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Beta'ed by AMMONITE. Thank you!
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HYBRID by -yannik-
Chapter Eleven - CLANDESTINO
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The Admiral strode towards his son as soon as the hatch of the raptor was opened. He didn't even bother with dismissing Hot-Dog, who brought him to Pegasus.
"What's going on?" he asked right away.
Lee swallowed hard, as the reality hit him. He was talking to a cylon. To a frakking cylon! It didn't even matter that he was half the machine himself. He was standing in front of a cylon. "We need a more private place, sir," he finally managed to say.
They left the crowded hangar bay in a hurry.
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Simon glared at her, and Kara couldn't move. "You'd better go now" he said. "I'll stay here with our friend Anders." He stepped towards them as he spoke, and suddenly hit Sam in the head with the back of his gun.
Kara shrieked and jumped at him, but he sent her flying with a swift move of his hand. "Don't mess with us," he hissed. "You stand no chance."
She needed a moment to clear her head, and she watched with terror as Sam lay on the floor not moving, Simon-cylon leaned over him, and fastened his arms and legs.
The Hot-Dog model came to her and held out his hand. "You'll come with me."
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As soon as they were in an empty briefing room, Lee locked all the doors and turned to his father - to the cylon.
He needed to stop thinking this. But first – he needed to know.
"We uncovered the identity of…another cylon," he started, his throat tight. "Model Number One."
If there was a change in his father's face, it was so brief Lee could have easily missed it. After he blinked once, he wasn't sure if it ever was there. The Admiral's expression was it's usual mask.
"Who is it?" he asked.
Lee swallowed hard. "You tell me," he whispered.
His father gazed at him for a long while. Then he finally spoke. "How can I tell you? You said you uncovered a cylon."
Lee breathed in and out before even trying to respond. He wasn't sure what it was he felt at the moment – relief? That it wasn't he and his father - that Dualla lied; or fear? That they were back to the situation in which they hadn't known anything.
Or worse – that the hybrid was really Kara.
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Kara tried to resist, but two guns – one pointed at her husband's head, the other into her own face – convinced her. She'd have time to fight this later; she'd have to fight. If she could only bring Apollo up to date with the situation. Frak! Calling him should have been the first thing to do when she realized it was Simon outside her door. But she was Starbuck – first act, later think.
The cylon lowered his gun as they walked the corridors of Pegasus, but kept it pressed against her side.
"I know what you're thinking Starbuck" he hissed. "I know you. We used to fly together."
That was one arrogant bastard! "No we didn't" Starbuck replied through clenched teeth.
"It's just like Boomer" the cylon smiled, relaxed. "We share memories – those sleepers need to be controlled. I know how he admires you, and – frankly – I share that feeling too." There was an eerie mixture of esteem and mockery in his voice. Two opposites. "You're my hero."
"Frak off!"
"Thought you were capable of more."
She nearly jumped at him for this, but he stopped her with a simple raising of his palm. And then he pointed behind his back.
"Remember? Samuel. He's back there with our agent. You wouldn't like him to get hurt would you?" He gazed her for a moment, until he saw the answer in her eyes. "You'll obey orders. And now – watch this." He smiled, and as they turned the corner they saw…
Hot-Dog.
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The Admiral gazed at his confused son, and decided to break the silence.
"Alright" he sighed. "Who told you that I was a cylon?"
Lee looked up and assessed his father. "I never said it was you. I only implied that you knew." His heart, already racing like crazy, sped up even more.
"Hmm." Adama gave his son a look, but his face still betrayed no emotion. "I assumed" he explained simply. "They keep lying, deceiving us, trying to pit us against one another. Leoben tried that trick with Laura Roslin already. Back when Kara interrogated him on Gemenon Traveller. He told the President I was a cylon, but he was proved wrong. Now, who was it this time?"
Lee's mind was set on a name his father mentioned, but he tried to answer nonetheless. "Um, it was Dualla. Did you say Leoben?"
"Dualla? Lieutenant Dualla?" the Admiral asked, as if there was some other Dualla, ignoring Lee's query.
"Yes" Lee confirmed. "She's Model Number Nine."
"So there was a cylon agent uncovered after all?" the Admiral mocked, and Lee scowled slightly.
"Are you saying that she lied?" he asked bluntly. "About you?"
"Most certainly!" The Admiral's offended anger seemed too sincere to be a feign. "Where is she?" he asked through clenched teeth.
"In the brig."
"Let's go!
"After you, sir."
The Admiral strode form the briefing room in a hurry, and the Commander quickly followed.
They walked in silence, side by side. And again it was the father to break the silence first.
"What does she want?" he asked.
"Well the thing is…" Lee hesitated. Where should he start? From the beginning of course. "This whole story has actually started with Leoben, and with what he wanted."
The Admiral shot a glance at his Commander. "Keep going."
"This model came to Kara, back on New Caprica" Lee started explaining. "He sold her antibiotics for Anders – he had pneumonia. In exchange Leoben asked Kara to help them get the human-cylon hybrid."
"The hybrid?" the Admiral stopped abruptly and turned to look his son in the eye. Lee was unpleasantly startled by a sudden fear he saw in his father's face. "What do they want from the hybrid?"
This was not the question the Admiral was supposed to ask. Both Lee and Kara first wondered how the cylons could have wanted anything, if the only hybrid they knew about – Sharon's daughter – was dead. There could be two answers – either the older Adama knew about Hera's survival, or he was concerned about his own child.
Lee swallowed hard and opened his mouth wanting to reply, but his father beat him to it once more.
"Kara is supposed to get the hybrid?" he asked frantically. "And deliver it to them?"
"That's right."
"Where is Kara?"
