Authors Note: Forgot to mention this earlier. Eve is not her first name, its like how everyone calls Anastasia Dualla Dee, except her last name is Eve.

Even in Death

Chapter Three

I was to take over the later shifts for Dee. I wasn't needed nearly as much as I was before and because of this I had received a lot more sleep since the "thirty-three minutes" incident that had been three days ago. But now because I wasn't needed as much (if at all) I had barely anything to do, and a lot of my spare time was just spent going round and round in circles on the Galactica.

I practically knew the ship by now.

I had about fifteen minutes before Dee wanted me there and I had nothing to do. Though I didn't plan on going anywhere near the CIC until I was needed. I sighed and continued to do another round, maybe to see if I could be of any help to anyone else for a few minutes.

In the end I ended walking back to my bunk and deciding there was only one thing that would help me kill time. I sat on my bunk and when I closed my eyes I opened my mind. There were a fair few people walking around, but a lot were too busy working to actually think as much as others, so I was easily able to shift through the surrounding area until I accidentally attached myself onto something interesting.

"Where are the others?" She asked.

Other what? I asked myself as I pushed a little more energy into my mind to actually fall into their thoughts and find out whose mind I was in. Sharon, it was Boomer.

Pushing all my thoughts I tried to find out what she was terrified of, I could feel her emotions running like crazy. When I pushed myself further into her mind, I slammed against a mental wall.

"Ow…" I murmured receiving a large headache. Slamming into mental walls like that can give me incredibly large headaches and migraines. I shook my head and blinked a few times as it began to dull down a bit. Ok, let's not do that again for a while. I sighed and decided to go to the CIC a little early now.

As I was walking I accidentally slammed into the back of someone. Flashes of pulling a trigger flooded through me and relighted the headache I had. I grabbed my head in pain as I stood up. "Sorry sir." I said.

"Don't worry about it." Apollo, no, Lee Adama said with a small smile. I smiled back and continued my way to my shift. I could hear him and his father, the Admiral, talking about what was running through, at least, Apollo's head as I got away as quickly as I could. Was there nobody on this ship with happy thoughts that I could find comfort in?

"Hey Eve." Dee said pulling down the headset to talk to me, "Nothing you really need to do, Colonial 1's just about to port and I think the President's coming down to give us a thank you."

"So you think I should stay?" She shrugged her shoulders. "Yeah, thought as much, I'll go and see if Gaeta has anything for me." I sighed and walked over a few stations across to Gaeta. "Hey G-man, got anything for me, Dee wants to keep her shift."

"Ah… yeah, if you take over this for bit while I go with Adama to get the President that would be great, there's nothing happening at the moment but anything could change." I nodded at him as I sat down and took over his station. Like he said, there was nothing to do, not to mention the computers didn't have any games.

After watching the few screen for what seemed like hours, Gaeta returned with the President close as foot. "Thank you, all of you, without your extraordinary dedication and your tireless effort and your sacrifice no one of us would be here today I'm proud to serve as your president. Thank you." I clapped at the end of the speech and a fair amount of the others followed suit, while others just nodded in approval.

"Carry on." Admiral Adama said, leaving us to our business. But before I actually returned back to the long process I had ahead, Dee called for Admiral.

"The Virgon express is manoeuvring along side they're standing by for end-rep." Nothing of interest to me so I sighed and went back to work. Though Gaeta saluted the Admiral before walking, meaning that he was called upon to do something.

-

"Virgon Express, Galactica, we have you in visual contact maintain current course and speed." I said speaking into the headset to the Virgon express.

"Roger that Galactica, maintain current course and speed." I assumed that the Virgon Express was here to pick up water for the people and crew upon their ship. The Galactica had enough water for several years for everyone, at least, if what I remember about school is correct.

Nothing of interest was happening at the moment and I was no longer needed to direct the Virgon Express in what to do, with all the extra energy I had that was been wasted, I decided to check around and see if there was any nice thoughts to call upon. Slowly I let my mental wall and fall and as I searched around, I realised that most thoughts were pretty neutral at the moment.

But it was pretty funny how the XO, the Admiral, the President and the CAG were all thinking that this entire thing was pretty stupid and that the other person was thinking less of them. None of them liked the ceremonial thing they constantly went through when the President came on board, but they all thought it made the other person feel more comfortable.

I didn't say anything though, because I see tell that Apollo was catching onto this, being the CAG and all; he did have to have some sort of intelligence.

