The Rain'll Be Gone In The Morning
Title: The Rain’ll Be Gone in the Morning
Rating: PG
Words: ~4600
Characters: Kara, Hera with appearances by Helo, Lee, Cally, and Sharon
Setting: Between “The Woman King” and “A Day in the Life”
Summary: The kid’s been lost in grey walls and cried out with no one to hear her, waiting around for no one to rescue her, and somehow after all of that she’s learned how to laugh.
A/N: Companion piece to “ Lullaby for a Stormy Night,” however you don’t need to have read the first one to follow this one. Also semi inspired by these scenes from the original BSG.
Beta'd by the wonderful workerbee73
Focus.
Focus.
Focus.
Kara taps an erratic beat on the table in the duty locker with the back end of her pen. She can think of few things more boring than paperwork. Back in the day it was her least favorite part of being a flight instructor, and it certainly isn’t any better now. She rakes a hand through her hair and wills her brain to frakking focus on her lesson plans for the nuggets for tomorrow because it’s better than thinking. Anything is better than thinking these days.
She doesn’t realize that the tapping has stopped and that her hand is curled around the pen like it’s the handle of a blade, and she jumps when she hears footsteps behind her. Her heart is pounding, blood racing in her ears like she’s actually running.
Starbuck wouldn’t scare so easily.
“Frak, Helo,” she hisses. It’s only Karl; the thought doesn’t drain any of the tension from her shoulders. “Don’t do that!”
He raises an eyebrow at her and shifts slightly, adjusting his grip on Hera who is sitting on his hip with a ratty old stuffed toy tucked under her arm. “Are you alright?”
“Yeah. Fine.”
He must buy it, because he’s asking her for a favor. “Sharon and I are going out to do some recon. There’s a couple of planets not too far away and there’s too much radiation between here and there to do any long range sweeps. Have to see if there’s anything useful on any of them. Can we leave Hera with you for a while?”
The little girl stares at her with brown eyes, dark eyes; Sharon’s eyes, she thinks. It’s completely unlike that tiny blue gaze that looked at her like she was everything, but it doesn’t matter; Kara looks away. “Isn’t that what daycare is for?”
“Yeah, but the therapist thought it would be a good idea to spend some time with people outside the daycare, form some stronger attachments… something like that.”
She starts tapping her pen against the table again, trying to look like she’s busy with her lesson plans, which aren’t any more complete than they were two hours ago when she first sat down. “I don’t think so.”
“Come on, Kara. It’s just for a few hours.” Helo taps a finger against his daughter’s nose and she bursts out in a fit of giggles. “What do you say, Hera? You want to spend some time with Auntie Kara?”
The heartwarming laughter of children-greatest joy in the worlds, her ass. “I said no,” she grits out, everything in her tense and tight-from her voice to every tendon in her hand. A pencil would’ve already snapped under the force of her grip and the pen seems to be considering it. She turns back to Helo who is about to protest; she cuts him off. “I have better things to do with my time than look after some snot-nosed little brat!” She watches the blow land and feels no satisfaction in it.
He tries too hard to sound okay, and she gets the feeling it isn’t for the kid’s sake. “Thanks anyway, Starbuck.”
When he’s left, she throws her pen at the doorway. It hits the wall with a thunk and ricochets back, striking her in the leg. She swears under her breath and falls forward, forehead thudding against the table as she heaves out a sigh.
Godsdamnit.
---
“Skids up in fifteen minutes. Dismissed.”
Kara doesn’t even wait until the ready room is clear before she’s storming up to the podium. “What the frak was that about, Major?” She doesn’t say his name. She isn’t sure she can; not now, not when she can’t say it the way she wants to say it because it’s not her place-never was her place.
“What was what about, Captain?” He pinches the bridge of his nose. He never makes eye contact anymore.
It makes it a hell of a lot harder to pin him with her gaze. “You left me off the SAR team.”
Less than three hours after she’d had Helo asking her to play babysitter, Hot Dog was breaking the news to her that the Agathon’s Raptor had sent off a distress beacon before all contact was lost. The first move was to have Racetrack and Skulls jump out to their last known coordinates but they were nowhere to be found.
Lee flips through his papers, like he’s looking for justification in them. “It’s too far out for Vipers. Raptors only.”
“You know frakking well I’m Raptor qualified,” she bites out and it finally gets him to look at her. She knows what he’s remembering-the sun scorches everything and the air reeks of algae, the Raptor provides no shelter but is the best privacy they’ve had, and they have only seconds more to live in this lie they’ve created-it’s all there in his eyes, going up in flames, and she isn’t exactly sure how she feels about the flicker of remorse in all that blue.
They have an audience still. So, his voice drops. “What do you want from me, Kara?”
Where to begin?
He doesn’t wait for a response. “I’m not sending the flight instructor out on a twelve-hour SAR rotation when she has nuggets to whip into shape in ten. Besides, we need you here to fly CAP after that so don’t bother asking about the second rotation.”
She plants her hands firmly on her hips. “Hell of a lot of excuses there, Apollo. I’m sure you’re just full of them.”
He steps around the podium; nothing between them anymore. His voice is sharp and his eyes are fury. “I want to see Helo and Athena get back alive just as much as you do, and gods know I want to be out there looking for them myself, but I can’t just go running off from my responsibilities when I know I’m not going to be doing much good out there. Neither can you.”
There are a thousand ways she can call him on that one. But she’s trying not to think about the man who pulled the CAP to bring her home so many years ago because he’s clearly not here anymore; so she sneers, salutes, and storms from the room.
