TITLE: The Heretic
GENRE: Gen/Character piece
SUMMARY: Lee does not believe in prophecy.
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Lee Adama does not believe in prophecy, or dreams, or hidden meanings. Kind of ironic when you thought about it - Apollo the unbeliever.
Apollo was the God of Prophecy, who appeared to Pythia, and granted her the visions that became the Sacred Scrolls.
Every child was taught that in school; that the Gods were watching over them, protecting them, and Apollo more so than all.
Lee had abandoned his belief in such mythical creatures as Gods a long time ago. There were no greater powers dictating his life, unless you included the very human, and very physical, presence of his father. When Lee moved out of home, he stopped going to the Temple. He did not own a set of icons and he never felt the need for it. Religion was simply not part of his life.
It was one of those things about Kara that always amused him, her deep and unquestioning belief in the Gods. But just because he did not believe, did not mean he could not understand why it meant so much to others. You could not grow up in the household of Caroline Adama without understanding the simple power of faith.
Every morning she would get up and go to the Temple to pray. She would drag Lee and Zak along, and to this day, the mere sniff of incense would carry him back to cold dark mornings and sore knees and whispered chants. He had seen the support that faith had given his mother in those hard days when his father had left them and she struggled to raise two small boys on her own.
But Lee was in a minority as an unbeliever. For most in the Colonies religion and prophecy were a major part of life. It was easy to forget that at times. The acceptance of Laura Roslin in the role of the "Dying Leader", and the ease with which that belief had split the Fleet at Kobol reminded him of that. And for the first time in many years, Lee found himself questioning why others were so willing to simply follow without challenge on the basis of prophecy and faith.
How could he explain the Prophecies and the Arrow of Apollo? He was not sure, but he seriously doubted that the ramblings of an Oracle, made thousands of years ago, directly referred to the events on the planet.
That was the thing with prophecy he remembered Grandpa Joe telling him as a child, the words are always vague enough that people can see what they need in it. And add in the sense of desperation, the religious fanaticism of the Geminese, and people were willing to throw their future away on a thousand-year old myth.
After Kobol, instead of being granted a new found sense of faith, Lee was left feeling even more uncomfortable about the whole thing. He simply could not accept that their lives were being dictated by beings on high,and that their actions were pre-determined thousands of years ago. However, it was not something he had had much time to dwell on. The practical aspect of day-to-day survival weighed more on his mind.
Even his own near-death experience had not reignited his faith. No dying, because for a brief few minutes Lee Adama had indeed been dead, had simply confirmed what he always known. There were no Gods, or even a God, no-one was watching over them.
Then came New Caprica, and Lee watched as even the most devout abandoned their beliefs for the promise of a future on the desolate planet below.
Laura, no longer the "Dying Leader", lost her role as President and everyone forgot about the Prophecies and the dream of Earth, lured by Baltar's promise of a new bright new shiny future. Even Kara, who had risked so much to find the Arrow of Apollo, had succumbed and abandoned the Fleet.
So they made a new life; those who elected to leave the Fleet and settle on the planet below and those who stayed behind. It was not much of a life for either. The planet barely hospitable, each day a struggle, and the near-silent, creaking hulks of Battlestars, deserted by most of their crew, those left behind without a purpose anymore.
No one had time or cared for prophecies now, and Lee laughed at the irony of it all, and from his position in the heavens, Apollo, flanked by his father Zeus, watched over those below, and waited for the time when the people would turn to them again.