I found myself crying on the way back home today from post.  I'm not normally an emotional person, so it was odd.

Today, many countries take the day off for Memorial Day, or Armistice Day.  Here I am in Germany, among the people who rose up twice in less than 50 years, and twice America came to the aid of Europe.  We all mourn for the fallen:  the soldiers, the civilians, the guilty and the innocent.  I can feel their ghosts, walking amongst us.

Tags: memorial day
Current Location: middle of a war zone
Current Mood: melancholy
Current Music: Systsem of It Down

Chapter 5

 

Kara looked dumbstruck at Zak.  He had just admitted to deliberately seducing her in order to pass basic flight.  All these years of wallowing in her own guilt, she had never considered anybody else’s culpability.  Zak shook his head, trying to contain a chuckle.  He slipped her arm through his and started walking again.  “I knew I would never be as good as Dad or Lee.  I’m an Adama - I had to do something.  I just never expected to fall for you.”

 

Kara shook herself loose from him.  Rage started to build inside her.  “You bastard!  You used me?  All this time,” she shook her head, comprehending the time that she and Lee had wasted on this, now lost forever.  “I love Lee. Gods damn it, Zak!  I left him alone on New Caprica to protect him from me and my bad luck, and now I find out you manipulated me?”  Tears streaming down her face, she hauled back and punched him in the jaw.

 

Zak was caught unprepared for her punch that contained years of pain and rage behind it.  Coming upward from a shorter opponent, her fist hit his slack jaw and drove it into his skull.  Zak dropped like a felled tree onto someone’s front lawn.  She turned away from him and sunk onto the curb, overwhelmed by it all.  Grief and despair engulfed her.  Gasping between tears, she realized it was all gone.  She and Lee would never be together.  What did she care about Earth?  Why should she care about anything?  Lee, he was all that she wanted.  And she had frakked it up.

 

“Lords of Kobol, Starbuck!”  Zak sat up his left hand rubbing his jaw.  He struggled to his feet, walked over to her, and collapsed down on the curb next to her.  Staring off across the street, Zak said “It’s not your fault.”

 

“Yeah, well, I still passed an unqualified pilot.”  Kara looked away from him.  Zak had never seen her cry, and it made her feel exposed.

 

“Kara, there’s more to it than that!  I thought I’d get a chance to explain it to you over a glass of wine back at my apartment, but…”  His plans dashed, Zak sighed.  “Remember back at the club, when I told you I understood about the whole “death as your destiny” thing?”

 

Kara tucked herself into a ball and hugged her knees.  She nodded.

 

“I understand it, because it was my destiny, Starbuck.”  Starbuck looked at him, her eyes big, but didn’t trust herself to speak.  Zak plowed on.  “I know, it sucks.  But you passing me was as much part of my destiny as my death.  I had to die, to bring you, Dad and Lee together.  You three are the heroic core of the fleet, and you all have roles to play in saving humanity.”  Zak put a hand on her shoulder, ”I’m OK with what happened, Kara.  It was the will of the Gods.  You need to forgive yourself.”

 

Kara’s head reeled.  She could see it now, as plain as daylight.  They were all just pawns in the bigger war Hermes had alluded to, to be sacrificed as needed.  “If that was the will of the Gods, why do I love him?  Why does he love me?”

 

“I don’t know.  Free will?  Destiny?  My role was to bring you together.  I don’t know what your destinies are.”  Zak stood up and offered her his hand, “Sorry.”  She took it and stood up.  He wrapped his arms around her and stroked her hair.  She leaned into him, feeling brittle and unsure of herself.

 

“Come back to my place and crash there tonight.  I think the Gods owe you one.”  She nodded against his chest.

 

 

Zak’s apartment was just as she remembered it.  It was masculine and austere, but the green and brown earth tones made it feel comforting.  She had always felt like she was in a forest when she was here.  She sat down on his coffee colored leather sofa, as Zak rummaged around in his bedroom, looking for a pillow, sheet and blanket. 

 

Zak came out of the bedroom shirtless, wearing only a pair of pajama pants, and carrying an armload of linens.  “OK, I think I got it all.  Is there anything I can get you before bed?  Another drink?”

 

Kara looked at his bare chest, and looked away quickly.  Zak was a darker version of Lee, the same DNA shaping huge biceps and a lean torso.  All that seemed to be missing was the gunshot scar.

 

Zak saw her look away, “What?”

 

“Nothing.  I just never realized how much you and Lee looked alike.  I was looking for the scar.”  She stood up and landed in a chair so that Zak could make up the sofa.

 

Zak folded the sheet in half and tucked it into the back of the sofa.  “The scar?  What scar?”

 

“Where I shot him.”  Zak gave her a questioning look over his shoulder.  “I didn’t shoot him on purpose!  There was a hostage situation and he got hit by friendly fire.”

 

Zak grabbed a blanket, “Where did you hit him?”

 

“Come here.”  Zak tucked the blanket under an arm and walked over to her chair.  She stood up.  Stepping in close, her eyes cast down, her left hand came up, hovering over his right pectoral muscle.  She could feel his warmth radiating under her hand and felt herself flushing hot in response. She placed two fingers on his chest and whispered, “Here.”

 

Zak’s breathing deepened and Kara saw his nipple contract under her hand.  He quickly turned away, bending over to spread the blanket on the sofa.  Zak cleared his throat.  “That’s a bad place to get hit, I’m surprised he lived.”

 

Kara bit her lip and sat down again.  That had been too close, for both of them.  “Yeah.  But Dualla was there to nurse him back health.”

 

“Who’s Dualla?”  Zak grabbed the pillow and sat down on the couch, leaving it in his lap.

