See Chapter One for notes and disclaimers.
Lee goes to Helo about Kara's request. He just doesn't have the same pull with the pilots as he once did, and he didn't even go to the auction after all. Kara's not with him today, and Lee imagines it's because she knows what's next on his schedule: a meeting with the Admiral of the Fleet.
The meeting does not go as expected, from the moment Lee enters his father's quarters to find the old man on the couch, a tumbler of expensive whiskey in his hand. He offers Lee a glass, and the two sit for a minute in companionable silence, just drinking.
Hours later, Lee's still musing over the strange conversation when he enters his quarters. Kara is waiting, leaning back in the chair, her bare feet propped up on his desk. When he walks in, she grins in such a way that Lee immediately forgets the day's events.
After, Kara untangles herself from his body and rises from the bed, still naked, sashaying in a way that ought to be a crime, as she goes for a glass of water. She stops, however, when her gaze falls on the desk. Specifically, on an item he'd discarded in favor of putting his hands to better use.
On the bed, Lee pushes up on one elbow to watch her. "Kara?" he says when she's been still for too long.
She turns back to face him, the small figurine gripped in one hand. "Where did you get this?"
He blinks, rubs one hand over his jaw. "My father gave it to me, just today. Said it was something that…that meant the world to him." Lee speaks slowly, cautiously almost as he recalls the low timber of his father's voice. "He said he wanted me to have it, but he wouldn't tell me what it was." He frowns slightly, unsure. "Why? What is it?"
Kara's eyes are still on the statue as she walks over and sits beside him on the bed, atop the rumpled sheets. "I gave it to him," she says. "The last time I saw him, before."
"What is it?" he asks again.
Kara sucks in a deep breath, still not looking at him. "Aurora, goddess of the dawn. I found her in some stupid Oracle's tent down in Dogsville. Seemed, I dunno, important at the time."
"And now?"
"Well I'm here," Kara says, finally raising her eyes, "and here she is. And Aurora, she's supposed to bring a, a fresh start. That can't all be coincidence, right?"
It's Lee's turn to look away, to stare at the tiny metal woman as though she holds the answers. He can feel the weight in the room, the air pressing down and around the two of them, and he knows what he says next really matters so it had damn well better be good.
"You know, you used to talk about having a destiny, and I didn't really understand then. I'm not sure I do now either, but…you, here?" He reaches for her hand, the one that's still holding Aurora on the bed between them. His fingers close around hers. "It's not nothing."
She smiles then, and he feels her grasp loosen beneath his. "You saying my destiny is, what, to be your super special frakbuddy?"
"You say that like it's a bad thing."
She laughs and kisses him, and for now it's alright.
"It's not going to work," Kara says. They're in the Admiral's quarters—Lee, Helo, Tigh, and Adama. Plus Natalie and Natalie's armed guards. They've been hammering the details of the battle plan for the Hub mission for going on three hours now, and tempers are fraying. Kara was never known for keeping hers in line. "Lee," she snaps, "tell them it's not going to work! You're going to get all of your pilots frakking killed before you can say 'jump.'"
She's probably right, Lee thinks, but he doesn't see much point in saying it. Her ego is dangerously inflated as is, and besides…
"It's not going to work," the Admiral says, leaning back in his chair and pinching the bridge of his nose.
There it is. This statement of the obvious doesn't seem to appease Kara though.
"Damn right it's not. So what are you going to do about it?" She's standing just across the desk from the Admiral, leaning forward with her hands planted on the edge.
"It might still work," Helo is saying, "if we can just find some way to distract them, draw their fire…"
It strikes Lee suddenly that Kara is wearing her blues, neatly pressed and ironed as ever, pips and wings gleaming on her collar. She doesn't have clothes though, not really. They are just there when she needs them. So why, he wonders, the uniform? Is it simply routine, or does she have an unspoken desire to be a part of this, to be one of the officers again?
What if it's not her desire, but rather his? Does she appear however he imagines her? Lee suddenly coughs into his fist and looks at the Cylon who is speaking. He steadfastly does not look at Kara as he tells himself that now is not the time to be picturing Kara naked.
It's hard to ignore her though, as she keeps interrupting, or trying to interrupt the meeting.
Eventually, the Admiral announces the meeting adjourned, and has the Cylon escorted back to her room. Helo and Tigh leave soon after, and Lee, rather reluctant to have another heart to heart with his father, makes his own awkward excuses.
Kara doesn't say a word on the way back to his quarters, striding in front of him so that he can't quite see her face.
She's pissed, Lee thinks distantly. His hallucinations sure aren't very accommodating.
No sooner has he closed the hatch behind him, than she is rounding on him, hands on hips and mouth a sharp line.
"Fat lot of good you were in there," she says.
