Fic: The Black Ships, Part IX
Title: The Black Ships
Author: Major Fischer
Universe: Battlestar Galactica/The West Wing Crossover
Pairings: Roslin/Adama, with some Roslin/Zarek
Notes: Many thanks to melyanna for inspiring me with her excellent (and highly recommended) west_gate series. This is a Facebook for those of you unfamiliar with one side of the crossover. Also thanks to alesia027 for her help making this more coherent.
Chronology: This takes place in BSG's second season after Epiphanies but before Sacrefices, and in the West Wing's mid sixth season. Spoilers beyond that point are unlikely.
Summary: A few weeks before Christmas, late in the Bartlet Presidency, a fleet of interstellar refugees arrive at Earth and changed the world. But is it the end of the saga, or the beginning of a much more complicated one?
Part I
Part II
Part III
Part IV
Part V
Part VI
Part VII
Part VIII
Kara Thrace looked herself over in the mirror, brushing imaginary bits of dust and the occasional blonde hair from her uniform. It seemed to her that whoever had made the Colonial Fleet uniforms chose a fabric with a supernatural attraction to shedding hair (something Starbuck had in abundance).
“Stop fidgeting, Starbuck. You look like a cat in a dog show.” Lee Adama was standing behind her watching the rare display of nervousness. “You look fine.”
“How many dog shows have you been to in your life, Lee?” She glanced over at him to see a shrug. “I bet you like little fluffy dogs with nasty dispositions.”
“Well, I like you.”
“Touché.” She continued to fiddle with her uniform.
“Here, let me,” Apollo finally said with a smile as he came over to fix her collar.
“I don’t understand why you can’t go with her to this thing instead of me.”
“You are her military adviser, not me.”
“She stopped taking your advice?”
“She stopped asking for it actually.” Lee sat down in the chair. “Or I stopped offering it. I’m not really sure which came first.”
Starbuck saw the chance to deflect the conversation away from her own nervousness. “You can’t hold onto parental figures very long, can you, Lee?”
“She’s not my mother.”
“Lee, she’s everyone’s mother, except maybe the Old Man. Hell, some of the pilots even call her ‘mom’ and the Admiral. ‘dad.’”
“Just what I need, a couple dozen new brothers and sisters.”
Kara shook her head, but watched him for a long moment. “Are you in love with her Lee?”
The question seemed to surprise him, and he didn’t answer for several minutes. “I think I was once, a little. Not really with her, but with the idea of her.”
Starbuck raised an eyebrow. “Isn’t that like being a little bit dead?”
Apollo shook his head. “Have I ever told you about meeting her for the first time?”
Kara shook her head.
“My Viper was damaged when I destroyed a raider’s missile. Colonial One picked up my bird dead in space. Here was this little civilian liner trying to organize a rescue in the middle of a war zone, and at the center was this soft-spoken fragile looking woman, who I thought could break in two with a stiff wind. She was quiet, calm, and more in control of the situation than I ever could have been, but in the moments before we found out she would be President… she looked so small and scared. I liked her because she made me feel like she needed me, and wanted me to be around without making me feel like I was always disappointing her.”
Starbuck chuckled a little bit to herself. She knew Lee was referring to his relationship with his father, but that was exactly how Lee handled his own personal relationships as well.
“So what happened?”
“She convinced my father to murder Admiral Cain.”
They both knew what he was referring to; after all, Kara was to have been her assassin. “Lee, she couldn’t have convinced your father of the need for that any more than she could have convinced you to pull a gun on Colonel Tigh. I’m hardly the person to lecture anyone about personal responsibility, but you and your father are strong enough men not to need to scapegoat someone else for the actions you disapprove of.”
Lee smiled a little. “I think if my father and I didn’t disapprove of each other, we wouldn’t know how to relate at all.”
“You know that’s unhealthy?”
“And you're going to lecture me now on healthy interpersonal relationships?” Apollo asked disbelievingly.
“Just because I’m messed up doesn’t mean I can’t stand in judgment of others.” She turned around and fidgeted again with her uniform.”
“Why am I going again?”
“She specifically asked for you. You’ll have to ask her what her reasoning was.”
