"Hard to imagine we were young once" was the soft whisper that caused Kara to shut her locker door and turn to smile at Lee.


"Hard to imagine we were young once" was the soft whisper that caused Kara to shut her locker door and turn to smile at Lee.

"When did you get done with your meetings?" she asked.

"About two minutes ago. I figured I'd check and see if you were around before I go back to Pegasus."

"I'm always around," Kara said, motioning to the cane leaning up against the table. "Or did you forget I hurt my knee again?"

Lee shook his head. How could he forget about that? His shift in the CIC was just ending when he got word of the accident in Galactica's hangar bay. For two hours, he stayed glued to the comms to hear the updates as the deck crew worked to pry Kara's Viper open. Hoshi had to remind him five times that he could not fly over to Galactica and try to lend a hand, no matter how much he wanted to.

No one really knew what happened. She was landing her Viper from CAP, and something exploded in the tube. It could have been a part of her plane or one of the many mechanisms that worked the landing tube. The deck crew said they just heard a long bang followed by the most unnatural scraping noise ever. The Viper was completely shot by the time the crew got to her. Cottle said Kara was lucky to escape with only a tweaked knee. "I'm sorry I couldn't come sooner."

Kara rolled her eyes. "Come on, Lee. You have a lot of responsibilities over on the Beast. I didn't expect you to drop everything because I managed to have another accident."

"That wasn't just an accident," Lee said, taking a few steps in the bunkroom. He knew he should be getting back to Pegasus. It was his ship, and he really hated leaving it for long periods. Still, it had been a long time since he had a moment alone with Kara. "It took them two hours to cut your out of your ship, Kara. That's more than an accident. You could have died."

"Don't remind me." Kara limped over and took a seat on her bunk. She reached underneath her pillow and pulled out a stack of papers. She had a flight schedule to map out regardless of whether the Commander of Pegasus deemed her worthy of a visit, not that she didn't appreciate having him here. She had heard Lee was going to be on ship and hadn't dared to hope he would remember to stop by.

Lee watched her working for a few seconds and then realized he was intruding. Just because she was hurt didn't mean she no longer has a job to do, you idiot. "Well, I just wanted to be sure that you were all right. I should get back to my ship." He turned and was almost to the hatch before he heard her call his name.

"Could… could you stay with me a bit?"

Lee twisted back towards the bunk. The look of sheer longing on her face shook him to the core. She shouldn't be that lonely and miserable that she felt the need to beg such lousy company as Lee knew he would be. Still, if she wanted him to stay…

He leaned against the table. "What are you working on?"

"Flight schedules," Kara said. "Why don't you come over here and help? I'm trying to figure out how to work my two new pilots in the rotation."

Lee hesitated a moment before sitting down on the edge of her bunk. One of his meetings had included Doc Cottle, and the crotchety, old man had growled at Lee not to overtax Kara. How Cottle had known he was going to visit her was beyond Lee. He hadn't even known until his feet had walked here like they had a mind of their own.

Lee watched Kara while she looked over a few papers . His mind drifted back to the worn picture in her locker. "So, you still have that old picture from Academy up."

"It makes me happy," Kara said, still staring down at the schedule in her hands. "I like to remember how great things were back then. Simple, you know?"

Lee thought that over for a moment and realized he couldn't correct her, not when he almost wished he could go back to that time, too. "Things aren't that bad now."

"They're not simple," she pointed out.

"But they're not bad."

"You only say that because you're not laid up in a bed doing endless amounts of paperwork."

Lee shook his head. "No, I'm just chained to a desk in a job that I never asked for with no hopes of being allowed to do anything else."

Kara's face went white as realized what she just said. "Gods, I'm sorry, Lee. I didn't mean that."

"Don't worry about it," Lee said, shrugging off her comment. She had been tiptoeing around him ever since the shooting on Cloud Nine. They had talked about it, but for some reason, Lee couldn't get her to let the guilt go. It wasn't her fault he got shot regardless of if she was the shooter or not. Lee pushed himself into the bunk until his back hit the wall and let out a deep sigh. He was tired of having this conversation with Kara. She needed to forgive herself, but Lee had no idea how to help her do that.

After a few seconds, Lee unbuttoned his jacket and slid it off. He wasn't go to lie and say this didn't feel awkward. The two of them had barely talked since his promotion and her last minute request that they work through whatever issues they had with each other. She had asked if they were okay. He reassured her they were and then ran away the first chance he had. "I heard that Helo's been helping you with the physical therapy."

