54 Days After Cylon Attack
Coordinates Unknown
Is this the shape of things to come...?
Only one thing for it then—
Bill Adama woke with a gasp.
He couldn't breathe.
Pain was a line of fire down his chest and across his torso, but his lower body felt cold, like he'd been standing too long in waist deep water.
The more he tried to get air the more it hurt.
Panic gripped him as he fought against a pair of hands that held him down.
"Easy, easy—Doctor! He's awake—Hey, calm down, it's okay, you're okay."
His struggling subsided once conscious thought caught up with his body's reaction of distress. A few slow, shallow breaths and he found he could breathe around the pain, but frak—his chest ached and he had to close his eyes until they adjusted to the lights.
What happened?
It took a second for him to realize that he hadn't actually spoken. He swallowed and tried again.
"What happened?" he croaked.
"You were shot," replied Cottle. "Two bullets."
That much he'd figured out already. He remembered the impact, a familiar sensation from having been shot before, but the last time he'd taken a few rounds he had been wearing tactical gear and it had felt more like getting hit with a sledgehammer, less like having been run through with a white hot poker.
"How—How long have I—?"
"Three days."
Bill pushed himself up into a sitting position.
"Hey, hey, just what the frak do you think you're doing?"
He didn't respond, instead he sat perfectly still, his teeth ground together as pain arced across his body and his vision pulsed dark. "Do you believe in destiny..." No. When the sensation had faded down to a dull ache, Bill looked up at the doctor.
"Get me a Marine escort," he said, "and something to wear."
"You're in no condition to leave the infirmary."
Adama forced himself to sit up straighter and resisted the urge to wrap his arm across his stomach.
"My ship hasn't had a commander for three days, I can't stay here."
Cottle tried to assure him that his ship and the fleet had survived intact without him, but Bill could tell from the way the doctor was ignoring the burning cigarette in his hand that he was trying to hide something.
"You need rest," insisted Cottle.
"I've had enough rest." The doctor met Bill's glare with one of his own, but Cottle flinched when his neglected cigarette started to burn his fingers.
"Ah, frak." He snubbed out the cigarette. "All right," he said with a huff. He turned to the medic who had been hovering nearby. "Ishay, find him something and call down a couple of Marines. If the commander wants to leave, let's see him try." He threw one last glare at Adama and then walked away, grumbling something that sounded like "damn fool."
Bill was being foolish, he knew. He shouldn't be sitting up, much less trying to leave. It wouldn't take more than a phone call to have Saul come down to sickbay and brief him, but something pressed, a shadow, a whisper in the back of his mind—fear—that if he didn't get up now he might not be able to later, that if he rested and fell asleep, he might end up trapped in the dark, unable to wake. He didn't want to just sit here with his pain and his fear and the jumble of thoughts that plagued him between one throbbing heartbeat and the next. "Do you believe in destiny?...It catches up with you...No matter what you do..." He forced his mind to concentrate on something else by examining the bandages that covered nearly half his chest. The slightest pressure from his fingers around any of those bandages left him holding his breath with his eyes squeezed shut. It was like trying to breathe with lungs full of glass shards, so when Ishay returned with a robe and a full set of tanks he knew not to bother with anything above the waist.
She set the pile of clothes down next to him, stepped outside the boundary of the curtain around his bed and pulled it closed to give him some privacy. It took a couple of tries and a steady stream of curse words, but he managed to change into a fresh pair of boxers and get his arms into the robe. Once he managed that, he looked around to find his glasses folded neatly on the bedside table. Even though they were only for reading, he picked them up and put them on. When he looked at his surroundings everything seemed a little sharper, a little clearer. He was alive. This was real. I'm okay. So he tried to stand for longer than a second and take a few steps, but the floor felt like it was shifting underneath him... "You can't fight destiny...It catches up..."
"Commander?" Ishay's cautious inquiry was followed the curtain being pulled back a fraction, and when he didn't object, she stepped through. "Your escort is here," she said.
He was on his feet, but with his back against the bed and both hands braced to hold himself up.
"Sir—?"
"Just, give me a minute," he replied through his ragged breathing.
She left and returned a moment later with a cane. She held it out to him without comment and he accepted it with a quiet thank you. He shifted his weight onto the cane and after he was sure that he had enough strength to stay upright without falling over, he moved out from behind the curtain. His legs were stiff and he was sweating with the effort of keeping himself focused on maintaining slow, controlled movements, but it was getting easier.
