Free Will and Other Notions of a Capricious God (The Destiny is Overrated Mix), by millari
Title: Free Will and Other Notions of a Capricious God (The Destiny is Overrated Mix)
remix author: millari
Summary: She has refused up until now to consider the possibility that one day she will have to explain why Gaius Baltar is sleeping with a man God barely notices, instead of with the handpicked Cylon who is supposed to help him save the humans and Cylons from mutual self-destruction.”
Characters: Head!Six, Head!Baltar, Gaeta, Baltar, Zarek
Pairings: Baltar/Gaeta
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: Bondage, dominance/submission themes
Title, Author and URL of original story: Dinner Date by lorrainemarker I hope you like it, Lorraine!
The unmistakable whimpers of desire fill the small bedroom in Colonial One.
Six watches, invisibly perched on the headboard, cross-legged and stork-like, as Gaius sat upright in the center of the Presidential bed, the dawn light streaking through the small porthole windows and falling scattered across his naked body. At the moment, her charge is bent forward and cross-legged, kissing his equally naked chief-of-staff, Felix Gaeta.
They have been hiding this side of their relationship from the rest of the world for a long time now, since they were living on Galactica.
“You know, you are a great kisser,” Gaeta says breathlessly as they part for air. Gaius smiles with self-satisfaction and ruffles a hand affectionately through Gaeta's hair as he pushes him backward onto the bed and kisses him some more, his hand drifting down to Gaeta's groin.
“I am, aren't I?” he quips, only partly meaning it as a joke. Six is sure that a large part of the appeal of Gaeta is the way the man constantly strokes Gaius' ego. “You're rather lucky I found you then, wouldn't you say?”
To Gaeta's credit (which Six awards only begrudgingly), the young man rolls his eyes at that and shakes his head. He pulls Gaius onto him and traces his finger along Gaius' jawbone.
“I sometimes can't believe how fate worked us out, you know,” he says with wonder in his voice. “To think that I'm sleeping with the guy I used to watch on the wireless in high school...”
Gaius cries out with mock indignation. You make me sound like some decrepit old man!” he complains.
Gaeta grins with delight at how he's gotten to Gaius' vanity, but his lover soon wipes the victorious expression off his face. Gaius has begun palming Gaeta's cock with slow, sure strokes, gradually tightening his grip and falling into a splendid, leisurely pace that makes makes Gaeta's eyes widen and his whole frame shudder, openmouthed. The excited whimpers start again and Gaius' mouth falls upon his again.
Six sighs with annoyance.
She has never taken to Gaeta, and she never will. She decided this long ago, ever since Gaius had turned his eye towards the small, unremarkable young soldier. From the first time she'd seen him, following after Gaius like a spaniel, jabbering excitedly about biogenetics, Six had seen that Gaeta was insignificant. He was not part of God's plan.
And yet (perhaps for this very reason) Gaius has insisted on carrying on a relationship with him, a relationship much longer than the ones with any of the women Six has watched revolve in and out of his life - Starbuck, Gina, other nameless female conquests who came and went with Gaius forgetting their names almost instantly. But Gaeta has held some frustratingly effective difference for Gaius, even after he'd broken up with Gaeta temporarily for Gina. Not counting that hiatus in their relationship, Gaius has been with Gaeta now almost as long as he spent with that Cylon on Caprica, the one God actually intended him for.
When this fact bothers her, Six amuses herself with the idea that Gaius carries on the relationship as an act of petulant rebellion against her, and by extension, God's plan for him. God has a plan for Gaius. She's been told that much, even if He doesn't see fit to inform her on all the details just yet. And whatever that plan is, it can't possibly involve this unimportant human with whom Gaius has inexplicably entwined himself. For she knows that soon Six's human manifestation will appear, taking over New Caprica with her Cylon siblings and rendering Felix Gaeta to nothing more than a blip on the DRADIS screen of Gaius' universe. Her counterpart is busy on old Caprica making sure that happens.
“Have you thought about what it will do him once you tire of Gaeta and toss him aside?”
She shimmers into visibilty for Gaius. Her petty enjoyment at the way he startles is an admitted weakness on her part, and probably not becoming an angel of God. But she figures she can afford a weak moment once in a while. It's not as if God is always watching, no matter what she tells Gaius.
He can't avoid going stiff with residual fear when she appears so suddenly like this, but he has learned how to resolutely avoid her gaze by now.
“Toss him aside?” He stops his kisses, but keeps up the strokes, his voice dripping with a quiet sarcasm that only Six can hear. “Oh, do you mean the way you tossed me aside?”
He's referring to Gina. And her, the one on Caprica. Gaius has this habit of seeing all of Six's human doppelgangers as an extension of her. Which she supposes they are, in a way. And she supposes that if she squints hard enough, metaphorically speaking, she can see how from Gaius' perspective, they all betrayed him, not the other way around.
She stretches forward, leonine in her movements, and waggles an admonishing finger at him. “You might as well get rid of him sooner rather than later, Gaius. You don't appreciate him enough anyway.”
As if to spite her, Gaius speeds up the pace, his body naked and hunched over Gaeta, shutting her out. Below him, Felix's orgasm spurts out and his shivering cries echo loudly into the dawn.
***
Gaius foolishly forgets that Six is privy to his thoughts, all his thoughts.
And so he thinks she doesn't notice that what binds him to Felix Gaeta is what literally binds Felix Gaeta to him.
Gaius loves to tie Gaeta up, to watch him give total control over to Gaius - which at first puzzled Six, because she knows from experience how willing, no, how eager he is to be dominated himself. Gaius' first real love back on Caprica, the one who has been recently given the moniker of a destroyer, used to keep him in thrall that way. Oh, he'd never admit to wanting something so obvious as to be restrained or to be made to feel small in any way. But he did like the overwhelming feeling of a strong sexual partner taking control of the situation - throwing him roughly onto the bed, stripping his clothes off in a rush, smothering him with openmouthed kisses. Really, the trick with Gaius is to dominate him without calling it that. His lover on Caprica had had that trick down cold, her angelic version had noted with approval.
Gaius has always loved giving up control in the bedroom, but Gaeta has sparked something quite unexpected opposite in him, something Six thinks she should have seen coming but didn't.
After the apocalypse, the more Gaius' life spun out of control, the more he would reach out in desperation for a lifeline. She had predicted that, had in fact counted on that. She'd assumed that God had picked a vain, insecure, cowardly man like Gaius Baltar for His design precisely to ensure this kind of reaction. But what Six hadn't counted on was God wanting a laugh or two at her expense along the way.
How else could one explain the coincidence of Gaeta happening to already worship Gaius so much that he'd let the man tie him to a bed and frak him, even though the prospect unnerved him each time?
The first time the two of them slept together, Six hadn't paid much attention, because it was clearly supposed to be nothing more than a casual frak, an opportunity to release some tension. With Adama in a coma and the Galactica in chaos, the Commander's right-hand man had taken charge and he was none too pleased with Gaius for his failed Cylon detector. After the Starbuck debacle, Gaius had welcomed the chance for corporeal sex again - with someone who was emotionally safe this time - and Six never begrudged him that opportunity. But with increasing disbelief, Six had witnessed how the uptight little junior grade officer lent an eagerly sympathetic ear to Gaius' complaints about Tigh's gruffness, about the pressure Gaius was under ever since returning from Kobol, and about how he'd been awarded three Magnates, thank you very much, and was deserving of some consideration.
Gaeta's slavish devotion had taken root in Gaius' mind, and grew and grew, until it became an overplanted patch of begonias in the back yard of Gaius' soul. Soon, Six saw how Gaius was attached to Felix Gaeta in ways that even he could not articulate.
“I am not falling in love with Felix Gaeta,” he'd insisted drily the first time Six had accused him, more or less just to provoke him, but she'd been surprised by just how defensively he'd responded. “He's just a convenient frak.”
But Gaius forgets that his thoughts are her thoughts and that she would know he isn't entirely telling the truth. It's true that Gaius isn't in love with the man. He doesn't yet know what love is really, nor how truly to give of himself in that way. Still, the more Gaius has lost control over his own destiny, the more and more interest Six has noticed him display in tying Gaeta up and asserting dominance. The more times he has invited the man into his bed, the more wary he has became of her. It troubles her.
Curiously, Gaeta struggles mentally against the rope. Every single time.
He began this affair with Gaius with no particular interest in losing control in or out of the bedroom, devoted as he is to his world being in order at all times. Every time Gaius moves to tie him up, Six can just about smell the initial whiff of animal panic Gaeta always makes himself suppress. Gaius is oblivious, of couse. But it's become clear to Six that Gaeta is struggling to overcome his need for control in order to please Gaius.
As little as she likes Gaeta, she has to admit she's impressed by the discipline he imposes upon himself, all for Gaius' benefit.
”You're hardly deserving of such devotion, you know,” she'd told him irritably.
***
The smell of stale cigarette smoke hangs in the air of Colonial One for hours as the three men in suit jackets try to sort out how to get a concrete apartment complex built.
“This would be a whole lot easier if you'd just kiss and make up with Adama,” Zarek says, in a voice thick with frustration. This is the the third hour they've spent hunched over maps and proposals.
He walks over to the end table where a half bottle of ambrosia remains. “We're never going to find the materials for concrete without his help.”
“As long as you're going over there, Tom, bring that bottle over,” Gaius orders with just a hint of slurring to his words. “I could use another drink myself.”
When Gaius isn't looking, Six notices Vice-President of the Colonies Tom Zarek roll his eyes as he dutifully brings back the alcohol and rests it on the presidential desk with a thud. Gaeta notices it too, and he looks over to Gaius with a barely perceptible, worried frown. Gaius merely is glad to see the amber liquid and pours another hearty glass for himself.
“Surely there must be some way we can make this happen without those Raptors,” he announces vaguely to his team. “We've been sitting here for hours. We're educated men.”
“We've considered every possibility, sir,” Gaeta says in a quiet, infinitely patient voice Six has been hearing him use more and more with Gaius outside of the bedroom. “We can't get this done any other way.”
“I'm not going begging to Adama for Raptors,” Gaius insists. “He's made it abundantly clear that he has no respect whatsover for the office of the President unless it happens to be occupied by someone named Roslin.”
“Gaius,” Zarek intervenes. “Just because the man lost his temper...”
“Tom, the man called me a stuffed shirt! I'm his frakking superior officer. I don't have to take that from him.” He takes another swig of his drink. “Besides, you heard the man. He's prioritizing the search for food, despite the fact our agricultural program is up and running.”
