FIC: The Glass Strewn Road I
Summary: Lee questions Laura at Baltar's trial.
Rating: T
Genre: Romance, Angst, Drama
Setting: During Crossroads I
Series: Love in the Time of War: 16
Chapter 1:
She heard Lee's low words: "It should be me." Laura's spine straightened even more ramrod--he looked like a boy going to temple for his coming of age ceremony, new ill-fitting suit, shiny face and all.
She had sensed trouble brewing as soon as a still-fuming Bill had told her about his confrontation with his son.
“That damn boy--what he did to Tigh!” he gritted, reaching for the decanter.
She touched his shoulder. “I understand, I do, but--“
“He had to know--“ insisted Bill as though trying to convince himself.
She crossed her arms, hugging herself against the chill. “Perhaps not. But he should have guessed.” She watched Bill drain his glass in a few gulps. “You did.”
“Frak, yeah. Saul would have died before he would have allowed those toasters to kill Ellen. That doesn’t leave many options.”
She had said, “Still, it’s Lampkin; Lee’s just one of his props.”
Laura looked at Lampkin now, pretending to be surprised at Lee's outburst. Another performance. She’d been around enough politicians to understand trial lawyers. There was a reason so many moved onto politics.
Lampkin said, "If it pleases the court, my associate Mr. Adama will question the witness."
Bill muttered contemptuously, "His associate."
She'd been preparing herself all morning for Lampkin and he'd pulled the rug out on her. She'd wanted to go at it with the wily lawyer after his opening statement.
She'd been late for the trial--had to ask Tory to go on without her. She had ducked into a head and put cold compresses on her forehead as the tiny space whirled and bucked, the walls rippling like waterfalls.
When she'd carefully picked her way towards an empty seat in the courtroom, Lampkin had said, "Especially her." Whatever he'd been talking about, that had caused her to turn, meeting his outraged eyes with a raised eyebrow. They had some bore in a dull suit for the prosecutor and Lampkin was a carnival barker.
"She's been wanting this for over a year now." Lampkin gave a brave little smile and shook his head with disapproval. "Ever since he beat her in a free and fair election--" At last, she found an empty chair. She needed to sit desperately as the floor seemed to roll like a ship's deck.
"Her chance to exact her revenge on a man whose only real crime was bowing to the inevitable--" The lawyer's voice reaches a high pitch.
Hyperbole, much? she thought, settling into her chair. "Gauis Baltar saved the lives of the people on New Caprica where Laura Roslin--" Lampkin turned and looked right at her to say, "--would have had us all dead." She leaned forward, glasses on to see as clearly as possible. "Victims of a battle we had no hope in winning." The crowd shifted uneasily in their seats; Bill watched the lawyer, impassive.
She had been ready to do the next frantic jig with him, but it was Lee, verbally fumbling like that thirteen year old boy trying to remember his prayers at the altar, that she had instead.
He nearly unseated her right off with something about Baltar saving her life--the script was straight from one of that weasel’s whining diatribes. She could easily see Lee in the cell, listening to that man; Baltar was a good talker, and Lee liked to listen. He just didn’t hear very well.
She gritted her teeth and replied with a soft vagueness, balanced right at the edge of the chair. Dance to this tune, Laura.
Lee hopped from her first bout of cancer to what she had taken for it. She murmured, "You know, at the time, I was taking a lot of medications, and I can't remember all the names."
He gave an impatient huff. "Did you take something called chamalla extract?"
She saw Lampkin smirk and she smiled too. So that's where he was going. "Yes," she drew out.
"Isn't it true, that one of the side effects of taking chamalla is a propensity to suffer hallucinations?"
Very slow, like explaining complex theories to a student, she replied, "Yes, that is one of the possible side effects of chamalla."
"Isn't it also true that the visions that you once described as messages from Gods were actually the result of pharmacological reaction from taking chamalla?"
"The chamalla did enable me to see certain things that were foretold by the Scriptures, things that will help this fleet find it's way to Earth; you of all people should know that, Major."
Cassidy cut in. "Your honors--" protesting Lee's argument, as obviously it had nothing to do with the case. It didn't, of course; his questions were about something more important than the trial.
