Disclaimer: Battlestar Galactica belongs to Ronald D. Moore and the Sci-Fi channel. Violet Adama and Priam Bennick are mine. Spoilers for the episodes "Eye of Jupiter" and "Rapture" are marked /like this/.

Chapter 8: Into the fire

The president and Violet walked to Colonial One as soon as she could stop laughing. They talked again before going to bed. "I know that was your idea," the president stated, regarding dinner.

"Was it a total loss?" Violet inquired, giving her a half-smile.

The older woman crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow. "I wouldn't say that, but a president doesn't have to explain herself."

Violet looked at her incredulously. "Did you make that up?" she asked with a smirk.

"Actually the last president passed that pearl of wisdom on to me," Roslin relayed.

"I hallucinated again," Violet blurted out.

Roslin studied her. "What happened?" Violet recounted it and the president sighed, feeling sleepy from the affects of the alcohol. "Just be careful and stay alert," she suggested. Violet nodded and the two went to sleep.

The next day was a weekly day off for the students, so Violet decided to look over more lessons in Adama's quarters. He and the president were busy with a recent discovery made on the planet below. /Unfortunately the Cylons decided to intervene and four baseships appeared, wanting what was to become the Eye of Jupiter as well, forcing a negotiation point./

/"I can't believe were dealing with a Cylon ship," Adama grumbled as he and Roslin waited in the cargo bay with the guards standing by./

/"I can't believe they're sending Gaius Baltar," she added almost wryly./

/"Let him say whatever he wants, more time to get our people off the planet," Adama remarked as the Cylons entered with Baltar./

/Baltar had grown a beard and looked more to the others like a man who had been in prison for a long time. He looked from Roslin to Adama. "It's good to see you," he uttered./

/Roslin crossed her arms and gave him the political cold shoulder. "What do you want?"/

Number Three spoke. /"We want the Eye of Jupiter and we know you have people on the ground."/

/"We have our people on the surface, we're not leaving them behind,"/ Adama articulated.

/Baltar chimed in. "I would like to discuss the practicality-"

/Roslin cut him off. "The less this man says, the better," she expressed. The next part of the discussion would proceed without the president. Before leaving, she walked over to the admiral. "I'll give you a hand with this, Bill, if you need it let me know."/

/As she left, the admiral faced the Cylons again. "What's your offer?" he questioned./

Number Three smirked at Baltar and then faced Adama. /"If you give us the Eye, we will let you go. We'll even throw in Baltar."/

/"Worth thinking about," Tigh muttered./

/"Definitely worth thinking about," Adama stated. Then he turned back to the Cylons. And spoke firmly. "I'm setting the terms now, make any attempt to attack this ship or the people, I'll nuke it, lay waist to an entire continent."/

/The guards escorted the Cylons back to their ship and Adama went to talk the situation over with Roslin in his office while Violet had gone to the gym for a while./ "I can't believe that they think we would actually want Baltar back after what he did," she commented.

"There are probably several people who wouldn't mind trying to assassinate him," Adama added.

"Do we even know what the Eye of Jupiter is? I'm planning on going over the scrolls again," she mentioned.

He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. /"All we know for sure is it supposedly points the way to earth."/

She tried to rub the stress out of her neck. "I wish that we had more time to explore it. This whole situation has become one big frakking mess," she conveyed.

"You're telling me. /I'm not a religious person as we both know, so if this is the work of a higher power, then they have one hell of a sense of humor,"/ he remarked with a wry grin.

Sitting at his desk, she folded her hands in front of her and looked at him with seriousness reflected in her eyes. "Bill, you might not be a religious person, but your daughter is. She had another hallucination and I think there might be more to it than that. She might be having visions," Roslin informed him.

He sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "You could be right, but I need to deal with the Cylons before I deal with something like that."

"And I intend to help you," she chimed in. He soon left the office to see a few officers and get a few more perspectives on their situation. However, what he did not expect to find was a Number Eight with some interesting information for him.

/Adama reentered the room and found Roslin scanning a few books. "I can't find much mentioned about the temple, five pillars of the-"/

/His face did not show it, but he looked at her sadly. "Laura," he interrupted her and she looked up to face him. "The Cylon we know as Boomer told Sharon that Hera is still alive./ What's going on?"

