Chapter 13-

Kara-

When she woke up she felt the soft pillow under her head and a blue blanket keeping her warm from the room's chill. The very first thing her mind registered was that they had not been there when she fell asleep. It was dark in the office when she knew she'd left the lights on and the book had a bookmark in it.

Pushing the covers off of her body she stood up and stretched. This wasn't good, not at all, she thought furiously, he may have covered her up with a blanket and pillows, but what else had he done to her? She should have known better than to fall asleep, but she had been bored, and the book of poetry had been familiar. As a matter of fact there was a copy of the same book sitting in her storage locker on Galatica, which was probably light years away. Before she had known it, her eyelids were closing of their own accord and she was sucked into dreamland.

Nightmares had plagued her for as long as she could remember. It had become a fact of Kara Thrace's life, four out of seven days of the week she woke up often more than once in the middle of the night panting and shaking. It had used to be so bad she'd wake up screaming, but that had long since faded as ghosts of her past didn't become so much of a shock anymore. The fact she was stuck with about 10 of her co-workers in the bunkroom didn't hurt her learning to tolerate them, or at least make sure she was quiet and didn't whimper or cry when she was asleep, either.

The nightmare she'd had was one she hadn't had in a while. She had first started having it after she'd first tortured Leoben aboard the Geminion Traveler. Some of her worst childhood memories played out again for her: her father leaving, when her mother broke her fingers, her pyramid knee injury, and the wet and bedraggled Leoben was there to watch it all. He'd make comments here and there, how it was God's will and his way of leading her to finding him or whatever psycho babble he'd thought up this week. She always woke up before the dream could complete itself.

Her fingers reached into her boot and curled around the hilt of what had once been Admiral Cain's pocket knife. She hoped wherever the woman's soul had ended up she would help Kara through this, despite the short time she had known her. Kara had respected her and sought to please her, because Lords knew she hadn't been able to please her mother. Kara needed a more than a bit of the deceased Pegasus Commanding officer's hard, fiery, ruthlessness right about now.

She moved carefully out of the office, just in case Leoben happened to still be lurking about, she moved across the living room floor with practiced stealth. The clock on the hall was hit by one of the planet's two moon's light reading three or so in the morning. Perfect time to strike, if all was well he would be asleep right about now. She didn't know what exactly the cylon had done to her, but he had disturbed her while sleeping. At the very least he had watched her sleep. At the very most he had invaded her personal space while she was asleep, and that was unforgivable.

Not even Sam, Zak, or Lee had ever done such a thing; they knew that when she was asleep she was not to be messed with if only due to fear of their own health. Starbuck had no intentions of anyone seeing her sleep or the nightmares that plagued her, much less bother her. Everyone knew you didn't bother anyone while sleeping, bunkroom and rooming etiquette 101.

The fact the cylon had broken it, and acted like he cared about her to farther fuel his insane idea that he was in love with her and she would one day fall in love with him too bothered her. He was cylon, she was a human. It was that simple. Helo and Sharon had been different, because she had changed because of her time pretending to be human. Leoben had no such excuse, he was a cylon, he pretended there was a nuke on one of their ships, he'd nearly strangled her and attacked guards. Cylons had destroyed her entire civilization; they had launched nuke after nuke after nuke to destroy her home worlds. They were evil, but she, she was human. And while humans could be evil they could be good too. She had seen some of the worst human evils in her time, and yet she knew the goodness existed somewhere too, it was part of the reason she had gone into the military in the first place.

Shaking her head a moment or two to help get her mind back into the game plan she considered her MO. Obviously she would have to send a message to the cylon that bothering her while sleeping was not tolerated, but how. Throwing a fit wouldn't serve her purposes nor would it get the message across. So she would have to send the message to him the only way she knew how, violence.

Her long, tapered fingers slid the blade out of the pocket knife's handle, which she decided to keep in her right hand. These fingers, were, if you looked close enough, slightly crooked in the same spot. Kara was ambidextrous, she had to be, considering how many times both of her arms had been broken as a child, but she favored her right hand. Maybe because it was the hand she liked to write with the best, or because her paintings and drawings always seemed to turn out better when she used it, she didn't know.

Padding as quietly as she could, something she had also learned from her days under Socrata Thrace's 'care', she carefully found the door knobs handle and turned it ever so slowly as to not wake him up. She didn't know how sensitive he was, but she had learned how to do this quietly, sneaking out of her room for food, leaving for parties and clubs as a teen, and sneaking out of the enemy territory in the Basic Training exercises. She made it in and padded softly to where he appeared to be still sleep.

