Chapter 103 Fueling Up
Jerked upright in bed by the memory of pain, Kara bit back a cry as she fought free of the nightmare. She flexed her fingers, seeking reassurance that they were whole and the pain was just an echo from her past. Well, most of it. There was always a low level ache that she never admitted to anyone, especially to any of her doctors. Her hands worked. They did their job well, so what else really mattered.
Kara cursed silently. She had hoped that in her exhausted state the dreams wouldn't come this time. Not her luck. If anything, it'd been worse, a violent mix of remembered moments from her childhood mingled with ones of Leoben insisting that her destiny was coming for her and she had to be prepared to make the leap of faith it demanded. One good thing. The erotic portion of her dreams had been thankfully missing this time; Leoben's shade seeming intent on focusing on his streams and how they were now swirling into the circling currents of a whirlpool.
Shoving her curtain aside, she stood and looked at the wall clock. Almost three hours since she'd collapsed across her bunk, not even bothering to shed her flightsuit first or pausing long enough to remove her boots. It hadn't been nearly long enough, but she did feel some of the cloying pull of fatigue clear as she ran a hand through her short hair.
Just as she decided that it should be about time for the fourth trip through the radiation storm, Dee's voice came through the speaker, warning the crew to prepare for FTL. Kara gripped the ladder to the upper rack as the usual moment of disorientation tilted her balance. Apprehension whitened her knuckles as she waited to see if another flashback pounced. Counting off the seconds, her thoughts shifted to her fellow pilots as she visualized them trying to steady their Raptors long enough to locate their individual ships. The memory of the painful brightness of the radiation storm had Kara reflexively closing her eyes.
The second FTL jump signaled the completion of the run.
With a frustrated huff, Kara released her breath, unsure how long she'd even held it. The entire thing had only taken a few minutes, but it had felt like an hour as her mother's voice once again reminded her that she should have been out there, not taking a frakking nap while others did her job.
The voice was right.
But so was Lee.
He couldn't afford to trust a pilot that was losing her shit over a little kiss.
It dawned on Kara then that she hadn't had flashback. The FTL jumps hadn't triggered it this time. Maybe that wasn't what had caused it before? It hardly mattered why. The problem was what was she going to do about them? And the nightmares? It seemed like she was sliding back into the same pattern she'd just pulled herself free from such a short time ago.
Reluctantly accepting that she'd have to seek some type of help, Kara resolved to speak with Sharon once things had settled back down. In the meantime, she knew she needed to be able to sleep, really sleep, not just these interrupted snatches. Then, maybe she could get a handle again on the mess going on inside her head.
One thing she knew.
She was going to have to go to Cottle.
Frak it all. The bastard better not give me a bad time.
Knowing she didn't have a choice, she headed off to sickbay, knowing she'd have to tell the doctor at least part of the truth if she expected to get anything from him.
Life Stations was surprisingly busy as Kara entered and she debated turning around and coming back later. Before she could retreat, the white-haired surgeon was coming toward her with his normal scowl firmly in place.
"Expected to have to drag you in," he said, "Maybe you're not as much a fool as I've always thought." Kara blinked at him in confusion, not at his manner since he was just being his usual charming self, but at his words, liked he'd been expecting her? "Come along then," he gruffed, waving her toward a row of chairs arranged along one wall with an IV stand beside each. She followed, still uncertain, but sat where he brusquely pointed.
"I just need some pills—" she started to explain.
"Yeah, yeah. Everyone's getting fluids first," he interrupted. "You just stay here and Ishay'll get you hooked up." And before she could say anything further, he tramped off.
What the hell?
As she started to stand, the doctor's assistant was abruptly at her side.
"Oh no you don't, Captain. Just sit back and you'll be done in about twenty minutes," Ishay firmly directed, her tone carrying a warning that she wasn't in a mood to put up with any arguments. Settling resignedly back, Kara grudgingly held her arm out as indicated and looked away as the needle was inserted at the crook of her elbow.
"There," stretching a piece of tape to secure the line along Kara's forearm, "The fluids will help with dehydration and give the stims something to work off," she said. Kara watched as the woman fiddled with the bag to get the flow to her satisfaction, then something she'd just said finally registered.
"Stims?" she asked, unsure she'd even heard Ishay correctly the first time.
"Doctor Cottle won't give you any until you're done here, so don't bother trying to get out of this," Ishay said with a shake of the head.
