Lee sat down in one of armchairs in his quarters. These things were so uncomfortable that he could suddenly understand the rumors of how Admiral Cain only stood when she had her meetings in here. The chairs were fraking torture devices. His eyes caught on the bowl of cold noodles on the table, and he suddenly remembered he hadn't eaten the lunch his XO had sent over earlier that day. There was too much to do.

He had been Commander of Pegasus for exactly one month, and he had never been so busy in his life. Cain ran a tight ship, but somehow that was forgotten under Fisk and Garner. There was a lot of damage control to be done, and Lee had absolutely no time to do it in. It didn't help that he was also juggling the organization of this rescue mission to Caprica.

It pissed him off to no extent how easy it was to get this thing together. He simply told his father he was sending his extra Raptors on the mission and should anyone from Galactica care to join up he would give them the time the ships were scheduled for the first jump. It wasn't a surprise when he heard Helo and Racetrack were the first ones to volunteer. Kara had a lot of friends on that ship.

It killed him to stand in front of that briefing room full of Raptor pilots, look into each one of their trusting faces, and lie. He pointed out that they were making history by doing this. He said it was the good of the Fleet. He gave them confidence.

He said all those things when all he really wanted to do was beg each and every one of the pilots to back out. He didn't want them to go to Caprica. If they went to Caprica, they were going to bring back the man Kara loves and then she would never be his again, not even the small piece that had the heart of Starbuck tucked deep inside it.

Before this morning, he hadn't seen Kara in over a month. She had been busy on Galactica, and he barely had time to update his father, let alone the CAG, of his progress on Pegasus. He hadn't even seen Dee. She must hate him considering the last words he said to her contained a promise to not let this reassignment kill their relationship, whatever the frak that was.

Lee's mind wandered back to the briefing earlier. Kara had looked rather pale. He figured she had been running herself ragged, setting up this mission from the Galactica end, but he hadn't actually seen it with his own eyes until now. She really wanted to do this.

Lee could feel his last bits of hope slowly fall out of reach.

A knock on the hatchway pulled him away from his dark thoughts. Lee ran through his schedule quickly and realized he wasn't wrong to think there were no meetings scheduled until at least a few hours later. "Enter," he called, cringing at just how much he sounded like his father. Soon his crew would be calling him Old Man.

Starbuck hesitated a moment before stepping through the hatch she had opened. The metal door slammed shut behind her. She half walked, half stomped over to where he sat, and Lee realized she was suited up to leave. It must be time. He had purposefully ignored the clock since the morning briefing, not wanting to silently count down the seconds until his last bit of happiness slipped away.

"Hey," he said, giving her a smile. He hoped she couldn't read the emotions he was keeping trapped below the surface.

"Hey," Kara said, still staring intently at the ground. She had thought this would be easy. All she had to do was come in here, let him know she was going, and leave. Both of them knew what they were doing and they didn't want to drag it out. Kara was leaving to get Anders, and that was that.

"They told me you were looking for me."

Lee looked confused for a moment before he remembered his XO saying something about the traditional send-off for missions like this. The commanding officer was supposed to remind the mission leader of the support they had waiting back home in order to encourage the mission to run safely. He was going to have to have a talk with Stinger about keeping his Commander informed.

Honestly, Lee was almost happy Stinger had done this. He might have been scared to say goodbye to Kara, but he knew letting her go without one last exchange would weigh heavily on him. "I just wanted to say-" Kara looked up at him, and Lee felt himself losing his train of thought. He went with the safest option. "-good hunting."

Kara looked relived. "Thank you, sir."

"When did you start with the sir stuff?" Lee automatically asked. He could feel himself flinch inside. He wasn't supposed to make this conversation personal. They were just going to say goodbye and good hunting. There would be no admitting to feelings and intentions. There couldn't be.

"About the time you decided to jump up two ranks in under a week," she shot back. "I still can't believe you're a Commander and I'm still a Lieutenant."