“I'm not saying you have to actually like the man,” Zarek protests. “I can't stand him myself. But maybe if you make nice with him, stroke his ego a little, maybe we can convince him to give up a few Raptors for a couple of weeks. That should be enough. Seriously, Gaius, winter is coming. People are going to start dying if we don't build some real housing for them.”
“Oh, don't be melodramatic, Tom. The meterological reports have been inconclusive,” Gaius scoffs, inspecting Zarek and Gaeta's faces for disloyalty. “We don't really know what kind of weather the winter season will bring. You said that yourself, Mister Gaeta.”
Gaeta looks like he wishes he'd never said that as he watches Gaius gesticulate with the sloshing glass of ambrosia.
“I'm telling you,” Gaius continues, “we have to stand firm against Adama, or else he'll learn that he can hold the need for resources over our head whenever he wants...”
“What do you mean learn?” Zarek cuts him off, his pitch strained. “He's doing that now! And you're only encouraging him more by engaging him in this pissing contest!”
Zarek takes another sip off his drink, an angry one.
“If you'll excuse me, gentlemen,” he says tersely, “I'm going to use the head.”
Gaius glares at Zarek's back as the man exits to the bedroom toilet and slams the door behind him. He turns to Gaeta with narrowed eyes. “What the frak has gotten into him today?”
Gaeta grimaces more openly this time. “He's right, Gaius. We really need those Raptors if we're going to have any hope of finding ingredients we need for concrete on this planet. We don't have a choice on this one.”
Gaius rises up from the chair, draining his glass. Six can tell what he has in mind already, although Gaeta hasn't spotted it yet. His breath reeks of ambrosia as he takes advantage of Gaeta's momentary inattention to grab the man's body with possesive hands and hurtle them backward together. In surprise, Gaeta finds himself pinned to a wall behind the desk, Gaius' mouth on his throat.
“We have those geological survey charts Galactica drew up when we first found New Caprica,” he points out, his voice breathy against Gaeta's earlobe.
Gaeta melts under the assualt, but manages to choke out. “Not good enough. Those were taken from orbit. They can't tell us more than generalities-” He jerks his wrists uselessly against Gaius' grip and takes in a sharp, nervous breath. “This is not a good time, Gaius. Vice-President Zarek is right in the other room.”
Even though his body yields to Gaius' advances, his words are rapid-fire and emphatic. Six almost finds herself feeling bad for Gaeta. Almost.
Gaius kisses under his chin, unrepentant. “Relax, Felix. So what if he sees us? Who do you think he'd tell?” His lips move to Gaeta's mouth, getting down to business. “And we can make do with the charts,” he whispers. “Anything's better than letting Adama get away with strong-arming my presidency.”
He kisses Gaeta deeply. Six watches Gaeta squirm and then his eyes roll back with a muffled sigh. But he eventually gains the resolve to pull his mouth away. His wrists jerk against Gaius' grip in panicky indignation.
“Gaius!” he hisses. “Zarek will be back any minute!” He wrenches his way to freedom, and the two them stare at each other, both of them half-hard, their breaths rasping with desire. Felix forces himself to stand up straighter.
“Without the high-powered sensors on those Raptors, we might as well be drilling blind,” he lectures. “Are you seriously telling me that you would rather go on a wild goose chase and have people dying in their tents of exposure rather than compromise on a political showdown between you and the Old Man?”
Gaius pouts at the admonishment and looks away, his mood for conquest withered.
“The Old Man...” he says, resentment buried just under the surface. “You never have stopped being loyal to him, have you? Not even after you uncovered his and Roslin's little election fraud did the bloom of that rose fade, Felix?”
Felix sighs. “Gaius, I know Admiral Adama will agree to a compromise if you just give him an opening. He doesn't want anyone dying in the cold any more than we do.”
“I'm not talking to him anymore, you hear me? It's useless, and besides, I've had it up to here with his arrogance.”
“Please, Gaius. Let me talk to him. I know if you give me a chance, I can get this for us. I just need a meeting with him. I can make him see reason.”
Gaius reaches out to touch Felix's lips one last time, sighing with resignation at the sound of Zarek opening the head door. “I disagree, but whatever. If you want to try with him one last time, fine, you have my blessing.”
“I'll talk to him.” Six can hear the relief wash over Gaeta' s voice. A excited smile broadens over his entire face. “I know I can convince him to give us something.”
“Well, you're going to give me something.” Gaius' tone lowers to a murmur, playful and predatory. “Tonight, when I'm done for the day, I expect to find you in my bed, naked, ready for me with your wrists above your head, do you understand?”
Six watches how Gaeta swallows back a mixture of excitement and trepidation at the order. They've never mixed business with their love life before quite like this.
“Yes, sir,” he says, and Six can sense he feels a little odd about it. But before either of them can really react, Zarek re-enters and glances with surprise at how the two men are in such close proximity.
“I miss anything?” he says with half-formed suspicion in his eyes. The two other men pull away a more appropriate distance from each other, despite Gaius' bravado a minute earlier.
“Mister Gaeta here thinks he can smooth the way for a compromise with Adama,” Gaius reports, his tone subdued. “I'm going to send him as our emissary. He assures me he can convince Adama to give us enough Raptors to find the materials we need.”
Zarek's eyes widen. “What?” He looks from Gaius to Gaeta for confirmation. “Three and a half hours we've been sitting here arguing,” he said in disbelief. “I go to the head and you two settle it in five minutes?”
Gaius casts one last salacious smirk at Gaeta. “My chief-of-staff can be very persuasive,” he says with deadpan matter-of-factness, “when he tries.”
Gaeta avoids Zarek's gaze.
“Well, this is an unexpected development,” a being remarks with an exact copy of Gaius' voice, appearing beside Six as she watches. “When did this start?”
Gaius' doppleganger points to Gaeta and Gaius, who are unable to stop casting glances at each other every minute or so while Tom Zarek brings up other business of the day.
Six shrugs, her nonchalance affected. “What does it matter? Gaeta's going to eventually tire of Gaius' obsession with tying him up, and it'll be over soon anyway once your charge arrives, no?”
Her angelic counterpart's mouth twists. “Yes, I suppose that's true.” Six thinks he sounds distant, thoughtful. “He's sort of an odd one, isn't he?” he remarks, meaning Gaius.
Six laughs in the back of her throat. “Well he is you,” she quips, even though she knows that this couldn't be further from the truth. Gaius is nothing like this being, just like Six is very little like the Cylon Sixes. But it's something to say after all.
“He loves that other human, doesn't he?”
“Who? Gaeta?” she scoffs, then turns reflective. “He doesn't know what love is. He's far too scared of it just yet.”
Her counterpart blinks. “Well I suppose Mister Gaeta will have to be the brave one, then, won't he?” He caresses his chin in thought.
Six's face is overtaken by a distant smile that sounds like ice cubes tinkling in a glass. “What does that mean?”
His smile is deliberately vague. “Oh nothing,” he says, dismissing her question, but then adds a bit of intrigue. “Nothing really.”
Six gazes back at Gaius, who always forgets that she is watching always. He's staring at Gaeta, who is standing next to Zarek, trying be attentive, with his hands clasped demurely behind his back. Gaius is imagining taking those wrists in his hands without warning, ordering Gaeta not to move, then tying them together with one the silk ties he never wears anymore on New Caprica, because no one cares. Already, no one believes in the dream of New Caprica anymore except Gaius, Zarek and Gaeta. And Gaius is fast becoming a non-believer.
That's one of the problems with Gaius' species, Six reflects. They don't believe in much anymore. And so God brought them an apocalypse, to give them back something they could believe in, even if it's only themselves.
“Sometimes God's children have to be kicked out of Paradise to appreciate its value,” she muses.
“Oh please,” he retorts, suddenly sounding rather like Gaius for a moment. “You know very well He's hardly watching these days.”
She moves to respond, but he lifts a finger.
“If He was, would He have let things get to such a state? I think not. We're the mop-up crew, you know, trying to get them somewhere useful, evolutionarily speaking.”
Six snorts. “He's always had a plan in place. He has a plan for Gaius,” she insists. “And for yours too.” She changes the subject. “What are they calling her now?”
“Caprica-Six,” he supplies.
“Charming,” she quips, deadpan.
“Yes, that's what I said.”
A silence settles over them as they watch Gaeta place a surreptitiously exploring hand on the small of Gaius' back while Zarek is bent over a proposed union contract. Gaius startles, then smiles briefly at the unexpected flirtation before composing himself and commenting on a line in the paperwork. Zarek nods and Gaeta withdraws the hand. The moment is over almost as soon as it began.
“There's potential there,” Six's counterpart murmurs, nodding. Her eyes narrow.
“You have your orders,” she reminds him stiffly.
“Yes, yes, I know,” he replies with a smirk that is more mischievous than it should be.
Six wonders at it as the angel continues to watch Gaius and Gaeta with a pensive expression.
***
It's cold in Gaeta's tent. It's not the most discreet place for Gaius and Gaeta to rendezvous, and it's so unlike Gaius to venture out of his comfort zone on Colonial One. So it surprised Gaeta when he found an amorous Gaius lifting the flap to enter his tent so late in the night. But he did not resist.
They've reached the part of the night when Gaeta knows Gaius expects to tie him down. Six watches him fall into his usual discomfort with the idea. The way this usually goes is Gaeta quietly panics for a minute or two, then begins to calm and to resign himeslf to the idea until eventually he feels bliss.
This night, goes differently however.
“You seem restless, love,”
The perceptiveness towards his lover is unlike Gaius.
“Is everything all right?”
Gaeta goes still. “Well, uh...” He clearly doesn't know what to say. “Sure,” he lies.
But he finds this line of questioning not so simple to make go away.
“It's this, isn't it?” Gaeta's eyes follow his lover's hand picking up the rope sitting next to them on the sheets. He gestures with it in his hand. “Has this been bothering you all along?”
The look of dismay freezes on Gaeta's face, and Six watches him struggle for words. He clutches at the blanket on top of them and twists it around in his hand. “Look, Gaius...” he falters. “...it's just a reflexive thing, I ...” His gaze casts about helplessly.
“You don't like it when we do this?”
“No, no, Gaius, that's not it.” Gaeta's voice strains with burgeoning worry. “I always end up loving it, I do. It's amazing. I love to let go like that. It's just that at first … at first, it's … um ...” He squints with discomfort.
“You find it difficult to submit to me,” he finishes for him.
Gaeta closes his eyes in embarrassment. But then he feels hands touching him, pushing through his hair and he sighs with pleasure. “Only when we start,” he makes a blind confesson.
