Lee Adama stared around the briefing room on the main campus of the Academy of the Twelve Colonies as everyone started arriving for their orientation. He could see a few familiar faces from his days of general schooling. Most of the people, including those he knew, looked scared, confused, intimated. He wasn't any of those things.
All he was to anyone right now was another Commander's son who had had no problem getting acceptance into the Viper training program because it would be a slight to Daddy if he got rejected.
Everyone would be wrong. The great William "Husker" Adama had helped him get his foot in the door, but that was all. Lee planned to make it to graduation with only his merits to credit for the success. He would fly his ass off until everyone saw that he was good enough to be in this program no matter who his father was. They might say it was genetic, the ease he felt in a cockpit, but he didn't care. At least genetics implied that he was utilizing his talent to its fullest.
He waved to Broc, his best friend since primary school, who was leaning against the back wall. "Why aren't you down there?" he asked, pointing to the front row where there was no one sitting.
"I'm a little too intimidated to just go and plop myself in front of where the instructors are going to be staring us down in a few minutes as an act of intimidation."
Lee nodded. The reason made sense, but he still couldn't help but feel that it only pointed out how out of place Broc was in this environment. He shouldn't be nervous because of the instructors' desire to intimidate. Everyone knew it was coming. You just stared at the wall and took it.
"So how does the competition size up?" Lee asked, scanning the room.
"There are your usual tough guys who keep making circles around the room, staring people down. And then there's the usual bookworms who are smart but mostly got in because they have parents in high places. No offense, Lee."
"None taken as long as you-"
"-understand that you're good enough to be here. I know. Am I your friend or not?"
Lee rolled his eyes. "So anyone else?"
Broc chuckled and pushed off the wall as he began to get noticeably excited at what he was about to say. "You're never going to believe this part. But, well, there was this little slip of a blonde girl walking around before. I thought that maybe she was lost. Someone beat me to the punch before I could get over there and ask her if she needed help. She gave them one cold look and marched herself up to the front row that no one seems to want to sit in and sat in the center."
Lee's eyes immediately fell on the girl Broc was talking about. He had been wrong about the front row being empty because, sure enough, a blonde girl was sitting there, looking very standoffish. She was fiddling with the chain her newly issued Nugget dog tag was hanging on.
Broc had continued talking, but Lee had stopped listening. Something about this girl intrigued him. Somehow he knew that she wasn't the little frail, lost thing that his best friend had taken her to be. There was a power in the way that she sat. And her eyes kept scanning everyone around her as if she was searching for weakness in all those present.
Unlike almost every other person in the briefing room, she looked like she knew what she was doing. She looked important. She looked like she belonged.
Lee continued to stare at her, trying to figure out if he should know who this mystery person was and why she might be so fraking important.
The staring had nothing to do with the fact that he found her pretty.
Nothing at all.
Lee slammed the cockpit hatch to his simulator open. He knew that everyone expected him to come vaulting out, gloating at his accomplishment.
They didn't know that he hadn't meant to do it.
He hadn't meant to beat her.
His face reddened as all the eyes in the room clearly focused on him.
It had been the normal weekly flight simulation they were all obligated to do as nuggets. There was some silly competition between the different halls in his dorm as to who could perform the best. He didn't care about that. How he flew only mattered to the instructors and even that was only when he could get out of the simulators and into the real thing.
That didn't stop the little blonde thing he had seen all over the campus since that day in the briefing room from barreling into the room while yelling about how the instructors had seen it fit that she be matched up with this bunch of frak-ups. Seems like they were getting a little too big-headed.
Lee couldn't even pretend to have no idea what she meant. His flight simulator partners had all gotten a little too cocky. The problem was they were usually only given team assignments, not assignments of individual skill. They weren't particularly good as a group, but with Lee on their team, they hadn't failed once.
They were getting cocky when they didn't have the chops to back it up. Secretly, he was glad that the instructors had thrown her in with them for this particular sim. This was an individual test in which you didn't have to watch out for anyone's back but your own. He knew from the rumors circulating that she wouldn't hesitate for one second if it came to the point where they got in the way of her own success. She would be ruthless.
Lee had been about to turn quietly and start his simulated pre-flight checklist, but when she kept talking, he froze.
"Let me see. You're probably the worst of them, aren't you?"
He was shocked to realize she was pointing at him. "Huh?"
"You are the person the instructors sent me in here to put in his place, aren't you, hotshot?"
"I have no idea what you're talking about," he said, secretly laughing at the fact that she had read the situation completely wrong. He was the hotshot who was going to soar because she was here to put down the rest of his team.
"You think that just because I'm not on your squad that I don't watch your sims? Your team is ragged. There's no flow. If there hadn't been some strange miracle in each one of your flights, you all would have been simulated dead. And word is you're the ring leader. How someone who flies so sloppy can lead is beyond me."
"You don't know what you're talking about," Lee hissed, suddenly wishing he had bothered to learn this rather annoying girl's name.
"I bet you think you're some sort of god. That you were destined to be in the sky and that no one can touch you when you're up there. Well, wake up, fly boy. You're not a god."
And then she disappeared into the flight simulator that had been assigned to Broc before he realized he couldn't hack it and dropped out of the Academy. For some reason, it seemed fitting that she should be riding in the spot of his best friend.
The only thing that had kept even a semblance of control to his flying in the beginning of the simulation was the fact that she hadn't made a dig about him being Daddy's little boy. She had left out all the usual taunts. He gave her a little leave-way because of that.
His teammates all dropped out of the simulation within minutes. It was just he and this girl fighting against one another to see who could accurately shoot the Cylon targets while flying as fast and as accurately as they could. She had kept up with him for the first hundred or so targets. But then he could practically taste her getting fatigued.
And suddenly he found himself wanting to rub in how wrong she was. He wanted to point out that she might be good, but she would never be the best with him in the cockpit.