"You have to put in your dues before you reap the rewards. Besides if you pull this mission off, I'm sure the Admiral will give you at least a Captain rank." Lee watched Kara's eyes fall to the ground again at the mention of the looming mission. "You know it's a good plan, right? It's a good plan. Sharon should be able to jump you into the atmosphere a couple of clicks above the surface and below the Cylon dradis."

Kara cut him off. "I know the plan, Lee. I wrote it."

"Right," he said, giving her a nod. The silence grew between them until it was too uncomfortable for either one of them to move. "It's a good plan," Lee whispered. He couldn't let it go. He was scared to death that something was going to go wrong.

Kara had to come back to him. Even if it was with another man, he had to have her back. There was no other option.

"I… I have to go," Kara said.

Lee winced for a second. Of course she would be anxious to get this thing going. There was only one more thing left for him to do. Too bad it involved more lies and basically ripping the last piece of his heart in two. "I hope you find him, Kara. I really do."

Kara tried to keep the surprise from registering on her face. Those were the last words she had thought to hear coming from Lee's lips. They were definitely not the ones she wanted to hear. She wanted him to tell her he had been keeping quiet for too long and he couldn't keep quiet anymore. She wanted him to admit that he was as in love with her as she was with him. She wanted him to say it didn't matter if she brought Anders back to the Fleet because she was his and always would be.

Instead, he told her he wanted her to find Anders.

Two could play at that game, she decided. "So do I."

She waited for his anger to bubble over, but when he just sat there staring at her, she realized she had misjudged the situation. He really didn't care at all. "Good hunting, Apollo."

"Good hunting, Starbuck," Lee said, watching her leave his office. Silently he prayed to the gods that this would not be the last time he saw her. She paused at the hatchway and turned to look at him. "Is there something you forgot, Lieutenant?"

She watched him a moment before smirking. "Do me a favor while I'm gone. Try not to die on me, flyboy."

Lee felt his heart rip from his chest at her words, and it took all his strength to keep himself from chasing her down. She hadn't called him flyboy since before Anders. Why she chose this moment to start back up again was beyond him.

All he knew was it made the small flame of hope he had been carrying for months now flare up again. He could remember how blissfully good it had been back then, and it was slowly killing him. He couldn't keep this up if he wanted to maintain his sanity.

Suddenly Lee didn't want to be alone while Kara was out there saving Anders. He knew it was wrong in so many ways, but he needed company right now. Reaching across the table to grab the handset of the phone, he did his best not to over think this. It only took the Pegasus comms officer a few seconds to get him a line to the CIC on Galactica. "Pegasus Actual, this is Galactica. Go ahead."

"Relax, Dee," Lee said, smiling despite the fact that he knew what he was about to do was wrong on multiple levels. "This is a personal call."

He could hear Dee smiling through the phone. "About damn time, sir."

Lee winced. He could be a real bastard sometimes. Still, he felt like he had an irrational right to be selfish on a day like this one. "I was wondering if you had any free time to catch one of the shuttles over to the beast today."

"I switched my shift," Dee replied. "I figured you might not want to be alone after all that's happening today."

"Very wise of you, Petty Officer."

"Your father calls me prolific."

"My father's right." Lee sighed. "So you'll come?"

"As soon as I can," Dee replied. "Now if there isn't anything else you need to say, Pegasus Actual, some of us need to be doing our jobs right now."

Lee chuckled. "Understood, Galactica. Pegasus Actual out."

He laid the phone back down onto his best and leaned back in his chair. Dee deserved someone a lot better than him. She deserved someone who would make love to her without imagining the face of another woman, someone who could love her without wondering if he was just using her for the things he couldn't get elsewhere. Dee deserved to not have to wait idly by the phone until he called for her. She deserved to be the pursued, not the pursuer.

He wished he could be man enough to say that to her face.

Instead, she was going to come over here. They would undress without saying a word, and Lee would try to forget about what Kara was doing out there. Dee understood that was what this was about. She wouldn't fight it.

She really was too good for him.

Twelve days later, Lee was hunched over the initial recon reports of New Caprica when he looked up to see his brother standing in the doorway of his office.

"She's come home."