Lee can already see how this is going to go, but he still can't control his instinctual ire. "Well what do you expect?" he tosses back. "It's a little hard to concentrate on the actual conversation with you there."
"I'm so sorry," she snaps back, pacing away from him now. "I'll just go haunt someone else, shall I?"
"Oh come on, Kara," Lee says, following after her, "don't take all this out on me. You're just mad that no one's listening to you."
She whirls around, and suddenly they're only separated by a short distance. "And so what if I am, Lee? You think I like this? You think this is fun? Following you around everywhere, not being able to do anything for myself, and the entire frakking world frakking ignoring me?"
Her eyes are blazing with anger, but Lee feels his own draining away. He almost laughs when he glances down and sees her clenched fists. "You know, I was starting to wonder if maybe you were in my head, since the real Kara Thrace would never go this long without shouting at me or punching someone."
Kara stares at him incredulously, then snorts and gives her head a little shake. "Frak, Lee," she says and smacks his shoulder with one closed fist.
"Ow," he complains, rubbing at the spot. She pulled the punch, as much as she ever pulls punches—which is not very much. "Real nice, Kara. Good to know some things never change."
"Laugh all you want Lee, but you've got to admit this situation is seriously FUBAR."
"That's easy for you to say," Lee tells her. "What do you have to worry about? I'm the one that might be going crazy."
"Sure," she scoffs, "and I'm just the one whose entire frakking existence is being called into question. You know, normally I'd be flattered to have such a starring role in Lee Adama's delusions…"
She lets the sentence hang there for a moment, then brings one hand up to brush gently against his cheek before settling into the curve of his neck. She closes her eyes and leans in slightly, so slightly—not enough to bring their bodies together but just enough that Lee can feel the air she breathes curling against his chest and the length of her like a phantom limb. Neither of them are laughing when she speaks again.
"When I gave your father the statue of Aurora, I was pretty frakked up."
Lee bites back the familiar rush of panic and guilt, waiting silently as she seems to gather her thoughts, eyes open now and staring into his.
"And even though everything had gone to shit, I still had that—faith. That I was meant for something." She grimaces. "That I had a destiny. And when I came back, everything was so clear. But now that's all gone and it's just…" She drops her hand from his neck, and twists her head slightly to the side, glancing down and away before looking back up again. "Gods, it's just so frakking stupid and pointless."
Lee frowns, searching for the right words as he resists the urge to close the gap between them. "You know I didn't believe in that stuff. But now, with you here…I think I finally understand what you meant about having a destiny. We've got to do this, you and me. Got to find that Hub and go wherever else this life leads us. And the fact that I don't have an explanation why doesn't…doesn't really seem to matter anymore.
"That," he continues, "or maybe I'm just crazy."
She smiles slightly. "Oh, you're crazy alright. Downright insane, I'd say."
The next thing Lee knows, she's reaching for his hand and then she's pressing her lips to his and they're moving, stumbling, staggering backwards until Lee's backside hits the desk. She pulls back slightly and bites her lip to hold back a smile.
Lee whispers into the quiet that follows, "Maybe it's the gods or god or destiny or maybe it's just us, just Lee and Kara…but I can't shake the feeling that this is something we were meant to do."
She laughs then. "Oh really?"
"Really," he says, and kisses her.
A few days later, Lee enters the Agathons' quarters. Athena is on CAP, he knows, so it's just Helo and little Hera. The girl is sitting at a small table with crayons and papers spread in front of her.
"Hey Apollo," Helo calls from the back of the room, "got your message. Just gimme a sec."
Lee nods and turns to see that the girl has stopped drawing and is looking at him. No, not at him—she is gazing right at Kara, who has abruptly appeared at his side, as she is wont to do these days. As if that isn't unsettling enough, Kara jabs her elbow into his side and rolls her eyes in the direction of the child.
When he still doesn't move, she actually shoves him forward. "Idiot," she mutters under her breath just as his legs finally get the message and start walking.
"Hey, Hera," he says. She just looks between him and Kara. Gods, this is uncomfortable. "What are you drawing?"
"Stars?" Kara prompts when the kid is still silent.
She nods, eyes turning back to her paper. Kara gives Lee another pointed look, and another pointed elbow in the side.
He winces. "Uh, they're very nice stars."
Hera whispers "thank you" so softly that Lee's not entirely certain she actually said the words. Still, he nods in reply and turns away from the girl as Helo approaches.
"Attaboy," Kara says, patting him on the back.
Fortunately, Kara's sufficiently interested in what Helo's got in his hands that she can't be bothered with her usual game of humiliating Lee in public.
"Took me awhile," the other man is saying, "but I managed to track this down after you asked. You know Catman, of all people, had it? No idea the guy was a music buff."
Lee takes the object from Karl's hand, feeling the cool plastic of the case. Catman, at least, seems to have taken good care of it, for there's nary a scratch on it.
