It All Came Tumbling Down (55/?)
Title: It All Came Tumbling Down
Warnings: Some mature content used. AU but some material from all seasons
Characters: Kara/Lee of course!! some Karl/Sharon and all cast appear
Disclaimer:
I do not own the characters unfortunately they belong to to Ron Moore
and Universal. I'm just borrowing their brilliance!
***
Chapter 55
Ford paced around the makeshift quarters with nervous energy. He was exhausted from the lack of sleep, caused jointly by the uncomfortable bed and Swanson’s continued snoring. He was well aware from looking in the mirror that his eyes were red with dark lines underneath. Now he was just waiting for Blondie to come so he could start his day.
At about 0700 hours the young politician had come for Langley and they had gone off together. Half an hour later Rugby had collected Swanson. Now it was 0800 hours and Ford and Biggy were the only ones left.
“You’ll wear a hole into the floor,” said Biggy as Ford continued to pace up and down.
“Can’t help it, I need to get out of here,” replied Ford as he rubbed his hands together and then made a few little jumps.
“Kat promised me she’d show me her bird today.”
“Lucky you,” said Ford with a pang of jealousy. “Blondie didn’t think to tell me what we’re doing.”
“Wanna swap? I kinda like the blonde, she’s seems more spunky.”
“Well if it makes you feel better, she requested you. Unfortunately none of you got your choice.”
“Shame, Blondie seems like a riot.”
“Not when she’s pushing you through a window she’s not,” replied Ford with a slightly pained smile.
Biggy smirked, “I would’ve loved to have seen that.”
The sound of the hatch opening halted their conversation. Ford recognised the small pilot from the day before, she motioned towards Biggy who leapt enthusiastically to standing.
“Seeya later mate,” he said and then walked out of the hatch leaving Ford alone.
Suddenly the hum of the ship seemed deafening as he sat himself down on his bunk to wait. Looking around he studied the angles of the walls, the pipes and vents. It didn’t look that futuristic, more like a giant submarine, and the principle was the same, only with the vacuum of space outside instead of the crush of the ocean.
The long seconds turned to minutes, dragging on for another hour. Ford had soon tired of listening to the hum of the ship and now he was laid out on his bunk, flipping playing cards into his open bag. A messy pile was beginning to scatter around it on the floor. He let out a board sigh and spun a card which bounced off the far wall.
He then launched himself up from his bunk and walked over to the hatch. It was locked so he banged on it hard with his fist. After a few seconds it opened and three marines were standing in the corridor.
“What can we do you for sir?” asked the middle marine. Ford glanced over at the translation machine which had been set up beside the door and then turned back to them.
“I’m going crazy in here. Where’s Blo…Major Thrace.”
“Hold on,” said the marine and walked around the corner leaving Ford standing with the remaining two, feeling awkward. Thankfully the marine returned quickly and motioned his head for him to follow. Ford pulled an excited grin and ran back into his quarters to grab his jacket before following the marine eagerly.
Part of him was annoyed at being kept waiting so long, but that feeling was suppressed by his excitement of starting his day. He had even spent most of the night trying to remember words that he had already learnt in their language. He believed he had mastered “hello” now in a number of variations.
The marine led him down a corridor which was slightly narrower than others and had many hatch doors leading off to unknown places, which Ford guessed might be living quarters. The marine stopped by a hatch and motioned with his arm to go inside. Ford was slightly apprehensive, not sure what was behind the door, and then he heard the squeal of a child.
He knocked politely and heard a harsh response, which could only have come from Blondie. Aware that the marine behind him was smirking, he opened the hatch and stepped carefully inside. The translator machine was hit with a barrage of sounds.
“No Seph, put it down,” said Blondie, her voice rising above the squeals.
The toddler just looked at her and carried on, flinging his arms about. He looked as if he was holding some sort of thick glove. Blondie was wearing a spacesuit. She didn’t greet Ford, she was too busy trying to stop her son running riot, whilst simultaneously trying to get her daughter dressed.
The little girl screamed and stomped her feet as soon as she was put down. Blondie had turned her attention to Joseph, taking the glove from his hand and lifting him up, balancing him on her hip. He struggled and whined, reaching out for the glove, determined to reach it.
“No, mom needs this or she’ll turn into a lump of ice out in space.” Ford had never seen Blondie looking flustered before. Her cheeks were red and she looked exhausted. Deciding to get out of the way he took a seat in one of the chairs that surrounded a little table. The quarters were small with two doors leading off. The main space consisted of a bed and a few items of furniture. The rest was scattered with clothing and worn toys.
The little boy struggled in his mother’s arms and reached out for the glove as she tossed it onto the table, “No, no, I wanna,” he wailed. The translator machine gave up trying to work out the rest of the garble the child came out with.
Blondie sighed and bounced him on her hip as he began to cry. The little girl, feeling left out started to do the same. Blondie looked ready to scream along with them.
Ford picked up an old looking teddy bear from the floor. He waved it at the little girl, “hey there, do you want to play with the bear?” He felt like an idiot, knowing that the child wouldn’t understand him and then get even more confused when a computer spoke to her. But it seemed to work. She stopped screaming, staring at him with apparent curiosity as she sucked on one of her fingers.
“Don’t stop,” said Blondie as she continued to bounce the little boy who was starting to calm down.
“Er,” replied Ford. He could see the little girl’s face was going red again so he continued to bob the teddy bear up and down, making stupid noises as he did so.
The volume in the room finally decreased and Blondie looked calmer. Ford looked up at her for a second and then felt the teddy being pulled from his grasp. He let go and the girl cuddled it to her. She then looked up at him with a determined look before slapping him on the leg.
“Where dada?” she demanded.
Ford was too shocked to respond, he just looked at the little girl in bewilderment.