Laura had sudden insight. She'd been convinced that Baltar would give her the truth and he'd thwarted her at every turn. But now, if this courtroom, she realized she had the truth; she was the dying leader again. None of this mattered; whatever happened with Baltar, she would lead them to Earth.
"Where are you going with this?" Captain Franks asked.
"Just one more question," said Lee and she allowed it.
He strode across the courtroom towards Laura, his jaw set in that way that he did, as though he could take the bit and run away from anything. When he got close enough, she whispered, "Please don’t do this. Please," through barely moving lips, meaning, don't do this to your father. Bill couldn't see where this was going--perhaps he couldn't believe it--but she could.
She was afraid for Lee, even as he shook, his eyes filled with defiance. Yes, it was dangerous to poke your stick into the black den and know something would come out.
"Madam President, are you taking chamalla at this time?"
She said, "Captain Apollo; remember that? I always thought it had such a nice ring to it. I'm so, so sorry for you now." This was a lie under oath. She did not pity him, she held him in contempt.
She remembered a brave pilot, at attention before her, offering his allegiance, standing up to his father then too...only this time he was shimmying under a low-lying branch.
Like any woman, bright blue idealistic eyes, chiseled features and a shiny flightsuit had turned her head. Only later, she’d come to see that the real champion wore a shabby old blue uniform, had stoic eyes and worn features. And she made a choice that had left Apollo, his bullets unfired, in shackles...was there still resentment?
Well, she had her own resentment now as she watched him blanch at her words. He looked away, probably sensing her true feelings. Her proponed pity didn't sway him; it toughened his resolve. He'd tossed down his wings on his Admiral's desk and he meant it.
He hated himself for Kara's death; he deserved to be hated for it; he was doomed to be alone. Trying to unshackle himself from the Old Man never worked--Bill was simply too resistant to life's trials and he loved too deeply, so Lee attacked the weak and sick--Tigh and Laura--to force them apart. He would be alone at the end of the day.
"Chamalla, Madam President. Perhaps dissolved in your tea to disguise the bitterness."
Bill couldn't remain silent. "Don't answer and we're gonna stop this right now."
Lee insisted, "Your honors, if she's on drugs, it goes to her credibility as a witness."
Bill wouldn't even look at him. "Witness, you are dismissed."
Lampkin said, "Your honors, I have to strongly object. He's obviously trying to cover something up here," waving his hand between Laura and Bill, his gesture suggesting something more.
Bill gritted out, "One more word out of you and you'll both be held in contempt."
Bill's outburst gave her time to think rapidly, as the seconds slowed to a chamalla moment. She saw Lee in the CIC with them, she saw herself crack a bit, the returned visions unsettling her. She retreated, fleeing the heat of the glowing plot table and Lee’s stare.
“Laura,” murmured Bill. Of course he had followed her; it didn’t seem as though he was out of arms' length reach at any time. “Are you all right?”
She hated that question; he would be asking it a lot. She wanted to scream, she wanted to pound her chest and sob--she said, “Yeah, I’m just...it’s all too much sometimes.” She couldn’t tell him about the returned visions from the Opera House; she heard him saying, I didn’t know you were religious with a sneer again.
He came as close as he could without touching her. “Of course.” His head dropped. “I hate this so much; you shouldn’t be going through this.”
“Yes, the trial is playing hell with my schedule,” she said and ignored his eyes.
“It’ll be over soon,” he said.
She had glanced quickly at Lee--had he been touching her thermos? Yes, now she saw his fingertips just leaving it. He’d discovered she was taking chamalla; he had told Lampkin.
Thinking of Lampkin, she felt the sort of hate that one feels for a natural disaster, irrational because it is an unstoppable force.
She could see Lee now, in Lampkin’s cabin...had he stormed in with his tale of Laura’s drug use? What had he thought she was using it for? Or had he even thought? Perhaps he believed that she was desperate enough to lead them to Earth that she sought the visions in chamalla. That she was desperate now that she wasn't the dying leader. She could see Lampkin giving a half-smile; encouraging Lee's quickfire sense of moral outrage; that thief knew just the item to take that left his victim vulnerable. He had taken her secret and would make it a warped truth.
