Not the Colonial Dream II
Title: Not The Colonial Dream II
Rating: PG-13
Words: ~6400
Pairing: Kara/Lee
Summary: “Try is not an option for us now, Lee. We’re having a kid. Okay? We’re stuck with it. So either be there, or don’t.”
A/N This is the continuation of the short-ish pregnancy!fic I wrote for the 3rd BSG Porn Battle-- Not The Colonial Dream. Massive amounts of love and hugs and rainbows and puppies to taragel and
thrace_adama for putting up with me while this fic kicked my ass in every way imaginable and helped turn it into something presentable. csm37 and eugis as well for being helpful and letting me talk at them.
"Come in."
Lee could see Kara tense at the sound of the Old Man's voice. He placed his hand lightly on her shoulder and felt her take a steeling breath before pushing the hatch open.
"Good evening, Starbuck. Son." He said with a nod to each of them. If he was at all surprised by their visit, he didn't let on. "What can I do for you two?"
As his father rose from his seat, Kara shifted her weight from foot to foot beside him. She looked ready to break out into a sprint and run as far from this encounter as possible. Her hands were clenched at her sides, knuckles turning white.
"Sir, there's something I need to...something we need to talk to you about. I-... I'm..." Her gaze dropped to the floor and Lee brushed his hand against hers, hoping to ease some of her tension. In all honesty, he was surprised to see her so nervous-even if he’d been the one to insist on telling the Admiral as soon as possible, she’d been adamant about telling him, herself.
Lee reached out again to squeeze her hand lightly, and she squeezed right back, dropping it quickly before his father could notice. Kara raised her eyes, looked straight at the Admiral, and said it quickly, like ripping off a bandage. "I'm pregnant."
Adama’s gaze shifted from Kara to Lee and back, with a look in his eyes like he was trying to decipher some foreign language that Kara was speaking. After a moment of uneasy silence, he stepped forward, hands resting on Kara’s shoulders. Lee could see Kara fidget under the scrutiny. All he said, however, was “Are you alright?”
Kara gave a short nod. “Yes, sir. I’m... I’m fine.”
Everything about the Old Man’s demeanor was completely professional-Lee thought it seemed coldly detached, but it seemed to put Kara at ease. “How far along are you?”
“Ten weeks.”
A strange look crossed his father’s face as the numbers didn’t add up. Apparently the Old Man had made the same first conclusion Lee had, but Sam and his crew had only been rescued three weeks ago. “Are you going to tell me who the father is?”
Kara glanced Lee’s way, but it seemed that Adama was still a little bit slow on the uptake. Lee took Kara’s hand in his and looked his father in the eye. “That would be me.”
Lee was sure the temperature in the room dropped several degrees. His father went rigid and turned to Kara, with a stern countenance. “I need you to go down to sickbay. I want a full report on your condition from Cottle ASAP.”
“Yes sir,” Kara said, snapping off a salute before turning to leave.
As Lee made to follow her, his father’s voice stopped him in his tracks. “Lee, I need to have a word with you.” As soon as the hatch was shut behind Kara, the Old Man leveled a stern look that made Lee feel like he was ten years old. “What the hell were you thinking?”
Lee’s face flushed hot, a familiar anger bubbling up inside him. “You know, Dad, it’s really none of your business.”
“Of course it’s my business!” he snapped. “It is my business because my CAG is pregnant by someone who, ten weeks ago, was her commanding officer and her fiancé’s brother..”
“You think I don’t know all of that!?”
“No, I know you know. I just don’t know if you’re prepared to deal with the consequences of your actions this time.”
The words felt like a steel-toed boot to the gut. He hadn’t confessed his past mistakes with Gianne-getting her pregnant and shoving her away-just to have them thrown back at him like this. The very thought of abandoning Kara right now was enough to make him ill. “I’m not going to run away. Not from Kara.”
“You better not. She deserves better than that. The child deserves better than that.” Lee watched as his father reached for the bottle of whiskey he kept in his desk. Apparently the Admiral was taking a page from Tigh’s book on how to cope with upsetting news. He was watching so closely he was startled when his father spoke. “Do you love her?”
It wasn’t that Lee hadn’t thought about it, it was more that he’d actively forced himself not to think about it-tried to ignore the way he felt whenever she was near, how she could simultaneously be the object of his deepest frustrations and his greatest desires, how he trusted her to live up to her reputation in the cockpit and come back alive and whole after every fight because he couldn’t bear to think of the alternative. He dropped his gaze to the floor before looking back up to his father. “My life doesn’t feel right when she’s not in it.”
Adama raised his glass to his lips. “Does she love you back?”
Lee ran a hand through his hair, coming to rest at the back of his neck. This conversation was impossible to have without feeling like a teenager again-not that this was a conversation he’d had back then. The truth was Lee wasn’t sure at any given moment whether telling a pregnant Kara that he loved her would reassure her that he was there for her or send her running, let alone how she truly felt about him..
When no answer was forthcoming, his father mercifully changed this subject. “What are you two going to do when the baby is born?”
Lee stood up a bit straighter. “She said she was going to keep it.” Though she never said so, Lee’d gotten the distinct feeling that the decision was not set in stone and he pushed the thought aside. He watched as his father finished off the glass, and dearly wished he had a drink himself right now. “I saw all her medical and psych records back when I was CAG; I know about… I know this isn’t easy for her, and it’s her decision, so whatever she wants… she has my support.”
“And if she doesn’t keep it?”
Lee looked down, avoiding his father’s gaze. “I… I don’t know.”
“Lee,” he asked, voice firm and demanding. “Do you want this baby?”
“Yes!” Lee said with a conviction he didn’t even know he’d had. “Dad, it’s my child.”
“That didn’t stop you before. If you want you want this baby-really want this baby-you need to let her know that. You’re going to be a father, Lee. That child will be depending on you for everything. You can’t just run off when things get tough.”
Lee fought back a bitter laugh-that was some rich advice coming from him. “I won’t run away from my child, sir.”
Lee turned to leave but once again his father’s voice stopped him. “Son?”
“What?”
There was a mournful quality to his voice. “Be a better father than I was.”
---
Kara ran a towel through her damp hair, trying to focus on the clean smell of regulation soap on her skin and hair, instead of the steam and sweat, grease and fuel, being washed off in the showers-all smells that used to make her feel like she was exactly where she was meant to be, but nowadays set her stomach churning. Forcing the wave of nausea back, she tugged her pants up her thighs and pulled at the zipper-once… twice-she gritted her teeth in frustration as she pulled a third time, sucking in her breath.
Frak, frak, frak, frak.
“Hey, Starbuck,” Kat’s voice grated on her ears, despite the relatively light tone. “Better lay off the booze. Looks like you’re starting to get a beer belly.” Kara scowled, barely able to shout a venomous go frak yourself before Kat had left the head-she was really off her game-and before she lost the battle with her stomach.
Part of her was grateful for her reputation for drinking, even though she hadn’t touched a drop of the stuff since she found out. It meant no one asked questions when she was kneeling huddled over the toilet.
“Sharon said the nausea wore off at around twelve weeks,” Helo said, kneeling beside her and rubbing small circles on her back.
“Great.” She sat back on her heels with a groan, wiping at her mouth with the back of her hand. “Two more weeks to go.”
---
Attention. Pass the word to the CAG. Captain Thrace, report to the CO’s quarters.
---
“How are you feeling?”
Kara shifted slightly as she sat on the couch, tugging at the waistband of her pants. She’d finally been able to button them shut, but the fabric kept digging into her, making it impossible to breathe properly or sit comfortably no matter what she did. “I’ve felt better,” she admitted.