She slapped him again, her voice even more demanding. “Where dada!?”
Ford let out a sharp exhale of breath as he saw the determined look on the toddlers face. “Hit first and ask questions later,” he said and then looked up at Blondie. “Wonder where you learnt that?”
“Lena, don’t hit our guests,” said Blondie.
“Where Dada!” squealed the little girl again.
“They’re not shy are they,” observed Ford. Most other toddlers would be hiding behind their mother’s leg right now, but this little girl was standing in front of him, stoic.
“They miss their father,” explained Blondie. “And they won’t let me forget it.”
Ford smiled at the girl. “Do you want to know where your dad is?” he asked. She looked at him strangely, sucking on a finger, but when the translator machine sounded she nodded. Ford rummaged in his pocket until he found a miniature model of the Earth. “This is my home,” he continued and showed the globe to her. “This is Earth.”
“Err?” said Lena.
“That’s right.” He twisted the globe around and pointed to a spot. “Your dad is here, it’s a place called England.”
“Gla” said Lena and pointed to the globe.
Blondie looked at the globe with a frown, “out of all the places to crash, Racetrack finds the smallest island on the planet.”
“It could’ve been a lot worse, believe me,” observed Ford.
Lena grabbed at the globe, saying “dada.”
Blondie shook her head, so Ford said, “this is too small for you sweetie, but I’ll tell you what, I’ll keep your dada safe in my pocket.”
The girl seemed to accept this proposition. She turned to her mother and said “up.”
“It’s time for nursery,” said Blondie. She leant down and struggled to lift her daughter whilst also holding her son. To the shock of Ford she then placed the girl in his lap.
Ford wasn’t sure which was scarier, Blondie’s watchful eye or the child grinning up at him, shouting “up.” He stood up slowly, carefully lifting the child as if she was a fragile vase. She could sense his trepidation, making things more difficult by squirming slightly.
He then followed Blondie as she walked out of the quarters and down the corridor until they reached what was obviously the nursery. Blondie placed her son down and he went running off towards some other children. Ford did the same with the girl. She didn’t run straight off but looked up at him.
“Dada?”
Ford patted his jacket, “safe in my pocket.” She then ran off to join her brother. Ford turned to Blondie. “Did you tell them I was the evil man who took their parents away?” he asked half-heartedly.
“No,” replied Blondie. “They just seem to sense things, scares the frak out of me.”
“They’re cute, and a chip off of the old block.” Blondie frowned at him. “Sorry, what I mean is, they’re a lot like you and their father,” he explained.
“Hopefully the good parts,” replied Blondie with a grin. “Come on, do you want to go out flying or what?”
She quickly walked off down the corridor. Ford jogged slightly to catch up and then fell into step with her. “Really?”
“Really. Not in my bird mind, but in a raptor.”
Ford had already flown in one of those, but he was still excited. “Thank you. After you were so late this morning I thought I wouldn’t get to do anything.”
“I’m not about to let Kat be the best host. I’ve stuck her doing maintenance all day.”
“That’s unlucky for Biggy.”
Blondie grinned, “it helps when you’re put in charge of scheduling.”
Ford nodded in understanding and said “thank you” again. He was now feeling really lucky to have Blondie as his escort, and regretted that he had not felt this way sooner.
As they walked down to the hangar deck, Ford tried to take everything in. The ship was amazing, and massive. He had been here before, but that didn’t stop the excitement bubbling in his stomach.
“Have you got my bird ready Chief?” shouted out Blondie to a man dressed in orange overalls.
“Over here sir,” replied the man, whose gaze was fixed on Ford rather than Blondie as he motioned over to the side of the hangar.
Looming in a space on the deck was one of the fighter jets, it was white and red and had obviously seen many battles. Scorch marks marred the underbelly and wings. Blondie stroked a hand across its side with a look of pride. Written just below the canopy was some lettering, which Ford guessed was Blondie’s name.
“What’s your callsign?” he asked. “If you have those, that is.”
“Starbuck,” said Blondie as she bent down to examine the hull. Ford smiled when he heard the call sign translated. “What?” she asked, standing upright with her hands on her hips.
“It’s just an interesting name to use. It translates to the same name as a character in a famous book on Earth. And it’s also a brand of coffee.”
Blondie stared at him hard and then continued examining her ship. “Chief, did you sort out that dodgy landing strut?”
“Months ago sir.”
Ford watched in awe as Blondie continued to look around the small ship and then ticked off a number of items on a clipboard. “I’m guessing that this only carries one?” he asked.
“Yep, but I wanted to show you what she can do. You’ll be going out with Chuck and his ECO.”
Ford looked over towards a familiar looking ship where two men in flight suits were standing. He followed them on board and took a seat at the front. The pilot looked at him uncertainly, but Ford didn’t care, he kept his focus upon Blondie as she took a seat in the fighter jet and pulled on her helmet, closing up the canopy. Her ship was then slowly towed over to a large airlock.
The atmosphere in his ship seemed tense, the pilot appearing reluctant to make conversation so Ford kept his eyes ahead until their ship had been hauled into the airlock. It burst to life as soon as the lift had reached the top of the airlock and then they were out into space. He had seen it before, but it was still the most beautiful sight Ford had ever seen.
“I wish you could be here with me to see this Carrie,” he whispered to himself, too quietly for the translator to work. He placed a hand gently against the glass. Swooping in close to the ship, came the fighter jet, pulling in just ahead of them.
“Frakking Starbuck,” muttered the pilot next to him, jerking at the controls and making the ship rock.
“Not getting jumpy are you Chuck?” laughed Blondie over the comm.
“Are you trying to give me a frakking heart attack?” he asked.
“Just keeping you on your toes.”
