"Does anyone have a seven-pronged screwdriver?" a voice called out from the air force crew trying to re-assemble the parts of the crashed space ship they had been disassembling.
"How did you get it out to start with?"
"Damned if I know."
From a distance, CJ Cregg winced as she overheard the discussion at one end of the Andrews Air Force Base hanger. They were working under the influences of one of the alien-human-whatever crew of the ship, who kept muttering about what she presumed was something analogous to monkeys with power tools. Some things were universal, even if the metaphors were unfamiliar.
Behind her she could hear the distinctive footsteps of Josh Lyman stopping short, and she turned. "Coming, mon petit-frère?" CJ teased with a raised eyebrow, waiting four, three, two, one…
"That's a space ship."
"Yes, Josh, it is."
"From space."
"That's generally where they come from."
"You mean this isn't a joke?"
"You didn't believe the President?"
"I thought maybe it was a practical joke. Something Donna put him up to…"
"You thought Donna put the President up to telling you there were aliens out at Andrews? And this didn't seem like a slightly implausible theory to you when you came up with it?"
He began walking again to catch up with her. "Slightly more plausible than going down to Andrews to help arrange meetings with real aliens. Speaking of, where are the little gray guys?"
"We're having them dissected as we speak," Kate Harper said with such a deadpan expression that CJ wondered for a moment if it was true, until she remembered as Chief of Staff she probably would have been told about that. Kate held the straight face for just a bit longer before breaking out in a grin. "You should see the side arms they were carrying."
Kate picked one up off a table to show it to CJ. "This looks like a standard mid-caliber automatic pistol. Even a bit archaic with the wooden grips. But this," Kate pointed to a large boxy part under the barrel, "is a miniature rocket launcher. We've experimented with something like this but they've always turned out to be spectacular flops that tended to set the shooter's clothes on fire or bounce off the target because they don't gain enough speed as they leave the barrel."
"You know, Kate, sometimes I think you're? a scary scary woman." CJ shook her head.
"It's my job to be scary, CJ." Kate turned a wiry smile on the other woman.
"Hey, where are the aliens?" Josh repeated his question after another few minutes of staring at the wrecked ship and CJ would bet missing the conversation about weapons entirely.
Kate nodded towards the other side of the hanger. "The man and the woman in solid green over there are trying to get their communications gear fixed with the dubious help of the Air Force." Kate turned and nodded in another direction where a young woman in a flight suit was talking to another man in green. "Those are the officers. She's the pilot, and he seems to be in charge. He says his name is Captain Lee Adama, but they call him Apollo."
CJ shot a glance at Kate and the other woman smiled, both thinking the same thing at the same time, but deciding to keep it at least marginally professional for a moment, "Do you think they are as human as they look?"
"Does it matter when they look like that?" Kate asked.
"Could the two of you stop ogling the alien like a pair of doe-eyed school girls? It's disturbing," Josh complained.
"We weren't ogling," CJ corrected. "We were discussing anatomy."
Josh turned around 360 degrees as if looking for an ally, but none was near. "Why is it that when strange alien men from outer space come down to steal our women, no one else is alarmed?"
"I'm pretty sure lots of people are alarmed right now, Josh."
"Isn't alien men from outer space redundant?" Kate tilted her head to the side as if to emphasize the question.
"And more importantly, how often have you encountered this problem?" CJ grinned.
"I have a vivid imagination."
"Of course you do."
The banter quieted then as Leo and the subject of the women's attentions started walking over. Apollo explained, "Chief Tyrol says he thinks he can get the radio working in about an hour. We'll be sending for new orders. This was only supposed to be a survey mission and I don't have the people here for a diplomatic protocol."
"And then what?" Josh asked without bothering to be introduced.
"And then we wait for my government to decide what to do."
"If that takes as long in space as it does on Earth that might be a while."
Lee smiled. "I don't know, the Admiral and the President settle their disagreements pretty quickly. Most of the time."
**~**~**
"Earth? It really is Earth?" Laura asked with a slightly disbelieving expression.
Adama wasn't sure he blamed her. They'd been searching for the place for so long that it seemed hard to believe they'd actually stumbled upon it. "That's what the locals claim," Adama said as he sat down behind his desk once it became clear that the President was going to remain standing. or pacing as the case may be. Like a caged cat, Adama thought to himself. "Lee has made contact with one of the major nation-states."
She raised an eyebrow over her glasses. "As in they are holding the survey team?"
"That would be my interpretation."
"If they don't have a global government I would rather not deal with just once until we know what the political situation is down there."
"We may not have a choice if they are holding our people."
"I am aware of that, Bill."
Her use of his first name hung in the air for a moment as if it was a reminder of a conversation the two of them both knew they needed to have at some point, but were always deferring. Roslin stopped pacing after a moment before cracking a small smile, and than bursting out into a fit of laughter.
"Something funny?"
"This is a diplomatic incident."