And during it all, he’d laughed inside that this frakked up little family, with its thunderous father, distant mother, and crying little boy.
Back in the courtroom, the question was repeated, "Are you taking chamalla?" and the press leaned in, microphones poised.
She nodded. "Yes, I am."
Bill glared at Lee with the power to crush him to powder.
The young man said, "No further questions," with that tip of his head as though he wanted to hide it under his pillow, like from a bad dream.
Laura was furious beyond reason. She could feel Bill's anger roiling beside her as well. She demanded, "Mr. Adama isn't going to ask me why?"
He stopped; he'd almost made it safely to his chair. "I'm sorry?"
"Why am I taking chamalla?" she said, her tone suggesting that she was talking to the slow student again. Lee always wanted the truth; she would use him to get it out.
He looked to the tribunal for salvation. "It's not strictly relevant."
"It's not relevant to you, but it's relevant to me." Unspoken was, like you give a shit.
The boy's eyes shifted to his father, who gave him nothing but a blank glare back.
A deadly calm had come over Laura. With measured contempt, she said, "Go ahead, ask me why. Finish what you started." Her hands remained neatly folded on the table to keep her shaking a fist at him.
His face covered with blank fear, Lee parroted, "Why are you taking chamalla again, Madam President."
She removed her glasses, and looked to her citizens, not to these fool lawyers behind their tables. "I'm taking chamalla because my cancer has returned."
Lee seemed as though he wanted to throw up; he sought his father's eyes once again, and Bill dropped his gaze in disappointment.
"The witness is dismissed," Bill said quietly.
Bill rose with the other judges and they exited the courtroom, but not before he looked to Laura, tipping his head slightly asking her to join him outside. She shook her head and went to the prosecutor's table.
Cassidy started to grumble, but Laura didn't listen. Tory hurried to her side, and she also was babbling. Laura told her, "It seems that we're going to need a press conference; you better set that up on Colonial One."
To Cassidy, she said, "May I have a scrap of paper and a pen?"
Lampkin and Lee were conversing by the defense table; Baltar had been led away by guards. She knew that Lee didn't want to walk past her, but she had no problem going to him.
She tossed the folded slip of paper on the table. He clenched his jaw for the twentieth time that afternoon. "Put it in your pocket," she told him, turning away before he could reply.
Her guards created a black cocoon around her as she headed to her shuttle. Lee probably thought it was her name on that paper; she was a dead woman walking after all, but it read William Adama.
*~*
Dee stumbled into the duty locker, dragging her duffle bag behind her. Gaeta leapt to his feet, taking the bag. She wiped her nose with the back of her hand, for once ungraceful.
Gaeta didn’t need to ask; they'd been sitting together to hear President Roslin’s testimony. As Lee's performance had reached its crescendo, he'd sought her hand and had held it tight.
“Looks like I need a rack,” Dee said bravely. She glanced at Starbuck’s old rack, and laughed bitterly. “I believe there’s one open.”
Gaeta tugged her further down the row to another empty rack and locker. “Maybe this one.”
“No,” she said. “I want to lie on the mattress when another woman frakked my husband.”
“I don’t think they ever--“
“Oh, they went other places? Major Adama wouldn’t disgrace his honor by messing around in front of junior officers?” she spit out, her anger unabated.
“Dee, honey,” Gaeta said, leading her to the table, holding out a chair for her.
She waved hand at him. “Yeah, yeah,” she muttered. “I know. He wasn’t good enough for me--“
“He isn’t,” Gaeta said definitely.
She grinned, her pretty smile that he adored. “Always on my side.”
“Always.” He squeezed her hands.
She shook her head. “I’m just afraid Baltar, that frakker, is going to win. The way they keep twisting the truth--and now he’s using Lee--“ She was still on his side; afraid for the damage to his relationship with his father.
Gaeta tipped her chin up so that she looked into his eyes. His gaze was that of a dead man when he said, “No, Dee, he’s not going to win. Remember, my testimony is next.”
