If there was one thing Kara hated, it was the way Lee Adama pushed her buttons.
And at the moment, he'd pushed about every last one she had.
"Lee."
No real response, just a few flexed fingers and a slight shift in his position. Kara let out an almost inaudible sigh, and looked around to make sure none of the medical staff were around. She was damned sick and tired of being stuck down here waiting for him, but being separated would be worse.
"Lee." This time, she reached out and gave his left arm a little shake - carefully. Hating to wait was one thing; shoving the IV needle further into his hand would be cruel and unusual punishment - at least as a wake-up call.
He was starting to come around. Kara kept her hand on his arm, but leaned her head back for a second and closed her eyes. Sickbay rated pretty low on her all-time favorites list. Especially with a concussion and a medical staff that seemed inclined to wake you up every hour to make sure you weren't dead.
She would've tried punching a few, but even for her, punching meant raw knuckles. That tended to hurt, and since her left wrist had already been broken in the last 24 hours, she wasn't anxious to try for the other.
And it would've hurt the Old Man's feelings, besides. He had enough on his mind.
Kara felt Lee's arm move under her hand, and she opened her eyes to see him turning his head toward her. About damned time. She wasn't the only one waiting for him to get his lazy ass all the way out from under the anesthesia.
When his eyes started to open, she forced her trademark smartass grin on her face.
"Well, if it isn't the great and mighty Captain Adama." He finished turning his head, and his eyes started to slide open. She felt her own grin widen as she got her first glimpse of his light blue eyes, unfocused but trying to train in on her voice. A giddy rush of relief welled up from the bottom of her stomach. Even clouded with confusion and drugs, those eyes soothed her frayed nerves more than any other salve could have.
"Kara?"
It took another moment, but those eyes finally focused in on her face. She nodded slightly, and he blinked at her. Pinning her with a surprisingly solid look of puzzlement, Lee's lips turned in a small, steady frown. When he finally spoke, his words were scratchy, barely audible - but clearly and unmistakably Lee.
"You ..." He stopped, pulled in another breath, then coughed.
"You look like hell."
OxOxOxOxOxO
Lee wanted to close his eyes and let sleep wash back over him. The transition out of that sweeping pool of darkness had been easier this time - less jarring, less panicked. He could feel the air in his lungs and a comfortable warmth around him, but the aching tiredness kept wandering over him, fogging his head and pulling him back down.
But the presence next to him wouldn't let him drift off again. And as Kara broke into helpless giggles at his last comment, Lee Adama tried to find enough annoyance to conjure up a glare.
Only when he closed his eyes in admittance of the failure did Kara regain control of herself.
"I'm sorry, Lee, but you really need to look in a mirror."
The sweet amusement in her voice did nothing for his confusion, and he let out a slow sigh.
"How ... about you-" Lee found himself cut off by a deep-seeded cough, one that wracked at his throat and sent stabs of pain through his chest. And when he tried to recall exactly why he should hurt so badly, all he could find were small flashes of memory, hardly enough to dignify the use of the word.
A flash, fire...smoke and haze...no air...
Everything around him swam in and out of focus, a sea of grey and black surrounded by a haze of pain.
"Sir!" He felt...Lee felt a touch, vague at first, and then ... fingers, a hand, on his throat.
Checking for a pulse.
Lee shivered slightly as the details eluded him. He tried forcing the memory to the surface, but it slipped further away from his grip, until even the few details he had became vague impressions once more. He fought the swimming sense of being overwhelmed, and opened his eyes to look at Kara again.
"What happened?" The words almost didn't take form, and Lee frowned as they sputtered out in a near-whisper.
Kara leaned forward, raising an eyebrow. "What do you remember?"
Lee tried shaking his head, only to be rewarded with a fresh stab of pain. He hissed the air out through his teeth.
"Fragments...Not much." He latched onto the one solid thought that remained - the flash of light and heat that seemed almost seared in his brain. "An explosion?"
Kara nodded, and then regarded him heavily for a moment, evidently weighing a response.
"Well, seeing as the same explosion that knocked you on your ass trapped me at the same time, I'm not exactly the best source." Kara cracked a small grin, but there was a sadness behind it Lee couldn't quite place. "But rumor has it you flew back here with the first of the injured, and then proceeded to collapse in your father's arms, turning purple from lack of oxygen."
Now the grin slipped almost completely away. Lee felt a small, heady rush of clarity as adrenaline hit his system. He was awake no, for better or worse. He couldn't remember, but...
Noair,noair,needtobreatheGodshelpsme...
"Next time you want to get out of talking with your father, don't try to get yourself killed as an excuse." Lee's body felt weightless as the implications of her words sunk in. There was no emotional context for him, but he knew. The pain itself was too real a reminder. How close this time? How close did I come?
Only the look on Kara's face kept him firmly anchored. "Cottle'll give you the full rundown later, but you were in surgery for almost six hours while they fixed everything you broke...and another six hours now waking up.
"You scared the hell out of a lot of people...including the Old Man."
