Strength in Pain: Razor
"Like I said, you make your choices and you live with them. And in end you are those choices." It's hard not to like Kendra Shaw, despite everything. But isn't that the truth of this show - the complexities?
This is part 4 of my alternate ending piece, although as we should all know, I own neither Battlestar Galactica nor any of its characters. Parts 1-3 are listed below.
Part I: The Plan
Part II: Six of One
Part II: Lay Down Your Burdens
Laura Roslin knew her death would leave wounded.
She hadn’t the faintest idea what she was going to tell Lee. There had been no way to tell him in advance of the plan, no way to prepare him, no channel secure enough to give him fair warning. She hoped she wouldn’t have to explain it to him. She knew he was smart, she knew he was adaptable, and she knew he was perceptive. She knew he wouldn’t like this plan, but she hoped he would go along with it.
Only once in a while, in a long, long while, did she allow herself to remember life as it was before the attacks. Before the cancer, before the constant fighting and hoping and running away. When she allowed herself to remember that life, she thought of sun and surf and the wind in her hair. She remembered her idealism and optimism, traits that seemed to have belonged to another woman, a gentler, easier one.
Most of the time she forgot about that woman, that life, but every once in a while, in a blue, blue moon, she remembered her. It happened most often when she was with Lee. The truth was she saw something in him, something that reminded her of all of those wonderful things that humans were capable of, his determination to do the right thing. It was also the reason that he drove her up the wall from time to time. But, oh, the potential she saw in him…
It had driven his father crazy, from time to time, the link before her and his son. Particularly in the early days, when Bill and Laura had been far from close, when she found it easier to confide in the younger Adama. Bill’d resented the connection between Laura and her Captain Apollo. Though, she smiled, mostly because he resented the fact that Lee never confided in him.
‘He’s your son.’
‘He’s your adviser.’
Sometimes she was afraid that Bill was still resentful of what he saw as her attempts to steal his son, (which maybe she ultimately had). Sometimes she was afraid that he was still resentful of the easy camaraderie she and Lee had fallen into the moment she met him on Colonial One. Of course it didn’t help when Lee took her side when Bill had decided to stage his ill-fated coup. She understood that for Lee it was a matter of principle, but Bill took these types of decisions personally. I never thought I’d be grateful to Boomer for shooting him. Without that, would Bill Adama ever have come to Kobol? Come to believe in her?
Yet, the fact remained that he had, and their connection had grown every day that followed. At the same time, her decisions, her compromises had strained that early connection with Lee. Kobol; Admiral Helena Cain; the Agathon’s baby; the election; settling on New Caprica; all of these had chipped away at his faith in her integrity.
New Caprica. Laura’d been speaking the truth when she’d reminded Starbuck that no one who hadn’t be there would ever be able to fully understand events there. The entire debacle had hardened her determination to get her people to get to Earth safe, driven her closer to Bill. At the same time it had caused her to drift away from others, including Lee. She also had some idea of the damage New Caprica’s legacy had done to Lee; to his sense of worth, to his relationship with Kara.
And then Baltar’s trial. Lee’s actions then had hurt her, especially when he’d had to force her to reveal the return of her cancer. It’d been her decision, in the end, but still… She, who been so proud of her ability to forgive, hadn’t found it as easy as she’d hoped, even as his father had quickly embraced his son following the Battle of Ionian Nebula. Adamas. Quick to anger, but given the option, quick to forgive. She envied that. It was hard for her.
So, yes, as she sat in her raptor heading down to Earth, she had no idea what to say to Lee. Reaching out to Kara was easy, in retrospect. Their disagreements had always been political, not personal. For the Adama men, everything was personal.
The Raptor touched down perfectly, Kara’s casual competence showing in its every move. She moved quickly back to the passenger section of the Raptor as Laura stood waiting. As the hatch opened, Kara stood at attention while maintaining a wary eye on their surroundings, her weapon loose in her holster.
Laura jumped down slowly and gingerly onto the tarmac on which they had landed before turning and then carefully, if awkwardly, returning Kara’s salute. Kara then passed her the cooler they had brought along with them and returned to attention. Laura didn’t turn around, but she could feel Kara’s eyes on her through the front windows of the Raptor. She walked about 20 feet down the tarmac and carefully set it down before standing beside it. She hoped they wouldn’t be long in meeting her. Standing was no longer her strong suit.
Thankfully, as she looked down the tarmac, she saw the Colonial group approaching, Lee in the lead. Natalie and Gauis Baltar followed behind. Gaius and Natalie, what a combination. For just a moment, she imagined the figure of Tom Zarek walking alongside them. The devil you know, indeed. She’d really thought she knew him, knew the real him, the human being under the swarm and the rhetoric. She still couldn’t believe she had misjudged him so much. Maybe she’d wanted too badly for him to be one of the good guys, to be a true political ally and, maybe, a friend to her. So yes, maybe she’d wanted it too badly.
Or maybe the experience of the Original Earth just pushed him over the edge.
‘Captain Apollo.’
‘Please. Please don’t do this.’
So quick. It seemed he had guessed her plan after all.
‘I need you off this rock, and we don’t have a lot of time.’
