Chapter 48 Revelations
Cottle pulled the curtain aside, giving the three men waiting beyond a glimpse of Kara, looking incredible small in the hospital bed, before the doctor tugged the drape closed behind him. He took a moment to scrutinize the officers, not missing the angry tension between the younger men. Frowning, he considered his options. Not like he had a lot of them to choose from, he scoffed to himself.
"This way, gentlemen," he said, giving a jerk of the head for them to follow as he lead the procession to his office.
While Helo closed the hatch, providing them some privacy, Cottle dropped the thick medical record on his cluttered desk, the folder making a slapping sound in the quiet room. He tapped a finger atop the folder, gathering his thoughts before turning to face his worried audience.
"How is she, Doc?" the Admiral's hoarse question speaking for the trio.
"I've cleaned and sutured the cuts. They're mostly superficial. It's the infection and beginnings of pneumonia that's a concern right now." He stuck two fingers in the breast pocket of his overcoat, pulling a cigarette free and lighting it before continuing, "Got her on one of the new batch of antibiotics the Zeppelin's been cranking out, and other meds to bring her temp down. Between the fever, dehydration and blood loss it's not surprising she's delirious."
"That's why she was—" Helo began, probably hoping Kara's broken state could be explained away as mere fever symptoms.
Cottle brusquely interrupted, "Don't fool yourself. Her demons drove Starbuck into hiding long before the infection. Though, I think part of it can be blamed on sleep psychosis. Got a feeling she's not been getting much." The doctor shook his head. "We're just damned lucky the Chief found her when he did." He saw the men exchange bleak glances and knew his message of how close they'd come to losing her had been received.
"But she's going to be fine. Going t-to live?" Lee asked, voice and eyes practically pleading for a reassurance Cottle was loathe to give.
"Live? Probably. Finished the transfusion and I'm still pumping her full of replenishers, but they can only do so much. With the infection the next twenty-four hours are critical." He scratched a bushy eyebrow, feeling an unaccustomed sorrow making what he had to say so much harder. "But…she's far from fine. That girl's broken and we've got to figure why before we have a chance at fix'n her."
He met the gaze of each, noting the worry and determination on Captain Agathon's face, the lost and nearly desperate expression of Apollo's, but it was the shame-ridden guilt in his Admiral's eyes that surprised the physician. No. None of them were going to enjoy this conversation. Taking a deep drag, he slowly released the smoke out on a sigh into the silent room.
"Look…I need to know what the frakkin' Cylons did to her. So, we'll start there," he said with an expectant look at the three men. Each seemed startled by his question, and he was perplexed by their identically confused stares.
Cottle saw the Admiral shifted his gaze between the two younger officers before returning to meet his gaze. "What do you mean? What's the Cylons got to do with Kara?"
The doctor scrutinized the men, unable to phantom why they'd be playing dumb at a time like this. Inhaling sharply, his eyes widened as he realized what their bewildered looks meant.
"You don't know? None of you?" Cottle swept an accusing finger in an arc between them. "How can you not? You're her superior officers. What about her debrief?"
The Admiral's expression hardened as the doctor squinted at him. "There hasn't been time for an official debrief," he ground out.
"And an unofficial one?" Again, Cottle's cold glare raked the men as they shifted uncomfortably before him. Stabbing a finger at Helo, "Aren't you her friend? Surely you've talked, asked her about New Caprica?"
"I-I've been busy. Settling the refugees. With Sharon—" Helo broke off, pulling his hands behind his back. "No, Sir. She's been avoiding me and I let myself be distracted by other duties," the tall officer said, meeting the doctor's gaze with an abashed expression.
"Humph," with a grunt, Cottle swiveled his icy regard to the Major. "And you? You're her CAG."
"Well… I grounded her, so she's been off the flight rotation. And she and I… We're not exactly talking these days." The younger Adama clenched his fists at his side and met the doctor's glare with one of his own. The elderly physician took in the animosity that suddenly rolled from the Major, and wondered what disastrous turn Apollo's and Starbuck's relationship had taken to bring them to this point. His attention was pulled aside though as the Admiral stepped closer.
"Obviously you know something we don't. Tell us instead of throwing around accusations," Adama said harshly.
Cottle turned unimpressed eyes to his commander, letting the other man stew for another moment before answering. "The first day of the Occupation, Thrace was taken by the Cylons. Nobody saw her again until we returned to the Galactica." When Adama straighten as if slapped, Cottle shoved aside a grim satisfaction at the reaction; it wasn't his place to judge the Admiral, but to try to repair what was broken. And obviously, there was more damage here than he'd originally thought if the three people closest to Starbuck had no idea what she'd gone through on New Caprica.