I watched as the President's second, not the Vice, but her advisor… Billy I think his name was, walked over to Dee. They had a spark between them but he was to shy and she was too stubborn to do anything at this moment in time. Though Billy was in his defence, trying to give off signals.

I turned back to the President and saw that she had just been told what was going on with the whole "ceremonial-President" thing that everyone hated doing. Her expression went blank before she looked at Adama and realised that he was trying to do the same thing for her in which she was trying to do for him.

I bit the inside of my mouth to stop from laughing a loud.

"De-compression alarm!" I jumped and looked at my screen. Sure enough the tanks of water were beginning to blow from pressure or of something. I swallowed.

"Damage report."

"Ruptures in tanks three, five, nine, seven." I said as I had turned, looking at the other screen in confusion. Not quite understanding at what was happening. There were commands been shouted and Gaeta and I tried to do as much as we could in those few moments as the Admiral and the XO began shouting at us in a fit of anger, which was not directed at us.

A quick glance to Dee showed me that she too was working her ass off to help fix the problem to the best of her ability.

"All out water is going directly into space." The XO said behind me and I paused to look at him, gob smacked and incredibly confused.

-

Some time later, I had handed my shift back to the expert. Knowing that he would be needed more then I. But before I could actually leave, Gaeta asked me to report to the President and the board, to tell them what had happened.

I was standing here, looking at the board, which held Gaius Baltar, President Roslyn, the Admiral, the XO and a few others that I didn't know.

"How much water did we lose?" The president asked and I replied with what I had written down.

"Ten million GP's, sir roughly sixty percent of totally water reserves." I swallowed hard, as a few seconds of tension filled silence happened before the Admiral spoke.

"Emergency rasions." He said, "Shut down laundry, showers and anything non essential immediately." He had turned to speak to the XO, who replied and accepted this command. Though I accepted it as well, I did not want to go through another long strand of time smelling like old sweat with everyone else.

But it didn't matter much.

"How long will our water supplies last?" The president asked me and I took a deep breath before I spoke.

"Well, ah, aboard Galactica? Six days… but one third of the ships were depending on us for replenishment and if we don't find new supplies, they'll run out of water in two days."

"One third?" Billy said, "That's sixteen thousand people." I nodded.

"Get the names of those ships and tell them to go on emergency rations immediately." She told Billy and I chewed lightly on my tongue to stop from saying anything as the XO commented on riots due to restrictions.

"That'll be all Eve." He said.

"Just one more thing," The president said before I got off of the podium in which I was talking upon. "Do you have any theories in what might have caused the accident?" I swallowed, I had many theories, and I bet I could find out what actually did happen if I tried, and I plan on at least dabbing into that tonight, but I wasn't going to tell them that.

"Well, there are many theories at this point in time Madam President."

"Take a guess." She told me, as if knowing that I may have an idea. I swallowed and looked at everyone to see if I could get an idea in what they wanted to tell me, but I already knew from their expressions alone.

"I prefer my officers not to guess and have them wait for fact." Adama said, saving me from saying something that I didn't want to believe. The President made a noise of understanding before saying something that I remember briefly, someone else saying, though I don't know whom.

"Indulge me." I swallowed and my eyes fell on Doctor Baltar briefly, who too, as everyone else had, paused to look at me.

"Take a guess Ms Eve." I nodded at the Admiral's words of permission in saying what I thought I had escaped to say.

"Well, ah, from what I have seen and heard, I'd say that the tank was structurally weakened in the Cylon attacks and ah… that caused it to clasp and rupture." I licked my lips; this was what they wanted to hear but not what they had expected. This was good; I had done well in my little lie. "But… it's too early to say." I said ending the sentence there and waiting to see if I was dismissed now.

"Thank you." She said and I nodded at her.

The Admiral spoke again and I wondered briefly if I was to leave now or wait to see if I was to be called on again, but I decided that I had been dismissed from the podium but not the meeting, so I returned to my seat and waited through till I was needed again.

It wasn't long before the conversation was directed toward Doctor Baltar who was, and still is, one of the most intelligent men left from the colony. He told us; by tons, how much food we would need, and by the large amount I assumed it was for a month's supply and so did Lee, so I felt relaxed, until the Doctor said "per week."

Moments later Tyrol spoke, telling what he had found, and I swallowed hard at the announcement of six detonators missing from the arms locker, and because only five exploded, one was still unaccounted for, which raised the tension in the room to an extreme point.