“It's nothing to do with you personally,” he adds quickly, but his mouth is soon overtaken by affectionate kisses. When his lover comes up for air, he draws the silken rope gently, sensually across Gaeta's chest, eliciting a barely perceptible moan.
“Felix, love, this is only good for me if you're enjoying it. You're too sexy to be panicking underneath me like that.” he smiles. “But if you really enjoy this ritual, we can find ways to acclimate you to the rope, if that's what you want.”
Gaeta leans up and plants an impulsive kiss on his mouth. Six can tell he is touched by the consideration, the new gentleness. “I didn't think you realized.”
“We'll take it slow,” his lover promises, proffering the rope before him. “As slow as you need.”
Gaeta smiles with greater confidence than Six has seen before at these moments when the rope comes out. He offers up his wrists. They are enveloped with something not unlike affection and care.
They're actually kind of beautiful together, Six thinks.
“Too bad none of that was real,” Six tells her angelic counterpart a few hours later as he's walking out of the tent into the dawn's light. “You're just getting his hopes up about Gaius.”
He straightens the creases of his suit as the two of them stand outside of the tent No one can see them right now anyway, not even Gaeta anymore.
“You can't deny what that did for his confidence, though. He'll approach Gaius differently now,” he tells her, “Gaius is attracted to confidence. He'll respect Gaeta more.”
“You think that's really going to make a difference?” She raises her eyebrows. “Why are you doing this anyway? It won't last even one of their human years. Why bother?”
One of the privileges of being an angel is that one can close off one's mind to anyone - even other angels - so Six must wait for an answer.
“Gaeta is working so hard for this dream,” he says, his hands casting about to indicate the tents surrounded by cold and mud. “He deserves something.”
“Caprica-Six supposed to be arriving here in just barely one of their years,” she reminds him. “Shouldn't you be focusing on what's good for her?”
He rubs his hands together as if to warm up, even though he doesn't feel the cold. “Who says this isn't good for her?” he challenges. “And besides, any plan that might make your charge into a better person I should think you'd be pleased with.”
Six shakes her head. “Gaeta's not part of God's plan.”
He smiles, his response untroubled, declarative.
“I think God's plan can survive a little tinkering,” he says.
***
The two angels watch as Gaeta shows Gaius his rough sketches for a proposed power plant.
“I know we'll need to seek out real architects and engineers to actually design this thing,” Gaeta is saying with the excitement of a child who has just discovered the powerful rush that comes with building something. “But I couldn't sleep last night and so I drew up this conceptual design. See I was thinking about how we were so concerned about being dependent on Galactica regarding the Raptors. So it occurred to me that we were going to face the same problem all over again if we count on our power plant running on tylium to generate- ”
Gaius nods, swiveling in his chair slightly and eyeing the bedroom door for a single, distracted moment, then tries to refocus on his chief of staff. But it's clear to Six (if not to Gaeta yet) that Gaius isn't particularly interested in this line of discussion right now.
The apocalypse left humanity few hobbies with which to occupy itself, and coming down to New Caprica has only magnified the problem (although there had been a decently-sized uptick in the amount of pyramid courts since coming planetside, Six had noticed). Sex very quickly became one of the few enjoyable pursuits left to many humans, and Gaius is no exception to that rule.
At the moment, Six knows, Gaius is imagining what it would be like to march Gaeta into that bedroom over there and order him to strip in front of him, kneel before the rising erection Gaius is getting right now just from thinking about it, and bring him to orgasm.
To his credit, Gaius does try his damndest to focus. It's clear that he likes the sound of Gaeta's voice when he's in his element, truly passionate about something, anything. His eyes brighten, his speech gets quicker, he's more confident of his opinions, even with Gaius.
Which is why Gaius especially loves to dominate him when he's gotten like this. It presents more of a challenge.
“Aren't we putting the cart before the horse just a bit here?” he suggests, and Six rolls her eyes as she listens to Gaius' tone warming up to the chase. “We don't even have a lick of actual paved street yet.”
He grabs Gaeta's wrist, holding tight and boring his gaze into Gaeta's. “I love this idea, Mister Gaeta, I really do. You're right. It'll keep us out from under Adama's thumb.”
He pauses, circling around the inside of Gaeta's wrist, a familiar gesture between them that makes Gaius' train of thought unmistakable. This is one of those moments when Six marvels at how Gaius managed to become such a successful scientist. His work ethic has hardly ever been up to par - really only when he's been motivated by having something to prove or else intrigued by a truly innovative idea.
“But I must admit I'm having trouble concentrating on it ever since I noticed a perfectly lovely hour-long window in the day's agenda.”
“A window?” Gaeta cocks his head and glances over at their schedule on his clipboard, which is hardly ever far from his hands.
“Oh yes, that's right,” he confirms. “The Leonis representative had to cancel his meeting at the last minute. Apparently he's sick.”
“I think we should take advantage of that little deus ex machina, don't you?” Gaius not so much suggests this as demands it, eyeing the bedroom door much more obviously this time. “I think it would be criminal not to use such an unexpected and rare gift of free time in the middle of the day for a well-deserved break, don't you?”
“Break?” Gaeta says like it's a untranslatable word from one of the dead languages of Kobol.
“Yes,” Gaius says with just the correct amount of petulance. “A break, Felix.” His thumb moves up the inside of Gaeta's forearm in slow, circling caresses, his fingers burrowing themselves up into the sleeve of Gaeta's jacket. “In honor of our fallen colleague from Leonis.”
Gaeta's eyebrows raise. “That's total bullshit, Gaius.” But Gaius hears the slang and the buried interest there and pursues it.
“Hmmph, terribly mouthy,” he mock lectures. “Good thing I enjoy that sort of thing from you.” He treats Gaeta to a lascivious grin. “It makes your inevitable submission all the sweeter.”
“Yeah, but I likeit.” Gaeta drops all pretense with a knowing grin of his own, willfully keeping something of himself from Gaius' command a bit longer. “That must be terribly frustrating for you,” he teases.
Gaius yanks Gaeta close, pressing their lips together, parting Gaeta's mouth open for a good long taste of his soon-to-be sweet, pliant Felix.
To Six's shock, she catches just a glimpse of Gaius' thoughts as they kiss. He's imagining asking Felix to move into Colonial One with him. It's just a passing thought, one that Gaius ruthlessly pushes down and dismisses.
“In the bedroom, now.” He attempts a authoritarian tone, but the whisper comes out husky and lustful instead. They have an hour, but Gaius will be done long before that, given the erection tenting his expensive, black trousers.
“When I walk in there,” he adds, pushing himself into full domination mode, “I will find you on my bed, lying on your back, positioned in the usual way. Any questions?”
Gaeta gasps inwardly at the tone of command, but he sneaks a glance at Gaius, who can't keep the pleased grin off his face.
“No, sir,” he says, bowing his head with submission, hiding a smile at the excitement to come. Without another word, he disappears into the bedroom, hands folded respectfully behind his back, shutting the door with a gentle kick of his shoe. Gaius stares pensively at the closed door for a minute or two.
“See?”
The male angelic voice would fill the room with its dulcet tones if human ears could hear it, or if it technically speaking, had a voice. But it doesn't, and his female colleague is the only one to hear him.
“You can't deny the transformation,” he insists.
“Hmm...” Six replies, unwilling to concede her defeat in words.
The two angels watch Gaius as he undoes his belt buckle with a leisurely pace, reaching for his cock and caressing it with feather-light strokes, readying himself, all the while still staring at the door with a distant, troubled gaze.
“He's falling for him,” Gaius' angelic counterpart says with a note of triumph. “I knew all it would take was some strength on Gaeta's part.” Six glares at his self-satisfied grin.
“It's just going to break his heart all the more when Gaius disappoints him,” she concludes, shaking her head. Her platinum ringlets seem to reflect off the overhead lights, powered by generators that soon will run out of tylium. “And then she will arrive, and then this little game of yours is over.”
“Oh really?” he asks slyly. “How do you know he won't choose Gaeta over her when the time comes?”
Six's eyes narrow with disbelief. “Are you joking? Gaius is destined to be with her, remember?”
“You forget about free will,” he waggles a remonstrative finger at her. “Free will is what got us here in the first place, trying to clean up this mess at the last minute.”
“True.” Even Six has to reluctantly acknowledge the power of free will, though she still has trouble understanding why God invented it. “But there is no way you can tell me that Gaius will choose that little man. Not when Caprica Six is available.”
Six crosses her arms as they both watch Gaius open the door and walk into the bedroom with a sense of anticipation. With dismay, Six listens to his thoughts and hears the echo chamber of his mind's obsession with Gaeta. His thoughts weren't like this before.
“A year,” she would have said a moment ago. “You know they only have a year.” But her angelic colleague raises a disturbing possibility Six had not considered, only because she refuses to imagine a day when all her work could come to naught, all thanks to something as random as free will. She's refused up until now to consider the possibility that one day she will have to explain why Gaius Baltar is sleeping with a man God barely notices, instead of with the handpicked Cylon who is supposed to help him save humans and Cylons from mutual self-destruction.
“This isn't just some game for you,” she accuses, her words slow and halting as she realizes what he's been up to. “You don't want Caprica Six to be with Gaius at all, do you?”
He won't meet her gaze, looking as close to sheepish as an angel can possibly manage.
“She's preoccupied with him,” he grumbles quietly. “I'm teaching her about guilt and remorse and empathy, all according to His plan, but she filters it all through some ideal image of Gaius and his supposedly superior human example, and how she didn't measure up to it.”
He indicates the bedroom door with his head. “I half suspect she wouldn't even listen to me if it weren't for the fact that I look and sound just like him.”
Six shrugs. “It's the way of it,” she commiserates. “It took Gaius months at first to decide that I wasn't a chip in his head, and almost a year to believe that I wasn't a ghost.”
“But we don't have to settle for that. That's my point. We can- ”
“I know your point,” she cuts him off. “But I'll tell you what the real the point for us is - what it always is.”
He already knows what she will say. She pushes back her bangs with a heavy sigh.
“The point is that this ...” She indicates the closed door where they can hear the excited sounds of foreplay. “... is not God's will. You would do well to remember that.”
Silence falls between them like a light suddenly going out. A sullenness settles into his gaze, overtaking his usual expression of perpetual amusement.
“She is better off without Gaius,” he eventually says, unwilling to let it go. “She's stronger and more able to grow on her own. If she comes here and reunites with him, she will learn nothing.”