The decision isn’t hers to make and it’s killing her just a little bit.
---
Kara doesn’t know where her feet are carrying her until she’s standing in the daycare. She wasn’t even sure that she knew where it is, not like she ever had any reason to come here before. It’s brightly colored though, brighter than any other place on Galactica. It’s all soft corners and plastic instead of harsh edges and metal here and all the surfaces look like they should be sticky to the touch. Nothing looks big enough for an actual human being here.
And there are just so damned many of them. Children. Once they got to New Caprica it seemed like the entire frakking human race-those who’d managed their honorable discharges were no exception-decided the best course of action was to pair off and pop out kids. She’d only let herself fall halfway into that trap-solid ground screwed with her balance, she was going to trip one way or another. She never belonged down there. But it’s too late to do anything about that now.
As she stands in the doorway, one of the petty officers that has been on kiddie duty catches her eye. He nods his head towards the corner. Word about the Agathons must have gotten around quickly because he’s just directed her towards Hera, sitting against the wall, stacking blocks into towers.
She almost runs. Instead, Kara drops down into a crouch beside her, keeping her voice soft. “Hey, Hera.” No reply. “Do you know who I am?” The toddler reaches for her stuffed toy and swings it at Kara. It connects with her cheek and Kara can’t help but feel like she deserved that one. “I’ll take that as a yes.”
Before she can think herself out of doing it, she puts her arms around Hera and pulls her up onto her hip. She ignores the fact that it feels familiar. She’s about the same weight. She’s so grateful when the child blurts out, “Dada?” and stops her mind on that thought.
“No,” she says. Her heart is beating out a blaring alarm. “Your daddy and mommy are… they’re going to be a little while longer.”
“Dada? Mama?” Hera whines, her nose crinkles and tears start welling up in her eyes and if this kid starts crying, Kara doesn’t know what the hell she’s going to do. So she pulls Hera against her chest, rubbing circles on her back and making what she hopes are soothing sounds.
“It’s okay.” The lie tastes bitter in her mouth, not like Hera would understand the truth if she heard it. “Your parents wanted me to look after you for a while. So you’re going to come stay with me until they get back. Alright?”
Hera hiccups and, aside from the accompanying little kick to her stomach, Kara also takes that as a yes.
---
She’s down on her knees in the mess hall and if she gets hit with one more spoonful of mashed algae, that’s it. She’s done. “Come on, Hera, open up.” It’s not as though they have actual babyfood, green slop is green slop, and the toddler did not seem to be a fan as indicated by the way she keeps slapping the spoon away.
How the frak did Karl and Sharon do this day in and day out? Kara sits back on her heels. Not did. Do. They’re coming back. They have to.
She hisses out a deep breath and prepares a new strategy. She loads up another spoonful of algae. “Open up, Hera. Here comes the Viper.” The spoon banks and turns and Kara does her best imitation of an engine but the toddler is having none of it. With a huff, Kara rises to her feet and sets the spoon back on the table.
“Fine. If you don’t want to eat, don’t.” It’s been nice though. The past thirty minutes have all been consumed with trying to figure out how to get Hera to eat, and there hasn’t been any room for any other thoughts in her head. She likes that.
Kara sinks into her own chair and, after taking a bite of her food, starts to feel the urge to fling it into someone’s face as well. She turns her face to look at Hera who has herself propped upright in the chair beside her, her arms curled around the toy, clutching it tightly to her chest. There’s something accusatory in those dark eyes; Kara thinks that maybe Hera’s looking at her like it’s her fault that her mommy and daddy are gone.
“You’ve got something on your cheek, Starbuck.”
Kara glances up to see Cally sliding into the seat next to her with Nicky cradled in her arms. Cally gestures towards something just underneath her right eye. Kara gropes blindly at her face for a moment before flicking away the green gunk that had taken up residence there. She’s pretty sure she thanks her but even if she didn’t Cally doesn’t seem disturbed by it; her attention does seem to be fixed on Kara’s tiny companion.
“No word about…?”
“Not yet.”
“Gods.” Cally clutches her son tighter to her chest. “If anything happened to me and Galen, I just…” She shakes the thought away.
Kara’s glad she glances to the side because Hera’s gotten to her feet and is standing on the chair, one foot half off the edge and wobbling precariously. Kara shoots her arm out to catch her as she starts to topple. “No. Hera. You can’t do that.” She pulls the little girl onto her lap. Hera grunts and wriggles and throws her miniscule weight against Kara’s arms, letting out a grating whine. “Gods, if anything happens to you, your mother will kill me. With bullets.”
Cally snickers softly, like Starbuck holding a little kid is the universe’s best joke (Kara’s heard this one before). When Hera resigns herself to sitting in Kara’s lap, her face a study in petulance, the laughter dies away. “It was… it’s been hard on them.” She doesn’t look at Kara, just the way Nicky has his hand wrapped around her own finger. “Hera’s had a hard life; I mean she was stolen and then kidnapped by the cylons. Athena was telling me how hard it’s been, even to get her to start laughing. I swear, they’d go to the ends of the universe and back for their little girl.”
Laughing. The kid’s been lost in grey walls and cried out with no one to hear her, waiting around for no one to rescue her, and somehow after all of that she’s learned how to laugh. Kara is almost envious as she ruffles a hand through the dark curls on the toddler’s head.
Of course, Hera decides that this is the perfect time to let out a high-pitched wail and Kara sinks down in her seat. “Frak! I don’t know what she wants. I tried feeding her but she just won’t eat.”
