Our Stars Scattered Like Dust (6/11)
Title: Our Stars Scattered Like Dust (6/11)
Authors: icedteainthebag and wishflsinfl
Characters/pairings: Adama/Roslin, Kara/Lee, Gaius/Caprica, other assorted affairs, ensemble cast
Rating: MA (graphic sex)
Warnings: AU, Character death
Spoilers: through Daybreak
Summary: As the new bartender on the cruise ship Galactica Bill Adama is hoping for an uneventful first voyage, but his life is irrevocably changed when he meets cruise director Laura Roslin.
A/N: Halfway through! What will happen next? More AU. Plenty more AU. Thank you to fragrantwoods and somadanne for their invaluable beta assistance. Also thanks to the folks at bsg_checkin for cheerleading.
Chapters: One | Two | Three | Four | Five | Six | Seven | Eight | Nine | Ten | Eleven
*
DAY FIVE: En Route to Puerto Vallarta
Laura hadn't exactly signed on for option two but that didn't keep Bill from spending the rest of the day trying to come up with a way to ask her on a date. A real date, with food, drink, and a date activity.
Not just that activity.
While he was waiting for Laura to finish up on the phone, Bill happened to glance at the wrinkled, day-old schedule posted on her door.
Speed Dating for Dummies.
Maybe he should have signed himself up for that one instead of the scrapbooking.
Because not only had he spent twenty-five minutes wandering the corridors looking for her office, he'd done it while carrying a single (now wilted) daisy that he'd swiped from a buffet arrangement like a complete frakking noob.
He was considering going back to his quarters to die a little when she finally hung up the phone.
"Bill! What a wonderful surprise. Come in."
Her office was pretty high end, probably because it was in an area that the general public might visit. He felt out of place amidst the bright colors, but she looked absolutely perfect sitting at her plush desk surrounded by photos of smiling passengers.
"I, uh-" For godssakes Adama, man up. "Nice office."
"Nice flower." Her smile took the sting out of it.
"It was when I picked it."
She took it from him and stood it in the half-empty water bottle on her desk. "Nothing a little water won't fix. What brings you here?"
Her confidence, the business-like way she was treating him, was messing with his game. He needed to change things up and quick.
"Option two." The heated look that passed across her face told him she was still thinking about option three. "You never gave me an answer about option two."
She leaned back in her chair, twirling a strand of hair between her fingers. "That's right, I didn't, did I? What did you have in mind? Besides the lovely flower, of course."
"A real date. Conversation. Dinner. Get to know each other a little."
"I'd say we already know each other better than most of the couples on this ship."
He blushed at the memory of their first bold encounter. Lowering his voice, he said, "I meant socially, not … carnally."
She put her hand to her lips, stifling a fit of giggles.
"Fine," Bill said, rising to leave. "I get it. It was-"
"No, no, wait-" She struggled to compose herself and finally managed to settle down, blowing out a slow breath and fanning herself with her hand. "Sorry, nervous habit. I see your point. A date could be fun."
"Okay." He struggled to remember what he'd had planned. "Ten-thirty, okay?"
Glancing at the schedule on her monitor, she confirmed that it was. He'd stood to leave when she asked, "Bill, where exactly is this date going to take place?"
Shit. He hadn't thought that far. He'd half-expected her to turn him down. There weren't a lot of places the crew were allowed to socialize, let alone in private. His quarters were the size of a closet. The cafeteria was a zoo. The bar-no, not the bar.
"Don't worry," she said. "I have an idea. Meet me by the arboretum at seven."
*
Gaius was on the Baja Deck in a very secluded location enjoying an early evening frakking by his beautiful lady friend Caprica. She looked glorious in the ocean twilight, riding him while he sprawled out on his lounger, the plastic squeaking as their weight shifted.
"You are so lovely," he said, with all the sincerity he could muster.
She looked sad for a moment. "Gaius, do you believe in God?"
"Well I … He usually doesn't come up during times like this, or very rarely." Gaius pushed up into her, hoping to stave off what could become a very boring conversation. Caprica moaned and slammed her palm down on his chest. He cried out in pain. She squeezed her muscles around him and he grunted, feeling as if she could nearly snap his dick off if she kept up with this nonsense.
"Too … much … pressure," he gasped.
