Author's note: I took liberties with the coma thing. You can sue me, but that's about it… :OP
oooooOOOOOOOOooooo
The silence grew between them as her words sunk in, and Lee wondered how four little words could hurt so much even if he knew they were a lie - I don't love you.
oooooOOOOOOOOooooo
Kara could feel hands gripping her body, yanking her forward. She was thrashing out, but whatever it was held her so tight she couldn't breathe. She couldn't stop it. A loud, vibrant ache echoed through her body, and Kara felt herself slam forward. Everything went white, and slowly her eyes opened.
The light of the room was dim, a blanket of warmth on her skin. Kara reached her hands out and met cold smooth material. It was soft to the touch. She turned her head, ignoring the slow ache of her muscles. She was in a bed. No, scratch that. She was in a really nice bed.
Her eyes burned against the harshness of the air. There was a sharp pain in her arm when she reached to brush the stinging tears away. Kara forced herself to focus, and through the watery pain, she saw she had pulled at the tubes embedded in her wrist and hand.
Her body was shaking, and her mind was complete chaos. Somewhere deep inside her, the survivor's instinct she had prided herself on for so long kicked in. Her hand tightened over the tubes and pulled. The pain coursed through her body, making her jaw draw open and her eyes slam shut, but she pushed it to the side.
Her feet touched the floor slowly. It was cold yet familiar. Wherever she was, it was in the air. She bit down on her lip until the pain coming from her hand calmed.
Her knees buckled the second she tried to stand up, and she found her hands desperately clutching the bed to keep herself off the floor. The muscles in her thighs and calves were screaming, and she had no clue why. She had no memory of where she was, what she was doing here, and why it hurt so much.
The red that filled her visions, mingling with the white, did fade. The pain in her legs did not. She had spent most of her childhood shoving pain away, though. That much she knew how to do and so she pushed away from the bed.
Her legs screamed in agony, but each step was easier than the last.
The hatchway to the next room stood open in front of her, and she could see light filtering through. The air warmed slightly against her skin as she walked through the small opening into the other room. Her eyes drifted immediately to the man sitting behind the desk, and she felt her knees give out once again.
Lee's eyes went wide the second he saw her, and he was on his feet and at her side before she could clear her head of the pain. Her hands clutched at him almost on instinct. Her eyes darted around the room as she tried to understand what she was seeing.
This place… she knew this place. This was all wrong. Lee shouldn't be here. She shouldn't be here.
And yet she was safe. She knew she was safe.
"What's happening?" Kara choked out, the words sticking in her raw throat. Her voice was low and harsh. It hurt to even breathe.
"You need to get back to bed," Lee whispered, already leading her back the way she came.
Kara could feel the pain ease away as Lee took most of the burden off her legs. She still had no clue why it hurt so much to move. Lee paused at the foot of the bed, but Kara took one look at the machines and shook her head.
"Come on, Kara. You have to lay down." He watched her eyes frantically dart over the machines next to the bed to the tubing to the bed itself, and he could feel the fear growing inside of her somewhere. "I'll sit with you. How about that?"
Kara was surprised to feel a small relief at his words. She had no clue where it came from, but somehow she knew if Lee sat down with her, she would be okay. Tightening her hands around his shoulder, she let him lower her onto the mattress. He slid onto the bed next to her and leaned against the wall.
The silence filled the room immediately, and for the first time, Kara tried to remember what had put her here. If Lee was watching over her, then she knew that this was a voluntary thing. Something had happened to put her under his watch, but for the life of her, she couldn't remember. She could feel herself struggling with everything she had yet her mind remained a complete wash of white nothingness floating in the inconsequential details. She was scared. "Please tell me what's going on," she pleaded softly. Her hand came out to grasp Lee's. She was surprised to feel his hand trembling to match hers.
"You had a bad landing, Kara. You were out on CAP with Kat as your wingman, and you two encountered Scar." Lee felt her tense up immediately and did his best to ignore the ache that started in his heart, knowing this was just the beginning. "From what the alert fighters said, it was a sight to be seen. You went toe to toe with that fraking Raider, and then when that wasn't enough, you set him up and Kat took him down. It was probably the best flying most of these pilots have ever born witness to."
Lee sighed and shifted to slid his fingers between Kara's. He wanted so badly to just pull her into his arms and hold her as tight as he could, but that would hurt her too much. She was so damn fragile. "Then something went wrong in your landing. We still have no idea what that was, but your Viper went into a slide and you ended up flipped upside down and pinned to the wall of the launch tube. It took them an hour to cut you out."
"I was hurt?" Kara said, even though the answer was written all over Lee's face
"You were unconscious. The second you got down to sickbay, Cottle told us it didn't look good. You were so pale, Kara. I…" The words caught in his throat, and Lee lowered his head to try to gain some composure. His eyes fell to the caked blood on her hand. "I need to bandage that up."
Kara felt his hand slid away, and he started towards what she assumed was the bathroom for these quarters. The panic hit her the second he left the bed. "Lee?"
His voice carried from the bathroom. "Cottle took you through so many surgeries that we all lost count. There was bleeding in your brain and in your abdomen. It took him hours just to stabilize you enough to assess the damage."
Kara watched Lee as he made his way back to the bed, a basin of water and bandages in his hand. Her body was in pain, but she didn't feel like she had been through a million operations. Plus, bleeding in the brain and abdomen didn't explain why her legs were so damn weak. "It doesn't make sense. I don't feel like any of that happened."