“Like that would help,” she shot back over her shoulder at Lee, but immediately shut up upon seeing who was standing behind him.
“You could always try asking, Captain. I might surprise you. I sometimes even tell the truth.” Laura Roslin came further into the room, and Kara wondered how long she had been listening in on the conversation. “I would really like to take Admiral Adama. He hasn’t met President Bartlet yet and from what I have been told the place we are going to is a beautiful building.” She nodded to Apollo. “Your father and I have talked about architecture a few times…”
Both young offices glanced at each other. The range of things the Admiral and the President seemed willing to talk to each other about was amusing, especially when taken into account with what they were not willing to speak to each other about.
“However, the Admiral and I have decided to limit how much information we give these people for now. Besides,” Laura inhaled, “I’m not sure how comfortable he is with religion.”
Lee smiled, but the smile hid conflicted emotions. He was always seemed conflicted and sometimes Starbuck had an overwhelming urge to slap him silly-not that Laura Roslin didn’t inspire complex feelings in her as well. The butterflies in her stomach every time she was in the President’s presence made her want to slap herself silly. Unfortunately, beyond the slapstick appeal, that probably wouldn’t help. “Ma’am, I’m not good at this sort of thing.”
“Really, Madam President, she’s not,” Apollo confirmed, though the smirk made it clear he was slightly more amused than truly concerned, undoubtedly glad that it was someone else in the presidential crosshairs.
“You don’t have to agree so quickly,” Kara teased.
“When you’re right, you’re right. It doesn’t happen often.”
Roslin seemed to be enjoying the pilots’ banter, and Kara wondered if this was the first real smile she had seen from the older woman. Kara wondered if that was a real smile now. She should do it more often; it makes her look twenty years younger. The thought seemed both random and oddly out of place. Half the time she disliked Roslin and the other half she desperately wanted her approval. It wasn’t terribly different to her relationship with her mother. There were also times when it was impossible for her to identify what she was feeling about the President. She wasn’t entirely sure she wanted to know either.
“So why not Lee?” Kara asked, both wanting and not wanting to know Roslin’s answer.
“It’s a religious service and you're probably the closest thing to an expert on alien religion that I’ve got.”
If one counted a philosophical conversation over torture as enough to qualify one as an expert…there is definitely something else going on. “Cylon religion.” Starbuck corrected, and met Roslin’s eyes.
“Besides, Captain Apollo seems to distract women.” The President smirked at Lee.
“He’s done that since he was a little boy, I think.”
“You mean he isn’t still a little boy?”
“Ladies, I am still here you know.”
Laura looked innocent and Starbuck gave him a grin.
“The two of you scare me.”
**~**~**
CJ caught up with Donna Moss as she was carrying a large stack of files between offices in the West Wing. “Donna, I need to borrow you for a moment.”
“A moment moment, or a half the morning moment.”
“More than one, less than the other.”
The blonde assistant nodded and fell into step with CJ, though she had to jog a little to keep up with the taller woman’s strides. “I need you to handle some shopping for President Roslin. There's going to be a state dinner when the Security Council ambassadors arrive for talks with the Colonial delegation. I need you to go over to Blair House and find out if they have appropriate clothing.”
“Isn’t that the job of the Office of Protocol?”
“Not exactly, and I rather doubt that President Roslin’s people were carrying ball gowns when they fled their world.” Donna nodded again, as if to say she heard CJ, “It would look rather silly of us to be decked out in Vera Wang while she’s trying to make her limited wardrobe stretch even more.”
“I’ve noticed she’s wearing the same suits over and over. Like the one with moth holes.”
“I think those are actually bullet holes.”
“Well, it’s a good thing she didn’t escape wearing a ball gown. The dark suit hides the holes better.” It was a very Donnatella Moss comment.
“Donna, have I ever mentioned you have an odd way of looking at the world?”
“Seems like a good quality these days…” Donna grinned.
**~**~**
Towards the middle of the Mass, President Roslin had gotten up quickly and moved towards the side aisle of the massive sanctuary and back, asking one of the ushers a question. About half the eyes in the Basilica of the National Shrine watched her walk, followed closely behind by someone from the Bartlet family.
