Laura frowns as she finds herself walking down the hallway of an opera house. The turquoise dress she was wearing, swished gently as she clacked her way down the red carpet. Her head turns when she hears giggling, peering over the wall and down towards the stairs, her eyes widening when she sees the boys running down the stairs, hand in hand.
"Lex…Liam," Laura calls, picking up her speed once again as she tries to catch up with them, their giggles ringing through the ornate building.
"Alex…" Laura calls again as she rounds the corner, trying to see if she could see them again, looking up when she sees someone across the way from her, surprised to see her husband in his flight suit. They both approach the edge and look down, seeing the boys walk out into the main area. Laura starts running again, Bill taking up foot too. They both reach the atrium just as the Caprican Six picks Alex up, taking Liam's hand, leading them into the concert hall.
Laura snaps out of her deep sleep, taking a deep breath as she looks towards the ceiling. She looks over to see if Bill had woken up before dropping her head back and closing her eyes as she lets out a long sigh, feeling pain start to settle behind her eyes again. She hadn't had a migraine since she'd given birth to the boys, and yet they were back it seemed, along with the weird dreams they'd brought.
Laura lays quietly for a moment before slipping out of bed and going to the closet. She digs through her toiletries for a moment before managing to find an old yellowed pill bottle at the bottom of her makeup bag. She shakes out a couple of the small white pills before putting the bottle back, leaving it on top this time. Laura tosses the pills into her mouth, crushing them with her teeth before grabbing the glass of water by the bed and taking a large drink.
The redhead slips quietly back into bed, snuggling up to Bill as his arm goes to wraps around her automatically. She closes her eyes as she breathes in his scent, finding calm in the familiar spice as she slowly finds her way back to sleep.
"This case is going to tear our family apart," Laura says quietly, taking the last drag off of the cigar that her and Mona had been sharing, "We've made it all this way and Gaius Baltar is going to tear our family apart."
"Laur…"
"Kara's gone, Lee quit to defend that frakker, the headaches are back, and the dreams, gods don't get me started on the dreams," Laura shakes her head as she rests her forehead against her knees, "I can't go out there and testify again."
"You're going to do fine," Mona comforts pulling Laura's back to her chest and wrapping her arms around her. She presses a kiss to her head and sighs as she strokes her hair. Laura sits quietly for a moment, letting her eyes slip closed at the contact.
As her body starts to relax she finds herself back in the opera house, following her same path as the last time. Her and Bill lunge towards the closing door as the Six leads their sons away from them, a jolt runs through her body as she snaps back to reality.
"Hey, relax, you're okay," Mona comforts, shushing her gently. Laura sighs as her body slumps.
"I should go."
"Let me walk you down there," Mona says as she lets Laura go, standing with her. Laura nods wrapping her arm around her friend's as they slip through the hatch, making their way down to the court room. Outside, Mona squeezes Laura's arm and looks down at her, "Don't let them see you sweat."
"Thank you," Laura smiles slightly before disappearing into the room.
Bill sighs as he pulls the razor over the final pass of his shave, wincing as he nicks his jaw. He sets the razor down and grabs a piece of toilet paper, pressing it to the wound. As he looks to the mirror to asses the situation he finds himself looking down the hallway of the opera house, his feet carrying him towards his sons' giggles. He's surprised to see Laura across the way, both of them trying to get closer to the boys before the Six can close the door.
Bill jolts out of his vision as he hears Laura scream, stepping away from the sink before going into the main quarters. He finds her standing above a shattered glass, the kids staring at their mother with wide eyes. Laura snaps her head to the left, looking at her husband with wild eyes.
"Were you just…"
"The opera house?" Bill finishes. Laura nods, staring at him for a moment before opening her mouth.
"Um, let me clean this up," Laura comments, grabbing a rag to clean the broken glass up before cursing as she cuts her thumb, stuffing the bleeding digit in her mouth.
"Let me get it," Bill says taking the rag from her and making sure all the glass is cleaned up as Laura keeps her thumb in her mouth. She wraps her free arm around the boys holding them close. Aurora gets up off the floor and goes to the bathroom getting a bandaid before bringing it out to Laura.
"Thank you butterfly," Laura says as she takes her thumb from her mouth, assessing the damage before reaching out to take the bandaid.
"I can do it," Aurora says as she opens it up, carefully fitting it around her mother's thumb before smiling and pressing a kiss to it, "Better?"
"Much much better," Laura smiles, pulling Aurora into the fold and kissing her head, managing to let the uncertainty of the opera house fade for a moment.
"I get that it's Kara, Bill...but she needs to be put in the brig. I don't want to believe it but she could be playing all of us," Laura says, looking between Bill and Lee, "We need to protect ourselves until we are certain that it is Kara."
Bill and Lee share a look before the older looks at the marines that were with them, nodding slightly. The marines disperse, leaving the small group alone. Laura rests her hand on Bill's bicep and squeezes before moving to leave the flight deck with Tory, their paths diverging outside the hatch. Laura meanders her way down to the brig and motions to the marine to let her in to see the Six.
Laura wrings out a warm compress before grabbing a blanket and heading to the living area. The kids had taken over the rack for an afternoon nap, leaving their mother to the couch. She tucks her feet under the blanket and lays the compress over her eyes before sighing happily as the warm darkness envelops her mind, lulling her into a light nap herself.
