his shoulder and digging into his back as she arched her back and moaned. He thrust and she whimpered and moaned, head tilted back and eyes squeezed so tightly shut that lights flashed behind her eyes.
It felt…
Starbuck's other hand grabbed hold of the pillow beneath her head and squeezed it tightly, balling a corner up in her fist as she gasped for breath and clutched at his back.
"Oh my gods – Lee…" The words came out a stifled plea and Lee thrust harder and she mewled louder, legs clamping around his hips, pelvis tipping toward his. He felt so big, so deep, he filled her like…like she was meant to be…like completion…and still she wanted more, wanted harder, wanted…
"Oh gods."Starbuck's flesh twitched around his cock – she was wet and hot and pulsing as he slid in and out, her nerves so sensitised that every thrust felt like torture. And she craved it – and, and…it pushed her over the edge. Starbuck let out a shivering low moan as she started to come and both her hands clutched at Lee's shoulders, fingers clawing into him reflexively. Her orgasm rolled over her – the fourth time since he had woken her with a kiss and a squeeze of her ass – and some how it was more intense than the other three put together. It felt like her body was shaking apart at the seams, convulsing and twitching and almost hurting deep inside. She opened her eyes and watched him as she came; Lee's sun browned skin was sheened with sweat and his teeth indented his lower lip as he frakked Starbuck through her orgasm – his head bent and eyes slitted half-shut, grinding himself into her just the way she liked.
And then the intensity began to ease and her orgasm ebbed away, leaving her throbbing and tender and so exquisitely aware of his cock.
"Ohmigods Lee." The words fell scrambled and slurred from Starbuck's lips, and she let out a choked half-sob half-moan.
"Good?" Lee asked smugly, his sharp eyes flitting to Starbuck's. She smiled like the cat that got the cream, lazy and heavy-lidded as he moved within her – slower and gentler now. Starbuck pulled him down closer to her, his weight on her, pushing her into the bed, heavy and solid and somehow so godsdamned hot.
"Frak yes…" she breathed and held up a hand, wiggled four fingers.
"Four?" Lee's eyes widened with surprise and she nodded, smirking and actually blushing a little – not that Lee would be able to tell. She was hot and flushed all over from the sex, skin sticky and limbs shaky.
"Four." Starbuck murmured confirmation, squirming under him and squeaking out a moan as he thrust harder. A wicked smile spread over Lee's face and he grinned at her, dropping a kiss on the corner of her mouth, his lips warm and soft.
"I still haven't come yet, you know." He raised an eyebrow, waggled them both.
"Uh huh." A breathless little waver of acknowledgement and anticipation, the pit of her stomach fluttering, making her fingers twitch involuntarily where they lay now on his forearms.
"I'm just gonna have to keep frakking you 'til I come."
"Uh…uh huh."
"Glad you understand," Lee replied, quiet and rough with a smile lingering, which faded as he began to move harder and faster inside her again. It felt overwhelming; Starbuck was so over-sensitised that she could feel too frakking much. She mewled and writhed and her hands blindly searched for something to grab onto, to anchor her. Lee was balanced on just one elbow over her, his weight half crushing her breasts against his chest and his free hand gripping the curve of her hip, kneading her flesh and holding her still as he frakked her. Harder and faster and it was too much, too much her head was spinning and – oh gods it felt like she was going to catch fire or melt or…
"Oh frak yes oh gods Lee please…please…please." Starbuck whimpered a stream of nonsense words, no idea what she was pleading for. Her flesh was swollen and tender, and she couldn't take anymore, but oh frak it was just so good. Starbuck buried her face against Lee's throat, and her fingers wound their way up, into his hair, raking through it roughly, greedily.
"Mmph." Lee made a small muffled sound and his fingers dug cruelly into her hip as he pulled out; Starbuck's hand slipping between their bodies and gripping his cock – slick and wet with her own juices. Her fingers wrapped around it, gliding up and down light and quick, and Lee dropped his forehead to her throat with a gasp, fingers still digging into the swell of her hip. He made a soft moan, stifled by his lips pressing themselves against her skin as he came, hot spatters on her belly.
"Oh." Starbuck exhaled hard as Lee rolled off her, and her muscles went all limp like a rag doll's. She just breathed for a while, and then rolled her head to gaze at Lee lying next to her and he smiled lazily, mellow and contented in the afterglow of orgasm.
"Fun?" she mumbled with a lopsided smile.
"Mmph. Mm hmm," was all Lee managed, and twined his sex-sticky fingers with her own, squeezing.
"Good." Starbuck sighed, chest still rising and falling hard as she stared dazedly up at the ceiling.
"Gods. That was a frak and a half," she said and snorted with weak laughter and Lee squeezed her fingers again emphatically.
"Uh huh."
They lay flopped side by side for a while, and then Starbuck rolled out of bed reluctantly, and washed with the deliciously hot water out of a big pot – nestled in the coals of the fire for that purpose. Clean and damp, she opened the shutters, letting the sun and the warm air stream in and bathe her skin. It was a gorgeous morning – just coming up on nine from the sun's height in the sky. Starbuck luxuriated naked in front of the windows that looked out over toward Landfall, sun warming and drying her skin, acutely aware of Lee's eyes on her as she stretched.
