Author's Note: Chapters 3 and 4 were intended to be one and the same. However, I did not know if you would appreciate another 20 page chapter, so it was split up. Once again, reviews greatly appreciated.

Kara leaned into the kiss, consumed by the passion that had fueled her furious play, had shaken the core of her. She felt Anders' heat, felt it wash over her as he crushed her against him.

Then, suddenly, inexplicably, Kara Thrace felt her stomach knot. It was a hard twist, like someone had reached into her and jerked her guts around. Her breath caught. With an effort, she put her hands on Anders' chest and pushes, breaking their embrace. Her heart was pointing, her chest heaving, as he was. Her mind was spinning. She couldn't do this. An image sprang unbidden to her mind, a voice demanding hotly, Why'd you do it Kara? Just tell me why. Because I'm a screw up Lee, try to keep that in mind.

Oh, frak.

And she stared up at him, her hands still resting lightly on his chest. She stared an expression of passion and confusion, at a man who remained, blessedly silent. She could not have said anything to him. She had no explanation for the force that had overwhelmed her, for the wrongness of it. After a long minute, she broke contact with him, withdrawing her hands and her eyes. All she could do was turn, shoulders hunched a little, head angled down, and walk briskly away from him. She very nearly ran, backhanding something that could not have been a tear from her face.

It was a long time before she could return to the more populated areas of the old high school. She found a secluded corner and sat there, staring out a window, trying like hell to work the last few days' events out in her mind. She knew the others would be wondering what had become of her. They would also be wondering when they could get the frak out of here. And she had no answer for them. She no more knew how to leave than she knew how to stay. All she knew at this point was the punching walls was infinitely more painful than satisfying.

When she finally emerged from her little hidey hole she did not have any particular destination in mind. Or at least, not in her conscious mind. That her feet carried her to the infirmary could hardly have been coincidence. She had not seen Lee since that morning, and it would be good to look in on him. Still, she stood for a while in the doorway before going inside. Why was it so much harder to face him now? It wasn't like she hadn't slept with Anders before. It wasn't as if she hadn't gripped Lee tightly upon her return from her first Caprica trip, held him to her with no trace of guilt in her heart. Until he'd kissed her of course…but that was another matter altogether. A simple kiss was hardly the worst of her sins, if it was a sin at all. Finally, loathing herself for her hesitation, she pushed through the door and went inside.

But Lee wasn't there.

The bed he had been resting on when last she'd seen him was neatly made and empty. The cane was gone from its place in the corner, the dog was gone from her place at the foot of the bed.

"Hey. Jackson." She called to the man who was resting on a cot a short distance from where Lee had been. Jackson was not recovering half so well as Lee was, it seemed, but he was conscious. "Do you know where Captain Adama is?"

"Hmm. He's been in and out a few times today. Helo came and got him…hour ago maybe."

Starbuck nodded her thanks, and turned to leave. What did that mean, Apollo'd been in and out? It seemed to imply he'd been up and around all day. Why hadn't she seen him? Because you were hiding, Thrace, that's why.

It was a good sign that it was Helo who had come to get him. The two men had been getting along as well as she had hoped they would, in recent weeks. Could be that had something to do with the fact that Lee preferred to shoot at the Sharon-cylon targets at the firing range. It might also have something to do with the fact that no one in the universe could hold a grudge as faithfully as Lee Adama, or that Helo felt threatened, or territorial. It was strange really. On this trip, Apollo and Sharon had been getting along passably well, at least outwardly. That he had prevented his new pet from ripping her throat out had been a good sign. But Helo and Apollo had still maintained something of parameter, hissing like tomcats, the morons. As long as Helo hadn't come to get Apollo so he could use his face as a target at the firing range, she would view this as a step in the right direction.

In fact, everyone was coming together these days. Even Racetrack and the Marines had been treating Helo and Sharon with a kind of respect and deference she would not have expected. Well, would not have expected towards Sharon. Helo had been in since the Blackbird was built with carbon plating, at his suggestion. But once or twice she had heard Sharon direct one of them to do something, and heard them respond with "sir." Meanwhile here she was, Starbuck, always one of the best liked and respected pilots on Galactica, now falling out of favor with the crew with each passing day. That wasn't what bothered her though. What bothered her was that she stood here on Caprica, with her shipmates, with two of her best friends left in the universe, with a whole compound full of resistance men and women who viewed her as their comrade, and with Anders, who was impossibly smitten with her, and she had never felt more alone in her life. To which group did she belong? Whose interests was she working to promote. In which were her interests represented?

