(no subject)
Title:Double-Talk
Rating: PG? Language, I guess
Spoilers: Crossroads II
Characters: Sam, Kara, Tyrol, Lee
Pairings: This is mostly a character-study, but there's a little Kara/Sam
Disclaimers: Not mine. Also, this is my first fanfic, so um, Caveat lector? (Constructive Criticism gratefully accepted, natch.)
Written for Bop-Radar's Character-Study Challenge. Prompt: Sam Anders, Post Crossroads II
“They say she’s refusing to eat.”
Sam had just handed the Chief a glass of the pale, watery liquid that passed for beer before settling across from him at the booth. Funny how he still sometimes thought of him as “The Chief.” It was Kara’s fault, they’d been neighbors with the Tyrols for almost a year on New Caprica and she’d never called him anything else. He and Galen had hit it off instantly. Almost, Sam thought with bitter amusement, like they’d had some kind of hidden connection.
They’d stayed close after the exodus; even after Sam had moved off the Galactica he’d come back to see Kara, and often as not he’d need a drink afterwards. Generally, he’d find Galen at the bar. They drank whisky in those days, when the worst that could come out of their mouths was a little drunken commiseration about their wives. Their wives, who whatever their flaws, could never have deserved the men they married.
“They?” Sam asked, though he pretty much knew.
“Colonel.” Figured. No one else would be giving out classified information about their new Cylon prisoner to the Chief of the Deck. Tigh and the Chief had been meeting at Joe’s regularly, taking over a table in the back corner and talking in low voices, coded words. Figured it was less suspicious to meet in plain sight than to keep skulking around abandoned rooms. No one gave them much thought; they’d led the Resistance together, after all. Sam had avoided them at first, wanting to forget about what had happened between them. Problem was, no one else was talking to him. Another source of wry amusement -back when he’d been the widow of their fallen champion, pilots and civilians alike had been tripping over each other to offer him comfort of every kind. But now he was the husband of the worst Cylon traitor in the Fleet’s history, he could practically clear a room just by walking in. Raptor training was a nightmare, but Sam stuck with it. As long as Kara was locked up on Galactica, he wasn’t about to give up his only excuse to remain onboard.
Not that he could bear to see her, even if they’d let him. The first time he’d set eyes on her, when they’d brought her back onboard and she’d flashed him one of her trademark grins, Sam thought his heart might burst out of his chest for joy. She hadn’t looked at him with such openness since they’d left New Caprica. But a moment later that joy was replaced by a cold conviction that he couldn’t allow himself near her. Not because she was a Cylon; he knew she wasn’t, somehow, in the same way that he’d known she wasn’t dead. He was learning to trust that voice inside his head, whether he liked what it told him or not.
No, he was avoiding Kara because he couldn’t trust himself, not her. But he still couldn’t leave her in that cage by herself, so he stayed aboard the Galactica, unable to get close to her or to cut the cord completely. So basically, it was more of the same.
“Why the frak would she do that?” It didn’t fit. Sam had been there when Kara stepped out of that pristine Viper. She’d been calm, joyful, practically serene, even as she was surrounded by a squad of Marines carrying assault rifles. She hadn’t even flinched when one of them had approached her with that dog collar they’d used on Sharon. The Admiral had been the one to balk at that, and ordered them to take “it” to the brig - but only in handcuffs. Somehow, Sam didn’t picture himself getting similar consideration.
Tyrol sighed, then reluctantly met his eyes. “Admiral won’t let anyone in to see her. She kept… going on about Earth, that she’d been there. He’s afraid she’ll compromise anyone he sends in to interrogate her.” “So she’s on a frakking hunger strike?" It didn’t fit. Kara had never been one for that kind of passive resistance. Or skipping meals, for that matter. But then, what else could she do? “Colonel’s worried about her. Says she’s acting different. Barely eats, won’t acknowledge the guards; she’s not even asking to see the Admiral anymore. Like she’s giving up.”
“”For how long?”
“Almost a week.”
It had been just over three since Kara had returned. Sam fought a surge of anger that he knew was unfair at the thought of Tigh and Chief sharing information about his wife without him and swallowed hard. Galen was eyeing him warily.