The bed dipped down to accommodate Lee's weight as he sat next to her again. She held her arm out to him, and he started washing off the blood. "You wouldn't feel like that because it happened a long time ago." His hands stopped, and his head lifted to look her in the eye. "You were in a coma for six months, Kara."
Her reaction was instantaneous. She snatched her hand away from him and felt the wounds pull again. She didn't have to look down to know she was bleeding. "No, that's not possible."
"Kara."
"No, Lee. I'm not stupid. If I was in a coma, I wouldn't be able to walk. I would be stuck in the fraking sickbay, hooked up to a million machines. Cottle would be watching over me. I wouldn't be waking up in some fraking office that I know isn't where I'm supposed to be."
Lee stayed silent as she lashed out at him in confusion. The only real success he had ever had in talking with Kara was simply to let her fume and wait patiently for her to calm down. His mind drifted back to a conversation he had had with Cottle everyday for the past few months. The Doc said that when Kara woke up, she would need to be looked over completely, but he assured Lee that there was no rush. Just because she woke up didn't mean that her body was going to go haywire. Plus, they both knew Kara would have a million questions. It would be easier to make her lay down and try to give her the answers she needed rather than force her to wait to find out that she had lost such a large chunk of her life.
Content with his decision not to immediately call someone to tell them to get Cottle, Lee reached for her arm again. She didn't jump away from his touch which he took as a sign that she was calm again. They sat in silence as he washed off the newly shed blood and wrapped the gauze around the torn skin. Kara felt the pain dull slowly against the gentle touch of his fingers. "Do you want me to continue?" he asked.
Kara nodded slowly. She was okay now.
"Under normal circumstances, you wouldn't be where you are, but circumstances have never really been that way, have they?" Lee waited for her to nod again before continuing. "For one hundred, eighty-seven days, there was no change. You were stable but not making any forward progress. I think it took all of Cottle's courage to tell my father and I that it was time to decide what to do with you. I can't begin to describe how completely floored I was when the Doc turned to me and asked for a decision. I don't think I fully understood what was happening until he held out your med records for me to look at." Lee tipped Kara's chin up to look at him. "Why did you put me in charge of making life decisions for you?"
Kara felt relieved when the memory of that day popped right to the top of her head. It looked like her memory wasn't completely shot. It was just full of a few well-placed holes. "A few things clicked into place after I came back from Caprica. Two things mainly. One, the Old Man welcomed me home with open arms even after I betrayed his trust, and two, you told me about what you did to Colonel Tigh. I knew in that moment that you were more likely to make the tough decision. You would do what was right by me."
Lee shook his head. "I kept you around, Kara. Against everyone's recommendations… orders… whatever you want to call them, I wouldn't let you go. You made the wrong choice."
"I don't think so," Kara said. The calmness washing over her took her by surprise. Something was still very wrong about this picture, but she felt herself ignoring it for just a few seconds. "Look at me, Lee. I'm not dead. I'm not in a coma. Don't you get it? I'm alive because you wouldn't let me go."
Lee nodded. "Somehow I knew all those months of fighting to keep you around were worth it. The day I felt your hand move in mine, I thought it was a dream. I had been willing you to come back to me for so long."
"And so here we are."
Lee shook his head. "Not quite. The day you started waking up was months ago. Since then, it's been a slow process of rehabilitation. Cottle kept telling me that your slow progress was a good thing because it meant you weren't rushing the healing. I didn't believe him. We worked hard to keep your muscles active when you were in a coma, but when you woke up, I demanded that you be pushed even harder. Cottle told me that I was being stupid, but I didn't listen. I knew you wouldn't want to wake up to find that you could barely move without it hurting."
"Have I really been awake for months? Because I can't remember any of it."
"You have been awake for awhile now in a sense," Lee admitted. "Usually it would only be a few seconds or a few minutes. Last week, I had you for almost half of an hour, but you were so out of it that I don't think any of my words actually got through to you."
"I'm awake now, though."
"Yeah, you are," Lee said.
Kara realized that he was smiling for the first time. Her eyes drifted over the lines of his face and then down his body. He hadn't changed that much. She took in her surroundings again and found they, too, were familiar. "Where are we?"
"The quarters of the XO," Lee said without much thought.
Kara's eyes went wide, and Lee realized his mistake even before she said the words. "You had me moved to Tigh's quarters?"
"No, Kara, calm down. These are my quarters now. Saul bottomed out around the time we found New Caprica."
Kara found it odd that Lee would use Tigh's first name so casually, but she shoved that question to the side. Instead she focused on the other confusing part of his last statement. "New Caprica?"
"We found a planet that could sustain human life by mistake about seven months ago. It's surrounded by some sort of nebula which interferes with any sort of dradis reading. That's what's been hiding us from the Cylons. President Baltar thought this intel on the nebula was all the assurance he needed and ordered the whole Fleet to stand down. We've been slowly populating the planet ever since."
"President Baltar?"
Lee couldn't hide the smile that came to his face. "You've missed a lot, Kara."
"So, let me get this right. By some miracle of the gods, the Fleet just stumbled onto this planet?" Kara watched Lee tense, and even though she was in quite a bit of pain still, the significance wasn't lost on her. He was hiding something.