"I don't need—"
"You pilots don't know what you need," she cut off Kara's protest again. "If you're going to be flying with stims, your body needs the boost of a dextrose drip. And with the nausea, you've not been drinking enough water, have you." The nurse quickly pinched the skin on the back of Kara's hand. "See. You're dehydrated. So, just let us do our job then you can go do yours, Captain."
She frowned as the assistant spun and moved away before she could protest further. Obviously no one had told the medical staff that she'd been grounded again. Stims and fluids? Cottle must be really worried if he was willing to use more of their limited resources.
Just great, she groused to herself, further frustrated by the knowledge that since she wasn't flying, those precious resources were being wasted.
Kara was about to remove the IV when a commotion at the entrance drew her attention. A gurney was being pushed in by one medic as another helped a stumbling Narcho along just behind. As the prone figured groggily tried to sit up, Kara recognized Showboat. Both of her fellow pilots looked like hell.
As Showboat was wheeled, still weakly protesting, into an examination cubicle, Narcho and his human crutch staggered toward the row of chairs.
"Wait here, Sir," the medic ordered as he eased the sagging pilot into the seat beside Kara.
"What happened," she demanded as the ex-Pegasus pilot grimaced an acknowledgment at the corpsman's unneeded order.
"Marcia was trying to land when I guess the nausea got too much for her. Barely got her bird down before spewing in her helmet. They had to carry her out," he explained. Then Narcho's already washed-out features suddenly paled further and he quickly leaned to the other side of his seat, dry heaves shaking his shoulders as he gagged.
Kara looked away, as much to give him some privacy as to still her own too ready nausea. Showboat was obviously out for the remaining trip. From the continued sounds of choking at her side, Narcho was pretty iffy, too. Mentally counting ships, Kara realized that they still had enough pilots to guide the final batch—if Narcho could fly.
If not…
Well, if not, then Lee would have to return her flight status. At least for the last jump. She still felt like crap…but better. The few hours in her rack and maybe—she grudgingly admitted—the fluids she was getting, seemed to be restoring some of her energy. Deciding to take the stims when offered, Kara leaned back into her seat to wait.
A few minutes later, Ishay came over and inserted something into the flowing line. As she capped the needle she must have noticed Kara's questioning look.
"For the nausea. Settle your stomach," she said by way of explanation.
"Could've used that hours ago," Kara said, more sharply then she'd intended.
As Ishay's gaze shifted to the curtained enclosure where Showboat had been taken, Kara understood. The assistant gave an uncomfortable shrug as she turned to Narcho's IV.
"The drug's on the ration list," Ishay said while tapping excess air from the syringe. "The pharmacy lab on the Zeppelin's a makeshift affair. They're doing what they can, but they're concentrating on high priority things like antibiotics. Medication for nausea's pretty far down on the list." Putting both now empty, but still precious syringes into her pocket, the assistant's eyes again flickered across the expanse of sickbay. "After Captain Case's…mishap, Doctor Cottle's decided that this constituted an emergency and ordered you all to receive a dose. You should be feeling the effects shortly." With that, she hurried toward the entrance as Racetrack shuffled in.
Over the next half hour the other pilots continued to trickle in and be summarily hooked up to the waiting IVs.
Kara smirked as HotDog gave an indignant yelp when Ishay slide the needle home.
"Sorry, Sir. We're reusing needles, so they're probably a little dull," the woman explained as she finished securing the line in place.
"Hope you cleaned 'em first," he grumbled.
"All except yours, Lieutenant," Ishay replied, then turned away from HotDog's affronted look. Her eyes met Kara's and they shared a moment of amusement before a shadow crossed the woman's expression.
Kara turned her head and saw Cottle coming towards her, a deeper scowl now crevicing his face.
Uh-oh, she groaned to herself. It looked like he must have found out about her rescinded flight status. Shit! She suddenly just knew that he was going to tear her a new one right there in front of the others. Bracing for the expected berating, Kara took a breath to defend herself.
But her words were stoppered as Cottle said, "Here's your stims. They'll see you through the next ten hours. Just take the frakking things and do your job. We all have to."
She closed her mouth, bit her tongue on her prepared argument and mutely accepted the two pills he held out. With a brusque nod, he glanced at his assistant and something passed between the pair. Kara tried to decipher the look but Ishay abruptly shifted to face her and Cottle moved on, dispensing pills to each of the pilots where they sat attached to their IVs.
Pulling her perplexed gaze from the doctor's stiff back, she looked up to see Ishay regarding her with a pained bleakness in her expression.
