Chapter 52

Diaspora

During the spring of President Adar's last year in office, the Caprica Museum opened an exhibit that contained valuable artifacts that had been looted from the museum in Delphi following the bombing of that city. A cache of the stolen artifacts was recovered by a team of investigators when the thieves attempted to sell them on the black market. Seen for the first time in over four years were the cornerstones of the exhibit, the Shield of Athena and the Arrow of Apollo.

-Bartell, History of the Second Cylon War

.

"Saunders, wait up," Kara called to Cadet Dwight Saunders. He turned and she ran the rest of the way to the front of Karl's dorm.

"What's up, Thrace?"

"I need you to do me a favor."

"For you, beautiful, anything."

"Go up and tell Karl I need to talk to him. I'll wait in the lobby."

"Agathon? Won't I do?"

Kara grinned. "Some other time, Dwight."

Together they walked up the steps to the dorm. "Are you still dating Commander Adama's son?"

"Yep."

"So what's this with you and Karl? I thought he was dating Cadet Valerii."

"Are you going to help me or not?"

"If you'll put in a good word with Maggie for me."

"You go get Karl for me. I'll put in a good word with Maggs for you."

Kara waited in the lobby for ten minutes before Karl came out of the doorway leading to the stairs. He was wearing his heavy fatigue jacket. His eyes were bloodshot and he didn't look like he'd had much sleep. He put on a pair of sunglasses.

He started walking toward the gym. "Aren't you going to tell me I told you so?"

She caught up with him. "What good would that do?"

"Are you here because Sharon asked you to talk to me?"

"I'm here because I'm your friend. Because I meant it when I told you I'd never turn my back on you."

Karl jammed his hands into his pockets. "I walked off and left her yesterday afternoon because if I hadn't, I would have thrown her down and smashed her head into the ice. All this time…all this time we've been…me and her…and she's one of them. I had sex with her. I told her that I loved her."

"Blame me for it."

"How can I blame you? You didn't make her what she is."

"I should have told you sooner."

"You tried."

"Sooner than that."

"Don't, Kara. This isn't your fault."

"It isn't her fault either. She can't help what she is."

They walked around the gym and headed for the jogging trail. Neither spoke until they came to the spot where Captain Reider's body had been found. Some cadets had put remembrances at the spot. There was a plastic-wrapped yearbook photo of Reider fastened to a stick that was pushed into the ground. There were a dozen bunches of dead and faded flowers. There were also several small statues of the gods.

"Would you look at that?" Kara said. "I didn't know he was so popular."

"Everybody didn't hate him," Karl said. "I haven't been by here jogging since it happened. I've stuck to the track. A lot of cadets have."

"Sharon still jogs the trail every afternoon."

"Why would she even have to? She's a machine. She doesn't need to keep in shape."

They continued walking. "What are you going to do now?" Kara finally asked.

"Do? I thought I'd already done it. I broke up with her. She's out of my life."

"I mean are you going to tell anyone?"

"Who would I tell and what would I say? It's not like I've got any proof." Karl's voice changed. Kara finally heard a shift in his emotion, from anger to something softer. "You said the only way to tell if she's a Cylon would be to kill her and dissect her brain. I mean…no way I'd want…that to happen to her."

Kara almost laughed. "Karl, the government doesn't go around killing people and dissecting their brains to see if they're Cylons. That's an urban legend."

"I don't know. There's a web site that has the names of people who have disappeared. Some of them were accused of being Cylons."

"Karl, the government does not…never mind. You're going to believe what you want to believe."

"Who else knows about her?"

"Me and Lee and my dad and Laura."

"That's it?"

"Yep. I think we can turn her."

"Turn her?" Karl's voice showed his incredulity. "You've got to be kidding me."

"She loves you."

"Right. A machine loves me."

"Sharon says she's here to learn about human emotions. I think she's doing it."

"Great. I'm happy for her. Too bad she had to do it at my expense. Too bad she couldn't have picked some other poor sucker to cut her teeth on."

"It would have been Zak, but you jumped in there and asked her out."

"So now this is my fault?"

"You love her, don't you?"

"I'll get over it. I thought I loved Maggie, too. Some things aren't meant to be. I mean don't get me wrong. I still care about Maggie. She was the first girl I ever…well, you know all that. But we weren't meant to be a couple forever. With Sharon I thought it was different."

"Last Thursday afternoon my dad and I had a long talk. He told me that love isn't always perfect all the time. He said you have to work at it sometimes. You have to compromise and forgive."

"Forgive? She's a gods damned Cylon. Her kind killed my whole family."

"But not her. Cavil is the one behind all the killing. And Simon and Doral. They're the bad ones."

"Sharon is still a Cylon. She's one of them. End of story."

Kara stopped and looked up at her friend. "I know what she is, but getting her help is more important right now. I'm going to trust you with something big. I'm going to trust you with something that could cost a lot of lives if you say anything. Commander Adama has a plan to get rid of the Cylons. The clock is already ticking. We've got less than a year."

Karl didn't say anything for a long time. Finally he said, "What's he going to do?"

"I don't know exactly. But we're part of it, and it would help to have Sharon on our side. It would probably save her life if she was on our side."