The end Chapter Two>>>
Rating: T
Genre: Romance, Angst, Drama
Setting: During Crossroads I
Series: Love in the Time of War: 16
Chapter 1:
She heard Lee's low words: "It should be me." Laura's spine straightened even more ramrod--he looked like a boy going to temple for his coming of age ceremony, new ill-fitting suit, shiny face and all.
She had sensed trouble brewing as soon as a still-fuming Bill had told her about his confrontation with his son.
“That damn boy--what he did to Tigh!” he gritted, reaching for the decanter.
She touched his shoulder. “I understand, I do, but--“
“He had to know--“ insisted Bill as though trying to convince himself.
She crossed her arms, hugging herself against the chill. “Perhaps not. But he should have guessed.” She watched Bill drain his glass in a few gulps. “You did.”
“Frak, yeah. Saul would have died before he would have allowed those toasters to kill Ellen. That doesn’t leave many options.”
She had said, “Still, it’s Lampkin; Lee’s just one of his props.”
Laura looked at Lampkin now, pretending to be surprised at Lee's outburst. Another performance. She’d been around enough politicians to understand trial lawyers. There was a reason so many moved onto politics.
Lampkin said, "If it pleases the court, my associate Mr. Adama will question the witness."
Bill muttered contemptuously, "His associate."
She'd been preparing herself all morning for Lampkin and he'd pulled the rug out on her. She'd wanted to go at it with the wily lawyer after his opening statement.
She'd been late for the trial--had to ask Tory to go on without her. She had ducked into a head and put cold compresses on her forehead as the tiny space whirled and bucked, the walls rippling like waterfalls.
When she'd carefully picked her way towards an empty seat in the courtroom, Lampkin had said, "Especially her." Whatever he'd been talking about, that had caused her to turn, meeting his outraged eyes with a raised eyebrow. They had some bore in a dull suit for the prosecutor and Lampkin was a carnival barker.
"She's been wanting this for over a year now." Lampkin gave a brave little smile and shook his head with disapproval. "Ever since he beat her in a free and fair election--" At last, she found an empty chair. She needed to sit desperately as the floor seemed to roll like a ship's deck.
"Her chance to exact her revenge on a man whose only real crime was bowing to the inevitable--" The lawyer's voice reaches a high pitch.
Hyperbole, much? she thought, settling into her chair. "Gauis Baltar saved the lives of the people on New Caprica where Laura Roslin--" Lampkin turned and looked right at her to say, "--would have had us all dead." She leaned forward, glasses on to see as clearly as possible. "Victims of a battle we had no hope in winning." The crowd shifted uneasily in their seats; Bill watched the lawyer, impassive.
She had been ready to do the next frantic jig with him, but it was Lee, verbally fumbling like that thirteen year old boy trying to remember his prayers at the altar, that she had instead.
He nearly unseated her right off with something about Baltar saving her life--the script was straight from one of that weasel’s whining diatribes. She could easily see Lee in the cell, listening to that man; Baltar was a good talker, and Lee liked to listen. He just didn’t hear very well.
She gritted her teeth and replied with a soft vagueness, balanced right at the edge of the chair. Dance to this tune, Laura.
Lee hopped from her first bout of cancer to what she had taken for it. She murmured, "You know, at the time, I was taking a lot of medications, and I can't remember all the names."
He gave an impatient huff. "Did you take something called chamalla extract?"
She saw Lampkin smirk and she smiled too. So that's where he was going. "Yes," she drew out.
"Isn't it true, that one of the side effects of taking chamalla is a propensity to suffer hallucinations?"
Very slow, like explaining complex theories to a student, she replied, "Yes, that is one of the possible side effects of chamalla."
"Isn't it also true that the visions that you once described as messages from Gods were actually the result of pharmacological reaction from taking chamalla?"
"The chamalla did enable me to see certain things that were foretold by the Scriptures, things that will help this fleet find it's way to Earth; you of all people should know that, Major."
Cassidy cut in. "Your honors--" protesting Lee's argument, as obviously it had nothing to do with the case. It didn't, of course; his questions were about something more important than the trial.