The pilot wasn’t annoyed, he just shook his head and smiled as Blondie’s ship danced in front of them. Ford had seen many birds in the sky before, but none that had been flown with such grace and beauty. He looked out at it with a look of awe on his face.
“You should see her in combat,” said the pilot. “Thank the gods she’s on our side.”
The tension in the little ship had eased slightly. The pilot weaved about, showing Ford what it could do whilst Blondie darted in and out of their vision. He was having so much fun that two hours flew by too quickly for Ford and before he knew it they were landing back on the deck.
As he exited the ship he could see Blondie sitting at the top of the steps to her jet. She was looking at a clipboard, seeming to tick things off half-heartedly. She had a new glow about her, which was probably from wearing a close fitting helmet, but Ford also put down to the thrill of flying again. She saw him approach and grinned widely, putting her clipboard to the side.
“So what did you think?” she asked enthusiastically.
“That we have a lot of catching up to do back on Earth. Nothing we have there flies as well as your ship.”
“This is just an old model, it was retired when the cylons first attacked us.”
Ford nodded, she had told him something about this before in their debriefing. “I think you’d like some of our jets though, even if they can only fly in the atmosphere.”
“Well maybe I’ll get a shot one day.” She stood up quickly and descended the steps, handing over her clipboard to a young looking woman at the bottom, who was dressed in orange overalls and looked obviously like a mechanic. She walked strongly across the deck, motioning for him to follow, a marine still keeping guard. They were half way down one corridor when she spoke to him again. “I’m gonna hit the head and then fill out some paperwork, the marine will have to show you back to your quarters for a while.”
Ford nodded, “and then what?”
Blondie shrugged, “I dunno, think of something.”
She then swaggered away leaving Ford behind, still in complete awe about what he had seen and done today.
oooo
Ford had been alone for a few hours when Swanson and Biggy returned to their quarters. He had spent the time updating his journal about their trip so far and was currently doing a series of press-ups on the floor. He had just broken out into a good sweat when the hatch door clanged open.
Coming to a stand, Ford grabbed his towel and wiped his face down. “Have a good day guys?” he asked.
“Absolutely frigging amazing!” said Swanson happily as he flopped down on his bed. “This ship is huge!”
“I hear you got to go out on a little flying tour,” said Biggy turning to Ford.
Ford tried not to look smug, “I might have done.”
“My guide, Kat, was spitting blood about it all day,” replied Biggy. “She was stuck doing maintenance.”
Ford laughed, “Blondie might have pulled a few strings.”
“Yeah? Well according to Kat, Blondie isn’t the hotshot she thinks she is.”
“Sounds like someone is jealous.” Ford got back down on the ground and started to do some sit-ups. “You didn’t see her out there. Fuck me she could make that ship of hers dance. Also, the pilot I was with said that whenever Blondie’s around, she’s always the top gun. He also mentioned that quite a few pilots are jealous of that.”
“Are we seriously playing “who has the biggest hotshot pilot supervisor?””
Swanson sat up from his bunk, “hey, at least you two have a woman to follow around. Rugby’s great, but half of the time he had to keep disappearing to look after his kid. He didn’t seem to want me anywhere near it.”
“Perhaps because you refer to her as an it,” said Biggy.
“Probably thinks you’ll want to analyse the poor kid,” added Ford.
Swanson went quiet, which they took to be an affirmation. Ford shook his head and continued with his sit-ups.
It was about three hours later when Blondie came to their quarters and took Ford out. This time he was first, leaving Swanson and Biggy looking on jealously. Langley hadn’t come back at all.
She led him to the Mess room where they grabbed some food and sat down at one of the tables. The room reminded Ford of any other officer’s Mess. It was now evening and many of the officers had gone off duty, which meant the drinking and smoking was in full swing. It was almost difficult to hear the translation machine, but Ford was starting to pick up a few words here and there.
“Does this remind you of home?” asked Blondie.
“Yeah,” replied Ford. “Back in the day, I was usually that one,” he added, pointing to one pilot who had his head tilted back whilst another poured drink through a large straw.
Blondie smiled, “but not anymore?”
“I left that life behind to move to the base you were held at. How about you?”
Blondie sighed, “not since the kiddies.”
“Do you miss it?”
“Nope,” she replied with a smile. “I did enough of that when I was younger to last two lifetimes. Back on Caprica I even got arrested for it a few times and thrown in hack.”
“Why am I not surprised?”
She seemed to be thinking about something with a fond memory, “once I dragged Lee down with me, years before we were together. I still remember the look on his face when he woke up in a police cell the next morning.”
Ford laughed, “good night?”
“Yeah,” she replied with a warm smile, which had a hint of slight sadness about it which Ford thought was best not to enquire about. “Lee started a bar fight, it was hilarious, and we got away with it. Pity we couldn’t go back to that bar again, it had a great view of the ocean and served the best ambrosia.”
“I wish I could have seen your home planets, seen how you all used to live. I’m sorry about what happened.”
Blondie seemed to think for a moment and then stood up from the table, motioning her head, “come on, I’ve got an idea.”
She led him down the corridors until they reached a large room, which looked almost like a cinema with rows of seats cascading down in front of a large screen.
“Debriefing room?” asked Ford.
“That’s next door, we use this for training mostly. Every viper is fitted with a camera so we can record their performances in combat and tell them what they’re doing wrong.” Ford took a seat at the front whilst Blondie walked over to a cupboard at the side. He was just about to ask her what she was up to when she said, “Before the attacks every ship in the fleet was sent a care package from fleet headquarters every month. It always contained some cheesy film about life in the Colonies, apparently it was meant to keep moral high.” Blondie looked at Ford sceptically and then continued looking, digging deep into the cupboard. “Ah hah, these look right. They’re not labelled, so it’s pop luck. Hopefully none of it is Hotdog’s porn collection. That kept us all entertained for about a month on the Galactica.” Ford laughed as she stood up and placed one of the disks in the drive and then sat next to him.