"What the hell was that?" Kara quietly demanded.
Ishay looked away, her features tightening further before disappearing behind the professional mask she usually wore. Kara thought she wasn't going to answer, but then heard her low reply.
"Sometimes military needs outrank his medical oath."
Then Ishay was striding away, too, leaving Kara to wonder what she'd meant by that?
A short time later, a female medic removed Kara's IV, leaving a cottonball and strip of tape in its place.
"You can go now," she was informed and stood, gaze sweeping the line of men and women still sprawled in various states of exhaustion. A few notable people were missing. Kat hadn't come in yet…and neither had Lee.
The thought of a confrontation with him surrounded by her fellow pilots was enough to hurry her step towards the exit. If she had hopes of going out on the last trip, she needed to face him, but not here.
Making her way along Galactica's corridors, Kara worked through a mental time table. It'd take probably a good three hours to off-load the prior group of civilians, then a quick double-jump back through the storm and another three or so hours to bring on board the final lot of passengers. She'd have to find Lee well before they finished so she could present her case, but she also wanted to give him time to visit sickbay; Cottle certainly wouldn't let the CAG sidestep the order for fluids and stims any more than he'd let her.
So, what could she do in the intervening time to distract herself?
She probably should have held off taking the stims until closer to launch. Sure, she'd still be plenty wired by then, but with hours between and the pills burning through her blood, the false energy had her edgy and frustrated. There was no use even considering laying down to rest, and she felt reluctant to go back to her Raptor after the recent flashback.
At the junction ahead, Kara saw a line of people clad in assorted garments shuffling by; the civilians being herded back to the flight deck to return to their ships. It brought to mind the little scene she'd witnessed in the hanger earlier between Kat and the stranger. Something in their manner had spoken of an intimacy she couldn't recall ever seeing before in Kat. Not even with HotDog, and she knew that those two had been true bunkmates in the past.
Usually Kara couldn't give a snipe's tits who was doing whom, but…
Turning to follow the column of refugees, she went in search of Kat's secret.
[ I I I I I ]
An hour later and Kara almost wished she hadn't found the stranger.
Enzo. Drug dealer, black market trafficker and—she could tell even from just the single confrontation she'd just had with him—grade-A asshole. He was the sort of guy Socrata had warned her about. The sort she'd dallied with a few times in high school just to piss her mom off. It hadn't take Kara long, though, to realize that in this her mother had been right. Guys like Enzo would lead to more trouble then even she was willing to court, especially since at that time Kara had just been accepted onto the school Pyramid team and didn't want to risk her position.
Best bit of fortune to have happened to her in a long time.
From all appearances, Katraine hadn't had the same luck.
Or hadn't made the same choices.
On Galactica, Kara had finally found her quarry chatting up a pretty girl in Dogsville. She had thought first to check amongst the departing passengers, but trying to search the milling crowd had quickly stretched nerves already zinging from the stimulant. On a hunch she'd gone to the hold set aside for Galactica's permanent refugee camp. Once she'd spotted her objective, she had asked around about him before cornering Enzo in a hallway.
It hadn't taken long to confirm the rumors she'd sussed out.
Tricking him into the nearest airlock had been simple too, though it hadn't had the immediate effect of loosening his tongue as she'd planned. Hepped up as she was, Kara had been tempted to go ahead and just flush the piece of trash out the lock and have done with it. Enzo must have read something of that in her expression because he had started talking then, offering to trade information if she'd just let him go. It had still taken some time. And she had gone so far as to engage the emergency door override; the resulting warning lights and sounds had shaken the last of his renitence. Even then his answers were muttered in reluctant sentences that were half-truths buried beneath excuses and bullshit. Kara began to think he was incapable of a straight answer. Not that it mattered, for he had given up his purpose in remaining on Galactica…and his connection to Kat.
She'd certainly gleaned enough to understand who—or more correctly—what he was. Kat was a different matter, though. At first Kara had been shocked when she'd come to understand that the younger woman had been involved in a long term relationship with this dirtbag. Surely she was smarter than that?
As her initial disbelief wore off, Kara had to admit that she really didn't know much about her one-time nugget.
Turns out, not even her given name.
Not Katraine at all.
Sasha.
Assuming even that was true.
Kara handed over the now quite cooperative Enzo to the first marine she spotted and gave orders to ensure that he departed with the last load of civilians. She then wheeled away from the pair and stalked off to find the pretender in Galactica's ranks.