Lee knew he should tell her the rest of the story. She had a right to know where Racetrack had been heading when her Raptor mis-jumped and ended up near New Caprica. He just didn't want to tell her right now. He had waited forever for this moment. He wanted to draw it out as long as he could.
The silence hung between them, and for some reason, Kara felt desperate to keep this conversation going. It was almost like if she stopped talking with Lee, she knew everything was going to change. The feeling of protection would fade away. "So somehow after finding this miracle planet, you got appointed XO?"
"Demoted," Lee corrected.
"Okay, you're not making any sense."
"A month into your coma, my father appointed me Commander of the Pegasus. It seemed I was the only officer he thought could handle the job."
"And could you?"
"Yeah. The Old Man was right. For some reason, the people listened to me."
"So why are you here now?"
Lee looked like he was about to answer and then stopped. "Are you sure you're up for all this, Kara?"
"I think I've rested enough to last me a lifetime if you're telling me the truth."
Lee nodded. Kara was stubborn. She wasn't going to fall asleep even though he knew her body was probably screaming for the rest. He had no fraking clue where she found the strength to walk all the way to his office on her own. "You and I would be on Pegasus right now if there hadn't been an accident."
"What kind of accident?"
"The kind that takes a whole chunk out of the Fleet," Lee said bluntly. He wasn't about to start sugar coating things now. "There was a Cylon living on Cloud Nine, and somehow they got a hold of a nuclear warhead. I don't know why they waited for us to find New Caprica to use it, but we had barely begun to settle the planet when it detonated. Pegasus was nearby refueling some of the smaller ships, and the blast burned her through from one end to the other."
"You weren't on the ship."
Lee shook his head. "No, I was visiting my father at the time to go over some of the changes that were happening because of the planet settlement."
"Thank the gods for that," Kara whispered. As soon as the words left her lips, she saw Lee's expression change to one of confusion. She could feel herself desperately searching for some reason why he would be surprised to find she liked the idea of him staying alive, but once again her memory was failing. She pushed whatever that was to the side and chose to focus back on where their conversation started. "So now you're the XO of Galactica?"
"We're running with half the crew that you remember, but I'm still needed," Lee confirmed. Still keeping his eyes locked with hers, he got to his feet. "Now I think you need to be resting because in a few minutes, I'll have a med team down here giving you a full work-up."
Kara groaned. "Can't I go back to the whole coma thing instead?"
"Not on you life," Lee said, poking her un-injured arm.
Kara growled and was happy to hear him laugh as he cleaned up the basin and extra bandages from before. She watched him for a few moments before there was a small tingling at the back of her mind. Shutting her eyes, she focused on it and a few memories flashed through her mind. A conversation with Lee over a bottle of ambrosia. Helo sparring with her in the gym. An overheard conversation in the mess.
For some reason, the memory of listening to Racetrack and Hawkeye talk over their lunch was what stuck in her head. They were joking about Dee's new fascination for the CAG. Kara realized with a start that the pilots had been talking about Lee. He was CAG back then. She could remember seeing something happen between the petty officer and her superior officer, but she found it hard to believe that Lee would be selfish enough to take another man's girlfriend.
Lee was about to disappear into the bathroom when Kara called out to him. "How's Dee doing?" He spun around immediately to look at her, and Kara saw something flash across his eyes. Her heart froze as she realized Racetrack and Hawkeye had been right. There was something there. "I don't know why I asked that," she blurted out, backtracking as quickly as she could. "I just… I remembered something important I think, but I don't know what that is."
Lee set down the things in his hands and turned to look at her. "Cottle said you would have a fuzzy memory for at least the next few weeks."
"So you're saying I was right to ask you about Dee?"
Lee nodded. "There was an attraction between Dee and I that I guess started those few weeks before your accident. You must have picked up on it. It probably wouldn't have amounted to anything. I was pretty screwed up back then, and I think I knew better than to try to pull someone down with me."
"But?" Kara said, sensing there was more to this story.
"But then there was a hostage situation on Cloud Nine. I was there on a mandatory downtime order so the Old Man sent me in to diffuse the situation. I didn't get there quick enough, and Billy was killed."
"Bil… Billy?" Kara's voice cracked. Her mind flashed to the memory of the young presidential aide. He couldn't be dead.
"He was trying to protect Dee. She was devastated by his sacrifice, and I helped her pick up the pieces. Something happened between us. I knew that it shouldn't, that she was just vulnerable, but I couldn't stop it."
Kara nodded her understanding. She knew a few things about losing control. The room filled with silence as she wondered if she wanted to hear what the rest of this story was. She had a bad feeling from the way Lee was talking about this that she had managed to frak things up even while in a coma. He had that slight hesitance in his voice that only showed up when he was trying to protect her from herself.
"We got serious enough that when the Pegasus was destroyed, she asked if I wanted to settle down on the planet with her and try to make a new start. I thought about it, but I couldn't leave things hanging in limbo like that. There was still so much to do. So I took the XO position when the Old Man offered it to me." Kara gave him a small nod of understanding, and Lee turned away to tend to the things he had thrown onto the counter a few minutes earlier.
"One more question." Kara waited until he was facing her before she gestured to the machines. "How does Dee feel about this little arrangement?"
"She didn't have a say in it."
"That's awfully harsh."
"By the time I got Cottle to agree to move you out of sickbay, she didn't have a say in a lot of the things I did." Lee shrugged. "You can't have a girlfriend when you already have a woman sleeping in your bed." Kara went to ask him another question, but he shook his head. "You need to rest. You can ask more questions when Cottle's cleared you."