A rushing noise appeared in my ears and I barely heard the Admiral tell Tyrol to put guards around all the arms lockers. But it didn't matter much to me, I have had, and will have, nothing to do with the arms locker. There was more speaking about an investigation and who had probably had access to the arms locker, but like before, I was still in shock.

Most of us were dismissed, with a warning that this was strictly confidential before those that were not selected, got up and left.

I walked away a far enough distance to be safe, before I projected my thoughts inside someone's head to listen to what the Admiral had to say, I was to curious to not do this. "There is at least one Cylon aboard this ship." The admiral said, confirming my beliefs that the Cylons now looked like us, humans.

There was talk of how many people actually knew without a doubt that the Cylons look human, and the XO spoke up, "The five people in this room and three marines."

"Let's keep it this way." I swallowed, I wasn't supposed to know, but I would have found out anyway. Besides, this information may be able to help me find who had placed the detonators in the tanks and where the other one might be. I pulled out from the strain before I relaxed and connected myself again.

"Doctor Baltar, how you doing with the screenings?" The admiral asked, but the moment he did, I realised I was inside of the Doctor's head; I hadn't meant to attach myself to him.

"Screenings?" He asked and I felt a soft amount of worry before the confusion covered him.

"You're supposed to be screening the Galactica crew for potential Cylon agents." Panic rose up as the confusion melted away. Why was he panicking? Though his eyes I saw the people around him looking in desperation for him to say something that would bring some sort of good news to them, but from inside Gaius Baltar, I sensed that he couldn't do anything like that.

It was strange because for one second I was watching through his eyes, then the next, I felt a tug, and found myself in his sub conscious.

"Do you remember the first time you lied to a woman?" Not only was I in his sub conscious but also I was actually standing here as if this was a real place. I slid behind something and watched as a blonde, beautiful woman talked to him. "Other then your mother that is." I could feel myself backed up against something. This was strange, I've never, ever had something like this happened.

And the woman's voice was so familiar, though I couldn't place it where.

"Other then my mother?" He spoke. Everything here was as clear as it was on Galactica, which is wrong because this is impossible. "Sherry Bennet." He said, and my eyes flickered to him. He was dressed in a suit, and unlike before, he was composed and relaxed as he looked at the woman in the hot tub.

She tilted her head slightly to look at him, and I watched her, she had very careful movements, like a cat, a panther even, she looked as if she planned every movement.

"Fourth grade." Baltar continued. "On the play ground, behind the band room." I sensed where this was heading to, but listened regardless. "If you show me yours, I'll show you mine?"

She, the blonde beauty was grinning now, finding his story completely amusing. After watching her for a few moments, I realised she was bare in the hot tub, making me feel that this… imagination, was all a fantasy, a defence mechanism when he felt panicked. But I couldn't unlock myself from it; I was too entranced by what was going on.

"She did, I… did not." He finished. "You know, I think I slept with her, many years later of course." He said as she got out of the hot tub, and as she walked, I wondered how even a man with his intelligence could create such a vivid image, such perfection, with every step she walked it was confident, it was known, but it was definitely not a memory.

She grabbed a red towel and said to him, her smile less obvious now, "of course." Before she continued to walk to him, "Was she a beautiful woman?" Jealousy, why would some wish jealousy into their fantasy? It made no sense; I was becoming deeply confused now.

"As a matter of fact she did." It was obvious he was pleased with the woman walking towards him, but I couldn't get a reading off of her.

Even imaginations have some sort of reading, not thoughts of course, but emotions that the person wants them to feel. It was like she had a shield around her to stop me from seeing anything of her.

"Very beautiful." He said, as if not realising that she was not impressed by the statement, which of course he should be, it was written all over her face. "But every woman has her beauty." This made me smile; he was both complimenting them and everyone else. "The ah, feminie charms that are hers and hers alone." He was trying to seduce her now, coax her back to been happy with him. She smiled but before it continued I was pulled back, along with him, out of the fantasy.

"Doctor."

"Ah right… screenings." I breathed out a sigh from my own body as I sat down, feeling this world once again, while feeling what Gaius felt from being in his body, to most people it would confuse the senses. It still did to me; being in his imagination had completely ripped away these senses in reality and had only been there, but now. I frowned I was confused now, but I pushed them down as I continued to listen.

I felt Gaius Baltar saying something about not been able to screen then. And though he fully believed that what he was saying was true, as did other people around him, something threw me off, it wasn't quite right, what he was saying that is. He was waffling and babbling his way through before the Admiral stopped him, and I relaxed, his thoughts were confusing me, they were rushing so much out at once, but at the same time so little, his most guarded were heavily protected that I would never be able to get through them, even by a miracle.

