AN: Thanks to the few of you who took the time to alert and/or review chapter 1 of this story. I'm glad to see it caught a few people's interest. This chapter focuses completely on my original characters and was originally a second section to chapter 1 but I wanted to get the canon characters into chapter 1 a bit so I reorganized. Hope you enjoy.


Three hours after ending her CAP duty, Phoenix was walking through the quiet corridors of the Pisus after initiating the weekly computer security check. Though she usually remained in CIC during the check so that she could be on hand to handle any problems that might arise on Pisus or one of the other three ships in their small fleet but the last few days had been busy ones. Other than breakfast time, she hadn't seen much of her daughter and she really wanted to be the one to tuck Laura Jean in tonight. Besides, most things her military counterparts could handle and if something arose that they couldn't, then she was only a page away. The security check took three hours to run, and she planned on being back before then.

Reaching the guest quarters she still occupied despite technically now being a part of the crew, Phoenix turned the wheel on the hatch and stepped inside. One lone lamp dimly lit the living area of the quarters. The small room where her daughter slept was the only other place light was coming from. As she walked in that direction, she heard voices.

"I miss mommy reading me a bedtime story."

"Your mother's been busy," came Jaina Reese's response. Jaina was nineteen years old and had been hired to help take care of Laura during what was supposed to be at most a two-week stay onboard the Pisus. Needless to say, the position had become more permanent than originally intended. "I'm sure she misses reading you your bedtime story too, and as soon as she can be here, she will be."

"Looks like I'm just in time then," Phoenix interjected, stepping into her daughter's bedroom.

Laura hopped off the bed she had been sitting on and ran toward her mother, a picture clutched in her left hand. Kneeling down, Phoenix met her daughter with open arms, holding the little girl close to her as Laura hugged her.

"You made it!" Laura exclaimed, her voice muffled from her proximity to her mother. "Are you done for tonight?" the little girl asked, not releasing her hold on the older woman.

"Not quite, sweetheart. I just took a break so I can read you a story and tuck you in for the night. So why don't you pick a book and climb in bed."

Laura finally let go of her mother and ran over to the stack of books in the corner. Getting to her feet, Phoenix looked over at Jaina. "How's she been today?"

"Well, that's the first smile I've seen on her face today, Rebecca," Jaina said quietly taking a step closer to her employer and now friend. The two had become each other's confidants over the past six months they had been aboard Pisus. "She's upset her dad won't be around for her birthday and scared that you'll be gone all day too."

"If nothing out of the ordinary pops up, I'll be with her most of the day tomorrow," Rebecca replied. It was her daughter's second birthday and she hoped to spend the day with her daughter. If the Cylons left them alone for another day and no emergencies popped up, she was going to do exactly that. "I've made arrangements to spend some time on Cloud Six," she added, referring to the luxury cruise liner that Pisus had made their escape from the colonies with. Along with Ares and the mining ship Astral Ore, Cloud Six made up the small fleet Pisus was leading through space, in search of a haven, that might not even exist. Though the Cylon attacks seemed to be getting further apart, their enemy didn't seem to be content to just let them go about their own way. Just when they would start to think that perhaps they had finally shook their pursuers, a few more Raiders would appear on DRADIS. "You can either join us or take some time for yourself."

"I think Laura Jean needs the time alone with her mother tomorrow," Jaina replied, with a smile. "In fact, I'm going to slip out to the living quarters now and let you put her to bed for a change."

As Jaina went to walk past Rebecca, the older woman reached out for Jaina's hand. "Thank-you, for all that you do. It makes it easier knowing she's with you when I'm away."

"You're welcome," the teenager replied, with a smile, squeezing Rebecca's hand before slipping out of the room.

"I'm ready, mama," Laura Jean called, having climbed up in bed again.

"Coming, sweetheart," Rebecca replied, smiling herself as she head toward her daughter. Sitting down on the bed next to her daughter, she reached for the selected book. Not surprisingly, Rebecca found that her daughter had selected the collection of fairy tales. Before the Cylons had attacked the colonies, Laura had only let her dad read to her from the book. It had been their special thing for when her daddy was at home. Now, the book was sacred between herself and her daughter. "I'll read you two tonight," she told her daughter.

Laura pouted but didn't argue. "Can they be new ones?"

"Of course," Rebecca replied, turning to the part of the book that contained the fairy tales that had yet to be read.

Relaxing against the headboard, Rebecca started reading the first fairy tale. Though she couldn't make out the words, Laura Jean still looked over her mom's arm at the book while her mother read. Rebecca knew that before too long she would be teaching the inquisitive little girl how to read.

In what seemed like no time to both of them, they came to the end of the second fairy tale. Closing the book, Rebecca looked down at her daughter. "Now it's time for you to climb under the covers and get some sleep. Tomorrow is your birthday, and I have a surprise for you."

Instead of her face lighting up at the mention of a surprise, Laura Jean's mouth turned down into a frown.