"What are you saying, Kara?"

"I was counting on her relationship with you to help with that. Now I guess I'll have to do what I can on my own."

"Are you asking me to keep seeing her? Pretend I've got no problem with what she is?"

"I would never ask you to do that."

Karl took a deep breath and blew it out as he shook his head. "I don't think I can do it, Kara. I've got feelings for her. If I keep seeing her…I'll…I'm in it too deep as it is."

"I said I wouldn't ask you to do that. I'll do what I can to turn her to our cause. I'll handle it."

Karl put his arm around her and squeezed. He didn't have to say anything to her. They had been friends so long that she knew his thoughts. She felt his gratitude, but she also felt his conflict. Part of him wanted to see Sharon again. Part of him understood that she couldn't help what she was. It was almost like hating someone because they were Tauron or Sagittaron.

They turned and started back up the jogging trail.

"She seems so…human," Karl finally said.

...

"Cadet Thrace, I need to see you," Hugh Connelly said to her at the end of their history class on Tuesday.

"What have you done now?" Karl asked as he gathered his book and notebook and stuffed them into his book bag.

Kara rolled her eyes. "Who knows?" She picked up her own book bag and walked up to Connelly's desk.

"The bar on Acropolis Street is called The Forum and Dreilide Thrace plays there on Tuesday and Thursday nights. He lives in an apartment on Fifty-First Street near the waterfront."

"How did you find that out?" Kara asked in surprise.

"I asked in a couple of bars on Acropolis Street near that strip club until I found the right one. I looked up his address in the Caprica City directory."

"I can't get out of here on Tuesday or Thursday nights."

"Do you want to go see him at his apartment on Saturday morning? I could meet you somewhere in the city and we could take a transport."

"I'm getting a weekend pass. I'm going home Friday afternoon. This Sunday is Braedon's dedication ceremony at the temple where Laura and my dad got married."

"Stacey and I have been invited. Next weekend, then."

"No. This Saturday might work. Where do you live?"

"Ten blocks from Laura and your dad. Laura helped me find the place. It's not as upscale as their place, but it's a nice older neighborhood, and I can afford it."

"I'll let you know Thursday after class. Is that okay?"

"That's fine, Kara. Think about it. You don't have to do this right now. You can wait a while."

"No, if I'm going to do it, I need to do it now."

Upstairs in her lit class as they waited for Mrs. Nagala to arrive, Karl asked her. "How is Sharon?"

Kara shrugged.

"Has she said anything more about me?"

"She asked me last Sunday if I thought you would ever want to see her again and I told her I didn't think so. But I told her you weren't going to do anything, either…like turn her in."

"Tell her…tell her I said hello."

"I'll do it this once, but I'm not going to start being your messenger. If you have something to say to her, say it yourself even if it's just hello."

Karl leaned back in his desk and stretched his long legs out to the side. "You're right. I should have the guts to do it myself."

Mrs. Nagala walked into the room and greeted the students. Kara opened her notebook and looked at the front of the class. She was really enjoying the book they were now studying. She still had something to say to Karl, though, so she penned it into the margin of a page and turned the notebook slightly so Karl could read it.

Word got around that you and Sharon broke up. Cadet Pike asked her for a date.

She chanced a sideways glace and saw Karl's jaw harden.

As soon as class was over Karl said, "What did she say? Is she going to date him?"

"She's thinking about it."

"All he wants to do is get in her pants. You need to tell her."

"Karl, she knows how he is. She's heard the other cadets talk about him. I don't need to tell her anything."

"How can she be that stupid?"

"She cries, Karl. After lights out. I hear her. She lies in her bunk and cries."

She looked up at him and saw the pain in his eyes. She halfway expected him to say something else, but he didn't. They parted when they got to the gym, Kara heading into the women's locker room and Karl into the men's. She'd done all she could. If knowing that Cadet Pike was after Sharon didn't stir Karl to do something, then nothing would.

Late that afternoon when Sharon returned from her run, she was smiling.

"Karl was waiting for me when I got out of chem lab this afternoon."

"And?"

"He apologized for leaving me at the ice rink last Saturday. He's speaking to me again. It's a start."

...

Kara sat at the kitchen table with her father on Saturday morning. She had just finished telling him about Sharon and Karl.

"So what do you think? Are they getting back together?"

"Sharon's happy that he's speaking to her again. I told her not to push him, to let him make all the moves. I guess we'll see."

"What are your plans for today?"

Kara looked at her cup of coffee. "I've got something to do this morning."

"Something to do," her father repeated. "Could you be a little more specific?"

"I'm going shopping for Lee's birthday present for one thing, and I've got to get something to wear tomorrow to Braedon's ceremony. It's either something new or my uniform."

"Lee's birthday isn't for another month."

"I don't know when I'll get another chance."

"What are you going to get him?"

"I don't know, yet. That's the whole point of going shopping."

Kara couldn't look at her father. She knew he would see right through her. She kept her eyes on her coffee. "I'm meeting Connelly. We're going to see Dreilide Thrace."

"I didn't know the bars on Acropolis Street were open this early in the morning."