Bill noted the time before he left, a little after twenty fifteen hundred hours. Normally, Saul would be just off his watch in CIC and so the commander headed for the XO's quarters. But what's normal on a ship after her CO 's nearly killed? He had to stop more than once to catch his breath and was grateful that the corridors were relatively empty of personnel. For their part his escort kept silent. The Marine on his right he recognized as Sergeant Griggs. Griggs kept his gaze steadfastly ahead, but the other one, a Marine Bill didn't know, kept glancing at him every so often with thinly disguised concern.
"What's your name, Corporal?" he asked when he paused again to rest.
"Dasilva, sir."
Dasilva works with Griggs. Bill offered a nod of satisfaction and started moving again. He took a turn down the final section of corridor that led to Saul's quarters and though he couldn't make out the specifics of what was being said he could hear Ellen Tigh's voice echo in the hall. If she's been harping at Saul this whole time... Gods knew what kind of damage her influence had done.
He heard her accusing declaration, "All because when push came to shove, you got shoved."
"It was his son..."
"Saul," Bill interjected from the open hatchway. "What's happening on my ship?" Adama glanced back over his shoulder and told the Marines to wait in the corridor. Saul had already moved from his seat to help Bill inside. "Ellen, can I speak to my XO?"
"Of course." She drifted out of the room, her expression a mix of shock and he noted, no small measure of disappointment.
"Slow," he cautioned as Saul eased him down onto a chair. He couldn't stop a groan from escaping as he shifted his weight. "What's happened?"
Saul pulled up a chair and sat across from him. "I frakked things up and good."
"How?"
"I made some bad calls."
"I've done that." Too many times to count. Besides, Saul made bad calls even when he wasn't drinking and arguing with his wife, that was nothing new.
"Not like these."
Bill glanced at the table to his left and the bottle sitting on it. Frak, he was thirsty. "You gonna pour us one of those or what?"
"Yeah."
"Never had much use, for people who second-guessed my decisions," said Bill. I won't second guess yours. "Especially if they've never held a command. They don't understand the pressure." You've probably borne a lot in the last few days and you never were very good at handling stress. "You make a call, it effects the lives of thousands and you have no one to turn to for backup." I wasn't here, but I am now.
"Eh, you make it look easy." Saul handed him a glass with a few sips worth of what smelled like whiskey. He drank it and immediately regretted it. The alcohol did nothing to ease his thirst and only reminded him of the aching line of stitched together skin that ran down his chest.
"Well, you know that's a lie now." You know all the mistakes I've made. You were there trying to convince me not to make them.
"A lot of pieces to pick up..."
"Then we'll pick 'em up together." Whatever you did, I forgive you. I don't have choice. "Where's my son?"
Saul looked down at the glass in his hand and set it back onto the table. "I don't know. He sprang Roslin from the brig about an hour ago. We lost 'em in the traffic around Cloud Nine and we're not gonna have a lot of help from the fleet after what I've done," he admitted. "Martial law and boarding parties didn't go over too well. Most of the ships are refusing resupply orders, hell any kind of orders..."
"You declared martial law?" Frak. That's something it's too late to undo. Bill sighed. "Then we wait, for as long as we can, let things cool off. But Saul, you make it clear to the fleet's captains that if they refuse to provide Galactica with whatever aid we request then when the Cylons catch up, I will respond in kind."
"Yes, sir." Saul retrieved his abandoned drink and gulped it down. "There's one more thing..." He stared at the bottom of his empty glass. "Roslin's dying."
"What?"
"Cottle confirmed it." Tigh reached for the bottle to refill his drink rather than meet his friend's gaze. "Cancer."
"That's—" He paused. That's not—No...
His thoughts tumbled back into motion as the pieces slid together. The signs had been there all along... "We'll just have to find Earth." She was running out of time. "We better find it soon." She had been from the start. "Do you have a ship's doctor aboard Galactica?" And Lee, Lee had known... "You don't seem surprised." He'd kept her secret almost as well as she did. "Something wrong?" Because she could lie without flinching. "No, nothing at all." And he'd believed in her, in both of them.
"Frak."
"Bill, I—" Saul was interrupted by the buzz of his phone. "Frakkin' thing never quits..." The colonel went to answer it and though he kept his voice calm and his expression neutral Bill knew it wasn't good news. "Sonofabitch," he sighed as he returned the phone to its cradle.