When Ellie Bartlet entered the bathroom, she heard the sounds of decidedly unpleasant retching. “Ma’am? Ma’am, I’m a doctor, are you feeling all right?” She leaned against the bathroom stall down from the one Laura was in. When there wasn’t an answer for a moment. “Ma’am, this is Ellie Bartlet. We met briefly outside. I’m one of the President’s daughters.”
“I’m fine, Dr. Bartlet. Just a bit of an upset stomach.” The toilet flushed and she came out quietly, fixing her jacket and trying to look more dignified than she probably felt right now. Still, Ellie managed a diplomatic smile honed in her time in medical school.
“I’m glad. I was a little concerned you might have been upset about some of the imagery. Without the context, a nearly naked, bloody, emaciated corpse nailed to a cross would probably seem disturbing. Your escort seems a bit tense…”
Roslin shook her head. “It’s a little eccentric, but the Protocol Office did brief us beforehand. I’m sure if you sat through a religious service of ours there might be strange elements as well. I’m afraid this was entirely my fault. I forgot to take my medication this morning, and the body demands what it demands.” She smiled a little more self deprecatingly as she began washing her hands.
Ellie came over and leaned against the sink. “Is this the disease or the treatments that cause the nausea?” Roslin looked over at her with a raised eyebrow. Ellie had the grace to blush a bit as she explained. “I’m a cancer specialist, ma’am. My father asked me to come because he thought I might understand better.”
Laura took a bottle of pills out her pocket and set them on the counter as she was cleaning herself up. “It’s the medication that causes the nausea. I’m in remission but the cancer came on so rapidly the first time that my doctor wants to try and head it off before it gets a foothold in my body again.”
Ellie picked up the pill bottle looking at it absently, and opened it, examining some of the pills before reaching for a small paper cup to get water for Roslin. “How much sleep do you get, Madam President?”
Roslin smiled at her again. “If you're going to ask me personal questions, Doctor, you might as well call me Laura.”
Ellie blushed again. “I’m sorry, was that over the line? Sometimes I forget to slip out of doctor mode.”
“No, you're fine. I don’t get enough sleep, or so my doctors and aides tell me. I’m not sure I can afford to get more though. All my problems began at the end of the world.”
“Do you mind if I talk to the people at Bethesda about your condition?”
“Doctor, I’m hardly in a position to turn down help. None of us are.”
**~**~**
“Did you see the look on the Captain’s face in there?” CJ asked as she leaned against one of the motorcade cars outside. Around were a gaggle of people from the White House Staff, lapsed Catholics, Secret Service Agents, and Kate Harper just getting off her cell phone. “It could just be that her breakfast didn’t agree with her, but she seemed like she didn’t like what she was seeing.”
“If she’s a carrier pilot I doubt that’s the case. Probably an iron stomach,” Kate added.
“I thought the food on ships was supposed to be the greatest in the military, or so the army tells me.”
“They lie,” the naval officer teased, “I heard on the Secret Service radio that the President disappeared into the ladies' room for twenty minutes.”
“I do hope you mean Roslin and not Bartlet.”
“She was sick.” Both CJ and Kate turned to see Eleanor Bartlet walking down the steps. “She was sick and went to the bathroom to do so discreetly. She and I spoke a bit about her cancer treatments.”
Kate missed what Ellie was trying to tell them, but CJ had known her longer and noticed it immediately. “There’s something else, isn’t there?”
Ellie paused and held out her hand to Kate. “I stole some of her medication as we were talking.” She looked a little sheepish.
Kate immediately took out a small envelope, slid the pills out of Ellie’s hand, and into it for safekeeping. “That was smart thinking.”
CJ wasn’t sure if she wanted to scold Ellie for having done it, or Kate for immediately thinking it was a good idea. “You stole medication from a cancer patient? Your mother is going to have a fit.”
“I wasn’t planning on telling her.”
“Neither was I.” CJ smiled and turned to Kate. “Commander, how fast can we have those pills analyzed?”
“Well, I’m sure Ellie can tell you that medical research on them might take years, but I think we can find out a few of the properties in a few days with luck.”
“Do it.”