She found them back at the pyramid court, which, for reasons she did not care to think about, was absolutely the last place she looked. It made sense. Whatever they had going, it looked like the kind of conversation you would want privacy for. Everyone was sitting in a tight semi circle around Lee, except for Helo, who stood against the wall behind the captain with his arms folded, his jaw set, and a grim expression on his face. And Sharon, too, she noticed. The cylon stood a stone's throw away from the others, as if whatever it was Lee was discussing with them was not a subject of which she was a part. She paced a little. Lee, sitting cross legged, leaned forward a bit and spoke earnestly to Racetrack and the marines. He seemed paler than he had been this morning, but not half so pale as his audience. Had she been closer she would have noticed one or two of them shaking.

Starbuck did not stand long unnoticed. Seek, who had been lying down beside Lee, raised her head as Starbuck approached. She chuffed, her tail brushing the pavement, and squirmed a little, but did not get up. Lee was holding onto her, Starbuck noticed. That was pretty smart of him, considering where the big dog's focus had been before she spotted Kara. Maybe that was the reason Sharon was keeping her distance.

As soon as Seek alerted, everyone turned to see who was approaching. They seemed jumpy. Seeing her, everyone rose, with Helo offering an arm to haul Lee to his feet, and Sharon drawing closer to the others. There was nothing for it now. Their eyes followed her expectantly as she sauntered into the group.

"Good of you to join us Lieutenant," Lee said. Uh oh. "Lieutenant" is it? Now what have I…

"Ah you know me Captain. Hate to miss a party." She indicated the assembly with an absent wave. "What's going on?"

Lee struggled not to grimace. When Helo had come to collect him from the infirmary, he had told him that everyone had been gathered except for Starbuck. No one seemed to know where the Lieutenant was. Lee, who had had his own ideas on that count, had simply said that they would have to meet without her, and brief her later. He knew this had startled Helo; the other man had probably assumed that Kara had already been told. One couldn't blame him for the assumption. Kara should have already been told.

In the forty five minutes between the time Helo had brought him here, to where he had ordered that the others gather for their briefing, several things had happened. First, Lee had explained as calmly, and rationally as he could, what he believed had happened on the ledge to him, Faustus, and Marcel. He explained, occasionally calling on Sharon to fill in some of the details, about cylons using only one type of ammunition, and about cylons being creatures of mass destruction, with no use for sniping. The cylons that had tortured him had told him that humans had shot him, and based on what he had seen and learned since then he believed them, and so did Sharon. Racetrack was the only one who had not seemed surprised, but instead wore the grim half-smile of one who has just seen a missing piece fall into place. She had mentioned that the resistance group had turned up at the scene of the fight at pretty much the same time the Galactica landing party had, and that she had thought they were behaving strangely. When asked what she meant by that, she said she had seen one of the resistance fighters lurch behind a tree and vomit; not at all the reaction to death one would expect from a man who had been fighting the cylons for nearly one hundred days now. At this, Landin had piped up, and said he had come across a woman of the resistance in camp that night, sobbing in the arms of another, who was trying to keep her calm and, almost desperately, quiet. Walker then pointed out that no one had actually seen cylons in the vicinity of the fight, or anywhere really for some time. Racetrack had angrily asserted that it was probably the resistance raiding party who had shot up Apollo, and the two marines with him. At this point Apollo had silenced her. He wanted to make it absolutely clear that he did not believe the resistance had fired on them intentionally, if it was them who had fired at all. It had been dusk, and whoever had fired had done so from a fair distance at first, judging by the brief delay between the impact of the first bullet and report of the rifle. Whoever had fired might not have known they were firing at humans. In fact, they probably hadn't. In a situation like that on Caprica it would be very understandable, and justifiable, to shoot first and ask questions later. Helo had nodded just slightly at this, remembering his first encounter with the resistance here.

Sharon and Lee between them had made a few suggestions as to what might cause humans to fire on humans unprovoked. The first, they had not seen, and therefore not realized, who they were shooting at; the second, there was a cylon infiltrator among the resistance who had fired the first shot, or encouraged another to do so; the third, which would have seemed the most far fetched until recently, was that there was another group of humans on Caprica in addition to the resistance who were, for whatever reason, working with or for the cylon occupiers.

Lee's plan of action was simple. Everyone would stay calm, and remain friendly towards their hosts, giving no indication of suspicion or anger. They would be sure to take Seek out frequently, and expose her to everyone in the compound. They would also take special care that anyone wishing to return to the fleet with them be screened using Sharon and the dog. Ops on Caprica were to be completed and brought to a close. It was vital that they return to the fleet as soon as possible. Any questions and reports were to be brought to Apollo directly. At this, Helo had shifted uncomfortably, not liking the idea of excluding Starbuck. He had just made up his mind to insist that she be briefed as well, and as soon as possible, when she had appeared around the corner.

"We were making plans to pull out." He said it matter-of-factly, eyes searching for her response. His heart burned. He would pull no punches here.

"Already? We just got here."

"We've been here almost two weeks."

"Sure. Pulling ourselves together. We haven't accomplished much."