Other impressions began to come back - sensations, fragments of memory. He remembered - no, felt - his father's arms go around him, and then darkness take over from there. The next thing memory he had was a hand on his shoulder, and feeling like his chest wouldn't work on its own.
The sensation had passed, but the hand had remained.
My father was there. Lee shook his head slightly as he realized what was gone now. His shoulder felted chilled, and the only person beside him was Starbuck. He said he wouldn't leave.
Lee swallowed hard, trying to keep the bitterness out of his voice as he spoke.
"If I scared him so much-" Lee coughed slightly, then continued, trying not to feel the disappointment. "Where is he?" He winced a little at the harshness of his own words, unable to reconcile the separate idea of his father - warm and comforting so short a time ago - with the battlestar commander.
"I'm not leaving. I promise." But he had left, going to do whatever "duty" demanded of the Great Commander Adama. He started to close his eyes against the tears before the look on Kara's face finally caught his attention.
Her gaze was locked with his - unmoving, stunned.
"Lee, he-"
"Don't, Kara." He didn't need to hear the words, didn't WANT to hear them. Except for his father's sudden promise - which Lee remembered mostly as a dream and not a true memory - he wouldn't have expected him to be at his side. He hadn't been before, and he'd learned a long time ago how to live without that comfort.
He wanted his father, not the commander or the icon William Adama had become. And he had left him.
Kara started to say something anyway, but a rustle of sound cut off her words. At the foot of his bed, the pale-green curtains parted, and a familiar figure stepped through.
His father. Lee found himself unable to look away as the older man looked at him emotionlessly, his face unreadable as he gazed at his son.
"I'm not leaving. I promise."
Lee felt his face begin to burn with emotion, and he watched as Kara looked from him to his father and then back to him again. The wrench of emotion in her face dug at him guiltily, and he became intensely aware of saying the wrong thing.
Intensely aware, but unable to say anything to take it back.
"Starbuck, you can go now. Thank you for ... for keeping watch for me." Kara nodded, and Lee watched with sympathy as she slowly pushed her way to her feet. Limping slowly, she stopped in front of Adama at the edge of the curtain.
"Maybe we just should have found you a bedpan. Sir."
Lee choked slightly as Kara tossed a grin. Then she pushed her way through the curtain and was gone, leaving just Lee and his father in the quiet space the curtains provided. He watched as his father took two long steps to the chair, and after pausing for a moment, sank into it without breaking eye contact with his son.
The weightlessness in his body had returned, and Lee knew there was something to say - words that had to be spoken. He had searched for them before, and now searched for them again - without success.
"Sir...I-"
His father held up a hand to stop him.
"I had to take a call from CIC...and visit the head." William Adama's voice was low, and extremely level. But there was a slight catch in his voice, a tone suggesting a slight hint of guilt. The long silence that followed made Lee's breath hitch in his throat. Suddenly, every assumption he had ever made about the man seemed called into question, and when his father finally spoke again, the words that came out stunned Lee more than anything had in his life.
"This hasn't been easy for you. I'm sorry."
Lee felt shock, pain, a tumultuous mix of emotions so intense he could hardly think. He had grown used to the distance between himself and his father, the carefully-guarded neutrality they both had worked so hard to develop and maintain. In the space of two simple words, it was destroyed.
"I've sat here for the past few hours, wondering just how I could let us drift so far apart." His father shifted in the chair, squaring his back against the frame. "I've tried to figure out just what to say, how to explain my actions in a way that would make sense. I couldn't find any easy answers."
Lee made a noise, trying to find words, but his father silenced him with a look.
"You don't know how hard it is, trying to come up with justifications for your actions as a commander." His father's face twisted into a sad smile. "It's even harder as a father. I realized when you came on board that I would have to answer for my sins. It never occurred to me I wouldn't get the chance. Your mother had forgiven me. So had Kara. I thought two years had been enough time to heal your wounds."
"Sir...Dad...I..." Lee couldn't go any further. His voice, already all but nonexistent, disappeared in the swell of emotions. What came out was an almost inaudible rasp - one his father didn't seem to hear in any case.
"I've never been good at expressing my feelings. That was never a secret, and I thought ... hell, I don't know what I thought." His father's voice, which had been sure and confident, faltered. Lee felt a shiver run down his spine. His father's voice was losing volume, and Lee realized his father was no longer looking at him. His gaze had wandered to some spot above Lee's head, fixed on something inanimate that would not look back.
"When you came on board, I realized how much time we had lost. I realized that you hadn't forgiven me, and that maybe you couldn't. It hurt to admit it, but I thought I deserved no less ... because you were right. I played a part in your brother's death, if only because I loved him and pushed him to succeed."
There was a long pause, and Lee could see his father's face twist. Now, for perhaps the first time maybe in his life, he could see the pain on his father's face. It dug into him, hard, full realization of the moment hitting home.