 

She couldn’t keep the bitterness from her voice, “Now?  She’s his wife.”

 

 

Zak said he’d sleep on the sofa and gave her the bed.

 

She slipped out of her clothes and into the bed.  It was full sized, but for someone who had spent the last three years sleeping in a rack, it felt palatial.  She spread out, feeling the sheets silky soft against her skin, closed her eyes and fell asleep.

 

She dreamt of Lee.  Like all dreams, it was nonsensical.  She saw Lee in the cockpit of Raptor, not his Viper.  He wasn’t in his flight suit, but dressed in his blue duty uniform.  The CAG wasn’t the pilot:  Lt. Sharon Agethon was there in her flight suit sitting in the right-hand pilot’s chair.  A man wearing sunglasses, of all things, got on the Raptor carrying a large tote bag with a live cat in it.  She knew somehow there was a bomb on the Raptor and everyone would die if she couldn’t stop their takeoff.  She was inside the bird, screaming and yelling, but no one could hear her.  The only thing that did hear her was the cat.  She clapped her hands loudly, spooking the cat, which jumped out of the Raptor.  The Chief saw the cat go under the Raptor, and stopped the launch.  The deck gang surrounded the Raptor trying to capture it.  Chief Tyrol saw the bomb, and then she and Lee were alone.  He was behind her, kissing her neck; whispering in her ear that it was OK, that everyone was alright.

 

“Lee!”  She cried out in relief.  He was safe!  She turned around and kissed him deeply.  He returned her kiss, stroking her hair.  They were no longer standing in the hanger bay, no longer dressed.  She lay on her back in a bed with her eyes closed, feeling his lips around her nipple, teasing it, a hand gliding down her body.  She was so happy that he was alive, that he was here with her now.  She didn’t care if he was still married to Ana.   

 

Despite the darkness that surrounded her, she knew she had awoken.  Kara slowly realized the passion she was feeling was no longer contained by her dream. Her body was aflame with need.  She felt his body next hers, lips on her body, a hand caressing her gently between her thighs.  She did not question how they got there or how she and he could be together.

 

She felt his desire for her.  Kara pulled him to her and clung to him as he joined with her, frantic not to lose this moment they had together.  There was a desperateness between them.  Love, regret, friendship, all flowed together, their bodies moving in unison.  They climaxed together, panting, not moving, afraid to break the spell. 

 

Kara inhaled and smelled the scent of pine trees.  Reality came crashing back in.  She laid her left hand against his chest and found only smooth skin.  “Zak.”

 

He rolled off of her.  “You were so sad, Kara, crying for Lee in your sleep.  I wanted you to make you happy, if only for a little while.”

 

“But Lee…” Kara started. 

 

“I loved you, too, Kara.  We were going to be married.”

 

Speaking softly, she asked him, “How much of that was really you, and not your destiny?”

 

She waited for him to reply.  A minute went by.  “I don’t know.” 

 

“Neither do I.”

 

 

Kara stood in the shower, letting the water course over her.  Somewhere inside her, had she known it was Zak?  Did it matter?  Lee was alive and she was dead.  It may be 60 years until they were on the same side of reality again.  And after 60 years with Anastasia, would he still love her?

 

Frak that!  Kara felt her resolve strengthen.  She was Starbuck, hotshot Viper pilot and Hero.  She had to go back.  She would get back.  She was going do anything they wanted of her, but there was going to be a price for her obedience.  They were going to send her back alive, back to Lee.

 

 

It had been a long day.  The assassination attempt on Rolo Lampkin and the confrontation with his dad over Kara had left Lee emotionally exhausted.  He just wanted to go to sleep.  Lucky for him, his wife was already asleep.  They could skip their nightly banter on why he had been pulled from CAG duties to serve as security guard for Baltar’s lawyer.  And to top everything off, the incident in the pilot’s ready room had already made its way around the ship.  It was getting harder and harder to go through the motions placating Ana’s insecurities regarding Kara.  Kara was dead.  Ana had won.  He wished she’d just leave it alone.

 

Stripped down to his tanks and his briefs, he poured himself a glass of ambrosia.  He sat down, glass in hand, staring out into the room.  He raised his glass and took a drink.  He was staring out into the room again when they caught his eye.  They were so small, sitting on the table, Ana’s statues of the Gods.  He picked them up and held them in his hand.  There were only two statues for all the Gods –archtypes - Dee had explained to him, one male and one female.  That was the way it was suppose to be, the way they should have been.

 

Anger welled up inside him.  Anders and Agethon had both told him about how Kara had believed she had a destiny, something that frakking Cylon Leoben had done to her.  He hadn’t known about it because he had rejected her, and now she was dead.  He hurled the statues across the room, where they clattered against the bulkhead. 

The temple was empty again except for Aurora’s bright torch in a bracket against the wall.  Hermes looked over at a scowling Starbuck.  “Coffee or beer?”

 

“Beer.”  Starbuck blinked.  They were no longer at the temple, but lounging in low, padded patio chairs under a canopy of birch trees  Sitting upon a patio of natural field stones, the stones wound around the trees and extended to the edge of a pool fed by the stream.  They were in a valley.  Kara could see a mountain range peeking through a hedge of birches, aspens and sand cherries on the far bank. Hermes got up and fished two longnecks from the edge of the pool.

 

“Glass or bottle?”

 

“Bottle’s fine.”

 

Hermes grabbed a bottle opener that hung from a line on a tree branch and popped the tops off the bottles.  He passed a dark brown bottle to her.  It was icy cold.  Kara took a swig and tasted a bright clear lager.  She started to relax.  “OK.  This I could get used to.”