“Have you checked her diaper?” Cally asks like she’s missed the most basic item on a routine maintenance check. “Here, if you hold Nicky for a while I can-”
“No.” Kara grimaces as she rises to her feet, holding Hera out a ways and taking a hesitant whiff. Yup. Diaper. Check. “No. I’ll do it.” Because it’s something to keep her busy. Because maybe if she can do this right. Because she’s made up her mind, she’s gonna watch after this stupid kid ‘til Karl comes back. Because it’s frakking ridiculous that the last thing she wants is to be around this kid and there’s no frakking reason for the way it feels like she’s breaking down and maybe, just maybe she can win this.
---
“Hold still!” Kara snaps. Hera retaliates with a kick to Kara’s shoulder that seems far too strong for her small size. It must be the cylon in her. The little girl is grinning and seems to be getting far too much joy out of this game of ‘piss off the babysitter.’ And Kara might almost be proud of the kid’s guts if she wasn’t so irritated that her undefeatable opponent is so godsdamned fragile, no matter how hard she kicks.
It’s pathetic really that she can’t just force the kid to sit still for a second. Hera can barely walk on her own, can’t feed herself, can’t even use a frakking toilet-completely dependant on others; and yet she still manages to be defiant as all get out even when someone’s trying to do her a frakking favor. Ungrateful brat, Kara thinks.
She’s making a second attempt to get the clean diaper on, when she hears the hatch to the head squeal open and someone starts laughing behind her; not amused so much as bemused. She recognizes the laugh before the voice starts. “I never thought I’d live to see the day.”
She refuses to let it derail her from her mission. “Keep it up, Apollo.” She grunts as Hera tucks her knees into her chest and rolls to the side, nearly falling off the bench, and before she can do anything about it, Lee is standing there-his hand stopping the child from tumbling to the floor.
The newcomer seems to attract Hera’s attention. Especially the way the dim light catches on the pins on Lee’s collar. Her arms raise up, waving towards the shining metal and Lee smiles. “You like these, Hera?” he asks, dropping down to his knees, and while he’s got her distracted, Kara finally succeeds in getting the clean diaper on.
It’s probably rude to just scoop the kid up into her arms and walk out so she gets out a “Thanks” before picking her back up. As Lee rises to his feet, she sees him watching her, watching the way she holds Hera on her hip, her grip on the child firm but gentle, her stance wide; she can’t quite tell what he’s thinking, but of course he’s thinking something because when is he not?
“You could’ve just left her in daycare,” he reminds her as she turns to leave. Like she didn’t already know that one.
She gives a noncommittal shrug. “So what?”
For a moment he looks like he’s about to smile; instead, he shrugs as well.
---
She can get about six hours of sleep before he has to get up for training the nuggets; only five if she takes into account the fact that she’s going to have to get Hera to daycare before she’s running drills all day. And that is if she falls asleep right frakking now.
Not a likely scenario.
She hasn’t gotten a good night’s sleep since… well since before she moved down to that shithole excuse for a planet. At first she’d thought that getting back in her rack would fix everything-it was one of those little lies she told herself to get her through that nightmare, but soon it’s not a matter of whether the nightmares will come at night but which nightmare, a familiar trap or some new torment.
But tonight she’s bone tired after realizing just why they were called toddlers. If she let the kid out of her sight for more than thirty seconds she might be finding her on another deck entirely. The first time was almost funny. The half-hour it took to find her after Sam briefly stopped by only to discover Kara’s new bunkmate for the night was distinctly not.
She is tired. So tired.
Hera makes a soft hiccupping noise as she curls against Kara. She’s cute when she sleeps, at least she has that going for her. Kara heaves a sigh and lets her eyes slide close and for a little while there’s a great black nothing.
---
She’s been running up these stairs as long as she can remember. Her lungs are burning and the grey stretches on forever but she’s sure that with a few more steps she’ll reach the top; so she pushes harder, harder, faster, stronger until she’s a step away.
Less human than a hand-maybe a claw or a tentacle-but it doesn’t matter what it is, it reaches up where the stairs lack risers and snares her ankle in a vice-like grip and she’s falling.
Back down the klick’s worth of stairs. Every edge, every corner marks her, tears her, as she plummets; it’s a mockery of how far she’s come until she finally hits the ground, broken. She wills herself to move, to get back up and go again, but the effort is futile and the world is dimming at the corners of her vision and spiraling into red and yellow and blue and soon she can see nothing but him.
The eyes of maddened calm are fixed on her and he’s telling her it’s going to be alright but there is nothing that can make this right. Nothing but release from this rag doll body she has no control over.
All she can hear is a high-pitched wail and she prays to the gods it’s not her.
---
“Someone shut that kid up!” a tired voice demands.
Kara’s never been so grateful for a sobbing baby in her life. “I’m going, I’m going,” she growls as she gathers Hera up into her arms and carries her out into the corridor. The child struggles in her arms, small hands balled into fists and swinging at invisible monsters. Kara pulls her against her chest, afraid that she’s going to fight her way right out of Kara’s grip and onto the hard metal floor.
She paces the halls and lets the kid do the crying for the both of them. Hera’s wails draw the attention of other officers on late duty, leaving Kara to be the one shooting sharp angry looks and snap, “What are you looking at?” She wonders if she can really keep this up until they find the Agathons (if they find the Agathons). She shoves away the thought and the following ones, the ones wondering what would be worse handing the kid over to yet another stranger or if Karl’d written a will naming her as caretaker. She scoffs at how ridiculous that sounds and her hand traces little patterns on Hera’s back and whispers empty assurances to her and to herself. “It was only a nightmare, Hera. It’s not real, it can’t hurt you.”