Lee's face was hard. Part of him knew that she hadn't meant it the way it had sounded to him, but the greater part could not help but wonder why saving his life could not be enough.

"Our mission here was not to save the whole fraking planet, Starbuck. We were to bring supplies to the people fighting here. We've done that. We were to take anyone who needed or wanted to come back to the fleet with us when we returned, and as soon as we secure a transport, we can do that too."

"They need us here, Captain. We came here to help these people."

"We have helped them! And we lost four good men to do it. Now the fleet is waiting for us. They're vulnerable to a cylon attack every minute they stay in the same place. We have to go."

She was quiet for a moment. Of course she had known that they would have to leave, and soon, but making plans to go with the immediacy Lee was implying took her by surprise. She wasn't ready to go, she realized. She felt like there was so much more to do.

"They're planning a raid within the next few days," she ventured, looking to Helo for support. "There's a Farm outside Caprica City. They could use some experienced military backup. Another week, tops."

"What the frak's a Farm?" Racetrack asked.

Starbuck had no idea how or why the Resistance had kept knowledge of the Farms totally to themselves in the time the Galactica crew had been among them. Well, she had one idea. Anders had ordered it, waiting for her to give him some indication that it was a subject they could speak about freely. Only a very few people knew what Starbuck had gone through on her last visit to Caprica; she had played that pretty close to the vest.

"It doesn't matter," Apollo growled. "Look, Starbuck, we're not here to fight. I know it's hard. Believe me when I tell you I would like to personally junk every fraking toaster on this planet. I hate what they've done to my home. I hate that most of my family and friends died here. We all do. But this is not our mission. We do not have the manpower or the supplies to support an insurgency. And even if we did, we have to return to the fleet as soon as we can, or everyone who is left there will die."

"Or leave us," Shields muttered.

"No, you look, Lee. Our mission is to defend the Colonies. That's what we all swore to do. These people, these people that we left here, fight and die every day against the cylons." She ignored the angrily muttered "and we don't," from Walker, and the offended glares from the others. "As long as we are here it is our obligation to help them in whatever way we can. The Commander knew that. That's why we're here."

"No! Lieutenant, we're here on a recovery mission! You got us into this, Kara. We all came here because we believed we owed it to these people to support them as much as we could. But every one of us dying…never going home… was not part of the deal."

"Do you even hear yourself? Lee, we are home! Caprica is our home!"

"No, it's not." His voice dropped, taking on a deadly calm. "Everything that made this place home is dead. Everyone who made this place home is dead. Our family, our tribes, are waiting for us to jump back to them so we can get the hell out of the system and go find Earth. This," he made a sweeping gesture, "these planets, are not the Twelve Colonies anymore."

For a long time, no one spoke. It was a harsh truth, what Lee had just spoken, but they had all felt it. Ever since that first day they had landed, Caprica had ceased to feel like home for most of them. It was hostile place, a place of death, and they had all grown homesick in their hearts. In part, they wanted to return to Caprica as it had been, and to the people who had made it what it was. But mostly, they wanted Galactica. They wanted their duty lockers and their racks. They wanted bad food, abrupt medical attention, co-ed showers, and their one and only change of clothes. They wanted the evening card game. Hell, they would have even welcomed their fifteen hour rotations. This was not where they belonged. It had not been for nearly one hundred days.

The verbal duel between Starbuck and Apollo had escalated to the point of shouting, and their shouting had begun to attract attention. Anders, and several others, made their way towards the pyramid court to investigate. It did not take a genius to realize that Kara was the odd man out, so to speak, in a very volatile situation. Even Helo had not risen to her defense, though it was taking all his effort to keep silent. Anders, after a brief hesitation, strode up to stand beside her. Lee darkened. Kara averted her eyes.

"Everything ok, Kara?" Anders asked. If he thought he was going to stare down Lee Adama, he had quite another thing coming. Seek, whose collar was still held firmly in Lee's grasp, growled softly.

Kara didn't respond.

"Of course, Lieutenant," Lee said, his voice low, dark, and dangerous, "we all realize that you have reasons of your own for wanting to stay."

He held Anders' glare with equal force for several minutes longer, and when the other man's gaze broke, Lee turned, without another word, and walked away. He looked like someone had replaced his spine with an iron rod. Racetrack and Walker followed immediately on his heels, with Landin helping Shields along after only a moment's indecision. Sharon and Helo hesitated. They would have stayed with Starbuck, but Sharon had no love for Anders and his resistance. She did not know what made her angrier: that they had gunned down members of the fleet, the service she loved, unthinkingly, or that they had thought they were gunning down her people. Probably the former. She had long since grown accustomed to the idea of humans killing cylons. She was even becoming tolerant of the idea that her face was one of the ones on the targets at the firing range on Galactica; the crew had to desensitize, in case they ever faced one of her kind less friendly towards them, she understood that. She doubted though, that she would ever grow accustomed to the senseless killing of which the humans seemed so fond. Shooting down an ally without thought, or apparent remorse, enraged her. Looking Anders up and down with a disdain that surprised even her, she turned as well to follow Apollo. With an apologetic look to Starbuck, Helo went with her.