"Another piece to pick up?"
"Something like that," he mumbled. "I better go see to it. I'll have a full report for you tomorrow." Bill recognized that as Saul's polite way of insisting that his commander let him handle things. He trusted Saul to do his job, if only because at this point he didn't think is could get much worse and he was too tired to argue. Adama pushed himself onto his feet and went back out into the corridors where his Marine escort was waiting.
By the time he made it to the infirmary his excursion had left him exhausted. He nearly collapsed into his bed and he didn't object when Cottle insisted on overnight observation.
"And I don't care if half the ship's on fire," continued the doctor, "you're staying here until I say otherwise, understand?"
It wouldn't have been so bad if he could sleep. When the lights were turned down for the night he tried. He lay still and closed his eyes, but in the dark he had no way to escape the memories that pushed their way to the surface. As soon as he drifted off, he was falling...
The sky spun, a long gray blur across his vision and the wind howled. In his ears was the urgent cry of an alarm that meant only one thing, eject. Eject.
He reached for the handle and—nothing. No! The wind deepened into a roar. There is no victory without sacrifice.
From the darkness you must fall...
Eject eject eject! I have to—
Bill jerked awake. The sudden movement lent a sharp edge to the painkiller and sedative induced fog that masked the ache of his body. He held himself motionless, lying on his back with one hand clenched around a tangle of sheets, the other hung over the side of the bed in open air. There was no ejection handle there for him to pull that would get him out of this. Failed and weak. He closed his eyes again in the hopes that he would calm down, but within moments the darkness dragged him under. To darkness all...
He emerged from the shadows into a narrow corridor where the lights flickered across the walls. He had a rifle in his hands and was wearing tactical gear over his flight suit. He was alone. Between one flicker and the next he stood in the middle of a junction, exposed from three different directions. He swept his rifle from one empty corridor to another. The lights blinked out. When they flashed back on he wasn't alone anymore.
He saw the barrel of the gun, but not the person holding it, and reacted, fired without thinking only—no ammo. He couldn't hear it, but he felt it. The shot, it hit him like a hammer. The lights flickered again. He was on his knees. There was no pain. Must have missed... But when he looked down his hand came away from the side of his bulletproof vest covered in blood.
He had to stand up, had to move, before—
A voice, far away...
"Get up. Come on, you have to get up." She sounded worried, desperate, familiar. But he couldn't see her. "On your feet solider. Let's go." Hands tried to pull him up and he tried to obey, but his lower body felt cold, it wouldn't move the way it was supposed to. He stumbled, the room spun and he couldn't keep his balance. He was falling—
Bill woke again and before the drugs Cottle had given him could carry him off into yet another nightmare, he pushed himself up into a sitting position. He contemplated trying to leave sickbay. Maybe he'd get some decent rest if he was in his quarters where he could lock the hatch and have his back against a wall, but the thought of going out into darkened corridors alone kept him in bed. He couldn't let himself fall asleep again, so he made use of the habits that had he'd developed as a commander—habits that were the result of a warning he'd taken to heart— "When you finally have a battlestar of your own, know the name of every man and woman who serves with you. Know who they really are. Because if you don't—" He pushed the memory away.
Dasilva works with Griggs. Dasilva works with Griggs.
He kept going, listing every name he could remember, from Galactica, Valkyrie, Columbia, Atlantia, Cerberus... He ran through the pre-flight, launch and post-flight checklists that he'd used thousands of times when flying. He recited the oaths he'd sworn as an officer and a commander and, piece by piece, he used it all to reconstruct the wall of stoicism that he'd built for himself long ago.
It was all he had left.
-xxx-
The sound of someone bumping into a piece of equipment just outside the curtains pulled Bill out of a half-dozing, half-aware state. A grumbled curse and a moment later, Saul shuffled into view, the colonel's expression was locked in the grimace he had every time he quit drinking. His XO apologized for waking him and handed him a logbook.
"That report I promised," he said.
Bill pushed himself up out of his slumped position and rubbed his face with his hands. "What time is it?"
"Oh five hundred. I uh—I'm late for my check in with CIC..."
The colonel wouldn't meet his gaze.
"Saul."
"I'll stop by again later this afternoon," he said and left before Bill could press him any further.