A large logo appeared on the screen with some writing underneath. Blondie then pressed on the fast forward button and he could see a uniformed male moving at high speed as he seemed to be talking.
“These films always started with a really long and boring speech by someone high up in the fleet, giving us a few updates and telling us repeatedly how important we were for the protection of the Colonies,” she explained. “We weren’t much frakking good when the cylons penetrated our defence mainframe and launched our own missiles against us.”
“No-one would have any chance, but yet this ship survived.”
Blondie un-paused the film without answering. Uplifting music played as footage played, showing what looked to be different areas of a large city. It looked modern and clean, but the hustle and bustle was not that different to Earth.
“This is Caprica City,” said Blondie.
They watched the entire film and then two others. Ford loved seeing the different places on each one, but it did feel morbid. All the people in these films were now dead. The fourth disk started, showing scenes from what looked to be a military base.
“Frak,” said Blondie. “This is Delphi, I think I’m in this film. For some reason they decided it would be a great idea to make a film at the academy one month. They followed three nuggets through training.”
“You?”
“No, I was one of their instructors.”
Different sites around the base appeared and then he saw Blondie walking by what looked to be a simulator, wearing a space suit and with the same swagger she still walked with. Her face looked softer, younger, than it did now and she had short hair. She also appeared to be making a point of ignoring the camera. She was then speaking to a group of rookies, followed by different interviews with the rookies, talking about their experiences and hopes for the future.
Ford turned to Blondie to ask her a question, but then noticed that she was looking up at screen sadly, her eyes slightly glassy.
“Do you remember them?” he asked softly.
“Every one,” replied Blondie. She pointed to one female who was speaking to the camera, “she was posted to the Galactica after qualifying second in her class. She died in the initial attacks. The cylons just switched off her viper, she had no chance, promising pilot too.”
“If the cylons reach Earth, what will they do?”
“I really don’t know.”
“Could you protect us with this ship?”
Blondie turned to him with a serious expression on her face, “probably not, but we would die trying.”
“You don’t even know us and have no idea what the people of Earth are capable of. How could you honestly say you’d lay down your life for us when every instinct would be telling you to jump away?”
“The hope of Earth has kept us alive for the past few years,” she replied. “I think we owe you one.”
She then stopped the conversation by walking over and changing the disks. She obviously didn’t feel too comfortable will such serious conversation. Ford could understand that, before he had moved over to the base he had left the thinking and politics to others. All he did was jump when he was told to.
Blondie returned back to the seat next to him and started playing the film. This one seemed different, the logo not appearing but instead a woman who looked to be a reporter started speaking.
“Frak, I didn’t know someone had brought this over to the Beast,” said Blondie. “This was a film made on the Galactica after the attacks,” she added by way of explanation.
“Really? Awesome, I was wondering what that ship was like.”
“It was filmed before we found the Beast.”
Ford could see that Blondie was looking up at the screen with disgust as the reporter continued, speaking about some disaster that happened on a ship called the Gideon. “What’s up, didn’t you like the reporter nosing about on your ship?” he joked.
“Yeah, that was bad enough,” replied Blondie and then pointed to the screen. “Finding out she was a toaster was even worse.”
“She’s one of them?” asked Ford shocked, the woman looked exactly human.
“No doubt she took all this footage and then sent it on to the others. The bitch tried to kill me nine months later.”
The film was entertaining, showing the military bond that he was used to and missed greatly. He had raised an eyebrow upon seeing Blue Eyes dressed only in a slipping towel as Blondie smirked in the background.
“Is that Biggy’s supervisor?” he asked as he watched a flailing woman being lifted onto a stretcher by Blondie and Blue Eyes.
“Yeah, she couldn’t hack the pressure, started taking stims.”
The footage continued and then something came up on the film that he did not expect. The cylon spoke about two pilots that had died shortly after filming, and then pictures of Blondie and Blue Eyes appeared.
Neither of them said a word and then the pictures faded to black, followed by footage of them during an obviously private moment. Blondie was giggling away as Blue Eyes tickled her relentlessly.
“Motherfrakker!” shouted out Blondie. “That model better pray to her singular God that we never meet again.”
“I’m guessing you hadn’t seen that end part?”
“No!”
The room was silent again for a few minutes before Ford felt brave enough to ask, “do you want to talk about it?”
“Not really,” she replied quietly. Ford could see the pain on her face.
“You told me about being captured, I’m guessing that happened soon after this?”
“Lots of things did,” said Blondie. She then smiled privately to herself, “our kids happened shortly after.”
“Oh…right, so when you were captured…?”
Blondie turned to face him, “I had no idea until I woke up back in lifestation months later.”
For a moment Ford wondered what that must have felt like, to wake up to realise something so huge. “The only thing that had changed during my captivity was my football team losing the Premiership League. I couldn’t believe it, they were way ahead when I was taken.” Blondie looked at him sceptically, “I’m serious, I was heartbroken. The people of the Earth take their sport very seriously.”
Blondie then burst out laughing, “you’re really odd, you know that?”
“Carrie liked to remind me from time to time.”
Blondie jumped up from her seat and motioned her head, “come on, we can catch a quick triad game in the Mess. Someone might even let you have some of their ambrosia.”
Ford eagerly followed his guide. He had only known Blondie for a short time, but he already knew that apart from the strong fighter she appeared to be on the outside, she possessed a heart of vulnerabilities. He could read it in her eyes as he broke through her barriers. He felt that for some reason, she trusted him now, respected him as a brother-at-arms. He also felt that on this ship, with these people, was where he belonged.