“Well, I don’t know what you want me to do about it. Even if I could get in to see her, I’m the last thing she needs right now.”
“She wouldn’t need to know that.”
They were getting into dangerous territory. Nobody seemed to be paying them any mind, but that wasn’t enough when they were playing with these stakes. Only her being the legendary Starbuck and the Admiral’s surrogate daughter had been enough to keep Kara from being airlocked as soon as she landed, and they both knew it.
"Kara’s a Cylon, Chief. “ Sam said slowly. “That means that all the time I knew her, she was lying to me. Manipulating me.” Their eyes locked, and Sam couldn’t help but twist the knife. “We know the frakking Cylon mandate is to seduce human beings, right? Breed with them.” That was below the belt, but right now he didn’t much care. Chief laughed, angry, but not at him. That was a good thing, Sam decided. No matter how big you were, you really never wanted to piss off the Chief.
“Yeah. Yeah we do know that, don’t we? So, you’re saying that Kara never loved you? Because she’s a Cylon.”
Sam took a long drink. “You know, maybe she thought she did. Maybe she really thought she did. I mean she took me back,” that was pushing it “- She came back for me” he revised, “despite all of the … obstacles. But that must have just been what she was programmed to do. No matter what she thought.”
To Sam’s surprise, Galen was smiling and shaking his head ruefully. “Something funny, Chief?”
“You think you love someone, you love them.”
“What?”
“That’s what love is, right? Thoughts.”
“You a godsdamned philosopher now?”
Chief shrugged, still with that same weird smile. “I thought it was pretty good.”
***
About an hour later, Sam had moved up to the bar. Half cleared it in doing so, but Conner was one of the few who still treated him the same as before. Galen had left a while ago, on the grounds that Cally would have his balls if he left her on her own with Nicky any longer. The man had seemed more cheerful at the prospect of going home to his wife and son than he had seen him since New Caprica, Sam reflected in amazement. Before he left he’d told him to think about what he’d said, and they could talk to the Colonel about getting him in to see Kara.
So that’s what he was doing. According to the Chief, the fact that Sam had thought he loved Kara meant that he had, easy as that. Only it wasn’t that simple, and Sam knew it. Why else were Chief and the Colonel so damned worried about keeping her strength and spirits up? She might not be one of them, but she was important to them, to whatever they were supposed to be doing here on Galactica. Each of them sensed it. It seemed all too clear to him that the connection he felt to Kara - from the moment he’d laid eyes on her, like nothing else he’d felt before in his life - had something to do with that as well.
It sure explained a lot about their relationship. Their marriage had been happy, most of the time, but it had sure as hell never been easy. And then after the occupation… Back when he was a star pyramid player, his sister would come to see him from time to time and she’d always preach him the same sermon: how would he like it if women treated him the way he treated them? Sam would always say that a good-looking, athletic woman who’d use him for sex and then cut him loose sounded like the answer to all his prayers. After the world ended he’d forgotten all about those days, but he guessed the gods hadn’t. He’d been able to explain it to himself well enough, why he kept trying to save his marriage, even while his wife claimed to want nothing from him but sex - and not just from him, either. That Cylon bastard had frakked up her head (but which one?), and if he was just patient enough, she would come back to him, like she always had.
Sam had never been the best player on any team he’d been on. Oh, he was good, and his size gave him a definite advantage, but he’d made a good Captain for the same reason that he’d made an effective resistance leader; he had an instinctive ability to read people and to know how to get the response he wanted out of them. So at the time it hadn’t seemed all that strange that he was so good at reading Kara. You never pushed her for more than she was ready to give, and she would give you more than you’d expected. When Cally had gotten pregnant, he’d casually mentioned that he’d thought about having kids someday, maybe in ten years or so. Kara had glared at him and told him he’d married the wrong women if that sentimental bullshit was what he was into. Sam had been careful not to react, but just grinned and joked that she didn’t need to worry, he’d never risk unleashing one of her ornery brats on an unsuspecting colony. That night they’d gone out drinking, and as sometimes happened when she drank enough, Kara’s mood had shifted from manic joviality to a deep sadness. That was the night that she’d first confided in him about her mother. He’d wanted to react, to curse her mother or promise her that no one would ever hurt her again, but he’d known better. Somehow he’d kept his tone and his expression neutral, and before she knew it she’d told him almost everything. He knew, somehow, that he was the first person she’d ever told, and that now he knew her better than anyone else ever had, or would. So when Kara had gotten out of that prison and started to shut him out, he hadn’t tried to force his way in. He’d given her all the space she’d asked for and more, and before long she was calling him up, insisting it was only for sex, but eventually talking to him about what she’d been through. And instead of taking it as some kind of sign that they were back together now, Sam had done the opposite and urged her to go to Lee, if that was who she loved. That night she had given him her dog tag back.