The Old Man just smiled at her and poured two glasses of water, holding one out to her. She thanked him quietly as she raised it to her lips. “I looked over Cottle’s report. Looks like everything is normal,” Adama said, taking a seat beside her on the couch. “There will be some limitations to your duty for the next couple of months.” It sounded like an apology.
“Believe me,” she said. “I know.”
“Good thing the cylons have supposedly given up. Won’t be much out there to shoot.” The Old Man was trying his hardest to make this all better and Kara laughed despite herself. “I suppose the biggest question right now is whether or not you want to try to arrange a transfer to Pegasus.”
Kara swallowed hard before setting her glass aside. “I’m… grateful for the offer, but I’m not exactly ready to think about playing house with Lee just yet.” She thought about the slight joy in daily driving Lee up one bulkhead and down the other with crazy demands she could write off as pregnancy hormones, about that idiotic, pathetic face he made when she knew he was thinking about how he got her into this mess, and of course about dragging him into bed every night and making him make it up to her over and over and over. She had to bite her cheek a bit to keep from smiling. It was all too much wishful thinking way too fast. “Besides, I have responsibilities here.”
“Well, provided you can find someone to run your training drills for you, you can stay on as CAG until it’s time for you to take maternity leave.” Kara was starting to feel cabin-feverish at just the thought of being laid up for weeks. Adama must have sensed her discomfort. “You’re not the only officer under my command who’s ever had a child, Kara.” Kara folded her hands in her lap, not really sure how to respond. “You know, after Zak passed, I thought about things that might have been, that would never happen… about grandchildren. Funny how life works-you never know what’s going to get thrown your way.”
Kara dropped her gaze into her lap. Kara’d never thought about having kid’s with Zak-never had thought about having kids, period. But she couldn’t help the feeling that this wasn’t the way he wanted a grandchild, didn’t want hers and Lee’s child. Even if it was true, he didn’t say a word about it.
“By the way, Kara,” he said, rising to his feet. “I have something for you.” She noticed for the first time since she’d walked into the office, a pile of fabric folded nearly on his desk.
---
The next day, Kara strode into the ready room, grinning to herself as the entire room fell into complete silence while she made her way up to the podium and proceeded to breeze through the morning briefing. Every once in a while she cast a look around at the sea of faces, and she could see a mix of disbelief, shock, amusement (the latter mostly from Helo). Kat’s face was the best by far-flushed bright red and squirming in her seat whenever she noticed the CAG was looking her way. At least Kara was getting something amusing out of all this.
Twice she caught two raptor pilots with their heads bowed together, whispering. The first time she let it slide, she was on a roll with detailing the new second CAP being implemented to patrol around the orbit of the planet. The second time she called them out. “Stubbs, Callan. Got something you wanted to share with the class?” A brief round of snickers rippled through the ready room.
“No, sir.” Callan’s denial earned him a death glare, as Kara stepped around the podium, hands planted firmly on her hips.
“On your feet, Lieutenant!” she snapped and he readily complied. “Now I want to know exactly what was so much more fascinating than my briefing.”
“We… we were just… we… Weweretryingtofigureoutwhothefatherwas,sir,” Callan said with a brief gesture towards the new maternity uniform that Kara now wore. She felt like she was wearing a frakking tent and it made her look a hell of a lot farther along than she actually was, and she could think of very few things that would be more humiliating.
Running her tongue across her teeth, Kara wordlessly resumed her position behind the podium; she stared down at her papers, studying them intently. She could feel the burn of every eye watching her as she thumbed through her papers. She glanced up and sought out Helo in the crowd, remembering a certain bet he’d told her about the other day. She turned a smirk to the rest of her captive audience, a perfect study in the art of one-upmanship. “The father is Apollo. Those of you who were in on the pool can talk to Gaeta after your shift.” And without missing a beat resumed the briefing.
After the meeting, she dismissed the pilots, but asked Kat to stay behind.
“You wanted to talk to me, sir?” she asked, her face still hot with embarrassment. Kara kept her head down, flipping through papers and letting her stew in it a little bit longer, before she looked up, shoving a folder into Kat’s hands. “What are these?”
“Training drills I’ve worked out for the next two weeks. Just because the cylons said they’re giving up, doesn’t mean they are. I need my pilots ready when they show up.” Kara watched Kat rifling through the papers. “And since I’m not going to be getting in the cockpit any time soon I need someone out there who can run them for me. So you can either step up, or I’ll find someone else who will.”
“Yes sir,” Kat said, sticking the folder under her arm.
Dismissed, Kat turned to leave, taking three steps towards the door before turning back. “Starbuck?”
“What?” Kara asked with a roll of her eyes.
“You should’ve said something sooner, instead of letting people think you were just getting lazy and fat.”
“You want to tell me why that’s any of your business, Lieutenant?” Kara snapped. “No? Didn’t think so.”
She gathered up her papers before leaving the room. What the hell would’ve been the point of telling everyone? She didn’t need anyone’s frakking pity. Oh well, didn’t matter now, the secret was out; she ran her hand along the more forgiving fabric of her new pants-it was so much easier to breathe.
---
It had been five days since Lee’s promise to be there for Kara and the baby-since he convinced her to come clean to her commanding officer, the baby’s grandfather-and he hadn’t had the chance to come and see her until now. He spent the entire raptor ride running through scenarios in his head. What if she had changed her mind? Decided that she didn’t want to be a mother and give the baby away. And what if she hadn’t? What if she was getting used to the idea? Kara said she didn’t know a thing about raising kids, but Lee didn’t have half a clue either-only knew he couldn’t leave her, couldn’t leave his kid the way his own father had done. Too many questions; too soon to answer any. So he sighed and sat back in his seat until they reached Galactica.
He found Kara jogging laps around C deck, face flushed, hair held back in a ponytail and slick with sweat, and gods, so beautiful. She rounded the corner, eyes locking on his, as she slowed her stride, and he felt like a dumb schoolboy who just couldn’t stop staring.
“Hey,” she panted, breaking the silence.
“Hey. How are you feeling?”
“Well,” she said, bracing one hand on the bulkhead as she stretched out her calf, her voice all too pleasant. “Now I only feel the need to vomit whenever I smell sweaty viper jocks mixed with engine grease, so pretty much every time I’m in the bunkroom or the rec room or the head. And it’s a good thing I’m not flying because I have to pee all the frakking time. How about you, Lee?”
“Well,” he said, running a hand through his hair, unsure of exactly how to answer her small tirade. “I am a little tired.”
“Good,” she grunted, stretching out her other leg. “Serves you right. Where the hell have you been?”
“Sorry, I’ve been busy. This whole permanent settlement thing is demanding a lot of my time,” he offered by way of apology, though it sounded lame even to his own ears. When her mood didn’t soften, he continued. “If it makes you feel any better, I’m spending a good twelve hours a day around President Baltar. I think that’s a fair punishment in and of itself.”
“Yeah, not quite.” Kara folded her arms across her chest. “Frak, Lee, you know, I actually got this crazy idea in my head when you said you were going to be here that you were actually going to be here. Should’ve known better,” she muttered as she angled to move around him.
“Kara, wait,” he pleaded, catching her by the shoulders. “I promised I would back you up on this and I meant it, but this is the first chance I’ve had to get away all week. I just… want to make things okay.”
She looked up into his eyes with an unreadable expression on her face. “Prove it.” She didn’t move though, just kept staring at him like she was daring him to step up. And he wasn’t about to back down from a dare from Starbuck.
“I frakked up this week, but I promise from now on I’ll try harder.”
“No.”
He blinked. “What?”