Adama retrieved his reading glasses from the stand next to his bed and opened the book on his lap. He flipped through the pages until he found the last date he could remember and skimmed through the text...Raptor 1 found a planet in sector 728. Galactica is prepping a survey team...
The next page was blank, except for a single sentence.
Have taken command of fleet after Commander Adama shot and critically wounded by Lt. Valerii, Cylon.
He looked at the words that had been hastily scrawled across the paper and at the last word...Cylon. A soldier who followed her orders, steady and fearless—
He flipped to the next page where the lettering was careful and precise, the sentences terse, but complete and he read. About the lost civilian fleet. No doctor on board. No information from the Cylon prisoner, hereafter referred to as "it" instead of "she". Computers networked together. Cylon boarding parties and damaged sustained. He read the list of how many injured and the names of the crew members killed. Many of them were names he hadn't seen often enough to match with faces, but that he committed to memory until they were a part of his litany. And then he read on...
...I went to sickbay to check on Commander Adama's condition before the arrival of Doctor Cottle. Captain Lee Adama and former president Laura Roslin were both there. I don't know how she got out of the brig during the boarding action by the Cylons, but I have reason to believe that Capt. Adama was responsible. After seeing the commander, Ms. Roslin volunteered to return to her cell—
Bill paused. In the aftermath of the Cylon boarding party it must have been chaos, Laura could have found a way off the ship before anyone realized she was missing. But she'd stayed. Until something changed her mind.
He skimmed down the page and kept reading.
...The government was no longer functioning in the best interests of the fleet, so I declared martial law. This action went against the wishes of my commanding officer, but I feel it was necessary in order to protect the ship and its crew...
...At approx. 2030 hours the SAR mission returned from Kobol with the survivors of Raptor 1 comprising Chief Galen Tyrol, Spc. Cally Henderson, Spc. Diana Seelix and Dr. Gaius Baltar. Chief Tyrol was questioned in connection with the Cylon prisoner and held in the brig for forty-eight hours. He was released after further testing by Dr. Baltar indicated that he was human and was not involved in the assassination attempt. —Given Tyrol's relationship with the Cylon and Baltar's testing methods I have my doubts, but without the chief our Vipers won't fly...
…Galactica's battle readiness was being undermined by ships refusing to release their supplies. I sent boarding parties to ensure their compliance. Not enough Marines were available for the number of boarding parties needed. Pilots were reassigned to provide oversight—
Bill sighed. He didn't even have to consult Saul's log to know what happened next. A shot into a crowd that kills someone innocent. A mistake that sets the dominoes falling. It was how the civil war on Tauron started, and how the riots on Aerelon had ended. Now it was Gideon and four dead civilians.
It was after that, that Laura escaped.
…Capt. Adama abused the freedom of his parole, disabled the brig guards, released Roslin from her cell and commandeered a Raptor using CMO Cottle's flight clearance. The CAP was ordered to intercept and fired a warning shot, but the Capt. knew I was bluffing. He was my commander's son. Maybe it was a mistake to let him go, maybe now the fleet tears itself apart and the Cylons wipe us all out, but I couldn't—
The entry ended abruptly at the bottom of the page and was left unfinished. The next page had only two more sentences.
...During transfer of the Cylon prisoner to a more secure cell Spc. Cally Henderson intercepted the transfer escort, discharged her firearm, and killed the Cylon. Spc. Henderson has been confined to quarters pending review by Commander Adama when he resumes his duties.
Bill closed the logbook. Three days and one disaster had piled on another and another until he was almost grateful that he'd missed it. He couldn't say that he would have done anything different if he had been in Saul's place. Or in Lee's, or even Laura's for that matter. But the shadow in the back of his mind whispered... You believed in them. And how did they repay you?
With broken oaths and lies and two bullets to the chest.
He pushed the whisper away.
When Ishay brought him his breakfast he smiled and made small talk because it would get him out of sickbay faster. When Saul came to check on him that afternoon he kept their conversation short, yet encouraging because no matter how badly Saul had frakked up, Bill needed his XO to have enough self-assurance to keep the crew and the ship ready for the next crisis. But when he returned to his quarters that night, locked the hatch and settled into his rack, the shadow came back and it whispered: You believed in them and look what happened. Look at the mess that they've made... The whisper followed him. It swirled in a lazy little circle at the edge of his thoughts while his body healed. It trailed along behind him when he returned to the CIC to cheers and applause and told his crew that they meant something to him, that it was time to get back to work.
