Sorry for the long time between updates. Long story, involving pain and bedrest. The extra sleep was kinda nice, though.

Many thanks to everyone who's been following and reviewing - your thoughts keep me on track. Thanks to the anon reviews - and apologies for not being able to write a proper thank you - but I do appreciate that you're out there reading and commenting..

Disclaimer: You've heard it before. Pretend you're hearing it again..

Okay, so here's the deal: Bill won't wake up. I keep trying, but he's a damned stubborn man...

Too High a Cost
By: Mariel

-xxxxxxxxxx-

Chapter 14
Remember

As she was rolled into the Admiral's room, Laura kept her eyes trained firmly on him. What she saw reassured her. She'd seen him like this more than once; threads of silver hair gleaming in lamplight, his body composed, his eyes closed, his features relaxed in sleep. Unbidden, his name escaped her lips. "Bill…" she breathed softly.

He didn't respond, and the moment of foolish hope died. This was no restoring sleep holding him in gentle arms. This was a frightening unknown, keeping him silent and separate. Emotions welled up inside her, making her throat ache.

Meyes stopped the President's bed alongside the Admiral's so that the two faced each other. She then rounded the end so she could push the headboard against the opposite wall. Glancing up, she saw the President's expression and hesitated. Making a quick decision, took a few steps and pushed Roslin's bed hard up against the side of the Admiral's.

"Madame President," she murmured, "I seem to have forgotten something. I'm going to run and get it; I'll leave you like this while I'm gone, if that's all right." Moving towards the doorway, she turned off the harsh ceiling light, leaving just the light above Adama's bed glowing softly. "When I come back," she said, "I'll move your bed into place and hook you back up to the monitors."

Laura answered quietly, saying that it was fine, and thank you. She did so without moving, carefully keeping her head still so that the tears welling against her eyelashes would not cascade over them and spill down her cheeks.

She remained motionless until Meyes had left the room. Then she stretched out her arm and reached to tentatively touch Bill's hand. She trailed her fingers along the top of it, revisiting the play of tendons and veins beneath his skin. Tears now running unnoticed down her face, she curled her fingers around his.

"I'm here," she whispered, hoping he would miraculously awake because of her presence.

When he did not, she fell silent.

-xxx-

Laura Roslin sat propped up in bed, her gaze fixed steadily on the man lying across from her. In the twenty-four hours since her arrival, she'd spent considerable time staring at him, willing him to open his eyes and look at her.

He hadn't.

Sighing worriedly, she looked down at the report in her hand. Tory would arrive soon for the papers she'd signed and to discuss some of the things that had come across her desk in the past day. The Quorum, now that it knew that she was healing and would soon be up and walking, was beginning to make rumbling noises about resuming their trek towards Earth. There were other considerations, too. The bacterial infection that had so suddenly sprung up throughout the fleet was not only overtaxing their medical system but also causing fear throughout the civilian population. Rumours were rife as to its origins and how it could be cured. Anyone who survived it had a reason for it they were all too willing to announce; anyone who appeared immune had an explanation to share, as well...misinformation that caused unrest and suspicion raced from ship to ship, with people swaying from one sure cure to the next certain prevention. On top of that, transportation between the fleet had become an issue. Civilian ships were not always observing quarantine protocol; and some pilots were refusing to take necessary medical supplies to severely infected ships. Military help was going to be needed in overseeing-

Her thoughts were interrupted by Lee's arrival.

Setting aside her work, she smiled up at him. "Lunch didn't take you long."

He shook his head. "Wasn't worth the trip down. I should have taken you up on your offer to share yours!"

"Mine was pretty bad. You can have a look, if you like," she offered, nodding at the covered tray on her side table. "I didn't touch anything."

Lee moved to lift the cover. After a brief examination of the tray's contents, he grimaced and set the cover back down with a slight clatter. "Thanks, but I'll pass," he said. "Perhaps we both should have ordered out."

They smiled at one another, remembering days long gone when such a thing were possible.

He looked over at his father and his smile faded.

Her smile also sliding away, Roslin told him, "He's the same."

"Yeah," he said.

"He'll be all right," she said, trying to reassure herself as much as him. "You know that, don't you?"

He nodded, not really knowing that at all. The last time he'd seen his father like this, he had known there was a will to live, a desire to fight death. This time, he wasn't so sure. Though he had shared his thoughts with no one, in the past few days he had come to realise that there had been something final about his father's decisions on Kobol. His father, he decided, had had no intention of leaving the planet alive. Worse, something in his manner had clearly indicated he had planned to die, had looked forward to not making it with a sort of macabre anticipation.

Without thinking, he said aloud, "He doesn't want to live."

The words struck Roslin hard. She'd thought the same thought and had prayed it untrue. To hear someone voice it leant a possible reality to it that frightened her.

"He's got to, whether he wants to or not," she said firmly. "Besides, Doctor Cottle says he's healing unexpectedly well."