 

“Glad you like it,” Hermes said and took a swig himself.  “You know, you can go anywhere you imagine once your destiny is fulfilled.”

 

“Yeah, but it would still suck.  There’s nobody here.”

 

“Billions of human just died, you don’t think someone you know might have been a Hero?”  Hermes looked at her with hint of mischief in his eye.

 

Kara took another sip of her beer and stared out at the mountains.  She thought about Zak.  If Lee was a Hero, wouldn’t that mean Zak was one also?  The pleasant buzz she was nursing evaporated as she thought about meeting him again.  “Maybe.”

 

“Hey, that’s a good idea.  Let’s ask him!”

 

“What?”  Kara exclaimed.  Surely he couldn’t know about Zak.

 

“Zak Adama.  He should know whether his brother will listen to you as a shade.  Besides, I’m sure you two have some catching up to do.”

 

Kara felt like she did that time her bird and that Cylon raider had collided, caught in a flat spin and about to crash.  Zak was here, in the Elysian Fields.  Although the longer she was here, the more it was starting to feel like the Underworld.  “I’m not so sure that’s a good idea.”

 

“Kara.  You visited Socrata and let go of your fear.  Nothing could’ve been harder than that.  This is Zak.  What do you have to lose?”  Hermes looked at her and a chill ran down her spine.  She remembered that look from Leoben, the Cylon whose soul she had once prayed for a long time ago.

 

“Who made Leoben?  You said he was made in your image, but the Cylons don’t believe in our Gods, just their one God.  So how did he end up so much like you?”  Kara looked into those blue eyes, wondering if the same madness lay behind them.

 

“Talk to Zak, then I promise to answer your question.  Now close your eyes and think of him.  When you’re ready to come back, just close your eyes and think of me.”  A knowing smirk crossed his face.  She remembered that reoccurring dream she had of frakking Leoben just before she crossed over.  Somehow, she bet, Hermes had had a role in it.

 

She lifted her bottle and knocked back the rest.  There was no point in doing this sober.  She leaned back, closing her eyes and summoned up the picture of the three of them in her locker, Zak, with his dark hair and hazel eyes, gregarious and carefree.  She remembered that Lee had seemed so alien, with a stick firmly rammed up his backside, that she couldn’t fathom how they could be brothers.  Now she realized Zak's normalcy had come with a price, paid by his older brother.  Lee, always so noble and self-sacrificing; she could only imagine how different he would have been had he not have had such a frakked up childhood.  Well, that was the pot calling the kettle black…A hand on her shoulder startled her out of her thoughts.  Hermes bent over and whispered in her ear, “Zak, Zak Adama.”

 

Kara concentrated again – Zak - spontaneous Zak who could never really focus long enough to get flying, Vipers or otherwise.  Touched by the Gods, some would say, golden.  No one could ever fault with happy go lucky Zak.  It made it all more shocking when he died.  Kara blinked and found herself sitting in a semicircular black vinyl booth, the beer in her hand replaced by scotch rocks in a low ball glass, looking out on a dance floor.  Kara snorted.  How typically Zak.  She saw him out on the dance floor, tight jeans and a white shirt contrasting with his darker features.  He was dancing with a pretty brunette, but Kara could see the other women on the dance floor keeping an eye on him.  Zak did not seem to be suffering here in the Elysian Fields.

 

Zak seemed to feel her eyes on him and scanned the room until he saw her.  “Starbuck!” he yelled across the room.  He said some thing to his dance partner and made his way off the dance floor and picked his way through the crowded club.  Approaching at full tilt, Zak came up to the booth, flung himself beside her and enveloped her in a huge hug.  “Kara Thrace in the Elysian Fields!  Of course you’d end up here!”  He looked at her face and his enthusiasm waned, as his brain caught up with him. and he hugged her again  “Oh frak, Kara.  I’m sorry you died.  Cylons finally get you?”

 

“Damn, Zak!”  Kara pushed him off her like a big puppy.  “Grab a seat, will ya?”

 

He slid into the booth across from her.  He was gleaming with sweat from dancing, and she could smell his familiar scent.  More sharp than Lee’s, it always reminded her of pine trees.  A rum and cola was in his hand and he ran the cool glass across his forehead.  He brought his glass down slowly, his eyes searching her face with trepidation, “Is Lee with you?”

 

She gave him her reassuring smile, “No.  He’s on Galactica with the old man.”

 

Zak visibly relaxed.  “Sorry.  I want to see him, but, you know, I can wait.”  He took a sip of his drink, “So, how’d our Top Gun finally buy it?  It’s got to be a damn good story!”

 

She examined her ice cubes.  “Not really.  I was “guided” over to fulfill my destiny.”

 

“A gun like you?  That’s a frakking crime!  I’m mean, me, I understood the whole “death as destiny” thing, but I’d think you’re more valuable alive.  So, what’d they tell you?  Your martyrdom would solidify the fleet?  You would serve as a mythical inspiration for generations to come?”

 

“Actually, that’s why I’m here.  I’m supposed to lead the fleet to Earth, but to do that, they want me to be non corporal so that the location of Earth cannot be captured by the Cylons.”

 

“But?”  Zak asked.

 

“But in order to appear as a shade, it has to be to..” Zak finished her sentence with her, “..someone who loves you.”  “Yeah.”  Starbuck slumped down in her seat, twirling her glass around, watching her ice spin around the interior of the cup.

 

“Dad and Lee both love you – so what’s the problem?”  Kara looked up at him from underneath her eyebrows, waiting for the other shoe to drop.  “Oh, yeah, it’s Dad and Lee.”

