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Fic of doom Chapter Six
Chapter Six: There are Pilots and Problems.
"Demetrius, Starbuck, how's that flying feel?" Helo sounded half-amused and half-worred, over the wireless. Sam didn't really blame the man. Kara had been resistant and angry the entire time they'd been doing pre-flight checks, and her flying speed wasn't exactly conducive to a careful recon.
But she was flying, which was sort of the point of the thing. Sam wasn't entirely sure how he'd successfully goaded her into it, but he'd felt the need to. For some reason, he was hoping that Kara would re-connect with reality a little better in the cockpit. After all, flying had been her lover and friend long before he'd known her. She'd missed it on New Caprica, and he couldn't imagine that she wasn't missing it while pacing the cramped cabin with her paints and her star charts.
"Five hour recon, Longshot, you sure you want that?" Helo had looked bemused when Sam had herded Kara down into the prep room.
Kara had ignored their quiet conversation as she stomped her way through stripped off her uniform and into her flight suit, her boots sounding hollow on the decking. Sam hadn't taken his time, following right behind her when she barreled out to the airlock.
They had all become adept at space-walking to their vipers, climbing in after checking the bird for damage and wear. Sealing the cockpit was routine, reading off to the flight officer was simple.
Watching Kara tilt and turn her viper and trying to follow her through every twist was a challenge, but Sam could feel his blood flowing and heart beating. This was flying, this mad, insane streak through the heavens. He could almost feel himself relaxing, even as the adrenaline kicked in harder.
"Starbuck, Longshot, you still back there?" She called, her voice mocking as she dipped and twirled through half a dozen turns before leveling off again, upside-down in relation to the Demetrius.
"Roger that, Starbuck. Still here." He paused, then added, "You might wanna be on the look-out for comets, though, or is that my job?"
Her viper flipped again, and Sam figured that was his answer. He continued to follow her, eyes scanning while he let his flying go on some sort of auto-pilot.
Being in space like this was lonely, even if he could hear her breathing, there was too much space between them, too much distance between the stars. The thought made him laugh a little at how ridiculously sentimental he was being. After their last encounter, he was surprised he could feel something that silly towards Kara. But he believed there was more to her than this search for Earth. He believed that her lashing out at him and everyone around them was frustration. A mechanism to keep herself sane.
He believed she would put a bullet in his brain the instant she found out he was a Cylon, frustration and search for Earth or not.
It was thoughts like that which kept him silent on the subject.
Kara could find Earth. He felt that in his bones, a certainty that rattled him. What if it was just a programed response? What if his love for her was some elaborate subroutine to keep him at her side until someone flipped a switch and he killed her?
Thoughts like that only plagued him when she was nearby, or he was alone in the black, nothing to stop him thinking about what being a Cylon meant. Sure, he had Athena's example, but he also had Boomer's, a Cylon who was a sleeper agent, who hadn't known what she was, even at the end. He could be like her--they all could. And yet, here he was, flying Kara's wing, following her on this insane quest for Earth.
Maybe he was there because it was insane, it was something he could believe in, outside of himself.
Flying through the black, he didn't have to worry that he'd be unable to fire on Cylons, that Tigh would turn them in, that Tyrol would accidentally sabotage his bird and kill him... Sam wasn't sure if Tory would kill him, but she'd succeed if she tried.
"Demetrius, recon crew, we're getting a blip on dradis. Might be nothing, but keep your eyes peeled."
"I like my eyes boiled," Kara muttered, her voice sounding tinny across the wireless.
Sam let himself grin, even though his adrenaline was kicking in again.
There was static suddenly, then Kara's voice cut across it, mumbling, "C'mon, c'mon, c'mon..."
It was weird, but it was almost like she was expecting something. Sam followed her through another loop, then almost felt his heart stop as two Cylon raiders were suddenly just there, hanging in space in front of them.
At the same moment, an alarm went off, and Helo's voice broke through the channel again, "Dradis contact, one base star, two heavy raiders. Get back to the barn, people."