"What's wrong, Laura?" Rebecca asked, sitting the book on the night stand that held the small lamp, as she looked down at her daughter in concern.

"I want Daddy to be here for my birthday. He promised he would be," the little girl said as tears filled up her blue eyes.

"Oh sweetie," Rebecca said, wrapping her arms around her daughter and pulling her close to her. "I know that was a promise that your Daddy very much wanted to keep and if he could, he would be with us tomorrow," she told her daughter, trying to keep her own voice steady as she talked about the man she had loved. She had exchanged a quick message with him shortly before the Cylon attack had taken place. Never did she imagine that those would be the last words she would speak with him. She hadn't even told him the customary 'I love you' before she had signed off as her mind had already been going over the plan for the next test run they had been going to conduct. It was something she regretted, much as she regretted the long hours away from her daughter now. Nowadays though, it was a matter of their survival and not just getting too wrapped up in work.

"Do you think there is a chance daddy is out there?" Laura asked in a tearful voice.

Rebecca hesitated before answering. As much as she didn't want to give her daughter false hope she didn't want to break her daughter's spirit completely. The little girl was already solemn much of the time. She didn't want those moments of joy for the little girl to disappear completely.

"Well, there are other survivors out there," Rebecca replied slowly, thinking of the report Juniper had brought back to Pisus after the scouting mission to the rendevous point at Ragnar. Juniper had said they had spotted several ships jump away while Galactica held off a Cylon attack and then jumped away themselves. Knowing that they had missed joining up with other survivors had been a bitter disappointment for their small group. For Rebecca, Galactica's jump had taken away her last hope of joining up with family, other than her daughter, vanish. Though their hope at the beginning had been to cross paths with the other group of survivors, they knew it had been a long shot. Six months in and they had all but given up hope of that happening. "But the chances of your father being among them or us crossing paths with them are slim."

"But there is a chance. All we need is hope."

~The sweet innocence of the hope of a child, ~ Rebecca thought, as she continued to hug her daughter. She caught sight of the picture Laura Jean carried around with her quite a bit these days. It was a picture from her wedding day, and both the people in it were smiling back. She had already been pregnant with Laura at the time, and things had seemed to be falling into place. What she wouldn't give to feel like that again.

"Do you think you can hold onto that hope for the both of us, Sweetheart?" Rebecca asked.

"I'll try mommy," Laura replied even as the ship's public address system came to life with a page for Rebecca to report to CIC. "Can I come with you, mommy?" Laura asked, holding tighter instead of letting go.

Rebecca hesitated. It wouldn't be the first time Laura had been in the ship's control center while she worked and as it hadn't been a stat page, Rebecca figured it was nothing too serious. Probably just something with the security check on one of the ships. She tried to recall who was on the rotation for the night watch and remembered it was the one night of the week that Colonel Cruise took the night watch. Though now Pisus' commander, the Colonel insisted that he couldn't very well ask those serving under him to perform duties beyond what was expected of them, if he didn't do so himself. Knowing the Colonel had developed a soft spot for Laura Jean even before they had fled from the Cylons, Rebecca didn't see the harm in her daughter being up late one night.

"As it is almost your birthday, I guess I can let you stay up a little later," Rebecca said, letting go of her daughter. She stood up and walked over to the room's bureau. Opening the top drawer, she removed her daughter's bathrobe. Turning she found that Laura Jean had already climbed down from the bed and was heading toward her mother.

"Do you need me to finish up?" Jaina asked, coming into the doorway.

"No thanks. I'm going to take Jaina with me this time. Why don't you head back to your own quarters for the night," Rebecca replied, as she helped Laura Jean put the robe on.

"You sure?"

"Yes. I think Laura still needs some mother and daughter time and things should be fairly quiet up in CIC tonight."

"Okay. You know where I'm at if something changes," Jaina replied, turning and heading from the room as Rebecca knelt down and tied the sash on the bathrobe.

"You ready?" Rebecca asked, still kneeling in front of Laura Jean. The little girl nodded, her left hand still holding on to her cherished photo. Rebecca stood, and took her daughter's hand. "Let's go then."

With Laura Jean in tow the walk to CIC took a little longer than usual. As Rebecca had expected, the room was quiet. There was only the bare minimum staff on duty. PO Ana Easton was sitting at the station Rebecca normally used for her work when in CIC. Though the woman's brow was furrowed in concentration there didn't seem to be any urgency about her.

At the sound of footsteps entering CIC, Colonel Randall Cruise turned in their direction. "I see you brought along a hitchhiker," the commander of Pisus commented, seeing Laura Jean by Rebecca's side.

"She asked to come. I hope you don't mind."

"Of course not. We could do with a bit of sunshine around here," Colonel Cruise replied.

"What's going on?" Rebecca asked, well aware that whatever the issue was that had resulted in her being paged to CIC, the Colonel would have at least a basic knowledge of it.

