Lee had his flight suit around his hips by the time he made it back to his quarters. All he wanted to do was drop into bed and sleep for twelve years. Right now, all he could afford was four hours.

Four hours and then they were jumping.

"You must be exhausted."

Lee was so exhausted he didn't even startle. "I've been up in the air for over twelve hours making sure those idiots know how to do an end-on-end turn in their sleep, so yes, I'm exhausted." Lee paused as the reality dawn on him. "What the frak are you doing here?"

"I'm your going home present from the Old Man," Helo smirked, kicking his feet up onto the table. "Are you surprised?"

"Get the frak out of my room, Helo," Lee growled. He threw the papers in his hand onto the desk before peeling off the rest of his flight suit and letting it drop to the floor.

"Seriously, Lee, the Admiral sent me over here to replace Dee."

Lee pulled his tanks over his head and threw them against the wall. They were so drenched in sweat that there was no hopes of stretching them out another day. "I don't understand."

"Well, let's just say the Old Man and I were having a talk the other day about a certain mystery tattoo that everyone now knows about. We figured if we can get the people evacuated off New Caprica…" Helo's voice faded off as he thought twice about what he was going to say.

Lee paused on his way to the bathroom. "Karl."

"Well, if Kara's still alive, sir, it might be better for all of us if she knows upfront that you and Dee are done. I know Starbuck, and she has a nasty jealous streak. The Old Man and I filled in the blanks and decided it was best for Dee's personal safety that she be off Pegasus."

Lee's eyes drifted to his bed before looking back at Helo. "Kara's not that impulsive."

"Blasphemy!" Helo yelled, the laughter thick in his voice. He grabbed a few papers off the table and began leafing through them. "Nice penmanship, Adama."

Lee rolled his eyes and slammed the bathroom door shut. "I take it that means I have to work with your Cylon-loving ass from now on?" Lee yelled.

"For at least the beginning of the rescue mission, yeah."

It was weird how quickly Lee had grown comfortable with Helo. He had even adjusted to Helo's relationship with the Sharon still tucked aboard Galactica.

Sharon played an integral part in finding ships on the Twelve Colonies that weren't stripped bare by the Cylons. Without her, they would have plenty of pilots and no ships for them to fly. That kind of assistance goes a long way towards repairing the trust issues. Lee had learned to tolerate Sharon and her relationship with the people in his life, and that made the job they were doing just a little easier.

Pushing all thoughts of Cylons out of his head, Lee flipped on the water and took the quickest shower of his life. He wasn't surprised to find Helo still sitting on his couch when he stepped back into his living quarters. The couch was infamous for being the most comfortable seat on the Beast, and this was usually where Helo gravitated towards during their daily briefings.

"Nuggets all trained up on your end, sir?"

Lee nodded at the flight suit balled on the floor. "I just finished graduating them. We're good to go as soon as I get a few hours."

"How many made it?"

Lee knew the numbers by heart, having gone over them every single night, so he had no problem reciting them. "Ten pilots from Aerelon, six from Aquaria, five from Canceron, nine from Caprica… there would have been more if we hadn't already run a rescue mission there… twenty from Gemenon, three from Leonis, six from Libra, fifty-two from Picon… that's mostly because of the Academy… eleven from Sagittaron, eight from Scorpia, two from Tauron, and six from Virgon."

Helo waited a moment before sighing, "So?"

Lee rolled his eyes. If Helo was going to be under his command, even for a few days, he was going to have to start putting some effort into it. "One hundred, twenty-eight."

"Not bad for twelve colonies."

"I think they're pretty well trained, too." Lee picked his flight suit up off the ground and walked it over to the closet. "Not that Kara won't be pissed when she sees what's been done with them."

Helo wisely chose not to comment on that statement. Pessimism was the last thing they needed right now. Luckily there was a loud knock on the hatchway at that exact moment. Lee rolled his eyes. "This will only take a minute."

Helo heard the hatch open and Lee started speaking. A female voice responded, sounding rather put off , and then the room filled with silence again. Helo could hear the woman's footsteps going down the corridor, and he couldn't help but wonder if he had just witnessed an adult temper tantrum.

Lee groaned and collapsed onto the bed. "I don't think Kara ever had this issue with the nuggets. I mean, do you ever recall Hot Dog trying to get into her pants?"

"I wasn't around," Helo reminded Lee.

"Forgive me for being too tired to think straight." Lee's voice was muffled in his pillow, but Helo could still hear the whiny tone. After a moment, he lifted his head. "Every day I've got a different nugget knocking on my hatch, Karl, asking for a private lesson as if I didn't know what that really meant."

"It's because none of these people have met Kara. They don't know."

Lee smiled and flopped his head back into the pillow. "Damn right."

Helo sighed. It was odd how easy it had been to accept this new dimension to the woman he considered his best friend. From the little Lee had told him, he and Kara basically admitted to loving one another and then she up and married Anders. Lee seemed okay with it for some reason. Helo was pretty sure that was all a brave front. No man can be happy to see the love of his life making a permanent commitment to someone else.

Then again, Lee had seven whole months to adjust to what Kara had done before anyone else discovered the whole story. He had gotten pretty good at showing his lack of concern.

Nonetheless, Helo wasn't buying it. The few times a badly informed crewman told the Commander of Pegasus that there was a high chance they would be returning to a dead planet, Lee snapped. Ishay tended to look the other way when people were wheeled into her sickbay with mysterious injuries.

Lee was in all-out denial, and Helo wasn't a brave enough man to open that can of worms. He hadn't known Lee that well before the Fleet settled on New Caprica, but he knew enough to sense the difference. As Kara would have said if she had been there, the stick up Lee's ass got larger by the day. He was more distant, more quiet, more strict. Even after he told his father and Helo about Kara, he was still different.

Helo couldn't put his finger on it, but something was wrong.

Noticing that Lee's breathing was already evening out, Helo pulled himself to his feet. "Okay. I'm going to go down to the CIC and assert my authority."

"See you in three and a half," Lee said, giving a half-hearted wave.

Only after Helo left did Lee fully realize how much had changed in the past few months. Their relationship had been by necessity in the beginning, but that changed over time. They were both the most senior pilots in the Fleet right now which required them to work hand in hand to get these pilots trained. Together, they had produced seventy-six Viper pilots, fifty-two Raptor ECOs and pilots, and one solid friendship. Lee was surprised his father hadn't swapped out Helo for Dee weeks earlier.

"I am so going to get a kick out of you two when you finally get off your lazy ass and come get me."

Lee smiled at the sound of Kara's voice. He had been wondering where she was.