Kara made her way through the corridors of Galactica, ducking into hatchways and out of the way corners whenever someone came into view. She would have to thank Lee for setting this whole thing to go down in the middle of the night. There were a lot less people to duck away from at three in the morning.

She slid into the open hangar bay door and pulled herself behind the first column she could find. The hangar wasn't buzzing with activity like normal, but there were still a few crewmen working on the downed Vipers. She had no idea how she was going to get to the launch tunnel without being seen.

There was a commotion around one of the ships in the hangar, and Kara heard the crew call out for assistance. She figured this was the only opening she would have and began to casually run across the hangar as quick as she could. She was a few steps away when she heard someone yell out for her to stop. Knowing she couldn't just keep going, that doing so would cause even more suspicion, she froze in her tracks.

Kara knew that this was going to end badly. Her hand reached down to rest on where the gun lay in her holster.

"Specialist!" Racetrack's voice echoed through the nearly empty room. As soon as Kara heard it, she took off again. "What the frak do you think you're doing? There are massive repairs that need to be done to this Raptor. We need you."

"I'm sorry, sir. I thought that was Lieutenant Thrace over there."

"What the frak, Jammer? You know as well as I do Lieutenant Thrace is in the brig. Just because you see a blonde with a ponytail does not mean we have a brig break on our hands."

Kara didn't hear Jammer's response as she made her way down the ladder into the launch tube. She didn't think Jammer had turned back in time to see where she went. At least, she hoped he didn't. That kid had too big of a mouth when it came to gossip. Her feet hit the bottom of the tube with a thud as she skipped the last few rungs.

Kara found herself wondering what was going to happen now that she was here. Obviously Lee had put a lot of thought into this escape plan. He even went as far as to make sure Racetrack was in the hangar bay to give her the opportunity to cross it. Her stomach was doing flips of excitement as she considered the next step. She hadn't had this kind of safe excitement in her life in so long.

As her eyes adjusted the darkness of the launch tunnel, her mouth dropped open. Hot Dog was standing in front of her, leaning against the nose of the Viper she had called her own for the past month.

"Hello, sir," he said with a smirk. He patted the ship lightly. "Routine maintenance. I'm supposed to be making sure that it can properly engage the boosting motors in the tunnel."

Kara strolled casually over to where Hot Dog was standing and shook her head. "How the frak did he get to you?"

"He's a damn good CAG," Hot Dog insisted. He held out a flight suit for her to take.

As one hand grabbed the flight suit, the other lingered on the patch fixed to his right arm. "Full-fledged pilot?"

"Nugget no more," he said with a laugh. "You should be going, Starbuck."

Kara unfolded the flight suit and began to slid it on. She paused about halfway to look up at Hot Dog. "So, the pilots? How are you all doing?"

"We're find. It's gotten hard, but we're fine."

She was hesitant to ask her next question, but she knew it might just be better to know the answer than avoid it all together. "Why didn't any of you come down to the brig?"

"The Commander gave the order for us to stay away. He wanted you isolated until your trial."

"Why is he so angry with me?" Kara said, doing her best to get as much information she could without breaking down. Isolating her from everyone she trusted was action fueled by hatred and resentment. She had no idea why Adama, a man she considered like a second father, would do it.

Hot Dog thought about lying to her at first, but eventually he figured it would be better if she just knew. "He's mad because everything started to go downhill from the point you left the Fleet. It spiraled out of control, and you're the easy person to blame. Almost every person has blamed you at one time. But things change, Starbuck. We've all made mistakes in the past few weeks. That's why things have fallen so far. We're all responsible for it."

"When the frak did you become such a deep thinker, Hot Dog?" Starbuck muttered, shaking her head in disbelief.

"Things got boring around here without you. I had to do something with my time." Hot Dog braced himself. "Now don't hit me too hard."

Kara nodded and drew her fist back to throw the blow.

"Wait!" Hot Dog yelled, holding up his hands around his face.

Kara didn't lower her hand. "Are you chickening out on me?"

"No. I just forgot to tell you. Billy Keikeya left a present for the President in your cockpit. He told me to tell you to take care of it because it was awfully hard for him to get his hands on. I don't know what that means, but now you know."

"Thanks," Kara said before bringing her fist forward to connect with his chin. Hot Dog went down like a brick, and it was obvious he wasn't getting up.

"Still got it," Kara whispered with a laugh. She grabbed Hot Dog under his arms and dragged him over to the emergency protective hatch they had set up after that particularly nasty accident involving miscommunication and one unlucky maintenance crewman. Once she was sure Hot Dog was safely tucked away, Kara made her way up into the Viper cockpit. When her eyes rested on the cylindrical tube on her chair, she smirked. "Can't get away from that damn Arrow," she quipped with a shake of her head.

Kara powered up her ship and smiled at how good it felt to be back in a Viper. It amazed her how much this intense longing to be in the sky could make her forget the fact that she almost died the last time she flew one of these things.

The smile wiped off her face as she looked around and realized the launch tube was sealed shut in front of her. Immediately, her mind went to Lee. He had made so many arrangements just to get her out of the brig and to wherever those coordinates took her. He couldn't have forgotten something so simple as getting the tube open.

"What would Lee have done?" she muttered to herself.

When the answer finally came to her mind, she found doubts rising up in her mind. If she was wrong, then this would frak up everything that had had been put into place. Kara was never one to let fear get the better of her.

Tapping the comm channel on, she whispered a quick prayer to the Lords of Kobol before tentatively asking, "Dee? Are you out there?"

There was no answer, but the launch tube groaned as it slid open. Kara let out the breath she had been holding in and powered her Viper up the rest of the way. The boosters kicked in and her body was sucked back against the cockpit chair as gravity and the forces of space took hold.

Kara visualized the jump coordinates Lee had given her on that note. Her first reaction had been to wonder what the frak Lee thought she could do with jump coordinates. If she hadn't taken the time to analyze the coordinates, she would have been quite frustrated upon seeing the FTL-incapable Viper waiting for her.

But luckily she had analyzed the coordinates and she did realize where Lee was leading her to.

It would take her at least ten hours to get there by Viper, but Kara was on her way to Kobol.