Lee shrugged. "Physically, perhaps, but the coma is saying something else; maybe he just doesn't want to wake up. Maybe he's just not interested in living anymore."

Horrified by his words, she insisted, "He's got to."

"We don't have a say in that."

He was right. A panic she couldn't tamp down crept into her and her heart began to thud in her chest. Moving restlessly, she suddenly needed the freedom to relax her features into whatever expression they desired. Wishing Lee gone, she forced herself to maintain a calm demeanour. Bill couldn't die, and he couldn't remain in this coma. He couldn't-

If he did either, all hope would die. She knew that as surely as she knew that she was the rightful president of the Twelve Colonies. She might be the people's leader, but he was their navigator, the solid, stolid beacon everyone set their gaze upon. Bobbing and weaving as she needed to, she led the fickle, feckless masses; he guided the fleet on a steady course with a sure hand.

She closed her eyes. In the first, horrible days of running from the cylons, it had been Bill who had stood before them and supplied hope for the entire fleet, Bill who had made a promise to the remains of humanity and given them something to live for. He had nurtured that hope in them all, built the flame of it inside of everyone, military and civilian alike… and then allowed her to take his lie about Earth and turn it into truth as a part of her prophecies.

But it had still been Bill's hope, and it had had its roots in his steady hands.

With almost painful clarity she saw the role the gods had intended for them. Saw how they - she – had failed...for now the hope in Bill was dead and lay cold and forgotten beside his lost trust.

Into the thought-ridden silence that had fallen between them, Lee rose with a gusty sigh. To her intense relief, he told her, "I have to go - I'm taking an extra rotation." Setting aside his own dark thoughts, he attempted a smile. "I'm glad you're doing so well. Cottle says you were up walking this morning."

Forcing herself to turn her focus onto Lee, she nodded. "I was. He's a hard taskmaster."

"He'll have you out of here before you know it!" Lee declared reassuringly.

Something he couldn't interpret flashed across the President's features. "Are you okay?" he asked quickly.

Laura nodded and forced a smile. "Just tired, I think."

"Then I'll get out of here," Lee said. "Anything I can bring back with me when I come tomorrow?"

She shook her head and her eyes drifted towards Adama.

Knowing he was already forgotten, Lee quietly left.

Laura sat motionless for a long moment after he was gone. For reasons she was not likely to explain to Doctor Cottle, she wasn't prepared to leave Life Station; at least not yet.

-xxx-

Thought is a strange thing. It is stranger still when done in isolation, stripped of body and feeling and outside stimuli...

For days now, Bill's thoughts had cast through the past, sifting, analysing, delving into events and emotions he had avoided for perhaps too long.

Cool and unsentimental, his mind had undertaken its solitary pursuit with single-minded fervour, examining, judging, and refusing to set aside memories he'd desperately sought to ignore or forget. Taking full advantage of this opportunity, his mind replayed for him each hurt, each joy, each failure, each triumph…and each betrayal.

-xxx-

After Lee's departure, Laura continued to watch Bill. She'd had a lot of time to think about him and her relationship with him and what had gone wrong and where they were now. One thing had become clear to her: the paradigm of their relationship had changed.

Nothing between them would be the same again.

It frightened her, but not so much as the thought of life without him.

She sighed, and moved restlessly. She'd believed being here with him would make her feel better and miss him less, but, if anything, it had filled her with more longing. She wanted to crawl into the bed and lie next to him. With the warmth of his shoulder against her face, she wanted to wrap her arm around his middle and slide her leg so that she felt his thigh beneath hers.

She wanted to feel his breath softly caress her skin.

And, because when she allowed herself to want, she wanted it all, she wanted him to say her name, to open his eyes and look at her. Touch her. Be the Bill she had known. The Bill she had loved without knowing that she loved.

-xxx-

Candlelight caressing silken hair...

Caroline's arms had held him tightly and he'd spoken without thinking... The wrong question asked; the wrong answer given…but not to be regretted because it had resulted in Lee and Zak.

Warm, confident eyes filled with knowing...

The right question asked for the wrong reasons; the right answer given, for the wrong reasons... but not to be regretted because Anne had given what he'd needed to receive, had taken what he'd needed to give. And they had loved...

Candlelight caressing silken hair. Warm, confident eyes filled with knowing...

No question asked; no answer given. Who could say what the question should have been, or how Laura would have answered?

It had all gone horribly wrong…

You can't hide from the things you have done. You can't hide from what others have done, either...

-xxx-

It had been fifty-seven hours since she'd been placed here with Bill. Exhaling softly into the darkness of ship's night, she moved restlessly. Lee and Kara had left a few hours ago, the twenty-four-hour-a-day vigil by the Admiral's bedside now ended out of deference to her presence.

"Give the woman some privacy, why don't you?" Cottle had chided them. "The President needs her rest, and she's not going to get it with people parading in and out of her room at all hours. You wanted Adama to have company, and now he's got it built right in, 'round the clock. That means you people are expected to keep to regular visiting hours, and that's an order."