"Breakfast?" she asked him as she dressed in pants and a worn old regulation singlet, and Lee nodded and finally hauled his ass out of bed with a groan.
They ate slightly burnt fried potato-root slices that were left over from last night's dinner, with a couple of strips of dried venison each. The most you could say about it was that it was food, not that Starbuck was fussy.
"Thith ith goot," Lee mumbled through a mouthful of potato, before contorting his face and plucking a large blackened flake of potato skin out of his mouth. Starbuck arched a sceptical eyebrow and he swallowed the potato with a wince and shrugged,
"I'm used to your cooking now."
"Ha. Ha. Ha," Starbuck retorted deadpan.
"It's edible," he pointed out with a wave of his fork,
"Better than the shi…I mean, ah, the ah, whatever it was, the other day. What was that anyway?"
"It was a pie. You know it was a pie," Starbuck ground out. The pie was still a sore spot, even days later. She had spent hours on that pie, and then she'd forgotten about it while it was in the coals, and burnt did not even begin to describe it. The bread that had substituted for pastry had been charred to a crisp, and she'd spent what felt like forever scraping off all the burnt bits so it was edible. He was a frakking asshole, bringing that up again – and then Lee's lips twitched with humour and Starbuck realised the bastard was teasing her.
"That's not frakking funny, Lee. I spent ages on that godsdamned pie, and then…"
"It kind of is. A little bit." Lee gave her a look that was all boyish innocence, and Starbuck rolled her eyes at him but couldn't help smiling, annoyance melting away.
"Is not," she shot back but a feeling of warmth ran through her. This was good. This was what she wanted, what she craved – to be able to be with Lee and have everything easy, happy, comfortable. These moments were still too few and far between, and she clutched each one tight to her chest when they happened. Soaked them up. Although it was getting better. Ever since that day out on the plains – since the lion and Leon – things had been so much better. Most of the time. There were still things… Like not knowing what the hell she actually was even after swallowing her pride and talking to Ellen Tigh last week…and then there was Lee's dissident movement, and his increasingly distant and weird behaviour lately, and Sam… But Starbuck refused to think about those things right now.
"Okay, it's not funny. I'm sorry," Lee was saying, but his lips were still twitching, threatening a smile, and his eyes sparkled at her.
"Just for that, you're doing the dishes." Starbuck got up and dumped her scraped clean plate in the dishwater bucket, dipping some pine needle tea out of the bark kettle over the fire, savouring the scent; familiar and comforting now. Lee's arms slipped around her waist a few moments later; warm and strong, and she leaned back into him, smiling to herself. Yeah. This was good.
"You working today?"
"No, I've got today off. I'm on the early shift with Romo tomorrow." Starbuck paused and bit her lip, debating her next words and how to say them.
"I was wanting to go into Landfall anyway though," she said, a little nervous.
"You mean without me, right?" he asked, with a hint of an edge to his voice and Starbuck stiffened, twisted in his arms so she could look over her shoulder at him.
"Oh godsdamnit, Lee. You always –"
"Shh – it's fine. Go," Lee interrupted, and grinned at her confused expression. This was the one thing they always fought about – Starbuck taking off without Lee. She had been mentally gearing up for a screaming match and the usual name calling and swearing, followed by her storming out in furious tears. She blinked, all the fight taken out of her.
"Really?" She turned around completely, pine needle tea held out to one side, her face kissing distance from Lee's – and she felt like kissing him for not starting an argument.
"Really. Go…drink with Hoshi, or whatever the hell it is you do." He meant it and Starbuck grinned gleefully, delighted,
"Drink with Hoshi – yeah, I reckon I can manage that." She smirked at him and kissed him hard on the lips, ignoring the hot tea sloshing onto her bare foot as the cup tipped unheeded in her hand. Lee tasted of burnt potato-root and tea, and his hand cradled her throat, thumb over her pulse point, warm and rough as he kissed her firmly in return.
# # #
Author's Note: Yay, Lee and Starbuck are having happy sexy times! A Two has offed himself! That's not exactly yay, though… I looked up what happens when one hangs oneself, so the information regarding the suicide in this chapter and later chapters is as accurate as Wikipedia, however accurate that may be.Because this episode is going to become darker, and the characters will be going through/enacting some heavy shit, I'm very interested in knowing whether or not they stay pretty much in character – taking their current circumstances into consideration, of course. BSG really did quite a lot of very dark, intense, emotional stuff, and so I think the tone of this episode (not so much this chapter but it's coming) should fit in with the show's tone but, well, I worry. So advice = good. I'm not much for rewriting I must admit, but I will gladly take advice given and keep it in mind for future episodes at least.
So, you know the drill by now, people. Leave me a review and give me motivation to write more and faster :D The more reviews I get, the quicker the story gets to you!