"He lives on Fifty-First Street. Down near the waterfront. We're going to his apartment."

She heard the hurt in her father's voice. "Why Connelly? Why not me…or Lee?"

"You're too close to it. So is Lee because he's your best friend. Connelly's not involved. He's just doing this as a favor to me because I asked him."

Laura walked into the kitchen with Braedon. Kara held out her hands, glad for the diversion. Laura handed the baby to her.

"Hey, little star-mapper." She smiled at him. "You look awfully happy this morning." Her brother gave her one of his toothless grins. "Is he always this good?"

"When he's fed and dry," John said. "He doesn't mind letting us know when either condition is not satisfied."

Laura said, "Billy and Tory are both coming over this morning. I'm going to need some help with Braedon."

"That would be me," John said. "Kara has an errand to run and some shopping to do."

"I'll be back by lunch. I'll take the afternoon shift." Kara kissed her brother on the cheek and handed him to her father. "I'd better get going."

Her father's green eyes met her own. She leaned down and kissed him on the cheek, too. "I love you, Dad."

He nodded. "Be careful, baby."

She smiled and winked. "I'm always careful, except when I'm not."

"Not funny," her father said, but he smiled, too.

...

Hugh Connelly was waiting for her in the subway station ten blocks from Laura and John's apartment. He was wearing jeans and a sweater and a ski jacket. He looked younger than he did in the shirt and tie he always wore in class. He looked more like he had on the day she had first seen him.

He smiled. "I haven't seen you in jeans since the camp."

Kara laughed. "I was just thinking the same thing."

"Are you ready for this?"

"As ready as I'll ever be."

"Does John know where you're going?"

"I told him at breakfast this morning. I don't think he was thrilled, but he didn't try to stop me."

They boarded the train and rode to the central station where they changed trains and boarded one for the east waterfront station.

"I can tell you've done this a lot," Connelly said as the train began to move.

"I used to ride the subway everywhere when I wasn't on the motorcycle. Then Lee got his mom's car and I don't ride underground as much anymore. Does Stacey know where you are this morning?

"Not exactly. Does Lee?"

"I told him last night that I was going to do this today."

"And he's okay with it?"

"He thinks it should be him going with me. If I come back maybe I'll bring him."

"You're dad's okay with me going with you?"

"It's not so much you going with me as it is him not going with me. The thing is that he…and Lee, too…always think they know what's best for me. They both seem to forget that for three years I didn't have anybody telling me what to do or what to think. I did okay." Kara smiled. "Sometimes I have to ignore both of them or they would really make me crazy."

Kara found, though, that as she and Connelly got off the train at the east waterfront station, she had a moment of doubt. She stopped at the bottom of the stairs leading up to the street and moved to the side. She took a couple of deep breaths.

"You don't have to do this, Kara," Connelly said.

"Yes, I do."

They walked four blocks to Fifty-First Street. Connelly looked at the numbers. "This way."

They turned right and walked three more blocks to a non-descript building sandwiched in a row of other non-descript buildings.

"This doesn't look all that bad," Kara said.

Dreilide Thrace lived on the third floor. As she and Connelly walked down the hall from the stairwell, Kara was aware that she suddenly felt like she had the night she had met Tom Zarek for the second time. Her heart was beating fast and not just from climbing the stairs. Her hands felt sweaty inside her gloves. She pulled them off and stuffed them into her pocket. She wiped her palms on the legs of her jeans.

Connelly stopped outside the door and put both hands on the top of her arms. "We can still walk away."

She shook her head. "You knock. You tell him why we're here." She took a deep breath and leaned against the wall beside the door.

"You're sure?"

She nodded.

Connelly knocked on the apartment door. It opened and sunlight from the interior flooded the hallway. She heard his voice, at once so familiar after nearly ten years.

"Yeah."

"Mr. Thrace?" Connelly asked.

"That's right."

"There's someone who wants to talk to you."

Kara pushed away from the wall and stepped in front of the doorway. He looked almost exactly the same as she remembered him. The sandy hair, with some silver in it now, still flipped up on one side in the front. He was wearing a dark plaid shirt and jeans and he was barefoot. He looked like he hadn't shaved in several days and he was thinner than she remembered, his face grayer. The smell of cigarette smoke drifted from the interior of the apartment. There was a lit cigarette in his hand.

"Lords of Kobol," he said and shook his head like he was trying to clear it. He backed away from the door and motioned for them to come inside.

Kara took a deep breath and followed him in. Connelly stepped inside the door and Dreilide closed it.

The small apartment was crammed with his music things. An old upright piano stood against the wall. There was an electric keyboard in a corner and a bookcase piled with sheet music and recording disks. There was a small television and stereo, a two-cushion sofa, and a table where some blank pages of sheet music were spread out.

Dreilide walked to the piano and poured a drink from a bottle of whiskey that sat on top. He held up the bottle. "Anyone?"

Kara shook her head. Connelly said, "No thanks."

He gestured to the couch. Connelly remained standing by the door. Kara sat on the end of the couch and Dreilide sat across from her on the piano stool. For a long time they stared at one another. She had never realized before how blue his eyes were. Even though they were bloodshot, they were still blue like the sky at twilight, like Connelly's, like Lee's. She struggled and got herself under control.