She stared down at him. "Gaius, the time has come for judgment and I want you to be spared."
Sometimes this woman went a little nuts. "My dear," he cooed, running his hands over her shapely ass and cupping each side. "All I need is you, my angel, to save me."
A dark shadow passed over their bodies. Gaius's head snapped to the side and he saw a huge black ship sailing way too close to Galactica. It flew a black flag with what appeared to be a shifting red LED light across it.
Gaius, startled, sat up and clutched Caprica. "What the everloving frak is that?"
Caprica kissed his temple, her arms slipping around his neck. She twirled the back of his hair through her fingers. "Perhaps judgment day's come early."
*
Captain Ellen Tigh stared out the bridge window at the large black ship that had come out of nowhere. One moment she was looking at a panorama of the open ocean, not a thing in sight, and the next moment there was a flash and there it was. Dangerously close and flying its telltale flag.
There was no way they were getting out of this.
"What the frak is that?" Lieutenant Felix Gaeta exclaimed, his eyes wide. "It … it just appeared on DRADIS, came out of nowhere."
Gaeta tended toward the dramatic, but this was an occasion in which his dramaticism was quite warranted. If only he knew how much.
"I've heard of ghost ships, but this is bullshit," Ellen said, trying to play cool. "Must be pirates."
"But it came out of nowhere."
Ellen knew exactly how it got there and exactly what it wanted. None of this made her feel good about the situation. "We must've missed it on the DRADIS."
"Sir … with all due respect, I miss nothing."
"You missed this!" She picked up her wireless handset and tried to find an outbound radio frequency to call for help, but every frequency was jammed.
Every frequency except one.
"Mayday, Mayday, Mayday, this is the M.S. Galactica, our coordinates are-"
"Galactica, it is so good to see you again. Am I speaking to the illustrious Captain Tigh?"
The voice coming over the radio sent a chill down her spine. "John."
"It's been far too long, Ellen."
"Not long enough." Ellen turned to Gaeta. "Gaeta, launch distress rockets. Since we can't emit emergency transmissions we're going to have to roll old school."
"Engaging distress rockets … are … jammed?" Gaeta said in astonishment.
"Shitfrak," Ellen growled.
"And don't think you're going anywhere-if you hadn't noticed, we've disabled your navigational systems and your outbound communication devices." John's voice over the radio was cool but it was tempered with a threatening tone Ellen knew all too well. "A baby could've done it. When was this ship built, anyway? 1985?"
"'89."
"You might as well invite me in."
"Do I have a choice?" Ellen set her jaw in anger.
"No," John said. "And I suppose there'll be no champagne cork popping as we board."
"If I knew you didn't already have weapons trained on my ship full of innocent civilians I'd pop something else right into your ass," Ellen replied.
"Maybe later."
Ellen cringed at the thought. She needed her team-no, more than that, she needed Bill frakkin' Adama. Nobody else would do.
*
Bill was in the head, getting ready for his first real date with Laura when, unbeknownst to him, the pirates boarded the ship. His phone rang just as he was spritzing his favorite Giorgio Armani cologne on his neck.
"Adama," he growled, trying to make his voice sound sexy in case it was his date.
"Get up here now."
Ellen slammed down the phone.
Well, shit.
He felt the ship slow. To anyone else, the minor change in velocity probably went unnoticed, but Bill had spent enough time in dangerous waters. His body was tuned to the ship, riding the water like he was seventeen again and barefoot on a board in the waves of the Gulf.
He dried his face on the towel slung around his neck. There could have been any number of good reasons for the unexpected change in speed. An unidentified object in the water. A frak-up in the engine room. Word from the next port that their arrival time had been pushed.
He cursed his lowly crew position and the inside cabin that came with it. He needed a window, some way to orient himself to the stars or the horizon.
Laura probably had a window. Maybe he'd get to see it tonight. He was thinking about how the window might fit into their plans-trying his best to ignore the captain's rude summons-when he heard the engines shudder, the ship slowing abruptly in the wake of the noise. Closing his eyes, he tried to sense movement but soon every nerve in his body was telling him they were dead in the water.
He grabbed his jeans from the hook behind the door and tugged them on, shoving his feet blindly into his boots as he buttoned up his pants.