He threw in all the hot dog moves that he had vowed to never use. He flipped his simulated Viper end to end and shot targets that were behind him as well as in front. He rolled and pitched so that she had to go on the defensive, and he took out a few of the targets which were obviously intended as easy shots for her guns. Throughout it all, he could hear her voice swearing over the comms that linked simulator to simulator.
He knew she wanted him to taunt her. To point out how wrong she had been.
He didn't need words for that. His actions would speak loud enough. And taunts would only serve to anger her into stepping up her game.
Then the buzzer rang. The simulation ended. Reality set in.
And he realized how much he had humiliated her. He had let his temper get the better of him and had taken down a pilot who hadn't needed a reality check.
She had been cocky and now he had made himself the center of attention.
Crap. So much for laying low until he got his wings.
One of his fellow students yelled out, "So, how does it feel to be a god, Apollo?"
He rolled his eyes. Apollo. God of the sun. Cute.
The name rang through people's cheers and chants. The only thing that kept him from grimacing was knowing, at least after a few minutes, no one would ever call him such a conceited name again.
Lee ran his hand through his still wet hair and, grabbing the key card that would let him back into the dorms, made his way out the door. He hoped his brother hadn't been waiting in too long in the rundown bar most of the nuggets training to be Viper pilots preferred.
When Zak had first called him to let him know that he was training to be a Viper pilot, Lee had been surprised. His brother had never really shown much promise at flying. A lot of times, Lee only thought he tried so that he could gain some of his father's attention. The great Commander only seemed to want to talk to them when they were doing particularly good things in the air.
Groaning, Lee broke out into a slight jog. He had warned his brother that he wasn't sure if he could make this little dinner. His first few weeks in War College were wearing him thin. It had gotten to the point where he really wasn't sure if he could eat and sleep let alone socialize with his brother.
But then he thought about how hard those first few months in the Academy had been on him. And he had had the raw talent to back up the challenge flying gave him. Zak didn't. His little brother had to be going nuts, trying to pull out decent scores on those simulators. A supportive brother would be there for him no matter how busy he was.
Lee smiled at the sight of the rundown bar that he had frequented so many nights when he was in the Academy. He hadn't had time to make it down here in months. Seeing the people laughing and joking as they indulged in a little ambrosia and triad made him understand his decision had been right. This place was distraction at its worst, and if he was going to make it through War College and the officer training that accompanied it, he would need to avoid it.
He had resigned himself to that. But then a call from his brother had brought him rushing down here.
He spotted Zak sitting at a table in the back and grinned. His kid brother loved being the center of attention as much as Lee hated it. He had chosen this table away from the action for his brother's sake.
"Hey," Lee said, sliding into a chair across from Zak.
"I wasn't sure you were going to make it," Zak said, holding up his watch. "Half an hour late?"
"My classes ran long, and then they threw me into a Viper flight. I had to take a shower after that as a favor to you nuggets."
"Well, at least you made it," Zak said. He leaned back and took a sip of ambrosia out of the glass in front of him. "I guess you're wondering why I asked you down here."
"I am." Lee said. He turned to signal at the bartender to send over two more drinks.
"Better make it three," Zak said.
"Someone joining us?"
"Yeah. She actually just went to check on a few of her pilots who weren't looking so well."
"First, she? And second, her pilots?"
"My new girlfriend. And she's an instructor for first years."
"You're dating a teacher?"
"Don't make it sound so dirty."
Lee leaned back in his chair as the tiny little waitress who had been staring at him since he walked in brought their drinks over. "Thank you."
"No problem," she said in a drawl that clearly identified her as a citizen of Geminon. "Should you need anything at all, I'll be right over there."
Lee nodded and watched her walk off.
"How do you do it, big brother?"
"Do what?" he said, turning his attention back to Zak.
"Get girls to lust after you without even looking at them."
"I'm not interested," he said, even though it was really not an explanation. "She's not my type."
"And what type would that be?"
Lee's mind immediately flew to the woman whose image had been occupying his dreams of late. "The type of woman who wouldn't take shit from men like that waitress is doing with those nuggets. But let's not get into that. Let's go back to the fact that you're probably breaking about fifty Academy rules by dating an instructor."
"We're not hiding our relationship, and her boss has made it clear that she's not to be the one administering tests to me at any point. She just helps me with my flight simulations."
"And boy do you need it."
The voice made Lee freeze. Frak. If that was who he thought it was, then he was in trouble.
Hoping to the gods that he hadn't recognized the voice correctly, he turned to look at his brother's new girlfriend and flight instructor.
Yeah. There she was. The woman he had seen on and off as they worked their way through the Academy training program. The woman he had lost control around and ground into the dust that day in the simulators. The little blond thing that was so many more things than she seemed.
But worst off, she was the woman who he had been having rather vivid R-rated fantasies about every single time he closed his eyes.
Frak didn't even begin to cover it.
Lee walked into the bar on Picon after pausing slightly at the sense of deja vu. This whole situation was familiar. About eight months earlier, he had strolled in happy to see his little brother and left confused as to why he wasn't happy that Zak had found someone to love.
And now he was walking back in to meet the two people that had confused him so badly before.
He made a detour at the bar. This time he wouldn't be stupid enough to wait to order the alcohol until after he had found them. In fact, if he could get a few drinks in him before they even noticed he was here, all the better.
"Lee!"
Maybe not. He grabbed the drink from the bartender and threw a few cubits down.
The sound of her voice calling out his name still felt new and strange. They had gone through Academy together without even uttering each other's call signs, let alone their actual real names. And now she just tossed it around like they had known each other since they were young.
All the same, he didn't hesitate to give her a small wave of recognition before dropping his gaze as he pushed his way through the crowd to their table. "Again, I find myself answering a cryptic summons from my little brother," he said with a laugh as he took a seat.
"He doesn't have a new girlfriend this time," Kara said with a laugh, grabbing Zak's hand in hers.
Kara. When had he let himself think of her on such a personal level? Why couldn't she just be that little blonde thing? Or the girl he had beat in simulations? Why did she have to be Kara?