She says it enough that it starts to sound like truth (or maybe she just wants it to) and maybe Hera wants to believe it, too, because the wails turn to sobs and the sobs to sniffles. Hera throws her arms around Kara’s neck and buries her head against her shoulder. Soon, Kara’s clutching back just as tightly.
---
Hera’s been alright since Kara brought her back to the Agathon’s quarters. The familiar surroundings seem to keep her calm (quiet, at least), but the girl shows no interest in going back to sleep. That’s just fine by Kara, adrenaline has kicked in and it should be enough to fuel her for a while. Who needs coffee when a good nightmare works just as well, turns on fight or flight and there’s certainly enough in her day-to-day to keep the feeling from crashing.
Hera’s settled in at a small table to the side of the room and is studiously scribbling away with her crayons, leaving Kara to pace the private quarters.
Sitting on the table in the room there is a photograph. It’s nothing fancy, but she wonders who had the camera in the first place. Immortalized on that piece of paper, Helo and Athena clutch at each other, bright and shining. Both of them are decked out in their dress greys and if Kara has to guess it must have been taken right after Sharon was sworn back into the fleet, or into the fleet for the first time, whatever. But their smiles barely reach their eyes, and as close as they are there still seems to be a gaping hole in the picture.
“You have no idea how lucky you are, kid.” Hera doesn’t hear her of course. Kara sets the picture aside and shakes her head. “Your mom and dad would do absolutely anything for you. Hell, they’re probably more worried about you than about themselves right now.”
Kara drops down beside the little girl and runs a hand through the wild forest of black hair. Hera’s head turns towards Kara and pushes the paper towards her. The small hand has scribbled colored wax-yellows, reds, and blues, concentric circles that gives Kara another shot of her own personal drug, this one should be enough to get her through until the next nightmare; but the kid is beaming and Kara certainly doesn’t want to set off another round of tears. So, she plasters a smile onto her face and thanks her, folds up the paper and slides it into her pocket, and wonders if Hera understands a little bit more than Kara thinks.
She’s suddenly aware of time again because Gaeta’s voice comes over the wireless announcing reveille and Kara rises to her feet. “Come on, kiddo, let’s go get breakfast.” She holds out her hand to Hera and the little girl hops down from her chair and shuffles alongside her to the mess, only stumbling once or twice along the way.
---
They haven’t been eating for more than five minutes when there is an eruption of cheers, whoops, and hollers coming from the corridor and it’s way too early for that kind of noise. Hot Dog pokes his head into the mess hall and cups his hands around his mouth and shouts for everyone to come down to the hangar deck RFN. Kara catches up to him with Hera in tow and he confirms exactly what she wants to hear-Racetrack and Skulls located the Agathon’s missing Raptor twenty minutes ago and they’re about to come aboard.
By the time Kara gets down to the deck, there is a crush of people in a circle around the returning pilots who look tired but other than that no worse for wear.
“Got a welcome home present for you,” she announces when she’s pushed her way through the crowd and is grinning broadly and earnestly for once. Hera is already reaching for Sharon who is all too eager to scoop her up into her arms, showering kisses all over her little girl. She turns to Helo and gives him a light smack in the arm. “What the hell happened to you guys anyways?”
Helo scrubs a hand over his weary face. “We took some damage coming out of our jump, there was some space debris we couldn’t pick up through the radiation; but it didn’t set off any indicators, nothing serious. Anyway, when we were returning…”
“Let’s just say you never want your FTL drive to fail mid-jump,” Sharon cuts in. “Ever.”
Helo shakes his head. “We lost communication, pressure, and most of our power. But we made it back, that’s the important thing.” Grinning, he takes Hera into his arms and spins her around. Maybe Kara gets that whole children’s laughter thing after all. “Thanks for looking after her, ‘Buck.”
She gives a slight shrug. “No problem. You’re raising a little monster,” she says with a grin, “but it was no problem.”
“She’s not a monster, she’s a fighter. Right, sweetie?” he asks settling Hera on his hip. “What do you say, Hera?” The little girl says nothing and buries her face in her father’s shoulder but she’s still giggling away.
“We’re still working on ‘thank you.’” Sharon pats her daughter on the back. “So, Hera, did you have a good time with Aunt Kara?” Hera makes a little humming noise that sounds affirmative and Kara waves it off.
“I’d love to stay and chat, but I’ve got nuggets to harass.”
As she turns to leave Helo calls after her, “If there’s anything we can do to thank you… anything.”
She looks back at the Agathons-one perfect complete picture-and shakes her head. “Forget about it.”
---
The adrenaline wears off shortly after that and she spends the day running on something that resembles happiness and a couple cups of something that resembles coffee, and it’s enough that Kara collapses into her rack at the end of the day with every fiber of her body screaming for sleep.
She hovers on the edge of consciousness reminding herself that they’re just dreams and they can’t hurt her. To be honest, the dreams aren’t what frightens her anymore. She’s getting used to waking up with adrenaline coursing through her; her survival instinct keeps her sharp, but she’s forgetting-forgotten-how to get through her days without it.
The low fuel light is on.
She distantly hears her own voice saying something about fear and anger and letting go of them both, but right now it’s the only thing keeping the spark of life in her. She surrenders to sleep before she can worry about what will happen when she’s finally run out of anything to burn.