 

“I told’em that Lee’d never lead the fleet based on what a shade told him, even if it was one of his best pilots, but they didn’t believe me.  So they sent me here to you.”  Kara knocked back the rest of her scotch, feeling its warmth spread throughout her.

 

Zak reached his hand across the table and touched her hand.  “Hey, you want to get outta here?”

 

“Yeah.”  They scooted out of the booth and Starbuck noticed she was wearing normal clubbing gear, a short navy skirt and a gold metallic halter top that left little to the imagination.  She wondered whether she or Zak had been responsible for her outfit.  Eh, it was better pink.  Zak’s hand found her waist as he guided her out of the club.  Kara felt surprisingly comforted by his unconscious gesture.  It felt so normal, a normal that hadn’t existed for anyone in years.

 

It was night in Caprica City.  She recognized their old stomping grounds, Capitol Hill, where Zak had kept an apartment.  Zak led her down familiar streets heading them back to his place.  She watched the lines in the sidewalk as they walked, trying to figure out a way to broach the inevitable topic.  “Zak?”

 

“Yeah, babe?”  He smiled and threw an arm around her shoulder, pulling her in close to him.  Gods, did he have to make it harder?  She dropped her shoulder, his hand sliding off.  She stopped and turned to face him.

 

“Zak, I’m sorry.  I should have never passed you.”  Her voice started to tremble.  “You wanted to fly so bad and I,...I couldn’t bear to disappoint you.  I frakked up and it got you killed.”

 

Mirth danced in his hazel eyes while she spoke and when she was done, his face splitting open in a wide grin.  It was infectious, and she grinned like an idiot back at him.  She finally hit him in the arm.  “What, damn it?”

 

“You’re so clueless!  You and my brother!  No wonder you two still haven’t managed to hook up.  Did it ever occur to you that I intentionally seduced my hot flight instructor to make sure I got a passing grade?”

Kara stood on the slope a lone hill looking out upon the undulating plain of farmlands and forests.  Morning haze blanketed the landscape, waiting for the sun to arrive and burn it away.  The horizon was aglow with shades of pink.  She looked around.  Hermes sat on a bench off to her left.  He beckoned her to him.

 

“Come.  Sit down and watch the show!”  Hermes patted the bench next to him.  She sat down; the marble cool against her legs.  “How was your trip?”

 

She sighed.  She didn’t know what was worse: her own heartbreak or the torment of watching her lovers’ grieve.  As a young girl in temple school, she could never comprehend the concept of the Fields of Asphodel.  Losing one’s memory had always seemed like a punishment to her, something more appropriate to Hades.  Now she understood the sweet relief it offered mortals.

 

He grabbed her hand and gave her a comforting squeeze.  She considered his hand in hers, with its golden glow.  Golden, she mused, like Lee’s aura.  Her mind flew down that pathway like a missile locked on a target.  Hermes had said something about a Hero and a Cylon Archangel.  Gold, gold must be the color of the Gods, and Heros, being part God, would have golden auras.  And that meant…“Sam is a Cylon!”

 

It came out breathless, barely audible.  Kara clutched her middle, turning her back towards Hermes.  She thought she would vomit.  She had endured captivity on New Caprica with Leoben, only to be rescued by another Cylon?  The depth of their mind game made her sick.

 

“Cylon Archangel – not the ‘skin jobs’ you’re familiar with – though the original ‘skin jobs’ were all Archangels once.”  Hermes looked out at the brightening horizon with pink giving way to gold, the aurora of the sun becoming visible.  “She’ll be here soon.”

 

“Archangel, skin job, Centurion, what does it matter?  They’re all frakking toasters!” Kara’s voice was bitter.  She was tired of the pain, but it just kept coming.  Even death had not been a reprieve.

 

“Kara,” he chided, “you know better than that.  Cylons have souls – that’s the essence of being sentient.  You think they are just some sort of computer running a sophisticated software program – but they are more than their programming, just as you are more than your schooling.  Look at model number eight.  Boomer worked so hard to fight off her programming, like an alcoholic trying to stop drinking.  Even when she resurrected, she wanted to find a way to coexist with humans.  Athena made a choice to fight along side you, to love a human.  Do you think she’s following her programming?  Did you know the model 3 was boxed?  She was trying to go far beyond her programming, like you, to see what lies between life and death.  Even the ruthless six line had a defector - Caprica Six.  All souls make choices, and even though we gods write fate into some of you, we cannot control all the choices that you make.  We cannot control the choices we make.  That’s why we are at war.”

 

“War,” Kara echoed.  “We lost the war.  We’re running for our very existence.”

 

“You have not even conceived of the war that surrounds you.  You see Cylons killing humans.  I see an unending war that repeats itself for eons.  It is our punishment for our hubris that ripples throughout time in an endless cycle of love and hate.  You call it the cycle of time, all this has happened before and will happen again.  I call it a rip in the fabric of reality.”  Kara looked at him, suddenly reminded of his Cylon counterpart’s ramblings.  Hermes looked out to where the sun had fully traversed the horizon.  “Your mother is here.”

 

Hermes rose and waited for Kara to follow him.  They walked up a path to the very crest of hill, where a circular temple stood, made of gleaming white marble.  Between each column hung a banner of silken fabric shining in the new day’s light in alternating shades of gold and rose. A bright light radiated from the interior.  As they hit the steps, Kara saw a large sphere of golden light that slowly materialized into a shapely woman with wavy black tresses done up in intricate braids and warm mocha skin.  Her wings were the same color.  She wore a golden dress bound by a rosy cord.  She looked directly at her and spoke, “Kara, I’m glad you finally decided to embrace your destiny.  I’m the mother of your line - Aurora.”

