FIC - Cold, [PG], L/K, Z, 1/1
This one’s for me!!! Yay!
Title: Cold
Author: hackaddict
Date: 10/05/2006
Rating: PG
Pairing: Kara/Lee, Zak
Spoilers: none
Disclaimer: They're not mine. I wish they were mine. In some cool alternate universe, they are mine. But, alas, that universe is not the one I'm currently living in. So they're not mine.
Summary: “The cold of space can be extremely discomforting the first time you feel it, but you will find a creative way to warm up when your bird touches the ground, ” Kara told the class of nuggets, and she did her best not to wink at the man in the back of the briefing room who knew firsthand of the creative way she had snuggled in next to him ten minutes after she landed a Viper for the first time.
Words: 1,198
“The cold of space can be extremely discomforting the first time you feel it, but you will find a creative way to warm up when your bird touches the ground, ” Kara told the class of nuggets, and she did her best not to wink at the man in the back of the briefing room who knew firsthand of the creative way she had snuggled in next to him ten minutes after she landed a Viper for the first time.
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Kara slammed her stack of papers down onto the front table and turned to smirk at the class in front of her. “Kellerman is out sick so I’m teaching her class today. Most people call me Starbuck, but you can call me God.”
There were a few snickers which Kara killed with one particularly well-aimed look. “We are going to go over the basics unless someone wants to tell me that you’ve already mastered them.”
“What if we have?”
Kara’s eyes snapped up to look at the nugget sitting in the front row. He actually had the nerve to look relaxed. “Well then, I’ll take you down to the simulators and prove you wrong.” Kara pointed to the plaque on the wall behind her. Each classroom had one of these as all the nuggets knew. “See that? Those are the flight records for the Academy. If you look closely, there are only a handful of names on there. Mine is one of them. Until one of you frakers gets your call sign up there, you shut up and listen. Got it?”
That little tirade earned her a roomful of nods, and Kara sighed in relief. She really didn’t want to waste class time on pointless simulator runs, not that she didn’t love the sims. Hell, she had even named her favorite machine.
Kara realized everyone was staring at her and started rifling through her notes. “Says here that you were about to cover the reality of flying in space. Does anyone have any stupid questions before we start?”
“What does it feel like?”
Kara’s eyes scanned the room, but instead of landing on the person who asked the question, she settled on the man leaning in the doorway behind all the nuggets. She smiled and gave a small nod before turning her attentions back to her job. “Ah yes… a truly stupid question. It’s space. Hopefully you will never have to experience its feel.”
The young girl in the back turned bright red, but to her credit, she straightened up and tried again. “I meant what does being in the cockpit in space feel like?”
“The cold of space can be extremely discomforting the first time you feel it, but you will find a creative way to warm up when your bird touches the ground, ” Kara told the class of nuggets, and she did her best not to wink at the man in the back of the briefing room who knew firsthand of the creative way she had snuggled in next to him ten minutes after she landed a Viper for the first time.
Lee nodded and motioned he would be out in the hall when she was done.
The rest of the lecture flew by once the nuggets got their stupid questions out of the way. Kara did her best to put the fear of the gods in them while also preparing them for their inevitable first launch. The class of nuggets left with two very distinct feelings. Half the class looked incredibly worried that they were going to die the second they left gravity behind. The other half looked like they were going to combust with excitement. That was the half that would make it in this program. That was the half that would know the joy of being weightless and in control.
The nuggets filtered out quickly, and Kara started gathering up her things. Kellerman hated when Kara left her classroom a mess.
“Excuse me, sir?”
Kara looked up to see the man who had asked her the question about what she would do if they had already mastered basic flight. He was still sitting in his seat. “What is it, nugget?”
“You’re Kara, aren’t you?”
Kara’s hand froze in the air, and she turned to take a better look at this kid. No one called her Kara at the Academy. It undermined her authority as a mean son of a bitch. “What?”
“I knew it the second you made that joke about warming up after your first flight out.”
“How?”
“I was worried about how it would feel like most of the class, so I asked my brother to tell me about it.” The nugget could see Kara’s mouth open to tell him to get to the fraking point, and he held his hand up. “Just humor me, sir.”
“Your brother’s a pilot?” Kara asked after a few seconds, agreeing to his plea to listen. She leaned back against the table and waited.
“He is. He told me a story, sir, about his closet friend in Academy and her first flight. She came knocking on his room, interrupting his studying, and pushed him onto his bed. Before he knew it, she had shed her flight suit, crawled in next to him, and pulled the covers up around their bodies. Lee told me that was the only time he ever let you pull him completely and totally away from his studies.”
“Lee?” The other words she wanted to say caught in her throat. All she could managed was his name.
The nugget stood up and smiled at her. “I’m Zak Adama, sir, and I have to say I’m really sorry that I didn’t get placed in your normal class. You’re as good as Lee always said you were.”
Kara was left gaping at the chair this cocky nugget had just vacated. Lee told her his little brother was going to start flight school soon, but she hadn’t realized that soon meant this year. Gods damn Lee and his cryptic way of giving her information.
She slammed the rest of her papers into her bag and stomped out of the room. Lee pushed off the wall he was leaning on the second he saw her. He had barely adjusted to her presence before her fists started beating on his chest. “What the frak? Kara. Stop it. Stop it.”
Kara threw one last punch that hit him squarely in the jaw, and she saw him recoil. She had really made contact on that one. “Fraking hell, Lee. You could have told me your little brother was a nugget before he threw an embarrassing story in my face and undermined the little amount of authority I may have had.” She whacked him on the arm again. “Bastard.”
Lee smiled and slung his now bruised arm across her shoulders, ignoring the pain. “Let’s go get lunch, Kara, and then you can tell me which story Zak embarrassed you with.”
Kara made it a few steps before his words sunk in. “Just how many stories did you tell your brother?”
Lee chuckled and tightened his hold on her, dropping a quick kiss on the top of her head.