Despite what you may think I haven't forgotten about this fic. I have the entire story mapped out to the end AND I have a few big chapters coming up. Hope you are still interested!! Thanks for reading!
Disclaimer: I own nothing, all belongs to Ron Moore and Sci-fi ect.
Chief Tyrol was in more than just a daze as he stepped off the Raptor and back onto the Galactica hanger deck. He missed the last step and tumbled over the side of the ramp. Lee Adama was there to break his fall.
"Watch it," Lee grumbled.
Under normal circumstances Tyrol probably would have replied with something equally as rude to the Viper pilot as that was a game often played between deck hands and pilots. As it was, Tyrol opened his mouth but nothing came out. Tyrol didn't even notice the concerned stare that spread across Lee's face.
"Chief? Is everything okay?" Lee asked tensing his shoulders as if ready to catch Tyrol should he pass out.
"I…yeah, fine," Tyrol managed. "Hey, will you let someone know I'm heading back to the mess hall to find Cally? I'll be back soon."
Tyrol started walking away before he even heard Apollo's answer.
"Sure," came a faint voice from somewhere in the background.
All Tyrol's mind could focus on was finding Cally. Cally would know what he should do. Cally would know how to interrupt the words of the President…Tyrol tripped over his shoe and flung out his hands to balance himself with the wall.
He wasn't thinking clearly. That much was apparent. If he had been, he might have considered the consequences of leaving his post in the middle of the day. He might have remembered a cylon attack could occur at any moment and his expertise would be needed. As it was, one thought alone flooded his mind. Cally…must find Cally. Cally will know what to do.
After nearly running over three people in the hallway, and pushing his way through a group of pilots huddled near the mess hall door, Tyrol spotted his wife. She was cursing at one of the mess hall microwaves with each of her hands covering one of Nick's ears. The situation might have made Tyrol laugh, had Roslin not crushed his perfect reality.
When his wife saw him she merely smiled with surprise and excitement then let a cloud of confusion drift across her face.
"Galen," she said in an upbeat voice with a smile. She opened the microwave and took out a steaming plate.
"What are you doing here?" she asked as she set the plate on the table.
"The president is my mother," he blurted, his eyes glazing over as the daze overtook him again.
Cally looked over her shoulder incredulously.
"Yeah, right. So, why aren't you on duty," she questioned, completely ignoring Tyrol's preoccupied confession.
Cally set Nick in his makeshift carrier and then seated herself at the table in front of her food. Tyrol snapped out of his trance. He grabbed a chair near her, flung in around and sat down in it backwards. He leaned forward so the back two legs of the chair were in the air and intensely took Cally by the shoulders.
"No, you don't understand. Laura Roslin just told me she is my mother," Tyrol repeated, hearing the real weight of the words for the first time. He still didn't believe it. Cally's brow furrowed as she read Tyrol's expression. He could see the light dawning in her brown eyes.
"Are you…? You're not serious…are you?" Cally questioned, turning her gaze away from her food. Now Tyrol was getting somewhere.
"Yes, totally. She ordered me over to Colonial One. She said it was urgent. I just got back," Tyrol said loosening his grip on her and resting his elbows on the back of the chair.
"Your mother?" Cally repeated in disbelief. "But, you have a mother."
"She said I was adopted," Tyrol explained. Cally shook her head.
"Okay, wait, from the beginning, dear. What exactly happened?" Cally asked. Tyrol was so incredibly relieved to see his wife's clear headed brilliant mind already making the situation better.
"Roslin took me into her office, sat me down and said she was my mother," Tyrol explained after taking in a deep breath. The words where finally settling in.
"How does she know?" Cally questioned.
"She had a report from Dr. Cottle. He ran a blood test or something," Tyrol said. His wife looked at him with a raised eyebrow.
"Or something?" She repeated and then held out her hand, "Let me see it." She ordered him. He leaned back in the chair and the two legs hit the ground again.
"I don't have it," he replied with guilt. He could tell already he was eventually going to have to tell Cally about how irrationally he acted.
"You don't have it?" she drilled her voice rising with her disbelief. "Why the frak not?"
"I…" Tyrol noticed how tight his collar suddenly became around his neck. He stuck a finger under the fabric to try and relieve some of the pressure. It didn't work. Cally folded her arms and impatiently huffed as she waited for the explanation.
"I was kind of…in a hurry to get out of there," Tyrol began; he stood up and noticed for the first time there were people in the room. He might have started yelling but he was sure this was not something people should know about. For his sake or Roslin's. He bent down to speak to Cally in a low voice.
"What was I supposed to do? The woman just told me I was adopted. My whole frakking life my parents never told me. It was a bit of a shock to my entire world. How was I supposed to take that?" Tyrol asked, defending his cowardly behavior. Cally suddenly lost all the tightness encroaching around her eyes. They became soft and she unfolded her arms.
"Well," she shrugged smirking, "It was probably a shock. I didn't even know Roslin had any kids. When did she have you? She must have been young," Cally mused.
Tyrol sank down into his chair.
"I didn't really get around to asking her that either," he mumbled.