Warnings: Some mature content used. AU but some material from all seasons
Characters: Kara/Lee of course!! some Karl/Sharon and all cast appear
Disclaimer:
I do not own the characters unfortunately they belong to to Ron Moore
and Universal. I'm just borrowing their brilliance!
***
Chapter 55
Ford paced around the makeshift quarters with nervous energy. He was exhausted from the lack of sleep, caused jointly by the uncomfortable bed and Swanson’s continued snoring. He was well aware from looking in the mirror that his eyes were red with dark lines underneath. Now he was just waiting for Blondie to come so he could start his day.
At about 0700 hours the young politician had come for Langley and they had gone off together. Half an hour later Rugby had collected Swanson. Now it was 0800 hours and Ford and Biggy were the only ones left.
“You’ll wear a hole into the floor,” said Biggy as Ford continued to pace up and down.
“Can’t help it, I need to get out of here,” replied Ford as he rubbed his hands together and then made a few little jumps.
“Kat promised me she’d show me her bird today.”
“Lucky you,” said Ford with a pang of jealousy. “Blondie didn’t think to tell me what we’re doing.”
“Wanna swap? I kinda like the blonde, she’s seems more spunky.”
“Well if it makes you feel better, she requested you. Unfortunately none of you got your choice.”
“Shame, Blondie seems like a riot.”
“Not when she’s pushing you through a window she’s not,” replied Ford with a slightly pained smile.
Biggy smirked, “I would’ve loved to have seen that.”
The sound of the hatch opening halted their conversation. Ford recognised the small pilot from the day before, she motioned towards Biggy who leapt enthusiastically to standing.
“Seeya later mate,” he said and then walked out of the hatch leaving Ford alone.
Suddenly the hum of the ship seemed deafening as he sat himself down on his bunk to wait. Looking around he studied the angles of the walls, the pipes and vents. It didn’t look that futuristic, more like a giant submarine, and the principle was the same, only with the vacuum of space outside instead of the crush of the ocean.
The long seconds turned to minutes, dragging on for another hour. Ford had soon tired of listening to the hum of the ship and now he was laid out on his bunk, flipping playing cards into his open bag. A messy pile was beginning to scatter around it on the floor. He let out a board sigh and spun a card which bounced off the far wall.
He then launched himself up from his bunk and walked over to the hatch. It was locked so he banged on it hard with his fist. After a few seconds it opened and three marines were standing in the corridor.
“What can we do you for sir?” asked the middle marine. Ford glanced over at the translation machine which had been set up beside the door and then turned back to them.
“I’m going crazy in here. Where’s Blo…Major Thrace.”
“Hold on,” said the marine and walked around the corner leaving Ford standing with the remaining two, feeling awkward. Thankfully the marine returned quickly and motioned his head for him to follow. Ford pulled an excited grin and ran back into his quarters to grab his jacket before following the marine eagerly.
Part of him was annoyed at being kept waiting so long, but that feeling was suppressed by his excitement of starting his day. He had even spent most of the night trying to remember words that he had already learnt in their language. He believed he had mastered “hello” now in a number of variations.
The marine led him down a corridor which was slightly narrower than others and had many hatch doors leading off to unknown places, which Ford guessed might be living quarters. The marine stopped by a hatch and motioned with his arm to go inside. Ford was slightly apprehensive, not sure what was behind the door, and then he heard the squeal of a child.
He knocked politely and heard a harsh response, which could only have come from Blondie. Aware that the marine behind him was smirking, he opened the hatch and stepped carefully inside. The translator machine was hit with a barrage of sounds.
“No Seph, put it down,” said Blondie, her voice rising above the squeals.
The toddler just looked at her and carried on, flinging his arms about. He looked as if he was holding some sort of thick glove. Blondie was wearing a spacesuit. She didn’t greet Ford, she was too busy trying to stop her son running riot, whilst simultaneously trying to get her daughter dressed.
The little girl screamed and stomped her feet as soon as she was put down. Blondie had turned her attention to Joseph, taking the glove from his hand and lifting him up, balancing him on her hip. He struggled and whined, reaching out for the glove, determined to reach it.
“No, mom needs this or she’ll turn into a lump of ice out in space.” Ford had never seen Blondie looking flustered before. Her cheeks were red and she looked exhausted. Deciding to get out of the way he took a seat in one of the chairs that surrounded a little table. The quarters were small with two doors leading off. The main space consisted of a bed and a few items of furniture. The rest was scattered with clothing and worn toys.
The little boy struggled in his mother’s arms and reached out for the glove as she tossed it onto the table, “No, no, I wanna,” he wailed. The translator machine gave up trying to work out the rest of the garble the child came out with.
Blondie sighed and bounced him on her hip as he began to cry. The little girl, feeling left out started to do the same. Blondie looked ready to scream along with them.
Ford picked up an old looking teddy bear from the floor. He waved it at the little girl, “hey there, do you want to play with the bear?” He felt like an idiot, knowing that the child wouldn’t understand him and then get even more confused when a computer spoke to her. But it seemed to work. She stopped screaming, staring at him with apparent curiosity as she sucked on one of her fingers.
“Don’t stop,” said Blondie as she continued to bounce the little boy who was starting to calm down.
“Er,” replied Ford. He could see the little girl’s face was going red again so he continued to bob the teddy bear up and down, making stupid noises as he did so.
The volume in the room finally decreased and Blondie looked calmer. Ford looked up at her for a second and then felt the teddy being pulled from his grasp. He let go and the girl cuddled it to her. She then looked up at him with a determined look before slapping him on the leg.
“Where dada?” she demanded.
Ford was too shocked to respond, he just looked at the little girl in bewilderment.