"That what you were looking for?" Helo says in that even, appraising voice of his.
At Lee's side, Kara nods. "Yeah, this is it," he says.
Lee turns toward the hatch, Kara just over his shoulder when Hera halts him in his tracks with just a gesture. She's holding out that same paper with its colored stars and looking expectantly at him—or Kara, she's standing so close that Lee can't say for sure which it is.
"Is that for me?" Lee asks, as nicely as he can. Lords, but he doesn't know how to talk to kids.
She just keeps holding it out and keeps staring—gods, does she even blink?—at them. Not knowing what else to do, Lee takes it in his free hand.
He looks down at the drawing for a moment. "Thank you," he tells Hera with a smile. "And thank you too," he says to Helo. "I owe you one."
The man just looks at him in that infuriating I-know-something-about-you way. "Damn right you do."
"Don't worry," Kara says once they're out in the corridor. "You ever need to shut him up, I've got plenty of dirt on him."
"Very funny," Lee says. They walk in silence for a few minutes. Then, "so what did you want this for anyway?"
She shrugs, taking the case from him as he opens the hatch to his quarters. Her fingers trace the outline of the figure on the cover. Once they're inside, she's immediately popping it open and heading towards the locker. He knows she's going to get the music player he'd won (with her help—it wasn't really cheating) at the triad table two nights ago.
"Just wanted it," she says, her back to him.
As the gentle tones of piano music fill the room, Lee picks up the discarded case, familiarizing himself with this rare piece of her she's sharing. He takes in the black-and-white profile and the silver lettering.
Daniel Thrace: Live at the Helice Opera House.
A few nights later, after a hard shift, Kara coaxes Lee out to Joe's. Once they get there, however, it appears that she's the one who needs the coaxing. She stops in her tracks, transfixed by that piano, still sitting there untouched.
"Come on," Lee says. He takes her hand and it's like he's flying by feel alone as he guides her through the room to the looming piano. "Play for me?"
She stops just beside the bench, staring down at those keys. She looks wounded and afraid in a way that reminds him painfully of that day, that day when he'd seen her in the memorial hall, staring at a blank space on the wall. Had she known then what was coming?
But now Kara meets his eyes, that look passes, and he can breathe again. They sit on the bench, legs and thighs and hips pressed together. Kara's hands hover over the ivory keys, then she pulls them back in, twisting her fingers in her lap.
"You play," she whispers.
Lee puts his hands on the keys, calling back his ten-year-old self, and hesitantly taps out a scale and a few chords. Kara just sits and watches like she's waiting for something, so Lee finally begins to pick out the melody from that song she's been listening to obsessively. It takes him a few tries to get anything remotely resembling the tune, but when he does Kara seems to snap back to herself.
"No, that's," she says quickly, "that's wrong." When the brushes his hand aside and touches the keys, something seems to go through her. She inhales and exhales shakily, then slowly begins to play. Each note seems to hang quivering in the air between them, and Lee sees Kara blinking furiously as she plays.
He spots a pencil and some bare pages of sheet music atop the piano, and begins to painstakingly mark down each note. For perhaps the first time in his life, he's grateful for those years of lessons.
Kara pauses in her playing, glancing up to see what he's doing. "Holy crap," she whispers and immediately starts fumbling for something in her back pocket.
Lee watches, not comprehending, as she unfolds a piece of paper to reveal Hera's drawing. A feeling starts to build deep in his gut as she lays the drawing atop his own work and the notes line up almost perfectly. It's only the latest in weeks of impossible things, but somehow this one impossibility seems that much more unbelievable.
Kara, on the other hand, seems possessed by some unseen force, her hands moving with more urgency than he's seen in too long.
"Play the chords, Lee," she says. Before he can protest that he doesn't know how, her left hand covers his and she's there, pressing his fingers to the right keys, pounding out the rhythm while her right hand lets loose with the melody.
Suddenly, a heavy hand falls on Lee's shoulder and spins him around on the bench. He looks up into the perturbed face of Colonel Tigh.
"Where did you learn to play that song?"
Lee is at a loss for words, and he knows better than to look to the left for help. "Piano lessons," he says, "when I was a kid."
"What are you talking about?" the Colonel says. Tory Foster, Chief Tyrol, and Sam Anders crowd around him.
"What are you talking about?" Lee shoots back, staring at the odd group before him. What, are they friends?
"Who did this?" Foster asks, gripping the sheet music in both hands.
"I did," Lee snaps back, momentarily thankful that she hasn't seized Hera's drawing. He doesn't think his reputation would survive telling everyone he has a penchant for coloring.
It's Sam who pulls Tigh and the others away. Lee watches them go, not sure what to make of the decidedly strange encounter. But when he shrugs it off and turns to his silent companion, she's still staring after them. Lee doesn't have to look to know her eyes are on her husband as he walks away.