 

“Uh,” was all that Kara could manage.  How did one address a Goddess that was your progenitor?  How did one address any God that appeared before you?  It was not something they covered in temple school.  Kara looked at the winged woman in front of her and suddenly understood why the oracle of dog town gave her the figurine of Aurora.  Why had she given it to Admiral Adama?  How did the pieces fit together?

 

“It’s alright, my child.  Just speak to me as you spoke to Hermes.  He is no less a God than I.  You may call me Mother or Aurora, as you wish.”

 

Kara managed to gather her wits about her enough to respond, “Yes, ma’am.”

 

Aurora looked at her expectantly.  Kara revised herself, “Aurora.”

 

Aurora smiled.  “Now, I expect you wish to know the nature of your quest?”  Kara nodded.  “You will lead your people to Earth.”

 

“I thought that was the president’s job.”

 

“Ah, the Scrolls of Pythia.  Yes, she was fulfilling the role of the dying leader.  However, she forsook that role when she became tainted by the Fallen.  Now you will play that part as well.”

 

“Dying leader?  I’m already dead!  How am I supposed to lead the fleet to Earth?  I don’t even know where it is.”

 

“Apollo will show you.  You will follow his arrow to Earth and then return to the fleet.  You will appear to his son and lead him to Earth.”

 

Starbuck couldn’t believe the crap she just heard.  “I died for this?  That is the stupidest frakking plan I have ever heard!  Have you people never heard of a map?”

 

Aurora was taken aback by Kara’s sudden change in attitude.  “We must keep the location of Earth secret.  A map or a person can be captured by the Fallen.  You saw what nearly happened at the Eye of Jupiter.  You will appear as a shade.”

 

“I hate to point out a flaw in your plan,” Starbuck the Viper pilot said, “but if the son of Apollo is who I think it is, your plan won’t work.”

 

“Why?”

 

“Because if the Son of Apollo is Lee Adama, you’re screwed.  He’s an atheist.  He doesn’t believe in the Gods, he can’t see me, and even if he could, he would never let a figment of his imagination lead him anywhere.”

 

Aurora gave a worried look to Hermes.  He shrugged his shoulders.  She turned her attention back to Starbuck.  “Even from the woman he loves?”

 

“News flash for you:  He’s married…to another woman.”

 

Aurora frowned.  “But he loves you.”

 

“Well, Mother, you should know what a frak-up I am.  Maybe you picked the wrong daughter for this quest.”

 

“Self-pity doesn’t become you, child,” Aurora scolded Kara.  “No, this is just an unexpected obstacle.  I must consult with the others.  Hermes, since my daughter seems to have insight that we lack, will you please tell her about the last two cycles?  She may see something we’ve overlooked.”

Dear Friends:  I have repeated a portion of the previous post for continuity's sake.  I promise from now on, to post only up to a natural break!  Thanks for reading.


Everything was out of focus.  Faces seemed to stare out at her from every direction.  There were small points of bright light and a vague scent of incense in the air.  Kara felt she knew this place.  It was the Hall of Remembrance on Galactica.  She looked around.  There were living people here, vague shapes enveloped in colorful auras that felt like an electric field.  She felt lost.  Who had called her here?  How would she be able to tell people apart if she couldn’t see them?  There had to be a way.  She closed her eyes and breathed.  Think!  She felt a tugging sensation.  It was pulling her to her 2 o’clock, around the bend in the hallway.  She moved in that direction.

 

And there he stood, as clear as day.  He seemed to have a golden glow about him, but she could see every muscle, every line.  In the short time she had been away, she had forgotten how beautiful he was.  “Damn.”

 

She stood next to him, feeling his anguish.  It made her heart ache.  “Hey.”  She didn’t know if he could hear her, but all she could do is try.

 

“Kara, why?  Why did you do it?”  Lee was talking to a picture of her he held in her hand.  

 

“I have a destiny to fulfill, and it’s not like there was anything left for me here…”  How long would they have continued screwing up what they had?  Regret, that was the only thing she had left.

 

He choked up.  “I was so frakking stupid.”

 

“We both were, Lee.”  Tears started rolling down her cheeks.  For a moment, she was glad she was an apparition.  She always felt weaker than Lee; he was a master of holding his cards close to the chest.

 

“I love you, Kara,” he whispered.

 

“I love you, Lee.”

 

Lee looked up at Kat’s picture.  He was figuring out where to place her picture.  The hatch door opened and someone came up behind him and spoke.  It was muffled, but she thought she could make out “Major?

 

Kara watched him as he palmed her picture, and slid it into his pocket.  She briefly thought his wife, Anastasia, would have a field day if she found it there.  Kara just hoped that she would take care of him.  Ana’s amenity towards her was well deserved, but Lee shouldn’t have to suffer for it.  Kara watched as Lee put on his game face, and shoved his feelings down deep.  Kara felt his pull on her lessen and was surprised to feel another pull on her.  She closed her eyes again, trying to let that pull guide her.

 

She opened her eyes and tried to orient herself.  She was on the flight deck.  There were many people here, indiscernible behind their colored auras.  They were grouped around a Viper.  She looked around, looking for the person who called her here.  Atop the Viper was Sam, clear as day but for a silver shimmer, drunk.  “Oh, Gods, Sam!  You idiot!  You’re going to kill yourself.”

 

If he heard her, he gave no indication.  Sam swayed dangerously with a bottle in one hand and flipping a coin in the other.  “Heads!  See that?  My girl’s too lucky to check out!”