"Helo helps out every once in a while when he can. He's picked up some of the slack my absence caused so he doesn't really have a lot of time to worry about the poor cripple." Kara's hand paused in what she was writing, and she gave Lee a suspicious look. Kara's feet brushed against his legs as she sat up at attention. "Wait a second. Did your father force you to come here?"

"What? No, my father didn't send me here."

Kara shook her head as a wave of embarrassment came over her. "I'm sorry. I just… the Old Man doesn't like that I have to do most of my rehab by myself. He wants to hire some civilian to come on board and take care of me. I thought he might have sent you here to argue his case."

"A civilian trying to keep up with you? I don't think it's possible."

Kara let out a laugh. "That's exactly what I said. I know the Old Man is just trying to watch out for me, but it's not like I'm on my death bed. I hurt my knee. I seem to do that once a year these days."

"Good point." Kara's foot accidentally brushed his knee again as she shifted to get comfortable. Lee reached out and pulled both her feet into his lap. Sighing, he rested his hands on her legs as she dipped his head back against the wall and closed his eyes. "So tell me all the juicy gossip here on Galactica. My crew will be mad if I come home and don't have anything to offer them."

Kara bit her lip as she tried to think of what would be good enough to do the job. She had spent time over on Pegasus. She knew they were complete gossip hounds over there. "Rumor has it that Racetrack and Showboat have started dating."

Lee shook his head. "Not true. Showboat's been leading one of my squadrons so I would know."

"You don't know every little thing about your crew," Kara pointed out. "People like to keep some things secret. It's called having a private life."

"Not Showboat," Lee said with a chuckle. "Sometimes she's so upfront and in my face that I wonder if she's a relation of yours."

Kara leaned forward to smack Lee's arm. "Not funny."

"Seriously, though, I know for a fact that Showboat's been fraking Stinger for the past month or so, so I really doubt she started something with Racetrack."

"Frak me! A squad leader and the CAG? Isn't that illegal or something?"

"Restrictions have gotten lax," Lee said, shrugging his shoulders.

"Can I tell people about that? Hot Dog's been bugging me for some good gossip this whole week, and since I'm laid up in my bed, I can't avoid him."

"Sure. I doubt Showboat will care."

Kara smiled and picked up her pen again. "You have no idea how excited that makes me. Once I tell Hot Dog, I think I might actually get a full two hours peace and quiet."

"Glad to be of service."

Lee started rubbing the bridge of her foot, and the room filled up with silence. He had forgotten how much he liked to watch her work. These rare moment of peace were few and far between.

"You can tell them I'm fraking Gaeta or Helo or something."

He was only half listening when Kara's suggestion yanked him back into reality. "You're fraking Gaeta?"

"No," Kara laughed. "I just figured you needed good gossip and I was offering myself as a willing subject. The whole Fleet already thinks I'm fraking most of the pilots and crew on this ship. You might as well use it to your advantage."

Lee rolled his eyes and reached out to grab the papers out of her hands. "Let me see those. Maybe I can help." The problem popped out at him immediately. "Kara, this schedule's done."

"Yeah, so?"

"So you asked me to stay and help you finish it?"

"I know," she admitted. "I just… I don't know. I'm bored."

"With all that paperwork I'm sure Colonel Tigh is giving you?"

"Bastard keeps passing it all off on the invalid," Kara growled. After a moment, the anger subsided and she returned to giving Lee that sad look. "Hurting my knee is different than the first time. I just sit in this damn bed all day and maybe if I'm lucky Helo or the Old Man shows up to tell me what I'm missing. I get up, take a rather painful walk to the shower, do paperwork, eat lunch, more paperwork, therapy, dinner, try to work on selecting a new class of nuggets, and then I go to bed. Day after day after day, it's the same. I just wanted you to stay and distract me from how crappy my life's become."

Lee felt his heart break just a little. "I should have come sooner."

"I'm just glad you're here at all," she admitted. "I miss having you here."

"Why don't you relax for a bit, Kara?"

"I can't. I have to go down to sickbay and get my therapy. Not that I want to hobble all the way down there but Cottle says I have to keep the muscles active if I want to put myself in a cockpit anytime soon."

"What exactly do they do for your knee to keep it active?"

"Oh, it's stupid. They just massage it for about half of an hour and give me a lecture that I'm pushing myself too hard."

"I don't know about the lecture, but I could probably do the other part," Lee offered.

Kara felt her face blush and wished her mind didn't always go down an inappropriate road every time Lee started being nice to her. "You don't have to."

"I want to," Lee insisted. "Besides you said you wanted a change in routine, and this way you and I can talk a little more. You can tell me how my dad is really doing."