He finally said, "If I were smoking something other than this cigarette, I'd think I was hallucinating." Then without a word he turned and began to play a melody one-handed on the piano.

It was sad, like leaves in the autumn raked into a pile in the back yard and burned, the acrid, pungent smell of her childhood, one of her memories of him. He always let her jump into the pile. The smell of dead leaves was all around her. She remembered the way they would laugh.

"Stop," Kara said.

"I still think about you," he said, his back turned to her. "Every time I play that song I think about you." He reached for the glass of whiskey on top of the piano. His hand was shaking.

She stood. "I'll come back another Saturday and we'll talk."

"You don't have to wait until Saturday. I'm here every day."

"I'm at the Academy. I can't get off during the week."

"You're going to be a soldier like your mother?"

"A Viper pilot."

He made a small sound, almost a laugh. "Like him."

She walked over to Connelly. "Let's go."

"Who's your friend?"

"I'm Hugh Connelly. Kara and I were in a refugee camp together."

Dreilide Thrace wiped his palm on the front of his shirt and shook Connelly's hand. "Boyfriend?"

"Good friend," Kara answered.

"Your mother?"

Kara shook her head. "I'll come back next Saturday." She felt like she was going to suffocate if she didn't get out of the apartment.

"I'll be waiting."

In the stairwell Connelly stopped her. "Are you all right?"

She took a deep breath. "Fine. The worst part is over. This is not such a terrible neighborhood. Next week I'll get a transport and come back. I'll be okay. I'm going to have to do this a little at a time."

"I think he is, too."

She left Connelly at the central subway station. He was going back to his apartment. She was going up into the heart of the city to shop for an outfit for Brae's dedication ceremony and for Lee's birthday gift. What do you buy for the guy who has everything? An expensive bottle of wine? The latest mystery book? A new watch? Kara went into the biggest shopping mall in Caprica City. It covered a square block and was a multi-story panoply of stores and boutiques and restaurants with a translucent dome-covered atrium in the center.

It took her exactly twenty minutes in Maximillian's to find an outfit for the next day's ceremony. She got a pair of slacks and a short jacket that looked good on the mannequin.

Finding something for Lee was harder. She walked for nearly two hours, going into store after store. She finally realized that she still had no idea of what to get him. She would have to come back. She had almost a month. Next Saturday after she saw Dreilide Thrace, she would come back and try again.

...

Back at Laura's and her dad's apartment Kara stopped in the lobby and picked up the mail before she rode the elevator upstairs. Laura was in the dining room with Tory and Billy. They had files and papers spread out everywhere. Billy had a laptop open. Kara saw both Laura and Tory eye her shopping bag. She waved to everyone and continued down the hall.

She took the bag to her bedroom and put it on the dresser before she went to the nursery. Her father was sitting in the rocking chair with a heavy-eyed Braedon at his shoulder.

Quietly she made her way back down the hall and into the kitchen. She found some wrapped sandwiches in the refrigerator. She sat at the table and began eating realizing only after the second sandwich how hungry she had been.

Her father walked in ten minutes later and sat down at the table with her.

"I left you some sandwiches."

"I found them. Thanks."

"How did it go?"

Kara shrugged. "I didn't stay long."

"You've been gone four hours."

"I was at the Central Caprica Mall most of that time. Lee's really hard to buy for. I still haven't gotten anything for him."

"Was Thrace surprised to see you?"

"You might say that. I'm going back. We didn't really talk. I think he was in shock. Did you ever meet him?"

Her father shook his head. "I saw him play once, though. You would have been maybe four or five at the time. Your mother and I had a fight, an argument about her not letting me spend time with you. She told me it was over. It didn't last. Being apart never lasted with us, but for a few months I dated another woman. She got tickets to one of your father's concerts. It was very upscale, at the Opera House, no less. I was surprised by how talented he is."

"Why?"

"Your mother never talked about him. I got the impression he was just a two-bit jazz musician who eked out a living playing the clubs."

"Mom never told me why he left. One day I came home from school and he was gone. All his stuff was gone. Everything except the piano. I guess that was too big for him to take with him. A couple of weeks later we moved into a little house on the base. I found out later that one of his relatives owned the house where we'd been living. He wanted to sell the place so he told Mom to find something else."

"It was tough for you after you moved, wasn't it?"

Kara shrugged. "I did okay."

"You don't have to lie to me to make me feel better."

"Dad, I don't want to talk about it, okay? A couple of months after that I met Karl. His mom and dad took me in and started treating me like I was Karl's sister. Things were fine after that."

They sat in silence while Kara toyed with some bread crumbs on her plate.

Finally her father said, "What are you and Lee doing tonight?"

"We're meeting Zak and Maggie at Zeno's for dinner. Then I guess we'll go back to Lee's place. What are you and Laura doing?"

"What we're always doing now…staying at home."

"You don't sound too happy about that."

"I'd like to take her to dinner, just the two of us, for a couple of hours. Her former secretary Adele has volunteered to stay with Braedon anytime Laura wants. She just doesn't seem that interested anymore."