 

Kara felt ashamed.  He was a good man and he obviously loved her a great deal, but she had long since just considered him a friend and a frak buddy.  His professional Pyramid player ways, playing, drinking and frakking, had gotten old after a while.  She had left more of that lifestyle behind her than she had admitted.  It was only after living it, day in and day out on New Caprica, did she realize that the extent in which she had embraced her life as a fighter pilot.

 

She watched as Lee entered the hanger bay and approached Sam.  So this is why he had been called away from the Hall of Remembrance.  How ironic was that; her lover coming to her husband’s aid?  “Hey, Sam,” Lee said in a weary voice.

 

“Leeeee!  Apollooooo!”  Sam looked down.  Kara felt Sam’s jealousy of Lee.  Sam had once called him ‘her Major’ and he had been right. He may have been the one married to her, but it was just a consolation prize.  Loving Sammy was easy, but she could never purge Lee Adama from her heart.  Ultimately, her marriage had been a mistake

 

“Just hang in there, Buddy,” Lee said as he climbed the rolling staircase.  “Boy, you’re flying!  Let’s just get down and get some sleep.”  Lee, Mr. Fixit; Kara admired his selflessness.  He was a better person than she was.  No wonder he decided to salvage his marriage to Dualla.  She loved Lee, but she didn’t deserve him.

 

“I’m fine.  I’m just going to sit down…”  Sam struggled to lower himself onto the Viper in his impaired state.  “Ow!”

 

“Are you alright?” asked Lee.

 

Sam gazed long into Lee’s eyes and Kara felt his jealousy drain away.  Sam had somehow seen the pain Lee had tried to hide away.  They were both mourning her loss.  “She wasn’t supposed to …It wasn’t …No!  I gotta go.”

 

Sam rose, forgetting he was sitting on a Viper, and stepped off into midair.  He came down in a sickening thud onto the unforgiving hanger deck.  Kara and Lee exclaimed in unison, “Oh, Frak! Frak!”

 

Questioning the deck gang that surrounded Sam, Lee asked, “Is he OK?”  The gang swiftly went into action, two running to the aid station to grab a gurney, another to the phone to advise Doc Cottle that he had an incoming patient.

 

Lee swiftly descended to stairs to Sam’s side.  The fall seemed to sober him up.  “Ow…I think I fell.”

 

“Sam!” Kara yelled, terrified.  “Lee!”  If she couldn’t do anything, she hoped Lee would.

 

“Sam.  Sam.” Lee said in a gentle voice.  Kara and Sam watched as Lee’s stoic mask started to crack.  Sam’s extroverted mourning was everything Lee wished he could do, but couldn’t.  It wasn’t his place.  He wasn’t her husband.  And it was killing him.

 

“Ow” Sam sat half way up. Sam's eyes pleading with him, hoping Lee could change the outcome, he asked “She’s still alive, right?”  Sam tilted his head to the side, unconsciously mirroring Kara’s mannerism perfectly.  Seeing it, Lee froze just for an instant.

 

Regaining his composure, he said softly, “She’s gone, Sam.  She’s gone.”

 

 

“Glad to see you’re finally awake.”  Doc Cottle‘s cigarette smoked drifted around the edges of the bed.  Cottle stood at the foot of his bed writing notes in a chart.

 

“What?  What happened?”  Sam was more than a little fuzzy on the details that had him waking up in the ship’s hospital.

 

“Seems you took a header off a Viper after getting stupid drunk.  You have a contusion on the left side of your head, and a partial tear of your left ACL.  I sewed back together with some monofilament but it’s going to take time to heal.”  He hung the chart up at the end of the bed.

 

“You operated on me?”  Sam lifted the sheet covering him.  He saw knee was covered in bandages, and the leg was immobilized in a brace.

 

“Oh, brother!”  Cottle took a drag off his cigarette.  “You Pyramid players aren’t real bright, are you?”  You’ll stay here tonight, and will use crutches for the next month.  You keep that knee immobilized in a brace for the next 60 days, do I make myself clear?”

 

“Yeah.” 

 

“The nurse will be in to give you some pain medicine now that your anesthesia’s worn off.”  Doc Cottle parted the opaque privacy curtain and was gone.

 

He lay in the hospital bed, staring up at the gray metal ceiling and let his mind drift as he waited for the nurse.  Images of standing a top a Viper returned to him - and Apollo.  Apollo, his wife’s lover, came to his aid.  He always expected Apollo to be a prick to him, but at most, he was formal in his dealings with Sam.  He had to really push Lee’s buttons to get a real reaction from him, like on that damned algae planet.  That’s when he realized that Kara was not just another frak to Apollo; he was madly in love with her.  No wonder Kara always had to act out around him.  She needed to push his buttons just to get past Apollo’s stoic façade.  He had seen the way she had taunted him, hell, the first day Sam had come on board!  Then again at The Dance, she had been vicious, pushing him until he had reacted all over her face.  Sam couldn’t believe Kara could love two men who were such opposites.  It gave Sam an ugly idea and he shook his head, trying to deny the truth of it as it blossomed fully.

 

Kara had once been in contention to be a professional Pyramid player before a knee injury sidelined her.  She had gone on to join the military and become one of the best Viper pilots the fleet had ever seen.  She took lovers who were as proficient as she was, and that’s where the similarity between them ended.  Apollo internalized, Sam externalized, Apollo was all about self control and discipline, Sam was undisciplined and out of control – his knee was a testament to that.  He was as different from Apollo as he could be.  And that’s why she had chosen him.