"What exactly did you say to her?" Cally finally questioned. This was the question Tyrol was dreading. He had never lied to his wife but oh, how sorely tempted he was now.
"I laughed in her face. I thought it was a joke. Then I…" he trailed off, looking up and seeing Cally's alarmed and displeased expression.
"…called her a lair. I said there was no way she could be my mother. I threw Dr. Cottle's report in her face and marched out of the room."
Tyrol dropped his forehead onto the back of the chair and let it rest there.
"You threw a report at the President?" Cally's voice scolded.
Tyrol nodded with his head still resting on the back of the chair. He heard a loud sigh come from Cally then a burst of giggles, which caused him to look back up. The giggles stopped and she smiled at him.
"We're going to have to put this right. You have to talk to her, rationally, Galen, and I'm coming with you. Besides, Nick probably wants to meet his grandma, don't you Nicky," Cally said turning to attention to the baby.
"You mean, you believe her?" Tyrol questioned. Cally frowned at him as she lifted Nick out of his carrier with a few blankets wrapped around him.
"You don't?" Cally retorted quickly and curiously. Tyrol hesitated.
"It's kind of hard to believe. All of the sudden Roslin has a son and it's me? Who is my father and…and why did she give me up?" Tyrol began questioning.
He wished he had been coherent enough to question Roslin earlier as she seemed collected, calm and willing to explain. Of course, Tyrol could not remember a time when the President didn't seem like that. Her collectedness was the thing he feared most about her.
"We will have to arrange something. I bet the old man would help us, if he knows…of course he would know, they are lovers after all," Cally said with a giggle once again.
"They are not, and why all of the sudden is this your problem?" Tyrol asked harshly. He regretted the words as soon as they left his mouth. He saw Cally's head drop and her red hair hid her face from him.
"Cally, I'm sorry," he apologized.
She drew back when he took a step forward. With a sigh he slowly lifted her chin up with his finger.
"I just don't know how to deal with this," he said just above a whisper.
"I know," Cally whispered back giving him a gentle hug, "But we will figure it out together…the three of us…and Roslin."
"Yeah," Tyrol said kissing the top of his wife's head. "That sounds good."
He noticed an overhead light flickering and made a note to fix it when he got off duty. Suddenly his sense kicked in and with a hurried step he marched back to the hanger deck.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Starbuck was always at her best in the cockpit of a Viper. She knew it and so did everyone else. She steered closer to Hotdog's silver Viper on her left.
"Alright, let's take these frakkers out," she ordered into the helmet comlink.
"Yes, ma'am," Hotdog yelled back with excitement.
The Vipers in formation fanned out in separate directions. Two Vipers trialed the Cylon Raider on the right. Starbuck and Hotdog took the other Raider. The chase took them deep into the blackness of space with the Galactica drifting further from their view. A shutter always ran down Kara's back whenever the Galactica floated out of com range. They were on their own now. The old man wasn't going to like it.
Starbuck made a hard right and cut down the distance between her and the Raider. Hotdog was close behind but he wasn't within weapons range. With a grin Starbuck locked her sights on the ugly butt of the metal ship.
"Gotcha," she said under her breath and hit the trigger. The ship split apart and its red entrails floated into space.
"Holy Frak!! Starbuck look out," she heard Hotdog's deafening screech in her ear.
By the time she glanced up in front of her she was nearly face to face with an enormous ship. She twisted her head from side to side. No, there wasn't just one ship there was a dozen…two dozen, and all the time her eyes were registering more and more shinny motionless metal objects in the sky. Starbuck brought her Viper to a dead stop as she examined the ships further. They were cylon, no question, but they hadn't moved to attack her. Her eyes narrowed. They weren't ships at all, they were space stations. As Kara looked to her right she saw they made a line in space as far as she could see. Her dradis screen wasn't picking up a signal from any of them.
Out of the corner of her eye she saw the second Cylon Raider speed across the threshold and the Vipers hot on its heels.
"No, wait! Racetrack, Gunny," Starbuck ordered to the pilots but it was too late for one them.
Starbuck stared on with clenched teeth as Gunny followed the Raider into the midst of the space stations. Racetrack's ship stopped just before its nose peaked across the line.
The stations lit up like a Caprican skyscraper in dead of night. Within seconds three of the stations had fired. To Starbuck's surprise both the Raider and Gunny's ship were completely destroyed.
"Damnit," Starbuck cursed at the lost Viper. Quickly she buried her emotions.
"They shot at both vessels," Hotdog said with awe over the static in the helmet com.
The words he spoke were racing through Starbucks mind as she mentally played the scene over. Hotdog was right. The cylon looking stations fired on a cylon raider. Why in the name of Kobol would they do that?
Racetrack and Hotdog were silent. Starbuck knew they were waiting for her orders. The urge to explore the strange Cylon stations overtook her but with a forced turn of her head Starbuck convinced herself not to let the curiosity get the better of her. There would be plenty of time for exploration as soon as she told the old man what they had seen. She would convince him to let her be part of the recon mission.
"Back to Galactica, now," she said and turned her Viper around.