Micheal,

Things are very weird here. President Roslyn has decided to appoint me ambassador officially. I never expected that. She says that it makes sense, given that I've had the most contact with you and already have been able to create relationships.

Of course, I haven't mentioned the nature of some of those relationships. :)

Kara hoped the translation program could recognize and interpret the "smiley" in her note to Micheal. She pressed the key that rendered the text into his language and was pleased to see that a little round face with a smile appeared at the end of her text.

She was glad that once she'd shown Lennier and Marcus one of the Galactica's keyboards, they were able to create a virtual one for her to use on the White Star's computers. SHe never felt comfortable dictating her letters to the computer and the keyboards they had on the space station just were too different for her to use to type efficiently.

She typed on,

Susan tells me that the plan is to bring the Fleet to B5 in the next 48 hours. Things are likely to get even weirder when we get there. Adama and Roslyn are limiting the general populations exposure to the non-humans in the party. They've been making addresses over the wireless to break things to them gently. Food supplies are being passed out, and Cottle's been bitching that his infirmary is now filled with cases of people eating themselves sick. He's exaggerating, of course.

Kara stopped, biting her lip, she reread the paragraph she just typed and then deleted it. She was just dodging the issue with the small talk. She tried again.

We'll be there soon and then I think you and I need to talk.

Frack, she just knew that men didn't react to that phrase well, in any language. She hit the delete key again.

I should have told you some things before we got involved.

Delete.

There are things I should have told you. I didn't mean to keep things from you. I guess I should have mentioned my husband and my boyfriend, for instance.

Delete. Delete. Delete.

It's just that I get so tired of being me, with my problems. You didn't ask me about me-alright its a little awkward to have deep personal conversations with the computer translating-and I was grateful. I don't want to talk about it and you were so good about me waking you up like that

She broke off in frustration, deleting the whole letter. If it were this hard to write it, how could she ever say it?

Susan and Marcus had been appointed her handlers and they were quite happy to escort her around, but the novelty of solitude had a powerful pull on Kara. Since the Fall of the Colonies, the only place Kara had been alone, was in the cockpit of her Viper.

Or in some awful prison cell, either back on Caprica or on New Caprica.

On Babylon 5 they gave her a whole set of rooms to herself, an ID card that took her most places she wanted to go and a stipend to cover personal expenses, like clothing and restaurant food. To her joy, once she had been given a tour of the station, and Franklin had cleared her healthwise, she spent some very happy hours walking alone. She was even able to find a few people who spoke her language at least as well as Susan.

One of the mornings she took herself out to breakfast, Micheal came in search of her. Susan was stuck in a meeting with Sheridan and Marcus had disappeared on some errand of his own.

At the time, Babylon 5's best navigational people were trying to map out the possible coordinates the Fleet could have jumped to. All the meeting points that Kara had knowledge of. Babylon 5 had star charts that boggled Kara's imagination.

She was dazzled by the amount of space they had explored, yet she spent the whole week terrified that they would never find her people again. That, in all that vastness, they would be lost until the Cylons tracked them down and picked them off.

That day Micheal had stepped in to take Susan's place and escort her about. He didn't speak her language, but she was learning English, a little. And the translator in her little handheld was more than adequate.

Kara was very comfortable around Micheal. He was military of some ilk and if she understood him, he'd come up through the ranks in the last war Earth had with the Minbari. They'd spent a very fun day together. It seemed only natural to invite him into her quarters.

One thing led to another. The language barrier wasn't much of a problem; Kara supposed some things were just universal.

In the wee hours of the morning, she'd woken him by trying to strangle him.

Gods bless the man, he'd been very sweet about it, once he'd woken her up, properly. He'd had the sense to shout to tell the computer to turn on the lights as he wrestled her off of him, and then he slapped her hard, "Kara!" he'd yelled, shaking her, then some words in his own language.

The audio of the computer had translated his words. "Kara. Dream. You're dreaming." The weird, artificial female voice was what brought her out of it.

She sat up, looking around in a panic. Tears were spilling down her cheeks and she had scrubbed them away angrily. Holding her breath, she had stared into Micheal's face. Very deliberately he removed his hands from her shoulders. "Shhh..." he'd said, "You okay?"

She'd recognized that phrase, but couldn't think of the pronoun. She nodded "Kara okay," she'd said to be clear, but feeling like a moron.

Micheal had gotten up and brought her back a glass of water. He'd sat next to her, without touching her, but had squeezed her hand when she took his.

"Sorry." she whispered.

Her words were repeated by the computer. He smiled, shrugged. "Happens. Get them myself now and then."

She nodded at the translation, returned the smile.

After that, they had lay back down together, sleeping after a while. Kara was grateful for Micheal's discretion. Lee or Sam would have wanted to sit up all night and analyze the fracking thing. They would have wanted to talk about New Caprica and Leoben. They'd want to talk about their relationship, then they'd want to talk about What Went Wrong.

Kara had just wanted to sleep and Micheal let her.

So it wasn't anything to base a relationship on, it was what she'd needed, right then. Like the calories Dr Franklin insisted she keep stuffing herself with, like the clean air and clean water, a little uncomplicated sex was doing her body and spirit a whole lot of good.

Kara glanced at the time, gave her attempted letter up as a bad job. She had to be back at the Galactica soon. She wasn't looking forward to her continued game of keep-away-from-Lee-and-Sam, but she and Susan were accompanying Lyta Alexander to her meeting with the Old Man and Roslyn and the highest ranking oracle left in the fleet.

For some reason that Kara couldn't fathom, the people from Earth (Earthers? Earthlings? Either term sounded silly to her ears) seemed to think that oracles were a big deal.