“Try is not an option for us now, Lee. We’re having a kid.” Her voice broke a little bit on the last word. “Okay? We’re stuck with it. So either be there, or don’t.”
Lee cupped his hands around her cheeks, locking eyes with her. “I’m here now, aren’t I?”
---
Lee still wasn’t there half the time. He said he moved around his schedule, sloughed some of his duties off on his XO especially in regards to settlement, but she still didn’t see him more than a few times a week, and was more or less ready to give up on relying on him when she started getting missives from him on the days he couldn’t make it over. Dumb, stupid little letters, telling her what was happening aboard Pegasus, telling her he was thinking of her, hoping that she was alright. Eventually, she started writing back.
And maybe the time apart was good because when they were together harsh words were kept to a minimum in lieu of tangled tongues and roaming hands. On the days when she felt like she was going crazy from not being able to fly, they’d go down to the firing range together and he’d watch her empty a clip or two and her frustration into the target.
Once, they went up to the observation deck and sat together, grumbling about Baltar’s stupid plans for the planet. He teased her mercilessly the day he saw her in her maternity blues and she, in turn, made him rub her feet despite his protests that they weren’t even swollen. Sometimes, they just sat in her office and talked while she worked out CAP rosters based on the ones he brought over from Pegasus’s CAG.
Of course, for every good day, there was a bad one right around the corner.
---
Lee all but stormed into the bunkroom, not usually the way he started his visits. “Chief said he saw you down on the hangar deck for several hours.”
“So what?” Kara muttered, turning the page of the old tattered book she was staring at, not even reading.
“Every day for the past three weeks. Kara, what the hell were you doing down there?”
“Just making sure the knuckledraggers weren’t neglecting my bird. What’s your point, Lee?” She leveled a glare at him as she put the book aside. His jaw clenched tight and she barreled right on. “I can’t just sit around here on my ass like some frakking baby machine, Lee. I’m not just here to-”
“You’re not supposed to be down there. Cottle said the tylium fumes are bad for the baby.” He threw his hands in the air. “Frak, Kara, what were you thinking? Were you even thinking at all? For the gods’ sakes, you could’ve hurt the baby! You can’t be so self-”
“I don’t frakking need this. Don’t need you to tell me how to take care of my frakking kid, Lee. I can still do this on my own, you know.” And without another word she brushed past him and vanished out into the corridor.
Lee stewed for a good ten minutes, then followed, but after a methodical search of the ship, Kara was nowhere to be found. He even checked with Tyrol to make sure she hadn’t caught a raptor or a shuttle to gods-know-where.
In a last ditch effort, he went back to the bunkroom and found her pulling on her tanks. Her hair was dripping and her eyes were red and puffy, revealing more than she would ever tell him. “Kara…”
“Just get out,” she snapped, staring him down until he left.
He sent her a letter later that night, said he was sorry for yelling at her, told her to take care of herself.
She wrote back making no mention of his apology, just telling him he better show up for her next appointment with Cottle. Or else.
---
Kara looked up as Lee rushed into sickbay. She had to give him credit, she wasn’t sure he was going to show up. “I’m not late, am I?” he asked, panting slightly.
“No,” Ishay said, not looking up from her work as she prepared for the sonogram. “You’re right on time.”
Lee’s gaze focused intently on the still blank monitor and Kara rolled her eyes. “Need me to hold your hand, Commander?”
Cottle had been harassing Kara about the sonogram for a while now, practically breathing down her neck to get the test done and finally she gave in. It was cold and sticky and she hated staring at her swollen belly. Ishay was attempting to point out the baby’s hands but it just looked like one big grey blob on the screen to Kara. She pointed to a little flutter on the screen and identified it as the baby’s heartbeat, and then asked her if she wanted to know the baby’s gender. Kara didn’t really care one way or the other and shrugged.
“It’s a girl.”
Kara played the words over in her head. It’s a girl. They were having a baby girl. She was going to have a daughter. No matter how many ways she tried to think about it, she couldn’t wrap her mind around it. She stared hard at the monitor, watching the flutter on the screen.
She didn’t even realize she had a bruising grip on Lee’s hand until he squeezed back.
---
“Lee, what are you doing?”
“Just… give me a minute here.”
“Oh for frak’s sake-”
“I don’t want to hurt the baby.”
“You’re not going to hurt the baby, alright?”
“I just-”
“Gods! I’m still gonna be pregnant for four months and I’m not going through it without getting laid; now get over it and frak me already!”
“But-”
Kara let out a growl, grabbing him by the shoulders, as she swung him down to the bed and slid down over him.
---
Lee slipped his hand down over Kara’s bare belly, and she must have been tired or just in a really good mood because she didn’t smack his hand away. A week after the ultrasound, Kara had finally started coming over to Pegasus, swayed by the fact that his quarters were far more convenient than her office and afforded them time to lie together in his rack, him pressed up against her back, his head resting against the back of hers, every once in a while dropping a kiss against her shoulder.
All of a sudden, Lee felt something beneath his hand, and Kara just turned her head to look at him when he jerked in surprise. “What?”
“Did… did she just kick?” he asked, moving his hand, trying to see if he could feel it again.
Kara shifted slightly. “Yeah, she’s been doing that lately, usually when I’m trying to sleep.”
Lee’s face broke into a bright smile as the baby kicked again-that was when it hit him. “We haven’t talked about names.”
Kara groaned as she rolled away from him. “Do we really need to talk about this?”
“She needs a name, Kara,” he protested, watching as she stood and shimmied back into her briefs.
“We still have four months. Plenty of time to come up with a name.” She tugged on her sweatpants, which she seemed to prefer to her maternity clothes and wore them as often as she could get away with it. “Besides, I’m the one doing all the work. I get to pick the name.”
Lee leaned back on his elbows and nodded. “Sounds fair. Do you have any ideas?”
Kara tugged her tanks over her head and turned back to face him. “Eris.”
Lee felt his jaw drop slightly. “Kara, you’re not naming our daughter Eris.”
“You just said I get to name the kid.”
“Yes, but… no, Kara, I’m not going to let you call her that.”
“Why not?” Kara asked, sitting down to wrestle on her boots. “She’ll be our own personal goddess of discord and chaos, screaming at all hours of the night to get fed and changed-which by the way is all on you, Apollo. Since I’ll be the one sitting in the cockpit and you’re just sitting around CIC all day, I’ll actually need my rest and my gods, Lee, you are way too easy.”
Her face broke out into a grin when she noticed the way his must have paled. Lee hadn’t even realized he was holding a breath until he let it out and was breathing normally again. “So you’re not naming her Eris?”
“Are you kidding? You think I want to curse her with a name like that?” She caught his face between her hands and pressed a long, lingering kiss to his lips, so that when she pulled back and said, “Midnight changing and feeding is still all on you, flyboy,” he was too breathless to argue.
Kara tugged on her sweatshirt, something in her demeanor softening. “I was thinking about Alexandra.”
“Alexandra,” he echoed back at her as he rose to his feet. “Defender of mankind? I like it.” A smile crossed his face as wrapped his arms around her, letting his hand drift over her stomach again. His child had a name now, he’d seen her, and suddenly everything was becoming very real, very fast. He was going to be a father. Still, part of it made him seize up, a low strum of fear rushing in his veins remembering how badly he’d ended things with Gianne and never had the chance to make it right. With so many people settling on New Caprica, it seemed everyone was getting a fresh start, a second chance-and this was his. “Alexandra it is.”
---
Kara climbed into her rack alone that night. It took her forever to fall asleep lately since the kid… since Alex seemed to have her own ideas about when she wanted to sleep and did a good job of letting Kara know.