"The security check uncovered a failed firewall in our communications systems," Colonel Cruise replied, his voice taking on more authority as he began discussing business. He began heading to where Easton was sitting and Rebecca, still holding on to Laura's hand, followed. "Granted, it's only one of three in place but Ares is reporting the same result with their communication system so I figured it was something you should take a look at ASAP."

The added firewalls had been added to the computers following the Cylon attack as a further precaution after almost all of the networks in the ship had been taken offline. There had been a few critical networks that had needed to stay in place to maintain ship operations. The lack of networks meant more work for the Pisus, but added safety against the Cylons taking control of the vessel. Rebecca had also purged the computer of the new defense program that had been developed by Gaius Baltar and introduced the program she had been testing for protection on the Remote Emergency Control Takeover System they had been testing in the Mark V Vipers they had on board Pisus. The idea behind the RECT System was the ability for the home ship to take control of the viper in case the pilot was unable to fly the craft for some reason. Given the danger of someone abusing the system that was supposed to be used in an emergency only, Rebecca and her team had designed a series of firewall protection and security protocols for the system that were separate from all other ships functions. Following their flight from the Cylons, that protection had been implemented to protect the few networks left on the ships of their small fleet as well as the networked computers of the Mark VII Vipers. So far, the Cylons had not been able to penetrate their computer systems.

"Could be nothing more than a glitch in the programming. The security protocol wasn't designed to be used as it is, and it was a rush to get it in place. Coming across glitches is to be expected as I explained earlier. I'll get it sorted though."

"I have no doubt that you will," Colonel Cruise replied. "Given the reports gathered on how easily the Cylons shut down our ships in the attack on the colonies, your computer skills are probably one of the things that have gotten us this far."

The three of them had reached the station Easton was working at. The computer specialist looked up at their approach and upon seeing Rebecca immediately began explaining the situation in technical details Colonel Cruise couldn't follow. Cruise looked down at the little girl that had tagged along with her mother.

"Want to be my assistant for a while?" Colonel Cruise asked her.

The little girl looked up at her mother, her eyes silently asking permission. Although Laura Jean wasn't smiling, Rebecca saw a glimmer of excitement in her beseeching eyes.

"Go ahead," Rebecca told her daughter. "Just don't get in the way or cause any trouble."

Laura Jean let out a squeal of delight even as Colonel Cruise reached down and picked the little girl up. "She won't be any trouble at all, will you Laura Jean?" Colonel Cruise asked, looking at the little girl. Laura shook her head no in response to the answer. Looking from the daughter toward her mother, the Colonel put on a mischievous grin. "It isn't like either of your parents knew how to cause trouble," he added.

"That was a different time. I've matured since then," Rebecca replied, memories of the spoiled, military brat she use to be coming to the surface. Her dad's name had pulled a lot of weight in the fleet and her younger self had used that to her advantage until a fellow pilot had pointed out that she was doing what was expected of her instead of what she wanted and her that her behavior was just a facade to hide her fear of failing and letting people down.

"If you create this bad girl reputation within the fleet, then no one is going to be expecting much of you. It's the perfect cover."

Those words had gotten her thinking about her life and what she really wanted to do with. They had reawakened the fifteen-year-old girl who had loved problem solving and algorithms over flying a plane and shooting things out of the sky. Rebecca had never wanted the military life, but when her brother had drowned after his high school graduation that year, life had changed for her whole family. She had heard the sadness in her father's voice as he spoke of his son's dreams to join the Colonial Fleet that would never be realized. It was then that she felt compelled to carry that family legacy on, despite her own dreams but she had never been happy doing it. She had ended up resenting her father and the path she had chosen and had vented that resentment through her behavior.

Well, she hadn't failed. She had stopped following the path her father had set for her and started being who she wanted to be. She had started taking responsibility for her choices and actions, instead of relying on a name to keep her out of trouble. As for letting people down, Rebecca often wondered if her father was disappointed in the choice she had made for her life. Now she might never know.

"I guess I'll give you that one," Colonel Cruise conceded, having seen nothing except professionalism since she had stepped on board the Pisus. Given her reputation from her time in the service, Pisus' former XO had his doubts when he heard who was going to be conducting the experiments. He looked from Rebecca to the little girl he was holding. "However, let's hope you take after your daddy. He's a bit more of a straight arrow than your mommy."

"What is a straight arrow?" Laura Jean asked, tilting her head to one side as she looked at the Colonel inquisitively.

Neither Easton nor Rebecca could make out the colonel's response as he started walking away with Laura in his hands.

"I hope I don't regret letting her go with him," Rebecca said softly, as the two women returned their attention to the problem they were facing.

PO Easton just smiled as she resumed her explanation of the problem at hand. Like many of the others on board the Pisus, she was just grateful to have Laura Jean around to ease the tension of their reality. The little girl was definitely a ray of sunshine in an otherwise dreary world.