"You'll get to have plenty of dinners together when she gets elected President."

"Dinners with a four or five hundred people is not my idea of something romantic."

"Are you sorry you married her?"

"No, of course not. I didn't mean for it to sound like that. I've just got to get used to the idea of her running for President and what that means for me. That's all."

"So," Kara said lightly, "I guess I should think long and hard before I marry somebody who might run for President?"

"The word marriage should not be in your vocabulary at the moment. You're way too young."

"Don't worry, Dad. We totally agree on that."

"Even though you're already with your true love," he teased her.

"That's why I don't have to think about marrying him. Someday the time will be right. Just not anytime soon."

"Don't go and get him pregnant, then. You'll have to marry him. I'll insist."

They were both laughing so hard that Kara could barely get out her next sentence.

"You really think you're funny, don't you?"

...

Lee and Kara arrived at Zeno's only minutes ahead of Zak and Maggie. One thing Lee could say for Zak was that when he dated Maggie, he was on time.

Kara had just told him that she and Maggie had not had an opportunity to talk since the night of the winter dance nearly a month earlier. He knew that meant neither one of them had made the opportunity to talk.

After they found a booth near the back, Maggie said, "I heard about Karl and Sharon. What happened?"

"They broke up," Kara said.

"What happened?"

Kara shrugged.

Maggie was quick with an opinion. "She was too jealous. I knew that night at the dance they were headed for trouble."

"Dwight Saunders told me to put in a good word for him with you. I think he's got a thing for you."

"Who's Dwight Saunders?" Zak asked.

"Just a cadet," Kara said. "Tall, handsome and hot. Good in the Raptor simulator, I hear. He'll probably be class valedictorian."

Zak asked. "And I'm supposed to be threatened by someone like that?"

"If you don't treat Maggie right," Kara said. "Right, Maggs?"

"Right," Maggie echoed.

"Help me out, here, Lee. I'm getting ganged up on."

Lee smiled. "You heard the ladies. Treat Maggie right."

...

Zak and Maggie didn't seem to want to hang around long after they had eaten. They left to go to Zak's apartment. Kara and Lee walked back to Lee's apartment. Kara took a CD out of the bag she had brought with her and put it in the small player on top of Lee's bookcase. She skipped through five songs and stopped on the sixth track, letting it play.

Lee could feel her distance when she sat down on the couch.

"How did it go this morning?"

Kara shrugged. "I met him."

"And?"

"And I left. I'm going back…maybe next Saturday…maybe in two weeks."

"What did he say?"

"Nothing, really. He played a few notes of that song for me, the one we're listening to right now. I made him stop. It was too sad. It made me want to cry."

Lee felt exasperated. "Then why are you listening to it now? It is sad. Even I can hear that and I'm not all that musical."

"You wouldn't understand?"

"Try me."

How did she explain years of wanting to be loved by someone who held her at arm's length? Who had never remembered her on birthdays or Solstice celebrations?

"The song is about failure and loss," she finally said. "His. My mother's. Mine."

"How could it be about your failure? You were eight years old when he left."

"Not my failure. Them failing me as parents. It's not easy to put in words. It's something you have to feel."

Lee's edginess increased. Sarcasm clearly showed in his voice. "I'm obviously screwed then because I'm not capable of being able to feel."

"I read the inside cover of the CD. He wrote that song the same year he left my mother and me. I remember him playing it that autumn when the leaves were falling. I think it's about how he failed to be a husband…and a father…and how my mother failed him…and me. Maybe it's about John and what he had done to all our lives."

"How did you arrive at that conclusion?"

"Well, duh, Lee, the name of the song is Diaspora."

"Quit acting like a smart-ass. I don't know the titles of your…stepfather's songs. And diaspora does not mean failure. It means scattering. It commonly refers to people who have to leave their homeland and go to live elsewhere. As in exiles. As in refugees. As in what the Twelve Tribes did when they left Kobol if you believe that myth. As in what the other colonists did when they escaped the holocaust and came here to live."

"Thank you Mr. Dictionary."

"Kara, what is the matter with you?"

"Why does something always have to be the matter with me? You and my dad both think that when I'm having a bad day, then something has to be the matter with me."

"You weren't having a bad day at Zeno's. You were fine at Zeno's when you were cutting up and kidding around with Maggie and Zak and commenting about Dwight Saunders being hot and handsome."

"When did this get to be about Zak or Dwight? You're the one who was so damned hot for me to make up with Zak, and the minute I do, you're all over my case again. I can't win with you about Zak, can I?"

Lee got up and walked into the kitchen. In only a couple of minutes their conversation had spiraled completely out of control.

Kara followed him. "Why don't we talk about what this is really about?"

He turned around. "Okay, what is it really about, Kara, other than you going off the deep end?"

"It's about me asking Connelly to go with me today. That's what you can't handle. That's what you and my dad neither one can handle. Only he turns it into a joke. The fact is that neither one of you can admit that Connelly was the right choice to go with me to see Dreilide the first time. I made a big decision without asking you or my dad and it was the right one for me."