It needled at him while Gaeta reviewed the current sitrep and the unknown whereabouts of Laura and his son.
They broke their word to you and ran away. Hunt them down.
"I want them found," he ordered. "She was dangerous enough as a symbol of resistance, but now with Lee helping..." He chose his side. These are the consequences. "I want to search every ship in the fleet. Quarantine procedures. Isolate the ship out of the main body. If its clean we keep it quarantined away from the rest of the fleet. She can hide, but she can't run."
Saul moved to obey his commander. "Dee, start quarantine procedures. Start with Cloud Nine." He turned back to Bill. "What're you gonna do about Cally and the Chief?"
"Transfer her to the brig. Have Chief Tyrol report to my quarters."
-xxx-
He seems...hollow. That was Bill's first thought when he looked up from his desk and saw the chief standing at attention a few feet away. It was just enough to dull the sharp edge of anger that was the shadow, still hiding, still whispering, behind the wall of stoicism he had so carefully rebuilt.
"At ease."
Tyrol relaxed his stance, but his expression remained withdrawn, his gaze fixed on some spot on the wall behind Bill's shoulder. Just how broken are you?
"I've been going over the reports from the last few days," said Adama with a glance down at the open logbook before him. "Trying to get some context."
"Whatever I can do to help, sir." A rote response if ever there was one.
"Times like this make it hard to know who to trust. This ship runs on trust, Chief. This fleet, dies without it." He kept his voice level and his tone as empty of accusation as he could make it. "You've been investigated for collusion twice and my officers don't trust you, Chief. Why should I?"
Bill expected Tyrol to respond with indignation, with self-righteousness borne of either offended honor or concealed deceit, but there was none of that. It just wasn't in him anymore.
"Sir, I—" He finally met his commander's gaze. "I guess you shouldn't."
"Hm." So, that's how broken.
And it makes you want to trust him, but you thought the same thing before Boomer turned on you.
"You've made some mistakes and you're gonna earn back that trust," replied Bill. It was an order that he needed to make into a fact.
"Yes, sir." And so it's a fact.
"But you're not the only deckhand whose loyalty is in question. Cally shot— a prisoner. A prisoner who may have had valuable intelligence." Who might have told me why. "And she did it during a time of war. That makes her a traitor, Chief." I need to know why.
"If I may speak on behalf of Specialist Cally. She was distraught, sir. The experience on Kobol. Being on the surface, fighting the Cylons. It's shattering for all of us. I don't believe she was in her right mind when she shot Boomer."
He sighed. That wasn't the answer he cared about—To a question you still haven't asked.
Time to stop dancing around it then.
"Did you love her, Chief?" Did you believe the same lies I did?
"'Scuse me?"
"Boomer, did you love her?" Is that why I see an empty man standing here?
"I thought I did."
"When you think you love somebody, you love them. That's what love is, thoughts." I thought she was loyal. A good solider. "She was a Cylon. A machine. Is that what Boomer was? A machine?" I thought you all were loyal. "A thing."
"That's what she turned out to be." Is that what you are?
"She was more than that to us." Bill pushed himself up and stepped away from his desk. "She was more than that to me." He moved closer to Tyrol so he could see if there was another lie standing here in front of him. "She was a vital, living person…" Like you. "Aboard my ship for almost two years. She couldn't have been just a machine. Could you love a machine?" If you can't tell the difference. Does it matter?
"No, sir. I guess I couldn't have."
Just a hollow man. He can't tell you what you need to know.
Bill shook his head, trying to quiet the whisper and clear his mind. I just need to rest. To think.
"Cally discharged a firearm without permission, endangering the lives of her shipmates. Thirty days in the brig." Because she's not a traitor, she just did what I couldn't. He sat down on the edge of his rack. "Dismissed."
"Thank you, sir."
"You'll see her again, Chief," he warned. He lay back and pulled off his glasses to put a little more distance between himself and the sharp edges around him.
"Excuse me?"
"There are many copies. You'll see her again." He took a breath. Tried to relax. "Be ready for it."
"Yes, sir."
After the chief left, Bill closed his eyes and tried to get a little sleep, but the ache in his chest that had been his constant companion since the shooting kept him awake.