--End--
Rating: PG
Words: ~4600
Characters: Kara, Hera with appearances by Helo, Lee, Cally, and Sharon
Setting: Between “The Woman King” and “A Day in the Life”
Summary: The kid’s been lost in grey walls and cried out with no one to hear her, waiting around for no one to rescue her, and somehow after all of that she’s learned how to laugh.
A/N: Companion piece to “ Lullaby for a Stormy Night,” however you don’t need to have read the first one to follow this one. Also semi inspired by these scenes from the original BSG.
Beta'd by the wonderful workerbee73
Focus.
Focus.
Focus.
Kara taps an erratic beat on the table in the duty locker with the back end of her pen. She can think of few things more boring than paperwork. Back in the day it was her least favorite part of being a flight instructor, and it certainly isn’t any better now. She rakes a hand through her hair and wills her brain to frakking focus on her lesson plans for the nuggets for tomorrow because it’s better than thinking. Anything is better than thinking these days.
She doesn’t realize that the tapping has stopped and that her hand is curled around the pen like it’s the handle of a blade, and she jumps when she hears footsteps behind her. Her heart is pounding, blood racing in her ears like she’s actually running.
Starbuck wouldn’t scare so easily.
“Frak, Helo,” she hisses. It’s only Karl; the thought doesn’t drain any of the tension from her shoulders. “Don’t do that!”
He raises an eyebrow at her and shifts slightly, adjusting his grip on Hera who is sitting on his hip with a ratty old stuffed toy tucked under her arm. “Are you alright?”
“Yeah. Fine.”
He must buy it, because he’s asking her for a favor. “Sharon and I are going out to do some recon. There’s a couple of planets not too far away and there’s too much radiation between here and there to do any long range sweeps. Have to see if there’s anything useful on any of them. Can we leave Hera with you for a while?”
The little girl stares at her with brown eyes, dark eyes; Sharon’s eyes, she thinks. It’s completely unlike that tiny blue gaze that looked at her like she was everything, but it doesn’t matter; Kara looks away. “Isn’t that what daycare is for?”
“Yeah, but the therapist thought it would be a good idea to spend some time with people outside the daycare, form some stronger attachments… something like that.”
She starts tapping her pen against the table again, trying to look like she’s busy with her lesson plans, which aren’t any more complete than they were two hours ago when she first sat down. “I don’t think so.”
“Come on, Kara. It’s just for a few hours.” Helo taps a finger against his daughter’s nose and she bursts out in a fit of giggles. “What do you say, Hera? You want to spend some time with Auntie Kara?”
The heartwarming laughter of children-greatest joy in the worlds, her ass. “I said no,” she grits out, everything in her tense and tight-from her voice to every tendon in her hand. A pencil would’ve already snapped under the force of her grip and the pen seems to be considering it. She turns back to Helo who is about to protest; she cuts him off. “I have better things to do with my time than look after some snot-nosed little brat!” She watches the blow land and feels no satisfaction in it.
He tries too hard to sound okay, and she gets the feeling it isn’t for the kid’s sake. “Thanks anyway, Starbuck.”
When he’s left, she throws her pen at the doorway. It hits the wall with a thunk and ricochets back, striking her in the leg. She swears under her breath and falls forward, forehead thudding against the table as she heaves out a sigh.
Godsdamnit.
---
“Skids up in fifteen minutes. Dismissed.”
Kara doesn’t even wait until the ready room is clear before she’s storming up to the podium. “What the frak was that about, Major?” She doesn’t say his name. She isn’t sure she can; not now, not when she can’t say it the way she wants to say it because it’s not her place-never was her place.
“What was what about, Captain?” He pinches the bridge of his nose. He never makes eye contact anymore.
It makes it a hell of a lot harder to pin him with her gaze. “You left me off the SAR team.”
Less than three hours after she’d had Helo asking her to play babysitter, Hot Dog was breaking the news to her that the Agathon’s Raptor had sent off a distress beacon before all contact was lost. The first move was to have Racetrack and Skulls jump out to their last known coordinates but they were nowhere to be found.
Lee flips through his papers, like he’s looking for justification in them. “It’s too far out for Vipers. Raptors only.”
“You know frakking well I’m Raptor qualified,” she bites out and it finally gets him to look at her. She knows what he’s remembering-the sun scorches everything and the air reeks of algae, the Raptor provides no shelter but is the best privacy they’ve had, and they have only seconds more to live in this lie they’ve created-it’s all there in his eyes, going up in flames, and she isn’t exactly sure how she feels about the flicker of remorse in all that blue.
They have an audience still. So, his voice drops. “What do you want from me, Kara?”
Where to begin?
He doesn’t wait for a response. “I’m not sending the flight instructor out on a twelve-hour SAR rotation when she has nuggets to whip into shape in ten. Besides, we need you here to fly CAP after that so don’t bother asking about the second rotation.”
She plants her hands firmly on her hips. “Hell of a lot of excuses there, Apollo. I’m sure you’re just full of them.”
He steps around the podium; nothing between them anymore. His voice is sharp and his eyes are fury. “I want to see Helo and Athena get back alive just as much as you do, and gods know I want to be out there looking for them myself, but I can’t just go running off from my responsibilities when I know I’m not going to be doing much good out there. Neither can you.”
There are a thousand ways she can call him on that one. But she’s trying not to think about the man who pulled the CAP to bring her home so many years ago because he’s clearly not here anymore; so she sneers, salutes, and storms from the room.