… to be continued …
Next Chapter: Part X
Author: Major Fischer
Universe: Battlestar Galactica/The West Wing Crossover
Pairings: Roslin/Adama, with some Roslin/Zarek
Notes: Many thanks to melyanna for inspiring me with her excellent (and highly recommended) west_gate series. This is a Facebook for those of you unfamiliar with one side of the crossover. Also thanks to alesia027 for her help making this more coherent.
Chronology: This takes place in BSG's second season after Epiphanies but before Sacrefices, and in the West Wing's mid sixth season. Spoilers beyond that point are unlikely.
Summary: A few weeks before Christmas, late in the Bartlet Presidency, a fleet of interstellar refugees arrive at Earth and changed the world. But is it the end of the saga, or the beginning of a much more complicated one?
Part I
Part II
Part III
Part IV
Part V
Part VI
Part VII
Part VIII
Kara Thrace looked herself over in the mirror, brushing imaginary bits of dust and the occasional blonde hair from her uniform. It seemed to her that whoever had made the Colonial Fleet uniforms chose a fabric with a supernatural attraction to shedding hair (something Starbuck had in abundance).
“Stop fidgeting, Starbuck. You look like a cat in a dog show.” Lee Adama was standing behind her watching the rare display of nervousness. “You look fine.”
“How many dog shows have you been to in your life, Lee?” She glanced over at him to see a shrug. “I bet you like little fluffy dogs with nasty dispositions.”
“Well, I like you.”
“Touché.” She continued to fiddle with her uniform.
“Here, let me,” Apollo finally said with a smile as he came over to fix her collar.
“I don’t understand why you can’t go with her to this thing instead of me.”
“You are her military adviser, not me.”
“She stopped taking your advice?”
“She stopped asking for it actually.” Lee sat down in the chair. “Or I stopped offering it. I’m not really sure which came first.”
Starbuck saw the chance to deflect the conversation away from her own nervousness. “You can’t hold onto parental figures very long, can you, Lee?”
“She’s not my mother.”
“Lee, she’s everyone’s mother, except maybe the Old Man. Hell, some of the pilots even call her ‘mom’ and the Admiral. ‘dad.’”
“Just what I need, a couple dozen new brothers and sisters.”
Kara shook her head, but watched him for a long moment. “Are you in love with her Lee?”
The question seemed to surprise him, and he didn’t answer for several minutes. “I think I was once, a little. Not really with her, but with the idea of her.”
Starbuck raised an eyebrow. “Isn’t that like being a little bit dead?”
Apollo shook his head. “Have I ever told you about meeting her for the first time?”
Kara shook her head.
“My Viper was damaged when I destroyed a raider’s missile. Colonial One picked up my bird dead in space. Here was this little civilian liner trying to organize a rescue in the middle of a war zone, and at the center was this soft-spoken fragile looking woman, who I thought could break in two with a stiff wind. She was quiet, calm, and more in control of the situation than I ever could have been, but in the moments before we found out she would be President… she looked so small and scared. I liked her because she made me feel like she needed me, and wanted me to be around without making me feel like I was always disappointing her.”
Starbuck chuckled a little bit to herself. She knew Lee was referring to his relationship with his father, but that was exactly how Lee handled his own personal relationships as well.
“So what happened?”
“She convinced my father to murder Admiral Cain.”
They both knew what he was referring to; after all, Kara was to have been her assassin. “Lee, she couldn’t have convinced your father of the need for that any more than she could have convinced you to pull a gun on Colonel Tigh. I’m hardly the person to lecture anyone about personal responsibility, but you and your father are strong enough men not to need to scapegoat someone else for the actions you disapprove of.”
Lee smiled a little. “I think if my father and I didn’t disapprove of each other, we wouldn’t know how to relate at all.”
“You know that’s unhealthy?”
“And you're going to lecture me now on healthy interpersonal relationships?” Apollo asked disbelievingly.
“Just because I’m messed up doesn’t mean I can’t stand in judgment of others.” She turned around and fidgeted again with her uniform.”
“Why am I going again?”
“She specifically asked for you. You’ll have to ask her what her reasoning was.”