Three fifteen now, or so the digital clock on the dresser across the room said, the blue glow of the numbers the only real light in the room besides a night light next to the closet. Why in the name of the Gods would a cylon need a nightlight? What was its' purpose, did he have sight issues or something? Sharon had confirmed cylons were like humans, only they could see, hear, smell much better than a human could. So why did a cylon need a nightlight?

Pushing the distraction to examine it later she carefully approached the bed where he was asleep, curled up like a little kid. He slept on his hands, clasped together under his chin like a prayer. His neck was blocked, it was the quickest place to kill him, the back of his neck would be too much to risk, as she would have to reach over him or go from the other side of the bed, both of which left her exposed.

The chest was a no as she would have to shift the covers and that might wake him up, She decided what she was going to do was to grab his hands and move them carefully away as possible, if there was resistance she would push them out and go straight for the kill. Not a textbook plan, but she did live outside of the box.

Pulling her right arm with the pocket knife primed for leverage her left hand carefully moved forward to gently push his hands out of the way. She moved very slowly, taking her time, carful. You need patience to be a hunter, something she was not known for but, at times like this, she had an abundant amount of it. It was so odd, she could pull off things that required an almost Godlike amount of patience, and yet, when it came to other things in real life, she had almost none of it. Oh, the list went on, waiting for Lee and realizing it was never going to happen, waiting to get to go back for Sam, waiting for the shower even. But this, she was a hunter, and now Leoben was prey.

Pity there wasn't a bucket of water around.

Her left hand slowly clasped around his wrist and carefully pulled one of his hands away, giving her a small opening. Almost there, she would kill him in his sleep, he would go download and she could get some peaceful hours of rest knowing no cylon creep was watching her sleep.

The hand she had just moved shot up and grabbed her left wrist itself. Frack. She was no match for a cylon. Not that she wasn't going to try. Pulling backwards, another hand came up to try and wrap itself around her torso and stop her where she stood. Leoben had already gotten to his feet and she tried to backpedal, hoping it would give her an opening. He clearly had no idea of knowing that Starbuck didn't give up. Starbuck always won, always came back, and always killed the most cylons. That fact did not change juts because she had gotten herself caught by the cylons and was now apparently playing house with them.

She shifted her weight forward, her right arm coming and neatly drawing a line on his right shoulder down to his elbow. The cut wasn't threatening to his life, much to her dismay but it had to hurt. The hiss of pain that accompanied it only spurred her to attack more. Fight or frack, and since there was no way in Hades she would ever frack a toaster, that left fighting.

He was too strong, if she didn't do something she would quickly be overwhelmed and her only weapon would be taken from her. That couldn't happen. Pushing herself forward and unsettling his balance she let him get a hold of her torso and as he reached for the knife, she kept it just out of his reach and instead leaned forward again.

Starbuck wasn't sure what the hell she was doing, but she had one chance, one chance to make this work. Acting on pure instinct, she leaned forward and attacked his mouth with hers, running her tongue over his bottom lip and pushing itself into his mouth. She was slightly surprised his lips were so soft and he was very surprised by her own actions. His shock at her action was the only opening she needed.

Her right arm slipped free of his grasp and she shoved the blade that had seen two wars now into his throat, causing him to bleed instantly. Starbuck pulled away from him and leaned against the wall, panting, blood on her clothes and hands and the knife firmly in her grip.

The cylon lay on the floor of the bedroom he had predicted they would one day share. His blue eyes looked sadly at her, and what else was in them? Was it Love? Why would he love her, she questioned, she killed him, three times now if you counted when he had been airlocked. She was angry, on her way to leave the room and he was getting near death.

Kara lashed out, kicking him square in the ribs on her way to leave. "Don't come near me asleep again or next time will be more painful." She promised, and waited outside until she was sure he was dead. Truth be told her mind couldn't stop wondering why she had done what she did. She kept on telling herself the kiss was the only way to distract him, it meant nothing.

Kara knew what would happen if she started to think it meant anymore than that. It meant the cylon won. And she was not going to let him win. She was married to Sam, a man who loved her very much. There was no room for the cylon, even if he wasn't a cylon, obsessed with her to the point of locking her in an apartment all day, there wouldn't even be room for him if she was single and just looking for a good time with someone. For someone reason she had never really liked blondes, despite being one herself.

