Author's Note: Hello there ladies and gents! Chapter number two is officially HERE!! So now, you ready to rock this house?

Disclaimer: I own an epic mood ring – it's the kind of ring that you wear on your thumb, F.Y.I. Guess who's being cosplayed? :D

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I was nearly two seconds away from collapsing on the floor in exhaustion. My legs felt like jelly, and my lungs had probably shrunk down to the size of kidney beans. "Mom, can we take a breather for a quick second, PLEASE? My chest hurts like hell," I rasped, struggling to ignore the pain radiating in my chest.

My mom, who looked like she'd only been running for a mile and a half instead of four, shook her head and give me an eat-shit grin. "C'mon Sloane, you're thirteen years old, and you're as healthy as a frakking racehorse. If a girl like you can easily do twenty pullups, then you sure as hell can run six miles around Galactica."

Twenty pullups...gods, she makes it sound like I can frakking do a hundred of 'em.

"Mom, let me make this clear to you - NO. Four miles is my limit, not six."

Mom smirked and raised a blonde eyebrow. "You wanna fly vipers, Sloane?"

"Ah, don't do this to me-"

"Do you wanna learn to pilot a viper, or do you wanna be stuck doing repair jobs with Uncle Galen and sitting around in Uncle Helo's raptor for the rest of your life?"

"Hey, I actually like hanging out with them, mom," I contradicted. I did - Uncle Galen and Uncle Helo were pretty fun to hang around. Galen was hangar deck chief of Galactica and a badass, and Uncle Helo was the battlestar's best raptor pilot, and another badass. They were great.

Nonetheless, my mom did have a point, I guess. Viper pilots had to be pretty damn healthy and fit to fly a bird and handle the G's that came with it. You were pretty much screwed in the cockpit if you couldn't take the heat. But how does this apply to me? Well, I wanna be a pilot like you people wouldn't even BELIEVE; in fact, I'm so godsdamned focused on becoming one that mom's decided to throw me a bone and get me going on training in a couple weeks. Hey, I may be thirteen years old, but I learn fast and conquer. Besides, I hear that getting a head start on something at a young age means more wisdom and experience later on in the future.

Back to the original subject, though. Mom said that running and working out and all that other b.s. would help me get ready for the work ahead. Believe me, I get that it's important to be in top physical condition before jumping in a viper, but is it so important that I'm stuck running four to six miles a day?

Mom's voice brought me out of the murkiness of my thoughts. She pursed her lips, and calmly asked, "Well Sloane? Do you wanna fly vipers or not?"

I couldn't say no to her, there was no way in hell that I could. She was my mom, for frak's sake.

Damn her, and damn manipulation.

I sighed. "Yeah, I wanna fly vipers."

"Then keep running."

Reluctantly, I kept my legs moving, ignoring the fact that they were almost screaming in pain and soreness. "You are certifiably INSANE, you know that, mom?"

Mom laughed. "Trust me, you'll thank me later." She turned a corner, and left me struggling to catch up to her. "Just keep running, Sloane. You'll get used to the feeling soon."

She then barged through a cluster of people with a cry of, "Make a hole!" and disappeared around another corner.

Great. Now she's abandoned me. Joy of joys.

"FRAKKING SADIST!" I shouted at the top of my lungs, even though I knew mom wouldn't hear me. By now, she was too far away to be able to listen to me.

Evil woman.

"My gods, I'm gonna smack her when I'm done," I muttered.

"And who would she be?"

I looked over my shoulder, and saw Commander Adama staring at a small piece of paper in his wrinkly hands. He was murmuring the words to himself softly, like he was trying to memorize what had been written down. For a moment, I thought that what he was doing was a little odd; then it occurred to me that today was Galactica's decommissioning ceremony. The old man was memorizing the speech that had been pre-written for him.

Duh.

I smiled at the old man. "My mom, who else?"

He chuckled. "What's Starbuck done this time, Sloane?"

I gulped in a big breath of air before speaking. "She gave me a fitness lecture, then ran ahead of me to finish up her mile," I grumbled.

"How many miles have you done already?" he asked.

"Four...but the way my mom says it, you'd think I only ran one."

Adama chuckled again. "That explains why you look like a strawberry. I'll tell you what though, Sloane - why don't I tell your mother that I have a job for you, and we call it quits on the running?" he offered.

I frakking LOVED this guy. "What kind of job did you have in mind there, sir?"

"Well, Chief Tyrol says that he needs another deckhand to help him fix up the vipers before the decommissioning today. Why don't you go down to the hangar and give him a hand?"

"You," I panted, "are the frakking BOMB. Thank you!"

"I don't know how your mother lets you use language like that, but oh well." Adama laughed throatily and shook his head. "Get going now, Sloane. Chief's waiting for you on the hangar deck."