“Like that would help,” she shot back over her shoulder at Lee, but immediately shut up upon seeing who was standing behind him.
“You could always try asking, Captain. I might surprise you. I sometimes even tell the truth.” Laura Roslin came further into the room, and Kara wondered how long she had been listening in on the conversation. “I would really like to take Admiral Adama. He hasn’t met President Bartlet yet and from what I have been told the place we are going to is a beautiful building.” She nodded to Apollo. “Your father and I have talked about architecture a few times…”
Both young offices glanced at each other. The range of things the Admiral and the President seemed willing to talk to each other about was amusing, especially when taken into account with what they were not willing to speak to each other about.
“However, the Admiral and I have decided to limit how much information we give these people for now. Besides,” Laura inhaled, “I’m not sure how comfortable he is with religion.”
Lee smiled, but the smile hid conflicted emotions. He was always seemed conflicted and sometimes Starbuck had an overwhelming urge to slap him silly-not that Laura Roslin didn’t inspire complex feelings in her as well. The butterflies in her stomach every time she was in the President’s presence made her want to slap herself silly. Unfortunately, beyond the slapstick appeal, that probably wouldn’t help. “Ma’am, I’m not good at this sort of thing.”
“Really, Madam President, she’s not,” Apollo confirmed, though the smirk made it clear he was slightly more amused than truly concerned, undoubtedly glad that it was someone else in the presidential crosshairs.
“You don’t have to agree so quickly,” Kara teased.
“When you’re right, you’re right. It doesn’t happen often.”
Roslin seemed to be enjoying the pilots’ banter, and Kara wondered if this was the first real smile she had seen from the older woman. Kara wondered if that was a real smile now. She should do it more often; it makes her look twenty years younger. The thought seemed both random and oddly out of place. Half the time she disliked Roslin and the other half she desperately wanted her approval. It wasn’t terribly different to her relationship with her mother. There were also times when it was impossible for her to identify what she was feeling about the President. She wasn’t entirely sure she wanted to know either.
“So why not Lee?” Kara asked, both wanting and not wanting to know Roslin’s answer.
“It’s a religious service and you're probably the closest thing to an expert on alien religion that I’ve got.”
If one counted a philosophical conversation over torture as enough to qualify one as an expert…there is definitely something else going on. “Cylon religion.” Starbuck corrected, and met Roslin’s eyes.
“Besides, Captain Apollo seems to distract women.” The President smirked at Lee.
“He’s done that since he was a little boy, I think.”
“You mean he isn’t still a little boy?”
“Ladies, I am still here you know.”
Laura looked innocent and Starbuck gave him a grin.
“The two of you scare me.”
**~**~**
CJ caught up with Donna Moss as she was carrying a large stack of files between offices in the West Wing. “Donna, I need to borrow you for a moment.”
“A moment moment, or a half the morning moment.”
“More than one, less than the other.”
The blonde assistant nodded and fell into step with CJ, though she had to jog a little to keep up with the taller woman’s strides. “I need you to handle some shopping for President Roslin. There's going to be a state dinner when the Security Council ambassadors arrive for talks with the Colonial delegation. I need you to go over to Blair House and find out if they have appropriate clothing.”
“Isn’t that the job of the Office of Protocol?”
“Not exactly, and I rather doubt that President Roslin’s people were carrying ball gowns when they fled their world.” Donna nodded again, as if to say she heard CJ, “It would look rather silly of us to be decked out in Vera Wang while she’s trying to make her limited wardrobe stretch even more.”
“I’ve noticed she’s wearing the same suits over and over. Like the one with moth holes.”
“I think those are actually bullet holes.”
“Well, it’s a good thing she didn’t escape wearing a ball gown. The dark suit hides the holes better.” It was a very Donnatella Moss comment.
“Donna, have I ever mentioned you have an odd way of looking at the world?”
“Seems like a good quality these days…” Donna grinned.
**~**~**
Towards the middle of the Mass, President Roslin had gotten up quickly and moved towards the side aisle of the massive sanctuary and back, asking one of the ushers a question. About half the eyes in the Basilica of the National Shrine watched her walk, followed closely behind by someone from the Bartlet family.