She prayed to the Gods for forgiveness for what she had done against Sam. She prayed they understood her reasoning and didn't punish her or Samuel for her act. Kara had no intentions of being unfaithful to her husband, something few had ever expected from her. Marriage was a sacred bounding between two people, she would not dare think of doing such a thing to it.

Kara took a deep breath and stepped back into the room. From what she knew of the cylon downloading process he'd be gone for a couple of hours. Relief flooded through her when she saw he was really dead. No more worrying if he would suddenly arrive and interrupt whatever she was doing.

Moving back towards the closet she pulled out a new set of clothes and darted into the bathroom. Her old clothes was still there, great what a pair of clothes, a lived in for about a week pair and ones she'd worn while killing a cylon.

Out of sheer boredom she went to the side of the vanity and scratched in one tic mark, than another. Two times she had gotten the best of him. Kara spent another few moments staring at her creation than turned on the shower again for the second time today. She had some fake blood to wash off.

Sam-

His sister in all but blood and pyramid team-mate Jean had come over to help him out a bit. Despite being ill still, though the worse was behind him, the cylons forcing him to work didn't help him any with getting better. He was still coughing and nowhere near as productive as he would be healthy.

But he didn't have a choice; he had to keep his head down. He couldn't draw any attention to himself, not just because he was a popular well liked person, hero of the Caprica resistance, but because of Kara. Being the husband of the most famous Viper jock the fleet knew meant he was recognized more for Kara's accomplishments than anything from his pyramid days. As all things, it came at a price, he had already learned that the model Twos were after Kara, though for better or worse seemed to vary, and Sam knew they might use him against her or vice versa.

Lying down covered in blankets, another coughing fit seized his body and Jean passed him water. He and Jean went back, way back, way back to when they were being scouted. They had tried a love relationship but quickly realized they were better friends than lovers or frack buddies. Not that the press hadn't coined them as a cute couple or some random bit like that, they were just simply best friends. The closet example he could think of to describe what he had with Jean was Kara and Helo.

He gulped down the liquid, the drink soothing his throat for a while. Sam leaned back against the pillow, which was starting to finally lose the scent of his wife.

It made him so frustrated, she was probably in some cell somewhere, shivering and in pain, while he could barely stand after a while of working. Some husband I am Sam realized bitterly. I can't even save my own wife from cylons after everything she did for me.

Jean was reading some piece of paper that had been on the table. "Hey Sam you seen this?" Sam grunted a no, and Jean brought it over to him, her ponytail holding her long red-hair swishing as she did so. She passed the corner-less paper to him and he unfolded the paper curiously.

The handwriting was a neat like precision, if not for a few irregularities here and there he would have thought it had been typed on a computer. It wasn't anyone's hand-writing he recognized. No one had hand-writing like this, he would have remembered it.

While the handwriting was odd what the note said was far more important.

"I know where Kara is."

That was all. No name, no nothing. He looked at Jean who seemed just as confused as he was. He shook his head at the unspoken question of 'did he know who had written the note?'. This had to be some cylon trick or a cruel prank. But I know where Kara is, he'd show it to the insurgency tomorrow or whenever the next meting was.

"Want me to hang onto it?" Jean offered, and he gratefully handed the paper to her. If he didn't get it out of his sightline he would start to go crazy. Kara was the only thing he had left anymore, the fact someone was using her to tease him, play with him, was disturbing in itself. What kind of person dangled information like that in front of someone unless it was a cruel game?

Jean silently made her leave then, and Sam was left in his once shared tent all alone. He tried to fall asleep than, only to be unable to. His imagination dredged up the kind of horrors she could be going through, maybe they had tried to put her in a farm again? Sam shuddered and it had nothing to do with the cold temperature.

After a while exhaustion from the day's work took over and he drifted into an uneasy but uneventful sleep. No nightmares tonight, for which he was grateful. He was given a day of rest tomorrow, of course it coincided with the cylon calendar instead of the colonial but he wasn't complaining, he wouldn't have to go build a water system tomorrow and could actually get better. And than, maybe than, he would be able to rescue Kara.

Note: In my BSG universe, the movie Razor happened except for the bit at the end where the hybrid on the old Basestar told Kendra Shaw "Kara Thrace is evil, will lead them all to their end is the harbinger of death" etc. I was never happy with the whole she's bad news plot-line and so that would be eliminated, but everything else in Razor stands, And since Kara had the pocketknife at the end from Shaw, who got it from Cain, I assume she kept it. Of course Thanks to my beta, and another note that since school starts up soon, it may have an impact on update frequency.