Lee's mouth opened into a large yawn as he woke up from the first solid night's sleep he had had in weeks. There was a heavy weight on top of his body, and Lee panicked for a moment when he saw the short crop of blond hair. Then he remembered Kara's impromptu haircut and let out a sigh of relief. He should have known it was her the second he woke up to find himself being smothered. She always had the bad habit of sleeping on top of him every time they did this.

The pain meds had worn off sometime during the night, and Lee could already feel the dull ache creeping back in. Instead of surrendering to it, he pushed it down and reached his hands up to rest on her back. The scarred skin did not make his stomach clench in desire the way it did before the Cylon occupation, but it did make his heart speed up. She was right. Once the slicing cuts on his back healed, they would match her scars perfectly.

If Lee had to have scars, he wanted them to be like hers.

The gentle circles of his fingertips sliding across her back woke Kara up after a few minutes and she groaned, "I told you not to fraking touch my back, Sam."

Lee let himself absorb that statement for a moment before responding, "Well, I'm not Sam, and I'll touch your back if I fraking want to."

Kara's eyes flew open at the sound of Lee's voice, and he could tell the exact moment that she realized she was lying completely on top of him. She scrambled out of the bunk and reached for her pants. "Shit. I have to get going. There's stuff to do."

Lee sat up and gestured to the small clock on the wall. "The sun's barely come up. You can't have that much to do."

"I have to keep everyone alive for another day," Kara answered defiantly even though she was already sitting back down on the bunk.

"Spend a little more time with me first," Lee pleaded after a few seconds.

Kara gave a small nod, but the room still returned to silence. It seemed like she was still refusing to give him any free information. Like always, he was going to have to work for it.

"So, tell me about this whole not letting your husband touch your back thing, Kara."

"It's none of your business, Lee," Kara hissed, crossing her arms in front of her chest.

"Okay. Tell me why you're not worried about me touching your back." Kara's face went pale, and Lee realized he had guessed right. Whatever reason made her decide her battle-scarred back was off limits to Anders did not hold up when it came to Lee. "Kara?"

She looked down at her hands, and that was when Lee knew she was about to tell him the truth. "You've always had a calming touch, Lee, ever since the day Zak introduced us." She looked up and smirked at him. "I think that's why I let you hit me so much. All you had to do was touch the bruise and it didn't hurt anymore."

Lee looked down at his bandaged wrist and nodded. "I know the feeling."

Kara crawled to sit by his side. "This feels weird."

"I missed you," Lee said, looking at her out of the corner of his eye.

"Yeah. Me, too."

Lee sighed and picked out a point on the wall to stare at. After being tortured by the Cylons for days, it was nice to be able to just sit here in silence with his best friend by his side. The minutes ticked by, and Lee heard people walking through the hall outside his door. "Breakfast time?"

"I am not serving you in bed. You are not an invalid."

Lee chuckled. "I wasn't suggesting it. I just thought you might be nice enough to show me where the frak the food is. I am new here, after all."

Kara shook her head. "No, you're the most senior ranking officer we have. You just don't know the schematics of the place yet.

"Are you going to teach them to me?"

Kara's face fell, and she shook her head. "I can't. There's a lot of things to plan if we're going to stay alive long enough for Cally to talk with the Old Man and get the Fleet back here. I'm going to be busy."

"Too busy for me?"

"Too busy for sleep," Kara said wistfully.

Lee took that as neither a confirmation nor a denial. "I guess you could tell that Bauer kid to give me a tour."

Kara smiled. "The kid grows on you rather fast, doesn't he?"

"He reminds me of the kind of kid you would have been when you were younger. Within seconds of meeting him, I had the urge to tell him to go to his room."

"You owe Bauer's mom a thank you, you know," Kara said, a wide grin plastered on her face.

"Oh yeah? Why's that?"

"Well, Bauer was one of the kids in Laura's school, and his mom was the one who gave me that fraking fantastic bottle of ambrosia for Colonial Day. You remember?"