"Cleared me for what?"
"Cleared you to be alive," Lee teased before dropping out of sight.
Kara felt a smile come to her face and let her eyes slid shut. She didn't feel like she was falling anymore.
oooooOOOOOOOOooooo
A bang woke her up, and she saw Lee standing across from the bed holding his foot. He was doing his best to cry out in pain without making a sound, and it made her smile. The foggy haze of sleep was still in control of her mind even as the words fell from her lips. "Why did you bring me here, Lee?"
Lee looked up at her, and he was so startled he didn't think to sensor his answer. "Because I love you, Kara, and I wanted to watch over you."
Kara felt a sort of happiness hitting her somewhere deep inside at the same time her mind seemed to freeze. She tried to concentrate and clear her head of all the excess noise. This was important. Whatever this moment was, whatever it meant, it was important. She felt sleep tugging her back down and did her best to fight it as she suddenly remembered how she had left things with Lee. Before her accident, they had been in the bunkroom, and she had been this close to frakking up everything they had when he asked her to slow down. He had wanted more from her than she could give. The words tumbled out as the memory played over and over in her head. "I don't love you."
Kara looked up to see his face steel and knew that no matter how much time had passed, some things were still the same.
The silence grew between them as her words sunk in, and Lee wondered how four little words could hurt so much even if he knew they were a lie - I don't love you.
"Cottle's going to be here in a few minutes. I'll come back when he's done."
Kara nodded, not really sure what else to do. The door clicked shut behind Lee, and she was left staring into the empty space where he had been.
Doc Cottle showed up a little while later just like Lee said, and he found Kara still staring off into space. He fought back the urge to ask how long she and Lee had made it before trouncing on each other's emotions again. There was probably a bunch of pilots who had a pool going about that sort of thing. He could brib a few of them into getting their annual physicals with the information of when the two famous Fleet frak-ups started their streak of miscommunication again.
Kara had felt relieved to be around Cottle. The crotchety old man treated her the exact same as before the accident, and she was grateful. She knew that in the coming days, she would have to tell a lot of people that contrary to what they might believe she was not breakable. She had been in a coma, and now she wasn't. They were going to have to get used to the idea.
Cottle took some blood and told her he would be back the next morning with official confirmation of what they already knew. She was going to be just fine. Her body had shut down and healed itself. He suggested that she take it easy, though. The Commander… it took Kara a moment to realize he was talking about Lee… had made sure her physical therapy was top notch while she was out of commission, and therefore it should be an easy recovery if she just didn't push it.
She wasn't surprised when Lee stepped back into his quarters a few minutes after Cottle left. He was always good for his promises. Kara felt the urge to apologize for blurting out she didn't love him. She wanted to explain that she hadn't thought it out before saying them, that she was half wrapped up in memories now that she was awake, and she had no clue which end was up, but Lee cut her off.
"There's something I haven't told you, Kara." Lee looked like he was going to come sit beside her on the bed but stopped himself. "Racetrack was the one who found New Caprica, and she did it by accident. She was in the middle of a mission when her Raptor jumped to the wrong coordinates."
"Stop being melodramatic, Lee," Kara said, rolling her eyes.
"I'm not."
It wasn't the dark serious tone of his voice that made her stop teasing. She had heard that tone a million times, and never once had it phased her. No, it was the sadness laced underneath that tone which made Kara brace herself for whatever was to come next.
"Racetrack was on the mission headed back to Caprica."
Kara's eyes went wide as she suddenly realized why Lee was so sad. "Caprica?"
"Sam's alive, Kara. Helo lead a team of Raptors onto the planet, and they saved him and a handful of his resistance members. They're…" Lee shook his head. This wasn't about the resistance. This was about Anders. "He's down on New Caprica. He takes a Raptor up her at least once a week to visit you. There were a few times that you woke up when he was here, but you were so out of it no one expected you to remember."
"Sam?" It was the only word she could manage to get out right now.
"Yeah, Kara. Sam." Lee sighed. "I'll put in a call down to the planet and let him know that you want to see him."
Kara nodded and let her eyes drift away from Lee's face. She couldn't take seeing him this sad, not when she knew she was the cause. Her mind was screaming a million things at her, and she didn't hear him leave until the hatch clicked shut.
It felt like only seconds later that the hatch was opening back up. Kara shifted to watch Sam take a few steps into the room and stop dead in tracks. "Hi," Kara said, a shy smile on her lips.
"He told me but I didn't believe him," Sam stuttered.
"Well, believe."
"Cottle said you weren't going to wake up."
"That old bastard is too grumpy for optimism," Kara joked. The air fell silent around them, and she could feel an awkwardness creeping in along with reality. This was a man she had only known for ten days, and those ten days were well over a year earlier. "Are you just going to stand there like an idiot or what?"
Sam smiled, and Kara could tell that had been the right thing to say. For a second, she thought he was expecting her to say she loved him or she missed him or she was so glad he was here. She was glad he was here, though. She had made a promise to him.
Kara laid her hands carefully in her lap as Anders took a seat on the bed. "Cottle says that I'm going to be just fine. He says that with time and a whole lot of patience he knows I don't have, I can get back in the air."
"Is that what you want?"
"I don't think there are other options," Kara decided.