She took a deep breath and stood to face him. "I saw the child as a threat and wanted my aide, Maya, to look after her. I thought it was dangerous to have Sharon raise her because we don't know anything about hybrids it I was worried that she would raise the child to favor the Cylons."

He glared at her. "So that's it? You made yourself high supreme authority on whether or not they could keep their child? Now she's with the Cylons!" he pointed out.

Closing her eyes in shame for a moment as she swallowed, she faced him again. "A fact which I greatly lament."

"She would have been a hell of a lot better off with her parents!" he spat, hitting the desk. How could you do this? How could you make such a cold-hearted decision? I thought that you had better judgment than that.

Roslin looked at the floor and ran a hand through her hair. "It was a bad decision on my part," she admitted quietly.

"It was a decision that you know damned well should have been discussed with me! I thought we agreed to no more secrets!" he lectured.

Her eyes were pensive as she tried to meet his. "I guess I really frakked this one up."

"I won't argue with you there," he stated sardonically. "What you did was inappropriate and immoral. I know that somewhere you have compassion, but I'm beginning to think that anything of that sort got left on New Caprica! What if it was you? What if it was Violet?"

Roslin swallowed hard and a few tears slid down her cheeks. "A president doesn't have to explain herself to anyone," she commented, her voice not yet cracking.

Adama stared at her as if she had admitted to being a Cylon. "Well that's just frakking convenient, isn't it? What you've shown me is that the last three and a half years don't mean anything to you, that you don't trust me and that I sure as hell shouldn't trust you," he growled.

/He turned his back to her and moved toward the door. "Bill, I-"/

"I'm going to talk to Athena. I'm doing the right thing, for both of us," he said without looking at her.

She trotted over to him. "Wait, we should-"

He was not willing to let her get a word in edgewise. "I'm through with the lies," he told her as he faced her. Adama had returned to his stony reserve. The only indication that he felt anything was the contempt Roslin could see in his eyes. In a moment of anger, he said what he knew would wound her. "I'm disappointed in you," it was said quietly. As he left, she placed her face in her hands and sobbed. I just lost one of the few things in my life that meant something. I am such an idiot. He's never going to trust me again.

Roslin headed for CIC after Adama called her because the Cylons threatened an attack. /She looked over at the monitors. "Fortunately we are bluffing," she remarked./

/"Are we?" Adama added as he told the crew to prepare to send the nuclear weapons./

/Gaeta looked over at the admiral. "Missiles are loaded, sir."/

/Adama nodded. "Open launch tube doors."/

/Roslin's eyes opened wide. "What are you doing?"/

/"Getting ready to nuke the planet," the admiral instructed, not looking at her. "Set ground zero at the underground structure."/

/The president had a bad feeling about the idea in the pit of her stomach, but then she remembered one more thing. "Are we prepared to sacrifice Lee?"/

/He would not answer her. Oh no, he's really going to go through with this, she realized. She understood why though, and what the danger would be if the Cylons found the thirteenth colony. He looked over at her and she nodded. "Release nuclear weapons is now authorized," he told CIC./

Violet chose that moment to enter CIC, having heard alarms from the gym and wanting to know what was going on. "D-Admiral, what's going on here? Are we firing on the planet? Frak, Lee's down there! You can't just-"

"Madame President, please get her out of here," Adama requested, not taking his eyes off of the screen.

Roslin nodded. "Come on, Violet," she attempted to coax the girl, touching her shoulder to turn her toward the door.

Violet's feet were firmly planted and she continued to look at the admiral. "No, I'm not leaving. What the frak is going on here?" she demanded in near hysterics.

He rubbed the bridge of his nose. "Laura, I don't have time for this. Get her out of here," he ordered evenly.

Roslin gave a quick nod and looked Violet directly in the eyes, over the top of her glasses. "Young lady, not another word," she said, using what most would call a maternal tone.

The girl sighed reluctantly and they began walking out of CIC. "I'll be right back," Roslin conveyed to Adama. When she and the girl had stepped out into the corridor, the president looked directly into her eyes again. "I won't lie to you; this is a dangerous situation, too dangerous for you to be involved. I'm sorry that we're being short with you, but you need to go back to your father's quarters and stay there until you hear otherwise. Is that understood?"

Violet nodded slowly and replied, "Yes, Mom, and I'm sorry I was rude." She paused before heading off. "What's going to happen to Lee?" she asked quietly.