"No, I don't," Zak said. He tore his eyes away from hers in order to look at Lee. "I have a fiancée."
Lee knew that choking on his drink had not been the reaction they wanted, but it was what happened. "What did you just say?"
"I asked Kara to marry me yesterday, and she said yes."
Lee nodded his head slowly, trying to process this new information. He hadn't even known that his little brother was getting serious with his new girlfriend. He had been too busy trying to find a way to get through War College so that he could finally get his placement on some Battlestar far, far away from this very problem. Plus, he still had the goal in his head that he would be a better man than his father on all levels, and then finally, maybe the pressure would let up.
Not that he hadn't taken time to learn about this new girl in his brother's life. He found out that she was the daughter of a rather obscure military trainer mother and one of the best jazz musicians on Caprica. He found out that she had practically breezed through all the flying courses in Academy but struggled through the basic arts. He found out that she was a frequent visitor to the brig and had a problem with too much ambrosia when combined with men that were, frankly, fraking idiots.
All that research had been for his brother's own sake, of course. It had nothing to do with his own curiosity.
And now his brother was making this little relationship permanent. Something that no self-respecting Viper pilot would do. They knew that their lives were too hectic to let themselves make such attachments. Which, come to think of it, begged the question of why an Academy-trained Flight Instructor would want to put herself in that position, too.
Gods, this was all too much.
"Congratulations," he finally spit out after realizing they had been patiently staring at him, waiting for a reaction.
Zak rolled his eyes. "I think we need more ambrosia."
Before Lee could protest, his brother was gone. Now it was only Kara and Lee at the table.
"So, you didn't exactly sound thrilled," she commented after a moment of awkward silence.
"Well, you can only imagine," he blurted out. Oh gods. That did not come out right.
"Yeah. The baby boy of one of the greatest Viper pilots in the history of the Twelve Colonies marrying the trailer trash of Caprica. Sometimes even I don't believe it."
He stared at her in confusion. Was that really what she thought of herself? "No. It's not that. It's just… it seemed to me like you had more sense than that."
"I don't understand."
"Well. I assumed that after you finished your assignment as a flight instructor you would be going to War College to obtain an official placement out in the field. You and I both know that no matter how good of a teacher you are, there's no way Zak's going to make it through Academy. So then, what is he going to do when his wife is stationed on a ship orbiting another planet?"
"How much thought have you put into this, Lee?"
Oh frak. He had said too much. Lee looked behind him, frantically wondering when Zak was going to come back. He couldn't even see his little brother through the crowd. Defeated, he turned back to look at Kara.
It surprised him to see her also scanning the room, presumably for Zak. Her eyes locked on his for a few seconds before she quickly shifted to stare down at her hands. The ring on her left hand caught the light and shined brightly. It seemed like she had already gotten in the nervous habit of fidgeting with it.
Nervous habit? What the frak did she have to be nervous about?
Unlike him, it seemed like her life was just going splendidly these days. "How has instructing been going for you?" he asked, trying to bring up a topic that was much more safe than if they continued on with their discussion of the now not-so-secret engagement.
"Oh gods. You wouldn't believe the nuggets they send my way…"
He found himself staring at her sudden burst of excitement. She seemed to really love her job even though it was clearly a waste of some of the best talent the Twelve Colonies had. Her eyes had lit up as she started telling story after story about the new blood trying to make their way through Academy without washing out.
Her words slowly faded out as all of his senses suddenly directed themselves onto the glowing sight sitting in front of him. She looked a lot less jaded and soft when she let down her defenses, which obviously wasn't often from what he heard. He could see what had attracted his brother to her in the first place.
A voice in the back of his head nagged him to admit that he didn't have to invoke his brother to understand what would attract a man to this woman sitting before him. He would only have to consult his own memory of seeing her that first day in the briefing room.
She had seemed stubborn, not willing to budge for anyone. She had seemed smarter than most of the other people in the room without even having to say a word. And she had been the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.
He stared at her from across the table as she still continued talking about her students.
She still was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.
Frak. His whole body froze as it suddenly dawned on him what was going on.
When had he fallen in love with his brother's girlfriend?
He watched as Kara paused in her story to give Zak a smile as he returned to their table with a round of drinks.
Scratch that. Make that in love with his brother's fiancée.
Lee was in the middle of the daily jog he had taken to going on in order to get used to the schematics of Battlestar Atlantia when his eyes locked on to a face he never thought he'd see on this ship.
"What the frak are you doing here, Zak?"
"I caught a shuttle that was leaving Picon early this morning. There were a few things I wanted to ask you before you come to my graduation in a few weeks. I didn't want to go through all that pomp and circumstance with Dad and telling him about our engagement without talking to you first."
Lee wiped the sweat off his face. "I told you before Zak. Dad won't care about you and Kara. If it doesn't hurt your chances of being a Viper pilot, he won't care."
"This isn't really about Dad, Lee. It's about you."
"Me?" Lee said, scrunching up his face in confusion. "Your pressing questions have to do with me?"
Zak rubbed his face and gave a sigh. "Listen, Lee. There's no way I can ask you this easily, so I'm just going to do it. What do you feel for Kara?"
"She's a good girl. I think she's going to make you happy, Zak." He let out a tense laugh. "But you didn't have to fly all the way to Atlantia for me to tell you that. I thought you already knew how much respect I have for your future wife."
"Respect? Is that all you have for her?"
"Admiration. Appreciation. Do you want me to go on?'
"How about love, Lee? Do you love her?"
Lee felt his heart freeze. The way his brother was looking at him… he knew. Oh gods. He didn't know how, but Zak knew that he was in love with Kara. "I love the way she makes you happy," he lied.
"Right. But do you love her?"
There was no way around this. He had never in his life told an outright lie to his little brother. But he had no other choice.