She slapped him again, her voice even more demanding. “Where dada!?”
Ford let out a sharp exhale of breath as he saw the determined look on the toddlers face. “Hit first and ask questions later,” he said and then looked up at Blondie. “Wonder where you learnt that?”
“Lena, don’t hit our guests,” said Blondie.
“Where Dada!” squealed the little girl again.
“They’re not shy are they,” observed Ford. Most other toddlers would be hiding behind their mother’s leg right now, but this little girl was standing in front of him, stoic.
“They miss their father,” explained Blondie. “And they won’t let me forget it.”
Ford smiled at the girl. “Do you want to know where your dad is?” he asked. She looked at him strangely, sucking on a finger, but when the translator machine sounded she nodded. Ford rummaged in his pocket until he found a miniature model of the Earth. “This is my home,” he continued and showed the globe to her. “This is Earth.”
“Err?” said Lena.
“That’s right.” He twisted the globe around and pointed to a spot. “Your dad is here, it’s a place called England.”
“Gla” said Lena and pointed to the globe.
Blondie looked at the globe with a frown, “out of all the places to crash, Racetrack finds the smallest island on the planet.”
“It could’ve been a lot worse, believe me,” observed Ford.
Lena grabbed at the globe, saying “dada.”
Blondie shook her head, so Ford said, “this is too small for you sweetie, but I’ll tell you what, I’ll keep your dada safe in my pocket.”
The girl seemed to accept this proposition. She turned to her mother and said “up.”
“It’s time for nursery,” said Blondie. She leant down and struggled to lift her daughter whilst also holding her son. To the shock of Ford she then placed the girl in his lap.
Ford wasn’t sure which was scarier, Blondie’s watchful eye or the child grinning up at him, shouting “up.” He stood up slowly, carefully lifting the child as if she was a fragile vase. She could sense his trepidation, making things more difficult by squirming slightly.
He then followed Blondie as she walked out of the quarters and down the corridor until they reached what was obviously the nursery. Blondie placed her son down and he went running off towards some other children. Ford did the same with the girl. She didn’t run straight off but looked up at him.
“Dada?”
Ford patted his jacket, “safe in my pocket.” She then ran off to join her brother. Ford turned to Blondie. “Did you tell them I was the evil man who took their parents away?” he asked half-heartedly.
“No,” replied Blondie. “They just seem to sense things, scares the frak out of me.”
“They’re cute, and a chip off of the old block.” Blondie frowned at him. “Sorry, what I mean is, they’re a lot like you and their father,” he explained.
“Hopefully the good parts,” replied Blondie with a grin. “Come on, do you want to go out flying or what?”
She quickly walked off down the corridor. Ford jogged slightly to catch up and then fell into step with her. “Really?”
“Really. Not in my bird mind, but in a raptor.”
Ford had already flown in one of those, but he was still excited. “Thank you. After you were so late this morning I thought I wouldn’t get to do anything.”
“I’m not about to let Kat be the best host. I’ve stuck her doing maintenance all day.”
“That’s unlucky for Biggy.”
Blondie grinned, “it helps when you’re put in charge of scheduling.”
Ford nodded in understanding and said “thank you” again. He was now feeling really lucky to have Blondie as his escort, and regretted that he had not felt this way sooner.
As they walked down to the hangar deck, Ford tried to take everything in. The ship was amazing, and massive. He had been here before, but that didn’t stop the excitement bubbling in his stomach.
“Have you got my bird ready Chief?” shouted out Blondie to a man dressed in orange overalls.
“Over here sir,” replied the man, whose gaze was fixed on Ford rather than Blondie as he motioned over to the side of the hangar.
Looming in a space on the deck was one of the fighter jets, it was white and red and had obviously seen many battles. Scorch marks marred the underbelly and wings. Blondie stroked a hand across its side with a look of pride. Written just below the canopy was some lettering, which Ford guessed was Blondie’s name.
“What’s your callsign?” he asked. “If you have those, that is.”
“Starbuck,” said Blondie as she bent down to examine the hull. Ford smiled when he heard the call sign translated. “What?” she asked, standing upright with her hands on her hips.
“It’s just an interesting name to use. It translates to the same name as a character in a famous book on Earth. And it’s also a brand of coffee.”
Blondie stared at him hard and then continued examining her ship. “Chief, did you sort out that dodgy landing strut?”
“Months ago sir.”
Ford watched in awe as Blondie continued to look around the small ship and then ticked off a number of items on a clipboard. “I’m guessing that this only carries one?” he asked.
“Yep, but I wanted to show you what she can do. You’ll be going out with Chuck and his ECO.”
Ford looked over towards a familiar looking ship where two men in flight suits were standing. He followed them on board and took a seat at the front. The pilot looked at him uncertainly, but Ford didn’t care, he kept his focus upon Blondie as she took a seat in the fighter jet and pulled on her helmet, closing up the canopy. Her ship was then slowly towed over to a large airlock.
The atmosphere in his ship seemed tense, the pilot appearing reluctant to make conversation so Ford kept his eyes ahead until their ship had been hauled into the airlock. It burst to life as soon as the lift had reached the top of the airlock and then they were out into space. He had seen it before, but it was still the most beautiful sight Ford had ever seen.
“I wish you could be here with me to see this Carrie,” he whispered to himself, too quietly for the translator to work. He placed a hand gently against the glass. Swooping in close to the ship, came the fighter jet, pulling in just ahead of them.
“Frakking Starbuck,” muttered the pilot next to him, jerking at the controls and making the ship rock.
“Not getting jumpy are you Chuck?” laughed Blondie over the comm.
“Are you trying to give me a frakking heart attack?” he asked.
“Just keeping you on your toes.”