Lee didn't wait for an answer. He just shifted to her side of the bunk and started rolling up the leg of her sweatpants. His fingers unhooked the brace around the knee, and he tried to keep from flinching at the sight of the large purple bruises on the normally flawless skin. "Tell me if this hurts."

Kara agreed and let her head rest on her pillow as Lee's hands gently kneaded the tight muscles in her knee. She was surprised when there really wasn't that much pain. It always hurt like a bitch when the nurses did this. "That feels nice," she whispered. Her eyes slid shut as the smile played on her lips. "You missed your calling, Lee."

Kara didn't last much longer than that. She had been battling the pressures of finding her place again now that her knee was hurt, and there had been barely a moment to relax. She was constantly trying to prove that a hurt knee couldn't holding her back. It was exhausting. The sleep was a welcome treat.

Lee dutifully finished the full half hour of therapy even though Kara had been sleeping for over half of it. As much as she denied it, even the littlest things were tiring her out these days. Lee had been receiving daily updates from both Helo and his father so he should know. That was one of the reasons he arranged for his Raptor to pick him up late. He wanted a chance to see firsthand how bad off Kara was this time.

He pulled the blankets up around her body and leaned in to give her forehead a soft kiss. "Rest, Kara. I'll see what I can do about your problem."

Lee straightened up and, grabbing his jacket off the floor, made his way out into the corridor. He only had to wait a few seconds before seeing someone familiar. "Duck, come here a second."

"What do you need, Commander, sir?"

"I want you to tell Cottle that he doesn't have to worry about having one of the nurses give Kara her daily massage. I'm going to handle that from now on."

Duck's jaw draw open for a brief second before he caught himself. "Yes, sir."

Lee waited until the Viper pilot was out of sight before heading down to the hangar bay. He shouldn't have a problem ducking off the Pegasus for an hour or two during his off-shift every day. It just meant creating a regular fixed schedule between himself and the CIC staff. Even then, after a few weeks, Kara could start coming to him. After all, the Pegasus had paperwork that needed to be done, too.

He was about to board the Raptor back to his ship when his eyes caught on a few of the deckhands. They were trying to weld together a handful of metal into what looked like a half-rate patch for a Viper nose. Lee was always astonished at how inventive the specialist could be. If something broke and there wasn't a part to replace it, they simply built a new one from scratch.

"Hold off a second," Lee said to the pilot taking him back to Pegasus as a thought suddenly hit him.

The Chief was at his side within seconds. "Is something wrong, sir?"

"Nothing with the ship," Lee assure Tyrol. "Is it possible for you to start designing a new Blackbird, Chief? Improve upon the old one and iron out the mistakes we made?"

"Is there a particular reason why you want this done right now?"

"Yeah, there is." Lee paused, not sure if he wanted to get in to why Kara needed a pet project. "I think it's a good idea for the Fleet to have a stealth ship in their possession. I'll get you approval from the Old Man to divert whatever personnel you need to."

"I'd be happy to work on it, sir."

"Good. I just ask one favor."

"What's that?"

"Keep Kara in the loop as much as you can. She flew the Blackbird the first time so she should have a lot to contribute."

"Yes, sir," Tyrol said, snapping off a salute.

Lee returned the gesture. "Don't let Kara know I'm the one that organized this. In case you never noticed, she tends to go against whatever I say."

"I noticed, Commander," Tyrol said, trying to hold back a laugh. "And I just want to say it's a good idea. I've seen Kara a few times since the accident, and she seems to be going a little stir crazy."

"Glad you approve." Lee clapped the deck chief on the back as he pushed past him to board the Raptor again.

The ride back to Pegasus was quiet, and Lee decided it was a good thing that he liked the silence. He was going to be doing this a lot now that he volunteered to do Kara's physical therapy. He wondered how long he could keep his visits to Galactica a secret. He really didn't want to see Dee's reaction when she found out he had rearranged his schedule for Kara on the drop of a dime when he couldn't even get an off-shift to go down to Cloud Nine with her.

Lee shook his head. Anyone who knew him knew that he had his priorities, and it took a lot for them to change. Kara had always been a driving force in his life. He couldn't change that even if he tried. In fact, he had tried. It didn't work. She always came back.

Lee's thoughts returned to that worn photo shut up inside Kara's locker. Kara had been both his and Zak's world back then. They did almost everything together from going to bars to coming up with a way to surprise Caroline Adama on her birthday. They had been a family.

Lee had screwed up so many times when it came to his family. He lost his brother and then Gianne because he was too stupid to slow down and realize what he had. He was too intent on his own life that he didn't see the pain of others. Lee wasn't not going to let the same thing happen to Kara.

Starting now, things were going to change.