"No. Of course I don't. Kara and I had never even spoken to one another before you introduced her to me. I have to admit I knew who she was. Her actions at Academy were legendary. The girl spent more time in the brig than in the cockpit." Lee gave his brother his best fake smile. "But as for me loving her, no. I don't."
Zak nodded, and Lee could tell immediately that his brother hadn't believed a word he said. "Kara and I are going to get married, Lee. We are. I just wanted to make sure you knew that."
"I do," Lee said, understanding the subtext of his brother's words. He might love Kara, but Zak was the one whom she loved back.
That realization rang through his head as he watched his little brother turn his back to him and walk away.
Lee watched as the strongest woman he had ever known beside his mother broke down. She had held it together while everyone was gathered around the closed casket as it was lowered into the ground accompanied by the normal twelve-gun salute.
Now that only he and she stood in front of the covered grave, she had let herself go. Frak. She probably didn't even know he was still here, watching her.
He didn't know what to say to make her feel better.
"I know you're there, Lee," she whispered, pushing the tears from her eyes and glancing over at him.
"Are you going to be all right?" he asked, stepping forward to place a hand on her shoulder. Gods. Could he be any more impersonal?
She shrugged away from his touch and took a step towards the grave. "The man I intended to marry just died, Lee. He died in a fire caused by the Viper I taught him to fly. No. I am definitely not going to be all right."
He didn't know what to say to that. In fact, he didn't know what to say to most of what she had said to him since he received the news that his brother had been killed while flying.
He wanted to tell her that things were going to be all right. That even if she felt her life was over now that Zak was gone, she would manage to rebuild somehow. She could still fly better than any other pilot out there. She had that to fall back on.
But the words wouldn't leave his mouth. They would only sound hollow, anyway.
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to yell."
And now she was apologizing. His heart ached for the destroyed woman standing in front of him.
Because the words still weren't right for him to say, he simply stepped forward and took her hand in his. At least he could be a comfort for her with a while. As much as it pained him to be so close to her and still be holding so much back, he wasn't about to step away.
Kara had unknowingly reached out to him for help even if she would forever deny it. He wasn't going to back down just because of a little emotional pain. He had been raised better than that.
Maybe someday he'll find a way to tell her that she was going to survive this. Maybe someday he could show her that life would go on.
But for now, he was content to just show her that he was here for her to lean on. He was going to show her that at the very least she could go on for the next few minutes.
After that, he wasn't sure what came next.
Lee paced up and down the length of the long hall in the house on Caprica that his mother had always been so proud of. He had just spent the entirety of dinner listening to his mother go on and on about how well Kara was doing. She had breezed right through officer's training and then quickly accepted his father's offer of a place on Galactica.
That's where she was now.
Caroline Adama had mentioned that Kara hadn't even been thrown into the brig once in the past six months. And that was the point where Lee really starting worrying. For the past two years, the most common occurrence in all Twelve Colonies was hearing the words 'Starbuck' and 'brig' together in the same sentence.
If she was avoiding trouble, then there still must be some sort of sadness or anger festered up inside her. He desperately wanted to know why she hadn't let it go yet. It had been a year.
Suddenly determined, he picked up the phone and dialed in the security number and connection location he had known since childhood.
"Caprica private residence, this is Galactica receiving your transmission."
Lee startled for a second. For as long as he could remember, the voice that answered the transmissions had been an elderly man too old to advance farther than this position. This time the voice belonged to someone a lot younger and a lot more unsure of what they were doing. Not to mention that this someone was definitely a woman.
Clearing his throat, he pushed that thought to the side. "Galactica, I'm requesting you connect me with Lieutenant Kara Thrace if she's available."
"Understood."
Lee waited for the voice to click off. When it didn't, he asked, "Is there a problem, Galactica?"
"No. I just…" The young girl's voice paused. "Well, isn't this the number to the Commander's old residence on Caprica?"
"Yes. It is."
"And you don't want to talk to the Old Man? Oh gods. I didn't not just call him that on the comms. I am so going to get fraking fired. Oh gods. I just said frak. Oh. I said it again."
Lee let out a chuckle. "Is this your first day?"
"Yes, sir. Wait. Are you a sir? I don't even know."
"What's your name?"
"Petty Officer Dualla, sir. But everyone calls me Dee."
"Well, Dee, I guess then I would be a sir to you. I'm Lieutenant Lee Adama which is why I'm calling from the Commander's old residence. I don't want to talk to my father right now. I'd like you to connect me to Starbuck." Lee paused for a moment. "And don't be worried about your job. I'm sure you're doing just fine. In fact, the bumbling is kind of charming."
"Thank you, sir. Connecting."
Her voice cut off this time, and Lee let out a little chuckle. This girl was definitely going to have some hard work cut out for her if she was going to stay on in her post as communications officer.
"Lieutenant Thrace speaking."
And there it was. The voice he hadn't heard almost a year.
"Hello? Is there anyone fraking there?"
He found that he couldn't get himself say anything. Hearing her voice was drumming up things he had spent so much time trying to forget.
"Damnit, Dee. If you even cut off another call for me, I'm going to personally march myself down to CIC and show you how it's done."
Lee wasn't even hearing her words anymore as he set down the receiver.
Calling her had been a stupid, unthinking move on his part. He had no idea what to say to her. 'Sorry that a year ago the man you loved died' just wasn't going to cut it. Neither was 'I'm worried because I hear you've been on your best behavior lately'.
And he definitely wasn't about to admit to her what the mere sound of her voice did to his heart. It was currently beating at a hundred miles before hour. He had really thought he had gotten over those feelings when they parted ways after Zak's funeral. But the guilt of loving his brother's girl was still there.
He stared at the phone. The guilt was there. And obviously, so was the love itself.
He heard his mother enter the kitchen and yell for him to help her with the groceries.
Frak. She better not start talking about the wonder that was Kara again.
Lee leaned against the bars of the brig and watched the little blonde woman who was driving her body to the extreme as she did push up after push up. He had no idea how someone who had found such a fitting niche to live her life in could look so sad. He knew if she wasn't such a brave person to the core, she would probably allow those tears that were welling in her eyes to fall.