I grinned. "Yes sir," I huffed tiredly as I gave him a casual salute. Then, I jogged - at turtle speed, of course - down to the hangar to help Uncle Galen patch up the vipers.

As I moved through the halls, I sighed to myself blissfully, thinking of the repairs that would be sitting in front of me. One thing you should know about me: next to being just weird as hell and screwing around with certain things - and people, when I was feeling evil - I loved toying around with the birds. Not only was it a good way for me to really get friendly with the things and all their inner clockwork, but it was a shitload of fun to fix 'em up and see what they could do afterwards. Ever send a viper out of a launch tube, then just watch it blow anything in sight to hell? Well, lemme tell ya, it's really frakking COOL. Even cooler than fireworks, if you ask me.

Anyway, I finally reached the hangar deck, and was happy to see six birds with the painfully obvious yellow repair tape. Just my day, I thought to myself. Patchin' up birds with Uncle Galen, and absolutely no crap from mom - well, for the moment anyway. This is frakking perfect.

"Hey Sloane, what are you doing down here?" Uncle Galen asked as he came over and gave me a big 'ole hug. "Just dropped in to say hi?"

"Actually, no. The old man said you were short one deckhand, so I figured that I'd be a good niece and help you out with the vipers." I pulled on a neon-orange knuckledragger suit, then only zipped it up to the waist and tied the arms around it. Hey, those things could make you pretty godsdamn hot if you wear 'em all the way...wear that monkey suit for a good twenty minutes, and you'll be sweating like a frakking pig.

"Great! I was just about to ask you if you wanted to help me and the other guys out. No need to now, I suppose." Uncle Galen picked up his ever-present toolbox, and made his way over to one of the birds. "Just pick a bird with repair tape around it - you know the drill."

I nodded obediently, then picked out a bird with a screwy DRADIS. As I climbed into the cockpit to get to work on the DRADIS, I noticed two deckhands come on the deck. One of the two - Cally, a chick with straight reddish-brown hair, bangs, and a frak-ton of freckles sprinkled across her face - smiled and waved at me. The other - Prozna, who I thought was the biggest bore on Galactica - grumbled out a "Hello" as he trudged over to another bird with a slightly damaged underbelly.

"Cally!" Uncle Galen called out from across the bay. "How much time 'til the old man's here?"

Cally held up three fingers. "You got the picture?"

Uncle Galen nodded, then pulled out a large, hexagonal-shaped object wrapped in white paper. "Tell everyone to get to their places, 'kay Cally?" He then pointed to me and said, "You too, Sloane. Right now, you'd be considered a deckhand, so follow Cally and the others, and you'll be good to go, alright?"

I flashed Uncle Galen a thumbs-up, then jumped out of the cockpit, and stood beside Cally and Prozna just as the old man came on the deck.

"Attention on deck!" Uncle Galen barked as he saluted Adama.

Adama saluted back, and said, "At ease, Chief."

"This way, sir."

Adama followed Uncle Galen over to the group of deckands, and stood in front of a large figure shrouded in a black sheet.

Huh, never noticed that before. Gods, I feel blind now.

Two deckhands went around behind the mystery thing, and yanked the sheet off. As it floated dramatically to the floor, it was hard to keep my mouth from dropping down in awe. The thing in front of me right now, was a viper mark II. It looked like it had just been rolled off the show floor; the paint job was immaculate, the body had absolutely NO dings or scratches on it, and the trusters looked like they hadn't even been used yet. This baby was a frakking BEAUTY.

The old man's eyes grew wide at the sight of it. "A mark II....I haven't seen one of these things in about twenty years."

"If the commander will look at the tail numbering," Uncle Galen said.

Adama chuckled as he looked at the callsign plate. From I was standing, I could see his name, and the callsign HUSKER below it in large brassy letters. His amusement lasted for only a second, then he directed his attention to the tail of the viper.

"Nebula seven-two-four-two constellation."

A nostalgic look appeared on the old man's face. "Oh my gods, where did you find her?" he demanded after a few seconds of staring at the tail number.

Uncle Galen grinned. "Rusting out in a salvage yard in Sagittarion." His grin grew bigger as he looked at the mark II. "We had hope that the commander would allow her to participate in the decommissioning ceremony."

They found this thing in a SALVAGE YARD? Okay, I definitely wasn't buying that load of bullshit. The thing looked like it was frakking brand new!

"She'll fly?"

"Oh yes, sir. We've...restored the engine, patched the guidance system, replaced much of the flight controls, and it's armed and ready for launch, sir."

The old man ran a large hand across the body of the viper. "You guys are amazing," he murmured.

Uncle Galen then produced the hexagon-shaped object from behind his back, and handed it to Adama. "Commander."