Sam had never thought of it as manipulation. He thought he understood Kara so well because he was in love with her. Shaking his head, he flagged down Conner for another drink. He would leave, he decided. Resignation was all but unheard of, but for him, he thought bitterly, they’d make an exception. The CAG in particular would be happy to see the back of him.
But leave Kara? Tigh said she was giving up. Sam had given up once, on Caprica. He’d decided he was already dead and in his grave, he just hadn’t stopped moving yet. Might as well take as many toasters with him as he could. Then Kara had shown up, given him a dog tag and a promise that he had never really believed, until she’d kept it. He couldn’t leave her.
Standing up, Sam glanced back at the table where he’d been sitting with Galen earlier and froze at the sight of its diminutive occupant. Hunched over a glass of what looked like whisky, with a somewhat depleted bottle at his elbow, was Lee Adama. Even as he approached him, Sam tried to talk himself out of it. It made more sense to talk to Tigh; he was the one determined to get him in to see Kara, and he was closer to the Admiral than anybody. But how odd would that look, the irascible, Cylon-loathing Colonel making a sensitive plea on behalf of the traitor’s husband? Lee was the only other person Adama would listen too, and it would be much more natural coming from him. He took a deep breath.
“Evening, sir.”
“Ensign.”
“May I sit down, sir?”
Lee peered up at him and hesitated a moment before gesturing at the stool across from him. “Something I can do for you, Ensign?”
Sam knew that the repeated use of his new rank meant that Lee - or rather the CAG - was in no mood for conversation. He got right to the point.
“I’d like to request permission to see the prisoner.”
Lee gave him a look that told Sam this was going to be even more difficult than he’d thought. “There are four prisoners being held on Galactica currently, Ensign. One lieutenant in the brig for drunk and disorderly conduct, two civilians apprehended in the middle of a knife-fight over what is probably the last stale chocolate bar in the universe, and one notorious Cylon traitor being held in a maximum security cell. Which prisoner were you interested in paying a visit to?”
Sam swallowed the urge to knock the smirk right off of the smaller man’s face. He didn’t think he’d ever seen anyone smile so aggressively. But he’d come to understand Lee Adama pretty well once he’d had occasion to try, and he knew that the mocking sarcasm was simply his fallback whenever he felt more than he knew how to handle.
“I’m interested in my notorious wife, sir.”
Lee squinted at him across the table. “Are you drunk, Ensign?”
“No, sir.” He wasn’t. With all these secrets to keep, he’d be damned if he’d be losing control of his faculties any time soon. And from the look of him, the Major wasn’t exactly one to talk. Though even half in the bag, the guy was still wound tighter than a drum. But Sam knew how to play this.
“Maybe a little, sir,” he said, arranging his face into a slightly hangdog expression. Lee softened, just as he’d known he would.
“Look, Sam “ - He paused and reached his hand halfway across the table. “I’d like to help you. I would. But the Admiral’s decided - and I agree - that the prisoner is to receive no visitation. It’s too frakking dangerous Sam. Those things are liars. They manipulate us, that’s what they’re good at.”
“I know that sir.” Did he ever. “It’s just that I can’t get this idea out of my head that that thing in there might really be Kara. I just thought that, maybe if I could see it…” He let his voice break a little at the end there and took a long swig from his glass as if to mask his emotion. Lee was looking at him with compassion. This was so easy, he almost hated himself.
“I know,” Lee said quietly. “After I brought it back, it took me awhile to accept it, myself. But the Kara we thought we knew never really existed, Sam. That thing was just playing with us the whole time.” He paused, then continued: “Did it ever tell you about my brother, Zack?”