All day that order had been obeyed, more or less. Laura had been grateful for the solitude, but had also found some comfort in having company for a few hours.

That evening, Kara had walked in only moments after Lee had arrived, and though she had greeted the President with warmth and relief that she was doing so well, it had been obvious that her focus was on the man lying silently behind her. Understanding, Roslin had lifted her chin and nodded towards the Admiral. "You should say hello."

Kara hadn't needed a second invitation and had quickly moved to take up her position at the Admiral's side.

Laura had felt sadness when she saw the fear in the young woman's eyes, and understood the desperation the pilot felt at not being able to do anything. Sighing, she had resolutely turned her attention to Lee. Slowly, softly, they began to converse. Eventually, after she had sat holding Adama's hand for a while, Kara had allowed herself to be drawn into the conversation as well. The three of them had spent a remarkably comfortable hour or so talking quietly.

They had said none of the things most on their minds…

Now, looking at Bill in the muted lighting of the monitors that registered his life signs, she stirred. Tossing her bed covers to one side, she carefully rose and walked stiffly over to his bedside. She looked down at him for a long moment.

"You've got to wake up, Bill," she told him softly. Running the back of her fingers lightly against his cheek, she whispered, "It's been more than a week. We've both got to get out of here and start running the fleet. It's time to start heading for Earth."

He lay there silently, and she took his hand in hers. Lifting it from the bed, she turned and sat beside him, holding his hand in both of hers on her lap. Looking down at it, she massaged it gently. "I'm missing you a lot, Bill," she said softly. "I know we frakked things up royally, but I'd rather have you here alive and angry than not here at all."

Lapsing into silence, she thought back to all the time she had wasted, all the opportunities to love him she had let pass because she had felt that she couldn't have a personal life, couldn't take her focus from the fleet or from her cancer, or from whatever crisis-of-the-moment held her attention. For a long time, she'd felt that loving someone would lessen her somehow; make her a less effective leader, less of a force to be reckoned with. A woman in her position, she had thought, couldn't allow herself the distraction of a life with love in it; it would siphon off her energy, her focus. And she certainly couldn't afford anything with someone who commanded as much authority as Bill. It would be a relationship fraught with difficulties, she had thought. She might lose herself…Better to let sleeping dogs lie…

But the dog had awoken, and the few months she had allowed herself a relationship with him had shown her that perhaps she had been wrong...

And then New Caprica had happened. It had been a mistake of colossal proportions. She knew he felt guilt about that, knew she needed to talk to him about it. He needed to hear that even if the decision had been the wrong one, the reasons for it had been right.

And she knew that she needed to talk about the things she'd done on New Caprica and the decisions she'd made...

Too many of those had been wrong.

She closed her eyes, remembering some of them with regret. In the heat of the moment, when she had been focussed only on what she wanted, they had all made sense. She had not thought about consequences or cost of the people affected, only the goal had been important, only getting what she thought she needed. But afterwards, she had, for the first time in her life, felt that perhaps the ends had not justified them means. The guilt had been a surprise.

Opening her eyes, she regarded the man beside her. Did he know what she had done? Was that the root of his rage and cold remoteness? She brushed a tear from the corner of her eye.

Too many mistakes...

She rose to return to her bed. Placing his hand back where it had lain earlier, she looked down at him and gently combed her fingers through his hair. She loved its texture, loved the silver that weaved its way through it. She shivered as a sudden need surged through her. Carried easily along with it, she acted without thought. Gently moving his arm so that she could fit beside him, she quickly lifted the sheet that covered him and slipped in under it. Lying down on the narrow space beside him, she adjusted herself until she was comfortably pressed against his body. She kissed his shoulder softly and then tucked her head under his jaw and against his neck. Closing her eyes, she allowed herself to fall back into memory of a time when he had welcomed her beside him, when he would have held her close and wanted her to lie with him just like this.

"You've got to wake up, Bill," she whispered. "Please..."

As his warmth seeped into her, she relaxed. Here was the only place she could admit to her fears, the only place she could allow herself to react to what was happening. Feeling small and very alone, she fought against tears, then slowly gave into them. Short, muffled sobs made her body shake against his, and she clutched him to her, afraid and helpless. She didn't understand, not fully, what had happened to them, what had happened to their lives and their relationship. She didn't understand his response to her; didn't understand the passion of his lovemaking and the coldness of his rage…but she knew she didn't want to face the future without him.

When she was emptied of tears, her breathing calmed and tension slowly eased from her body. Wiping the tears from her face, she again settled against him, still seeking, still needing the comfort and warmth of his presence. Spreading her palm against the skin of his stomach, she concentrated on the gentle fall and rise of his breathing and the muted thud of his heartbeat.

In a short time, she was lulled into a peaceful sleep.

End
Chapter 14