Laura had sudden insight. She'd been convinced that Baltar would give her the truth and he'd thwarted her at every turn. But now, if this courtroom, she realized she had the truth; she was the dying leader again. None of this mattered; whatever happened with Baltar, she would lead them to Earth.
"Where are you going with this?" Captain Franks asked.
"Just one more question," said Lee and she allowed it.
He strode across the courtroom towards Laura, his jaw set in that way that he did, as though he could take the bit and run away from anything. When he got close enough, she whispered, "Please don’t do this. Please," through barely moving lips, meaning, don't do this to your father. Bill couldn't see where this was going--perhaps he couldn't believe it--but she could.
She was afraid for Lee, even as he shook, his eyes filled with defiance. Yes, it was dangerous to poke your stick into the black den and know something would come out.
"Madam President, are you taking chamalla at this time?"
She said, "Captain Apollo; remember that? I always thought it had such a nice ring to it. I'm so, so sorry for you now." This was a lie under oath. She did not pity him, she held him in contempt.
She remembered a brave pilot, at attention before her, offering his allegiance, standing up to his father then too...only this time he was shimmying under a low-lying branch.
Like any woman, bright blue idealistic eyes, chiseled features and a shiny flightsuit had turned her head. Only later, she’d come to see that the real champion wore a shabby old blue uniform, had stoic eyes and worn features. And she made a choice that had left Apollo, his bullets unfired, in shackles...was there still resentment?
Well, she had her own resentment now as she watched him blanch at her words. He looked away, probably sensing her true feelings. Her proponed pity didn't sway him; it toughened his resolve. He'd tossed down his wings on his Admiral's desk and he meant it.
He hated himself for Kara's death; he deserved to be hated for it; he was doomed to be alone. Trying to unshackle himself from the Old Man never worked--Bill was simply too resistant to life's trials and he loved too deeply, so Lee attacked the weak and sick--Tigh and Laura--to force them apart. He would be alone at the end of the day.
"Chamalla, Madam President. Perhaps dissolved in your tea to disguise the bitterness."
Bill couldn't remain silent. "Don't answer and we're gonna stop this right now."
Lee insisted, "Your honors, if she's on drugs, it goes to her credibility as a witness."
Bill wouldn't even look at him. "Witness, you are dismissed."
Lampkin said, "Your honors, I have to strongly object. He's obviously trying to cover something up here," waving his hand between Laura and Bill, his gesture suggesting something more.
Bill gritted out, "One more word out of you and you'll both be held in contempt."
Bill's outburst gave her time to think rapidly, as the seconds slowed to a chamalla moment. She saw Lee in the CIC with them, she saw herself crack a bit, the returned visions unsettling her. She retreated, fleeing the heat of the glowing plot table and Lee’s stare.
“Laura,” murmured Bill. Of course he had followed her; it didn’t seem as though he was out of arms' length reach at any time. “Are you all right?”
She hated that question; he would be asking it a lot. She wanted to scream, she wanted to pound her chest and sob--she said, “Yeah, I’m just...it’s all too much sometimes.” She couldn’t tell him about the returned visions from the Opera House; she heard him saying, I didn’t know you were religious with a sneer again.
He came as close as he could without touching her. “Of course.” His head dropped. “I hate this so much; you shouldn’t be going through this.”
“Yes, the trial is playing hell with my schedule,” she said and ignored his eyes.
“It’ll be over soon,” he said.
She had glanced quickly at Lee--had he been touching her thermos? Yes, now she saw his fingertips just leaving it. He’d discovered she was taking chamalla; he had told Lampkin.
Thinking of Lampkin, she felt the sort of hate that one feels for a natural disaster, irrational because it is an unstoppable force.
She could see Lee now, in Lampkin’s cabin...had he stormed in with his tale of Laura’s drug use? What had he thought she was using it for? Or had he even thought? Perhaps he believed that she was desperate enough to lead them to Earth that she sought the visions in chamalla. That she was desperate now that she wasn't the dying leader. She could see Lampkin giving a half-smile; encouraging Lee's quickfire sense of moral outrage; that thief knew just the item to take that left his victim vulnerable. He had taken her secret and would make it a warped truth.