"What, more?" he chuckled as he gladly took in his hands, and began to tear the paper off. "Somebody's bucking for a promotion around here."

"I believe that would be Prozna, sir. He found this in the fleet archives. He was doing some research for the museum."

Adama stared longingly at the hexagon in his hands - which I found out from Cally, was actually an old picture of him and his two sons, Zak and Lee - and mumbled something under his breath. Then, he looked at everyone present, and said, "Thank you...thank you all. It's an honor."

"You're welcome, sir," Uncle Galen smiled. Then, he dismissed everyone and told us to get back to work.

I jumped back in the viper with the gimpy DRADIS, and proceeded to undo the screws on the screen. "That was pretty sweet," I said absent-mindedly.

"Dontcha know it, Sloane." Cally half-smiled at me as she tightened loose bolts on the wing of a viper. "You have no idea how long it took us to fix that up....it sure as hell was worth it, though."

"Oh yeah...what possessed you guys to do that?"

"Sloane, the old man hasn't seen that bird in twenty years," Prozna replied as he wheeled out from under the bird he'd chosen to work on and gave me a DUH look. "We figured it would be nice to let him see it again before his son took it out for a spin during the decommissioning ceremony today."

Well, THAT was new - not only did Adama have two kids, but one of them was a pilot, too.

"Adama's son is a pilot?"

Prozna nodded. "Yup, and a damn good one, too. In fact, Lee Adama is such a good viper pilot that he almost passed your mother up in the best pilot category while they were in flight school."

"He almost did, but he didn't actually do it. So, my mom's still keepin' her status as a badass flying goddess." I undid the last screw on the dashboard, and yanked it off to reveal a bunch of multicolored wires and circuitboards. "Gods, who woulda' thought that Adama had kids?"

"Too bad it's only down to one now," Prozna muttered as he returned to repairing the underside of his viper.

Okay, what the hell?

"Wait a minute, what the frak happened to Zak?"

"He died two years ago," Uncle Galen sighed. "He crashed his viper into the Caprican Flight Academy's landing deck. Crash, bang, boom, done. It was bad."

Shit, that must've killed the old man when he found out.

"Well, that's depressing."

"Even more depressing than not knowing who your own father is?"

I shook my head. "No way. That sucker still ranks up top as number one."

There was nothing in the universe that could come close to being as depressing as my being fatherless. Ever since I was born, I've never known who my own dad is. What his name is, what he does for a job, what his personality's like - NOTHING. Whatever information about him usually came from mom when she got too cozy with a bottle or two of ambrosia. According to her, my dad has blue eyes - they were the kind of blue that could either be so beautiful that they made you wanna cry; or they could be so cold and harsh that you may as well be frozen into a godsdamn ice cube if you stare into them too long. It was all I knew about him.

As I untangled the massive jumble of wires in the cockpit, I said to no one in particular, "Does my dad even know I exist?"

All of a sudden, Uncle Galen shushed me. "Quiet Sloane, we've got chatter."

Obediently, I stopped my babbling, and listened; sure enough, there was comm. chatter going on between a pilot and flight control.

"Viper four-five-zero, this is Galactica. Approach port-side landing bay, hands-on speed one-zero-five. Checker's red, call the ball."

"Galactica, this is viper four-five-zero. Check that, did you say hands-on approach?" the pilot said in an unsure voice.

"Viper four-five-zero, that's affirmative."

"Copy that, Galactica. Port landing bay, hands-on approach one-zero-five. I have the ball."

As soon as the pilot said that, everybody on the hangar deck went ballistic with franticness. "LET'S GO, LET'S GO, LET'S GO!" Uncle Galen shouted to the deckhands. "SLOANE, YOU STAY PUT, GOT IT?"

Well DUH, what else do you want me to do?

"WILL DO!" I hollered back, then sat back and watched as chaos unfolded on the deck. Knuckledraggers and the occasional pilot or two were running around and squawking like a bunch of chickens. They all rushed to clear a path for the incoming viper and it's pilot, and desperately attempted to not make a total frakking mess while they did so. I shook my head and smirked; it was pretty rare for me to see a pilot board the ship, especially if it was a pilot from another battlestar, so I guess you could call this a bit of entertainment for me.

Anyway, the viper was wheeled on to the deck, and Uncle Galen immediately ordered everybody to stand to the side. "Captain Lee Adama, on deck!" he barked as he gave a stiff salute.

The cockpit of Apollo's - I was able to see his callsign plate from where I was sitting - viper was slid open, and after his helmet and oxygen collar were removed, he stood up and looked at everyone.

This was it - Lee Adama had officially arrived.

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SCORE!! Yet another chappie finished and POSTED!!!!! :D Anyways, R&R!!!!!!! REVIEWS ARE POWER!!!!