He saw pain flicker within the blue eyes before the Admiral shuttered them and, this time hesitantly asked, "The Cylons…they had Kara for over four months?"
Nodding, Cottle said, "Way I heard it, that male Cylon, what's his name, the one from Ragnor?"
"Leoben," Adama flatly said.
"Yeah, him. Took her practically first thing, and the Chief found her when they raided the detention center during the escape. Now, from her exam, I can tell she's been tortured, but—" he was abruptly cutoff as all three men recoiled and then spoke at once.
"Frak no!"
"The bastards!"
"What! Why wasn't I—"
Cottle chopped his hand downward, cutting off their outraged exclamations.
The Admiral was not to be denied though. Face tinged red with anger, Adama raised his hands as if wanting to take hold of the doctor and shake an explanation from him. "Why's this the first I've heard of any mention of torture? You cleared her for duty. Why's it not in the report?"
Holding himself steady beneath the threatening glare, Cottle gruffly explained, "Because I didn't do the physical. The Major," with a head tilt towards the CAG, "insisted on medical exams right away. I was in surgery the first few days trying to save those I could. So, Lieutenant Ishay did the pilot evaluations." Tapping the medical record again, Cottle went on, "Ishay's an excellent assistant, but she doesn't have the experience to recognize some of the subtler signs of abuse. Now that I've done a thorough examination of Captain Thrace, I have no doubts that she was subjected to torture while held by the Cylons."
"Tell me." The Admiral's granite expression gave the physician pause. Cottle suddenly hoped the man wouldn't take his anger out on the messenger.
As he lifted the manila folder, Cottle scoffed at himself, knowing he was instinctively using it as a shield against the menace he felt emanating from the senior Adama now. With a deep breath, he started to catalog his findings. "Captain Thrace has scarring on the back of her hands, her forehead and feet."
"Wait. No," Helo protested with a headshake. "I'd have seen scars on her hands."
"Not likely, Captain." Holding up his pinky, Cottle indicated the end of it as he said, "The scars are only bout this big; one on each hand at the junction of thumb and forefinger. She's got matching sets on both temples under her bangs and on the top of her feet."
"What are they from?" The question from the younger Adama as his expression tightened in concern and confusion.
Cottle's head swung back to Bill on hearing his sharp intake of breath. The craggy face seemed to crumble and they could barely hear the Admiral's muttered answer, "Electrical burns."
Keeping eyes locked with Adama's, the doctor leaned forward as he observed the color wash from his commander's face and saw the convulsive swallowing.
Damn it all! Last thing I need is the Old Man collapsing on me now.
Hurrying forward, he shoved the shaking man into one of the office chairs. Cottle gripped the other man's wrist to check the pulse but allowed his hand to be shaken off, and stepped back a pace, deciding to give the Admiral some space…for now at least.
"I didn't…I don't understand…What did you say?" Lee looked from his father and back to the doctor then demanded in a rising voice, "What did he say?"
"They're electrical burns. The scars are from multiple electrical shocks. Had to be set on a pretty high voltage, too, to leave scars," Cottle said bluntly, not bothering to sugar coat the words for the junior Adama's benefit.
As both younger officers paled when understanding sank in, the Admiral lifted his head and rasped out, "Is that all?"
Choosing to ignore the pleading edge to the man's question, Cottle leaned against the corner of his desk, suddenly weary of the damage people inflicted on each other. Course, it wasn't people this time, he consoled himself. Not that it made a frakkin' lot of difference when it came to fixing the damage.
Meeting Adama's eyes, "Don't be naïve, Bill. They had her for four months." He watched the blue-clad shoulders slump in acknowledgment. Unable to stand the sight of his devastated commander and friend, the doctor angled away so he was looking at Apollo and Helo instead. "There's two healed slash marks on her back and also a thickening of the skin around both wrists indicating that she was bound for extended periods of time. Probably shackles instead of ropes since there's no pattern marks present."
"Frakkin' bastards!" Helo punched the air in front of him, and turned in a semicircle, appearing to look for something more satisfying to hit.
Lee on the other hand, held himself rigid, like he'd been turned to stone by the revelations. The younger Adama's fair complexion was starkly pale in the fluorescent lighting of the office, and Cottle wondered if he ought to insist that the Major have a seat, too? Well, couldn't hurt. Especially since he wasn't even done with his report yet. Hooking another chair, he slid it towards Lee.