The decision isn’t hers to make and it’s killing her just a little bit.
---
Kara doesn’t know where her feet are carrying her until she’s standing in the daycare. She wasn’t even sure that she knew where it is, not like she ever had any reason to come here before. It’s brightly colored though, brighter than any other place on Galactica. It’s all soft corners and plastic instead of harsh edges and metal here and all the surfaces look like they should be sticky to the touch. Nothing looks big enough for an actual human being here.
And there are just so damned many of them. Children. Once they got to New Caprica it seemed like the entire frakking human race-those who’d managed their honorable discharges were no exception-decided the best course of action was to pair off and pop out kids. She’d only let herself fall halfway into that trap-solid ground screwed with her balance, she was going to trip one way or another. She never belonged down there. But it’s too late to do anything about that now.
As she stands in the doorway, one of the petty officers that has been on kiddie duty catches her eye. He nods his head towards the corner. Word about the Agathons must have gotten around quickly because he’s just directed her towards Hera, sitting against the wall, stacking blocks into towers.
She almost runs. Instead, Kara drops down into a crouch beside her, keeping her voice soft. “Hey, Hera.” No reply. “Do you know who I am?” The toddler reaches for her stuffed toy and swings it at Kara. It connects with her cheek and Kara can’t help but feel like she deserved that one. “I’ll take that as a yes.”
Before she can think herself out of doing it, she puts her arms around Hera and pulls her up onto her hip. She ignores the fact that it feels familiar. She’s about the same weight. She’s so grateful when the child blurts out, “Dada?” and stops her mind on that thought.
“No,” she says. Her heart is beating out a blaring alarm. “Your daddy and mommy are… they’re going to be a little while longer.”
“Dada? Mama?” Hera whines, her nose crinkles and tears start welling up in her eyes and if this kid starts crying, Kara doesn’t know what the hell she’s going to do. So she pulls Hera against her chest, rubbing circles on her back and making what she hopes are soothing sounds.
“It’s okay.” The lie tastes bitter in her mouth, not like Hera would understand the truth if she heard it. “Your parents wanted me to look after you for a while. So you’re going to come stay with me until they get back. Alright?”
Hera hiccups and, aside from the accompanying little kick to her stomach, Kara also takes that as a yes.
---
She’s down on her knees in the mess hall and if she gets hit with one more spoonful of mashed algae, that’s it. She’s done. “Come on, Hera, open up.” It’s not as though they have actual babyfood, green slop is green slop, and the toddler did not seem to be a fan as indicated by the way she keeps slapping the spoon away.
How the frak did Karl and Sharon do this day in and day out? Kara sits back on her heels. Not did. Do. They’re coming back. They have to.
She hisses out a deep breath and prepares a new strategy. She loads up another spoonful of algae. “Open up, Hera. Here comes the Viper.” The spoon banks and turns and Kara does her best imitation of an engine but the toddler is having none of it. With a huff, Kara rises to her feet and sets the spoon back on the table.
“Fine. If you don’t want to eat, don’t.” It’s been nice though. The past thirty minutes have all been consumed with trying to figure out how to get Hera to eat, and there hasn’t been any room for any other thoughts in her head. She likes that.
Kara sinks into her own chair and, after taking a bite of her food, starts to feel the urge to fling it into someone’s face as well. She turns her face to look at Hera who has herself propped upright in the chair beside her, her arms curled around the toy, clutching it tightly to her chest. There’s something accusatory in those dark eyes; Kara thinks that maybe Hera’s looking at her like it’s her fault that her mommy and daddy are gone.
“You’ve got something on your cheek, Starbuck.”
Kara glances up to see Cally sliding into the seat next to her with Nicky cradled in her arms. Cally gestures towards something just underneath her right eye. Kara gropes blindly at her face for a moment before flicking away the green gunk that had taken up residence there. She’s pretty sure she thanks her but even if she didn’t Cally doesn’t seem disturbed by it; her attention does seem to be fixed on Kara’s tiny companion.
“No word about…?”
“Not yet.”
“Gods.” Cally clutches her son tighter to her chest. “If anything happened to me and Galen, I just…” She shakes the thought away.
Kara’s glad she glances to the side because Hera’s gotten to her feet and is standing on the chair, one foot half off the edge and wobbling precariously. Kara shoots her arm out to catch her as she starts to topple. “No. Hera. You can’t do that.” She pulls the little girl onto her lap. Hera grunts and wriggles and throws her miniscule weight against Kara’s arms, letting out a grating whine. “Gods, if anything happens to you, your mother will kill me. With bullets.”
Cally snickers softly, like Starbuck holding a little kid is the universe’s best joke (Kara’s heard this one before). When Hera resigns herself to sitting in Kara’s lap, her face a study in petulance, the laughter dies away. “It was… it’s been hard on them.” She doesn’t look at Kara, just the way Nicky has his hand wrapped around her own finger. “Hera’s had a hard life; I mean she was stolen and then kidnapped by the cylons. Athena was telling me how hard it’s been, even to get her to start laughing. I swear, they’d go to the ends of the universe and back for their little girl.”
Laughing. The kid’s been lost in grey walls and cried out with no one to hear her, waiting around for no one to rescue her, and somehow after all of that she’s learned how to laugh. Kara is almost envious as she ruffles a hand through the dark curls on the toddler’s head.
Of course, Hera decides that this is the perfect time to let out a high-pitched wail and Kara sinks down in her seat. “Frak! I don’t know what she wants. I tried feeding her but she just won’t eat.”