“You don't know that,” she replies with firm certainty. “As you said, she has free will, just like they all do. There's no way to predict what she will get out of coming here. Besides, this isn't about what she needs. This is about the needs of two whole species. It's about what He knows is best for the many, not for any one individual.”
Her angelic counterpart crosses his arms defensively. “You're not going to go running to Him with this, are you?”
Her smile is all barbed wire and broken glass as she looks down and checks her nails pointlessly - they never grow or break..
“As if I knew how to find Him,” she huffs.
He shrugs. “I suppose.”
***
The heavy scent of cigarrillo smoke competes with the spiced aromas of homemade candles burning in Gaeta's tent as the two men in Gaeta's bed share a post-coital smoke.
Or rather, Gaeta smokes. The angel with Gaius' visage however, holds his cigarrillo just the way Gaius would, with a leisurely triangular grip of his forefinger, index finger and thumb. He sighs with decadent pleasure, just the way Gaeta expects.
Six stands at the foot of the bed, with one knee bent atop the mattress. “This mucking about in human sensation is beneath you,” she sneers.
He blows a lazy smoke ring at her image, the back of his head resting quite convincingly in the crook of Gaeta's arm. “If I didn't know you better,” he says quietly, “I'd think you were feeling sorry for poor Mister Gaeta.”
He shifts on his side, the tiny cigar held gracefully behind his head, and looks deeply into Gaeta's eyes. “But of course you aren't,” he finishes, unbeknownst to his partner.
Gaeta, who is of course oblivous to this conversation, merely smiles at him with pleased surprise, then squirms a bit under the focused attention. He takes a drag off his own little cigar as he feels the heat of the angel's gaze.
“What?” he asks, his self-conscious laugh stuck in the back of his throat.
The angel blinks back. “You've become quite the addiction, you know, ” he says.
The statement has a convincing, subdued air of confession. Six considers asking him if it's true.
She sits on the bed, delicately positioned between the two sprawled-out bodies instead.
“Gaius doesn't feel this way about him,” she accuses, although she knows she doesn't sound as convincing as she'd like to.
Gaeta, meanwhile, snorts. “Addiction?” He ruffles his lover's hair, hair he never seems to notice stays perfectly in place.
The angel looks briefly away from Gaeta and cocks his head at Six. “Now you know yourself that that's not true,” he tells her matter-of-factly.
“I would know,” she declares in a clipped tone. “I know everything he knows.”
“Then you're deliberately not paying attention,” he concludes.
He turns back to Gaeta, his voice gentler. “I suppose I sound ridiculous, don't I?” he apologizes.
“Yes, you do,” she sneers. “You're liking this too much.”
“No, no,” Gaeta's voice backpedals in surprise, thinking he's hurt a vulnerable spot. He sighs. “I guess I just wasn't expecting you to say that.” He buries his head into the angel's neck and kisses it. “I love you, Gaius,” he says.
The angel's face unfolds into a pleased smile.
“You don't have to say you love me back,” Gaeta adds quickly, his eyes glancing upward to hunt his lover's expression. “I don't need that. Not now. Not until you're really ready to say it, if you're ever ready to say it. I don't want you to ever lie about it. But it's how I feel, and I just want you to know that.”
The angel stares at Gaeta for a long, wavering moment. The human is comfortable, confident, only slightly nervous at his admission. He caresses Gaeta's jawline with what looks to Six like genuine affection. “I don't deserve you, Felix,” he says softly.
“This is cruel,” Six shakes her head. But the other angel remains unconvinced.
“He was going to make Gaius his whole world before I came along. Look at how he's changed,” he says. “And whether you choose to see it or not, Gaius has changed too. He protects Gaeta from you now.”
“You're getting too involved in their lives,” she accuses, “too involved in … all of this.”
In her frustration, she gestures wildly around at the objects in the tent. But really she means the carnality, the mundanity of it.
“These humans have a destiny they're meant to fulfill,” she lectures, “one with which your games are interfering.”
“Destiny is overrated,” he retorts, and pushes his human lover down on his back. Gaeta smiles into the firm, commanding kiss on the way down.
“And besides,” he murmurs at her between kisses, “since He isn't even watching, I don't see why we can't have a bit of say in how it all turns out.”
***
The months pass.
It's Founder's Day, and people feel obligated to throw a party, even though there isn't much to celebrate these days.
But before there can be celebrations of any kind, there is first business.
Gaeta points to the signature lines with a quiet, professional, “Here, Sir. And here, here, here and here.” Six knows that Gaius is not really interested in what the documents say. Constellations of them have crossed his desk at this point, and they still haven't managed to build homes. The crops are failing too, which Six knows holds the most poignant weight for Gaius because he'd insisted on supervising the planning of that project.
At anyone's most generous estimate, they'll be able to hold out for a month or two in the winter before they'll have to go running to Adama, who will no doubt gloat about the fact that he was right about prioritizing his Raptors with searching for planets with existing, harvestable food. Six knows that just picturing the superior expression in Adama's eyes makes Gaius' temples ache.
Oblivious to her presence, Gaius gently snatches at Gaeta's wrist while his chief of staff is gathering the papers in front of him, hoping for a distraction. “Not so fast,” he teases, with a thrill at the forbidden that annoys Six. The door is shut, he tells himself, as he makes tiny circles along Gaeta's wrist with his thumb; he can take a little risk.
“Are we still on for dinner, Mister Gaeta?”
Gaeta shudders as Gaius continues the stroking and asks slyly, “I don't suppose you'd tell me what's on the menu?”
He manages to say in an even tone, with an innocent smile no less: “That would ruin the surprise, Gaius.”
Gaius should really know better by now, Six thinks, blinking furiously at the two of them. Does he really think she doesn't know how close he was just now to telling Gaeta he loved him?
“I hate to say I told you so, darling,” the smug, angelic voice breaks through her thoughts, now standing beside her. “But I did. He loves Gaeta, in his own way. He just holds back from telling him.”
“He holds back from telling him because he doesn't actually love him,” Six insists. “But after destroying nearly all of humanity, Gaius wants to believe in something. What do you think Gina was about? What do you think this planet was all about?” She sniffs. “Gaeta is just another convenient target.”
But the other angel notices with a bit of amazement that she can no longer look him in the eye as she says this. He cocks his head for a long moemnt.
“Well then, all the more reason for me not to turn my charge over to him, right? The last thing she needs to be is yet another sop to his guilty conscience.” The angel shakes his head, indicating Gaius, who, as if he heard, looks around warily.
“Look at that,” her counterpart clucks. “Didn't I tell you? Look how he's trying to protect Gaeta.”
Six rolls her eyes.
“I tell you, he's carved out a special place for him in his heart, darling.” He uses Gaius' standard term of affection with ironic satisfaction. “Just to the right of yours.”
Gaeta, meanwhile, adds, “I won't spoil your surprise, Gaius, but believe me, you will like it,” he promises.
”Oh absolutely you will like it,” she whispers, even though she has no idea what Gaeta actually has planned.
Gaius startles at her sudden appearance in his peripheral view. “You won't appreciate it, but you will like it.”
Meanwhile, her angelic counterpart quirks a mocking eyebrow at her. “Now who's getting too emotionally involved?”
Six turns to hiss at him, but her eyes narrow and she's soon distracted by Gaius handing Gaeta lube and convincing him to undo his belt, even as Gaeta playfully grumbles: “You have a speech in an hour. We don't have time for this.”
“You have to admit they find each other pretty irresistible,” the angel's pleased voice tickles at her ear. “Anyone could walk in right now and catch them.”
Six's annoyance grows as she watches the two men falling upon each other. Too soon for her liking, Gaius turns oblivious to her presence and focuses completely on Gaeta. She will arrive in only a few more months, and Six is no longer sure the damage to the path of Gaius' destiny is reversible..
“You always were a selfish bastard,” she complains as she watches them..
Both Gaius and his doppelganger give her a brief, wan smile at the insult.
***
The angel who looks and sounds just like Gaius watches Gaeta with curiosity as he enters the makeshift temple on the south side of New Caprica City. A moment ago, he'd been about to get Gaeta's attention when he saw the man stop by the tent, think a moment, then take a resolute step inside.
The tent is dimly lit with candles everywhere. The priestess is in the back of the tent, a short, red-haired woman who looks slightly too emaciated for the fine gold robes that engulf her rail-like body. meditating in contemplative repose. Her eyes open calmly. Her smile is beatific..
“So you're ready?” she asks simply. Gaeta eyes the several feet of loose, red-dyed rope in her hand with mostly real bravado. He nods.
The angel spying on him now begins to understand what Gaeta meant earlier today, what he's up to in coming here.
“So you realize that this ritual has had thousands of people perfecting it over hundreds of thousands of years,” the priestess warns him. “It's evolved into a very complex system of binding the subject that'll take about an hour with two of my acolytes helping. You'll be just about totally immobilized until the person to whom you're offering yourself finds you. That's what makes it an act of devotion, you see.”
Gaeta swallows and nods. “I understand,” he says in a quiet voice. “I'm ready for it.”
“Huh,” the angel clucks to himself absently. “Surprise, Gaius. You had better appreciate this.”
“He won't.” Six's voice filters in lazily. Naturally, neither Gaeta nor the priestess can hear her.
Gaius' doppelganger holds back a smile. “He might,” he counters.
There is a long silence. Then, to his surprise, a concession. “He might,” she admits.
They watch Gaeta haggling with the priestess over the rope in her hand. He's insisting on absolute secrecy before he'll take them to where he wants to be bound - Gaius' bedroom on Colonial One. He's also demanding gold ropes, saying something about how only gold will do for tonight.
“Gaeta knows Gaius even better than he realizes,” Six admits reluctantly, watching him conversing with the priestess with utter determination. “This act of devotion will bind Gaius to him all the more tightly. For all his ego, Gaius doesn't expect people to actually care about him. He and Gaeta aren't all that different in that way.”
The other angel nods. They watch Gaeta leave the temple with the priestess and her acolytes. Gaeta has been victorious and they proceed towards Colonial One in the twilight with large amounts of gold silk rope carried in boxes . The Founder's Day revelers in the distance are far too drunk to notice this sober little pilgrimage making its way along in the shadows.
“You really think they'll make it?” Six asks philosophically, meaning Gaius and Gaeta. The two angels walk arm in arm towards an encampment of noisy Founder's Day revelers. She seems in a melancholy, open mood. Not unlike Gaius, she too seems to be softening, at least for one night.