The bunkroom felt colder than usual. Kara pulled her blankets up to her chin, but for some reason she just couldn’t get warm. Her eyes slide shut and she was invaded by the memory of lying pressed up against Lee, his arms wrapped around her, and just how good it felt. Gods, she missed him. And that’s when it hit her. She wanted that. She wanted him, and not just physically.
For years, the Old Man had been the closest thing she had to family-all her blood relations turned out to be complete failures in that department. It hadn’t been something that had even crossed her mind since she agreed to marry Zak-a shared life with someone else, belonging. She wasn’t quite sure if it was strange or appropriate that now she wanted to share her life with Lee-with Lee and their child.
And yet, here she was, falling asleep alone. Again.
---
Kara was convinced that she was going to lose her mind if she had to make it through this evening sober, and since that was the only option available to her, she grudgingly resigned herself to the inevitability. The entire groundbreaking ceremony had been just one big boring speech after another and there wasn’t much more she could do but sit. All the military senior staff had pretty much been required to show up. Even so, Kara had still been planning to skip out until Lee had practically begged her to go and she didn’t have half a clue why. She hadn’t even seen him since before the sun went down.
“Is this seat taken?”
Kara looked up to see Laura Roslin standing by the bench with a glass in her hand. Kara shook her head, moving down a bit. “No. Go ahead, Madame P-”
“Laura is just fine,” she said with a warm smile as she sat down beside her. “Lovely weather this evening.”
Kara raised an eyebrow at her. “Guess so.”
“The night sky is really quite beautiful when you can actually see it,” Roslin said, raising the glass to her lips.
Kara could smell the alcohol from where she sat and turned her gaze away to the crowd. “Get a lot of rain down here?”
“No, not really. Just a lot of clouds. It’s a shame though, I used to love the rain back on Caprica.”
“Yeah… me too.”
The two of them lapsed into silence for a long awkward moment before Laura sat up a little bit straighter, hands folded neatly in her lap. “May I ask you a personal question, Captain?”
Kara regarded her with a wary eye, but said, “Shoot.”
“If it wasn’t for the law, would you be pregnant right now?”
And there it was. Kara had to admit it was a question she’d asked herself at least a dozen times in the last seven months, and she’d never really come up with any solid answer. On one hand, the Gods didn’t exactly approve of abortion; on the other hand, it’d just be another on the long list of sins that made up her life. “I don’t know. There are a lot of reasons I’m pregnant right now, can’t really say that the law is one of them. Besides, I never was one for following rules.” Laura gave a slow nod, Kara couldn’t tell if it was understanding or sympathetic. “Why?”
“Let’s just say it wasn’t my proudest political moment.”
Before the conversation could get any further, Lee pushed his way out of the crowd towards them, saying something about getting caught up in a conversation with Gaeta who couldn’t seem to get the idea through his head that this was supposed to be a party, not a business meeting. Kara rolled her eyes-another brilliant excuse; but Lee took her hand and smiled. “Come on, let’s get out of here.”
They wandered away from the town, talking about pointless things for a while, before Lee dug his hands into his pockets. “So, Captain Taylor has been looking to muster out, move down here.”
Kara rolled her eyes. “Such a shame, really gonna miss that guy.” She laughed and Lee laughed with her. “You gonna let him?”
“Actually, yeah. I told him he’d have to wait a few more months though, I had to find a new CAG before he could go.”
“Months? It’s going to take you months to find a new CAG? Must not be looking that hard, Lee.”
“Well,” he said, coming to a stop. Kara stopped a few paces after he had and turned back to face him. There was something low and sweet and longing in his voice. “I have someone particular in mind.” He stepped towards her and held her hands in his own. “I thought it might be easier for me to actually be there for you if we could actually be in the same place. Especially since you already volunteered me for midnight feeding and changing. What do you say, Kara?”
She’d like to say she hadn’t thought about transferring to Pegasus since she turned down the Admiral’s offer months ago, but that would be a lie. She thought about it every time she lay down in her rack at night, alone, wondering if Lee actually wanted her in his life. But right now, the way Lee was looking at her made that doubt fade away, drew her closer until she angled her lips over his, fusing their mouths together. They kissed long, slowly, her tongue sliding into his mouth as he cupped his hands around the back of her head, and she wanted this moment never to end. Never wanted to be apart from him. Kara slid her arms around his neck, pulling him closer.
This was everything she wanted.
Finally gasping for breath, Lee drew back just enough to rest his forehead against hers and she shut her eyes. “Love you so much,” he murmured, pressing gentle kisses along her cheeks, her eyelids, the bridge of her nose, her lips, and pulled back once more.
Her eyes fluttered open to lock onto his gaze, a smile hovered on her lips. “Love you, too.”
---
Kara moved on to Pegasus on her first day of maternity leave-she’d argued with Cottle about it, but the old coot had insisted that at eight months it was time for her to take a break. No sooner had she set her duffle down in Lee’s quarters-now her quarters too, she figured-than Lee’s hands were all over her, wandering over curves, mouth hot against hers, until they tumbled into his… their rack. Kara woke up the next morning with Lee curled around her body, his feet felt like ice where they pressed against her calf, and he’d managed to steal all of the covers over the course of the night. Lying there in his… their quarters, she realized that this was going to be every morning from now on.
And she liked it.
---
Alexandra Gaia Thrace-Adama was born at 0945 three days before she was due. Kara kept her word about hitting Lee during the delivery, accompanied by some rather colorful and inventive cursing if she said so herself, and she was pretty sure Lee was bleeding from the scratches on his arm.
Cleaned off, swaddled in a blanket, and still wailing loudly, the newborn hovered in front of her, Cottle holding the baby out to be taken. After a moment of hesitation, he grumbled, “You’re not going to break her,” and all but pushed the little girl into Kara’s arms.
Kara stared down at the child, her child-hers and Lee’s-rocking her slightly, and she finally stopped bawling. She could see the resemblance to him, the little dark wisps of brown hair on her head, and a little bit in her nose too-tiny as it was it still looked like Lee’s. And from the way she’d been crying, Kara could tell she was a bit of a loud mouth. Obviously she got that from her. She grinned.
But then, the baby blinked open her eyes, big, hazel eyes that Kara knew too well, had seen them in the mirror her entire life, and yet… different. So bright and… gods, the only word she could think of was innocent. “Hi, Alex,” Kara breathed.
And even though the war had been over for seven months, it was still a hell of a world to be bringing a kid into. She pulled her daughter tighter against her chest and felt something seize her. She still had no clue how to be a mother, no idea how to raise a kid, no belief that suddenly everything was going to be okay-but suddenly she had a firm resolve: she wasn’t going to let anything or anyone hurt this child. Ever.
Kara raised one finger to trace along the tip of Alexandra’s nose, her cheek, the small shell of her ear. She barely took notice of Lee stepping up alongside her bed, his hand on her shoulder. One of Alex’s little hands caught Kara’s finger, clutching with what seemed like all her might. Kara flicked her gaze towards Lee. “She’s got a hell of a grip.”
“You surprised? Look who her mother is,” he said with a grin, brushing a lock of hair back from Kara’s face. He was practically glowing as he looked down at his daughter. “May I?”
“Mmm…” Kara shook her head. “Not yet.”
Lee lowered himself to sit on the edge of the bed, his thigh resting against hers. “Come on, Kara, you’ve had her for nine months, I think it’s my turn for a while.”
“It’ll be your turn when I say it’s your turn.” She grinned.
Lee leaned in, his lips brushing lightly against hers before pulling back to look at her and their little girl. He had one braced by Kara’s head, the other draped over her and holding Alex’s hand. He was almost breathless as he looked at the two of them and whispered, “Yes, sir.”