Suddenly, he wanted her to know that he was there watching her. Maybe she could find comfort in his presence like she had done that day in the cemetery.
"This seems familiar." That had come out a lot smugger than he had intended.
She looked up at him as if he was the last thing she had ever imagined would be before her eyes. Hadn't someone told her that he had been ordered to attend the decommissioning?
"Captain Adama, sir," she said, finally standing up. The cocky grin he had always connected with her replaced the held-back tears. "Sorry I wasn't there to greet you with the rest of the squadron. Did they kiss your ass to your satisfaction?"
As much as he would have loved to tell her how good it was to hear her sarcasm, he chose to ignore it. "So what's the charge this time?"
She thought it over a moment before saying "Striking a superior asshole."
He felt a grin spread across his face even though he had been trying his best to stay serious. "I bet you've been waiting all day to say that one."
"Most of the afternoon." Smiling, she walked up to the bars and asked him, "So how long has it been?"
"Two years," he said shortly, knowing that this was just steering them to a topic he really didn't want to get into right now. He just wanted to bask in the fact that she was acting the way he could remember her from when Zak was still around.
"Two years? We must be getting old. Seems like the funeral-" Her eyes darted up to stare into his. "-was just a couple of months ago."
The look in her eyes made him pause. Was she talking about the fact that she had to bury the man she died or was she talking about what had happened between them after everyone else had gone?
As she continued talking, he suddenly realized what superior asshole she must have been referring to. He did his best to cover his shock from the image of her striking his father's best friend as it popped into his head.
And for the first time in two years, he felt relieved. The tension he had always felt around her suddenly faded away. For the first time, he realized that the distance between them had helped him smother those feelings he should never have even started feeling.
He would be gone off Galactica in a few days. Maybe the continued distance would get rid of his love for her completely.
Now what was she talking about?
Frak. Why had she brought up his father, the only other topic he didn't want to talk about?
As the tone between them started to become a little hostile, he found himself wondering why she always had to push him until he didn't know which end was up. Couldn't things just be simple with her?
Well, no matter. Things would get better when he was off this hunk of junk and there were miles of space between them.
Lee made his way across the crowded hangar bay. Since the second the shuttle of Secretary Roslin- make that President Roslin- had docked on Galactica, all he could think about was finding her. Somehow, his training in high stress military situations had given him a second chance. He was going to fix whatever had gone wrong.
He saw her working under her Viper just like he had thought she would be. She had grease smudges all over her face. For some reason he thought that was probably the best thing he had seen since… well… since way too long.
Yeah. If it was the last thing he did, he would make whatever was broken inside of her right again.
After all, he had already proven it could happen before. He would just have to not get scared and run like he had the first time.
Lee sat in the Viper that had been so brutally pinned to the launch tube wall. He knew that Galactica's crew would have the tube sealed off and would be making their way towards the wrecked Vipers within minutes. He wished he didn't have to wait for them to let him out before talking to Kara.
He had no fraking clue why she hadn't left him behind. It was what they had both been trained to do in a time of crisis. Each pilot's life was worth the same as the next, no matter who it is. No matter whose son they are. She could have easily taken the one imminent casualty that would only slightly hurt the Fleet and multiplied it into two casualties which would devastate the little bit of progress they had made so far.
Her words as she screamed at him to shut up and hold still echoed through his head. He had ordered her to leave him behind, but she hadn't listened. Seeing as he was a Captain and she was a Lieutenant, he had the right to ground her for disobeying a direct order. But somehow he felt the fact that she had saved his life would make that a little too hard on both of them.
But still his mind kept going back to why she couldn't leave him behind. It insinuated that she thought he was too important to sacrifice.
He wasn't. When it came down to it, he wasn't even a part of Galactica. The fact that he was the CAG meant nothing. Any one of the other Lieutenants on board could do just as good of a job. So why had she risked her life, the one that was definitely not worthy of sacrifice, to keep him alive?
Why the frak did she do it?
As his cockpit suddenly flew open and he was surrounded by crewmen, he resolved himself to ask her the second he was free.
But then chaos erupted as he heard the shouts of the XO echoing through the tube. He was berating Starbuck for doing such a stupid move, and she was shouting back at him that if he cared for William Adama as much as everyone thought, he wouldn't be asking her that.
So, she had made the choice because of his father?
Her eyes locked with his for a second before she turned back to yelling at Colonel Tigh. The emotion he saw in them made his whole body stiffen.
She looked like she was about to cry. Which made him think that maybe it had something to do with Zak. That was the only thing that seemed to make her cry these days.
Because if it wasn't about Zak, then there was a lot of unspoken confliction stirring up between them that he couldn't just attribute to the stress of having his brother's memory hanging over them. He suddenly remembered the confliction he had felt all those years where he had tried to come to terms with Zak's death and with his feelings of guilt because he had loved the woman he couldn't dare to dream loved him back.
She had killed him. She had passed him when he should have failed. His death was no one's fault but her own.
Those words didn't seem even a little bit right. She might want to take all the guilt on her own shoulders, but that's not where it belonged.
He watched as she stomped away from Tigh. Asking her why he was so important would have to wait.
Maybe he could ask her on the day that the Cylons were finally beaten. Then they might be able to face up to the fact that they were both important to one another for reasons that made no sense.
But frak, didn't those reasons feel right?
Lee walked away from the Viper, empty pill canister in hand, laughing to himself. She had always been cranky when she was tired.
He paused as he realized he had no real right to know that. It had been something Zak had mentioned in passing one of the few times he had talked to him during the time his brother had dated Kara. She had been on the warpath because her instructing schedule hadn't given her more than two hours sleep at a time. Zak had told him about it, and somehow Lee had remembered.
