Chapter 6

Lee awoke the next morning with a renewed spirit. He had managed to get almost three hours sleep, which was three hours more than he thought he'd get, and it had assuaged his tiredness enough to give him a brighter outlook on the world that morning. His father was right; Kara was probably waiting until the very last minute to get back. He expected her to come shooting out of the storm field after 48 hours and five minutes, executing some impossibly dangerous rolling manoeuvre in the viper just because she could. If this did indeed turn out to be the case he was going to be so frakking annoyed with her that he fully intended to put her over his knee and spank her like a naughty school girl for what she had put him through!

He left Alex with Cally, who was off duty and had volunteered for babysitting duty that morning, and went to conduct the pre-flight briefing. His pilots were surprised to find their CAG so invigorated after the almost monosyllabic briefings he had subjected them to over the past few days. He swapped shifts with Kat to make sure that he was out on CAP when Kara's mission time would be up; he wanted to be the one to escort her back to the ship. As it came closer to the forty eight hour mark he made sure that they were patrolling the part of the fleet closest to the storm field. They hit that time and nothing happened. Lee waited five then ten minutes more before taking the CAP back around the fleet. Before he knew it 30 more minutes had gone by and almost as suddenly 49 hours were up and then 50 and still no sign of her.

Back in the CIC a short moment of silence had reigned when the claxon signalling the mission clock reaching zero had gone off. All his staff looked at the admiral; they had all been through this with him once already and didn't want to have to go through it again. No one knew how he was going to react this time.

−

Lee's patrol was coming to an end and the hopeful feeling of the morning had completely gone, to be replaced by a heaviness in his heart as the likelihood of his wife making it back safely diminished with each passing minute. He started his final approach into the Galactica, but just as he was about to enter the landing bay his viper jolted then dived as the port side engine cut out. With lightening reflexes and supreme strength he just managed to get the nose up far enough to avoid crashing into the bay and then took the ship out the other side.

"Galactica, this is Apollo. I've lost an engine. Coming round again to attempt another landing but it's not going to be pretty."

He managed to get the viper down in one piece, but the incident had done nothing to improve his mood. When the plane came to rest on the hanger deck he jumped out and climbed down the ladder quickly, viciously stripping off his gloves. If it had been Cally, his usual deck hand, she would have picked up on his mood immediately, but Socinus, who was her cover, wasn't so observant.

"Everything alright, sir?" he asked brightly.

"No it frakking well isn't. I lost the port side engine on my final approach. I'm lucky they're not scrapping my remains off the deck. Why the frak can't you people check everything properly before we go out?"

"I did sir, but blow me if it doesn't keep happening. They go off just like that. It's the exhaust valves, sir. We keep fixing 'em but you can't tell when they're going to go again," Socinus replied, a cheerful grin on his face.

Lee stared at the technician, an overwhelming anger boiling up in him. How dare this young idiot be so cheerful when his carelessness could have cost Lee his life. What if this is what had happened to Kara's viper. He took a step forward so that he was glaring directly down at Socinus, who had at last realised that the CAG seemed a bit pissed.

"You will check every single engine on every single viper until you are 100 per cent sure that every valve is fixed and you won't leave this deck until you have done so. Do I make myself clear?" Despite the fact that they were so close, he was shouting at the tech. Socinus had never seen the CAG like this.

"Yeeees, sir," he managed to get out, with a sketch of a salute. He stepped back, trying to get away from the waves of anger that were radiating off of Lee, but he tripped over some equipment and clattered to the floor. Lee kicked the equipment across the deck with a snarl of frustration. The chief, alerted by the rumpus, came over to see what was going on.

"Is there something wrong, major?"

"Your crewman seems to find it amusing that there's a known fault with the viper engines that you can't seem to fix properly. When were you intending to tell the pilots about it?"

"If you mean the exhaust valves, sir, we're working our way through them. I'm not letting any viper leave without the initial repair, but in some rare cases this hasn't worked and they've gone again."

"That doesn't make me feel more comfortable, chief." The chief looked at the CAG and knew what was going through his mind. He went on quietly so that no one else could hear.

"I triple-checked Starbuck's viper myself before she left, sir. I'm certain that there was nothing wrong with her engines."

Lee looked at him and for a moment the chief caught the utter despair behind Lee's eyes. Then Lee bent to grab the pile of tools Socinus had dropped at his feet. He hurled them at a box of parts and the whole thing collapsed in a mess on the floor. Lee stormed out of the hanger deck leaving an uncomfortable silence in his wake.

−

It was at this inopportune moment that the admiral chose to appear on the hanger deck. He had been coming to look for Lee, but what he found was a number of people trying to right a fallen parts housing and picking up scattered tools.

"What happened here chief?"

"The CAG got quite rightly annoyed with one of my young idiots," he said, glaring at Socinus. "Fortunately he only took his frustration out on a bag of tools, not Socinus' face."

"Still, that's hardly an excuse for such behaviour from an officer on your deck."

"May be sir, but I don't blame him." He went on quietly, "I can't imagine what he's going through right now. We're…we're all really worried for Starbuck. How much more time does she have, sir?"