And during it all, he’d laughed inside that this frakked up little family, with its thunderous father, distant mother, and crying little boy.
Back in the courtroom, the question was repeated, "Are you taking chamalla?" and the press leaned in, microphones poised.
She nodded. "Yes, I am."
Bill glared at Lee with the power to crush him to powder.
The young man said, "No further questions," with that tip of his head as though he wanted to hide it under his pillow, like from a bad dream.
Laura was furious beyond reason. She could feel Bill's anger roiling beside her as well. She demanded, "Mr. Adama isn't going to ask me why?"
He stopped; he'd almost made it safely to his chair. "I'm sorry?"
"Why am I taking chamalla?" she said, her tone suggesting that she was talking to the slow student again. Lee always wanted the truth; she would use him to get it out.
He looked to the tribunal for salvation. "It's not strictly relevant."
"It's not relevant to you, but it's relevant to me." Unspoken was, like you give a shit.
The boy's eyes shifted to his father, who gave him nothing but a blank glare back.
A deadly calm had come over Laura. With measured contempt, she said, "Go ahead, ask me why. Finish what you started." Her hands remained neatly folded on the table to keep her shaking a fist at him.
His face covered with blank fear, Lee parroted, "Why are you taking chamalla again, Madam President."
She removed her glasses, and looked to her citizens, not to these fool lawyers behind their tables. "I'm taking chamalla because my cancer has returned."
Lee seemed as though he wanted to throw up; he sought his father's eyes once again, and Bill dropped his gaze in disappointment.
"The witness is dismissed," Bill said quietly.
Bill rose with the other judges and they exited the courtroom, but not before he looked to Laura, tipping his head slightly asking her to join him outside. She shook her head and went to the prosecutor's table.
Cassidy started to grumble, but Laura didn't listen. Tory hurried to her side, and she also was babbling. Laura told her, "It seems that we're going to need a press conference; you better set that up on Colonial One."
To Cassidy, she said, "May I have a scrap of paper and a pen?"
Lampkin and Lee were conversing by the defense table; Baltar had been led away by guards. She knew that Lee didn't want to walk past her, but she had no problem going to him.
She tossed the folded slip of paper on the table. He clenched his jaw for the twentieth time that afternoon. "Put it in your pocket," she told him, turning away before he could reply.
Her guards created a black cocoon around her as she headed to her shuttle. Lee probably thought it was her name on that paper; she was a dead woman walking after all, but it read William Adama.
*~*
Dee stumbled into the duty locker, dragging her duffle bag behind her. Gaeta leapt to his feet, taking the bag. She wiped her nose with the back of her hand, for once ungraceful.
Gaeta didn’t need to ask; they'd been sitting together to hear President Roslin’s testimony. As Lee's performance had reached its crescendo, he'd sought her hand and had held it tight.
“Looks like I need a rack,” Dee said bravely. She glanced at Starbuck’s old rack, and laughed bitterly. “I believe there’s one open.”
Gaeta tugged her further down the row to another empty rack and locker. “Maybe this one.”
“No,” she said. “I want to lie on the mattress when another woman frakked my husband.”
“I don’t think they ever--“
“Oh, they went other places? Major Adama wouldn’t disgrace his honor by messing around in front of junior officers?” she spit out, her anger unabated.
“Dee, honey,” Gaeta said, leading her to the table, holding out a chair for her.
She waved hand at him. “Yeah, yeah,” she muttered. “I know. He wasn’t good enough for me--“
“He isn’t,” Gaeta said definitely.
She grinned, her pretty smile that he adored. “Always on my side.”
“Always.” He squeezed her hands.
She shook her head. “I’m just afraid Baltar, that frakker, is going to win. The way they keep twisting the truth--and now he’s using Lee--“ She was still on his side; afraid for the damage to his relationship with his father.
Gaeta tipped her chin up so that she looked into his eyes. His gaze was that of a dead man when he said, “No, Dee, he’s not going to win. Remember, my testimony is next.”
The end Chapter Two>>>