One of these days, he would have to stop kidding himself. These little details about Kara weren't something he just remembered out of the blue. He had committed them to memory. He had held on tight to every little detail he could get about Kara Thrace from the moment he discovered her as a little blonde thing in the middle of a briefing room of nuggets.
She was fascinating.
He turned back to sneak one last glance at her. She had her back to him, already in a rather intense discussion with the young Specialist named Cally. They were presumably debating about how her Viper was running and whether its shortcomings were the pilot or the crew's fault. Without warning, Kara turned and smiled at him, giving a mock salute.
He saluted her back.
He felt a voice in his head nagging him as to why he let her get away with the things she did to him. She made his life on Galactica as the CAG twice as hard as it should be. Yes, he didn't know any of the pilots. Yes, he still wasn't sure he was qualified to lead them. And yes, he felt like an idiot because he was still getting lost in the winding corridors of the Battlestar.
But shouldn't the one person he knew be helping to ease the burden? She was his friend, wasn't she?
Yet she caused him so much grief. He just stepped back and let her. She was right when she said he was trying to be her friend and not her CAG. He should be sticking with the basics. He didn't know these pilots. He had no obligation to make their lives easy.
But it was different with Kara, isn't it?
You know her, don't you? And you consider her your friend even if neither of you has ever said it out loud? And you want her to be more, don't you? That's why you let her walk all over you.
"No," he hissed as he started stalking out of the hangar bay. "No. You put all that behind you when Zak died. She's just a friend. A friend and one of your pilots."
He had always been a bad liar.
Lee was screaming orders at the Marines that were filling down onto the prison deck. He couldn't understand why Galactica hadn't gotten a medical team here yet. The young Specialist who had been so brave and fought her captor so hard was in needless pain.
He ripped an ear piece out of the nearest Marine's ear. "Galactica! Where the frak is the med team?"
"They are en route," came back the stiff answer.
Lee groaned and threw the headset down. He really wished that Dee was behind the communications panel and not here on the Astral Queen. He still had no idea why she was here. She had no real purpose.
Turning back, he stopped to look at Dee, who was holding Cally's hand tightly in hers. "How are you…" His voice cut off as he saw the young girl wince in pain.
"She's holding up, Captain," Dee said with a smile. "She's from Galactica."
Lee nodded. That was the sentiment he had heard from a lot of his pilots. They thought they were a tougher breed than the other Battlestars' enlisted and non-enlisted crew. From what he had seen, everything they thought was true. The people he was surrounded with were as tough as they came.
Speaking of tough, he wondered where Kara was. The shot that had been intended for Zarek would have been right on the mark if Lee hadn't pushed him out of the way. He didn't know anyone else who had that kind of accuracy except for her.
So she was on the Astral Queen. Why hadn't she come down to the deck level to help him keep things in control? Not that he really expected her too. She had already proven in their short time together that she didn't look out for anyone but herself. One second she was in a good mood and doing her best to make him laugh. The next she was screaming at him to shut up and do his job.
"Damnit, Lee," he muttered to himself as he started walking the length of the prison deck corridor again in order to make sure that everything was running smoothly. "You know why she isn't down here. You just saved the life of the fraking terrorist who tore a divide in Sagittarian society. She's disgusted."
Lee still wasn't sure why he had done it. All he knew was it felt like the right thing to do. He hadn't followed his instincts like that in a long, long time. Usually when he did, it never ended well. So he had learned to ignore his instincts and follow his head which told him what was expected of him, what was the right thing to do.
It seemed his opinion on his instincts was right. He had saved Zarek and lost Kara in the process.
It never ended well.
"Lee!" He turned as he heard her scream and barely had time to duck as she launched her fist at his face. "What the frak did you think you were doing? I had my shot!"
"Your shot wasn't needed. I had the situation under control."
She flipped the ridiculous helmet the Marines must have forced her to wear off her head and glared at him. "Do you call getting the best Specialist we have shot in the side having the situation under control?
And suddenly he was glad to be arguing with her. It meant he hadn't lost her after all.
Lee held the phone out to his father and listened in horror as the search for Kara was terminated. President Roslin's words rang through his head. He respected this woman. He trusted this woman. He believed this woman.
And yet he didn't want to give up looking for their missing pilot.
He couldn't give up on her. And he couldn't understand why his father would either. Grasping on to the one thing he had managed to understand from the President's tirade, he turned to his father, "I want you to know. I think she's wrong. I think we have come to terms with what happened to Zak."
"I haven't."
His father's voice was cold and extremely straightforward like always. Of course his father hadn't come to terms with it, he scolded himself. Only weeks ago neither one of them had had any clue about Kara's part in Zak's death and Lee was still blaming his father entirely for the accident.
He turned to leave, knowing somewhere deep inside him that his father didn't really want to stop searching for Kara. If he was honest with himself, they both loved Kara more than they loved one another. She was their pillar of strength.
The thought of his father loving a woman he had only known for a few years over the son he had known from birth made him pause and turn back. His father was looking at him expectantly. "I need to know something. Why did you do this? Why did we do this? Is it for Kara? For Zak? For what?"
"Kara was family," his father started out. The casual use of the past tense struck Lee to the core. His father had really given up on her. "You do whatever you have to do. Sometimes you break the rules."
"And if it was me down there instead?"
His father narrowed his eyes and hissed, "You don't have to ask that."
Lee's mind flashed to the moments he had seen Kara with his father. They acted like family. He treated her like a daughter. Her relationship with him was the polar opposite of Lee's. There was genuine love in the eyes of both Kara and William Adama when they spoke to or about one another. He didn't have that.
"Are you sure?"
"If it were you… we'd never leave."
The words made Lee's eyes sting. His father's tone had changed to an open, brutal honesty that he had never heard before. He gave his father a short nod of understanding before turning and leaving like he had first intended.
His father had said when someone is family, then you do what you have to do. You break the rules. Lee had always stuck to the rules for all his life. Sometimes he thought it was his only downfall.
Well, not this time. His father was right. Kara was family. And family meant more than anything else these days.