"After he died...I pushed you away, Lee. It was all I knew how to do. I grieved, and I hurt. And I didn't know how to tell you what had happened." His father looked back at him, finally. "I knew what had happened, as soon as I landed on Caprica for the funeral. Kara came to me, and we talked. She told me, and I ... I listened. And I forgave her. To this day, I don't know why I didn't tell you. Pride, maybe. The sureness that I deserved what you were throwing at me, at least in part. And knowing what would happen to Starbuck if I let you loose on her.
"So, I pushed you away. I refused to let you hurt me again. And when I did, I lost something." His father paused, his face twisting with emotion. "You tried to tell me something the night of the jump, and I made you stop. I wish now that I hadn't."
Lee made a noise, trying to find words, but his father silenced him with a look.
"I don't know what it was, but I should have listened. It was a mistake to tell you to wait." Adama's gaze dropped to his hands, pushed together at the fingers in his lap. "I wish I could say I was done making mistakes. It would make life a lot simpler. But I can't do that. It would be another lie." His father's voice hitched, and Lee realized with horror how close Adama was to crying, and the fierce amount of control it was taking not to. "I won't base anything else on lies. Not anymore."
Adama paused, and Lee saw him force his eyes up again, to look at his son with a gentle calm and acceptance he had never seen from his father in his life.
"We need to fix this, Lee. You're my son. I need your love." His father closed his eyes, and took a deep breath. "And I hope you still need mine."
OxOxOxOxOxO
The last words finally out of his mouth, William Adama swallowed hard and dropped his head, opening his gaze upon his hands in his lap one final time. He had never thought he would have to reach like this with his own son - make an effort so difficult just to be understood by someone he had always thought would know and understand how much his father loved him.
There were so many other things he had wanted to say. The intense pride he felt in his son was so evident to him - he could have looked at him right now and told him how highly he thought of his actions on board the Hephaestus in light of his own injuries. There was little doubt in anyone's mind that if Apollo hadn't taken charge and declared military control, far fewer people would have gotten off the deteriorating ship - and that Kara Thrace would be dead.
He wanted to tell his son that he was proud of him, and that he had a place on board this ship - more than one. He had earned the title of CAG, but he was also family. Adama tried to know everyone on board his ship, to create some sort of environment that fostered friendship and camaraderie. It occurred to him now that one of the people he was least close to was his own son, and the wrongness of the situation twisted his stomach.
And so he looked up expectantly, waiting for a response to his words.
Instead, he was met with closed eyes. Lee's lips were pursed together harshly, and his eyes pressed firmly shut in an effort to block out everything around him. Will could see him drawing in tight, controlled breaths, somehow making a great effort to maintain the cool exterior he had learned so well from his father.
And in the near-silence, William Adama knew that he had lost. So he rose quickly to his feet and moved away, pausing only a moment to brush a few angry tears from his face. Leaving now would be best.
But as he reached the curtain, an agonized voice called out from behind him.
"Dad."
Will almost didn't turn around, hardly daring to hope, not this time - not anymore. But he finally did turn, and found his son staring at him, his face wet from the tears slowly running down his face.
"I...I couldn't say it before. I'm sorry." The words were a rush, slipping out in a harsh alto whisper tainted with smoke and pain. Even 12 hours removed from the explosion, Lee's voice hardly existed. But it was the words he spoke that mattered.
"I don't know how...Kara told me about Zak, before the recon flight." Lee's eyes remained close, but the tears escaped anyhow. "I couldn't...I couldn't blame her, couldn't yell, couldn't scream. I wanted to say something, but..." Lee shook his head. "It didn't matter anymore. None of it did. It was over."
Lee shook his head softly, and the voice died to a whisper.
"If I can't blame her, what right do I have blaming you?" His son drew in a harsh, shaking breath, and opened his eyes. The pain William saw there was almost unbearable. "I wanted to tell you that night...and you made it easy for me to stop. I wish-" Lee coughed, and let out a bitter gasp. "I'm sorry."
Slowly, almost unwilling to believe what he had finally heard, Will made his way back to his son's bedside. Carefully, he snaked his hand around the tubing of the IV, and grasped his son's hand tightly. Lee's fingers closed immediately around his own, and the younger man closed his eyes.
"Please...don't leave. I ... I need you."
The last words ripped into Adama, and he tightened his grip, leaning forward as he did. Gingerly, he slipped his free arm behind his son's shoulders, pulling him into a gentle hug.
"I know, son." Lee's grip intensified, and through the hug, he could feel sobs wracking his son's body. Somehow, Lee found the strength to loop one arm around his father. It lay weakly on his father's back for a long moment, and then gripped him in a hug of its own.
There were no more words, and in any case, there was nothing more to be said. Not for now, at the very least. In the future, Will knew he and his eldest son would talk about Zak. It would take time, and discussions both long and terrible, but William knew now he could listen - not to angry words sent forward without remorse, but to stories and remembrances of long ago.
It had taken too long to get here, but as Lee sobbed against him, William knew that the path had finally led both of them home.
A/N: Almost there now! Chapter 13 of 13, but a short epilogue to follow. And thank you to Jen for taking the time to beta-read this at 1 a.m.!