--end--
Rating: PG-13
Words: ~6400
Pairing: Kara/Lee
Summary: “Try is not an option for us now, Lee. We’re having a kid. Okay? We’re stuck with it. So either be there, or don’t.”
A/N This is the continuation of the short-ish pregnancy!fic I wrote for the 3rd BSG Porn Battle-- Not The Colonial Dream. Massive amounts of love and hugs and rainbows and puppies to taragel and
thrace_adama for putting up with me while this fic kicked my ass in every way imaginable and helped turn it into something presentable. csm37 and eugis as well for being helpful and letting me talk at them.
"Come in."
Lee could see Kara tense at the sound of the Old Man's voice. He placed his hand lightly on her shoulder and felt her take a steeling breath before pushing the hatch open.
"Good evening, Starbuck. Son." He said with a nod to each of them. If he was at all surprised by their visit, he didn't let on. "What can I do for you two?"
As his father rose from his seat, Kara shifted her weight from foot to foot beside him. She looked ready to break out into a sprint and run as far from this encounter as possible. Her hands were clenched at her sides, knuckles turning white.
"Sir, there's something I need to...something we need to talk to you about. I-... I'm..." Her gaze dropped to the floor and Lee brushed his hand against hers, hoping to ease some of her tension. In all honesty, he was surprised to see her so nervous-even if he’d been the one to insist on telling the Admiral as soon as possible, she’d been adamant about telling him, herself.
Lee reached out again to squeeze her hand lightly, and she squeezed right back, dropping it quickly before his father could notice. Kara raised her eyes, looked straight at the Admiral, and said it quickly, like ripping off a bandage. "I'm pregnant."
Adama’s gaze shifted from Kara to Lee and back, with a look in his eyes like he was trying to decipher some foreign language that Kara was speaking. After a moment of uneasy silence, he stepped forward, hands resting on Kara’s shoulders. Lee could see Kara fidget under the scrutiny. All he said, however, was “Are you alright?”
Kara gave a short nod. “Yes, sir. I’m... I’m fine.”
Everything about the Old Man’s demeanor was completely professional-Lee thought it seemed coldly detached, but it seemed to put Kara at ease. “How far along are you?”
“Ten weeks.”
A strange look crossed his father’s face as the numbers didn’t add up. Apparently the Old Man had made the same first conclusion Lee had, but Sam and his crew had only been rescued three weeks ago. “Are you going to tell me who the father is?”
Kara glanced Lee’s way, but it seemed that Adama was still a little bit slow on the uptake. Lee took Kara’s hand in his and looked his father in the eye. “That would be me.”
Lee was sure the temperature in the room dropped several degrees. His father went rigid and turned to Kara, with a stern countenance. “I need you to go down to sickbay. I want a full report on your condition from Cottle ASAP.”
“Yes sir,” Kara said, snapping off a salute before turning to leave.
As Lee made to follow her, his father’s voice stopped him in his tracks. “Lee, I need to have a word with you.” As soon as the hatch was shut behind Kara, the Old Man leveled a stern look that made Lee feel like he was ten years old. “What the hell were you thinking?”
Lee’s face flushed hot, a familiar anger bubbling up inside him. “You know, Dad, it’s really none of your business.”
“Of course it’s my business!” he snapped. “It is my business because my CAG is pregnant by someone who, ten weeks ago, was her commanding officer and her fiancé’s brother..”
“You think I don’t know all of that!?”
“No, I know you know. I just don’t know if you’re prepared to deal with the consequences of your actions this time.”
The words felt like a steel-toed boot to the gut. He hadn’t confessed his past mistakes with Gianne-getting her pregnant and shoving her away-just to have them thrown back at him like this. The very thought of abandoning Kara right now was enough to make him ill. “I’m not going to run away. Not from Kara.”
“You better not. She deserves better than that. The child deserves better than that.” Lee watched as his father reached for the bottle of whiskey he kept in his desk. Apparently the Admiral was taking a page from Tigh’s book on how to cope with upsetting news. He was watching so closely he was startled when his father spoke. “Do you love her?”
It wasn’t that Lee hadn’t thought about it, it was more that he’d actively forced himself not to think about it-tried to ignore the way he felt whenever she was near, how she could simultaneously be the object of his deepest frustrations and his greatest desires, how he trusted her to live up to her reputation in the cockpit and come back alive and whole after every fight because he couldn’t bear to think of the alternative. He dropped his gaze to the floor before looking back up to his father. “My life doesn’t feel right when she’s not in it.”
Adama raised his glass to his lips. “Does she love you back?”
Lee ran a hand through his hair, coming to rest at the back of his neck. This conversation was impossible to have without feeling like a teenager again-not that this was a conversation he’d had back then. The truth was Lee wasn’t sure at any given moment whether telling a pregnant Kara that he loved her would reassure her that he was there for her or send her running, let alone how she truly felt about him..
When no answer was forthcoming, his father mercifully changed this subject. “What are you two going to do when the baby is born?”
Lee stood up a bit straighter. “She said she was going to keep it.” Though she never said so, Lee’d gotten the distinct feeling that the decision was not set in stone and he pushed the thought aside. He watched as his father finished off the glass, and dearly wished he had a drink himself right now. “I saw all her medical and psych records back when I was CAG; I know about… I know this isn’t easy for her, and it’s her decision, so whatever she wants… she has my support.”
“And if she doesn’t keep it?”
Lee looked down, avoiding his father’s gaze. “I… I don’t know.”
“Lee,” he asked, voice firm and demanding. “Do you want this baby?”
“Yes!” Lee said with a conviction he didn’t even know he’d had. “Dad, it’s my child.”
“That didn’t stop you before. If you want you want this baby-really want this baby-you need to let her know that. You’re going to be a father, Lee. That child will be depending on you for everything. You can’t just run off when things get tough.”
Lee fought back a bitter laugh-that was some rich advice coming from him. “I won’t run away from my child, sir.”
Lee turned to leave but once again his father’s voice stopped him. “Son?”
“What?”
There was a mournful quality to his voice. “Be a better father than I was.”
---
Kara ran a towel through her damp hair, trying to focus on the clean smell of regulation soap on her skin and hair, instead of the steam and sweat, grease and fuel, being washed off in the showers-all smells that used to make her feel like she was exactly where she was meant to be, but nowadays set her stomach churning. Forcing the wave of nausea back, she tugged her pants up her thighs and pulled at the zipper-once… twice-she gritted her teeth in frustration as she pulled a third time, sucking in her breath.
Frak, frak, frak, frak.
“Hey, Starbuck,” Kat’s voice grated on her ears, despite the relatively light tone. “Better lay off the booze. Looks like you’re starting to get a beer belly.” Kara scowled, barely able to shout a venomous go frak yourself before Kat had left the head-she was really off her game-and before she lost the battle with her stomach.
Part of her was grateful for her reputation for drinking, even though she hadn’t touched a drop of the stuff since she found out. It meant no one asked questions when she was kneeling huddled over the toilet.
“Sharon said the nausea wore off at around twelve weeks,” Helo said, kneeling beside her and rubbing small circles on her back.
“Great.” She sat back on her heels with a groan, wiping at her mouth with the back of her hand. “Two more weeks to go.”
---
Attention. Pass the word to the CAG. Captain Thrace, report to the CO’s quarters.
---
“How are you feeling?”
Kara shifted slightly as she sat on the couch, tugging at the waistband of her pants. She’d finally been able to button them shut, but the fabric kept digging into her, making it impossible to breathe properly or sit comfortably no matter what she did. “I’ve felt better,” she admitted.