Roslin pulled her into a hug. "I don't know, Vie, I just don't know." They parted and as the girl left for Adama's quarters, Roslin dashed back to CIC.

Violet entered the admiral's quarters to hear the phone ringing. She picked it up and was stunned to hear Priam's voice. "Vie? Are you alright?"

"Yes, for the most part. Why are you calling me, and how did you know to call here?" she questioned.

"With all the alarms going off here, I figured that I should see if you were alright. I actually tried calling Colonial One first."

She smirked. I guess he was really worried. "Are you on Galactica?"

"My quarters are on Galactica," he then mentioned where they were located.

"Priam, I got kicked out of CIC. Do you know what's going on?"

He heard the distress in her voice. "From what I've overheard, our people on the planet found something called the Eye of Jupiter. The Cylons showed up and they want it too. Both sides are willing to kill for it."

Her voice was shaky. "Lee's down there, Priam, and the admiral's got nukes pointed at the planet."

"Vie, listen to me. I've known him, and the president, for a long time and you've got to trust that they know what they're doing. Can you handle that?"

She took a deep breath and closed her eyes for a moment. "Alright."

"Why don't you stop by later? I've been looking over tactical strategies as well as the next few lessons for our students. You sound like you could use some company."

"I like that idea. I might just have to take you up on it," she said as they hung up their phones. To pass the time, she decided to clean the kitchen.

Back in CIC they were preparing for a nuclear attack on the planet. /"Mr. Gaeta, disable launch warhead safeties,"/ Adama requested as Roslin stepped back into the room. Then he turned to Tigh. / "XO, please input your firing code."/

/Adama and Tigh both put their keys into the device as Roslin watched pensively./ Why do I feel like this is the end of the world again? She turned to the viewscreen.

Turning to see the screen as well, Adama ordered/"Fire on my mark."/

/"Sir raiders are coming back," Gaeta announced./

/"Not all of them" the admiral observed./

/"We have five, one's still there," Gaeta informed them./

They called a cease-fire with the Cylons as some of the people returned. The admiral then decided to head back to his quarters to study a few more reports about the planet. Roslin trailed behind him and the walk was silent. "Is there a particular reason you followed me home?" Adama asked coldly

"I'm taking Violet back to Colonial One with me, like I usually do," she stated indignantly.

He shook his head adamantly. "No you're not. She stays here from now on."

She stared at him, wide-eyed, the hurt reflected in her eyes. "But we decided-"

"I'm deciding things with her from now on. There is no 'we' and the last person she needs as an influence right now is you," he growled quietly.

Roslin practically ran out of his quarters. He sighed heavily and sat down on his couch, his head still craned toward the door. What have I done? I let my temper get the better of me and I not only chased out my best friend, I just took the girl she's come to see as a daughter away from her. What make my decision any better than hers?

In his guilt-ridden musings, he did not see Violet storm out of the kitchen. She stood right in front of him and glared at him, not hiding any of her temper. "Why can't I go back with Mom to her ship?"

"Because you're staying here," he said flatly.

"Just because you two had a feud, I have to be passed between you two?" she demanded. "Don't I get a say in this? I'm not a child!"

He looked at her disapprovingly over the top of his glasses. "Young lady, you should be grounded for coming into CIC like you did. I'm taking responsibility as your father and making sure things don't get out of hand right now."

Her eyes were livid. "You just kicked her out!"

"I'm in no mood to deal with this right now, alright? Now go to your room for a while," he requested. "Please."

She shook her head, challenging him. "How can I go to my room if I don't have one here?"

"I will not take that kind of attitude from my own-" his temper was rising, but she interrupted him.

"I'm not five Dad, I'm seventeen. At least she asked me what I wanted to do. I don't mean to be disrespectful, but while you've been looking for places to assign me to, she's asked me what I want. Making me stay here when I have a place to go on her ship is only making things worse," she pointed out.

"What would you have me do?" he growled.

She took a deep breath and reigned in her emotions. "Whether or not you want to admit it, you're both stubborn as ever, but you need each other and when things aren't right between you two, it throws everything else, and everyone else off."

"I don't think she'll want to speak to me for a while," he grumbled quietly.

Violet crossed her arms and she met his deep blue eyes with her mother's green ones. "This is your mess, you fix it," she retorted, storming out of his quarters.

(My thanks to csiAngel, carolann, Trinity Everett, Alesia G, and Gabe for reviewing :D).