"You can come down to the New Caprica. A lot of the people you served with have made their way down there, and they seem to be content. There's a lot of work needing to be done for the settlement movement. The former President has even been talking about setting up a school for the children. I'm sure she would love your help."
"And what about you?"
"I would love to have you down there with me, Kara. It would be like a dream."
Kara smirked. "You didn't think I was going to wake up."
"I lost hope," Anders admitted.
"But you still came to see me every week. I know it couldn't have been easy."
"I had help."
Kara's eyebrows shot up in surprise. "Who?"
"Commander Adama."
Again, it took her a moment to realize who Anders was talking about. "Lee?"
"Yeah, Lee. He did a lot of things for me that he didn't have to, Kara. He helped me find a place in the Fleet when I came back from Caprica. He kept me updated to what was happening with you in those first few weeks when only top military personnel were allowed to see you. Then, when Cottle decided you were stable, he sent a Raptor down to the planet to get me as often as I asked him to. Most times when I came to visit you in the sickbay, he was already there, holding your hand. He would get up and let me have as much time with you as I wanted."
Kara knew what Anders was trying to tell her. In his own way, he was trying to let her know that he still cared for her even though the time they had had was so short and so long ago. He was trying to tell her that he wanted to give them a try. But somehow the only thing she focused on out of his whole speech was the fact that Lee had been holding her hand in sickbay so often. Through the fallout of losing the Pegasus and going through the end of whatever he had had with Dee, he had found time to be by her side.
"Kara, I just want you to think about it."
Kara's eyes darted up to meet Sam's, and she realized she hadn't been listening. She couldn't tell him that. "I… will."
"Good. Galen Tyrol and his wife would love to have your help with the Union since it is so new, and I know that the boys from the pyramid team would love to go a few rounds with you. Of course, that wouldn't be until you're feeling better, but the way these people talk about you that won't be that far off."
Kara felt a huge sense of relief as she realized Sam had been asking her to move down to New Caprica again. She would have felt stupid if she just told him she would consider marrying him or something equally ridiculous.
"Gods, Kara. I really didn't think you'd pull it off that day you said you'd come back. Even when Helo showed up, I still didn't believe."
"A girl keeps her promises even if she's in a coma."
"That's something to be admired," Anders said, giving her a wink.
Kara felt her whole body tense as she watched his eyes drift to her lips. He looked like he was two steps away from kissing her. Didn't he know she was way too fragile to be doing anything like that? A little tiny voice in the back of her head pointed out that Cottle said she could pretty much do anything right now in moderation.
Sam was still staring at her with the look in his eyes as Kara realized the problem wasn't in him wanting to kiss her. The problem was all her because, after not seeing him for so long, shouldn't she want him to want to kiss her?
Kara let herself look for him for the first time since he stepped in Lee's quarters. He looked good, healthy. At the very least, he had made it through his days on Cylon-occupied Caprica mostly intact. Memories of the days they had spent together flashed through Kara's head, and she remembered how much it had meant to her to have him in her life at that particular moment. She had been hurting pretty bad back then.
She wasn't stupid, though. Anders had helped fixed the pain inside her, but it hadn't all been his doing. When she first met him, she had still been on the high of having discovered Karl was alive. Helo had been her closet friend during her two years on Galactica along with Boomer. It was amazing to see that he had found a way to stay alive.
She felt like her heart was breaking when she had to leave Anders behind. He had represented a whole new start for her, and that was something she had waited a long time to get. Coming home to the Old Man and Lee killed the pain of leaving that second chance behind. When they both welcomed her with open arms and surprisingly open hearts, the ache that had been killing her weeks earlier melted away.
Sure, she was faltering in the weeks before her accident. The memory of the promise she had made haunted her day and night. She couldn't get away from the look on Anders' face when she left him. He believed she would come back.
"Can I ask you a question, Kara?"
Kara snapped away from her thoughts and realized Anders had been staring at her for probably the whole time she was thinking. "Go ahead," she said after a moment's hesitance.
"Who is Lee to you? I mean, I know he was your superior officer, and he's obviously your friend considering everything he's done for you so far, but to you specifically, who is he?"
"He's…" Kara's voice faded as she realized she really didn't know what to say. Sam had already hit on the two easy answers. Lee was her boss, and he was her friend. Still, that didn't explain why she wasn't all the shocked to find he had taken care of her for well over eight months.
"He loves you," Anders whispered. "Anyone could see that."
Kara nodded. Lee had told her out right in his own way that he loved her.
"But do you honestly realize how much, Kara?"
His question took her by surprise. Two minutes ago, he looked like he couldn't fight back the urge to kiss her, and now he was trying to get her to realize that Lee loved her. "I don't understand why you doing this, Sam."
Sam seemed to ignore her and trudged forward on the path to whatever point he was aiming to make. "Joining this Fleet without you around has been rather interesting, Kara. I think I've figured out a lot of things I might never have understood if things were different."
"If I was awake, you mean."
"Yeah," Anders said, with a nod, "that's exactly what I mean. All the pilots who've settled on New Caprica talk about is the good old days when Apollo and Starbuck were king and queen of the sky. If I didn't actually know you two, I'd think you were some kind of mythical demi-gods or something."
"We were pretty good," Kara said, the corners of her mouth turning up in a smile as memories of flying with Lee surfaced.