The pilot wasn’t annoyed, he just shook his head and smiled as Blondie’s ship danced in front of them. Ford had seen many birds in the sky before, but none that had been flown with such grace and beauty. He looked out at it with a look of awe on his face.
“You should see her in combat,” said the pilot. “Thank the gods she’s on our side.”
The tension in the little ship had eased slightly. The pilot weaved about, showing Ford what it could do whilst Blondie darted in and out of their vision. He was having so much fun that two hours flew by too quickly for Ford and before he knew it they were landing back on the deck.
As he exited the ship he could see Blondie sitting at the top of the steps to her jet. She was looking at a clipboard, seeming to tick things off half-heartedly. She had a new glow about her, which was probably from wearing a close fitting helmet, but Ford also put down to the thrill of flying again. She saw him approach and grinned widely, putting her clipboard to the side.
“So what did you think?” she asked enthusiastically.
“That we have a lot of catching up to do back on Earth. Nothing we have there flies as well as your ship.”
“This is just an old model, it was retired when the cylons first attacked us.”
Ford nodded, she had told him something about this before in their debriefing. “I think you’d like some of our jets though, even if they can only fly in the atmosphere.”
“Well maybe I’ll get a shot one day.” She stood up quickly and descended the steps, handing over her clipboard to a young looking woman at the bottom, who was dressed in orange overalls and looked obviously like a mechanic. She walked strongly across the deck, motioning for him to follow, a marine still keeping guard. They were half way down one corridor when she spoke to him again. “I’m gonna hit the head and then fill out some paperwork, the marine will have to show you back to your quarters for a while.”
Ford nodded, “and then what?”
Blondie shrugged, “I dunno, think of something.”
She then swaggered away leaving Ford behind, still in complete awe about what he had seen and done today.
oooo
Ford had been alone for a few hours when Swanson and Biggy returned to their quarters. He had spent the time updating his journal about their trip so far and was currently doing a series of press-ups on the floor. He had just broken out into a good sweat when the hatch door clanged open.
Coming to a stand, Ford grabbed his towel and wiped his face down. “Have a good day guys?” he asked.
“Absolutely frigging amazing!” said Swanson happily as he flopped down on his bed. “This ship is huge!”
“I hear you got to go out on a little flying tour,” said Biggy turning to Ford.
Ford tried not to look smug, “I might have done.”
“My guide, Kat, was spitting blood about it all day,” replied Biggy. “She was stuck doing maintenance.”
Ford laughed, “Blondie might have pulled a few strings.”
“Yeah? Well according to Kat, Blondie isn’t the hotshot she thinks she is.”
“Sounds like someone is jealous.” Ford got back down on the ground and started to do some sit-ups. “You didn’t see her out there. Fuck me she could make that ship of hers dance. Also, the pilot I was with said that whenever Blondie’s around, she’s always the top gun. He also mentioned that quite a few pilots are jealous of that.”
“Are we seriously playing “who has the biggest hotshot pilot supervisor?””
Swanson sat up from his bunk, “hey, at least you two have a woman to follow around. Rugby’s great, but half of the time he had to keep disappearing to look after his kid. He didn’t seem to want me anywhere near it.”
“Perhaps because you refer to her as an it,” said Biggy.
“Probably thinks you’ll want to analyse the poor kid,” added Ford.
Swanson went quiet, which they took to be an affirmation. Ford shook his head and continued with his sit-ups.
It was about three hours later when Blondie came to their quarters and took Ford out. This time he was first, leaving Swanson and Biggy looking on jealously. Langley hadn’t come back at all.
She led him to the Mess room where they grabbed some food and sat down at one of the tables. The room reminded Ford of any other officer’s Mess. It was now evening and many of the officers had gone off duty, which meant the drinking and smoking was in full swing. It was almost difficult to hear the translation machine, but Ford was starting to pick up a few words here and there.
“Does this remind you of home?” asked Blondie.
“Yeah,” replied Ford. “Back in the day, I was usually that one,” he added, pointing to one pilot who had his head tilted back whilst another poured drink through a large straw.
Blondie smiled, “but not anymore?”
“I left that life behind to move to the base you were held at. How about you?”
Blondie sighed, “not since the kiddies.”
“Do you miss it?”
“Nope,” she replied with a smile. “I did enough of that when I was younger to last two lifetimes. Back on Caprica I even got arrested for it a few times and thrown in hack.”
“Why am I not surprised?”
She seemed to be thinking about something with a fond memory, “once I dragged Lee down with me, years before we were together. I still remember the look on his face when he woke up in a police cell the next morning.”
Ford laughed, “good night?”
“Yeah,” she replied with a warm smile, which had a hint of slight sadness about it which Ford thought was best not to enquire about. “Lee started a bar fight, it was hilarious, and we got away with it. Pity we couldn’t go back to that bar again, it had a great view of the ocean and served the best ambrosia.”
“I wish I could have seen your home planets, seen how you all used to live. I’m sorry about what happened.”
Blondie seemed to think for a moment and then stood up from the table, motioning her head, “come on, I’ve got an idea.”
She led him down the corridors until they reached a large room, which looked almost like a cinema with rows of seats cascading down in front of a large screen.
“Debriefing room?” asked Ford.
“That’s next door, we use this for training mostly. Every viper is fitted with a camera so we can record their performances in combat and tell them what they’re doing wrong.” Ford took a seat at the front whilst Blondie walked over to a cupboard at the side. He was just about to ask her what she was up to when she said, “Before the attacks every ship in the fleet was sent a care package from fleet headquarters every month. It always contained some cheesy film about life in the Colonies, apparently it was meant to keep moral high.” Blondie looked at Ford sceptically and then continued looking, digging deep into the cupboard. “Ah hah, these look right. They’re not labelled, so it’s pop luck. Hopefully none of it is Hotdog’s porn collection. That kept us all entertained for about a month on the Galactica.” Ford laughed as she stood up and placed one of the disks in the drive and then sat next to him.
