Getting Kiff up and ready had been a battle that Starbuck wasn't volunteering to help with unless you counted asking the kid to keep it down and threatening to take away his rock. He felt bad about that one as the kid looked at him deeply wounded by the betrayal. Both he and Rene were worn out by the time they dropped Kiff off at the child care center.
"We need to pay them better," he said to Rene, an off the cuff comment but still the truth nonetheless. Rene's response was the first good argument offered that moving to the Zakar maybe wouldn't be such a great idea.
"There isn't a child care center on the Zakar. Are we going to make one?"
"How did you guys manage? What did you do with the kids if you were all on duty?" He knew Dante had been a boray, but he at least seemed to want the children to live and survive to build his little kingdom he could rule.
"Had to shift and trade duties to make sure we weren't all on at the same time. And we had less kids then, just Kiff and Daniel and Calliope."
Starbuck's steps faltered as he put the kids in order, realizing that Rene was the first of the gutter snipe girls to have a child, quickly doing the math, not thinking as he muttered, "You were only eighteen."
At eighteen, he had just entered the academy, a raw recruit still wet behind the ears, but the streets did add some experience. He wasn't as naïve as the other recruits and he credited that with helping his rapid rise in the ranks despite only marginal grades and poor study habits. He spent most nights far from the library studying the female recruits rather than his textbooks. He knew girls he graduated secondary school with who had sealed young, but that was nowhere on his mission plans at the time, let alone having kids. He doubted it had been on Rene's mind either. She and Jake had been playing clubs and roaming the streets, planning to get somewhere with their music, but the destruction had changed a lot of plans.
"I was nineteen. Had just turned before Kiff was born," she answered.
Starbuck did the math again as Kiff had just turned four, he was very sure of that as they'd had a party for the kid and everything at least a sectar before. "Wait, you're only twenty one. When is your natal day?" The words popped out before he realized that it was something he probably should have known before sealing with her.
She shrugged as they turned the corner for the duty office. He waited for her to speak, but she didn't answer. He halted outside the door to the office turning towards her.
"It was here while you were on the Galactica? It's already gone by hasn't it and I missed it didn't I?" He winced as she shrugged again. "I'm sorry, I don't really have one so I don't think about it and…"
"It's okay," she cut him off. "We gave those up when we became pilots. Dante told us that pilots are reborn on the first day they launch. Some of us get to land and celebrate it the next yahren, some of us go on to a new life beyond this one. So we celebrate that day. It's coming up soon."
He nodded and shoved the wince down. It was close to the same speech his old flight instructor had given the class just before their first launch and over the yahrens Starbuck had found the man had been frighteningly accurate in his words of wisdom. At the time they had seemed cryptic ramblings of an old war daggit past his prime. How he wished he could speak with the man now, to ask for more prophecies or at the very least tell the man he was right and deserved more respect than Starbuck had given him at the time.
"How many sectons after you were on the Zakar did you train before that first launch?" He braced himself for the answer, but still caught himself cursing at her words.
"Three I think. The cycles kind of merged together then. We had stopped counting them."
It had been three yahrens before he'd even been allowed officially into a simulator. He'd snuck into one at least a dozen times before that, but it was close to four yahrens before he'd been allowed in a viper, and then it was just a routine launch, a leisurely flight around Caprica and back down to the ground. He didn't see combat for close to a yahren after graduating from the Academy, and he was just the mop up crew then, protecting his battlestar rather than engaging the enemy. The real combat that day was left to those who were more experienced and still some of his squadron didn't survive that exchange. It was six yahrens before he was among those first to launch and that was only because he had excelled in his trainings and simulator sessions.
"Three sectons," he repeated the words aloud while in his head he threw some gratitude to lady luck. Rene and her friends were lucky to survive that first launch which Starbuck knew from their stories was straight into combat. They had launched first, a volley thrown at the enemy as fodder to provide a distraction so the experienced pilots could make it out of the launch tubes in one piece.
She had faced all that, as well as the abusive horn daggits of the Zakar crew, a sadistic commander and trying to juggle duty with a baby. How did she do it? He was having a problem juggling a hangover and a stubborn toddler. He didn't have duty today, not really, nor was he expected to fly a patrol nor attend a training, and he was already plotting how with his aching back and pounding head he could just kick back as the officer on deck with his feet up telling other people what to do today. His day hadn't even started and he thought he was done in. How had she managed and stayed optimistic? Maybe that was too positive a word for Rene. No one on the Galactica would agree she was a hopeful individual, but she had survived and formed bonds, created a family, built a home, lost it and was rebuilding another one here in the fleet. If that wasn't optimism, he wasn't sure what would count as an example of the word.