"Sit," he ordered, pointing as he added, "before you fall down." Watching Lee sag into the seat, Cottle sucked in a lungful from his previously forgotten cigarette, then, rubbing his neck, said, "The x-rays I took today confirms she's also recently had four of her ribs broken, and hairline fractures to her sternum, jaw and orbital lobe to add to her extensive collection. Probably happened two…three…months ago because they're fully healed now. She's significantly underweight but her bloodwork's clean. No sign of drugs, at least not now." Then, as an afterthought, "And she's not pregnant."
Moving away from the shell-shocked trio, Cottle reached over the desk and snagged the bedpan he used for an ashtray and crushed the remnants of his stub out. He ran a hand over the whisker stubble on his chin that he hadn't had a chance to shave off since being summoned from his bed some four hours ago. Gods. What he wouldn't give for a shower and hot meal, even if it was the same nutritional slop they'd been having for breakfast the past week. Well, sooner he got through this, sooner he'd be able to take a break.
"So gentlemen," he said, drawing each from their own distressed contemplations, "what we have here is a young woman that was a POW for an extended period of time, during which she was tortured. That's bad enough, but I can't see someone with Starbuck's history coming apart this bad if all the Cylons did was hurt her physically."
The Admiral rose to his feet, eyes narrowing in speculation as he faced the doctor. "You think they messed with her mind, too?"
"Pretty standard interrogation technique. Wear a prisoner down physically and then move on to the psychological, assuming time allows. And unfortunately they had plenty of that." Cottle saw both Adamas flinch at the inadvertent reminder of their jump away, leaving the colonist—and one Kara Thrace—stranded at the mercy of the Cylons. Yup, there was a lot of guilt there. But he certainly didn't blame their choice. They'd survived to return and rescue those left behind. As a military officer and physician, he understood the necessity to do whatever had to been done in the moment, whether it be an amputation—or a strategic withdrawal —and deal with the consequences afterwards.
Helo took a step forward. "Whatever they did to her, it really frakked her up. The things she was saying…" As he trailed off with a shake of his head, Cottle decided the younger man was probably replaying all the crazy mutterings they'd both heard while trying to coax Thrace from her refuge.
Well, if they were going to help her, they still needed to know more, and he was afraid their only source of information lay heavily sedated beyond the hatch. Still, Captain Thrace had been holding it together for the past three weeks, abeitly, not very well. In fact, from the sounds of it, she had been slowly imploding, all without any of these three men ever asking why. That was increasingly disturbing since it emphasized the gulf between Thrace and those that were closest to her. It was bad enough that none of them had asked her personally about her experiences, it was worse that they hadn't even bothered to make inquiries from other colonists. Just about anyone on Galactica that had been down on the planet would've been able to tell them about her disappearance.
Deciding that interviews of key personal were imperative, Cottle flipped open the medical record and jotted a quick note to himself as a reminder. Raising his gaze as he reclosed the folder, he met his old friend's eyes once again and it triggered an intuition. Something had crumpled Starbuck's last strut of support, reducing the once obnoxiously stubborn young woman to the broken one he'd just treated. Now, recalling the look of shame on the Admiral's face even before he apparently knew of her captivity, the doctor instinctively realized that there was something there, something relating to her that the Old Man deeply regretted.
"What happened? What happened three days ago, Bill?" Cottle quietly prodded, hoping that taking a personal approach might make it easier. As shame and guilt darkened his friend's face again, the doctor knew he'd been right. Sometimes he damns-well hated being right. As Adama's expression closed off again, Cottle decided he was going to have to push. "Something happened between you two. What was it?"
After casting a flickering glance at his son, the senior Adama straightened his shoulders as if to bear up under the responsibility he was about to reveal.
"I learned that Captain Thrace and Colonel Tigh had been sowing dissension among the crew." The doctor didn't miss Helo's flinch in response to Adama's words, but he kept his focus forward as the Admiral, "I confronted the two of them in the rec room. Put a pistol on the table and dared either of them to shoot me. Called them cowards… Then I—" As Bill choked off, Cottle could see his struggle in the taut cords of his neck and how he ground his jaw as if trying to chew words too bitter to swallow. After another moment, he managed to spit out the rest of his confession. "I shoved Kara from her chair. Called her a malcontent and cancer. Said she was no daughter of mine anymore and she could either get her act together or get off my ship."
Cottle wasn't the only one shocked by his words. The doctor figured he knew Bill Adama as well as anyone after all these years serving together, and he decided the only explanation for his approach with Starbuck fell under the heading of 'tough love.' And who knows, if she hadn't been so badly mind-frakked by the Cylons, it might even have been the right strategy. Thrace wasn't the sort to respond to subtle hints and nudges. Course, that's not the way things had fallen out, though. The timing fit too neatly. A badly traumatized Starbuck disowned by her father-figure would help explain the disintegration he'd witnessed in the hanger bay.
