Their trek towards their quarters is peppered with short encounters, crewmen and pilots and civilians alike, all clinging to them, trying to find out the truth of the rumors that had already started to circulate the fleet. Is it true? Madam President, Admiral, tell me it isn't true, comfort me, lie to me, make it better. By the time they reach their quarters her mood has sobered considerably. He still doesn't know what caused her giggle fit anyway, had just been content to bask in the glow of her laughter for a few brief moments. There hadn't been anything to smile about since they first set foot on Earth and any chance to see her smile again was one he was going to grasp with both hands.
They step through into their quarters and Bill closes and locks the hatch behind them. Laura starts for the phone, picks it up, asks to be put through to Colonial One. Bill looks on as she cradles the phone in the crook of her neck and massages her forehead with her left hand. The muted light glints off her cast, her shoulders look so tense. He wants for her to be able to just let go of all this, wants to let go himself. He wants to just be, with her. It would be the closest thing to heaven, even if he is an Atheist. But there's no one else, they have to see this through.
At least now they'll truly see it through together. Her declaration on the Baseship, the unspoken promises they made to each other, now bind them together in love as well as fealty. There are so many hurdles still standing in their way, not least of which is how to go about salvaging what they may from this fiasco. He knows she'll take the brunt of the blame, she's the Prophet after all, the one who made Earth real, who kept hope alive against impossible odds down on New Caprica. If now people will start saying that they were better off on New Caprica, that's only to be expected, hope fades fast in the face of an insurmountable reality, memory is short.
He starts towards her as she curses and, without speaking, carefully replaces the phone in its cradle. She leans her forehead against the bulkhead and by the shaking of her shoulders he knows she's just barely suppressing tears. He walks up to her and rests his hand on the small of her back, gently, so as not to startle her.
"What is it?" he asks in a whisper.
Laura turns around, a wry smile tugging at her mouth even while tears still threaten. "I don't know who to call. Tory…"
"I know." The revelation that Tory is a Cylon has hit her hard, maybe not as hard as Saul's revelation has hit him, but then, Saul is still right here beside them, steadfast as ever, where Tory has gone to be with her Cylon brethren, defected, in a sense, even though they are now all part of an uneasy alliance. Bill holds out his hand and when she takes it, he pulls her towards the couch, pushes her down into the soft leather. She leans back with a sigh, closes her eyes. The fingers of her left hand unconsciously start scratching under the edge of her cast. He sits down beside her, rests his own hand atop hers, stops her fidgeting.
"What did you want her for?" he asks, although her suspects he knows the answer already.
She doesn't disappoint. "To arrange a meeting with the Quorum, schedule a press conference."
"And tell them what?" He's genuinely curious and a little afraid. He knows she experienced something profound down on the surface and he's not sure he'll like what it is.
"Bill, I don't know what it all means, yet, but I saw something, realized something." She sits up straight, then gets up and paces the room.
"What?"
"Cylons, Bill," she says, as she comes to a stop before him. "Cylons lived on Earth. I don't know if they just lived amongst them or if they were the Thirteenth Tribe, but they were down there, and now they aren't and Earth is a wasteland and I'm still here."
He grabs her hand at that, pulls her to him. Her faith is a wonder to him, except in this, this notion that she is to die before they reach their Nirvana will never be acceptable to him. He chokes out her name, chokes on it. "Laura…"
She looks down at him, caresses the side of his face. "Don't worry, Bill. I'm not going gently; I'm not bowing down to this." She swipes off her wig, sets it down beside her on the coffee table. He rests his hand on the delicate curve of her naked skull, afraid almost to disturb the sparse auburn strands growing back in. She turns her head, leans her cheek into the palm of his hand. "I'll fight it every inch of the way, to be with you for as long as I can, believe me."
"Good."
"But we're still faced with this reality, and we have to tell the fleet something, have to keep their hopes up, or we'll have riots on our hands, people will start giving into despair, it's inevitable. The dream of Earth is what sustained us, without it, we won't need the Cylons, we'll destroy ourselves."
"So we tell them what?"
"I don't know, but I will, there's something here, it just needs to come clear and I don't know how to go about that, yet." She smiles that singular smile of hers and he believes her, with every fiber of his being, he believes her, he believes in her.
"In the meantime, we'd better arrange for Raptors to scour the surface, see if the whole frakking planet is as blasted as the bit we landed on?"
He moves to the phone as she nods at his suggestion. "That's what we'll tell the people, for now. Maybe we'll even find something, but somehow I'm not holding my breath."
"Me neither," he admits.
"How much time will it buy us?"
"Not much. A few days at most." It's an optimistic guesstimate and he knows she knows it by the lift of her brow, the tilt of her head.
She doesn't call him on it. "It'll be enough. It'll have to be."
"I'll call Kara to arrange the scouting parties. She flew back up here with us," he elaborates when she raises a questioning eyebrow. "Lee came back up as well. You had us all pretty worried there for a second."
"Only a second?"
"Yeah, well. Then I remembered you're Laura Roslin, and an itty bitty broken hand isn't going to stop you." He purposely downplays the terror he'd felt upon finding her, his absolute panic all during the Raptor ride back up to Galactica. He's rewarded by another full toothed smile and lifts the receiver, waggles it at her. "Want me to ask Lee to arrange the quorum meeting, set up the press conference?"
"Yes, please." She leans back into the couch, puts her feet up, gently rests her cast on her thigh, closes her eyes.
He places the calls. Kara is less than enthused but in the face of the enormity of this failure, which, he realizes, she must count as much her own as he and Laura count it theirs, she's just happy to be doing something, anything. Lee recognizes that it is imperative they keep moving. It's a lesson he's never forgotten, he tells his father, he learned it from Laura, the day the worlds ended.
Lee tells him he'll arrange the Quorum meeting to take place on Galactica, two hours from now, the press conference in three. "We're going to need the both of you in the days ahead," his son tells him. "Take good care of her, Dad."
Bill ends the call. "Will do, son," he whispers, soft enough so that he himself is the only one who hears the aching sadness in his own voice. Laura is on the couch, sleeping, or so he thinks and hopes. Never one to do his bidding though, he feels her presence behind him a moment before her soft touch alights on his shoulder. Her hands slide down his arms, steal around his waist as he hangs up the phone. He looks down, captures her hands in his gently, one elegant and expressive as ever, the other swollen and in a cast, both strong enough to hold him up as he takes a shuddering breath, then turns in her arms.
"We have two hours to get ready," he says as he moves back, puts some distance between them.
"Good," she replies. "Time enough to unwind, maybe take a shower."
He walks to his drinks cabinet to pour himself a drink. "Go ahead," he tells her, "I can just wash up later."
"With you," she continues as if he hadn't even spoken.
He chokes and splutters. The alcohol burns as it goes up his nose and down the wrong windpipe and she's beside him in a few quick strides, thumping his back as she laughs uproariously.
"Really?" He asks her when he's gotten his breathing back under control.
"Yes."
"Now?"
"About time, don't you think?"
He steps up close to her, rests his hands on her waist. "Laura Roslin, have I ever told you how much I love you?"
Her cool hand comes to rest on his face and a sparkle of electricity sweeps through him at the light touch. "Thoroughly and many times," she says. "But I think I didn't always hear you, I didn't always listen, and for that, I apologize."
"Then again, there were plenty of times you told me and I refused to listen, so I think we're about even on that score." She hums the way she does, low in the back of her throat and at the sound, a surge of desire blasts through him like a star going nova.
"How about from now on, we say it often and promise to always listen?"
"It's a deal," he says, and more than any promise he's ever made in his life, this is one he intends to keep.