The Old Man just smiled at her and poured two glasses of water, holding one out to her. She thanked him quietly as she raised it to her lips. “I looked over Cottle’s report. Looks like everything is normal,” Adama said, taking a seat beside her on the couch. “There will be some limitations to your duty for the next couple of months.” It sounded like an apology.
“Believe me,” she said. “I know.”
“Good thing the cylons have supposedly given up. Won’t be much out there to shoot.” The Old Man was trying his hardest to make this all better and Kara laughed despite herself. “I suppose the biggest question right now is whether or not you want to try to arrange a transfer to Pegasus.”
Kara swallowed hard before setting her glass aside. “I’m… grateful for the offer, but I’m not exactly ready to think about playing house with Lee just yet.” She thought about the slight joy in daily driving Lee up one bulkhead and down the other with crazy demands she could write off as pregnancy hormones, about that idiotic, pathetic face he made when she knew he was thinking about how he got her into this mess, and of course about dragging him into bed every night and making him make it up to her over and over and over. She had to bite her cheek a bit to keep from smiling. It was all too much wishful thinking way too fast. “Besides, I have responsibilities here.”
“Well, provided you can find someone to run your training drills for you, you can stay on as CAG until it’s time for you to take maternity leave.” Kara was starting to feel cabin-feverish at just the thought of being laid up for weeks. Adama must have sensed her discomfort. “You’re not the only officer under my command who’s ever had a child, Kara.” Kara folded her hands in her lap, not really sure how to respond. “You know, after Zak passed, I thought about things that might have been, that would never happen… about grandchildren. Funny how life works-you never know what’s going to get thrown your way.”
Kara dropped her gaze into her lap. Kara’d never thought about having kid’s with Zak-never had thought about having kids, period. But she couldn’t help the feeling that this wasn’t the way he wanted a grandchild, didn’t want hers and Lee’s child. Even if it was true, he didn’t say a word about it.
“By the way, Kara,” he said, rising to his feet. “I have something for you.” She noticed for the first time since she’d walked into the office, a pile of fabric folded nearly on his desk.
---
The next day, Kara strode into the ready room, grinning to herself as the entire room fell into complete silence while she made her way up to the podium and proceeded to breeze through the morning briefing. Every once in a while she cast a look around at the sea of faces, and she could see a mix of disbelief, shock, amusement (the latter mostly from Helo). Kat’s face was the best by far-flushed bright red and squirming in her seat whenever she noticed the CAG was looking her way. At least Kara was getting something amusing out of all this.
Twice she caught two raptor pilots with their heads bowed together, whispering. The first time she let it slide, she was on a roll with detailing the new second CAP being implemented to patrol around the orbit of the planet. The second time she called them out. “Stubbs, Callan. Got something you wanted to share with the class?” A brief round of snickers rippled through the ready room.
“No, sir.” Callan’s denial earned him a death glare, as Kara stepped around the podium, hands planted firmly on her hips.
“On your feet, Lieutenant!” she snapped and he readily complied. “Now I want to know exactly what was so much more fascinating than my briefing.”
“We… we were just… we… Weweretryingtofigureoutwhothefatherwas,sir,” Callan said with a brief gesture towards the new maternity uniform that Kara now wore. She felt like she was wearing a frakking tent and it made her look a hell of a lot farther along than she actually was, and she could think of very few things that would be more humiliating.
Running her tongue across her teeth, Kara wordlessly resumed her position behind the podium; she stared down at her papers, studying them intently. She could feel the burn of every eye watching her as she thumbed through her papers. She glanced up and sought out Helo in the crowd, remembering a certain bet he’d told her about the other day. She turned a smirk to the rest of her captive audience, a perfect study in the art of one-upmanship. “The father is Apollo. Those of you who were in on the pool can talk to Gaeta after your shift.” And without missing a beat resumed the briefing.
After the meeting, she dismissed the pilots, but asked Kat to stay behind.
“You wanted to talk to me, sir?” she asked, her face still hot with embarrassment. Kara kept her head down, flipping through papers and letting her stew in it a little bit longer, before she looked up, shoving a folder into Kat’s hands. “What are these?”
“Training drills I’ve worked out for the next two weeks. Just because the cylons said they’re giving up, doesn’t mean they are. I need my pilots ready when they show up.” Kara watched Kat rifling through the papers. “And since I’m not going to be getting in the cockpit any time soon I need someone out there who can run them for me. So you can either step up, or I’ll find someone else who will.”
“Yes sir,” Kat said, sticking the folder under her arm.
Dismissed, Kat turned to leave, taking three steps towards the door before turning back. “Starbuck?”
“What?” Kara asked with a roll of her eyes.
“You should’ve said something sooner, instead of letting people think you were just getting lazy and fat.”
“You want to tell me why that’s any of your business, Lieutenant?” Kara snapped. “No? Didn’t think so.”
She gathered up her papers before leaving the room. What the hell would’ve been the point of telling everyone? She didn’t need anyone’s frakking pity. Oh well, didn’t matter now, the secret was out; she ran her hand along the more forgiving fabric of her new pants-it was so much easier to breathe.
---
It had been five days since Lee’s promise to be there for Kara and the baby-since he convinced her to come clean to her commanding officer, the baby’s grandfather-and he hadn’t had the chance to come and see her until now. He spent the entire raptor ride running through scenarios in his head. What if she had changed her mind? Decided that she didn’t want to be a mother and give the baby away. And what if she hadn’t? What if she was getting used to the idea? Kara said she didn’t know a thing about raising kids, but Lee didn’t have half a clue either-only knew he couldn’t leave her, couldn’t leave his kid the way his own father had done. Too many questions; too soon to answer any. So he sighed and sat back in his seat until they reached Galactica.
He found Kara jogging laps around C deck, face flushed, hair held back in a ponytail and slick with sweat, and gods, so beautiful. She rounded the corner, eyes locking on his, as she slowed her stride, and he felt like a dumb schoolboy who just couldn’t stop staring.
“Hey,” she panted, breaking the silence.
“Hey. How are you feeling?”
“Well,” she said, bracing one hand on the bulkhead as she stretched out her calf, her voice all too pleasant. “Now I only feel the need to vomit whenever I smell sweaty viper jocks mixed with engine grease, so pretty much every time I’m in the bunkroom or the rec room or the head. And it’s a good thing I’m not flying because I have to pee all the frakking time. How about you, Lee?”
“Well,” he said, running a hand through his hair, unsure of exactly how to answer her small tirade. “I am a little tired.”
“Good,” she grunted, stretching out her other leg. “Serves you right. Where the hell have you been?”
“Sorry, I’ve been busy. This whole permanent settlement thing is demanding a lot of my time,” he offered by way of apology, though it sounded lame even to his own ears. When her mood didn’t soften, he continued. “If it makes you feel any better, I’m spending a good twelve hours a day around President Baltar. I think that’s a fair punishment in and of itself.”
“Yeah, not quite.” Kara folded her arms across her chest. “Frak, Lee, you know, I actually got this crazy idea in my head when you said you were going to be here that you were actually going to be here. Should’ve known better,” she muttered as she angled to move around him.
“Kara, wait,” he pleaded, catching her by the shoulders. “I promised I would back you up on this and I meant it, but this is the first chance I’ve had to get away all week. I just… want to make things okay.”
She looked up into his eyes with an unreadable expression on her face. “Prove it.” She didn’t move though, just kept staring at him like she was daring him to step up. And he wasn’t about to back down from a dare from Starbuck.
“I frakked up this week, but I promise from now on I’ll try harder.”
“No.”
He blinked. “What?”
“Try is not an option for us now, Lee. We’re having a kid.” Her voice broke a little bit on the last word. “Okay? We’re stuck with it. So either be there, or don’t.”