 

The white curtain slid aside.  Carrying a tray, a small brunette in green fatigues with her hair in the regulation ponytail closed the curtain behind her.  She set the tray down on his bedside table and went to work.  She cuffed him, taking his blood pressure and pulse, checked his temperature, and his bandages.  Grabbing a length of rubber tubing, she tied it around his upper arm.  He felt the blood pressure in his arm rise as the blood became trapped behind the tourniquet.  With some gauze and a bottle of alcohol - he guessed they had run out of prepackaged alcohol swabs long ago - she sterilized the top of the glass vial and the inside of his elbow.  She threaded the needle into his vein and slowly depressed the plunger.  “This is the only dose you’ll receive, so enjoy the ride.”  She released the tourniquet, gathered her tray, and was gone.

 

The drug diffused itself through his body with each beat of his heart.  He felt warm and relaxed.  The pain in his knee faded away.  The truth he arrived at came back to him.  Kara had married him less for who he was and more for who he wasn’t.  His chest felt hollow.  Why hadn’t he been enough for her?  He felt tears streaming down his face.  Damn it, he loved Kara!

 

There was a glow beside the bed.  He used the heels of his hands to wipe the tears away.  The glow became a golden cloud.  Thinking the tears were still affecting his vision, he grabbed the top of the bed sheet to wipe his eyes.  He looked up and saw the transparent image of Kara growing more defined as he watched.  “Karrie?  Is it really you?”

 

“Hey, Sam,” the image spoke to him.

 

Wow, Sam thought, the nurse was right – these were really good drugs.  She was almost solid enough to believe she was really here.  “Why did you marry me?”  He felt his chest clench again. “You broke my heart.”

 

The Kara shade chewed on her bottom lip.  “I’m sorry.  I didn’t know.”

 

“Didn’t know that I loved you or that you were in love with Apollo?  You shouldn’t have done it, Kara.”  Recalling the look on Lee’s face in the hanger bay, he remembered that Lee was grieving, too.  “You hurt me, you hurt Lee, you even frakked yourself!”

 

The shade closed her eyes, then look to the side, trying to blink away the tears.  “I think it was my destiny, Sam.  I wouldn’t have been strong enough to go if I had anything left here.”

 

“Destiny?  To what?  Commit suicide?”  Frustrated, he closed his eyes and ran a hand through his hair.  “You know, I don’t need this anymore.  Go tell Lee about your destiny, maybe he’ll listen.  I’m done.”  Sam laid his head back against the pillow and shut his eyes.  It wasn’t nearly as satisfying as stomping out of the room.  He breathed in deeply and let it go.  He relaxed.  The drug did its work and sleep overtook him.  The shade faded back into a golden cloud of light, shrinking smaller, fading, until it was gone.

Title:  War of the Angels
Author:  Waterwitch

Date: 04/17/07

Rating: G

Archive:  Fallout Shelter

Warnings:  None
Spoilers:  Season 3
Pairings:  Lee & Dee, Lee & Kara, Kara & Sam

Time Period:  After Maelstrom
Disclaimer:  RDM’s world, I just play, I don't make money.

Her eyes watched the altimeter spinning down.

 

“Kara!”  Lee voiced screamed across space and into her headset, rending her heart.  She felt her resolve weaken.  He was her last tie to this life, the only one who could reel her back.  Dee, she reminded herself, he was happy with Dee.  He would be fine.  He could live without her.

 

“Lee, I’m not afraid anymore.”  Not afraid of her love for him, not afraid of her impending death, not afraid; she’d never be afraid again.  She was left with only regret of what might have been.

 

“Say again?” Oh my Gods, Lee thought.  I didn’t just hear what I think I just heard.

 

Like a lover whispering in his ear, Kara’s voice was soft and calm in his headset. “I’m not afraid anymore.”

 

Lee’s blood ran cold.  Why did he ever insist on bringing her out here?  Fear clouded the answer from his memory.  He had to save her.  “Allright, Kara.  Forget the damn toaster.  Climb now or you’re dead.”

 

There was no response.

 

“We can still pull up, we’re not past the point of no return!”  Kara startled at Lee’s use of “we”.  It was her journey.  It was too late for “we”.  “Kara!  Where are you?  Visual, visual.  OK, Kara.  I’m coming to get you.”

 

She was prepared to take the next step, to become her destiny, but Lee, he couldn’t follow her.  He had to live.  She tried to reassure him.  “Lee, I’ll see you on the other side.” 

 

“Kara, please, listen to me…”  She knew he was blaming himself for not grounding her, but she knew now that her destiny would not be stopped.  She was not in control.  The Gods had written her fate.  Guilt was undeserved.

 

“Just let me go” she pleaded in his ear.  She loved him.  He knew that now.  He could hear it in the pain in her voice.  Mountains of denial, guilt, and lies that he had buried his love under evaporated.  He loved Kara.  And in a microsecond, he knew he was going to lose her.

 

“Kara!  Gods damn it, Kara!  You come back, come back!”  He ordered her back, back to him. Kara knew he was breaking inside, but it was too late.  They were always too late.

 

“It’s OK.  Just let me go.  They’re waiting for me.”  And then she was gone.

 

 

It must have been Spring.  The ornamental cherries were blooming.  Daffodils and tulips sprung up from flowering groundcovers.  Rhododendrons were blooming. The garden seemed to go on forever, yet was made comfortable by being divided into distinct rooms.  A path ran through them, linking them together.  Kara stood in one of the gardens, situated in a bowl of rock.  She felt sheltered by the rock walls without feeling confined.  It was breathtakingly beautiful.