There were few good reasons to come to a dead stop in open waters. And a lot of bad ones. He thumbed the combinations to both locks on his footlocker and triggered the false bottom. From the concealed compartment, he pulled a Glock in a shoulder holster and two spare magazines.
He dropped the footlocker lid shut with the heel of his boot as he pulled the holster on over his freshly pressed dress shirt. Grabbing his bulky fatigue jacket from the back of the narrow closet, he pulled it on, concealing the weapon under his arm.
The spare cartridges went in his right jacket pocket, same as always. When he brought his hand up to run it through his hair, he caught the smell of gun oil and metal and he was back in the jungle, strapping on his weapon for a confrontation with river pirates.
You're overreacting, he chided himself. You're on a frakkin' cruise ship off the coast of Mexico, not a junk on the Orinoco. Still, he wasn't taking any chances. He hit the corridor at a jog, heading for the bridge.
*
The rent-a-cops hired by the cruise line hadn't stood a chance against the well-armed pirates. By the time Bill arrived on the bridge, the intruders had subdued all but the last round of defenses. He pulled his sidearm just in time to join the standoff.
The two sides faced each other, menacing glares all around. Ellen, Bill, Kara and Anders brandished handguns on one side and the five pirates armed with semi-automatic weapons stood opposite them.
"Okay, you've made your point," Ellen said. "Now drop your weapons."
"You drop your weapons," replied one of the pirates.
Bill did a double take. That frakker Doral. Bill hadn't recognized him at first. His usual teal jacket was gone, replaced by head-to-toe black combat gear. Frakking weasel, thinking he could pull an inside job right under the nose of Bill Adama.
Maybe this was his revenge for that bar clean-up Bill made him do a few days earlier.
"Look," Bill said, trying hard to keep the exasperation out of his voice, "just give your list of demands to the captain and we'll relay them to the owner of the cruise line."
The aggressive blonde-the one who seemed to be in charge-lowered her weapon and approached Bill, walking right up to the end of the Glock's barrel. "You sound like you have this all figured out."
Her smile sent a little shiver of fear down his spine, but Bill just shrugged. "I've dealt with your kind before." He nodded toward Ellen. "We both have, so let's keep things nice and civil. You can hand over your demands and then go back to your vessel to wait for a reply."
Beside him Ellen nudged his arm with her elbow.
"What?"
"The cruise line doesn't negotiate with terrorists."
Bill smiled half-heartedly at the blonde pirate. "Can you give us a minute?"
"Fine," she drawled, "but I don't have all day. Go on, have your little chat." She waved a hand in Ellen's direction and walked back to her side of the standoff.
Lowering his voice, Bill said, "What do you mean they don't negotiate? No one negotiates with pirates. You pay the asking prices and they go away."
"Ransom isn't exactly a line item in the corporate budget, Bill. We're ferrying tourists to the Mexican Riviera, not running tanks out of Pyongyang."
Bill glanced over at the pirates and their five guns, all trained on him and Ellen now. Turning back to Ellen, he said, "Then it looks like you're frakked."
"What do you mean I'm frakked?"
"I'm just the bartender. When they go looking for fingers to cut off and mail to the corporate headquarters, I'm gonna be so far down that list I'll be dead of natural causes before they get to me."
"Frak you, Adama."
"Okay, enough with the chit chat." Bill's head instinctively snapped around in search of the new voice and he found himself eye to eye with the dark-haired pirate, who he swore he'd seen serving up sushi in the buffet line just yesterday. She looked bored with the whole process. "You have something that belongs to us and we're not leaving until you hand it over."
"And what would that something be?" Ellen asked slowly, like she was talking to a five-year-old.
The dark-haired woman fixed her with a hard stare. "Don't play dumb with me. You know exactly what I'm talking about and you have twenty-four hours to deliver."
"Oh my Gods," Kara said with a laugh. "This is like the worst pirate movie ever. How are we supposed to give you something when we don't even know what it is?"
"Shut up," all five pirates snapped.
Bill prayed that Kara wouldn't say the first thing that popped into her head, which was probably no, you shut up.
Fortunately, Ellen intervened. "Enough. You said twenty-four hours. I heard you. Now get off my ship."
The leader of the pirate gang nodded and on her signal the five of them began backing off the bridge. Bill wondered if they would back themselves all the way off the ship.
