Fic: Across the Years
Title: Across the Years
Pairing: Kara/Leoben
Rating: PG
Words: 840
Summary: Leoben ages. (Total fluff written for the wonderful deborah_judge in honor of her 40th birthday! <3)
A/N: This can be read as an epilogue to Prayer (which conveniently got posted a year ago today!) but you don't need to be familiar with that to read this.
4
“How old are you?” Kara asks him one afternoon. They’re painting their bedroom, staining the wood with blackberry wine that Costanza tried and failed to make.
Leoben thinks a moment, frowning.
Kara laughs. “It’s an easy question!”
He shrugs. “It depends when you start counting.”
She sobers then, and nods.
“The first Two was made forty years ago,” he tells her, remembering faintly that first quizzical moment. “And this body is two years old. But the stream is ageless.”
Kara tilts her head. “When did you know you were yourself?” For a moment she’s completely serious.
Leoben smiles. This memory is stronger than any other. “When I met you.”
“Four, then,” she says, and it’s settled. “Frak, I’m a cradle robber.” She giggles, and paints his cheek with blackberry wine.
For the first time in his life, he feels young.
16
It’s a morning like any other - the girls out gathering eggs while he makes toast - when Leoben looks up and sees that Kara’s hair is more silver than blonde.
“What?” she asks, catching his gaze.
He reaches out, running his fingers through it. “You’re going gray,” he says with surprise.
Kara arches an eyebrow. “I’ll be 41 in a month. Why shouldn’t I be?”
Leoben presses his lips to her temple, feels her smile against his throat. Then Willa chases Dani inside, both girls shrieking and laughing, and it’s time for breakfast.
He finds Ellen Tigh a few weeks later, making her way through the marketplace. She waves to him, and he offers to carry her bags.
As she pours him a glass of whiskey back at her house, he asks the question. “Will I ever get older?”
Ellen sips her drink, then sets it down. “Of course you’re older.”
“But will I look older?” he presses.
For a moment, sadness crosses her face. “Back on Earth,” she begins. “I knew an oracle, back there, a man who helped me understand what we had to do.” She closes her eyes, projecting, and for a moment, he can see the man, himself, and the dearness Ellen felt for him. “I never saw him older,” she finishes, and tosses back the rest of her glass.
Leoben nods.
It takes months for Ellen and some of the Fives - Simeon and Walter and Max - to prepare a treatment. Some of his brothers and sisters take it; others didn’t. Leoben is first.
That night in bed, Kara studies his face, ignoring his fingers sliding over her skin as she teases him that she’s trying to find a new wrinkle. “You want to change?” she asks eventually, her voice softening.
Leoben captures her hand, studies their fingers together. “We’re going to grow old together,” he tells her. “We’ve always been growing old together.”
She smiles then, and kisses him. Leoben kisses her back, and runs his fingers through her hair.
52
Even after so long, there are moments he’s seen in the stream hundreds of times, dreaming and waking, that catch him off guard when they happen.
He saw the way Kara would bring peace long ago: the flash of her eyes, the flare of her hair, the brightness of her spirit as she joined two peoples into one. On Earth he’s watched her do it. Traveling across the planet and back, their daughters trailing behind or riding on their shoulders, they helped the human and Cylon races to make peace with each other. Two years ago, when they came back to their cabin for the last time, Leoben was sure the work had been done. Kara’s body pained her more than she’d admit, and God knew she’d earned some comfort.
And yet suddenly, staring across the large drafty quorum chamber, Leoben understands for the first time what it is that she did. That he did, too.
When Daniella was a little girl, she’d catch him staring off sometimes, lost in the stream. He’d take her hand, let her see. After a minute or two, she would pull away laughing, run off to her mother or her sister or to play in the garden. Kara was quick to tell the girls that their destinies would be whatever they wanted them to be. He never asked what his daughter saw.
Now, right in front of him, she calls the quorum to order with the same dear smile he’s known for so long. Leoben can see the stream in flux around her, can see the little girl who hated having her hair braided, the infant gazing up at him, this woman who holds herself with the poise of age and experience. Her own children are nearly adults; she’s come of age in this world, as it has with her.
Dani looks up, raises an eyebrow, waits for him to take his seat. Her power flows around her as Cylons and humans and the children of both races turn to her, listening. Leoben grins helplessly, tears shining in his eyes as he sits, and feels like an old man.