 

The sky was bright blue with the occasional white cumulus cloud.  The temperature was perfect.  She was neither hot nor cold and the air was still.  She breathed in.  It was not the recycled scrubbed air of space, always somewhat stale.  The air was heavy with oxygen and perfumed with the scent of the flowers that surrounded her.  It puzzled her. She didn’t have her helmet on.  Kara looked down.  She did not have her flight suit on, either.  She was wearing a rosy pink tunic embroidered with golden thread at the hem and ended at her ankles.  She had a golden chord crisscrossed between her breasts and wrapped around her waist.  Her sandals were deep pink.

 

“Pink?  I died and the Gods put me in pink?” she said out loud.

 

“That’s all you can think about?  The color of your dress?”  The voice she knew as Leoben Conoy’s came from the other side of the cherry tree, where he sat, leaning back against the tree’s trunk.  Kara wasn’t sure if she had overlooked him or if he had just appeared.  She walked over and stood before him.  Her eyes appraised the man before her.  Kara’s knowledge of this model was extensive, she knew every line in his face, every inch of his body.  This Leoben looked different.  His skin was smoother, his hair more golden, his frame trimmer.  He shimmered golden in the light.  Her hands rested on her hips.

 

“You again!  Who are you?  Why do you look like Leoben?”

 

“There’s the feisty Kara I know!  To answer your question, I resemble Leoben because he was made in my image.  I am Hermes.”  He looked up at her and smiled.  “Great garden, by the way.  Some Heros are so literal, they think Elysian Fields, so they do grass or grain, sometimes for miles.  Where is this?”

 

“Uh,” Kara looked around.  It did seem familiar to her.  She tried to picture herself walking the paths.  She was shorter, ganglier, with hair past her shoulders.  She was trailing behind the other kids, middleschoolers, trying to remember every detail.  “I went on a fieldtrip when I was in Middle School, to a big garden outside Caprica City - Butchart Gardens.  I had never seen anything so beautiful in my life.  I remember thinking ‘this must be what the Elysian Fields are like’.”

 

Hermes got to his feet.  He cupped a cherry blossom in his hand, “Beautiful.  Well done, Kara.”  He started to walk over to the path and beckoned her to follow him.  They strolled through the gardens at a leisurely pace.  “To answer your earlier question or lament, pink and gold are you mother’s colors.”

 

Kara stopped and gasped, “My mother?”

 

“Not your literal, biological mother.  I would call her an ancestor, but that is reserved for the dead, and she is most assuredly not dead.  Let me ask you this:  Who goes to the Elysian Fields?”

 

Kara felt like she was back in Temple school.  “Heros, usually, or really, really, really good people.”

 

“Who are Heros?”  Hermes plucked a vivid magenta tulip from the ground and idly rolled the stem between his fingers.

 

“Um, Heros are the offspring of matings between the Gods and man.  They’re mortals, but retain some of the power or attributes of the Gods.  Wait.  Are you saying I’m a Hero?”

 

“You’re here in the Elysian Fields, aren’t you?”  Hermes shot her a glance, “And I don’t think you’ve been that good, have you?”

 

Kara blushed.  But something still didn’t make sense to her.  “I don’t get it.  You said my mother, who is my ancestor, but not my biological mother…”

 

“Your ancestor was, is, a Goddess, who had a child with a mortal man.  Generation pass, but mitochondrial DNA is conserved, from mother to daughter, all the way back to her.  You are part Goddess, Kara Thrace.  A Hero about to embark on her heroic quest.”

 

Kara started to ask about the quest, the destiny she was here to fulfill, but she felt a pain in her chest.  It took her breath away.  “Frak me!” she said, as she stopped and put her hands over her heart.

 

“Oh.  That’s grief.  When someone is mourning you, their soul reaching out to you, you can feel it here.”  Kara dropped to her knees in agony.  “If the pain is particularly intense, they can rip you across the ether, and you will appear to them as a shade.”  Hermes laid a hand upon her head.  “Hmm.  A father.  A lover.  A husband.  My, my, my!  Another Hero, and a Cylon Archangel!  You do your mother proud!”

 

Kara bent over double, but noticed she could see through her legs to brick path underneath.  She was transparent.  Kara looked up at Hermes with panic in her eyes, but could not get the words out.  “Don’t worry,” he said as she grew fainter, “we’ll go see your mother when you return.”

 

 

Everything was out of focus.  Faces seemed to stare out at her from every direction.  There were small points of bright light and a vague scent of incense in the air.  Kara felt she knew this place.  It was the Hall of Remembrance on Galactica.  She looked around.  There were living people here, vague shapes enveloped in colorful auras that felt like an electric field.  She felt lost.  Who had called her here?  How would she be able to tell people apart if she couldn’t see them?  There had to be a way.  She closed her eyes and breathed.  She felt a tugging sensation.  It was pulling her to her 2 o’clock, around the bend in the hallway.  She moved in that direction.

 

And there he stood, as clear as day.  He seemed to have a golden glow about him, but she could see every muscle, every line.  In the short time she had been away, she had forgotten how beautiful he was.  “Damn.”

 

She stood next to him, feeling his anguish.  It made her heart ache.  “Hey.”  She didn’t know if he could hear her, but all she could do is try.

 

“Kara, why?  Why did you do it?”  Lee was talking to a picture of her he held in her hand.  

 

“I have a destiny to fulfill, and it’s not like there was anything left for me here…”  How long would they have continued screwing up what they had?  Regret, that was the only thing she had left.

 

He choked up.  “I was so frakking stupid.”

 

“We both were, Lee.”  Tears started rolling down her cheeks.  For a moment, she was glad she was an apparition.  She always felt weaker than Lee; he was a master of holding his cards close to the chest.

 

“I love you, Kara.”

 

“I love you, Lee.”

Tags: apollo & starbuck, battlestar galactica fanfic