Frak. “A little bit. I know they were engaged, obviously, and she passed him when it wasn’t entirely clear…”
“It was perfectly clear. Zack failed basic flight. She passed him anyway, and the kid died on his first training mission.” Sam knew all this, but he allowed himself to look surprised and disgusted. “When she… when it told me what it had done, I didn’t feel anything about it. Later I realized, that was because I already knew.” He laughed. ”I mean it doesn’t really take a genius, does it? That kid was so incompetent, my dad had to call in every favor he had just to get him in the door to flight school. Then he starts frakking his instructor and suddenly he’s getting passing grades? Of course I knew.”
Lee poured himself another drink and gestured at Sam’s empty glass. He nodded gratefully and watched Lee pour way too much whisky into the pint glass. “You know I didn’t speak to my dad for two years after Zack died? I was so angry with him for putting Zack in that position, but Kara? I couldn’t be angry at her, because I knew - I thought that she’d done it because she loved him so much.” He took a long drink, and Sam followed suit. This was harder than he’d expected. Back on the Algae Planet, when Sam had figured out that Lee and his wife were sleeping together, or getting ready to, he’d gotten into a fight with him and somehow he knew - he knew - exactly what to say to hit the other man right where he lived, get him to back off. He’d never felt even a twinge of guilt about that. But this was different. It occurred to him that the last three weeks might have been as painful for Lee as they had been for him.
“Yeah, I can see - I can see how that might look different now.”
“My Dad, he never really saw Zack. Only who he wanted him to be. And I never had time for him either, never paid much attention to him.”
“I doubt that,” Sam said truthfully.
“Yeah, well, obviously I didn’t do enough. So how could I be angry with the one person who really loved Zack, who for once in his life let him feel like he measured up before he died? But now I know that it was all a part of that thing’s plan…”
“You think it had a plan to kill your brother, sir?”
Lee shook his head. “Sounds crazy, I know. But maybe there was something that Zack was supposed to do...” He gestured vaguely, then shrugged and picked up his glass again. "Or maybe it was just being destructive. I guess that’s what they do, right?" His laugh was the bitterest thing Sam could remember hearing.
"You know, right after she told me, Kara saved my life.”
“Yeah?”
“Oh yeah. Pulled one of her usual crazy-ass stunts, risked her neck to save me. Kind of like when she dragged your sorry ass back from Caprica.” His smile took the sting out of the words. “Made it easy to forgive her anything, right? But it was all a game. They can’t die. Kara never risked a godsdamned thing for anyone, not once.”
Sam didn’t have to fake the sting he felt at those words. All the people who had risked their lives on his orders, all the ones who’d died under him. He hadn’t known, but it didn’t matter. He drained his glass. “I know it, Lee. I know it in my head. But… I just think I need to see it, you know? The last time I talked to it was right before it died, and….”
Lee held up a hand. “Okay, Sam. Okay. I’ll talk to the Admiral. It’ll probably take a couple days. He’ll have to ‘think’ about it” - he almost grinned at him “you know. But he’ll give the order. Just be careful, will you? It knows how to push your buttons.”
“Yes sir. Thank you, sir.”
“Get some sleep, Ensign.”
***
Kara gazed at the dark glass that made up one of her cell walls and wondered idly if anyone was watching her tonight. Before, that thought would have made her want to strip down and do naked handsprings to embarrass the hell of out whoever was spying on her. But right now she lacked the energy to even think about it. It wasn’t just the lack of food. The lassitude had settled in even before she’d stopped eating.
She didn’t remember much of what had happened to her. Not that anyone would believe that, but it was the truth. She remembered flying into the Mandala - the gas giant, they insisted - and then falling for a long time. If she tried hard enough, she could vaguely remember lying on her back in some sort of … temple, she thought, with five figures standing over her, bathed in light. She hadn’t told anyone that part. But she remembered Earth. She had seen it from her Viper and known exactly where she was. And she knew how to get there, and that it was her mission to lead her family home. When she’d gotten back to Galactica, she’d felt happier than she’d ever been before in her life.