The minute Lee opened the cabinet over the refrigerator and got the bottle of ambrosia, Kara knew that he wouldn't be driving her back to the apartment that night. She knew he would be calling a transport for her.

"So what do we do now?" Lee asked after he had poured a glass of ambrosia. "Put on boxing gloves and duke it out? All of a sudden it seems like you want to fight. What are you so angry about, Kara?"

"I'm not angry about anything."

"Yes, you are. If you can't hear it in your voice, you're not listening. Is this about Dreilide Thrace leaving you? Or is it about John letting your mother keep him out of your life? I think you're angry at all three of them. I think you're trying to pretend it doesn't matter when it's really tearing you up inside. I think you feel like all of them abandoned you. I think you're denying it instead of dealing with it. And you're taking it out on me."

"Oh, here we go with Dr. Lee again. Is this therapy session going to be free or do I have to frak you for it?"

If she had hit him, it couldn't have hurt any worse. It wouldn't have hurt as much.

For a moment he couldn't seem to get a breath and when he did, he turned around and put both hands on the counter for support.

"Get out of here, Kara. Just go."

"Lee…"

"Go. Now!"

Numbly Kara got her coat and left the apartment. She walked the two blocks back to Zeno's, went in and sat at the bar. She was lucky because the bartender was the one who had served her a number of times as Carrie Warner. He got her a beer without asking for her ID.

What had she done? What the frak had she just done? She took out her phone and called Lee's mobile. He didn't pick up.

"You drinking alone, tonight?" A familiar voice said.

She looked at the man who had just slid onto the barstool beside her. Frogman.

"Yep."

"So am I. How's life at the Academy?"

"Good. I saw a friend of yours last Saturday. The instructor at Taggert's."

Frogman gave her a sideways look. "Now what makes you think he's a friend of mine?"

Kara smiled. "He's nice. Next time you see him, tell him a certain cadet said thanks. He'll understand. What are you doing here by yourself?"

"Probably the same thing you are."

"Which is?"

"Nothing better to do on a Saturday night."

"Where's your wife?"

For a moment he studied the ice cubes in the bottom of his glass. Finally he said, "That's a good question."

"I'm sorry," Kara said.

"The organization is hard on marital relationships. What's your excuse?"

Kara shrugged. "I don't know when to shut up."

"You want to talk about it?"

"Not really. You?"

Frogman signaled the bartender for another drink. "I had an affair with someone in the organization. I thought it was over, but we've started seeing each other again. My wife found out."

Kara turned up her beer. "Mrs. Peele?" she said without looking at him.

He didn't answer her.

"I have two dads. One of them left when I was eight. The other one let my mom keep him away from me." She snickered briefly. "You might say I grew up without a strong male role model."

"Which one did I meet?"

My biological father. He and my mother had an affair and you're looking at the result. The other one was married to my mother. He's a musician. I didn't know he was alive until two weeks ago. I went to see him today. I couldn't stay but five minutes. I felt like I was going to suffocate."

"So who couldn't you shut up around?"

"My boyfriend."

"Still with Lee Adama?"

"I was. Why do you think I'm here alone?"

"Two little words should fix that. I'm sorry."

"I tried to call him. He won't pick up. I'm not sure that's going to be enough this time."

"You'll never know unless you try. That is assuming you want to try."

"I want to try."

"Where does Lee Adama live?"

"Two blocks from here."

Frogman finished his drink. "Come on. I'll walk with you."

"Why are you doing this?" Kara asked him when they were outside.

"I have a daughter about your age."

They walked in silence until they got to the outside door of Lee's apartment building. Frogman gestured toward the row of buzzers. Kara pressed the one for Lee's apartment. She pressed it a dozen times over the next five minutes. Lee never answered.

"He must have gone out," Kara finally said. "I'll call a transport."

"I'll wait with you."

As the transport pulled up, she looked at him and held out her hand. "Thanks. I'm Kara."

He shook her hand. "Paul."

"Not Tom Jones?"

He smiled for the first time that evening. "Not Tom Jones."

Before Kara closed the door, she said, "Have you tried telling your wife that you're sorry."

"It's not always that simple."

She turned around and looked as the transport pulled away. Paul was walking slowly back down the street toward Zeno's.

...

Lee sat in his apartment with the lights out listening to the music of Dreilide Thrace. He didn't know what had happened, what was happening to him and Kara. His phone buzzed once. He recognized her number and ignored it. He had gotten through half the bottle of ambrosia when the buzzer sounded for the first time. He wasn't sure how he knew it was her or why he didn't answer it. He didn't know if she'd gone back to John and Laura's and then come back or if she'd been somewhere else. He wasn't even sure how much time had passed since she had walked out the door.

He wanted to understand. He had tried to understand what she had been through in her life. They had both had rough childhoods with mostly absent fathers and uninvolved mothers, but she had been through so much more since then. He thought about the way she had come through it. What he didn't understand was why she had turned on him when all he was trying to do was help? Was she just taking her anger out on him or did it go deeper than that?

He picked up his phone and put it down. The hurt was still too raw. He'd never thought of what they did as frakking. From the very first time it had been making love for him. And tonight, to hear her throw out that word even in the heat of anger had been a blow to his heart. Not just the word, but the way she had said it. Is this therapy session free or do I have to frak you for it?