Her ears perk up as she hears the hatch an hour later, reaching up to grab the compress from her eyes. Her eyes blink harshly a couple times trying to refocus her vision as she sees a blonde figure headed towards her. Eventually her vision clears in time to realize it was Kara, hearing the gun in her hand get racked before finding herself staring down the barrel.
"I want to hate you so much..." Kara says, her voice low, but her grip on the gun sure, "You had a vision and I listened. I went back to Caprica, I went down to Kobol, and a lot of good people died because of that vision, remember?"
"Of course I do," Laura lets out on a breath.
"I trusted you. On a vision...and I saw Earth, with my own eyes. And we're going the wrong way," Kara's arm begins to lower as she looks at Laura, a sad look in her eyes, "Why can't you trust me?"
Laura swallows, watching as Kara lifts the gun again offering it to her.
"You don't want to trust me? You think I'm a cylon? Then shoot me."
"Kara...what the frak are you doing?" Laura whispers. Kara shoves the gun into her hand, forcing her fingers to curl around the hilt.
"If you're not going to trust me then shoot me!" Kara yells, her eyes turning angry. Laura grips the gun tighter and backhands Kara with it, knocking her to the ground. She drops to the floor herself, a firm knee pressing to Kara's chest as she points the pistol at her.
"Are you so far gone that you don't value your own life anymore? How dare you pull a gun on me. Let alone in front of my children."
"We're going the wrong way!" Laura shifts her aim a few inches and pulls the trigger, emptying the round into the ground right next to Kara's head. Her grip loosens and she drops the pistol to the ground as Kara bursts into sobs, the hatch slamming open as marines swarm in with Tigh and Helo, Bill hot on their heels, "We're going the wrong way!"
Bill lifts Laura from Kara's body, cupping her cheek and catching her eye. He tries to hold her attention as the marines try to wrangle the distraught blonde.
"Hey, are you okay?"
"I'm fine," Laura shrugs him off, with a shake of her shoulder and head, noticing the kids lingering in the doorway with wide eyes. She wrangles them back to the rack, getting them to lay back down before sitting down next to them.
"What were they doing with Kara?" Aurora asks, a tremble in her voice.
"Taking her to get help," Laura assures her, a fake smile spreading across her lips as her eyes flick to Bill's, trying to swallow past the knot in her throat.
"What are you thinking about?" Laura asks, wrapping her arm around Bill's shoulders and resting her chin on the top of his head, watching as he plucks the Aurora figurine from the front of his model ship, rolling it in his fingers.
"Kara," Bill says as he lays the figurine down on the table, not placing it back on the ship, "What happened? Where did we go wrong?"
"We didn't go wrong anywhere, Bill...Kara had been lost before all of this happened. And nothing you, Zak, or I could have done would have changed that," Laura tries to reassure him, squeezing him with the arm she had around him. Bill sighs and drops his head back to her shoulder, his eyes closing.
"We could have done more...couldn't we?"
"I don't know that we could've," Laura murmurs, letting him go to take the chair next to the desk, tugging her robe tighter around her body. She was watching him, but his eyes never lifted to hers.
"What if she's meant to help us and we're making a mistake? What if convincing you was more important than anything else?" Bill asks, his hand reaching out to cover hers, their fingers tangling together gently, "You're the one guiding this whole thing..."
"She pulled a gun on me in front of our children, Bill. That hardly says, please trust me," Laura comments, "If it is Kara..."
"It's Kara," Bill says, finally looking up, "I can't believe anything else."
"Either way she needs help. And that's not help I can give her right now," Laura says, pulling her hand away and resting it in her lap with the other, "You're afraid of loss Bill...You've lost Lee from your crew, Zak is distant, and Kara comes back...it seems like the perfect circumstance to start putting the family back together."
"I am not," Bill says, his eyes hardening.
"Yeah you are," Laura insists, tilting her head as she looks at him, "I don't blame you, but if Kara loses again she's going to be taking us down with her. You've been in that Opera House Bill..."
"I know," He grunts. He reaches back out to take Laura's hand again, squeezing it gently, "Come on...it's been a long day."
"Are you okay?" Laura asks, as she stands, holding onto his hand still. Bill nods quietly, turning off his desk lamp before standing, walking with her to their rack.
"Have you actually lost your mind?" Laura accosts Bill as she comes upon him in the corridor. Bill looks up from the papers in his hand, finding Laura with her hand on her hip, glaring at him over the rim of her glasses. He side steps her as he heads into the ward room, shutting the hatch after she follows.
"You want to tell me what you're talking about?"
"The Demetrius, Kara, Zak, the 20 other people you sent with her. What the frak Bill!"
"It's a second option," Bill replies calmly, taking off his glasses as he looks at her, "Kara gets a chance to pursue her path, we keep pursuing ours. The people I sent with her were the best I could spare. We rendezvous in a couple weeks."
"Zak?"
"He wasn't going to be of any use of us here with her out there, and at least he's happy," Blue meets green and Laura narrows her eyes, staring down her husband for a moment before shaking her head and heading for the hatch.
"I have a quorum meeting," Laura tosses over her shoulder before slamming the heavy door shut.
[TBC]