"There was also a lot of gossip on whether or not the good Commander was in love with you. After you were in the coma for a few months, most people had their answer. He only left your side when he had to. Back when Pegasus was around, he came over here on every off-shift he had, and then when Pegasus was gone and he was on the same ship as you, he spent every moment he wasn't in the CIC or meetings by your bedside." Anders paused. "You already know this, don't you?"
Kara nodded. She had expected that from Lee. He was the kind of person who would worry about you to the point of killing himself. She had seen it time and again back when Zak was still alive. Lee was constantly calling her and asking how his little brother was faring in flight classes. She was surprised that after he heard about the accident that claimed his little brother, he never accused her of underplaying how bad Zak was doing.
"Then you know about the physical therapy."
"I know that I owe thank yous to a lot of people for giving me the chance to move around as soon as I woke up."
"Not really."
"You don't think I need to show my gratitude?"
Anders shook his head. "I don't think you have to track down a lot of people. Frak, Kara. I thought you said you knew everything already."
"I thought I did. Lee said that I'm this well off because he told Cottle to push up the time table on my physical therapy."
"He did do that," Anders agreed. "Cottle doubled the frequency of the massages you were getting to keep your muscles active, and he even allowed the pressure to be increased when your muscles started strengthening."
"So why shouldn't I thank the people who did all that?" Kara asked.
"Because it wasn't people, Kara. It was person. From practically day one, it's been Lee giving you your physical therapy. That's why Cottle was so willing to let the Commander move you into his quarters when things settled down, and that's why Lee didn't alert the whole Fleet that you were awake until you were back in bed. He knew how to handle you waking up because he's had to handle you sleeping for month upon month."
"He didn't tell me that," Kara whispered.
"I had a feeling." Anders reached out to grasp her hand for a moment before getting to his feet. "I'm a good guy, Kara. If I win your heart, I want it to be because that's what you want. I don't want it to be because you didn't know the rest of the story." Anders leaned in and brushed a kiss across the top of her head. "Get some sleep. I'll be back to see you as soon as I can."
As Kara watched Anders walk out the hatch, she remembered a little bit about what had attracted her to him in the first place. He was right to say he was a good guy, but she wasn't sure if that was what she needed. Everything was a jumble, and it didn't feel like things were going to stop spinning anytime soon.
oooooOOOOOOOOooooo
Kara woke up to a sharp pain on her right side. Pushing her eyes open, she realized she had been sleeping on her bandaged arm. She tried to be careful as she shifted her weight off the bad arm, and it was because she was moving so slowly that she didn't wake up the man sleeping in the chair next to the bed. "Lee?" she whispered. Her words stirred the man almost immediately and she realized that this wasn't Lee. He was too tall.
"Sleeping beauty awakens," Helo said, smiling as he rubbed his eyes.
"I'd say," Kara replied with a smirk. "What the frak are you doing here, Karl?"
"You didn't expect me?"
"I thought that Cottle would be restricting my visitors until I was more used to being out of this fraking coma."
"Ah. I missed that colorful language." Helo sighed and got to his feet. "I should let the Commander know that you're awake. He's in the middle of a CIC shift that he couldn't get out of."
"No, don't bother, Lee. Me waking up isn't a life-altering event."
Helo rolled his eyes. "Maybe not to you, Kara, but to a lot of people, it is."
Kara was left to puzzle over what exactly that meant as Helo walked to the other side of the bed. He picked up the receiver and requested a line to the CIC. Kara watched him have a very short conversation presumable with Lee and was about to ask him why he was here again when he held up his hand to stop her. "One more call," he insisted.
Kara listened as Helo now requested a line down to the planet. It took her a second to remember that the planet was New Caprica and not one of the original Twelve Colonies. There was too many changes for her to remember right now. She was still trying to adjust.
"Felix. I need a favor." Helo smiled. "Yeah it has something to do with Kara. Doesn't everything these days?"
Kara felt herself scowl. She didn't like the way this "one more call" was going.
"Send someone down to Laura's school to tell the Admiral that Kara's woken up, and tell him that she'll probably feel up to seeing him…" Helo glanced over her, and Kara shrugged. "…this afternoon. She should be lucid by then." Helo chuckled again. "Yeah, I think we all remember how long it takes."
Helo talked for a few more minutes before setting the receiver down.
"You're being awful dramatic about something as simple as me waking up." Kara was about to laugh at the absurdity of it when she caught the look in Helo's eyes.
"Kara, you've been sleeping for forty something hours now."
Kara felt a sudden weight push into her almost like she had been punched in the gut. The room suddenly got hot as her eyes clouded over. Helo was at her side in seconds. "Kara, what's happening?"
"I'm not feeling so good," she mumbled.
Helo sat down next to her and used his arms to help hold her upright. "Everything's okay, Kara. Cottle says your body is just trying to get used to being awake again. Even though you probably feel like you've slept enough for the next decade, that's the only thing your body's going to want right now."
"But forty hours?" Kara choked out. "That's over three days."
"The Commander seems to think we were pushing too fast."
Kara felt something click into place when Helo mentioned the man whose bedroom she was currently living in. "That's why Lee wanted to know when I woke up."
"He was worried we lost you again."
Kara nodded. She had no idea how to process that bit of information. "And Anders? Does he need to be told I'm awake?"
Helo shook his head. "I suggested that he be left out of this one. He's in the middle of building a new structure down on Caprica so he wouldn't be able to come up and visit you anyway. I figured if you still weren't awake in a few days, then we'd tell him."