But he had more important things to be curious about. He turned to Ellen. "You have a lot of explaining to do."
Authors: icedteainthebag and wishflsinfl
Characters/pairings: Adama/Roslin, Kara/Lee, Gaius/Caprica, other assorted affairs, ensemble cast
Rating: MA (graphic sex)
Warnings: AU, Character death
Spoilers: through Daybreak
Summary: As the new bartender on the cruise ship Galactica Bill Adama is hoping for an uneventful first voyage, but his life is irrevocably changed when he meets cruise director Laura Roslin.
A/N: Halfway through! What will happen next? More AU. Plenty more AU. Thank you to fragrantwoods and somadanne for their invaluable beta assistance. Also thanks to the folks at bsg_checkin for cheerleading.
Chapters: One | Two | Three | Four | Five | Six | Seven | Eight | Nine | Ten | Eleven
*
DAY FIVE: En Route to Puerto Vallarta
Laura hadn't exactly signed on for option two but that didn't keep Bill from spending the rest of the day trying to come up with a way to ask her on a date. A real date, with food, drink, and a date activity.
Not just that activity.
While he was waiting for Laura to finish up on the phone, Bill happened to glance at the wrinkled, day-old schedule posted on her door.
Speed Dating for Dummies.
Maybe he should have signed himself up for that one instead of the scrapbooking.
Because not only had he spent twenty-five minutes wandering the corridors looking for her office, he'd done it while carrying a single (now wilted) daisy that he'd swiped from a buffet arrangement like a complete frakking noob.
He was considering going back to his quarters to die a little when she finally hung up the phone.
"Bill! What a wonderful surprise. Come in."
Her office was pretty high end, probably because it was in an area that the general public might visit. He felt out of place amidst the bright colors, but she looked absolutely perfect sitting at her plush desk surrounded by photos of smiling passengers.
"I, uh-" For godssakes Adama, man up. "Nice office."
"Nice flower." Her smile took the sting out of it.
"It was when I picked it."
She took it from him and stood it in the half-empty water bottle on her desk. "Nothing a little water won't fix. What brings you here?"
Her confidence, the business-like way she was treating him, was messing with his game. He needed to change things up and quick.
"Option two." The heated look that passed across her face told him she was still thinking about option three. "You never gave me an answer about option two."
She leaned back in her chair, twirling a strand of hair between her fingers. "That's right, I didn't, did I? What did you have in mind? Besides the lovely flower, of course."
"A real date. Conversation. Dinner. Get to know each other a little."
"I'd say we already know each other better than most of the couples on this ship."
He blushed at the memory of their first bold encounter. Lowering his voice, he said, "I meant socially, not … carnally."
She put her hand to her lips, stifling a fit of giggles.
"Fine," Bill said, rising to leave. "I get it. It was-"
"No, no, wait-" She struggled to compose herself and finally managed to settle down, blowing out a slow breath and fanning herself with her hand. "Sorry, nervous habit. I see your point. A date could be fun."
"Okay." He struggled to remember what he'd had planned. "Ten-thirty, okay?"
Glancing at the schedule on her monitor, she confirmed that it was. He'd stood to leave when she asked, "Bill, where exactly is this date going to take place?"
Shit. He hadn't thought that far. He'd half-expected her to turn him down. There weren't a lot of places the crew were allowed to socialize, let alone in private. His quarters were the size of a closet. The cafeteria was a zoo. The bar-no, not the bar.
"Don't worry," she said. "I have an idea. Meet me by the arboretum at seven."
*
Gaius was on the Baja Deck in a very secluded location enjoying an early evening frakking by his beautiful lady friend Caprica. She looked glorious in the ocean twilight, riding him while he sprawled out on his lounger, the plastic squeaking as their weight shifted.
"You are so lovely," he said, with all the sincerity he could muster.
She looked sad for a moment. "Gaius, do you believe in God?"
"Well I … He usually doesn't come up during times like this, or very rarely." Gaius pushed up into her, hoping to stave off what could become a very boring conversation. Caprica moaned and slammed her palm down on his chest. He cried out in pain. She squeezed her muscles around him and he grunted, feeling as if she could nearly snap his dick off if she kept up with this nonsense.
"Too … much … pressure," he gasped.
She stared down at him. "Gaius, the time has come for judgment and I want you to be spared."