"In her quarters" Lee answered trying for all gods' sakes to remain calm. He hated where this was going. Focus on the question, Lee, focus on Kara. "She's safe. She's under guard."
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The pilot, wearing a flight suit, looked exactly the same as the marine standing next to her. Kara expected the former to be shocked, to be frightened, to resist maybe. But he made no move at all.
The conscious cylon agent motioned the two of them to a nearby equipment locker and, once they entered, hit Hot-Dog in the head with the back of his gun. Shocked, Kara couldn't help a sharp muffled scream. The pilot was obviously dead, without the slightest trace of a fight. There was no survival instinct whatsoever. Just programming.
It made her sick to the stomach, and she bent over losing the remnants of the dinner she had in Lee's quarters just minutes ago. Or maybe it was years?
As the cylon was undressing his prone copy and himself and changing into the flight suit, he started telling Kara what her objectives were.
"Our job should be simple" he started. "I am to capture the hybrid and take it to the Basestar that is waiting nearby. But we need to get rid of the cylon parent. This is going to be easy – they trust us both." He looked up with a smug smile on his face.
Kara eyed him with disgust. "So I'm supposed to kill someone I know, just because you tell me it's a cylon?" she asked in a mocking tone.
"Well, Kara…" Hot-Dog looked up and smiled. "Remember about Samuel. The choice here is really simple – it's between the man you love and the man you don't."
She only gritted her teeth.
The cylon got up and motioned for her to follow him. And just a few paces further she saw William and Lee Adama walking towards them.
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Lee stopped dead in his tracks.
"Kara" he gasped. "What are you doing here?"
Kara was trying to think of a good excuse for her and her companion, when something suddenly clicked in her head. A thought so ugly that she nearly blacked out. But no, she was stronger than that. She was a fighter.
And she was a loyal friend too.
"Code blue" she mouthed to Lee, before Hot-Dog had a chance to realize what she was doing.
With perfect timing Starbuck gently elbowed Hot-Dog, and smirked at him, drawing his attention, while Apollo drew his side-arm and pressed it to the pilot/cylon's chin. Starbuck grabbed the cylon's gun and jerked it from his hands with a forceful move. She thrust it into his guts, and she would have fired if she hadn't felt a steadying hand on her shoulder.
"Give me the gun, Kara" the Admiral whispered. She turned and gave it to him immediately, looking him straight in the eye.
"Yes, sir" she breathed out. This can't be, this can't be – a little voice in her head kept repeating.
"Hey, what do you want from me?" Hot-Dog screamed frantically, faking terror.
Kara's blood boiled. "You want me to lead them to the equipment locker we left your dead Galactica copy in?" She screamed into his face and was held back by Adama once again.
"There's no time for this Kara." The Admiral already had handcuffs that he had taken from one of the marines, standing by, weapons ready. "If she says you're a cylon, I believe her, Constanza, I'm sorry. We'll confirm it later. Meanwhile we'll take you to the brig, just in case. We were headed there anyway. Starbuck, do you mind accompanying us? Apparently you know a lot about what is going on here."
"Actually, sir," Lee interrupted, pushing a cuffed Hot-Dog in front of him, still at a gun point, "she knows significantly less than I do now - than I suspect." He corrected himself, looking his father in the eye.
"I understand," the Admiral replied slowly, returning his son's stare.
Kara felt sick again, at both – this silent communication between them, and at her own suspicions. Did they even have anything other than suspicions? Frak! Her head was really frakked up right now, these cylons were masters at that. She should tell them – the Adamas – shouldn't she? But what would they think about her? If she admitted what she suspected them of, they would hate her forever. There had to be some other way! Any other way…
As she frantically searched for a solution in her head, the Admiral asked her something. He had to repeat the question for her to understand.
"You were supposed to deliver the hybrid to the cylons?"
"That's correct, sir."
"And what next?"
"I was also supposed to kill its father" she whispered. This resolution was too obvious. Too obvious. This couldn't be, there had to be another explanation.
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Lee listened to his father quizzing Starbuck; he watched the back of Hot-Dog's head, as the pilot – the cylon – walked before him, and heard his pulse pounding in his ears faster and faster. He was scared. He was terrified.
"Alright" the Admiral said to Kara. "What do the cylons want from the hybrid?"
Why did he ask that? Why? Why!
Kara didn't know of course, the cylons hadn't shared that much with her.
"Constanza?" The Admiral turned to their captive, and Hot-Dog swirled around, using the opportunity to be heard.
"I'm not a frakking cylon!" he yelled. But that was what they always said.
Lee – not even fully aware of what he was doing – pushed the taller man against the wall, and pressed the gun to his temple. He realized his hand shook, and his finger on the trigger could easily slip.
"Shut it" he forced from his mouth.
"Lee…" he felt his father's presence right behind him, and that was enough.
"You want to know what they want?" he blurted, before he considered the best course of action. "You want to know? Because I can tell you! Dee shared a few things with me. She told me what their plan was. What their plan had been. Initially. They wanted to create the next generation of hybrids. Mix it with another cylon. But since that plan has failed, they only want to run some cylon tests on it. Then kill it. And run some more tests on the corpse. Just to find out why it even exists. How the frak was it's existence possible!" he stopped yelling, when he realized what he had just done.
Breathing hard, he turned around and gave the weapon over to his father without a word. Then he met Kara's frightened gaze. He shouldn't have exploded like that, he shouldn't have… She had no idea what that was about, she didn't know what Dualla told him. She didn't know any of this…
His father laid a hand on his shoulder. "We won't let that happen," he whispered.
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The choice is simple – Hot-Dog's words rung in Kara's ears, – it's between the man you love, and the man you don't.
Well, Hot-Dog was wrong…
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t.b.c.