"Not much, chief. That's what I was coming to talk to him about." His face was grim as he put a brief hand on the chief's shoulder and left the deck.

As he walked towards the CAG's office, Admiral Adama recalled the last time he had had to make the decision to leave Kara behind. It had been bad enough then, now it was agonising. She was his daughter in every way but biologically and she was the mother of his grandson, but he knew that if she were here she would be telling him to do what was best for the fleet. He knew this, but it didn't make the decision any easier. He thought of his wonderful grandson, having to grow up without knowing his mother. He also thought of Lee who had overcome all his inner demons to let himself open up to Kara and to love her; now that was going to be taken away.

He found Lee in his office. He had half been expecting to find him trashing the place after what had happened on the hanger deck. Instead the major was working diligently through the flight schedules. Seeing the deep frown on his son's face, Adama decided to let the hanger bay incident go.

"What are you doing, major?"

"I'm just re-adjusting tomorrow's schedules, sir. I think Starbuck might deserve a day off, don't you sir? The last thing she's going to want to do when she gets back is fly a patrol."

A slightly ironic grimace passed over Adama's face. Lee, who had been so pessimistic at the start of the mission, was now behaving in exactly the opposite manner when the chances of Kara still being alive were so slim. Adama knew that if Starbuck wasn't out of fuel by now then she would be out of oxygen; whichever, it added up to the same conclusion; his daughter-in-law wasn't coming back and he needed to help Lee accept this fact.

"Son, I think you can leave the schedules for the moment."

"No I need to get them done. I need to do something. If I don't I'll start to think about….and…and I just can't do that right now." He finished with a huge steadying breath.

"Lee, I've waited as long as I can, but even if she did put in a couple of extra bottles of oxygen in her survival kit as she said, they would be gone by now. We have to face the fact that she's not going to make it back this time."

"Dad, just let me take a couple of vipers into the storm to look for her. She could be really close and just needs some help getting back…..please."

"You know that I can't let you do that or we could easily loose you and the other ships as well. I know that this is beyond difficult but we have to move the fleet." Lee looked up at his father, his blue eyes unnaturally bright, and suddenly he looked very young.

"You said if it was me that we'd never leave. That's how I feel about Kara."

"I know, and I meant it: I'd never leave. I don't want to leave her either. But I can't make over 45,000 people stay as well. Right now I know you want to do something, anything, to get her back; I do too. You just want to stay here forever in the vain hope that she'll somehow appear, but you can't Lee. You have to face the pain of loosing her and get through it." Lee simply nodded, his jaw muscles quilted as he did his best to hold on to his emotions.

Adama turned to leave, but glancing back he saw his son's shoulders start to shake as the rigid control he had been maintaining on his feelings gave way. He didn't hesitate but pulled Lee into his arms. He couldn't remember the last time he had held his son while he cried; whenever it was, it was a hell of a long time ago and he would have only been a small boy. This time he didn't even think about saying that brave little warriors didn't cry because he knew that this one needed to. As he felt the body-wracking sobs tremble through Lee's body, he hoped it would be another long time before he had to do it again, but he had a feeling that wouldn't be the case. His own eyes stung with unshed tears as he felt Lee's utter misery.

−

The admiral put in a call to the president. He knew that she wouldn't force the issue this time, but she would still want the fleet to move on nonetheless.

"I think we have to move Madame President."

"Is there no hope, admiral?"

"I'm afraid not, Madame President. Even with our most optimistic calculations she ran out of oxygen almost an hour ago."

"Oh this is horrible, Bill, but I have to agree. It's in the best interest of the fleet." Laura recalled the last time she had asked this man and his son to leave Kara behind. She now had a much better understanding of what this type of decision cost them and her heart ached for them.

"How's Lee?" She asked.

"Falling apart," he said simply.

"And yourself?"

"I'll live," he replied tersely, then went on quietly. "Having to watch your child go through something like this is a pain that I wouldn't wish on anyone."

−

As the call to action rang throughout the ship and the great engines of the battlestar started to groan, Lee walked back to his quarters. Cally was standing by Alex' cot, tears streaming down her face. She gave him a hug, all considerations of rank forgotten at such a moment.

"Do you want me to stay with him?" She asked. Lee simply shook his head in reply and with a squeeze of comfort on his arm she left.

He lifted the sleeping baby out of his cot and then lay down on the bed, Alex resting on his chest. Lee kissed the top of his head and wrapped his arms around him. He knew that his son had no idea of the enormity of what was happening to him at this moment, the affect that it would have on his life. Lee just felt that he should be close to his son at the moment when he lost his mother, to make sure that he felt loved. He closed his eyes tightly and hoped the nightmare would go away as he felt the ship start to move.

−

The admiral stood like stone in CIC, his face a tight mask, as the fleet began to move away from the storm field. The whole ship's crew was subdued; as much of a pain in the ass as she might sometimes have been, Starbuck was a talisman for them, always surviving against the odds. In loosing her they had lost some of their hope of survival.

−

Author's note: Thanks for all the feedback on this one so far. How was that chapter for you? A bit overly melodramatic or just the right amount of angst? Let me know what you think. Next chapter coming soon.