Sam slewed around, finding the base star above them, its axis twisting and a rain of raiders erupting from it, all angling towards them, though a wing peeled off to head for the Demetrius, and Sam cursed. "Longshot, Starbuck, we need to get the frak out of here!"
"There's not enough time."
"Starbuck--" Helo broke off, then came back, "We have two minutes until the raiders and base ship are in firing range. Get your asses back here. NOW."
The heavy raiders slid closer to them, almost too slowly for what Sam knew them to be capable of. And then a voice broke into the channel. "To colonial vessels, this is Punchline and Lemon in the heavy raiders. We mean you no harm, but we can't say the same for that frakking base star."
"What the frak?" Kara demanded, "Who the frak are you?"
The voice of a Six broke through, "We're frakking pilots, there's been a frakking civil war and Cavil wants us all frakking dead."
"Enemy of my enemy and all that," offered Punchline.
"Starbuck, MOVE," shouted Helo.
"We won't make it in time." Sam could hear the decision in Kara's voice, even before she continued, "Helo, get the Demetrius out of here. Emergency protocols. You know the drill. Longshot, quit playing with yourself and get on my wing."
"Roger, Starbuck. What about the friendly unfriendlies?"
Before she could answer, one of the heavy raiders got even closer, then flipped, guns pointing forward. The other waggled itself, almost in a wave, then took off for the approaching raiders. "Punchline to the idiots in the vipers, Lemon's going to fire a nuke as a distraction, then I suggest you each pick a raider to get up close and personal with so we can jump the frak out of here."
"That's a waste of resources," Starbuck snapped, "Lemon, get your ass back here."
"Demetrius, Starbuck. We'll see you when we see you." There was a burst of static, and then Sam could see that the sewage ship no longer registered on his dradis.
They were truly on their own.
"Starbuck--"
"Shut up. This isn't going to pretty. Sam, there's ammunition clamps on the underside of the heavy raiders, get underneath, get attached. And then hold on. You take Punchline, I'll get Lemon."
They were trusting them, then. Or perhaps it was the only solution Kara could see. Sam had to admit that the two heavy raiders could have shot them down, and hadn't. He also didn't want to think about the precision flying he was about to conduct, with raiders bearing down on them, already beginning to fire.
"Hurry up, Longshot," Punchline snapped.
Flipping his bird, Sam aimed himself under the heavy raider, cutting propulsion and hitting the forward jets as he slid underneath her. There was a scraping of metal on metal and then he was jerked to a stop as clamps snapped down over his landing struts. "Secure!"
"Lemon?"
"We're having a little trouble with raiders."
The heavy raider Sam was attached to lurched as it moved forward, the viper only slowing it down a little. He could feel when the raider fired, sending cover while Kara's viper slipped beneath and twisted, docking struts brushing up against the underbelly.
"Got it!" Lemon shouted, "Let's get the frak out of here."
"Engines up. Jump."
-=-
"Why do you keep coming here?"
Tory had always wanted to be able to classify Paulla as a grubby human, but she really wasn't. There was more to her than just the desperate need to eke out a living on the Galactica, in a sham cult. At least, that's what Tory thought of it, sometimes: Gaius merely used them to hear his own voice (though sometimes, she wondered, as she watched his eyes go distant while he thought of God). It wasn't that Tory didn't think God was a legitemate concern. She just wasn't sure that Gaius believed he was.
But Paulla was another matter entirely. Paulla was terribly human, and so easy to read in her greed and jealousy.
"Would you take control?"
Confusion crossed Paulla's face, quickly muffled, and Tory again wondered where else Paulla had been. Once upon a time, she would have known that, would have had the population and census data at her fingertips. Now, there seemed no time for that sort of pointless precision. "Control of what?"
"All of this. If you could, would you want to be the leader?"
"Why would you want to know that?" Paulla was self-possessed again, sure of her footing. "Gaius is our leader, Ms. Foster. Would you want to take control?"
Tory almost clapped. Bravo, turning the question back on her. Even if Tory had succeeded in stopping Paulla's original line of questioning, she had an excellent sense of timing. "Perhaps I would," she replied, "though I'm not much of a speaker. I can leave that to others, I think."