“That's the beauty of free will, darling, isn't it?” he says waggishly, squeezing their non-existent hands together as they walk unhindered amongst a boisterous swath of of their charges playing drinking games. “Who can tell?”
remix author: millari
Summary: She has refused up until now to consider the possibility that one day she will have to explain why Gaius Baltar is sleeping with a man God barely notices, instead of with the handpicked Cylon who is supposed to help him save the humans and Cylons from mutual self-destruction.”
Characters: Head!Six, Head!Baltar, Gaeta, Baltar, Zarek
Pairings: Baltar/Gaeta
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: Bondage, dominance/submission themes
Title, Author and URL of original story: Dinner Date by lorrainemarker I hope you like it, Lorraine!
The unmistakable whimpers of desire fill the small bedroom in Colonial One.
Six watches, invisibly perched on the headboard, cross-legged and stork-like, as Gaius sat upright in the center of the Presidential bed, the dawn light streaking through the small porthole windows and falling scattered across his naked body. At the moment, her charge is bent forward and cross-legged, kissing his equally naked chief-of-staff, Felix Gaeta.
They have been hiding this side of their relationship from the rest of the world for a long time now, since they were living on Galactica.
“You know, you are a great kisser,” Gaeta says breathlessly as they part for air. Gaius smiles with self-satisfaction and ruffles a hand affectionately through Gaeta's hair as he pushes him backward onto the bed and kisses him some more, his hand drifting down to Gaeta's groin.
“I am, aren't I?” he quips, only partly meaning it as a joke. Six is sure that a large part of the appeal of Gaeta is the way the man constantly strokes Gaius' ego. “You're rather lucky I found you then, wouldn't you say?”
To Gaeta's credit (which Six awards only begrudgingly), the young man rolls his eyes at that and shakes his head. He pulls Gaius onto him and traces his finger along Gaius' jawbone.
“I sometimes can't believe how fate worked us out, you know,” he says with wonder in his voice. “To think that I'm sleeping with the guy I used to watch on the wireless in high school...”
Gaius cries out with mock indignation. You make me sound like some decrepit old man!” he complains.
Gaeta grins with delight at how he's gotten to Gaius' vanity, but his lover soon wipes the victorious expression off his face. Gaius has begun palming Gaeta's cock with slow, sure strokes, gradually tightening his grip and falling into a splendid, leisurely pace that makes makes Gaeta's eyes widen and his whole frame shudder, openmouthed. The excited whimpers start again and Gaius' mouth falls upon his again.
Six sighs with annoyance.
She has never taken to Gaeta, and she never will. She decided this long ago, ever since Gaius had turned his eye towards the small, unremarkable young soldier. From the first time she'd seen him, following after Gaius like a spaniel, jabbering excitedly about biogenetics, Six had seen that Gaeta was insignificant. He was not part of God's plan.
And yet (perhaps for this very reason) Gaius has insisted on carrying on a relationship with him, a relationship much longer than the ones with any of the women Six has watched revolve in and out of his life - Starbuck, Gina, other nameless female conquests who came and went with Gaius forgetting their names almost instantly. But Gaeta has held some frustratingly effective difference for Gaius, even after he'd broken up with Gaeta temporarily for Gina. Not counting that hiatus in their relationship, Gaius has been with Gaeta now almost as long as he spent with that Cylon on Caprica, the one God actually intended him for.
When this fact bothers her, Six amuses herself with the idea that Gaius carries on the relationship as an act of petulant rebellion against her, and by extension, God's plan for him. God has a plan for Gaius. She's been told that much, even if He doesn't see fit to inform her on all the details just yet. And whatever that plan is, it can't possibly involve this unimportant human with whom Gaius has inexplicably entwined himself. For she knows that soon Six's human manifestation will appear, taking over New Caprica with her Cylon siblings and rendering Felix Gaeta to nothing more than a blip on the DRADIS screen of Gaius' universe. Her counterpart is busy on old Caprica making sure that happens.
“Have you thought about what it will do him once you tire of Gaeta and toss him aside?”
She shimmers into visibilty for Gaius. Her petty enjoyment at the way he startles is an admitted weakness on her part, and probably not becoming an angel of God. But she figures she can afford a weak moment once in a while. It's not as if God is always watching, no matter what she tells Gaius.
He can't avoid going stiff with residual fear when she appears so suddenly like this, but he has learned how to resolutely avoid her gaze by now.
“Toss him aside?” He stops his kisses, but keeps up the strokes, his voice dripping with a quiet sarcasm that only Six can hear. “Oh, do you mean the way you tossed me aside?”
He's referring to Gina. And her, the one on Caprica. Gaius has this habit of seeing all of Six's human doppelgangers as an extension of her. Which she supposes they are, in a way. And she supposes that if she squints hard enough, metaphorically speaking, she can see how from Gaius' perspective, they all betrayed him, not the other way around.
She stretches forward, leonine in her movements, and waggles an admonishing finger at him. “You might as well get rid of him sooner rather than later, Gaius. You don't appreciate him enough anyway.”
As if to spite her, Gaius speeds up the pace, his body naked and hunched over Gaeta, shutting her out. Below him, Felix's orgasm spurts out and his shivering cries echo loudly into the dawn.
***
Gaius foolishly forgets that Six is privy to his thoughts, all his thoughts.
And so he thinks she doesn't notice that what binds him to Felix Gaeta is what literally binds Felix Gaeta to him.
Gaius loves to tie Gaeta up, to watch him give total control over to Gaius - which at first puzzled Six, because she knows from experience how willing, no, how eager he is to be dominated himself. Gaius' first real love back on Caprica, the one who has been recently given the moniker of a destroyer, used to keep him in thrall that way. Oh, he'd never admit to wanting something so obvious as to be restrained or to be made to feel small in any way. But he did like the overwhelming feeling of a strong sexual partner taking control of the situation - throwing him roughly onto the bed, stripping his clothes off in a rush, smothering him with openmouthed kisses. Really, the trick with Gaius is to dominate him without calling it that. His lover on Caprica had had that trick down cold, her angelic version had noted with approval.
Gaius has always loved giving up control in the bedroom, but Gaeta has sparked something quite unexpected opposite in him, something Six thinks she should have seen coming but didn't.
After the apocalypse, the more Gaius' life spun out of control, the more he would reach out in desperation for a lifeline. She had predicted that, had in fact counted on that. She'd assumed that God had picked a vain, insecure, cowardly man like Gaius Baltar for His design precisely to ensure this kind of reaction. But what Six hadn't counted on was God wanting a laugh or two at her expense along the way.
How else could one explain the coincidence of Gaeta happening to already worship Gaius so much that he'd let the man tie him to a bed and frak him, even though the prospect unnerved him each time?
The first time the two of them slept together, Six hadn't paid much attention, because it was clearly supposed to be nothing more than a casual frak, an opportunity to release some tension. With Adama in a coma and the Galactica in chaos, the Commander's right-hand man had taken charge and he was none too pleased with Gaius for his failed Cylon detector. After the Starbuck debacle, Gaius had welcomed the chance for corporeal sex again - with someone who was emotionally safe this time - and Six never begrudged him that opportunity. But with increasing disbelief, Six had witnessed how the uptight little junior grade officer lent an eagerly sympathetic ear to Gaius' complaints about Tigh's gruffness, about the pressure Gaius was under ever since returning from Kobol, and about how he'd been awarded three Magnates, thank you very much, and was deserving of some consideration.
Gaeta's slavish devotion had taken root in Gaius' mind, and grew and grew, until it became an overplanted patch of begonias in the back yard of Gaius' soul. Soon, Six saw how Gaius was attached to Felix Gaeta in ways that even he could not articulate.
“I am not falling in love with Felix Gaeta,” he'd insisted drily the first time Six had accused him, more or less just to provoke him, but she'd been surprised by just how defensively he'd responded. “He's just a convenient frak.”
But Gaius forgets that his thoughts are her thoughts and that she would know he isn't entirely telling the truth. It's true that Gaius isn't in love with the man. He doesn't yet know what love is really, nor how truly to give of himself in that way. Still, the more Gaius has lost control over his own destiny, the more and more interest Six has noticed him display in tying Gaeta up and asserting dominance. The more times he has invited the man into his bed, the more wary he has became of her. It troubles her.
Curiously, Gaeta struggles mentally against the rope. Every single time.
He began this affair with Gaius with no particular interest in losing control in or out of the bedroom, devoted as he is to his world being in order at all times. Every time Gaius moves to tie him up, Six can just about smell the initial whiff of animal panic Gaeta always makes himself suppress. Gaius is oblivious, of couse. But it's become clear to Six that Gaeta is struggling to overcome his need for control in order to please Gaius.
As little as she likes Gaeta, she has to admit she's impressed by the discipline he imposes upon himself, all for Gaius' benefit.
”You're hardly deserving of such devotion, you know,” she'd told him irritably.
***
The smell of stale cigarette smoke hangs in the air of Colonial One for hours as the three men in suit jackets try to sort out how to get a concrete apartment complex built.
“This would be a whole lot easier if you'd just kiss and make up with Adama,” Zarek says, in a voice thick with frustration. This is the the third hour they've spent hunched over maps and proposals.
He walks over to the end table where a half bottle of ambrosia remains. “We're never going to find the materials for concrete without his help.”
“As long as you're going over there, Tom, bring that bottle over,” Gaius orders with just a hint of slurring to his words. “I could use another drink myself.”
When Gaius isn't looking, Six notices Vice-President of the Colonies Tom Zarek roll his eyes as he dutifully brings back the alcohol and rests it on the presidential desk with a thud. Gaeta notices it too, and he looks over to Gaius with a barely perceptible, worried frown. Gaius merely is glad to see the amber liquid and pours another hearty glass for himself.
“Surely there must be some way we can make this happen without those Raptors,” he announces vaguely to his team. “We've been sitting here for hours. We're educated men.”
“We've considered every possibility, sir,” Gaeta says in a quiet, infinitely patient voice Six has been hearing him use more and more with Gaius outside of the bedroom. “We can't get this done any other way.”
“I'm not going begging to Adama for Raptors,” Gaius insists. “He's made it abundantly clear that he has no respect whatsover for the office of the President unless it happens to be occupied by someone named Roslin.”
“Gaius,” Zarek intervenes. “Just because the man lost his temper...”
“Tom, the man called me a stuffed shirt! I'm his frakking superior officer. I don't have to take that from him.” He takes another swig of his drink. “Besides, you heard the man. He's prioritizing the search for food, despite the fact our agricultural program is up and running.”