Pairing: Kara/Leoben
Rating: PG
Words: 840
Summary: Leoben ages. (Total fluff written for the wonderful deborah_judge in honor of her 40th birthday! <3)
A/N: This can be read as an epilogue to Prayer (which conveniently got posted a year ago today!) but you don't need to be familiar with that to read this.
4
“How old are you?” Kara asks him one afternoon. They’re painting their bedroom, staining the wood with blackberry wine that Costanza tried and failed to make.
Leoben thinks a moment, frowning.
Kara laughs. “It’s an easy question!”
He shrugs. “It depends when you start counting.”
She sobers then, and nods.
“The first Two was made forty years ago,” he tells her, remembering faintly that first quizzical moment. “And this body is two years old. But the stream is ageless.”
Kara tilts her head. “When did you know you were yourself?” For a moment she’s completely serious.
Leoben smiles. This memory is stronger than any other. “When I met you.”
“Four, then,” she says, and it’s settled. “Frak, I’m a cradle robber.” She giggles, and paints his cheek with blackberry wine.
For the first time in his life, he feels young.
16
It’s a morning like any other - the girls out gathering eggs while he makes toast - when Leoben looks up and sees that Kara’s hair is more silver than blonde.
“What?” she asks, catching his gaze.
He reaches out, running his fingers through it. “You’re going gray,” he says with surprise.
Kara arches an eyebrow. “I’ll be 41 in a month. Why shouldn’t I be?”
Leoben presses his lips to her temple, feels her smile against his throat. Then Willa chases Dani inside, both girls shrieking and laughing, and it’s time for breakfast.
He finds Ellen Tigh a few weeks later, making her way through the marketplace. She waves to him, and he offers to carry her bags.
As she pours him a glass of whiskey back at her house, he asks the question. “Will I ever get older?”
Ellen sips her drink, then sets it down. “Of course you’re older.”
“But will I look older?” he presses.
For a moment, sadness crosses her face. “Back on Earth,” she begins. “I knew an oracle, back there, a man who helped me understand what we had to do.” She closes her eyes, projecting, and for a moment, he can see the man, himself, and the dearness Ellen felt for him. “I never saw him older,” she finishes, and tosses back the rest of her glass.
Leoben nods.
It takes months for Ellen and some of the Fives - Simeon and Walter and Max - to prepare a treatment. Some of his brothers and sisters take it; others didn’t. Leoben is first.
That night in bed, Kara studies his face, ignoring his fingers sliding over her skin as she teases him that she’s trying to find a new wrinkle. “You want to change?” she asks eventually, her voice softening.
Leoben captures her hand, studies their fingers together. “We’re going to grow old together,” he tells her. “We’ve always been growing old together.”
She smiles then, and kisses him. Leoben kisses her back, and runs his fingers through her hair.
52
Even after so long, there are moments he’s seen in the stream hundreds of times, dreaming and waking, that catch him off guard when they happen.
He saw the way Kara would bring peace long ago: the flash of her eyes, the flare of her hair, the brightness of her spirit as she joined two peoples into one. On Earth he’s watched her do it. Traveling across the planet and back, their daughters trailing behind or riding on their shoulders, they helped the human and Cylon races to make peace with each other. Two years ago, when they came back to their cabin for the last time, Leoben was sure the work had been done. Kara’s body pained her more than she’d admit, and God knew she’d earned some comfort.
And yet suddenly, staring across the large drafty quorum chamber, Leoben understands for the first time what it is that she did. That he did, too.
When Daniella was a little girl, she’d catch him staring off sometimes, lost in the stream. He’d take her hand, let her see. After a minute or two, she would pull away laughing, run off to her mother or her sister or to play in the garden. Kara was quick to tell the girls that their destinies would be whatever they wanted them to be. He never asked what his daughter saw.
Now, right in front of him, she calls the quorum to order with the same dear smile he’s known for so long. Leoben can see the stream in flux around her, can see the little girl who hated having her hair braided, the infant gazing up at him, this woman who holds herself with the poise of age and experience. Her own children are nearly adults; she’s come of age in this world, as it has with her.
Dani looks up, raises an eyebrow, waits for him to take his seat. Her power flows around her as Cylons and humans and the children of both races turn to her, listening. Leoben grins helplessly, tears shining in his eyes as he sits, and feels like an old man.