"Ember in the Ashes" (Baltar/Gaeta, PG-13)

[demonqueen666]

Title: Ember in the Ashes
Pairing: Gaius Baltar/Felix Gaeta
Rating: PG-13 for mentions of sex and adult situations
Prompt: #20, Caprica
Length: 1,690 words
Summary: Hope is such a precious thing. And one so easily taken for granted.
Notes: set in the missing year on New Caprica; real spoilers only for S2 but with implications of downright anvil-

Comments

[millari]

Wow, I finally finish my final school project, turn it in, come home, go on LJ, and what's the very first thing sitting atop my flist? Felix and Gaius! In the missing year!

It's just like a graduation present. An irony-filled, break-my-heart melancholy graduation present.

Ok, the thing that most got me about this fic was how right from the beginning, Gaius was totally oblivious to the irony of even asking that question. I mean, asking Felix what he missed the most about before the Colonies were destroyed? Um, the destruction he had a major hand in??? Dude, I know you didn't know she was a Cylon and all, but still...you kinda got his entire family killed! You just don't *ask* that kind of question.

Yes, yes, I know. If you're Baltar, you do. The cognitive dissonance Gaius exhibits here hurt my soul to contemplate was really affecting, actually.

You managed to capture hints of the Gaius that was to come by LDYB, of his utterly disinterested attitude about his presidency even at this early stage when he was still managing to hold it together. I enjoyed the knowing wink to the Arielon origins, the implication that Felix might have grown his hair out like that to please Gaius (*ouch*) and when Felix says it'd be like "hope dying just as soon as it began", which pretty much sums up the New Caprica arc.

Oh, and the uncertainty with which Felix shifts back and forth between "Mister President" and "Gaius" is so very made of ready-to-be-kicked puppy that I almost thought I couldn't keep reading for a moment. (Almost. But they're like a transfixing car wreck when they're like this.) And the way that Gaius so cavalierly doesn't perceive how meaningful the shift in address is to Felix just made me think ahead to how Gaius was going to brutalize him emotionally later, and that when that time came, how he wouldn't even give it much thought.

Oh so sad. But very nicely done. And much appreciated.

[demonqueen666]

Well, I'm certainly glad to hear I made your day complete ;)

Dude, I know you didn't know she was a Cylon and all, but still...you kinda got his entire family killed! You just don't *ask* that kind of question.

That and, even then, it's really not the kind of question that warrants the careless, offhand tone Gaius uses when he asks, is it? "What do you miss the most from our entire way of life that got destroyed?" is not interchangable with "If you could be any animal/go back in time/sleep with one celebrity", really.

You managed to capture hints of the Gaius that was to come by LDYB, of his utterly disinterested attitude about his presidency even at this early stage when he was still managing to hold it together.

The thing with Gina and Cloud Nine pretty much sealed it, but regardless of whatever big dreams and positive attitude Gaius might have had at the start...he never wanted to be a politician in the first place. At all. He's 100% attracted to the power and trappings of the office and has no interest whatsoever in any of the work. They were so doomed the moment he was sworn in. Seriously.

the implication that Felix might have grown his hair out like that to please Gaius (*ouch*)

Interestingly, that was never in my personal canon before, yet someone it wrote itself in this time and I'm starting to think it might just end up that way. At the very least, the big discrepancy between Felix's strict adherance to military form of S1 and S2 and the way he goes completely native, so to speak, as a civilian by the time of the One Year Later jump was always worth an eyebrow raise. Personally, anyway. And it really wouldn't surprise me to learn Gaius might have peer pressure'd him a bit in that direction.

"hope dying just as soon as it began", which pretty much sums up the New Caprica arc.

It really does, doesn't it? "Unfinished Business" really killed me for that very reason, because we get to see how bright and eager and shiny everyone was, already knowing by then that everything is going to get so fucked up in the worst way :(

Thanks for your thoughtful commentary, and I'm glad you so enjoyed.