His words replayed in her ears as she dipped in and out of enemy lines, taking down as many Raiders as she could without getting herself shot.
The conveyor tunnel is clear. I'm going through it.
Kara had known they were running out of time, but taking a plane down a conveyor tunnel that might not open on the other side was suicidal. She had screamed at Lee to stop even as he accelerated towards the small opening. Briefly, she thought about flying in after him. Then the memory of something said back when they were stranded on that moon popped into her head. Lee said her presence was distracting. If she followed him into that tunnel and he got distracted, he would be dead. She would have killed him. So like a horrible wingman, she abandoned her partner to start taking out Raiders.
Now all she had to do was keep dodging and wait.
"Come on, Lee," she hissed. "Don't you dare die on me."
Vipers and Raiders were disappearing all around her, and Kara knew they couldn't hold the machines off much longer. Somehow, it wasn't the idea that Lee might fail which scared her. It was the fact that he might fail and she would never know. He would have just flown down that tunnel and she would never see him again.
She was going to kill him if he got himself dead.
"Galactica, Apollo." She was so happy to hear his voice that she almost didn't hear him say mission accomplished. Her ship was shuddering slightly, and it took her a moment to realize it was because her hands were shaking on the stick.
The sky lit up with fire. The rest of the squadron lost little time in kicking in the burn to help protect Galactica from the remaining Raiders. Kara knew that was part of the plan. They were supposed to fight until the last Raider was gone. Yet for some reason, she didn't follow the rest of the Vipers.
Kara steered her ship around the broken pieces and scorched parts of the wreckage around her until he was in her sights. He was making his way back to Galactica, but it was going to take him longer. He had been practically on the surface of the moon while the rest of the fighters were in the heat of the battle.
"Starbuck." There was no questioning in his voice. He didn't have to ask her why she was here. They were wingmen.
She didn't answer him, just dropped her ship in line with his, and they both flew their way back to the Fleet. There were barely any Cylons left to kill by the time they made it back. "Apollo and Starbuck, you are both cleared to land. Let the others clean up the trash."
Starbuck was surprised that it was the Commander and not Dee giving them permission to land. In the back of her head, she wondered if maybe the Petty Officer was too overcome with happiness that Lee was alive. Dee probably couldn't even speak because she was so happy.
Kara winced. She had thought she was over this unfounded jealousy thing.
Kara knew that she should just talk to Lee and ask him if he was interested in Dee, but somehow the idea of doing that made her feel like she was back in primary school. They were pilots of the Twelve Colonies. She shouldn't be so preoccupied with whether or not Apollo was getting some action on the side. It wasn't her right to know. In fact, it was probably appropriate that she didn't know.
Her Viper touched down with barely a jolt. The rest of the squadron quickly followed, and everything became a blur. There was ambrosia and cigars being handed out. People she had never even met were slapping her on the back in congratulations.
Lee was wrapped up in explaining to his father what exactly had gone on while accepting hugs and praise from all those around him. It was odd. All he had to do to be accepted by these people was to risk his life on a roll of the dice. Someone offered him a beer which he gladly accepted. He needed something to wash away the sound of Kara's screams ringing in his ears as he entered the conveyor tunnel.
That wasn't what haunted him, though. It was when her voice got strangely quiet and the words could barely be made out. He was never meant to have heard them, but he did.
Please. Don't.
For a brief second, he had thought about turning around. Kara could come with a new, better plan, one that didn't involve his probable death. Then reality kicked in. There was no Plan B. He had to be the hero.
So Lee pushed the fact that he was leaving Kara to fend for herself out of his mind. He had faith in her. She would be okay.
His heart leaped when he saw her Viper waiting for him as they made their way back to Galactica. She was safe, and she had waited for him. They landed together, and then everything became chaos.
Lee was giving his brother a hug when he finally saw her. She was standing at the back of the crowd, looking for something. Lee wasn't sure what that was until her eyes caught with his. A look Lee couldn't read flashed across her face. "I'll catch up with you later, Zak," Lee said pulling away from his brother's arms.
Zak turned to watch his brother push through the crowd. He caught a glimpse of an unruly head of blonde hair before it disappeared into the corridor. Sighing, he knew it was going to be up to him to cover until Kara and his brother had worked out whatever problem they were currently having.
Lee followed a few feet behind her without saying a word. A menacing feeling fell over him. In all the time he had known Kara, she always had a sarcastic comment to throw at him. The silence was unnerving.
Kara pulled open the nearest door and stepped into the empty equipment locker. Lee shut the hatch behind himself and turned to stare at her. Her back was turned to him, and he could see her shoulders gently rising and falling. She was struggling with something, that was for sure.
Kara turned to face him, and Lee was startled to see there were tears in her eyes. "Kara?"
Her hand came out to slap him across the face. He stared down at the floor in shock as the sting kicked in. His eyes came up to meet hers, and he saw something break inside of her. Kara stepped forward to cup his face and kissed him.
It took him a second to react. When he did, she opened her mouth to him. His vision went white.
His hands came up to clutch her tightly to him, and he felt her bite down hard on his bottom lip. The pleasure mixed with the pain, and he backed them up against the wall. His hands were on the collar of her flight suit, pushing it down to expose her neck, before he could think better of it. He licked the sensitive skin around her collar bone before kissing his way back up to her lips. She moaned against the frantic pressure of his lips against hers. Lee was convinced this was all a hallucination, that he had died going down this conveyor tunnel and this was the afterlife.
Kara pushed him away just as he decided death wasn't such a bad thing. Panting, she growled, "Never do that to me again, Adama."
He braced himself against the wall as she pushed out from underneath his arms and threw open the hatch. He struggled to figure out what had just happened as the hatch banged shut behind her.
He had just saved her life and the life of every other person in the Fleet, and yet Kara found a reason to be angry at him. His hand came up to rub a few drops of blood away from where she bit his lip. That had been a hell of a way to show anger.
Lee knew it was going to be a few minutes before he could go back to the celebration. He hoped in that time he could figure out what the frak he was doing. He and Kara were playing with fire right now. They had been since he forced her to tell him about her past. They hadn't spoken about it, but it was always there in the periphery.
For the thousandth time, Lee wished his life could have gotten a little easier when the colonies were attacked. Everyone else's lives seemed to simplify with the change. Lee's only got more complicated. First, he was overworked, filling in the many holes of command that the Cylons' initial attack created. Then he met Kara Thrace, and his heart was pulled in fifty different directions. There were regs, there were responsibilities, and there was a deep desire to forget it all.
Lastly, there was something that not even he could explain. One day, out of the blue, he realized he wasn't looking to Kara for a satisfying frak. They could do that without one person caring. It was the end of the world after all.
No, the trouble of it all was that he knew if he let his guard down for even a moment around her, he would be lost. He would want more.
Sighing, Lee pushed off the wall and pulled the hatch open to step into the corridor. There was no solution to this problem. He simply had to put his head down and keep barreling through.