He had to get to the CIC within a few minutes to prepare for the FTL launch out of the system. There had to be something he could think up by then, some way to get this rescue mission reinstated, some way to buy Kara a little more time, some way to keep the Fleet from jumping away and letting her die.
But there was nothing. As hard as he concentrated, as much as he tried, there was no solution. He had no way of rescuing her short of commandeering a Viper and going rogue. He was two steps away from running out of the CIC and doing just that when Dee announced Dradis contact.
The bastards who took Kara away from him. Even if there was nothing he could do to save her, there was that.
There was revenge.
Lee watched her walk away as if it meant nothing that she had just admitted how little she really thought of him. She had seen him fly too many times for them to count. She knew what he could do. And still she thought he was going to blow it.
And yet you still love her.
Gods. He really wished that little voice in his head would just stop. It was constantly nagging at him, pointing out that Kara could do no wrong. He would always have these forbidden feelings for her even if she was holding a gun to his head and screaming if he didn't give it up she would shoot him. He would let himself die.
Oh. Well, that was a nice mental picture.
Time to stop drowning in sorrow and start thinking up every possible angle for this mission. He had gotten them into this jam by wasting all that fuel trying to save a woman who could so obviously save herself every time.
The fact that his faith in her abilities had never wavered, not once, was too ironic for him to even comprehend.
Lee laughed as Cally pulled him into a hug. She really was his favorite deckhand by far. And for two seconds, he actually let himself believe he could tell her that. But then the memory of the fraternization policy kicked in and he pulled back from her. He couldn't tell her. There was no way.
His eyes rested on where Kara stood in front of him. If he couldn't tell Cally how much he liked her, then he certainly couldn't tell this phenomenal woman how much he loved her.
"Apollo, you magnificent bastard! That was one hell of a piece of flying, and I couldn't have done it better myself."
Her words erased the last bits of anger he had kept trapped up inside, but he wasn't going to admit that to her. In fact, he probably deserved to make her say it at least ten more times just to make sure it was committed to memory properly. "I'm sorry. I didn't hear you."
"I said I couldn't have done it better myself."
Nope. Twice was definitely enough. Tipping his drink to her, he smiled, "Well, thank you."
"I had my doubts."
He wondered why she thought he hadn't picked up on that. She practically told him there was no way she could count on him to do the job that she was destined for. Okay. Maybe the anger wasn't totally gone.
He gave her a small nod. "So did I." Okay. That surprised her. This would be more fun if he was actually the type of person who enjoyed hurting others. He had never really gotten the hang of that sadly. "I wasn't sure that crazy ass plan of yours could even possibly work."
That made her laugh. Gods, he had missed hearing that. It seemed like she hadn't laughed for him in way too long.
"You deserve this."
He snapped out of his little daydream to stare down at the cigar she held out to him. He recognized it immediately. His father had given it to her as a way of saying he was sorry for his harsh words after he found out about Zak.
Oh gods, Lee. Don't think about Zak right now. You're too happy to think about Zak.
Frak. Was it wrong to think that? He didn't know.
He turned to talk to a few of the Specialists who were laughing and joking around him. He really should try to get to know these people better. They probably thought he was a god for what he had done since they didn't really know him. Because it seemed like all the people who knew him had figured he couldn't do it.
Okay. Anger still present.
He laughed as the pretty girl next to him actually called him a god to his face. Maybe he was finally living up to the call sign Kara had unintentionally branded him with back in Academy.
As the people continued to surround him with their congratulations, his mind went back to the vision of Kara laughing.
That little moment had made all the trouble he had gone through worth it.
These were the things that ran through his head when he first realized that it was Kara standing before him.
"My gods. She is the most beautiful sight left in this world."
"I was wrong. Hygiene has never looked so fine."
"Shouldn't I feel guilty for staring?"
"Zak would be so proud of her."
"I wish that I could just smuggle her away to the bunkroom. It was bound to be empty. The whole Fleet is on this stupid luxury liner."
"She looks breakable. Vulnerable. Not like herself."
"Everyone is watching her. Are they watching me? Are they wondering what I'm doing talking to her? Do they know what I'm saying? Do they know how ridiculous I sound? Do they know what I'm thinking? Oh gods, I hope they don't know what I'm thinking."
"Wow."
"I need ambrosia."
"Wonder what my father thinks of her dress."
"Frak."
But the thought that shook him up the most was "She did this for me and only me."
Lee felt Kara sink into his arms. He had only asked her to dance with him. He hadn't expected her to show so much enthusiasm. In fact, he was pretty sure that their closeness was against some Fleet policy.
But frak it. For once, he couldn't give a care about what policy dictated.
For the first time in days, Zak's voice echoed through his head. "How about love, Lee? Do you love her?"
His brother had asked him that day on Atlantia if he loved Kara. He had lied to him. He had told him there was no way he could love the same woman that his brother was so infatuated with. In his heart, he knew that he had loved her with everything he had at that moment.
And now?
Now he loved her even more.
And it scared him to death. Because he could never have her. There was just too much baggage.
Dr. Baltar interrupted him before he could come up with a reason why the baggage didn't matter. It seemed Lee wasn't the only one who wanted to dance with Kara. He gave the good doctor a smile of relief. If he could just get some distance between himself and Kara, then maybe he wouldn't end up doing anything stupid.
He still looked at hopefully. If she said no to Baltar like he thought she would, then he can blame whatever happened on her. Maybe the guilt of loving Kara would be less that way.
But she surprised him by slipping out of his hold and into Baltar's. He stood there looking like an idiot as she assumed the same position with the doctor that she had just been in with him.
He had obviously misread what she was feeling.
And he wasn't afraid to admit to himself how much that hurt.
His father's suggestion rang through Lee's head long after William Adama had returned to his post in the CIC.
"You got to lose control. Let your instincts take over."
His father wanted him to let go? He didn't understand what he was asking.