The screech of a chair pulled his attention outward again as he saw the younger Adama bolt to his feet and get right in his father's face.
"How could you frakking do that to her?" Lee grabbed the front of his dad's jacket and yanked him in even closer as he practically spit his accusation, "This is your fault!"
"You don't think I know that?" The father met his son's furious gaze with opaque eyes. He didn't try to break the younger man's hold, just continued in a voice graveled with guilt, "I read Helo's report. Heard her myself on the flight deck. Saw her fear. She was terrified I was going to send her away." As he paused, Bill's eyebrows lifted slightly. "She said she wouldn't go back. I didn't understand…back where?" Turning his head from the blue eyes so like his own, he met Cottle's widening ones. "Did she…she couldn't really think I'd send her back to New Caprica? To the Cylons?" If it were possible, Bill's eyes plunged deeper into guilt.
Helo gripped Lee's arms at the elbows, tugging slightly to loosen the younger Adama's hold on his father's lapel. "Lee, let go. This isn't helping Kara, and there's plenty of blame to go around."
The words deflated Lee's ballooning anger, causing the young man to stumble backwards until the chair hit the back of his knees and he slumped into the seat, hands covering his face. Though muffled, the men clearly heard his own confession, "I offered to open a frakking airlock for her." His shoulders hunched forward in a shudder that was close to a sob. Taking a gulping breath, he dropped his hands limply into his lap as he met his dad's eyes. "I know Kara. When she acts out, it's her way of asking for help, the only way she knows how." Scrubbing at his eyes, "And I ignored it. Too frakking angry at her to see that she was tearing apart."
Taking in the guilt-laden countenance of the men before him, Cottle decided they'd had enough breast beating for now. Shoving his hands into his overcoat pockets, he cleared his throat, pulling three sets of haunted eyes his way. "Enough of the pity party already." That jerked them to attention, "So, we screwed up. Let's form a club. Maybe have patches made." The Admiral was frowning now at his flippant remarks, but Cottle drove on. "Now we know what triggered her…episode, but whatever you think, it was merely the push that shoved her over an edge we didn't know she was walking." He gave a sharp snort, then, "Hell, I even should take some blame. Knew she'd been held by the Cylons. And being too busy seems as poor an excuse for a physician as it is for a friend."
He gave a shake of his head. They'd all played their part in this debacle, including Thrace herself. The doctor knew more about the Thrace—Kara—then she'd probably ever realized. For one thing, he knew that the Admiral was the one person she had come to depend upon to provide her with a sense of self-worth. And if she believed that that relationship had been destroyed? It certainly would've been enough to mess her up good. Especially on top of everything else she'd been through these past months.
[ I I I I I ]
Silence had fallen heavily amongst the men in Cottle's office as each wrestled with what they'd learned.
All eyes swung to the Admiral as he broke their contemplations. "Doc, what did you mean when you said with her history?" he asked, a sense of foreboding building as he recalled some of Cottle's other references.
He watched Cottle move back to his desk and stare at Kara's medical record for a long minute before lifting the thick folder as if weighing it—and his words—before turning back around with a resigned sigh.
"Typically I don't discuss my patient's past conditions, confidentiality and all, or least not without an overriding reason," Cottle said, flipping the cover open, then closed again in an unsettled way that was at odds with his usual manner.
The Admiral waited for him to continue. When the doctor still hesitated, Adama prompted him, "But you think you have a reason this time?" he asked.
"Put bluntly…yes." Cottle paused yet again, the reluctance obvious in his refusing to meet their gaze. Then taking a deep breath, "Being a military surgeon, I don't deal with kids much, but that doesn't mean I don't know the medical signs when I see 'em." Adama's teeth clenched, he suddenly knew what was coming next as the doctor continued, "I've got extensive bone scans on Captain Thrace, and they're conclusive. They clearly show years of physical abuse as a child," Cottle finally spit out, his voice darkening with disgust.
Adama glanced over at his son as Lee suddenly exhaled as the doctor's meaning registered.
"How bad?" all the senior Adama was able to get out, afraid that if he said anything else, it would be a string of profanity.
"I've documented at least sixteen bone breaks—not counting the most recent ones from her time on New Caprica" Cottle grimly answered. "Each finger on both hands, five ribs—possibly more than once, her left arm once and her right twice. Oh yeah, and evidence of a skull fracture," the doctor said, listing off the catalog of damage. "Course, no way of assessing how often or how many soft tissue injuries she may have sustained over the years," the doctor added as an afterthought.