"You mean you don't write Laura Roslin's speeches?"
Sometimes. "No. Laura is very good at putting her own thoughts into words." So was Gaius. It was why she sometimes wished the two would simply work together. Then again, Gaius as president hadn't been a walk in the park.
"Her lies are very believable." Paulla acknowledged. Then she shook her head, "But you still haven't answered my question. What is it about our humble surroundings that brings you back?"
"Maybe I simply feel a need for spiritual guidance."
Paulla pursed her lips, then seemed to give in, "I suppose you would, with Laura Roslin as your president." With that parting shot, Paulla turned and walked away.
Humans were so fascinating and attractive. Tory tilted her head, eyes distant as she considered all the ways she could break Paulla. Perhaps she would let Gaius help, if he was interested in that sort of thing. And perhaps she wouldn't do anything at all.
-=-
Cally wasn't sure why she was poking around Starbuck's viper. They hadn't taken it on their little 'special mission', leaving it in a section of the hangar that wasn't easily accessable. It was the one place where Cally could go to avoid people. Or maybe it was the promise that everything could change and become new. Or the hope of Earth. She snorted. Right. Earth.
"Why doesn't Chief put her in the air?"
Apparently, not everyone avoided the plane, though Cally felt no rancor towards Diana Seelix. They might not share the deck anymore, with Seelix in the cockpit or stalking the deck all cocky and smug, but they had been friends. And sometimes, Cally missed her.
"Would you trust this thing to fly right?" Fingering the ladder, Cally gave into the urge and scrambled up, to drop down in the cockpit. It wasn't like she hadn't been there before, just that it was different, when there wasn't a purpose. She wasn't fixing anything, and she sure as hell wasn't yelling directions while they shoved the plane around, trying to find shorts or faults. Touching the controls, she wondered what it was like to be out there, forcing the viper through twists and turns. Flying hadn't ever been her thing, though.
"Point," Seelix acknowledged, moving closer and leaning up against the ladder, watching her.
"This is what you see every day, huh?" Fingers brushing over the controls again, Cally let her hand settle on the stick, amused at the phallicness for a moment. It was a little like being a kid in a candy store, and she poked at the telemetry indicator, tapping it to see it react.
"Yeah." Her voice hesitant, Seelix said, "You ok?"
"Why wouldn't I be?" Truthfully, the days were less worrisome, now she was divorced from Galen and back in quarters where she was surrounded by so many people. She felt safe there, despite the under-currents of anger at having walked out on her marriage.
There was no way to explain to them, and she'd realized something: it wasn't her secret to tell. Like Athena before them, Galen and Tory and Tigh were doing their best to stay human. Cally couldn't really hate them for that anymore than she could hate Boomer for being unable to walk away from what she was. Not that Cally liked any of them.
She could handle the jibes and mockery, the slurs on her and more than one person calling her out on the drugs she was still taking. Cottle had her on a very set schedule, making sure that the anti-depressants actually did their job.
Cally hoped they were.
Hand closing on the lip of the cockpit, Seelix shrugged.
"It's a divorce, not a death sentence," Cally told her, irritation in her voice. To distract herself, she flipped on the radio, automatically twisting the dial, searching for nothing. The indicator blipped, and she paused, then turned back, watching it blip again. "The radio's picking something up."
"Probably wireless chatter." Brushing that aside, Seelix looked uncomfortable, "I know it's not a death sentence, but Cally, you were so in love. I just don't..."
Cally turned to look at her, "I don't want to talk about it." End of story. End of a marriage. But not the end of a life.
"Yeah. Fine." Stiffening, Seelix slapped her hand against her thigh, as though dusting it off. "I should go," her lips quirked a little, "Racetrack isn't Starbuck, but she still gets pissed if we're not on time."
"Sure. See you around."
When Seelix was gone, Cally turned back to the radio, curiosity pinged. Maybe it was someone out there, maybe it wasn't. She'd have to check with Dee and find out. But first, she needed to narrow the band down to where the transmission was coming through at its deepest peak.
The viper had come back brand-new, Starbuck had come back... almost brand-new. Who knew what was up with that?