He turned up the bottle again and was aware that the music had stopped. He got up, went to the stereo and started the CD again. He skipped to the sixth track. Diaspora. Scattered…like leaves on the autumn wind. Like the tribes from Kobol. Like the surviving Colonists of the Second Cylon War who had made it to Caprica from the other eleven Colonies.

Even John had said it. Love isn't always easy. Love isn't always perfect. Love sometimes means compromise and forgiveness.

Lee leaned his head back against the couch and closed his eyes. Kara needed to work through her issues. She probably thought that he and John had both been crowding her, trying to tell her what to do, trying to make decisions for her that only she could make for herself.

He took a deep breath, let the pain all the way in, wrapped his love for her around it and picked up his phone.

...

Kara let herself into the apartment and walked into the den. Her father was lying on the couch with his eyes closed, an empty glass on the floor beside him. At first she thought he was asleep, but as she quietly opened the doors to the cabinet where the liquor was kept, he said, "Hey, baby. You're home early."

"Really? What time is it?"

"A little after eleven."

She poured a glass of ambrosia. When she turned around he was sitting up and patted the cushion beside him. She sat.

"Where's Laura?"

"She's already gone to bed."

"Lee and I had a fight tonight. It was my fault. I think he broke up with me. He told me to get out."

"I'm sorry, baby."

"I don't want to talk about it."

"I didn't ask you to. I know what it was about."

"What?"

"Either Sharon or Dreilide Thrace."

She put her head on his shoulder. "Can we just sit here for while without talking?"

"Sure, baby."

She was almost asleep when her phone buzzed. She jumped, sloshing the remainder of her drink on her jeans.

"It's all right," her father said. "Give me the glass."

She handed it to him and opened her phone. "I'm sorry," she said before Lee could say anything. "I'm so sorry."

"I just want you to know that I love you." The call ended and she was left staring at the phone.

The dam finally broke. For the second time in a week tears overwhelmed her. "I don't deserve him. I don't deserve to be loved that much, not by him or by you, either."

Her father put her glass on the floor and then put his arms around her. "Yes, you do. Don't ever think that you don't deserve to be loved. You and Lee will work it out. You love each other too much not to."

He didn't have to say anything else. She let herself believe him.

...

Elosha lit the candles on the main altar in the temple. Kara sat on the front pew with Laura and John who was holding his sleeping son. Her brother was dressed in a traditional gown made of the softest white cotton, the hem covered in delicate white embroidery. Laura had worn the gown at her own dedication ceremony as had her mother before her. Despite the fact that Laura was a very modern woman, she was also a traditionalist. Today, as Kara had watched Laura dress her son in the gown, fastening the tiny white buttons in the back, Kara had felt a sense of family again, a connection with the past.

Laura had smiled at her. "The gods willing, your child will wear this gown at his…or her dedication ceremony."

Kara had laughed self-consciously. "That's assuming I ever have a kid."

Kara had glanced around several times until she saw Lee come in and sit with his father and Fiona Nagala. Lee looked great in a dark navy suit and lighter blue shirt and burgundy tie.

They had exchanged a brief look. His eyes had given away nothing.

Laura and John had chosen a traditional dedication ceremony for their son, a ceremony as old as the scrolls of Pythia.

Elosha now instructed everyone to open the text that had been placed on the pews with them so they could all participate in the ceremony.

She invoked the blessing of the gods on Braedon. She told the assembled group to follow their texts. Then she began a responsive reading in which the group agreed to bind Braedon in faith as a child of Kobol and help to guide him as he grew. At the end of each passage, they all said, So Say We All.

Elosha reached for Braedon and John handed him to her. Under Elosha's guidance, Laura and John each dipped a finger in a bowl of water and touched Braedon's head while Elosha spoke of the origin of the water from the sacred spring at Delphi. Then Kara also dipped her finger in the water and touched her brother's head while Elosha talked about the special responsibility of a sister.

When the ceremony ended, Elosha handed her brother to her and Kara felt the bond tighten between her and the little boy who now seemed a part of her heart, the child whose destiny was linked to hers.

Then Elosha raised her hands, gave the benediction and the ceremony was over.

All those who had attended were invited to a private room that had been reserved across the street in one of the capital's nicest restaurants. Coffee and tea and snacks were being served.

Lee was waiting for her outside.

"That was a nice ceremony."

"I thought so. You look really good. That suit…your eyes."

He smiled and shrugged.

"Lee, I'm sorry. There's no excuse for what I said to you."

Her father and Laura came down the steps of the temple and prepared to cross the street. Braedon was bundled against the cold in his carrier. "Come on, you two," her father called.

"In a minute," Kara called back to him. "You go ahead. Lee and I need to talk."

Lee said, "I've done a lot of thinking since last night, and I think we need to step back and…get some perspective on our relationship."

Kara made a small, choked sound. "You're breaking up with me."

"No. I just think we need to start over and take it slower this time."

"What do you mean?"

"I think our physical relationship has gotten in the way of…I don't really know how to say it. It's gotten in the way of our friendship. Our trust."

"Your trust of me, you mean."