“I'm not saying you have to actually like the man,” Zarek protests. “I can't stand him myself. But maybe if you make nice with him, stroke his ego a little, maybe we can convince him to give up a few Raptors for a couple of weeks. That should be enough. Seriously, Gaius, winter is coming. People are going to start dying if we don't build some real housing for them.”
“Oh, don't be melodramatic, Tom. The meterological reports have been inconclusive,” Gaius scoffs, inspecting Zarek and Gaeta's faces for disloyalty. “We don't really know what kind of weather the winter season will bring. You said that yourself, Mister Gaeta.”
Gaeta looks like he wishes he'd never said that as he watches Gaius gesticulate with the sloshing glass of ambrosia.
“I'm telling you,” Gaius continues, “we have to stand firm against Adama, or else he'll learn that he can hold the need for resources over our head whenever he wants...”
“What do you mean learn?” Zarek cuts him off, his pitch strained. “He's doing that now! And you're only encouraging him more by engaging him in this pissing contest!”
Zarek takes another sip off his drink, an angry one.
“If you'll excuse me, gentlemen,” he says tersely, “I'm going to use the head.”
Gaius glares at Zarek's back as the man exits to the bedroom toilet and slams the door behind him. He turns to Gaeta with narrowed eyes. “What the frak has gotten into him today?”
Gaeta grimaces more openly this time. “He's right, Gaius. We really need those Raptors if we're going to have any hope of finding ingredients we need for concrete on this planet. We don't have a choice on this one.”
Gaius rises up from the chair, draining his glass. Six can tell what he has in mind already, although Gaeta hasn't spotted it yet. His breath reeks of ambrosia as he takes advantage of Gaeta's momentary inattention to grab the man's body with possesive hands and hurtle them backward together. In surprise, Gaeta finds himself pinned to a wall behind the desk, Gaius' mouth on his throat.
“We have those geological survey charts Galactica drew up when we first found New Caprica,” he points out, his voice breathy against Gaeta's earlobe.
Gaeta melts under the assualt, but manages to choke out. “Not good enough. Those were taken from orbit. They can't tell us more than generalities-” He jerks his wrists uselessly against Gaius' grip and takes in a sharp, nervous breath. “This is not a good time, Gaius. Vice-President Zarek is right in the other room.”
Even though his body yields to Gaius' advances, his words are rapid-fire and emphatic. Six almost finds herself feeling bad for Gaeta. Almost.
Gaius kisses under his chin, unrepentant. “Relax, Felix. So what if he sees us? Who do you think he'd tell?” His lips move to Gaeta's mouth, getting down to business. “And we can make do with the charts,” he whispers. “Anything's better than letting Adama get away with strong-arming my presidency.”
He kisses Gaeta deeply. Six watches Gaeta squirm and then his eyes roll back with a muffled sigh. But he eventually gains the resolve to pull his mouth away. His wrists jerk against Gaius' grip in panicky indignation.
“Gaius!” he hisses. “Zarek will be back any minute!” He wrenches his way to freedom, and the two them stare at each other, both of them half-hard, their breaths rasping with desire. Felix forces himself to stand up straighter.
“Without the high-powered sensors on those Raptors, we might as well be drilling blind,” he lectures. “Are you seriously telling me that you would rather go on a wild goose chase and have people dying in their tents of exposure rather than compromise on a political showdown between you and the Old Man?”
Gaius pouts at the admonishment and looks away, his mood for conquest withered.
“The Old Man...” he says, resentment buried just under the surface. “You never have stopped being loyal to him, have you? Not even after you uncovered his and Roslin's little election fraud did the bloom of that rose fade, Felix?”
Felix sighs. “Gaius, I know Admiral Adama will agree to a compromise if you just give him an opening. He doesn't want anyone dying in the cold any more than we do.”
“I'm not talking to him anymore, you hear me? It's useless, and besides, I've had it up to here with his arrogance.”
“Please, Gaius. Let me talk to him. I know if you give me a chance, I can get this for us. I just need a meeting with him. I can make him see reason.”
Gaius reaches out to touch Felix's lips one last time, sighing with resignation at the sound of Zarek opening the head door. “I disagree, but whatever. If you want to try with him one last time, fine, you have my blessing.”
“I'll talk to him.” Six can hear the relief wash over Gaeta' s voice. A excited smile broadens over his entire face. “I know I can convince him to give us something.”
“Well, you're going to give me something.” Gaius' tone lowers to a murmur, playful and predatory. “Tonight, when I'm done for the day, I expect to find you in my bed, naked, ready for me with your wrists above your head, do you understand?”
Six watches how Gaeta swallows back a mixture of excitement and trepidation at the order. They've never mixed business with their love life before quite like this.
“Yes, sir,” he says, and Six can sense he feels a little odd about it. But before either of them can really react, Zarek re-enters and glances with surprise at how the two men are in such close proximity.
“I miss anything?” he says with half-formed suspicion in his eyes. The two other men pull away a more appropriate distance from each other, despite Gaius' bravado a minute earlier.
“Mister Gaeta here thinks he can smooth the way for a compromise with Adama,” Gaius reports, his tone subdued. “I'm going to send him as our emissary. He assures me he can convince Adama to give us enough Raptors to find the materials we need.”
Zarek's eyes widen. “What?” He looks from Gaius to Gaeta for confirmation. “Three and a half hours we've been sitting here arguing,” he said in disbelief. “I go to the head and you two settle it in five minutes?”
Gaius casts one last salacious smirk at Gaeta. “My chief-of-staff can be very persuasive,” he says with deadpan matter-of-factness, “when he tries.”
Gaeta avoids Zarek's gaze.
“Well, this is an unexpected development,” a being remarks with an exact copy of Gaius' voice, appearing beside Six as she watches. “When did this start?”
Gaius' doppleganger points to Gaeta and Gaius, who are unable to stop casting glances at each other every minute or so while Tom Zarek brings up other business of the day.
Six shrugs, her nonchalance affected. “What does it matter? Gaeta's going to eventually tire of Gaius' obsession with tying him up, and it'll be over soon anyway once your charge arrives, no?”
Her angelic counterpart's mouth twists. “Yes, I suppose that's true.” Six thinks he sounds distant, thoughtful. “He's sort of an odd one, isn't he?” he remarks, meaning Gaius.
Six laughs in the back of her throat. “Well he is you,” she quips, even though she knows that this couldn't be further from the truth. Gaius is nothing like this being, just like Six is very little like the Cylon Sixes. But it's something to say after all.
“He loves that other human, doesn't he?”
“Who? Gaeta?” she scoffs, then turns reflective. “He doesn't know what love is. He's far too scared of it just yet.”
Her counterpart blinks. “Well I suppose Mister Gaeta will have to be the brave one, then, won't he?” He caresses his chin in thought.
Six's face is overtaken by a distant smile that sounds like ice cubes tinkling in a glass. “What does that mean?”
His smile is deliberately vague. “Oh nothing,” he says, dismissing her question, but then adds a bit of intrigue. “Nothing really.”
Six gazes back at Gaius, who always forgets that she is watching always. He's staring at Gaeta, who is standing next to Zarek, trying be attentive, with his hands clasped demurely behind his back. Gaius is imagining taking those wrists in his hands without warning, ordering Gaeta not to move, then tying them together with one the silk ties he never wears anymore on New Caprica, because no one cares. Already, no one believes in the dream of New Caprica anymore except Gaius, Zarek and Gaeta. And Gaius is fast becoming a non-believer.
That's one of the problems with Gaius' species, Six reflects. They don't believe in much anymore. And so God brought them an apocalypse, to give them back something they could believe in, even if it's only themselves.
“Sometimes God's children have to be kicked out of Paradise to appreciate its value,” she muses.
“Oh please,” he retorts, suddenly sounding rather like Gaius for a moment. “You know very well He's hardly watching these days.”
She moves to respond, but he lifts a finger.
“If He was, would He have let things get to such a state? I think not. We're the mop-up crew, you know, trying to get them somewhere useful, evolutionarily speaking.”
Six snorts. “He's always had a plan in place. He has a plan for Gaius,” she insists. “And for yours too.” She changes the subject. “What are they calling her now?”
“Caprica-Six,” he supplies.
“Charming,” she quips, deadpan.
“Yes, that's what I said.”
A silence settles over them as they watch Gaeta place a surreptitiously exploring hand on the small of Gaius' back while Zarek is bent over a proposed union contract. Gaius startles, then smiles briefly at the unexpected flirtation before composing himself and commenting on a line in the paperwork. Zarek nods and Gaeta withdraws the hand. The moment is over almost as soon as it began.
“There's potential there,” Six's counterpart murmurs, nodding. Her eyes narrow.
“You have your orders,” she reminds him stiffly.
“Yes, yes, I know,” he replies with a smirk that is more mischievous than it should be.
Six wonders at it as the angel continues to watch Gaius and Gaeta with a pensive expression.
***
It's cold in Gaeta's tent. It's not the most discreet place for Gaius and Gaeta to rendezvous, and it's so unlike Gaius to venture out of his comfort zone on Colonial One. So it surprised Gaeta when he found an amorous Gaius lifting the flap to enter his tent so late in the night. But he did not resist.
They've reached the part of the night when Gaeta knows Gaius expects to tie him down. Six watches him fall into his usual discomfort with the idea. The way this usually goes is Gaeta quietly panics for a minute or two, then begins to calm and to resign himeslf to the idea until eventually he feels bliss.
This night, goes differently however.
“You seem restless, love,”
The perceptiveness towards his lover is unlike Gaius.
“Is everything all right?”
Gaeta goes still. “Well, uh...” He clearly doesn't know what to say. “Sure,” he lies.
But he finds this line of questioning not so simple to make go away.
“It's this, isn't it?” Gaeta's eyes follow his lover's hand picking up the rope sitting next to them on the sheets. He gestures with it in his hand. “Has this been bothering you all along?”
The look of dismay freezes on Gaeta's face, and Six watches him struggle for words. He clutches at the blanket on top of them and twists it around in his hand. “Look, Gaius...” he falters. “...it's just a reflexive thing, I ...” His gaze casts about helplessly.
“You don't like it when we do this?”
“No, no, Gaius, that's not it.” Gaeta's voice strains with burgeoning worry. “I always end up loving it, I do. It's amazing. I love to let go like that. It's just that at first … at first, it's … um ...” He squints with discomfort.
“You find it difficult to submit to me,” he finishes for him.
Gaeta closes his eyes in embarrassment. But then he feels hands touching him, pushing through his hair and he sighs with pleasure. “Only when we start,” he makes a blind confesson.