Sometimes this woman went a little nuts. "My dear," he cooed, running his hands over her shapely ass and cupping each side. "All I need is you, my angel, to save me."
A dark shadow passed over their bodies. Gaius's head snapped to the side and he saw a huge black ship sailing way too close to Galactica. It flew a black flag with what appeared to be a shifting red LED light across it.
Gaius, startled, sat up and clutched Caprica. "What the everloving frak is that?"
Caprica kissed his temple, her arms slipping around his neck. She twirled the back of his hair through her fingers. "Perhaps judgment day's come early."
*
Captain Ellen Tigh stared out the bridge window at the large black ship that had come out of nowhere. One moment she was looking at a panorama of the open ocean, not a thing in sight, and the next moment there was a flash and there it was. Dangerously close and flying its telltale flag.
There was no way they were getting out of this.
"What the frak is that?" Lieutenant Felix Gaeta exclaimed, his eyes wide. "It … it just appeared on DRADIS, came out of nowhere."
Gaeta tended toward the dramatic, but this was an occasion in which his dramaticism was quite warranted. If only he knew how much.
"I've heard of ghost ships, but this is bullshit," Ellen said, trying to play cool. "Must be pirates."
"But it came out of nowhere."
Ellen knew exactly how it got there and exactly what it wanted. None of this made her feel good about the situation. "We must've missed it on the DRADIS."
"Sir … with all due respect, I miss nothing."
"You missed this!" She picked up her wireless handset and tried to find an outbound radio frequency to call for help, but every frequency was jammed.
Every frequency except one.
"Mayday, Mayday, Mayday, this is the M.S. Galactica, our coordinates are-"
"Galactica, it is so good to see you again. Am I speaking to the illustrious Captain Tigh?"
The voice coming over the radio sent a chill down her spine. "John."
"It's been far too long, Ellen."
"Not long enough." Ellen turned to Gaeta. "Gaeta, launch distress rockets. Since we can't emit emergency transmissions we're going to have to roll old school."
"Engaging distress rockets … are … jammed?" Gaeta said in astonishment.
"Shitfrak," Ellen growled.
"And don't think you're going anywhere-if you hadn't noticed, we've disabled your navigational systems and your outbound communication devices." John's voice over the radio was cool but it was tempered with a threatening tone Ellen knew all too well. "A baby could've done it. When was this ship built, anyway? 1985?"
"'89."
"You might as well invite me in."
"Do I have a choice?" Ellen set her jaw in anger.
"No," John said. "And I suppose there'll be no champagne cork popping as we board."
"If I knew you didn't already have weapons trained on my ship full of innocent civilians I'd pop something else right into your ass," Ellen replied.
"Maybe later."
Ellen cringed at the thought. She needed her team-no, more than that, she needed Bill frakkin' Adama. Nobody else would do.
*
Bill was in the head, getting ready for his first real date with Laura when, unbeknownst to him, the pirates boarded the ship. His phone rang just as he was spritzing his favorite Giorgio Armani cologne on his neck.
"Adama," he growled, trying to make his voice sound sexy in case it was his date.
"Get up here now."
Ellen slammed down the phone.
Well, shit.
He felt the ship slow. To anyone else, the minor change in velocity probably went unnoticed, but Bill had spent enough time in dangerous waters. His body was tuned to the ship, riding the water like he was seventeen again and barefoot on a board in the waves of the Gulf.
He dried his face on the towel slung around his neck. There could have been any number of good reasons for the unexpected change in speed. An unidentified object in the water. A frak-up in the engine room. Word from the next port that their arrival time had been pushed.
He cursed his lowly crew position and the inside cabin that came with it. He needed a window, some way to orient himself to the stars or the horizon.
Laura probably had a window. Maybe he'd get to see it tonight. He was thinking about how the window might fit into their plans-trying his best to ignore the captain's rude summons-when he heard the engines shudder, the ship slowing abruptly in the wake of the noise. Closing his eyes, he tried to sense movement but soon every nerve in his body was telling him they were dead in the water.
He grabbed his jeans from the hook behind the door and tugged them on, shoving his feet blindly into his boots as he buttoned up his pants.
There were few good reasons to come to a dead stop in open waters. And a lot of bad ones. He thumbed the combinations to both locks on his footlocker and triggered the false bottom. From the concealed compartment, he pulled a Glock in a shoulder holster and two spare magazines.