"So you got older without telling me," he chided her.
She smiled at him. "Is that a problem, old man? Going to call off the sealing now that I'm not so young?"
The age difference between them had never been an issue for him, despite the fact that it bothered many of his friends. Now he had his evidence to present as to why it wasn't a concern for him. She had dealt with more than anyone her age should or would have to under the old Colonial system. She was now the age most pilots were upon graduation from the academy, and she was responsible for at least two lives, six if you counted the kids she had adopted. He couldn't even manage one toddler and a pair of shoes.
"I think you have a few more yahrens to go before you have to worry about me trading you in for a newer model," he teased.
"Who says you're the one who will be doing the upgrade for a newer model?" she teased back and he nodded at her smile.
"Good point, but by then I'll have a cane I can use to beat off the competition." The joking eased the tension in his shoulders, soothing the ache in his spine. He nodded to the duty office. "Think I'll just check in and then these old bones might need a nap."
"You cleared for flying yet?" she asked, reaching out a hand to stop him from turning away.
"Yeah, thought I'd take a patrol today just to make sure they haven't forgotten who's the best."
The smile fled her face as she looked away before she reached into her pocket digging out something, reaching for his hand.
"I need some help with something," she said as she placed something small in his hand. She had his attention. He didn't think she had ever said those words to him and had begun to suspect the word "help" wasn't in her vocabulary.
He opened his hand to see what it was she had placed there, a bit surprised to find it was a gold ring with a purple stone. He looked up to her in confusion. This ring was made for a woman, too small for his fingers.
"Keenan gave it to me and…" she paused and in a flash she looked many yahrens older than her twenty two. "I can't bring myself to get rid of it but it feels wrong to keep it."
He knew very little about the man she had been with on Dilmun, only that he had been a Colonial warrior from the Zakar and had died before they could be sealed. Crius had been the man's friend, but his wing mate had not spoken of him and Starbuck hadn't pushed to know anything. On Caprica and once or twice since when they were in the life center she had called him by the man's name, and still he hadn't asked about him. Maybe it was because he had his own past of messy relationships that he didn't want Rene to know about. He figured she deserved the same chance at redemption. He knew Keenan must have been a decent guy to have been taken in by the Rats, but that's all he knew.
"It's okay. You should keep it," he said putting the ring back into her hand, but she held onto his.
"No. You make it feel wrong to keep it. We never made it to a sealing and I thought I knew what love was then but you…" she paused again looking down for a moment before looking back up to him, "You proved I was wrong. Please, I need your help to get rid of it."
He couldn't deny her. He was going to have to learn how, but mere days before the public sealing was not the time for that lesson. He took the ring from her, already thinking of a plan for what to do with it. His wing mate would be the right person for the mission.
"Let's worry about it after the sealing, okay? Let's go check in and then we can check out and talk about it, okay?"
He nodded to the duty office door and he let her go through first. He nearly ran into her as her steps faltered. He was a bit shocked to find Apollo at his old desk and the old guy Peryton at Starbuck's usual chair beside the desk. Bojay was there as well and he suspected that was what had Rene's steps unsteady. She and Bojay had yet to really repair the damage done when she poisoned him in the triad match where she proved she could best him. Bojay had not really given her the chance having learned a different lesson: Rene saw no problem with treasonous acts.
This time Bojay had a smile upon his face as he directed it her way. Starbuck would have to take his friend aside and tell him that smiles were worse than sneers for Rene. She could sniff out fakery better than muffy did mushies.
"Hey Apollo, I thought you headed back to the Zakar?" Starbuck spoke first, hoping to forestall a confrontation by reminding Rene that Apollo was here and in command.
"Gage encouraged me to stay over since we had a command briefing this morning anyway, and then Peryton visited my father this morning. He had a request that I thought I might be able to help with."
"A request?" Starbuck looked to the man, noting that his gaze seemed clearer and he wasn't nearly as old and faded as he remembered the man being on Caprica.