“Have you checked her diaper?” Cally asks like she’s missed the most basic item on a routine maintenance check. “Here, if you hold Nicky for a while I can-”
“No.” Kara grimaces as she rises to her feet, holding Hera out a ways and taking a hesitant whiff. Yup. Diaper. Check. “No. I’ll do it.” Because it’s something to keep her busy. Because maybe if she can do this right. Because she’s made up her mind, she’s gonna watch after this stupid kid ‘til Karl comes back. Because it’s frakking ridiculous that the last thing she wants is to be around this kid and there’s no frakking reason for the way it feels like she’s breaking down and maybe, just maybe she can win this.
---
“Hold still!” Kara snaps. Hera retaliates with a kick to Kara’s shoulder that seems far too strong for her small size. It must be the cylon in her. The little girl is grinning and seems to be getting far too much joy out of this game of ‘piss off the babysitter.’ And Kara might almost be proud of the kid’s guts if she wasn’t so irritated that her undefeatable opponent is so godsdamned fragile, no matter how hard she kicks.
It’s pathetic really that she can’t just force the kid to sit still for a second. Hera can barely walk on her own, can’t feed herself, can’t even use a frakking toilet-completely dependant on others; and yet she still manages to be defiant as all get out even when someone’s trying to do her a frakking favor. Ungrateful brat, Kara thinks.
She’s making a second attempt to get the clean diaper on, when she hears the hatch to the head squeal open and someone starts laughing behind her; not amused so much as bemused. She recognizes the laugh before the voice starts. “I never thought I’d live to see the day.”
She refuses to let it derail her from her mission. “Keep it up, Apollo.” She grunts as Hera tucks her knees into her chest and rolls to the side, nearly falling off the bench, and before she can do anything about it, Lee is standing there-his hand stopping the child from tumbling to the floor.
The newcomer seems to attract Hera’s attention. Especially the way the dim light catches on the pins on Lee’s collar. Her arms raise up, waving towards the shining metal and Lee smiles. “You like these, Hera?” he asks, dropping down to his knees, and while he’s got her distracted, Kara finally succeeds in getting the clean diaper on.
It’s probably rude to just scoop the kid up into her arms and walk out so she gets out a “Thanks” before picking her back up. As Lee rises to his feet, she sees him watching her, watching the way she holds Hera on her hip, her grip on the child firm but gentle, her stance wide; she can’t quite tell what he’s thinking, but of course he’s thinking something because when is he not?
“You could’ve just left her in daycare,” he reminds her as she turns to leave. Like she didn’t already know that one.
She gives a noncommittal shrug. “So what?”
For a moment he looks like he’s about to smile; instead, he shrugs as well.
---
She can get about six hours of sleep before he has to get up for training the nuggets; only five if she takes into account the fact that she’s going to have to get Hera to daycare before she’s running drills all day. And that is if she falls asleep right frakking now.
Not a likely scenario.
She hasn’t gotten a good night’s sleep since… well since before she moved down to that shithole excuse for a planet. At first she’d thought that getting back in her rack would fix everything-it was one of those little lies she told herself to get her through that nightmare, but soon it’s not a matter of whether the nightmares will come at night but which nightmare, a familiar trap or some new torment.
But tonight she’s bone tired after realizing just why they were called toddlers. If she let the kid out of her sight for more than thirty seconds she might be finding her on another deck entirely. The first time was almost funny. The half-hour it took to find her after Sam briefly stopped by only to discover Kara’s new bunkmate for the night was distinctly not.
She is tired. So tired.
Hera makes a soft hiccupping noise as she curls against Kara. She’s cute when she sleeps, at least she has that going for her. Kara heaves a sigh and lets her eyes slide close and for a little while there’s a great black nothing.
---
She’s been running up these stairs as long as she can remember. Her lungs are burning and the grey stretches on forever but she’s sure that with a few more steps she’ll reach the top; so she pushes harder, harder, faster, stronger until she’s a step away.
Less human than a hand-maybe a claw or a tentacle-but it doesn’t matter what it is, it reaches up where the stairs lack risers and snares her ankle in a vice-like grip and she’s falling.
Back down the klick’s worth of stairs. Every edge, every corner marks her, tears her, as she plummets; it’s a mockery of how far she’s come until she finally hits the ground, broken. She wills herself to move, to get back up and go again, but the effort is futile and the world is dimming at the corners of her vision and spiraling into red and yellow and blue and soon she can see nothing but him.
The eyes of maddened calm are fixed on her and he’s telling her it’s going to be alright but there is nothing that can make this right. Nothing but release from this rag doll body she has no control over.
All she can hear is a high-pitched wail and she prays to the gods it’s not her.
---
“Someone shut that kid up!” a tired voice demands.
Kara’s never been so grateful for a sobbing baby in her life. “I’m going, I’m going,” she growls as she gathers Hera up into her arms and carries her out into the corridor. The child struggles in her arms, small hands balled into fists and swinging at invisible monsters. Kara pulls her against her chest, afraid that she’s going to fight her way right out of Kara’s grip and onto the hard metal floor.
She paces the halls and lets the kid do the crying for the both of them. Hera’s wails draw the attention of other officers on late duty, leaving Kara to be the one shooting sharp angry looks and snap, “What are you looking at?” She wonders if she can really keep this up until they find the Agathons (if they find the Agathons). She shoves away the thought and the following ones, the ones wondering what would be worse handing the kid over to yet another stranger or if Karl’d written a will naming her as caretaker. She scoffs at how ridiculous that sounds and her hand traces little patterns on Hera’s back and whispers empty assurances to her and to herself. “It was only a nightmare, Hera. It’s not real, it can’t hurt you.”