"It is obvious that you'll need help, staff, resources." The admiral was saying and I felt Gaius relax as if he had gotten away with something.

"That is exactly what I'm saying… exactly." But as he began to talk, another voice entered through. "Although more staff-" He had began to say before the familiar feminie voice of the blonde woman spoke.

"More staff, snooping around, watching your every move." I didn't dare to focus more energy in or out of this. I was guarding myself now, inside of him. This was impossible. I knew where her voice was familiar now; she had been the other person on the same wavelength when I had been on Colonial 1. "Maybe it can be a woman and you can find her secret beauty." I could see out from the corner of his eye that she was smiling, and from him I could physically feel her touch.

"I'm going to assign Ms Eve to aid you, she's studied the same science you have, got top marks in her test."

Gaius was smiling now, and at the sound of my name I hesitated. Was this good or bad? "Aren't you lucky Gaius?" She whispered, playing with his hair softly as her warm breath seemed to act like a caress on his ear. She was, by what I could tell, an incredible sensual woman.

"But the need for secrecy..." He was guarding something, and the blonde had something to do with it.

"Cleary," Madam President's voice began, cutting him from saying anything further, "This falls into the absolutely necessary category." I swallowed in my body before I added a bit more energy. I couldn't tell if this woman was there, but Gaius was still tense. "Your screening technique may be critical for our very survival."

"Humanities very survival rests in your hands." She said looking down into him, and by the way she did, it was like she could almost see me inside of him, looking back out of him to her, though that too was impossible. She had raised a finger, and it lingered above his lips before his dropped down and grazed the bottom lip. "Now only if you had an actual Cylon detector." I swallowed. He had been lying? But then… how?

I pulled out quickly, and afraid that if I stayed any longer, she may actually see me. Though she's not real right? She can't be, it's impossible, and I can't do anything like that can I? So she can't be a mind reader as well.

-

"I'm ah… really looking forward to working with you Doctor." I said to him as we walked to where his so-called Cylon device would be located.

"As am I." He said, though he seemed distracted. I wondered if it was his fantasy. I continued, trying to see if I could trick him into saying something that he wasn't supposed to.

"I studied genetics in university, it was something I majored in actually before I worked with some of the military-" He cut me off.

"Wonderful." I wondered if he was sexist suddenly. "Is that a card game?" Though that seemed like he had been actually distracted, I sensed from his emotions that that truly had distracted him.

We walked in and I sighed as we did.

"Mind if I sit in?" He asked, directing all of his attention to Starbuck. I sighed. And I wavered at him for him to sit. My "feminine charms" must be a little dusty.

I sat near him as he and Starbuck talked and I decided that due to being completely bored by games like this, I would see if I could dig around in his head and pick out why the blonde was so vivid. I had been in his mind for a while digging around before I pulled out and saw that there was only three in on the table. I grinned, I wouldn't mind seeing the last round.

Starbuck raised Gaius' five up to twenty I almost laughed as the other man folded, pulling out.

There was talking to each other, trying to psyche the other out speech as Gaius pretended that he was nervous and Starbuck called his bluff. There was soft flirting and then Gaius said "Well my hand isn't too strong, it wouldn't take me much to push me out of the game." And it looked like he was about to fold.

"Why thank you Doctor." Starbuck said, grabbing the winnings before Baltar stopped her.

"Without a little risk, life would be so dull wouldn't it?" Almost showing that he had a fantastic hand. "Call it."

Starbuck, not wanting to be defeated, showed her cards, saying "three on a run." That was good, not great, but it was good, it did win a lot of games.

"Full colours." He said, one of the best hands you could get, smashing out three on a run any day of the week. He grabbed all the things he had placed down before pulling out a cigar and passing it to Starbuck, with the words, "A parting gift?" He conned her into getting it by making it sound a lot better with the words "also the last in the universe."

"Thank you." She said softly as she pulled it to her mouth and had him lit it for her.

"My pleasure." He said, with a cocky voice, before she blew smoke into his face. He collected the rest of his winnings, proving my theory that he had only been in it for the wins, before he parted good bye, I walked out, but this time, I attached a small part of me to him, only a few strands of connection, enough to just see out of his eyes, while seeing out of my own as we walked.

But broke out of it when over the intercom came the Admiral's voice saying, "We have found water."