He dropped the footlocker lid shut with the heel of his boot as he pulled the holster on over his freshly pressed dress shirt. Grabbing his bulky fatigue jacket from the back of the narrow closet, he pulled it on, concealing the weapon under his arm.
The spare cartridges went in his right jacket pocket, same as always. When he brought his hand up to run it through his hair, he caught the smell of gun oil and metal and he was back in the jungle, strapping on his weapon for a confrontation with river pirates.
You're overreacting, he chided himself. You're on a frakkin' cruise ship off the coast of Mexico, not a junk on the Orinoco. Still, he wasn't taking any chances. He hit the corridor at a jog, heading for the bridge.
*
The rent-a-cops hired by the cruise line hadn't stood a chance against the well-armed pirates. By the time Bill arrived on the bridge, the intruders had subdued all but the last round of defenses. He pulled his sidearm just in time to join the standoff.
The two sides faced each other, menacing glares all around. Ellen, Bill, Kara and Anders brandished handguns on one side and the five pirates armed with semi-automatic weapons stood opposite them.
"Okay, you've made your point," Ellen said. "Now drop your weapons."
"You drop your weapons," replied one of the pirates.
Bill did a double take. That frakker Doral. Bill hadn't recognized him at first. His usual teal jacket was gone, replaced by head-to-toe black combat gear. Frakking weasel, thinking he could pull an inside job right under the nose of Bill Adama.
Maybe this was his revenge for that bar clean-up Bill made him do a few days earlier.
"Look," Bill said, trying hard to keep the exasperation out of his voice, "just give your list of demands to the captain and we'll relay them to the owner of the cruise line."
The aggressive blonde-the one who seemed to be in charge-lowered her weapon and approached Bill, walking right up to the end of the Glock's barrel. "You sound like you have this all figured out."
Her smile sent a little shiver of fear down his spine, but Bill just shrugged. "I've dealt with your kind before." He nodded toward Ellen. "We both have, so let's keep things nice and civil. You can hand over your demands and then go back to your vessel to wait for a reply."
Beside him Ellen nudged his arm with her elbow.
"What?"
"The cruise line doesn't negotiate with terrorists."
Bill smiled half-heartedly at the blonde pirate. "Can you give us a minute?"
"Fine," she drawled, "but I don't have all day. Go on, have your little chat." She waved a hand in Ellen's direction and walked back to her side of the standoff.
Lowering his voice, Bill said, "What do you mean they don't negotiate? No one negotiates with pirates. You pay the asking prices and they go away."
"Ransom isn't exactly a line item in the corporate budget, Bill. We're ferrying tourists to the Mexican Riviera, not running tanks out of Pyongyang."
Bill glanced over at the pirates and their five guns, all trained on him and Ellen now. Turning back to Ellen, he said, "Then it looks like you're frakked."
"What do you mean I'm frakked?"
"I'm just the bartender. When they go looking for fingers to cut off and mail to the corporate headquarters, I'm gonna be so far down that list I'll be dead of natural causes before they get to me."
"Frak you, Adama."
"Okay, enough with the chit chat." Bill's head instinctively snapped around in search of the new voice and he found himself eye to eye with the dark-haired pirate, who he swore he'd seen serving up sushi in the buffet line just yesterday. She looked bored with the whole process. "You have something that belongs to us and we're not leaving until you hand it over."
"And what would that something be?" Ellen asked slowly, like she was talking to a five-year-old.
The dark-haired woman fixed her with a hard stare. "Don't play dumb with me. You know exactly what I'm talking about and you have twenty-four hours to deliver."
"Oh my Gods," Kara said with a laugh. "This is like the worst pirate movie ever. How are we supposed to give you something when we don't even know what it is?"
"Shut up," all five pirates snapped.
Bill prayed that Kara wouldn't say the first thing that popped into her head, which was probably no, you shut up.
Fortunately, Ellen intervened. "Enough. You said twenty-four hours. I heard you. Now get off my ship."
The leader of the pirate gang nodded and on her signal the five of them began backing off the bridge. Bill wondered if they would back themselves all the way off the ship.
But he had more important things to be curious about. He turned to Ellen. "You have a lot of explaining to do."