Lee cupped his hands around her cheeks, locking eyes with her. “I’m here now, aren’t I?”
---
Lee still wasn’t there half the time. He said he moved around his schedule, sloughed some of his duties off on his XO especially in regards to settlement, but she still didn’t see him more than a few times a week, and was more or less ready to give up on relying on him when she started getting missives from him on the days he couldn’t make it over. Dumb, stupid little letters, telling her what was happening aboard Pegasus, telling her he was thinking of her, hoping that she was alright. Eventually, she started writing back.
And maybe the time apart was good because when they were together harsh words were kept to a minimum in lieu of tangled tongues and roaming hands. On the days when she felt like she was going crazy from not being able to fly, they’d go down to the firing range together and he’d watch her empty a clip or two and her frustration into the target.
Once, they went up to the observation deck and sat together, grumbling about Baltar’s stupid plans for the planet. He teased her mercilessly the day he saw her in her maternity blues and she, in turn, made him rub her feet despite his protests that they weren’t even swollen. Sometimes, they just sat in her office and talked while she worked out CAP rosters based on the ones he brought over from Pegasus’s CAG.
Of course, for every good day, there was a bad one right around the corner.
---
Lee all but stormed into the bunkroom, not usually the way he started his visits. “Chief said he saw you down on the hangar deck for several hours.”
“So what?” Kara muttered, turning the page of the old tattered book she was staring at, not even reading.
“Every day for the past three weeks. Kara, what the hell were you doing down there?”
“Just making sure the knuckledraggers weren’t neglecting my bird. What’s your point, Lee?” She leveled a glare at him as she put the book aside. His jaw clenched tight and she barreled right on. “I can’t just sit around here on my ass like some frakking baby machine, Lee. I’m not just here to-”
“You’re not supposed to be down there. Cottle said the tylium fumes are bad for the baby.” He threw his hands in the air. “Frak, Kara, what were you thinking? Were you even thinking at all? For the gods’ sakes, you could’ve hurt the baby! You can’t be so self-”
“I don’t frakking need this. Don’t need you to tell me how to take care of my frakking kid, Lee. I can still do this on my own, you know.” And without another word she brushed past him and vanished out into the corridor.
Lee stewed for a good ten minutes, then followed, but after a methodical search of the ship, Kara was nowhere to be found. He even checked with Tyrol to make sure she hadn’t caught a raptor or a shuttle to gods-know-where.
In a last ditch effort, he went back to the bunkroom and found her pulling on her tanks. Her hair was dripping and her eyes were red and puffy, revealing more than she would ever tell him. “Kara…”
“Just get out,” she snapped, staring him down until he left.
He sent her a letter later that night, said he was sorry for yelling at her, told her to take care of herself.
She wrote back making no mention of his apology, just telling him he better show up for her next appointment with Cottle. Or else.
---
Kara looked up as Lee rushed into sickbay. She had to give him credit, she wasn’t sure he was going to show up. “I’m not late, am I?” he asked, panting slightly.
“No,” Ishay said, not looking up from her work as she prepared for the sonogram. “You’re right on time.”
Lee’s gaze focused intently on the still blank monitor and Kara rolled her eyes. “Need me to hold your hand, Commander?”
Cottle had been harassing Kara about the sonogram for a while now, practically breathing down her neck to get the test done and finally she gave in. It was cold and sticky and she hated staring at her swollen belly. Ishay was attempting to point out the baby’s hands but it just looked like one big grey blob on the screen to Kara. She pointed to a little flutter on the screen and identified it as the baby’s heartbeat, and then asked her if she wanted to know the baby’s gender. Kara didn’t really care one way or the other and shrugged.
“It’s a girl.”
Kara played the words over in her head. It’s a girl. They were having a baby girl. She was going to have a daughter. No matter how many ways she tried to think about it, she couldn’t wrap her mind around it. She stared hard at the monitor, watching the flutter on the screen.
She didn’t even realize she had a bruising grip on Lee’s hand until he squeezed back.
---
“Lee, what are you doing?”
“Just… give me a minute here.”
“Oh for frak’s sake-”
“I don’t want to hurt the baby.”
“You’re not going to hurt the baby, alright?”
“I just-”
“Gods! I’m still gonna be pregnant for four months and I’m not going through it without getting laid; now get over it and frak me already!”
“But-”
Kara let out a growl, grabbing him by the shoulders, as she swung him down to the bed and slid down over him.
---
Lee slipped his hand down over Kara’s bare belly, and she must have been tired or just in a really good mood because she didn’t smack his hand away. A week after the ultrasound, Kara had finally started coming over to Pegasus, swayed by the fact that his quarters were far more convenient than her office and afforded them time to lie together in his rack, him pressed up against her back, his head resting against the back of hers, every once in a while dropping a kiss against her shoulder.
All of a sudden, Lee felt something beneath his hand, and Kara just turned her head to look at him when he jerked in surprise. “What?”
“Did… did she just kick?” he asked, moving his hand, trying to see if he could feel it again.
Kara shifted slightly. “Yeah, she’s been doing that lately, usually when I’m trying to sleep.”
Lee’s face broke into a bright smile as the baby kicked again-that was when it hit him. “We haven’t talked about names.”
Kara groaned as she rolled away from him. “Do we really need to talk about this?”
“She needs a name, Kara,” he protested, watching as she stood and shimmied back into her briefs.
“We still have four months. Plenty of time to come up with a name.” She tugged on her sweatpants, which she seemed to prefer to her maternity clothes and wore them as often as she could get away with it. “Besides, I’m the one doing all the work. I get to pick the name.”
Lee leaned back on his elbows and nodded. “Sounds fair. Do you have any ideas?”
Kara tugged her tanks over her head and turned back to face him. “Eris.”
Lee felt his jaw drop slightly. “Kara, you’re not naming our daughter Eris.”
“You just said I get to name the kid.”
“Yes, but… no, Kara, I’m not going to let you call her that.”
“Why not?” Kara asked, sitting down to wrestle on her boots. “She’ll be our own personal goddess of discord and chaos, screaming at all hours of the night to get fed and changed-which by the way is all on you, Apollo. Since I’ll be the one sitting in the cockpit and you’re just sitting around CIC all day, I’ll actually need my rest and my gods, Lee, you are way too easy.”
Her face broke out into a grin when she noticed the way his must have paled. Lee hadn’t even realized he was holding a breath until he let it out and was breathing normally again. “So you’re not naming her Eris?”
“Are you kidding? You think I want to curse her with a name like that?” She caught his face between her hands and pressed a long, lingering kiss to his lips, so that when she pulled back and said, “Midnight changing and feeding is still all on you, flyboy,” he was too breathless to argue.
Kara tugged on her sweatshirt, something in her demeanor softening. “I was thinking about Alexandra.”
“Alexandra,” he echoed back at her as he rose to his feet. “Defender of mankind? I like it.” A smile crossed his face as wrapped his arms around her, letting his hand drift over her stomach again. His child had a name now, he’d seen her, and suddenly everything was becoming very real, very fast. He was going to be a father. Still, part of it made him seize up, a low strum of fear rushing in his veins remembering how badly he’d ended things with Gianne and never had the chance to make it right. With so many people settling on New Caprica, it seemed everyone was getting a fresh start, a second chance-and this was his. “Alexandra it is.”
---
Kara climbed into her rack alone that night. It took her forever to fall asleep lately since the kid… since Alex seemed to have her own ideas about when she wanted to sleep and did a good job of letting Kara know.