-=-
chapter seven
"Demetrius, Starbuck, how's that flying feel?" Helo sounded half-amused and half-worred, over the wireless. Sam didn't really blame the man. Kara had been resistant and angry the entire time they'd been doing pre-flight checks, and her flying speed wasn't exactly conducive to a careful recon.
But she was flying, which was sort of the point of the thing. Sam wasn't entirely sure how he'd successfully goaded her into it, but he'd felt the need to. For some reason, he was hoping that Kara would re-connect with reality a little better in the cockpit. After all, flying had been her lover and friend long before he'd known her. She'd missed it on New Caprica, and he couldn't imagine that she wasn't missing it while pacing the cramped cabin with her paints and her star charts.
"Five hour recon, Longshot, you sure you want that?" Helo had looked bemused when Sam had herded Kara down into the prep room.
Kara had ignored their quiet conversation as she stomped her way through stripped off her uniform and into her flight suit, her boots sounding hollow on the decking. Sam hadn't taken his time, following right behind her when she barreled out to the airlock.
They had all become adept at space-walking to their vipers, climbing in after checking the bird for damage and wear. Sealing the cockpit was routine, reading off to the flight officer was simple.
Watching Kara tilt and turn her viper and trying to follow her through every twist was a challenge, but Sam could feel his blood flowing and heart beating. This was flying, this mad, insane streak through the heavens. He could almost feel himself relaxing, even as the adrenaline kicked in harder.
"Starbuck, Longshot, you still back there?" She called, her voice mocking as she dipped and twirled through half a dozen turns before leveling off again, upside-down in relation to the Demetrius.
"Roger that, Starbuck. Still here." He paused, then added, "You might wanna be on the look-out for comets, though, or is that my job?"
Her viper flipped again, and Sam figured that was his answer. He continued to follow her, eyes scanning while he let his flying go on some sort of auto-pilot.
Being in space like this was lonely, even if he could hear her breathing, there was too much space between them, too much distance between the stars. The thought made him laugh a little at how ridiculously sentimental he was being. After their last encounter, he was surprised he could feel something that silly towards Kara. But he believed there was more to her than this search for Earth. He believed that her lashing out at him and everyone around them was frustration. A mechanism to keep herself sane.
He believed she would put a bullet in his brain the instant she found out he was a Cylon, frustration and search for Earth or not.
It was thoughts like that which kept him silent on the subject.
Kara could find Earth. He felt that in his bones, a certainty that rattled him. What if it was just a programed response? What if his love for her was some elaborate subroutine to keep him at her side until someone flipped a switch and he killed her?
Thoughts like that only plagued him when she was nearby, or he was alone in the black, nothing to stop him thinking about what being a Cylon meant. Sure, he had Athena's example, but he also had Boomer's, a Cylon who was a sleeper agent, who hadn't known what she was, even at the end. He could be like her--they all could. And yet, here he was, flying Kara's wing, following her on this insane quest for Earth.
Maybe he was there because it was insane, it was something he could believe in, outside of himself.
Flying through the black, he didn't have to worry that he'd be unable to fire on Cylons, that Tigh would turn them in, that Tyrol would accidentally sabotage his bird and kill him... Sam wasn't sure if Tory would kill him, but she'd succeed if she tried.
"Demetrius, recon crew, we're getting a blip on dradis. Might be nothing, but keep your eyes peeled."
"I like my eyes boiled," Kara muttered, her voice sounding tinny across the wireless.
Sam let himself grin, even though his adrenaline was kicking in again.
There was static suddenly, then Kara's voice cut across it, mumbling, "C'mon, c'mon, c'mon..."
It was weird, but it was almost like she was expecting something. Sam followed her through another loop, then almost felt his heart stop as two Cylon raiders were suddenly just there, hanging in space in front of them.
At the same moment, an alarm went off, and Helo's voice broke through the channel again, "Dradis contact, one base star, two heavy raiders. Get back to the barn, people."
Sam slewed around, finding the base star above them, its axis twisting and a rain of raiders erupting from it, all angling towards them, though a wing peeled off to head for the Demetrius, and Sam cursed. "Longshot, Starbuck, we need to get the frak out of here!"