“It's nothing to do with you personally,” he adds quickly, but his mouth is soon overtaken by affectionate kisses. When his lover comes up for air, he draws the silken rope gently, sensually across Gaeta's chest, eliciting a barely perceptible moan.
“Felix, love, this is only good for me if you're enjoying it. You're too sexy to be panicking underneath me like that.” he smiles. “But if you really enjoy this ritual, we can find ways to acclimate you to the rope, if that's what you want.”
Gaeta leans up and plants an impulsive kiss on his mouth. Six can tell he is touched by the consideration, the new gentleness. “I didn't think you realized.”
“We'll take it slow,” his lover promises, proffering the rope before him. “As slow as you need.”
Gaeta smiles with greater confidence than Six has seen before at these moments when the rope comes out. He offers up his wrists. They are enveloped with something not unlike affection and care.
They're actually kind of beautiful together, Six thinks.
“Too bad none of that was real,” Six tells her angelic counterpart a few hours later as he's walking out of the tent into the dawn's light. “You're just getting his hopes up about Gaius.”
He straightens the creases of his suit as the two of them stand outside of the tent No one can see them right now anyway, not even Gaeta anymore.
“You can't deny what that did for his confidence, though. He'll approach Gaius differently now,” he tells her, “Gaius is attracted to confidence. He'll respect Gaeta more.”
“You think that's really going to make a difference?” She raises her eyebrows. “Why are you doing this anyway? It won't last even one of their human years. Why bother?”
One of the privileges of being an angel is that one can close off one's mind to anyone - even other angels - so Six must wait for an answer.
“Gaeta is working so hard for this dream,” he says, his hands casting about to indicate the tents surrounded by cold and mud. “He deserves something.”
“Caprica-Six supposed to be arriving here in just barely one of their years,” she reminds him. “Shouldn't you be focusing on what's good for her?”
He rubs his hands together as if to warm up, even though he doesn't feel the cold. “Who says this isn't good for her?” he challenges. “And besides, any plan that might make your charge into a better person I should think you'd be pleased with.”
Six shakes her head. “Gaeta's not part of God's plan.”
He smiles, his response untroubled, declarative.
“I think God's plan can survive a little tinkering,” he says.
***
The two angels watch as Gaeta shows Gaius his rough sketches for a proposed power plant.
“I know we'll need to seek out real architects and engineers to actually design this thing,” Gaeta is saying with the excitement of a child who has just discovered the powerful rush that comes with building something. “But I couldn't sleep last night and so I drew up this conceptual design. See I was thinking about how we were so concerned about being dependent on Galactica regarding the Raptors. So it occurred to me that we were going to face the same problem all over again if we count on our power plant running on tylium to generate- ”
Gaius nods, swiveling in his chair slightly and eyeing the bedroom door for a single, distracted moment, then tries to refocus on his chief of staff. But it's clear to Six (if not to Gaeta yet) that Gaius isn't particularly interested in this line of discussion right now.
The apocalypse left humanity few hobbies with which to occupy itself, and coming down to New Caprica has only magnified the problem (although there had been a decently-sized uptick in the amount of pyramid courts since coming planetside, Six had noticed). Sex very quickly became one of the few enjoyable pursuits left to many humans, and Gaius is no exception to that rule.
At the moment, Six knows, Gaius is imagining what it would be like to march Gaeta into that bedroom over there and order him to strip in front of him, kneel before the rising erection Gaius is getting right now just from thinking about it, and bring him to orgasm.
To his credit, Gaius does try his damndest to focus. It's clear that he likes the sound of Gaeta's voice when he's in his element, truly passionate about something, anything. His eyes brighten, his speech gets quicker, he's more confident of his opinions, even with Gaius.
Which is why Gaius especially loves to dominate him when he's gotten like this. It presents more of a challenge.
“Aren't we putting the cart before the horse just a bit here?” he suggests, and Six rolls her eyes as she listens to Gaius' tone warming up to the chase. “We don't even have a lick of actual paved street yet.”
He grabs Gaeta's wrist, holding tight and boring his gaze into Gaeta's. “I love this idea, Mister Gaeta, I really do. You're right. It'll keep us out from under Adama's thumb.”
He pauses, circling around the inside of Gaeta's wrist, a familiar gesture between them that makes Gaius' train of thought unmistakable. This is one of those moments when Six marvels at how Gaius managed to become such a successful scientist. His work ethic has hardly ever been up to par - really only when he's been motivated by having something to prove or else intrigued by a truly innovative idea.
“But I must admit I'm having trouble concentrating on it ever since I noticed a perfectly lovely hour-long window in the day's agenda.”
“A window?” Gaeta cocks his head and glances over at their schedule on his clipboard, which is hardly ever far from his hands.
“Oh yes, that's right,” he confirms. “The Leonis representative had to cancel his meeting at the last minute. Apparently he's sick.”
“I think we should take advantage of that little deus ex machina, don't you?” Gaius not so much suggests this as demands it, eyeing the bedroom door much more obviously this time. “I think it would be criminal not to use such an unexpected and rare gift of free time in the middle of the day for a well-deserved break, don't you?”
“Break?” Gaeta says like it's a untranslatable word from one of the dead languages of Kobol.
“Yes,” Gaius says with just the correct amount of petulance. “A break, Felix.” His thumb moves up the inside of Gaeta's forearm in slow, circling caresses, his fingers burrowing themselves up into the sleeve of Gaeta's jacket. “In honor of our fallen colleague from Leonis.”
Gaeta's eyebrows raise. “That's total bullshit, Gaius.” But Gaius hears the slang and the buried interest there and pursues it.
“Hmmph, terribly mouthy,” he mock lectures. “Good thing I enjoy that sort of thing from you.” He treats Gaeta to a lascivious grin. “It makes your inevitable submission all the sweeter.”
“Yeah, but I likeit.” Gaeta drops all pretense with a knowing grin of his own, willfully keeping something of himself from Gaius' command a bit longer. “That must be terribly frustrating for you,” he teases.
Gaius yanks Gaeta close, pressing their lips together, parting Gaeta's mouth open for a good long taste of his soon-to-be sweet, pliant Felix.
To Six's shock, she catches just a glimpse of Gaius' thoughts as they kiss. He's imagining asking Felix to move into Colonial One with him. It's just a passing thought, one that Gaius ruthlessly pushes down and dismisses.
“In the bedroom, now.” He attempts a authoritarian tone, but the whisper comes out husky and lustful instead. They have an hour, but Gaius will be done long before that, given the erection tenting his expensive, black trousers.
“When I walk in there,” he adds, pushing himself into full domination mode, “I will find you on my bed, lying on your back, positioned in the usual way. Any questions?”
Gaeta gasps inwardly at the tone of command, but he sneaks a glance at Gaius, who can't keep the pleased grin off his face.
“No, sir,” he says, bowing his head with submission, hiding a smile at the excitement to come. Without another word, he disappears into the bedroom, hands folded respectfully behind his back, shutting the door with a gentle kick of his shoe. Gaius stares pensively at the closed door for a minute or two.
“See?”
The male angelic voice would fill the room with its dulcet tones if human ears could hear it, or if it technically speaking, had a voice. But it doesn't, and his female colleague is the only one to hear him.
“You can't deny the transformation,” he insists.
“Hmm...” Six replies, unwilling to concede her defeat in words.
The two angels watch Gaius as he undoes his belt buckle with a leisurely pace, reaching for his cock and caressing it with feather-light strokes, readying himself, all the while still staring at the door with a distant, troubled gaze.
“He's falling for him,” Gaius' angelic counterpart says with a note of triumph. “I knew all it would take was some strength on Gaeta's part.” Six glares at his self-satisfied grin.
“It's just going to break his heart all the more when Gaius disappoints him,” she concludes, shaking her head. Her platinum ringlets seem to reflect off the overhead lights, powered by generators that soon will run out of tylium. “And then she will arrive, and then this little game of yours is over.”
“Oh really?” he asks slyly. “How do you know he won't choose Gaeta over her when the time comes?”
Six's eyes narrow with disbelief. “Are you joking? Gaius is destined to be with her, remember?”
“You forget about free will,” he waggles a remonstrative finger at her. “Free will is what got us here in the first place, trying to clean up this mess at the last minute.”
“True.” Even Six has to reluctantly acknowledge the power of free will, though she still has trouble understanding why God invented it. “But there is no way you can tell me that Gaius will choose that little man. Not when Caprica Six is available.”
Six crosses her arms as they both watch Gaius open the door and walk into the bedroom with a sense of anticipation. With dismay, Six listens to his thoughts and hears the echo chamber of his mind's obsession with Gaeta. His thoughts weren't like this before.
“A year,” she would have said a moment ago. “You know they only have a year.” But her angelic colleague raises a disturbing possibility Six had not considered, only because she refuses to imagine a day when all her work could come to naught, all thanks to something as random as free will. She's refused up until now to consider the possibility that one day she will have to explain why Gaius Baltar is sleeping with a man God barely notices, instead of with the handpicked Cylon who is supposed to help him save humans and Cylons from mutual self-destruction.
“This isn't just some game for you,” she accuses, her words slow and halting as she realizes what he's been up to. “You don't want Caprica Six to be with Gaius at all, do you?”
He won't meet her gaze, looking as close to sheepish as an angel can possibly manage.
“She's preoccupied with him,” he grumbles quietly. “I'm teaching her about guilt and remorse and empathy, all according to His plan, but she filters it all through some ideal image of Gaius and his supposedly superior human example, and how she didn't measure up to it.”
He indicates the bedroom door with his head. “I half suspect she wouldn't even listen to me if it weren't for the fact that I look and sound just like him.”
Six shrugs. “It's the way of it,” she commiserates. “It took Gaius months at first to decide that I wasn't a chip in his head, and almost a year to believe that I wasn't a ghost.”
“But we don't have to settle for that. That's my point. We can- ”
“I know your point,” she cuts him off. “But I'll tell you what the real the point for us is - what it always is.”
He already knows what she will say. She pushes back her bangs with a heavy sigh.
“The point is that this ...” She indicates the closed door where they can hear the excited sounds of foreplay. “... is not God's will. You would do well to remember that.”
Silence falls between them like a light suddenly going out. A sullenness settles into his gaze, overtaking his usual expression of perpetual amusement.
“She is better off without Gaius,” he eventually says, unwilling to let it go. “She's stronger and more able to grow on her own. If she comes here and reunites with him, she will learn nothing.”
“You don't know that,” she replies with firm certainty. “As you said, she has free will, just like they all do. There's no way to predict what she will get out of coming here. Besides, this isn't about what she needs. This is about the needs of two whole species. It's about what He knows is best for the many, not for any one individual.”