She says it enough that it starts to sound like truth (or maybe she just wants it to) and maybe Hera wants to believe it, too, because the wails turn to sobs and the sobs to sniffles. Hera throws her arms around Kara’s neck and buries her head against her shoulder. Soon, Kara’s clutching back just as tightly.
---
Hera’s been alright since Kara brought her back to the Agathon’s quarters. The familiar surroundings seem to keep her calm (quiet, at least), but the girl shows no interest in going back to sleep. That’s just fine by Kara, adrenaline has kicked in and it should be enough to fuel her for a while. Who needs coffee when a good nightmare works just as well, turns on fight or flight and there’s certainly enough in her day-to-day to keep the feeling from crashing.
Hera’s settled in at a small table to the side of the room and is studiously scribbling away with her crayons, leaving Kara to pace the private quarters.
Sitting on the table in the room there is a photograph. It’s nothing fancy, but she wonders who had the camera in the first place. Immortalized on that piece of paper, Helo and Athena clutch at each other, bright and shining. Both of them are decked out in their dress greys and if Kara has to guess it must have been taken right after Sharon was sworn back into the fleet, or into the fleet for the first time, whatever. But their smiles barely reach their eyes, and as close as they are there still seems to be a gaping hole in the picture.
“You have no idea how lucky you are, kid.” Hera doesn’t hear her of course. Kara sets the picture aside and shakes her head. “Your mom and dad would do absolutely anything for you. Hell, they’re probably more worried about you than about themselves right now.”
Kara drops down beside the little girl and runs a hand through the wild forest of black hair. Hera’s head turns towards Kara and pushes the paper towards her. The small hand has scribbled colored wax-yellows, reds, and blues, concentric circles that gives Kara another shot of her own personal drug, this one should be enough to get her through until the next nightmare; but the kid is beaming and Kara certainly doesn’t want to set off another round of tears. So, she plasters a smile onto her face and thanks her, folds up the paper and slides it into her pocket, and wonders if Hera understands a little bit more than Kara thinks.
She’s suddenly aware of time again because Gaeta’s voice comes over the wireless announcing reveille and Kara rises to her feet. “Come on, kiddo, let’s go get breakfast.” She holds out her hand to Hera and the little girl hops down from her chair and shuffles alongside her to the mess, only stumbling once or twice along the way.
---
They haven’t been eating for more than five minutes when there is an eruption of cheers, whoops, and hollers coming from the corridor and it’s way too early for that kind of noise. Hot Dog pokes his head into the mess hall and cups his hands around his mouth and shouts for everyone to come down to the hangar deck RFN. Kara catches up to him with Hera in tow and he confirms exactly what she wants to hear-Racetrack and Skulls located the Agathon’s missing Raptor twenty minutes ago and they’re about to come aboard.
By the time Kara gets down to the deck, there is a crush of people in a circle around the returning pilots who look tired but other than that no worse for wear.
“Got a welcome home present for you,” she announces when she’s pushed her way through the crowd and is grinning broadly and earnestly for once. Hera is already reaching for Sharon who is all too eager to scoop her up into her arms, showering kisses all over her little girl. She turns to Helo and gives him a light smack in the arm. “What the hell happened to you guys anyways?”
Helo scrubs a hand over his weary face. “We took some damage coming out of our jump, there was some space debris we couldn’t pick up through the radiation; but it didn’t set off any indicators, nothing serious. Anyway, when we were returning…”
“Let’s just say you never want your FTL drive to fail mid-jump,” Sharon cuts in. “Ever.”
Helo shakes his head. “We lost communication, pressure, and most of our power. But we made it back, that’s the important thing.” Grinning, he takes Hera into his arms and spins her around. Maybe Kara gets that whole children’s laughter thing after all. “Thanks for looking after her, ‘Buck.”
She gives a slight shrug. “No problem. You’re raising a little monster,” she says with a grin, “but it was no problem.”
“She’s not a monster, she’s a fighter. Right, sweetie?” he asks settling Hera on his hip. “What do you say, Hera?” The little girl says nothing and buries her face in her father’s shoulder but she’s still giggling away.
“We’re still working on ‘thank you.’” Sharon pats her daughter on the back. “So, Hera, did you have a good time with Aunt Kara?” Hera makes a little humming noise that sounds affirmative and Kara waves it off.
“I’d love to stay and chat, but I’ve got nuggets to harass.”
As she turns to leave Helo calls after her, “If there’s anything we can do to thank you… anything.”
She looks back at the Agathons-one perfect complete picture-and shakes her head. “Forget about it.”
---
The adrenaline wears off shortly after that and she spends the day running on something that resembles happiness and a couple cups of something that resembles coffee, and it’s enough that Kara collapses into her rack at the end of the day with every fiber of her body screaming for sleep.
She hovers on the edge of consciousness reminding herself that they’re just dreams and they can’t hurt her. To be honest, the dreams aren’t what frightens her anymore. She’s getting used to waking up with adrenaline coursing through her; her survival instinct keeps her sharp, but she’s forgetting-forgotten-how to get through her days without it.
The low fuel light is on.
She distantly hears her own voice saying something about fear and anger and letting go of them both, but right now it’s the only thing keeping the spark of life in her. She surrenders to sleep before she can worry about what will happen when she’s finally run out of anything to burn.
--End--