Few things in her life had hit Kara Thrace as hard.

They did not return to the infirmary, or anywhere else where they were likely to encounter men or women of the resistance. The landing party from the Battlestar Galactica wanted to be alone, with each other, trusted family in a den of thieves. That's what it felt like, anyway. They knew these people were their kin, and their allies as well. But that didn't make it any easier to be here, nor did they feel any safer, when they saw Apollo and Shields all fraked up like they were and knew the reason why. So they went to one of the rooms that had been given to them for quarter. Walker, Landin, Shields, and Racetrack shared it. No one else stayed here.

Apollo sat away from the others, on the edge of Landin's cot, his head in his hands. He had been operating purely on autopilot, it seemed. His brisk, military bearing into which he had retreated had melted away. The others stood in a huddle talking quietly, trying like hell not to look at him. It was difficult, seeing their captain, the CAG, son of Zeus, broken like that. Helo and Sharon stood apart as well, not in the huddle with Racetrack and the marines, but on the opposite end of the room.

Helo was furious.

"She's not the enemy, dammit," he hissed. "And she's not wrong. We should destroy every one of those fraking farms while we have the chance."

"There are more you know. On the other Colonies."

"It doesn't matter! We should be fighting for those women."

If the room had been big enough to allow it, and keep their conversation private, he would have paced.

"He doesn't know."

"What?"

"Apollo. She never told him about the Farms. She never told anyone."

"He didn't want to know."

"I'm saying he's doing what he feels is right, and he hasn't been given a reason to think otherwise."

"What, you think we should tell him?"

"No. Not now. He wouldn't hear."

The dog, sitting in front of Lee, whimpered and put a paw on his knee. He didn't move.

"Gods, this whole thing has really fraked him up."

"It's fraked everybody up. We should never have come here." She looked at Apollo with a sad, almost pitying expression on her face. Strange. She was the one who was a prisoner, for all intents and purposes, hated by those she lived among, hunted by those closest to her. But she felt so much worse for him than she felt for herself. "It will always be hard for them."

"What? Who?" Helo was distracted, and still angry. He had only half heard her.

"Them. Apollo and Starbuck. I don't think they'll ever be able to deal with each other. On the same level they deal with everyone else, you know? Some people can't face the truth unless the issue is forced." Helo certainly hadn't been able to. He had shot her, been ready to push her away, disavow her completely, until Starbuck had challenged that, and when the chips were down, Helo had finally understood.

"What are you talking about Sharon? What issues?"

She did not answer.

Lee raised his head then, resting it on his fists and staring out the window. His face was drawn, worn, older looking.

"Sharon," he said softly. "Helo."

They did not hesitate to go to him. "Sir?"

He was silent for a moment, and did not look at them. Helo guessed that if they had hit him across the shoulders with a large stick just then, it would have shattered.

"Sir," Helo ventured, when Apollo didn't speak. "About the Farms. There's something you should know."

"I know about the Farms, Lieutenant," Apollo said softly.

Sharon and Helo both were taken aback by this revelation. This was unexpected. With Helo's furrowed brow as evidence of his incomprehension, Sharon's face opened with realization. The cylons who had tortured him had told him about the bullet wounds, and that the humans had probably shot him. How much more would it have tortured him to know what they had done to Starbuck, what they would do if they caught her again? How much did he know, then? What else had he been hiding from them?

"I want you two to begin the next phase of the mission. You will go with whatever supplies you need and recover a transport, like we discussed before we came." Helo opened his mouth to object. "I'm not done yet Helo. You will get a heavy Raider and bring it back here. We'll load up the raiding party and participate in this little adventure to Caprica City."

And the surprises just kept coming. Helo and Sharon exchanged a second round of startled glances.

"It will be purely voluntary," he went on. "Those who do not wish to go will stay here and pack up everyone and everything we're taking back with us, so that it can be loaded easily on our return. It'll be faster to fly than walk or drive, and Caprica City's quite a hike from here. After the raid, we come back here, load up, and head home."

"We come back? That mean you're going on the raid too, sir?" Lee just nodded. He still had not looked at them. Not the entire time he had been talking. What's in your head? Helo wondered. "Due respect, sir, but you're in no condition to go on any op."

Lee grunted. "Thank you for your concern, Helo."

"Are you trying to get yourself killed, sir?" He had meant it to sound like a challenge, when he'd asked him, but the question had come out with more than a little genuine concern.

Apollo did not respond.