Well, that had worn off. At first Kara had tried to talk to the interrogator they sent in. The woman had ignored everything she’d said and kept repeating the same questions over and over. Had she always known she was a Cylon? How long had she been planning to betray the Fleet? Who else had she compromised? They weren’t interested in her insistence that she was Kara Thrace, that she had never died, or in anything she had to say about Earth. And apparently they’d given up on getting any information out of her, because no one but Tigh and the guards had visited her in almost a week. So when the hatch opened, Kara almost jumped.
It was Sam. Kara had given up hope of seeing him, or the Admiral, or Lee - anyone but that frakwit interrogator and the silent, glowering Colonel. So she couldn’t help the rush of joy she felt at the sight of him, standing patiently by the phone outside her cell. And it looked like she hadn’t been imagining things the first time; he was wearing a Colonial uniform. She pushed herself up and made her way over to the phone.
“Hey.”
“Hey, Kara.”
Alright, she thought, that was enough pussyfooting around: “I’m not a frakking Cylon, Sam.”
Kara’s heart sank as she watched him flinch and refuse to meet her eyes. Dammit. She didn’t know why she’d thought he might believe her. She wasn’t even sure she believed herself anymore.
As if he'd heard her, Sam finally looked up for a second. “But you’re thinking you might be.”
It was true. The interrogator kept telling her that she’d died, that they’d seen her ship explode, and yet here she was. There was only one way you came back from the dead. Unless - but the idea of the gods having a special destiny in mind for the world-class frak-up Kara Thrace seemed more and more ridiculous by the day.
“Yeah. Maybe. That what they sent you here to find out? If that’s all you want you can get the hell out of here now.”
“Maybe it doesn’t matter.” He still wasn’t meeting her eyes. “Whatever you are. Maybe that’s for you to decide.”
He could still surprise her, she had to admit. “What the hell is that supposed to mean, Sam?” She was almost laughing. “Whatever the hell I am is what I am.”
He finally met her eyes, and Kara had to fight the urge to reach for him through the glass. It had been a long time. “Here’s what I mean.” He reached under his collar and pulled out his dog tags. All three of them.
Now she was laughing. “You’re a sentimental idiot, you know that Sam?”
He grinned at her. “When you gave this to me, you were hauling around some stupid-looking, rusty old arrow which you said you were going to take to Kobol. Then you were going to search the whole gods-forsaken planet for one little tomb, and from there you were going to make the arrow point your way to Earth. And then you were going to come back to Caprica, fight your way past the Cylons, and rescue all our sorry asses. I thought you were the craziest godsdamned woman I’d ever met. Hot,” he acknowledged, “but crazy.”
“Yeah, well, you always were a frakking idiot, Sammy.”
“Don’t call me Sammy." He paused. "Kara, if you say you’re going to lead us to Earth, then you’re going to lead us to Earth. I’ll never doubt that, Cylon or not.” He took a deep breath, like he was bracing himself for what he had to say next. "Just like I know I'll always keep my word to you. No matter what either one of us turns out to be." He looked down again. Kara could see how hard this was for him, which was no surprise. Sam had fought the Cylons in two resistance movements. No one hated them more than he did. And now it turned out he was probably married to one. She could tell her was trying to convince himself as much as her that it didn't matter, that they still had a say over their own destinies. "So," he continued, locking eyes with her again, "Are you taking us to Earth?"
She wanted to say no, and tell him to get the hell away from her. “If they don’t toss me out an airlock first.”
“Adama is never going to put you out an airlock, and you know it. He just needs time. Colonel Tigh’s working on him.” She raised an eyebrow at that. Sam shrugged. “So, enough of this hunger-strike bullshit?”
She glared at him, then grinned in spite of herself. They were just standing there looking at each other when one of the guards opened the hatch. Time was up. Sam traced the glass where her face was. “I love you,” he said.
Kara couldn’t help it. From the moment she’d returned, whenever she looked at him she had this feeling like she’d been falling, and Sam had been there, pulling her away from the darkness. Was she turning into some kind of a romantic? Well, that was a frightening thought. Worse, she’d had the same fuzzy feeling when she looked at Colonel Tigh.
“Me too, Sam.”
At Sam’s look of utter befuddlement, Kara threw back her head and laughed like she hadn’t laughed in forever.
Apparently, she could still surprise him, too.