"Not for you," the man said gruffly pointing to Jake who was leaning against the other desk. "For the punks who trashed my home and stole my Fabulon Four data discs."
"By the layer of dust, I'd say you weren't using them," Jake shot back but Starbuck thought he saw a hint of a grin on the young man's face.
"If you asked, I would have let you borrow them, but you didn't ask so I expect them back. But that's not my request." He turned to Rene. "I got your device hooked up. It makes something, but not what I would call a stable wormhole. I wanted to ask you some questions and maybe have you give me a demonstration of what you can do."
"No," Starbuck stated, but was cut off by Rene placing a hand on his arm as she asked in incredulity, "You got it to work? You've been playing with it?"
"You didn't think it would work, did you?" Peryton asked.
Rene looked around the room, her eyes wide looking nearly as scared as before they took on the Cylon slave camp. Starbuck stepped in to save the day.
"We are days away from a sealing, she's over four sectars pregnant and we are not having her fly until the baby is born. You actually think this is a good idea?" He looked at Apollo accusingly.
His friend held up his hands. "We are just asking questions, looking for some details. She was able to send others through when they got the fuel from Caprica. It doesn't have to be her that flies into the rift."
"I have to be there to get to where you are going," she interjected.
"That is what we want to find out today," Peryton said, "how you get from here to there as accurately as you do. I can create the rift. You are right, it is just focused energy, well negative energy actually. You took a huge risk when you did this the first time. You were turning energy back on itself. You could have just blown yourself to kingdom come in a very explosive fashion, did you know that? I suspect from what my son tells me of you barely making it out of secondary school, you don't know much about advanced quantum physics."
Rene's hand gripped Starbuck's arm hard as she blasted an icy glare at Bojay. He didn't back down from her anger, but he did drop the smile. "Am I wrong?"
She didn't answer Bojay, turning back to Peryton. "I'm self taught. It works."
"Yes, we are proof it does. My questions are all about the how? How did you learn this? How did you get it to work? How did you get back once you got there and how do you get there as accurately as you do? I hold advanced degrees, in fact, I wrote the course material for some of those, and I can't answer those questions, but you can."
He felt Rene ease up her grip at the compliment.
"So just talking," Starbuck asked Peryton before looking to Apollo.
"Yes, for now. Just talking, but I thought we could move this to the celestial dome. We do have something we want to try, but with a probe. I understand your concerns Starbuck," Apollo said, the words holding a deep significance now that they had both shared the same experience, watching the woman you love launch into battle. "Rene's boots on the Galactica, just like she promised you."
Starbuck looked at her and she nodded before saying softly, "I can fly until past seven sectars."
"Yeah, well you're not going to," he grumbled, "and not into that rift to wind up stuck again. Remember the mission that was supposed to take a centaur, because I do. The bruises haven't even faded yet."
"Just talking," Peryton assured them, "Let's go."
Apollo led the way, weaving them through the corridors until they were up to the dome. It was obvious by Bojay's astonished eyes as the shield peeled away that he had not been there before. Starbuck looked at Jake and saw the young man take the blossoming starfield in stride letting him know Rene had brought him here. The twinge of jealousy was a sharp pinprick to his heart before he brushed it aside with logic. She was sealed to him and Jake never showed his emotions. If the kid was surprised, he would suppress that so hard it would appear as nonchalance. He looked again to see the young man swiveling his head to take in the view before noticing Starbuck was staring at him. Maybe Jake hadn't been here before, after all.
Rene walked towards the transparent tylium, reaching her hands out like she usually did, as if trying to push through the thin shield and join the stars.
It was Apollo that asked the questions at first, and he wondered if he knew that Rene would be more truthful if she could be somewhere she felt safe.
"How did you learn how to do this?"
"In a dream," she said before turning to face them. The guarded look in her eyes had him taking the steps to be by her side for support.
"You're talking to people who saw a man in white and crystal ships. We dealt with Iblis too," Apollo said in an effort to get her to elaborate. Starbuck felt Rene take a deep breath that resembled a sigh.
"A guy in white with white hair showed up in my dreams several nights in a row. He told me how to make the device. He never gave me his name and he didn't tell me exactly what the device was for other than to say it was important. He didn't show it to me all at once, just pieces here and there. I made it but…" she shrugged and looked to Jake.
Starbuck wondered why Jake quickly averted his eyes. What did he have to do with the device and its use and why did he suddenly look so guilty?