‘Madame President...’
She hoped the Earthlings would take the movement for what it was as she wrapped her arms around him in a bear hug. She felt him quickly respond, taking care to be gentle while squeezing her. After a moment, she stepped back but kept his hands in hers. She looked directly into his bright blue eyes (so much like his father, so different from his father), trying to use them to express her deep-seated affection for him.
‘Seriously, Lee, just trust me and get in the Raptor.’
She broke off to give Natalie a smile and a squeeze of the hand as she walked by her and quickly boarded the Raptor. So much history. So much water under the bridge. Thanks the gods they hadn’t told the Earthlings the truth about Natalie, her position as leader of the Cylon faction. They’d never have gotten her off the planet in that case. Laura had a flash of Gina Inviere and what she’d endured under Cain and the Pegasus crew and shuddered. At least she wouldn’t be responsible for leaving Natalie to endure the same fate.
She couldn’t quite manage the same sense of forgiveness for Gaius, so she just tried to smile as her former vice-president/adversary passed by. Despite everything, maybe they had needed him on this journey, after all.
In any case, he was Colonial, so he was hers.
Returning her attention to Lee, she smiled at the worry written all over his face. She had no idea how he ever won at Triad, his worries were always written all over his face.
‘I can’t believe my father let you do this.’
‘Since when does your father let me do anything?’
They both smiled, and she liked to think he shared her memory of the two of them, locked up in the Galactica’s brig the last time she’d done something its commander hadn’t approved of. It seemed like a lifetime ago, her and Bill at loggerheads over Kobol and Kara and Lee.
She sighed. The sequel to that fight, when Kara’d returned from the dead, had been worse. It had gotten personal, and it had gotten mean.
They’d moved beyond it, forgiven each other, even as she realized she had to give up a measure of control. Had to let others take part of her burden, both in her life and in her work. She’d never been good at that.
Lee was continuing. ‘You know, he told me once, how grateful he was for you.’
‘He did?’
He nodded.
‘It was after Cain died, when we were struggling to deal with her legacy.’
‘Ahh.’
‘We were fighting over what it meant…’
Laura snorted.
‘Yeah, I know, surprise, we were fighting. Anyway, he told me that he was grateful, he could have never gone the path Cain, thanks to the people who’d been there with him.’
‘Really?’ Laura smiled. It was so like him.
‘Yeah. “I had the President in my face,” he said “arguing for the survival of the civilian fleet.” He said it grounded him, even when you weren’t seeing eye to eye.’
She looked at him sadly, realizing he was trying to send her off with a pleasant memory, an indication of the impact of her efforts. One she could cling to.
‘It wasn’t unusual for us, not to see eye to eye. It’s still not.’
They smiled at each other.
‘Still. Thank you, Lee, for that.’
‘Thank you, Madame President. For everything.’
They looked at each other for a moment, trying to communicate in that moment what their friendship had meant to each other. They’d only met three short years ago, but given the nature of that time, it was no wonder she felt closer to the people on this path than she had anyone since her family had died.
The flight from Caprica; it felt so long ago. Who knew it could end like this?
‘Take care of your father while I’m gone. All of them, really, but especially him. The Fleet needs the two of you.’
She hoped he could read the sub-text between her words.
He sighed, and she could almost see the responsibilities she just given him settle on his shoulders. Well, again, just as with his father, his shoulders were broad enough. Still, she would have spared him that, if she could.
That’s the nub, isn’t it? You have to accept that there’s nothing you can control, not anymore. Though, to be honest, has there ever been?
‘I will.’
‘Now go.’
He surprised her (it seemed he always did), when he brought himself up sharply to attention and saluted her with all the crispness of the Colonial officer he had been not so long ago. She struggled to control the tears.
Let the Earthlings see what strength looks like, she thought. Let them see the best of us.
Lee was Lee, whether in dress greys or pinstripes. She wished she had trusted him more over the years; of all of them, he was the one most determined to pursue the right path, no matter what it cost him.
‘Madame President.’
He waited until she returned his salute, then, turning sharply, he moved to walk quickly towards the waiting Raptor.
‘Oh, and Lee…’
He turned once again, waiting, still at attention.
‘I’m proud of you.’
I wish you’d been mine. As much as Kara, I really wish you’d been mine.
‘No more than I am of you, Madame President.’
Saluting again quickly, he boarded the Raptor. Moments later, Laura met his eyes through the windshield. Even before the hatch was fully closed, he had taken his place in the co-pilot’s seat. Good. Retired or not, he was still the second best pilot in the fleet. The best, Kara, sat next to him.
Laura stood and watched the Raptor take off, and counted the seconds even as the first Earthlings rushed towards her. How long does it take for those things to clear the atmosphere again? Once there, they were untouchable. She reassured herself. Kara would get them home.
She reminded herself to breathe as the first man grabbed her and began searching her quickly. He was surprisingly gentle. A second man moved equally quickly to the cooler at her feet and went through it as if it were a bomb. Which it was, although not of the traditional sort. More of an existential one.
She waited until they were finished. Taking advantage of a momentary pause, she smiled and waved her hand gently in the direction of the hanger in the distance.
‘Shall we?’