The buzz of his phone eventually dragged him upright.
It was Colonel Tigh.
"Roslin's broadcasting."
-xxx-
By the time Commander Adama reached CIC the broadcast was over.
"We tried to jam the transmission," reported Lieutenant Gaeta, "but the Astral Queen bypassed it somehow, sent the signal bouncing through half a dozen other ships before we managed to trace it back."
She's working with Zarek now?
The enemy of my enemy—
Is still my enemy.
"What did she say?"
Colonel Tigh motioned for Bill to join him by the command table and handed him a clipboard with the transcript. He skimmed through the first couple of lines until he reached the end of the justifications and the beginning of her call to action. The scriptures tell us that all this happened before and all of it will happen again. That we all have a role to play in the cycle of time...
"Is she kidding with this?" See how far she's strayed? And she's taken Lee and Kara with her.
"I know it's hard to believe, but that message has cropped up all over the fleet."
"It's religious crap," he snapped. He read aloud in disbelief, "'It seems I have been chosen to help lead you to the promise land of Earth. I will not question this choice I'll simply try to play my part in the plan. Therefore, at the appointed hour, I will give the signal to the fleet. All those wishing to honor the gods and walk the paths of destiny will follow me back to Kobol. It is there we will meet the Gods' servant with the Arrow of Apollo.'"
Bill slammed the clipboard down and it skidded off the table. What the hell is she thinking?
Saul ignored Bill's momentary outburst. "We've got five raptors with Marine fire teams standing by to board the Astral Queen," he offered.
So we can set another domino falling? One that might turn her into a martyr. No. "No one's gonna follow her. No one's gonna believe this crap. No one's this stupid. And anyone that is, that wants to make a suicide run back to Kobol. Please, let them." Then we'll see who's loyal.
"You sure about this, Bill?"
"Not long after the attacks there was a ship that thought they could do better on their own. I was willing to let 'em try. She's the one who wanted to keep everyone together. Now she wants to divide this fleet—" He shook his head. "I'm not gonna protect anyone who doesn't want it."
That's just as good a justification as any right? But why not the truth? If they follow her, they don't deserve your protection. She betrayed you, they all did, anyone who follows her is a traitor. And death is the sentence for traitors.
It wasn't long before Gaeta reported the detection of a signal flare and a moment later, "Astral Queen has jumped away."
"Now we see how many follow." How many will sacrifice themselves?
"To sit around and wait for Starbuck to show up with that stupid arrow?" scoffed Tigh. "Two. Three at the most."
Bill looked up at the Dradis console overhead and waited. How much more can you lose? At first there was no change. Then it was one green dot blinking out, then two, three, more and more. Then it was over.
Gaeta had kept count. "Twenty four ships, sir."
"That's almost a third of the fleet," said Tigh.
Bill's gaze dropped to the table. That's it then. He pulled off his glasses and said—nothing. He just turned around and left.
He walked through the corridors with no particular destination in mind, but his feet carried him where he had to go, to Galactica's morgue. To what was left of the pilot he'd met on the day that he'd buried his son.
He pulled out the slab that held her body and folded the sheet back to see her face.
At first all he could see was the machine. The Cylon who'd stood in his CIC and who'd followed orders that weren't his own. Followed them without hesitation, steady and fearless. Unflinching and heartless. As easy as flipping a switch.
"Why?" he asked. But there was no answer. It was too late for that.
And the longer he looked, the more he remembered the bright-eyed young rook who had greeted him with a salute and a smile. "...Sharon Valerii...It's an honor to finally meet you, sir." The pilot whose landings were rough."Missed the trap seven times in two days. It's a new Galactica record." Whose story he thought he knew. "Your family's gone, and I know that you have no home. All you've got is the service." Who'd made a promise in exchange for a chance.
"I'll pay you back someday, when it really means something."
He reached out to touch her face and he finally felt it. The real damage that two bullets could cause. It was the knowledge that no matter what he did he would never be safe, could never be sure anymore, who was human, what was real. It was the knowledge that no matter what he did his family, his pilots, sooner or later he lost them, would keep losing them, and that the wall that he'd built couldn't protect him. Not anymore. The wall he had built started to crumble with a shortness of breath, with a crushing, strangled sob that dragged itself free and he could do nothing to stop it. He wasn't carved out of stone. Caught in the flood, he had to give way.
Until it was over.