Since she'd initially refused to see Sam, Lee has wondered what her reaction to such an encounter would be. Still, he hasn't anticipated this. She looks settled in a way he couldn't have expected, and there's something almost serene in her eyes as she turns back to him, letting her fingers drag over the piano keys.
After a few minutes have passed in quiet contemplation, she turns to him again. "I haven't thought about my dad in ages," she says. "I was so angry."
"What changed?"
Kara tilts her head to the side as she looks at him, leaning her cheek on one hand while her other moves not-so-accidentally to rest next to his on the keys. "I'm not afraid anymore."
The next day, Lee returns from a shift in CIC to find Kara sitting at his desk, several pages of what appear to be mathematical notes—and he thinks he sees Hera's drawing too—spread out before her as she worries his pen between her teeth.
She barely pays him any attention as he greets her, so intent is she on whatever the hell she's doing.
Typical, Lee thinks without any real displeasure. Any other imaginary friend would actually notice him and listen when he talks and all that. But not Kara Thrace.
"Long-range sensors picked up some readings in a nearby system," he says. "Might be Cavil—either he's there now, or he jumped recently." Lee waits for a reaction. Nothing. She gives a little "hmm" between her teeth as she scribbles something down on the paper.
"So you know we need to fine-tune this battle plan," Lee continues. "And we've got to be ready to go ASAP."
She grunts.
"Dad says we need something outside the box, of course. So I'm thinking we'll ditch the traditional Vipers and gun batteries approach. I think if we just get Gaius Baltar on the comms, he can preach to his heart's content while we replace all our ammo with algae substitute. That'll show 'em."
"Mm-hm."
Lee sits on the bunk, and half-heartedly glares at the back of her head. "Kara. What are you doing? What's so important that you decided to hang around here all day?"
"Instead of hanging around CIC all day? Painting my frakking toenails, Lee."
"Yeah, yeah, smartass," he says, unbuttoning his uniform jacket and shrugging out of it. Next, he goes to work on his boots, sighing with relief when they're off. In just his socks, he pads over to the desk, peering over Kara's shoulder at the pages filled with musical notes and mathematical equations. "Considering a new career as a mathematician?"
"Hilarious," she says. "Do you write your own material?"
He can see the corner of her smile, though, as he lightly cuffs her head in retaliation.
"No, I'm…" She hesitates, turning slightly in the chair so that she's facing him now. "You won't laugh?" When he shakes his head, she continues. "I've been thinking about that song, the one my dad taught me and…I dunno, I think it's important somehow. I've been having these dreams, and hearing the song, and then Hera writes the notes…it can't be a coincidence.
"I think it's a code. I think if I can work out numerical values for the notes in the sequence, we'll have jump coordinates."
Lee stares at the desk, then at her. She's looking at him expectantly. "You really think you can do this?"
She shrugs, standing up. "I do. Besides, it makes about as much sense as anything else these days." She brushes past his shoulder. "That algae idea's inspired, Lee. Bastards'll never see it coming."
Later, Lee will think he should have seen it coming, should have known this peace would not last. But now, things are happening too fast and the pieces don't fall into place until it's far too late.
Kara spends much of the next night and day puzzling over her calculations, and somehow still finds the time to go over the plan he's drawn up with his father. The plan is inspired, and perhaps the most dangerous thing his father has ever proposed. But Starbuck approves, and that will have to be enough for Apollo.
That night, Kara lets Lee hold her after their lovemaking. He can't find it in him to worry in this moment, not with Kara's chin tucked into his neck, her cheek pressing against his. His hands trace the strong lines of her back, and her toes drag against his calf. He falls asleep like this, his senses suffused with her.
Kara falls asleep smiling. His body warms her, and she feels his arms around her even in dreams.
Kara opens her eyes and takes in the lush colors and the grand, open space. She knows this place. She has been here before.
She walks forward, past the rows and rows of empty seats. She's wearing her best shoes, which aren't very comfortable, but Daddy likes them. They are soundless on the plush carpeting. When the music finishes, he calls her up on stage. There are five bright pillars behind him, but they make her eyes hurt to look at them.
I'm sorry, Kara, he says, for so many things. I'm sorry you had to see like this. But you're free now.
With the last strains of music still echoing between them, she takes his hand. The warmth of it touches her through the thick flight glove as though there were no barrier. Hands together, they turn their backs on the crowded opera house.
He guides her through those pillars and Kara closes her eyes against the bright light. Blue and red and yellow burn against her eyelids. She's weightless, tethered to this world by his hand alone.
Kara takes a breath, opens her eyes. She sees stars.
Kara wakes, still in Lee's arms, and she knows. All her life, she's seen circles and circles, endless cycles and patterns. This one finally makes sense.