Her angelic counterpart crosses his arms defensively. “You're not going to go running to Him with this, are you?”
Her smile is all barbed wire and broken glass as she looks down and checks her nails pointlessly - they never grow or break..
“As if I knew how to find Him,” she huffs.
He shrugs. “I suppose.”
***
The heavy scent of cigarrillo smoke competes with the spiced aromas of homemade candles burning in Gaeta's tent as the two men in Gaeta's bed share a post-coital smoke.
Or rather, Gaeta smokes. The angel with Gaius' visage however, holds his cigarrillo just the way Gaius would, with a leisurely triangular grip of his forefinger, index finger and thumb. He sighs with decadent pleasure, just the way Gaeta expects.
Six stands at the foot of the bed, with one knee bent atop the mattress. “This mucking about in human sensation is beneath you,” she sneers.
He blows a lazy smoke ring at her image, the back of his head resting quite convincingly in the crook of Gaeta's arm. “If I didn't know you better,” he says quietly, “I'd think you were feeling sorry for poor Mister Gaeta.”
He shifts on his side, the tiny cigar held gracefully behind his head, and looks deeply into Gaeta's eyes. “But of course you aren't,” he finishes, unbeknownst to his partner.
Gaeta, who is of course oblivous to this conversation, merely smiles at him with pleased surprise, then squirms a bit under the focused attention. He takes a drag off his own little cigar as he feels the heat of the angel's gaze.
“What?” he asks, his self-conscious laugh stuck in the back of his throat.
The angel blinks back. “You've become quite the addiction, you know, ” he says.
The statement has a convincing, subdued air of confession. Six considers asking him if it's true.
She sits on the bed, delicately positioned between the two sprawled-out bodies instead.
“Gaius doesn't feel this way about him,” she accuses, although she knows she doesn't sound as convincing as she'd like to.
Gaeta, meanwhile, snorts. “Addiction?” He ruffles his lover's hair, hair he never seems to notice stays perfectly in place.
The angel looks briefly away from Gaeta and cocks his head at Six. “Now you know yourself that that's not true,” he tells her matter-of-factly.
“I would know,” she declares in a clipped tone. “I know everything he knows.”
“Then you're deliberately not paying attention,” he concludes.
He turns back to Gaeta, his voice gentler. “I suppose I sound ridiculous, don't I?” he apologizes.
“Yes, you do,” she sneers. “You're liking this too much.”
“No, no,” Gaeta's voice backpedals in surprise, thinking he's hurt a vulnerable spot. He sighs. “I guess I just wasn't expecting you to say that.” He buries his head into the angel's neck and kisses it. “I love you, Gaius,” he says.
The angel's face unfolds into a pleased smile.
“You don't have to say you love me back,” Gaeta adds quickly, his eyes glancing upward to hunt his lover's expression. “I don't need that. Not now. Not until you're really ready to say it, if you're ever ready to say it. I don't want you to ever lie about it. But it's how I feel, and I just want you to know that.”
The angel stares at Gaeta for a long, wavering moment. The human is comfortable, confident, only slightly nervous at his admission. He caresses Gaeta's jawline with what looks to Six like genuine affection. “I don't deserve you, Felix,” he says softly.
“This is cruel,” Six shakes her head. But the other angel remains unconvinced.
“He was going to make Gaius his whole world before I came along. Look at how he's changed,” he says. “And whether you choose to see it or not, Gaius has changed too. He protects Gaeta from you now.”
“You're getting too involved in their lives,” she accuses, “too involved in … all of this.”
In her frustration, she gestures wildly around at the objects in the tent. But really she means the carnality, the mundanity of it.
“These humans have a destiny they're meant to fulfill,” she lectures, “one with which your games are interfering.”
“Destiny is overrated,” he retorts, and pushes his human lover down on his back. Gaeta smiles into the firm, commanding kiss on the way down.
“And besides,” he murmurs at her between kisses, “since He isn't even watching, I don't see why we can't have a bit of say in how it all turns out.”
***
The months pass.
It's Founder's Day, and people feel obligated to throw a party, even though there isn't much to celebrate these days.
But before there can be celebrations of any kind, there is first business.
Gaeta points to the signature lines with a quiet, professional, “Here, Sir. And here, here, here and here.” Six knows that Gaius is not really interested in what the documents say. Constellations of them have crossed his desk at this point, and they still haven't managed to build homes. The crops are failing too, which Six knows holds the most poignant weight for Gaius because he'd insisted on supervising the planning of that project.
At anyone's most generous estimate, they'll be able to hold out for a month or two in the winter before they'll have to go running to Adama, who will no doubt gloat about the fact that he was right about prioritizing his Raptors with searching for planets with existing, harvestable food. Six knows that just picturing the superior expression in Adama's eyes makes Gaius' temples ache.
Oblivious to her presence, Gaius gently snatches at Gaeta's wrist while his chief of staff is gathering the papers in front of him, hoping for a distraction. “Not so fast,” he teases, with a thrill at the forbidden that annoys Six. The door is shut, he tells himself, as he makes tiny circles along Gaeta's wrist with his thumb; he can take a little risk.
“Are we still on for dinner, Mister Gaeta?”
Gaeta shudders as Gaius continues the stroking and asks slyly, “I don't suppose you'd tell me what's on the menu?”
He manages to say in an even tone, with an innocent smile no less: “That would ruin the surprise, Gaius.”
Gaius should really know better by now, Six thinks, blinking furiously at the two of them. Does he really think she doesn't know how close he was just now to telling Gaeta he loved him?
“I hate to say I told you so, darling,” the smug, angelic voice breaks through her thoughts, now standing beside her. “But I did. He loves Gaeta, in his own way. He just holds back from telling him.”
“He holds back from telling him because he doesn't actually love him,” Six insists. “But after destroying nearly all of humanity, Gaius wants to believe in something. What do you think Gina was about? What do you think this planet was all about?” She sniffs. “Gaeta is just another convenient target.”
But the other angel notices with a bit of amazement that she can no longer look him in the eye as she says this. He cocks his head for a long moemnt.
“Well then, all the more reason for me not to turn my charge over to him, right? The last thing she needs to be is yet another sop to his guilty conscience.” The angel shakes his head, indicating Gaius, who, as if he heard, looks around warily.
“Look at that,” her counterpart clucks. “Didn't I tell you? Look how he's trying to protect Gaeta.”
Six rolls her eyes.
“I tell you, he's carved out a special place for him in his heart, darling.” He uses Gaius' standard term of affection with ironic satisfaction. “Just to the right of yours.”
Gaeta, meanwhile, adds, “I won't spoil your surprise, Gaius, but believe me, you will like it,” he promises.
”Oh absolutely you will like it,” she whispers, even though she has no idea what Gaeta actually has planned.
Gaius startles at her sudden appearance in his peripheral view. “You won't appreciate it, but you will like it.”
Meanwhile, her angelic counterpart quirks a mocking eyebrow at her. “Now who's getting too emotionally involved?”
Six turns to hiss at him, but her eyes narrow and she's soon distracted by Gaius handing Gaeta lube and convincing him to undo his belt, even as Gaeta playfully grumbles: “You have a speech in an hour. We don't have time for this.”
“You have to admit they find each other pretty irresistible,” the angel's pleased voice tickles at her ear. “Anyone could walk in right now and catch them.”
Six's annoyance grows as she watches the two men falling upon each other. Too soon for her liking, Gaius turns oblivious to her presence and focuses completely on Gaeta. She will arrive in only a few more months, and Six is no longer sure the damage to the path of Gaius' destiny is reversible..
“You always were a selfish bastard,” she complains as she watches them..
Both Gaius and his doppelganger give her a brief, wan smile at the insult.
***
The angel who looks and sounds just like Gaius watches Gaeta with curiosity as he enters the makeshift temple on the south side of New Caprica City. A moment ago, he'd been about to get Gaeta's attention when he saw the man stop by the tent, think a moment, then take a resolute step inside.
The tent is dimly lit with candles everywhere. The priestess is in the back of the tent, a short, red-haired woman who looks slightly too emaciated for the fine gold robes that engulf her rail-like body. meditating in contemplative repose. Her eyes open calmly. Her smile is beatific..
“So you're ready?” she asks simply. Gaeta eyes the several feet of loose, red-dyed rope in her hand with mostly real bravado. He nods.
The angel spying on him now begins to understand what Gaeta meant earlier today, what he's up to in coming here.
“So you realize that this ritual has had thousands of people perfecting it over hundreds of thousands of years,” the priestess warns him. “It's evolved into a very complex system of binding the subject that'll take about an hour with two of my acolytes helping. You'll be just about totally immobilized until the person to whom you're offering yourself finds you. That's what makes it an act of devotion, you see.”
Gaeta swallows and nods. “I understand,” he says in a quiet voice. “I'm ready for it.”
“Huh,” the angel clucks to himself absently. “Surprise, Gaius. You had better appreciate this.”
“He won't.” Six's voice filters in lazily. Naturally, neither Gaeta nor the priestess can hear her.
Gaius' doppelganger holds back a smile. “He might,” he counters.
There is a long silence. Then, to his surprise, a concession. “He might,” she admits.
They watch Gaeta haggling with the priestess over the rope in her hand. He's insisting on absolute secrecy before he'll take them to where he wants to be bound - Gaius' bedroom on Colonial One. He's also demanding gold ropes, saying something about how only gold will do for tonight.
“Gaeta knows Gaius even better than he realizes,” Six admits reluctantly, watching him conversing with the priestess with utter determination. “This act of devotion will bind Gaius to him all the more tightly. For all his ego, Gaius doesn't expect people to actually care about him. He and Gaeta aren't all that different in that way.”
The other angel nods. They watch Gaeta leave the temple with the priestess and her acolytes. Gaeta has been victorious and they proceed towards Colonial One in the twilight with large amounts of gold silk rope carried in boxes . The Founder's Day revelers in the distance are far too drunk to notice this sober little pilgrimage making its way along in the shadows.
“You really think they'll make it?” Six asks philosophically, meaning Gaius and Gaeta. The two angels walk arm in arm towards an encampment of noisy Founder's Day revelers. She seems in a melancholy, open mood. Not unlike Gaius, she too seems to be softening, at least for one night.
“That's the beauty of free will, darling, isn't it?” he says waggishly, squeezing their non-existent hands together as they walk unhindered amongst a boisterous swath of of their charges playing drinking games. “Who can tell?”