"Always the rational one," Kara teased. She leaned her head down onto his shoulders. "So, can I ask you something?"
"Anything."
"What are you doing here, Karl?"
"I'm one of the few people the two Adamas trust to watch over you. They tend to cut my shifts short when they can't be around and someone has to watch over you."
"Your shifts?"
"I'm the tactical officer on Galactica now that Gaeta's been appointed Baltar's aide. I declined moving down to the surface when it became an option. I didn't want to leave Sharon up here by herself."
Memories of Kara's old friend who wasn't really her friend came slamming back into her. "I forgot," Kara whispered.
"About Sharon?"
She nodded and pointed to her head. "Things are still fuzzy up there."
They returned to the comfortable silence that had always defined their relationship, and Kara let out a sigh. It was nice to know that Karl would be right around the corner. Having him here while she fought her way back to one hundred percent was an immeasurable gift from the gods.
"I don't know what to do, Karl," she whispered after some time.
"About what?"
"Sam." Kara waited a moment before adding, "And Lee."
"Ah. Yes, that is a problem." Helo sighed. "Well, Sam's been pretty understanding about how much Lee wants to protect you, and Lee's been very patient with the fact that another man is waiting in the wings to take you away."
"Am I going somewhere?"
"I don't know," Helo answered honestly. "Either way, there's going to be a change. Your life is going to change with Sam in it."
"I don't want it to change." Kara bit her lip. "And I think that's the real problem."
"He's asked you to give up flying." Karl felt her head nod slightly against his shoulder. "I figured he would. He's really happy down on that surface. A lot of people are, including some of the pilots and crew you've worked with. It's a good life."
"It sounds really nice."
"But you don't want to give up flying," Helo said, voicing the unspoken half of her statement.
"Is it that obvious?"
Helo shook his head. "No, it's not. A lot of people who had your passion for flying gave it up when New Caprica was discovered so I've learned to assume nothing and expect anything."
"But you knew that I wasn't going to want to give it up?" Kara pulled her head off Helo's shoulder to look up at him. She didn't have to look very hard to see that she was right. He had known she wouldn't want to go down to New Caprica. "How?"
Helo let out a deep breath. "The Commander, you, and I, we're all the same, Kara. Flying is in our blood. This life is in our blood."
"This life was in a lot of people's blood like you said," Kara pointed out.
"But there's something holding the three of us here," Helo insisted. "For me, it's Sharon. For Lee, it's you and his father."
"And for me?"
"That's up to you to decide," Helo replied. He waited a moment and then pulled back to look at her. "Feeling better?"
Kara nodded. She didn't feel like she was going to pass out anymore, that was for sure. Too bad her head was pounding with all the damn thinking she was going to have to do.
Helo's eyes landed on the clock on the table, and he got to his feet. "He's not going to hate you if you decide with him isn't where you want to be."
Kara's face steeled for a brief second, just long enough for Helo to see the beginning glimmers of Starbuck somewhere deep inside, and then she went back to being torn. "I don't want to hurt him."
"There's nothing you can do about that."
"I care about him so much, Karl. He was there for me when I had no one else to turn to."
Helo nodded and softly patted the top of her. "That, my dear Kara, is what makes it hard."
"I just… he deserves a lot more than that."
"We all deserve a lot more than what we have, but until the Cylons are gone, that's not going to happen. We need to get what we can when we can. Those are the only words you need to focus on right now, Kara. Think them over and then do what your heart tells you to do."
"Even if it means hurting him?"
Helo nodded, and when he saw Kara retreat back into her thoughts, he turned to leave. He almost made it to the hatch when something she said suddenly sunk in. He paused and glanced back over his shoulder. There was Kara Thrace, his warrior woman, looking so fragile and yet so strong at the same time, and yet she still wasn't as worried about what she had to do as he thought she would be. He watched her for a few seconds before deciding he was right. Something was off about their little conversation, and he had a feeling he knew exactly what that was. "Kara?"
She looked up at him immediately. "What?"
"Who were you talking about before? When you were saying how scared you were that you would hurt him?"
"Anders," she replied without pause. "Why?"
Helo paused for a second and wondered if he should really be doing this with Kara right now. She was still a little on the weak side. But she was staring up at him so confused and so expectant that he knew he had no choice. "I was talking about Commander Adama."
"Lee?"
Helo nodded and then shrugged. "Maybe that's the answer you were looking for." He held Kara's gaze for a few extra seconds and then shut the hatch behind himself.
Kara let herself fall back on the bed. Her eyes roamed the ceiling of the XO's quarters as she tried to come to terms with the fact that she had never considered saying goodbye to Lee as a viable option, not for one second. She had no idea what that meant.
oooooOOOOOOOOooooo
It was hours later when Kara finally pulled herself away from her thoughts long enough to realize something wasn't right. She was still confused about a lot of things, but the length of CIC shifts was not one of them. No commanding officer was scheduled for more than six hours on the boards without at least a small break. Lee hadn't come to check on her the whole time she was trying to wade through her thoughts. Something was wrong.
Kara got to her feet. Her legs were still incredibly shaky and she was pretty sure Cottle would tell her that she was doing damage to all the therapy she had had, but she didn't care. Biting away the pain, she pushed her right foot forward. She waited until the pain dulled and then pushed her left foot to meet her right.