Lee smiled. Of course he remembered. Every second of those two weeks was permanently burned into his brain. "It was a good bottle."

"Frak yeah," Kara whispered.

The room filled up with silence again, and Lee could see Kara was struggling to come up with a way to push off her duties for a few more minutes. "So I see Anders got over that pneumonia."

"Yeah. Cottle was right. He was strong, and the Cylons showing up helped to motivate him. I often wondered if medication would have made it easier, though." Kara's face immediately went red as she realized she had just brought up the one topic she did not want to address. The day the Cylon occupation began was one she had tried so hard to forget.

Before she had time to apologize, Lee was turning to grasp her hand. "I would have given you the medication," he admitted. "If the Cylons hadn't have showed up, the medication would have been on the first available Raptor."

Kara shook her head. "I should never have asked you in the first place. I put you in a hard position."

"No, you didn't. I wasn't even going to hesitate to give you those drugs if it was what you wanted. If Dee hadn't spotted the Cylons coming through the atmospheric field, I would have said yes."

"How is Dee?" Kara asked.

Lee winced as she pulled her hand away. They shouldn't be doing this same old dance anymore. Kara was married. "I haven't seen her in weeks, Kara. Remember? The whole torture thing?"

"I'm trying to forget," Kara muttered, looking down at her hands.

Lee knew she was kicking herself for saying something so impulsive, and that was the last thing he wanted. "I wouldn't really know how Dee's doing anyway. She was transferred back to Galactica before we started our return journey to New Caprica. I mean, I do hear her voice from time to time. She's still manning the comms on the Bucket, but I don't really have conversations with her anymore."

"Oh."

"We weren't really talking a lot before that either. Things were strained between us months before the Pegasus jumped away." Lee glanced down at his chest before smirking up at Kara. "I mean, come on. You kind of ruined me for other women."

Kara's response was so soft Lee almost didn't hear it. "The same could be said of you."

Lee tried to touch her again, but this time Kara pulled away before he had the chance. She got to her feet and started walking across the room. Lee thought she was storming out on him at first, but then she paused, made a small movement to turn back to face him, and then shifted back to the door before pausing again. Lee watched her hesitate for a few seconds and then got out of the bunk and walked to her side. "You haven't asked me about how the rest of the Fleet is doing."

"I'm scared," Kara admitted. She was still staring at the door, her back turned to him. Lee was used to it. She always turned away from him when the conversation got too intense. It was the only defense she had that he really couldn't breech without risking a right hook to the face.

Lee reached out to grasp her shoulders, ignoring the flare of pain from his hurt wrist. Kara stiffened at first but then relaxed back into his touch as he started kneading out the knots that had been there for far too long. "It's okay to be afraid, Kara. I know I was."

She smiled at him over her shoulder. "What did you have to be afraid of?"

Lee let go of her shoulders and slid his hands down around her waist. Kara leaned back into his touch. "I was afraid that I didn't have this."

"You'll always have this," she whispered.

Lee took a moment to enjoy the content feeling racing through his body. "As much as I love the fact that we've become reliable sometime during this whole mess, I was speaking more literally." Kara twisted her body to look up at him. "I was afraid that I would come to New Caprica, and it would have been too late to save you, Kara." Her face melted as she realized he had been talking about losing her to the Cylons. "So you see, I understand the fear of acknowledging that which you cannot control. That doesn't mean you still don't have to do it."

Lee waited a moment before locking his fingers with Kara and pulling their bodies apart. He led her back to the bunk, and they sat down, side by side. "Dad's been worried about you, Kara."

"I figured," she said, giving a small nod as her eyes stared off into space.

"He worked almost as hard as I did to get this rescue mission happening as soon as we could." Lee grinned to himself and nudged Kara's shoulder. "Neither one of us bothered to keep up the pretense that we were doing this for any reason but you. Gods, I don't think we even talked about it. It was like everyone knew, and then when the new pilots signed on, the old pilots just filled them in on the situation."