Lee had let himself go for one second the night before. He had let his instincts take control and had found Kara secure in his arms. Stares and whispered comments were ignored. Feelings were felt.
And then life served him up another frak you.
She didn't even hesitate to move on.
Boxing with his father had always helped him work out his aggression, but this time he really held back. He wanted to let go and just let the man who was making his life so damn difficult for no reason he could see cry out in submission. But instead he found himself on the floor having been knocked around by life and by his father for too damn long.
Control issues, his father said. He had control issues.
Well, he could agree with that. The only problem was he didn't have a problem with too much control. He had a problem with not enough control.
When it came to Kara, he had none. He lost every semblance of control when she was close enough to touch, to smell, to taste. She assaulted his five senses at once and threw all coherent thoughts in his head far, far away.
He ripped his boxing gloves off and tossed them into a corner.
He had control issues.
But it was nothing a punching bag couldn't fix.
At least, he hoped.
He had never imagined himself as being too jealous to talk to her. He had lived through the time where she was so blissfully happy with his brother while he languished in a land of unrequited love. No one had ever caught on to how much he envied Zak and how much he wanted Kara.
He had always been good at keeping his mouth closed.
Still was.
She had looked him straight in the eyes, so vulnerable, so brutally honest, and whispered "I'm really sorry." She had paused, almost as if everything she believed in hung on the next words to come out of his mouth. Almost as if she would finally self-destruct if he gave her a little push either way.
And he had turned on heel and ran.
His jealousy and his cowardice had caused him to flee at the one turning point in their relationship.
He finally felt the despair that he knew everyone in the Fleet must have been dealing with since the moment they became a stranded band of survivors, together against the world.
He was alone like the rest of them.
"Apollo, this is Galactica. I repeat, you are ordered to bring your Viper in for debriefing."
This was the fourth time Lee had heard the order to return to the ship.
Somehow he couldn't tear himself away from the sky. It glittered slightly with the aftereffects of the Cylon Raider's FTL drive. In the back of his head, he was reminded of the trails that Kara always left behind everywhere she went. Sometimes they were trails of blood and violence. Sometimes they were trails of exaggerations and awe. Sometimes they were trails of laughter and tears of joy.
She had been right there within reach only seconds earlier. Why hadn't he figured out that she was going to do something this fraking stupid?
Because she gave you no warning, Lee.
She didn't even give you a goodbye.
Her words to ask for a secure channel with his father rang through his ears. She had felt the need to say goodbye to the Old Man. Not to him, though. He wasn't that important to her.
The small, quiet apology she had given him was also at the front of his mind. Why hadn't he said something to her? Said he knew. Said that it would just take a little time for him to forgive her. Said that he didn't want her doing anything so stupid ever again.
Gods. Kara. He was really sorry, too.
Sorry for not being strong and sorry for letting her down when she needed it the most.
The air around his Viper was cold and no longer had any sign of glitter as he kicked the ship into burn and returned to a ship that no longer felt like home.
Lee stared past his gun at the terrified face of the XO. He couldn't believe he was doing this. He was pointing a loaded firearm at his father's best friend.
"Men, lay down your weapons." He hoped that his voice sounded commanding enough for them to listen. He didn't want this situation to get any more out of hand than it already had.
If Kara could only see him now.
He winced. Don't think about her. She's gone. She's never coming back.
He steeled his gaze on Tigh as the old man started to scream that this was mutiny and did he realize what he was doing.
"Yes, I do. But you can tell my father that I'm listening to my instincts, and my instincts tell me that we cannot sacrifice our democracy just because the President makes a bad decision."
In the back of his head, he desperately wanted to add a big 'I told you so' to the list of things he wanted Tigh to tell the Commander. His control was directly linked to the pilot who had just gone rogue. Without her here to do the unthinkable and fix the unfixable, it fell to Lee.
Within seconds, the President had the situation back in her control. The guns were lowered, and Lee felt the snap of handcuffs on his wrists. The severity of his actions suddenly hit him. He wasn't going to just get a slap on the wrist for this one. It was highly likely that he would be stripped of his wings, of his title as CAG, and of every last thing he used to identify himself.
And why was it he wanted to blame Kara for all of that?
Since that first day of Academy, his life had taken a series of turns he had never intended. He wanted to be the best pilot the Twelve Colonies had ever seen. His ultimate goal was to raise himself to the level of Commander, almost wishing that he could just sweep his father's job out from under his feet.
But his life hadn't happened like that. Kara had showed up in his life and stole away his brother, both emotionally at first and then physically. The guilt made him study even harder, but his dreams felt hollow now that his brother couldn't be a part of them.
Then she had to do the unthinkable and try to fix his relationship with his father. He had written William Adama off as an unfeeling, uncaring bastard who didn't even deserve one ounce of Lee's respect. And then Kara turned that opinion on its head and made him look at his father in a new light.
Kara had taught him what it was like to care for someone so much that you would do anything for them. She had taught him why you sometimes had to make the crazy move to be sure that things turned out all right.
The shuttle clicked into lock as they were delivered onto Galactica. The Marines began to lead him through the corridors but not in the direction he thought. "Aren't you taking me to the brig?"
"Not yet, Junior," one of the Marines said with a laugh. "Daddy wants to see you."
Lee ignored the snide remark and steeled himself for the hard times ahead.
So this is what Kara had been feeling for the past five years of her life. This hopelessness, knowing there was nothing you could do but pray that the pain would eventually end one day.
Oh gods. He wished she was here. She would know what to do to make this situation right. There had to be some good sarcastic remark that he could say to make everything just disappear.
But she's not here. She ran to a Cylon-infested planet where she most likely was killed on sight. She threw her life away carelessly.
And as much as he mourned for her, as much as it hurt him somewhere deep inside that she wouldn't be around to smile and laugh with him, to make sure he wasn't too serious, he knew that his life could finally return to normal without her there.
No repression. No suppression.
Just a life in a cell in the brig.
Frak. He missed her already.