It was in this slow manner that she made it across the bedroom and into the adjoining office. The sight waiting for her tugged at her heart.
Lee was fast asleep on the couch in his office.
Kara started to walk forward and decided her slow movement was only an opportunity to get a good look at Lee. He had changed into sweats at some point and had a blanket tucked around his body. Kara realized with a start that he must have been doing this from practically the day he was given these quarters. She had been sleeping in his bed after all.
She let her eyes search his face, and she came back unsure of what she was seeing. He looked at peace, relaxed in this small amount of slumber he had managed to grab. Yet there were dark circles under his eyes and Kara watched him twist a little bit underneath the blanket. His body was restless.
There was a pile of papers down by the head of the couch. Kara stooped down to take a closer look and smiled when she recognized the flight schedules Lee was obviously in charge of approving now that he was XO. Of course he would have work to do even when he was off-shift.
Kara reached out to brush through Lee's hair. She could feel her smile growing. It felt like forever since the last time she watched Lee sleep. She and Lee had bunked across from each other since the first day he got stranded on Galactica, and she had spent many nights calming down by listening to the rhythm of his breath and watching the wrinkles of worry in his face finally melt away.
Lee let out a small moan in his sleep, and Kara noticed for the first time that his worry wrinkles were definitely still there. He was troubled about something.
Her knees started to twinge against the stress of standing. Kara had ignored the pain for as long as she could. Her hand drifted away from touching Lee, and she turned to go back to her bed. One look at the distance she had traveled to get to the couch told her the obvious. She wasn't going to make it back to that bed on her own.
Kara looked back down at Lee. She would be willing to bet that this was the first rest he had had time to take in a long while. She honestly didn't have it in her heart to wake him.
She moved her hand to pull the blanket up over his shoulder and was about to take a seat on the ground when Lee shifted. His cheek nuzzled against her fingers almost as if he knew it was her watching over him.
Smiling, Kara took a seat on the edge of the couch and, after a moment, stretched her body out alongside his. Lee didn't wake up, but he did shift the blanket up to cover them both. Kara found herself wondering how familiar he was with having women lay down with him on this couch that he would automatically accept her presence. That got her to thinking about all the things she had missed while in a coma.
There was still so much to be covered, especially in terms of Lee. That had been one of the few things Lee was tight-lipped about. For some reason, he didn't want to talk about what he had been doing the whole year she was out. Kara found herself wondering if maybe another woman had risen up to take Dee's place in his life. Maybe Lee was just too much of a gentleman to tell her. Maybe the woman snuck into his quarters every night to share the couch with him, and that's why he reacted to her so naturally.
One softly spoken word from Lee was all it took to clear her conscious. "Kara."
She bit down on her lip to keep from smiling so wide that she woke up the man next to her. Sometimes she could overthink things just as badly as Lee did. Her mind was her worst enemy.
Kara tightened her arm around his waist and sighed. She couldn't believe it ended up being this easy, but it was.
With one simple word, her choice was made.
She was just going to have to get Lee to send for Anders in the morning. Then she would explain that her heart was never free when she tried to give it to him. Hopefully, he would understand. From the way Sam spoke, he knew that Lee cared for her a whole lot. She just hoped that Sam was as observant when to it came to seeing how much she felt for Lee. It would make it easier if he understood what most of the Fleet already knew.
"Kara?" This time Lee's voice was harsh and husky. He was awake. "What's going on?"
"Nothing. Go back to sleep."
For a second, she thought he might actually listen to her, but then she remembered how Lee never did what she wanted him to. "Why are you laying on me?"
"Because I walked across your quarters and was too tired to go back."
That seemed to hit home. Lee's eyes flew open. "We're on my couch."
"You fell asleep here," Kara offered.
"And you were… what were you doing?"
"I was checking on you. I was worried when you didn't check on me after your shift was over."
"I didn't want to disturb you. Helo said you had a hard afternoon."
"Helo should have known I'd want to see you," Kara scolded.
"I'll let him know he's stupid."
Kara bit her lip to keep from laughing. She forgot how big of a riot Lee could be when he wasn't completely with it. He was amazingly entertaining when his defenses were down.
Once the urge to laugh had died down, Kara felt the urge to sleep kick back in. Helo was right. All her body wanted to do these days was sleep. She let herself focus on the gentle rise and fall of Lee's chest and the warmth of having him so close. It was soothing.
She was on the verge of falling asleep when she felt his hand push the hair out of her face. Raising her head, she found that he was staring at her. "Hi," she whispered.
"Hi."
The silence hung between them as they both continued to stare. "I made a decision today."
"When you were unconscious?"
"No, after," she said, shaking her head and settling back into his side.
"And what was this decision about?"
"I want to fly again. I know Cottle doesn't seem very optimistic so I may need your help. This place is my home. It's the only place I've ever felt safe, and I'm not ready to give that up. Other people might be at that point, but I'm not one of those people. Flying is in my blood."
"So you're staying in the sky?"
"I'm staying in the sky," she said, smiling at the look of hope in his eyes. They weren't talking about the sky, and they both knew it.
"You can stay here in my quarters as long as you want," Lee offered tentatively.
"Thanks," Kara said. She felt Lee's arms tighten around her and sighed. There was a long struggle in her future, but she had a feeling she could do it. The memories would come back in time, and until they did, she would just build new ones with Lee.