Rene took another breath, looking up to Apollo before she continued. "I tried it, and it made the rift, but I didn't fly into it for at least four or five sectares. I didn't trust the dreams or myself. I had no idea what it would do, was pretty sure it wouldn't do anything actually. And the guy kept coming to me in dreams saying stupid felgercarb like 'I would know when it was time,' and 'I can only intervene so far.' I have no idea what he meant."
She paused, closed her eyes and shook her head, a move Starbuck had seen her do since Caprica, as if she was trying to jar loose memories she couldn't bring forward. While she was getting better, the stutter beginning to fade away, her recall wasn't what it should be and grew rapidly worse when she was tired. He was about to tell her it was okay, they didn't have to do this today, but Apollo's voice made him recoil.
"When was this and when did Iblis enter your life?"
Her eyes squinted and her nose crinkled like it did when she was angry with herself. "On the Zakar," she whispered. "When we found the Shiva." She shivered and Starbuck reached out a hand to her shoulder, squeezing it in comfort.
"Crius told us some of what happened. It's okay, you don't have to recount it." Starbuck directed his words up to Apollo. On a patrol, Crius had filled Starbuck in on the capitulation of the Shiva's Commander, the slaughter of the Colonels and Gage's surrender. The Rats had been part of the initial crew sent to secure the ship. They had courtside seats to the slaughter. It had made a lasting impression, suppressing any ideas of rebelling or overthrowing Dante.
Rene still didn't open her eyes as she answered, "On the Zakar. Iblis would show up like a …a ghost. He was there, but not. I thought I was seeing things. He would…" she shook her head again searching for the words.
"Apollo," Starbuck said low in warning, but his friend answered him with a grave face before prodding Rene.
"We have to know if Iblis is involved. What would he do Rene?"
Rene took a ragged breath, "He didn't talk to me at first, just stood there and …watched sometimes. No one else seemed to see him, and Dante ignored him so," Rene shrugged. "The other guy told me not to trust him. I didn't know who to believe."
"John hasn't lied to us yet, but Iblis has," Apollo interjected.
"Yeah, but he also fed the fleet and brought us Baltar," Starbuck said before quickly adding, "not saying I trust the guy, but he delivers sometimes and things were looking bleak for Rene and the family. I can see where Iblis might be a better alternative than starving to death or being used as fodder."
He couldn't help coming his wife's defense mostly because Crius had been pretty detailed with Starbuck as to the conditions on the Zakar after they had taken on refugees from Caprica, picked up numerous smaller military vessels, and a few of the stragglers who had not made it to the Colonial fleet. Every pilot was "hot racking", something Starbuck had only experienced once and vowed never again. While other ranks might have to resort to it more often, rank had its privileges. Pilots were officers and only had to hot rack in emergencies, when bunks were so scarce that you shared, when one man was on duty, the other man slept in your bunk. Crius said that every bed on the ship including the Life Station was utilized, and the refugees were relegated to floors and corridors. Turbowashes were every fifth cycle and food was down to a meal a day, two for pilots. They were desperate and the Rats were low on the priority list for anything. Added to all that, the crew was abusive and the Commander a sadist. Iblis would have felt like a blessing from the Lords compared to all that.
Apollo nodded. "I understand. But I think it matters a great deal where she learned how to do this. If Iblis is involved, we may want to rethink how and why she uses her ability."
He looked to his wife, and she crinkled her nose even harder.
"About that," Starbuck drawled like Crius, "let's just fly past that for now. We all get to drink the spoils of those forays, so maybe we shouldn't be judging?"
"This isn't about alcohol and fumarellos Starbuck, this is about us being able to find Earth. What do we want to find at the end of our journey?"
Starbuck nodded slowly, feeling the cold water begin to rise up again and threaten to pull him down. This is not what he needed today.
He looked to Rene and found her eyes upon him. "It was the guy in white who showed the device to me, but it was Iblis who told me which way to head the fleet to find Dilmun. Once we were there, I didn't listen to him much or the guy in white since they wouldn't answer any questions. They just kept arguing about sides and right or wrong, but I don't give a frak about that kind of felgercarb, besides, they're both old men."
She shrugged and Starbuck knew exactly what that gesture meant. Rene had no trust in old men and he couldn't blame her.
"But you trust me and I'm old," he couldn't resist using the joke from earlier in the day to cut through the tension. It worked as she cracked a smile.