Adama nodded, not quite following, but wondering if perhaps this was her way of relieving stress. It wasn't a bad way, he thought.
"The first one of my presidency."
"Congratulations?"
This time when she burst out laughing again, it was infectious, and soon despite the weight of everything and despite the fact that his son was trapped down there, and despite the two of them being who they were… they both needed to laugh.
Laura finally sobered after a few minutes. "I'm going to have to talk to the Quorum."
"Better you than me."
**~**~**
Bill had left the emergency meeting of the Quorum half way through, not for the first time promising himself he'd never attend another session. The Quorum was Roslin's world and she was welcome to it. Adama had other business to attend to anyway. They were a petty and distrustful lot who only seemed to trust the President slightly more than they trusted him…and they didn't trust him at all. When he left, they were voting on which of their number would accompany the President to the surface.
The Admiral hadn't liked the idea of the President going down to the surface herself to start with, and liked it even less now adding one of those sycophants to the mix. The only way it could get worse in his mind would be if the press was traveling with them. Roslin herself had shot that down, much to his satisfaction.
There were moments when Bill Adama knew he was in love with Laura Roslin, whether he would admit it to anyone else or not, and there were moments when he knew, with equal passion, she was completely insane. What really confused the man, though, was when he felt both emotions at the same time.
He could probably let the conflicted feelings play out on their own were it not for her insinuating herself with those he loved and cared deeply about. When he was honest with himself he would admit that the real reason he had deposed and arrested Roslin a few months before was his realization that she could get at those closest to him.
Part of him wasn't surprised, and he was certainly relieved, that the relationship between Roslin and Lee had cooled. He had always known his son had the habit of putting people on pedestals, which were too high and very easy fallen from. Still, he wasn't sure if he was happy her influence over Lee had waned. He was even less sure when he discovered she had set her sights on Starbuck. Starbuck was almost more his child than Lee was, or at least than Lee would let himself be. One of the tools Roslin used to control those around her was insinuating herself as a mother figure. She had virtually done so with the entire fleet. Moreover, if there was anyone who needed a mother, it was Kara Thrace.
Arriving at the pilot's quarters he knocked once before entering with a package under his arm. Starbuck was standing at her locker, half dressed in her blues, her jacket hanging from one of the upper bunks. She jumped when she saw him, as if he had caught her doing something wrong. In her hands, she was fumbling with the wrapping of two small idols.
She had been praying. Worse yet, she had thought he would disapprove. The Admiral's secularism had become an issue in the fleet and in the public only when Roslin had made her faith a weapon against him. It wasn't that he disapproved of religion; in a way he admired it, but what he objected to was faith dragged into the public sphere.
Adama sat down on one of the lower bunks. "You shouldn't be ashamed of your faith."
It was an offer to discuss the subject, but she didn't take him up on the opportunity to debate religion. "Did you need something, sir?"
He smiled and offered her a small package. "Presidential military aides wear gold braid on their shoulders. If you're going down there with her you should at least look the part."
She took the package and turned it over in her hand, as if wanting to say something. When it didn't come, Adama stood again. "Be careful, Kara."
As he reached the door, she finally spoke, "We'll bring him home, sir."
"I know you will."
Adama shut the door, turned, and was almost immediately challenged by Doc Cottle, his irascible Chief Medical Officer. "Do you have any idea what a bastard you are, Bill?"
"Only half the one you are most of the time."
"Do you have to act like a disappointed father?"
"Starbuck hasn't done anything for me to be disappointed in."
"Yet you sit there and give her those big eyes and that manly pout you specialize in when you catch her in prayer."
"It's not her faith I disapprove of. It's how that woman uses her faith to manipulate her."
"Or how 'that woman' is using you by proxy? I'm not sure which of you is worse, Roslin who knows she's manipulating people or you who pretends he isn't. Either way I wish I could just lock the two of you in a room together for a week so that you could sort out your feelings without the rest of it. Might solve many problems."
The doctor turned and walked away without letting the Admiral respond.
Laura was glad to see Admiral Adama walking into the flight deck in time to say his goodbyes before they left for the planet. Behind her Tom Zarek was milling around trying to make conversation with some of the Galactica crew like a normal politician and discovering not for the first time that this was one ship on the fleet where he had few allies. This was definitely Laura Roslin's territory, and part of her took a bit of pleasure in seeing him slightly off his footing.
"I thought you might miss us off, Admiral." She smiled at Adama as he approached.
"One of the advantages to these stars. Ships don't leave without my say-so." He looked past her and raised an eyebrow. "Zarek?"
"What's a diplomatic incident without a convicted terrorist there to make it all better?" She smiled. "Strange as it may sound, of my choices in the Quorum I think he was the lesser of twelve evils."
"If you say so." He paused. "Be careful down there, Laura."
The two Colonial leaders' eyes remained locked in silence for a long moment, before the tension became too much and one of them looked away. It was the Admiral who flinched under her gaze.
… to be continued …