"You've got a huge amount going on in your life now. I want to be part of that. I want you to know you can turn to me for help and support. Not just for sex."

"Oh, gods. You think all you've been about for me is sex?"

Lee struggled with his feelings. At that very minute he wanted to take her in his arms and feel her mouth against his. Right there. On a public street. He pushed his hands into his pockets.

"We got involved so fast. Not that I'm complaining…but, I think we need to step back and…take a break from the physical thing…and…I can't believe I'm saying this."

"You don't love me anymore?"

"No, that's the problem. I love you too much. I start twelve weeks of War College tomorrow. Half days of work or flying and afternoons in the classroom. I'll have a lot of studying to do."

"Lee, I never meant to say what I did."

"But you did. You said it and I heard it. I just wanted you to open up to me, Kara, open up and talk to me about what's going on with you and Dreilide Thrace. You keep so much inside. I feel like you've shut me out."

"I'm not the only one who keeps things inside."

"I'm here for you, Kara. I want you to know that. If you want to talk…if you want to share your thoughts and feelings, I'm here for you if you need me."

He took her hand and they walked across the street.

Kara felt numb. He hadn't broken up with her, but it still felt that way.

Laura was outside the private dining room talking to D'Anna Biers. Her cameraman was there. It looked like Laura was giving an interview. Kara and Lee slipped past them into the room.

Her father had Braedon and was talking to Bill and Fiona. She and Lee walked over to them.

Kara looked at her father. "What's Laura doing out there?"

"I believe you call it giving an impromptu interview."

Bill said, "It's going to hit the news tomorrow that she's announced her candidacy for the Presidency. D'Anna Biers has an uncanny knack for turning up when there's a story to be had. She showed up at the airfield that day four years ago. She showed up at Caprica University the day Laura confronted Cavil. She's shown up several other places."

"Speaking of the University and that situation," Fiona said, "I was talking to a former colleague of mine out there. He said the Cylon woman isn't teaching her class on monotheism this semester. It seems she was a bit…overwhelmed by the male adulation in her class the first semester. She complained to Chancellor Enwright that no one took her seriously."

Kara snickered. "Why doesn't that surprise me?"

Her father said. "How are you doing, Lee?"

"Fine. I'm starting War College tomorrow at the Academy. I'll try to get out there in time to eat lunch with you."

Laura walked up. "I'm glad that's over. D'Anna Biers can be very persistent."

"Why didn't you just tell her you were busy?" John asked. "Our son's dedication ceremony was a private celebration for family and friends. Or did you invite her?"

"No, I didn't invite her. But I can't start a Presidential campaign by being uncooperative with the press. D'Anna does have a particular talent about knowing when to show up. I don't have a clue how she does it."

Bill said, "We were just talking about that particular talent of hers. Of course there's also a possibility that you have a leak in your office."

"Oh, no. Billy has been with me for over five years now…and Tory, I can't imagine she would…It could have been anyone who was invited today."

"But who knew you were getting ready to announce your candidacy?" Bill asked.

"That does narrow the field. Still, I can't believe Tory or Billy would have called her, certainly not Billy."

Kara looked at her watch. "I need to get back to the Academy. I have to be there by 16:00."

"I'll take you," Lee said.

Outside he took her hand again. They walked down the street to where John had parked the car. Kara used her key and got her duffel bag from the trunk. They walked to Lee's car. She couldn't get over the feeling that everything was different now.

They rode most of the way to the Academy in silence. Finally she said, "Someday I want you to meet my...Dreilide."

"Okay."

"He's not like my dad at all."

Lee parked in a visitor spot. She remembered the last time he had brought her back to the Academy, how he had held her in the lobby.

Lee got the duffel bag from the trunk. He took her hand again, and they walked to her dorm, but this time he stopped outside instead of going in with her.

"I'll try to see you tomorrow when I'm through. I've got to register and go through orientation. I don't know if class will last the rest of the afternoon or not."

Kara took her duffel bag from him and put it on the sidewalk. She put her arms around his neck.

Lee put his cheek against hers, his mouth near her ear. "I love you, Kara."

She loved him so much and yet she had hurt him so carelessly.

Kara knew if she stood there very long, she would go into the dorm in tears. She didn't want to have to explain that to whoever was at the front desk.

"You're everything to me," she managed to say before she picked up her bag and went up the steps.

Lee walked slowly back to his car. He sat for a long time in the parking lot wondering if he had made the right decision, if pulling back from the physical part of their love was the right decision, if he could stick to it.

He wasn't trying to punish Kara. He knew he would be punishing himself more, but if their love was real, if it were more than sex to her, it would survive and grow stronger.

He finally started the car and wondered what John would think of his decision. He wondered if Kara would tell him. He wished the scene at his apartment had never happened, but it had and they had to move forward.

He turned on the CD player in his car and skipped to the sixth track. Diaspora. The melody was haunting and sad like wind-scattered leaves in the autumn, like loss, like leaving home forever. Kara was right. The song wasn't something you could explain in words. You had to feel it. By the time he got back to his apartment, he was finally beginning to understand something about the man who had written that song the same year he had left his daughter behind.