"There's not enough time."
"Starbuck--" Helo broke off, then came back, "We have two minutes until the raiders and base ship are in firing range. Get your asses back here. NOW."
The heavy raiders slid closer to them, almost too slowly for what Sam knew them to be capable of. And then a voice broke into the channel. "To colonial vessels, this is Punchline and Lemon in the heavy raiders. We mean you no harm, but we can't say the same for that frakking base star."
"What the frak?" Kara demanded, "Who the frak are you?"
The voice of a Six broke through, "We're frakking pilots, there's been a frakking civil war and Cavil wants us all frakking dead."
"Enemy of my enemy and all that," offered Punchline.
"Starbuck, MOVE," shouted Helo.
"We won't make it in time." Sam could hear the decision in Kara's voice, even before she continued, "Helo, get the Demetrius out of here. Emergency protocols. You know the drill. Longshot, quit playing with yourself and get on my wing."
"Roger, Starbuck. What about the friendly unfriendlies?"
Before she could answer, one of the heavy raiders got even closer, then flipped, guns pointing forward. The other waggled itself, almost in a wave, then took off for the approaching raiders. "Punchline to the idiots in the vipers, Lemon's going to fire a nuke as a distraction, then I suggest you each pick a raider to get up close and personal with so we can jump the frak out of here."
"That's a waste of resources," Starbuck snapped, "Lemon, get your ass back here."
"Demetrius, Starbuck. We'll see you when we see you." There was a burst of static, and then Sam could see that the sewage ship no longer registered on his dradis.
They were truly on their own.
"Starbuck--"
"Shut up. This isn't going to pretty. Sam, there's ammunition clamps on the underside of the heavy raiders, get underneath, get attached. And then hold on. You take Punchline, I'll get Lemon."
They were trusting them, then. Or perhaps it was the only solution Kara could see. Sam had to admit that the two heavy raiders could have shot them down, and hadn't. He also didn't want to think about the precision flying he was about to conduct, with raiders bearing down on them, already beginning to fire.
"Hurry up, Longshot," Punchline snapped.
Flipping his bird, Sam aimed himself under the heavy raider, cutting propulsion and hitting the forward jets as he slid underneath her. There was a scraping of metal on metal and then he was jerked to a stop as clamps snapped down over his landing struts. "Secure!"
"Lemon?"
"We're having a little trouble with raiders."
The heavy raider Sam was attached to lurched as it moved forward, the viper only slowing it down a little. He could feel when the raider fired, sending cover while Kara's viper slipped beneath and twisted, docking struts brushing up against the underbelly.
"Got it!" Lemon shouted, "Let's get the frak out of here."
"Engines up. Jump."
-=-
"Why do you keep coming here?"
Tory had always wanted to be able to classify Paulla as a grubby human, but she really wasn't. There was more to her than just the desperate need to eke out a living on the Galactica, in a sham cult. At least, that's what Tory thought of it, sometimes: Gaius merely used them to hear his own voice (though sometimes, she wondered, as she watched his eyes go distant while he thought of God). It wasn't that Tory didn't think God was a legitemate concern. She just wasn't sure that Gaius believed he was.
But Paulla was another matter entirely. Paulla was terribly human, and so easy to read in her greed and jealousy.
"Would you take control?"
Confusion crossed Paulla's face, quickly muffled, and Tory again wondered where else Paulla had been. Once upon a time, she would have known that, would have had the population and census data at her fingertips. Now, there seemed no time for that sort of pointless precision. "Control of what?"
"All of this. If you could, would you want to be the leader?"
"Why would you want to know that?" Paulla was self-possessed again, sure of her footing. "Gaius is our leader, Ms. Foster. Would you want to take control?"
Tory almost clapped. Bravo, turning the question back on her. Even if Tory had succeeded in stopping Paulla's original line of questioning, she had an excellent sense of timing. "Perhaps I would," she replied, "though I'm not much of a speaker. I can leave that to others, I think."
"You mean you don't write Laura Roslin's speeches?"