When Ellie Bartlet entered the bathroom, she heard the sounds of decidedly unpleasant retching. “Ma’am? Ma’am, I’m a doctor, are you feeling all right?” She leaned against the bathroom stall down from the one Laura was in. When there wasn’t an answer for a moment. “Ma’am, this is Ellie Bartlet. We met briefly outside. I’m one of the President’s daughters.”
“I’m fine, Dr. Bartlet. Just a bit of an upset stomach.” The toilet flushed and she came out quietly, fixing her jacket and trying to look more dignified than she probably felt right now. Still, Ellie managed a diplomatic smile honed in her time in medical school.
“I’m glad. I was a little concerned you might have been upset about some of the imagery. Without the context, a nearly naked, bloody, emaciated corpse nailed to a cross would probably seem disturbing. Your escort seems a bit tense…”
Roslin shook her head. “It’s a little eccentric, but the Protocol Office did brief us beforehand. I’m sure if you sat through a religious service of ours there might be strange elements as well. I’m afraid this was entirely my fault. I forgot to take my medication this morning, and the body demands what it demands.” She smiled a little more self deprecatingly as she began washing her hands.
Ellie came over and leaned against the sink. “Is this the disease or the treatments that cause the nausea?” Roslin looked over at her with a raised eyebrow. Ellie had the grace to blush a bit as she explained. “I’m a cancer specialist, ma’am. My father asked me to come because he thought I might understand better.”
Laura took a bottle of pills out her pocket and set them on the counter as she was cleaning herself up. “It’s the medication that causes the nausea. I’m in remission but the cancer came on so rapidly the first time that my doctor wants to try and head it off before it gets a foothold in my body again.”
Ellie picked up the pill bottle looking at it absently, and opened it, examining some of the pills before reaching for a small paper cup to get water for Roslin. “How much sleep do you get, Madam President?”
Roslin smiled at her again. “If you're going to ask me personal questions, Doctor, you might as well call me Laura.”
Ellie blushed again. “I’m sorry, was that over the line? Sometimes I forget to slip out of doctor mode.”
“No, you're fine. I don’t get enough sleep, or so my doctors and aides tell me. I’m not sure I can afford to get more though. All my problems began at the end of the world.”
“Do you mind if I talk to the people at Bethesda about your condition?”
“Doctor, I’m hardly in a position to turn down help. None of us are.”
**~**~**
“Did you see the look on the Captain’s face in there?” CJ asked as she leaned against one of the motorcade cars outside. Around were a gaggle of people from the White House Staff, lapsed Catholics, Secret Service Agents, and Kate Harper just getting off her cell phone. “It could just be that her breakfast didn’t agree with her, but she seemed like she didn’t like what she was seeing.”
“If she’s a carrier pilot I doubt that’s the case. Probably an iron stomach,” Kate added.
“I thought the food on ships was supposed to be the greatest in the military, or so the army tells me.”
“They lie,” the naval officer teased, “I heard on the Secret Service radio that the President disappeared into the ladies' room for twenty minutes.”
“I do hope you mean Roslin and not Bartlet.”
“She was sick.” Both CJ and Kate turned to see Eleanor Bartlet walking down the steps. “She was sick and went to the bathroom to do so discreetly. She and I spoke a bit about her cancer treatments.”
Kate missed what Ellie was trying to tell them, but CJ had known her longer and noticed it immediately. “There’s something else, isn’t there?”
Ellie paused and held out her hand to Kate. “I stole some of her medication as we were talking.” She looked a little sheepish.
Kate immediately took out a small envelope, slid the pills out of Ellie’s hand, and into it for safekeeping. “That was smart thinking.”
CJ wasn’t sure if she wanted to scold Ellie for having done it, or Kate for immediately thinking it was a good idea. “You stole medication from a cancer patient? Your mother is going to have a fit.”
“I wasn’t planning on telling her.”
“Neither was I.” CJ smiled and turned to Kate. “Commander, how fast can we have those pills analyzed?”
“Well, I’m sure Ellie can tell you that medical research on them might take years, but I think we can find out a few of the properties in a few days with luck.”
“Do it.”
… to be continued …
Next Chapter: Part X