Adama flinched at the list. And 'soft tissue injuries'… Cottle meant all the bruises, blackened eyes and bloodied noses that wouldn't show on x-rays.
"Frak! What type of bastard does that to a kid?" Helo snarled, smacking his fist into his other palm.
"An accident… Kids have accidents. Or a car… Couldn't she have just…" Lee faltered, obviously not wanted to accept what the doctor was saying.
"No. These weren't caused by any 'accident', Major. Someone—probably a parent—repeatedly hit that girl hard enough to break her hands, arms, ribs and head. I can tell you that the oldest fracture occurred between the ages of two to five years and the newest set when she'd been about thirteen or fourteen, I'd guess. That young woman survived years of abuse long before the Cylons got hold of her," the doctor grimly stated.
As Dr. Cottle finished, the Admiral turned his back on the other men. He needed a moment to regain his composure. The need to hit someone—anyone—clamped his fists at his side. And that was just it; someone had been filled with such anger that they'd taken it out on a defenseless child. Had struck her small body over and over. Shutting his eyes, the Admiral's imagination supplied an image of Kara as a little girl flinching beneath blows. He opened them and gave a shake of his head, trying to dispel the vision even as his heart twisted in his chest.
Why hadn't he seen the truth earlier? She never spoke about her family, always deflecting any questions. And there had been hints, things she'd said or ways she'd reacted that he'd ignored. Their significance seemed blazingly obvious to him now. Again shaking his head, he turned to face the doctor.
"How long have you known?" he demanded, needing to direct his anger somewhere.
Not trying to avoid his commander's gaze now, Cottle truthfully answered, "Since she returned with that Cylon raider. I ran a full scan at the time checking for internal injuries," he admitted.
"And you didn't say anything," the Admiral grimly challenged.
"Doctor/patient confidentiality. It wasn't relevant…and Thrace had a right to her privacy," he explained, then added, "It didn't bear on her recovery then, it does now." He unflinchingly met the Admiral's glare.
"So, what does this mean for her?" Adama asked, needing the doctor to clarify why it was important to know now, when he'd withheld the information before.
"Interrogation techniques vary. If time allows, the subject's response is studied and the methods refined," the doctor explained, hoping to keep the discussion as matter-fact as possible. Not that he expected to succeed.
"Interrogation techniques?" Lee spat out. "What you mean is that they tortured her, then took notes to refine their technique for the next round."
"Yes, that's exactly what I mean. They certainly had her long enough to try different approaches," the doctor said, again falling back on neutral terms.
"You think they worked over more than her body, don't you?" the Admiral prompted, beginning to pace as he continued, "She resisted their physical abuse—she'd had practice, right? So, they changed tactics?" he guessed.
"I don't know, but yeah, that's what I think happened," Cottle agreed. "What we have to do now is figure out how to keep her alive, and I tell you that the odds aren't good," he grimaced. "What we have is a young woman that was repeatedly traumatized as a child. Then again on that gods-forsaken rock. That would have been bad enough, but her experiences back on Galactica since have damaged the relationships she needs to overcome those traumas. And that, gentlemen, is the crux of our current dilemma."
"So what can we do?" Adama asked, feeling despair at the magnitude of what they faced.
Cottle contemplated his hands before saying, "I'm just not sure. I'll keep her lightly sedated for the next day or so, see how she does. But I'd suggest posting a guard inside her curtain, maybe someone she knows.
"A suicide watch is what you mean," Lee protested.
"Yes, Major. That's exactly what I mean," the doctor grimly said. "The good news is she only sliced herself up, instead of opening a vein. The bad news, given the opportunity, there's a good chance she'll go there next." With a glare at the younger man, "I'd rather not give her that chance, how about you?"
The doctor watched Lee run both hands through his hair, then turn away as he clasped his fingers together at the back of his head, the anguish easy to read in the tensed shoulders. Unfortunately, Cottle hadn't the time, energy or inclination to deal with the young man's issues at the moment.
One frakked-up pilot at a time.
"I'll arrange for a Marine to be present at all times." The Admiral rubbed at his jaw. "Maybe Sergeant Mathias, she and Starbuck have always gotten on well."
"Corporal Paulson from the brig. Kara said he's a good sort," Helo volunteered.
"Whatever," Cottle said, "just make sure it's someone that can keep their trap shut. Last thing Starbuck needs is gossip—more gossip—making the rounds amongst the crew." Then, making usher motions towards the door, the doctor added, "Bout all we can do until she wakes up. Then maybe we can put together a course of treatment."