Sometimes. "No. Laura is very good at putting her own thoughts into words." So was Gaius. It was why she sometimes wished the two would simply work together. Then again, Gaius as president hadn't been a walk in the park.
"Her lies are very believable." Paulla acknowledged. Then she shook her head, "But you still haven't answered my question. What is it about our humble surroundings that brings you back?"
"Maybe I simply feel a need for spiritual guidance."
Paulla pursed her lips, then seemed to give in, "I suppose you would, with Laura Roslin as your president." With that parting shot, Paulla turned and walked away.
Humans were so fascinating and attractive. Tory tilted her head, eyes distant as she considered all the ways she could break Paulla. Perhaps she would let Gaius help, if he was interested in that sort of thing. And perhaps she wouldn't do anything at all.
-=-
Cally wasn't sure why she was poking around Starbuck's viper. They hadn't taken it on their little 'special mission', leaving it in a section of the hangar that wasn't easily accessable. It was the one place where Cally could go to avoid people. Or maybe it was the promise that everything could change and become new. Or the hope of Earth. She snorted. Right. Earth.
"Why doesn't Chief put her in the air?"
Apparently, not everyone avoided the plane, though Cally felt no rancor towards Diana Seelix. They might not share the deck anymore, with Seelix in the cockpit or stalking the deck all cocky and smug, but they had been friends. And sometimes, Cally missed her.
"Would you trust this thing to fly right?" Fingering the ladder, Cally gave into the urge and scrambled up, to drop down in the cockpit. It wasn't like she hadn't been there before, just that it was different, when there wasn't a purpose. She wasn't fixing anything, and she sure as hell wasn't yelling directions while they shoved the plane around, trying to find shorts or faults. Touching the controls, she wondered what it was like to be out there, forcing the viper through twists and turns. Flying hadn't ever been her thing, though.
"Point," Seelix acknowledged, moving closer and leaning up against the ladder, watching her.
"This is what you see every day, huh?" Fingers brushing over the controls again, Cally let her hand settle on the stick, amused at the phallicness for a moment. It was a little like being a kid in a candy store, and she poked at the telemetry indicator, tapping it to see it react.
"Yeah." Her voice hesitant, Seelix said, "You ok?"
"Why wouldn't I be?" Truthfully, the days were less worrisome, now she was divorced from Galen and back in quarters where she was surrounded by so many people. She felt safe there, despite the under-currents of anger at having walked out on her marriage.
There was no way to explain to them, and she'd realized something: it wasn't her secret to tell. Like Athena before them, Galen and Tory and Tigh were doing their best to stay human. Cally couldn't really hate them for that anymore than she could hate Boomer for being unable to walk away from what she was. Not that Cally liked any of them.
She could handle the jibes and mockery, the slurs on her and more than one person calling her out on the drugs she was still taking. Cottle had her on a very set schedule, making sure that the anti-depressants actually did their job.
Cally hoped they were.
Hand closing on the lip of the cockpit, Seelix shrugged.
"It's a divorce, not a death sentence," Cally told her, irritation in her voice. To distract herself, she flipped on the radio, automatically twisting the dial, searching for nothing. The indicator blipped, and she paused, then turned back, watching it blip again. "The radio's picking something up."
"Probably wireless chatter." Brushing that aside, Seelix looked uncomfortable, "I know it's not a death sentence, but Cally, you were so in love. I just don't..."
Cally turned to look at her, "I don't want to talk about it." End of story. End of a marriage. But not the end of a life.
"Yeah. Fine." Stiffening, Seelix slapped her hand against her thigh, as though dusting it off. "I should go," her lips quirked a little, "Racetrack isn't Starbuck, but she still gets pissed if we're not on time."
"Sure. See you around."
When Seelix was gone, Cally turned back to the radio, curiosity pinged. Maybe it was someone out there, maybe it wasn't. She'd have to check with Dee and find out. But first, she needed to narrow the band down to where the transmission was coming through at its deepest peak.
The viper had come back brand-new, Starbuck had come back... almost brand-new. Who knew what was up with that?
-=-
chapter seven