A large logo appeared on the screen with some writing underneath. Blondie then pressed on the fast forward button and he could see a uniformed male moving at high speed as he seemed to be talking.
“These films always started with a really long and boring speech by someone high up in the fleet, giving us a few updates and telling us repeatedly how important we were for the protection of the Colonies,” she explained. “We weren’t much frakking good when the cylons penetrated our defence mainframe and launched our own missiles against us.”
“No-one would have any chance, but yet this ship survived.”
Blondie un-paused the film without answering. Uplifting music played as footage played, showing what looked to be different areas of a large city. It looked modern and clean, but the hustle and bustle was not that different to Earth.
“This is Caprica City,” said Blondie.
They watched the entire film and then two others. Ford loved seeing the different places on each one, but it did feel morbid. All the people in these films were now dead. The fourth disk started, showing scenes from what looked to be a military base.
“Frak,” said Blondie. “This is Delphi, I think I’m in this film. For some reason they decided it would be a great idea to make a film at the academy one month. They followed three nuggets through training.”
“You?”
“No, I was one of their instructors.”
Different sites around the base appeared and then he saw Blondie walking by what looked to be a simulator, wearing a space suit and with the same swagger she still walked with. Her face looked softer, younger, than it did now and she had short hair. She also appeared to be making a point of ignoring the camera. She was then speaking to a group of rookies, followed by different interviews with the rookies, talking about their experiences and hopes for the future.
Ford turned to Blondie to ask her a question, but then noticed that she was looking up at screen sadly, her eyes slightly glassy.
“Do you remember them?” he asked softly.
“Every one,” replied Blondie. She pointed to one female who was speaking to the camera, “she was posted to the Galactica after qualifying second in her class. She died in the initial attacks. The cylons just switched off her viper, she had no chance, promising pilot too.”
“If the cylons reach Earth, what will they do?”
“I really don’t know.”
“Could you protect us with this ship?”
Blondie turned to him with a serious expression on her face, “probably not, but we would die trying.”
“You don’t even know us and have no idea what the people of Earth are capable of. How could you honestly say you’d lay down your life for us when every instinct would be telling you to jump away?”
“The hope of Earth has kept us alive for the past few years,” she replied. “I think we owe you one.”
She then stopped the conversation by walking over and changing the disks. She obviously didn’t feel too comfortable will such serious conversation. Ford could understand that, before he had moved over to the base he had left the thinking and politics to others. All he did was jump when he was told to.
Blondie returned back to the seat next to him and started playing the film. This one seemed different, the logo not appearing but instead a woman who looked to be a reporter started speaking.
“Frak, I didn’t know someone had brought this over to the Beast,” said Blondie. “This was a film made on the Galactica after the attacks,” she added by way of explanation.
“Really? Awesome, I was wondering what that ship was like.”
“It was filmed before we found the Beast.”
Ford could see that Blondie was looking up at the screen with disgust as the reporter continued, speaking about some disaster that happened on a ship called the Gideon. “What’s up, didn’t you like the reporter nosing about on your ship?” he joked.
“Yeah, that was bad enough,” replied Blondie and then pointed to the screen. “Finding out she was a toaster was even worse.”
“She’s one of them?” asked Ford shocked, the woman looked exactly human.
“No doubt she took all this footage and then sent it on to the others. The bitch tried to kill me nine months later.”
The film was entertaining, showing the military bond that he was used to and missed greatly. He had raised an eyebrow upon seeing Blue Eyes dressed only in a slipping towel as Blondie smirked in the background.
“Is that Biggy’s supervisor?” he asked as he watched a flailing woman being lifted onto a stretcher by Blondie and Blue Eyes.
“Yeah, she couldn’t hack the pressure, started taking stims.”
The footage continued and then something came up on the film that he did not expect. The cylon spoke about two pilots that had died shortly after filming, and then pictures of Blondie and Blue Eyes appeared.
Neither of them said a word and then the pictures faded to black, followed by footage of them during an obviously private moment. Blondie was giggling away as Blue Eyes tickled her relentlessly.
“Motherfrakker!” shouted out Blondie. “That model better pray to her singular God that we never meet again.”
“I’m guessing you hadn’t seen that end part?”
“No!”
The room was silent again for a few minutes before Ford felt brave enough to ask, “do you want to talk about it?”
“Not really,” she replied quietly. Ford could see the pain on her face.
“You told me about being captured, I’m guessing that happened soon after this?”
“Lots of things did,” said Blondie. She then smiled privately to herself, “our kids happened shortly after.”
“Oh…right, so when you were captured…?”
Blondie turned to face him, “I had no idea until I woke up back in lifestation months later.”
For a moment Ford wondered what that must have felt like, to wake up to realise something so huge. “The only thing that had changed during my captivity was my football team losing the Premiership League. I couldn’t believe it, they were way ahead when I was taken.” Blondie looked at him sceptically, “I’m serious, I was heartbroken. The people of the Earth take their sport very seriously.”
Blondie then burst out laughing, “you’re really odd, you know that?”
“Carrie liked to remind me from time to time.”
Blondie jumped up from her seat and motioned her head, “come on, we can catch a quick triad game in the Mess. Someone might even let you have some of their ambrosia.”
Ford eagerly followed his guide. He had only known Blondie for a short time, but he already knew that apart from the strong fighter she appeared to be on the outside, she possessed a heart of vulnerabilities. He could read it in her eyes as he broke through her barriers. He felt that for some reason, she trusted him now, respected him as a brother-at-arms. He also felt that on this ship, with these people, was where he belonged.