The bunkroom felt colder than usual. Kara pulled her blankets up to her chin, but for some reason she just couldn’t get warm. Her eyes slide shut and she was invaded by the memory of lying pressed up against Lee, his arms wrapped around her, and just how good it felt. Gods, she missed him. And that’s when it hit her. She wanted that. She wanted him, and not just physically.
For years, the Old Man had been the closest thing she had to family-all her blood relations turned out to be complete failures in that department. It hadn’t been something that had even crossed her mind since she agreed to marry Zak-a shared life with someone else, belonging. She wasn’t quite sure if it was strange or appropriate that now she wanted to share her life with Lee-with Lee and their child.
And yet, here she was, falling asleep alone. Again.
---
Kara was convinced that she was going to lose her mind if she had to make it through this evening sober, and since that was the only option available to her, she grudgingly resigned herself to the inevitability. The entire groundbreaking ceremony had been just one big boring speech after another and there wasn’t much more she could do but sit. All the military senior staff had pretty much been required to show up. Even so, Kara had still been planning to skip out until Lee had practically begged her to go and she didn’t have half a clue why. She hadn’t even seen him since before the sun went down.
“Is this seat taken?”
Kara looked up to see Laura Roslin standing by the bench with a glass in her hand. Kara shook her head, moving down a bit. “No. Go ahead, Madame P-”
“Laura is just fine,” she said with a warm smile as she sat down beside her. “Lovely weather this evening.”
Kara raised an eyebrow at her. “Guess so.”
“The night sky is really quite beautiful when you can actually see it,” Roslin said, raising the glass to her lips.
Kara could smell the alcohol from where she sat and turned her gaze away to the crowd. “Get a lot of rain down here?”
“No, not really. Just a lot of clouds. It’s a shame though, I used to love the rain back on Caprica.”
“Yeah… me too.”
The two of them lapsed into silence for a long awkward moment before Laura sat up a little bit straighter, hands folded neatly in her lap. “May I ask you a personal question, Captain?”
Kara regarded her with a wary eye, but said, “Shoot.”
“If it wasn’t for the law, would you be pregnant right now?”
And there it was. Kara had to admit it was a question she’d asked herself at least a dozen times in the last seven months, and she’d never really come up with any solid answer. On one hand, the Gods didn’t exactly approve of abortion; on the other hand, it’d just be another on the long list of sins that made up her life. “I don’t know. There are a lot of reasons I’m pregnant right now, can’t really say that the law is one of them. Besides, I never was one for following rules.” Laura gave a slow nod, Kara couldn’t tell if it was understanding or sympathetic. “Why?”
“Let’s just say it wasn’t my proudest political moment.”
Before the conversation could get any further, Lee pushed his way out of the crowd towards them, saying something about getting caught up in a conversation with Gaeta who couldn’t seem to get the idea through his head that this was supposed to be a party, not a business meeting. Kara rolled her eyes-another brilliant excuse; but Lee took her hand and smiled. “Come on, let’s get out of here.”
They wandered away from the town, talking about pointless things for a while, before Lee dug his hands into his pockets. “So, Captain Taylor has been looking to muster out, move down here.”
Kara rolled her eyes. “Such a shame, really gonna miss that guy.” She laughed and Lee laughed with her. “You gonna let him?”
“Actually, yeah. I told him he’d have to wait a few more months though, I had to find a new CAG before he could go.”
“Months? It’s going to take you months to find a new CAG? Must not be looking that hard, Lee.”
“Well,” he said, coming to a stop. Kara stopped a few paces after he had and turned back to face him. There was something low and sweet and longing in his voice. “I have someone particular in mind.” He stepped towards her and held her hands in his own. “I thought it might be easier for me to actually be there for you if we could actually be in the same place. Especially since you already volunteered me for midnight feeding and changing. What do you say, Kara?”
She’d like to say she hadn’t thought about transferring to Pegasus since she turned down the Admiral’s offer months ago, but that would be a lie. She thought about it every time she lay down in her rack at night, alone, wondering if Lee actually wanted her in his life. But right now, the way Lee was looking at her made that doubt fade away, drew her closer until she angled her lips over his, fusing their mouths together. They kissed long, slowly, her tongue sliding into his mouth as he cupped his hands around the back of her head, and she wanted this moment never to end. Never wanted to be apart from him. Kara slid her arms around his neck, pulling him closer.
This was everything she wanted.
Finally gasping for breath, Lee drew back just enough to rest his forehead against hers and she shut her eyes. “Love you so much,” he murmured, pressing gentle kisses along her cheeks, her eyelids, the bridge of her nose, her lips, and pulled back once more.
Her eyes fluttered open to lock onto his gaze, a smile hovered on her lips. “Love you, too.”
---
Kara moved on to Pegasus on her first day of maternity leave-she’d argued with Cottle about it, but the old coot had insisted that at eight months it was time for her to take a break. No sooner had she set her duffle down in Lee’s quarters-now her quarters too, she figured-than Lee’s hands were all over her, wandering over curves, mouth hot against hers, until they tumbled into his… their rack. Kara woke up the next morning with Lee curled around her body, his feet felt like ice where they pressed against her calf, and he’d managed to steal all of the covers over the course of the night. Lying there in his… their quarters, she realized that this was going to be every morning from now on.
And she liked it.
---
Alexandra Gaia Thrace-Adama was born at 0945 three days before she was due. Kara kept her word about hitting Lee during the delivery, accompanied by some rather colorful and inventive cursing if she said so herself, and she was pretty sure Lee was bleeding from the scratches on his arm.
Cleaned off, swaddled in a blanket, and still wailing loudly, the newborn hovered in front of her, Cottle holding the baby out to be taken. After a moment of hesitation, he grumbled, “You’re not going to break her,” and all but pushed the little girl into Kara’s arms.
Kara stared down at the child, her child-hers and Lee’s-rocking her slightly, and she finally stopped bawling. She could see the resemblance to him, the little dark wisps of brown hair on her head, and a little bit in her nose too-tiny as it was it still looked like Lee’s. And from the way she’d been crying, Kara could tell she was a bit of a loud mouth. Obviously she got that from her. She grinned.
But then, the baby blinked open her eyes, big, hazel eyes that Kara knew too well, had seen them in the mirror her entire life, and yet… different. So bright and… gods, the only word she could think of was innocent. “Hi, Alex,” Kara breathed.
And even though the war had been over for seven months, it was still a hell of a world to be bringing a kid into. She pulled her daughter tighter against her chest and felt something seize her. She still had no clue how to be a mother, no idea how to raise a kid, no belief that suddenly everything was going to be okay-but suddenly she had a firm resolve: she wasn’t going to let anything or anyone hurt this child. Ever.
Kara raised one finger to trace along the tip of Alexandra’s nose, her cheek, the small shell of her ear. She barely took notice of Lee stepping up alongside her bed, his hand on her shoulder. One of Alex’s little hands caught Kara’s finger, clutching with what seemed like all her might. Kara flicked her gaze towards Lee. “She’s got a hell of a grip.”
“You surprised? Look who her mother is,” he said with a grin, brushing a lock of hair back from Kara’s face. He was practically glowing as he looked down at his daughter. “May I?”
“Mmm…” Kara shook her head. “Not yet.”
Lee lowered himself to sit on the edge of the bed, his thigh resting against hers. “Come on, Kara, you’ve had her for nine months, I think it’s my turn for a while.”
“It’ll be your turn when I say it’s your turn.” She grinned.
Lee leaned in, his lips brushing lightly against hers before pulling back to look at her and their little girl. He had one braced by Kara’s head, the other draped over her and holding Alex’s hand. He was almost breathless as he looked at the two of them and whispered, “Yes, sir.”
--end--