"But the Old Man's doing okay?"

Lee smiled. He knew Kara would be worried about his father. Some things never changed, no matter how big of a falling out one has. "He was doing well."

"What do you mean was? What happened? Did he get hurt? So help me, gods, if someone hurt him, I'll… I'll…"

Lee laughed loudly and clamped his hand over her mouth. "Kara. Calm down. The last I saw him, he was doing better than ever, but things have changed since then. I mean, his son mysteriously disappeared from the ship he was commanding, and the woman he moved hell and back to rescue wasn't a part of the people he saved. I'm just hoping Dad holds out long enough to talk with Cally."

Kara nodded. "He will. William Adama is nothing if not a rational man. He never forgets his duty."

"Except when it comes to his children," Lee added, reaching out to grab her hand. "He's always had a soft spot for you and I."

"Cally knows what she's doing. She'll give hell to anyone who gets her in the way of her talking with the Admiral. Don't forget her husband and the father of her children needs saving along with us."

"Yeah, I distinctly remember the way Cally wouldn't stop bugging me until I lightened up the Chief's workload when he was dealing with the other Sharon's sudden appearance."

"How is Helo?"

Kara's question came out of nowhere, and yet Lee found he had been expecting it. "You're going to laugh."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Helo's been my XO for a while. Even more, I think he's become my best friend in your absence."

"No fraking way!" Kara shouted, punching Lee on the shoulder. She winced when she realized what she had just done, but when Lee didn't double over in pain, the smile came back. "I don't believe it."

"You told me you'd be amused." Lee saw Kara's laughing face shift into one of confusion and realized where he had gone wrong. "Sorry. That was the Kara in my head."

"You and I are so fraked up," Kara said, shaking her head in disbelief.

"I have to agree. Helo told me right before the evacuation that he talked to you, too, but I think that was more metaphorical than literal."

"You were always crazier than most," Kara pointed out. "So, tell me. What made you and Helo friends? Last I checked, you hated him for loving Sharon."

"Things change when your world ends for a second time. I guess you can say I started seeing things from his perspective. Plus, he was one of the few people in the Fleet who understood things."

"Things?"

Lee looked down at his tattoo and then back up at Kara. "He understands how much I love you, Kara." Kara hesitated for a moment before reaching out to gently touch his cheek. Her thumb absentmindedly ran along the edge of his lower lip. "I do love you," Lee repeated.

"I know," Kara whispered. 'I've always known."

His heart was pounding out of control as he watched Kara's eyes flicker down to his mouth. Her tongue darted out to moisten her lips before it hit her what she was thinking about to doing. Before Lee could even register the shift, she was up off the bed and out of his grasp. "I have to get to work. I'll try to come see you again as soon as I can. Rest. Don't try to be all manly and push yourself to start helping out before you're ready. I'm not taking care of your broke ass again, Adama."

Lee watched her walk across the bunkroom and couldn't help but think it was almost like she was running away. Just like old times. "Kara."

The sound of her name made her pause at the door, and she took a deep breath before turning back to face him. The tone didn't leave much questions about what he wanted to say. They had been avoiding one specific topic since the moment she saved him, but it looked like she couldn't run from it anymore. Plus, coming inches away from kissing him probably shoved the knife a few inches deeper into his back. Old wounds can still hurt a whole fraking lot.

"I'm not strong enough right now, but you know I'm going to eventually ask."

Kara didn't have to ask what exactly he wanted to know. The answer was in the way she immediately needed to trace the mark on his arm the second they were safe. It was the way his eyes had always sparkled when he thought he was sneaking a glance her way, the way that now when she knew he was looking at her, his eyes still sparkled.

Kara gave him a small nod. "I owe you that much." After taking one last look at where he sat on the bunk, she stepped into the corridor. There was a thousand things on her plate, and this morning she felt she finally had a good reason to get them done.