"I'm crazy. Figured I was crazy and then too," she paused again as she turned back to the view of the stars. "Then I went too far and the guy in white just showed up, like in real life showed up like Iblis would do. I assumed it was a hallucination. I was half high and pretty drunk, anyway he said I could use it to get away. So I did."
She stopped speaking and Starbuck squeezed her shoulder. "What do you mean you went too far?"
She shivered under his hand before turning to him. "Keenan was gone, I lost his baby, they'd taken Kiff away and Jake," she shook her head not finishing the thought, instead shifting to another, "I just couldn't take anymore, so I hit back."
"Hit back?" Starbuck sought clarification, knowing she could defend herself if needed, but with Dante's lackeys, the repercussions could be deadly.
"Dante bleeds red for the record," she said as if that answered everything.
The breath froze in his lungs, and he found himself again thanking the Lords because he didn't think Dante would have allowed anyone to live that might have drawn blood on him. Rene must have survived due to intervention from the heavens. What kind of punishment did she receive for the transgression? It was an even larger mystery in his mind than where she learned of her powers.
He didn't get to ask as she blazed forward. "So I had nothing to lose. I got out of the brig, grabbed a viper and activated the device. The rift formed and I went through. To where, I don't know. Nothing looked familiar. It wasn't Caprica or Kobol. I didn't pick up any signals or signs of civilization. The planets were just big gas giants, the moons either ice balls or covered in volcanoes. Nowhere to really land, nowhere to stay. Lord knows I tried. I didn't know how I got there or anything and the old guys weren't answering. My options were few and fuel was running low so I did it again, only this time just prayed to get back to Dilmun and it worked. I got back to the system and found one of our own planets to hide out for a few cycles until I ran out of food."
"And then you went back?" Starbuck asked wishing like hades he could go back in time, reach Dilmun sooner, no scratch that, land on Caprica, rescue all the Rats before they faced cylon imprisonment.
She nodded. "I didn't try it again for a long time. Thought I got lucky and then," she paused again and it was Jake that answered.
"Agenor almost killed her."
She nodded. "Then I used it a lot trying to find somewhere for us to go."
Peryton interrupted her story. "Could you only go places you had gone before?"
She turned to him, shaking her head. "No, but for some reason only coordinates the Zakar had been, but that might be because there were star maps of those places."
"So what do you do to get to where you are going? Put the coordinates in?" Apollo asked.
"Yeah, then wish."
Peryton interrupted her almost angry at her words. "No, none of that wishing felgercarb. Tell me exactly what you do. In order. Step by step."
She sucked in a breath puffing her cheeks before releasing it slowly. "I put in the coordinates, activate the device, fire my guns and then fly through. That's it. But you should know it doesn't work all the time. Sometimes it drops me close, but not quite there and other times it doesn't work at all. It's more accurate when I really need it to be. Like the guy in white said, I'll know when I need to use it, which kind of means to stop playing around with it."
"I don't think you really needed to go to Caprica," Starbuck said softly that earned him a shrug for a reply.
Peryton grunted like he could care less what a guy in white said. "What I can't figure out is why the coordinates don't work for us."
"What do you mean," Starbuck asked, still keeping his eyes on Rene, watching the storm of emotions about her past rage in them, lightning and thunder flashing just below the surface of blue.
Peryton answered, "We have opened the rift, and sent probes through to coordinates here in the fleet. None of the probes have made it. Some just fly through the anomaly like it isn't there. Others go in, but we don't find them again."
"No one else has been able to get it to work. Just me. Where did you send the probes? To ships or just out there?" Rene indicated the stars with a nod of her head before turning away from Starbuck to Peryton.
"Flight deck to flight deck, or just before the flight deck."
"Now who doesn't understand physics? You maybe?" Rene taunted.
"Explain," was the only answer Peryton chose to give her statement.
"An object in motion, stays in motion. The place you are sending the probes changes coordinates every micron. You probably just sent them into bulkheads." Rene said.
"Then they should be there."
Rene shrugged. "I guess, but they're not, right? The rift wouldn't let me go anywhere that was dangerous. It would bounce me back or close, but not there or…I don't know why. Mass is part of the equation."
"We tried other coordinates. Doesn't work. Apparently, your wishing is the key, and I want to know why," Peryton said angrily.