Rating: PG? Language, I guess
Spoilers: Crossroads II
Characters: Sam, Kara, Tyrol, Lee
Pairings: This is mostly a character-study, but there's a little Kara/Sam
Disclaimers: Not mine. Also, this is my first fanfic, so um, Caveat lector? (Constructive Criticism gratefully accepted, natch.)
Written for Bop-Radar's Character-Study Challenge. Prompt: Sam Anders, Post Crossroads II
“They say she’s refusing to eat.”
Sam had just handed the Chief a glass of the pale, watery liquid that passed for beer before settling across from him at the booth. Funny how he still sometimes thought of him as “The Chief.” It was Kara’s fault, they’d been neighbors with the Tyrols for almost a year on New Caprica and she’d never called him anything else. He and Galen had hit it off instantly. Almost, Sam thought with bitter amusement, like they’d had some kind of hidden connection.
They’d stayed close after the exodus; even after Sam had moved off the Galactica he’d come back to see Kara, and often as not he’d need a drink afterwards. Generally, he’d find Galen at the bar. They drank whisky in those days, when the worst that could come out of their mouths was a little drunken commiseration about their wives. Their wives, who whatever their flaws, could never have deserved the men they married.
“They?” Sam asked, though he pretty much knew.
“Colonel.” Figured. No one else would be giving out classified information about their new Cylon prisoner to the Chief of the Deck. Tigh and the Chief had been meeting at Joe’s regularly, taking over a table in the back corner and talking in low voices, coded words. Figured it was less suspicious to meet in plain sight than to keep skulking around abandoned rooms. No one gave them much thought; they’d led the Resistance together, after all. Sam had avoided them at first, wanting to forget about what had happened between them. Problem was, no one else was talking to him. Another source of wry amusement -back when he’d been the widow of their fallen champion, pilots and civilians alike had been tripping over each other to offer him comfort of every kind. But now he was the husband of the worst Cylon traitor in the Fleet’s history, he could practically clear a room just by walking in. Raptor training was a nightmare, but Sam stuck with it. As long as Kara was locked up on Galactica, he wasn’t about to give up his only excuse to remain onboard.
Not that he could bear to see her, even if they’d let him. The first time he’d set eyes on her, when they’d brought her back onboard and she’d flashed him one of her trademark grins, Sam thought his heart might burst out of his chest for joy. She hadn’t looked at him with such openness since they’d left New Caprica. But a moment later that joy was replaced by a cold conviction that he couldn’t allow himself near her. Not because she was a Cylon; he knew she wasn’t, somehow, in the same way that he’d known she wasn’t dead. He was learning to trust that voice inside his head, whether he liked what it told him or not.
No, he was avoiding Kara because he couldn’t trust himself, not her. But he still couldn’t leave her in that cage by herself, so he stayed aboard the Galactica, unable to get close to her or to cut the cord completely. So basically, it was more of the same.
“Why the frak would she do that?” It didn’t fit. Sam had been there when Kara stepped out of that pristine Viper. She’d been calm, joyful, practically serene, even as she was surrounded by a squad of Marines carrying assault rifles. She hadn’t even flinched when one of them had approached her with that dog collar they’d used on Sharon. The Admiral had been the one to balk at that, and ordered them to take “it” to the brig - but only in handcuffs. Somehow, Sam didn’t picture himself getting similar consideration.
Tyrol sighed, then reluctantly met his eyes. “Admiral won’t let anyone in to see her. She kept… going on about Earth, that she’d been there. He’s afraid she’ll compromise anyone he sends in to interrogate her.” “So she’s on a frakking hunger strike?" It didn’t fit. Kara had never been one for that kind of passive resistance. Or skipping meals, for that matter. But then, what else could she do? “Colonel’s worried about her. Says she’s acting different. Barely eats, won’t acknowledge the guards; she’s not even asking to see the Admiral anymore. Like she’s giving up.”
“”For how long?”
“Almost a week.”
It had been just over three since Kara had returned. Sam fought a surge of anger that he knew was unfair at the thought of Tigh and Chief sharing information about his wife without him and swallowed hard. Galen was eyeing him warily.
“Well, I don’t know what you want me to do about it. Even if I could get in to see her, I’m the last thing she needs right now.”
“She wouldn’t need to know that.”
They were getting into dangerous territory. Nobody seemed to be paying them any mind, but that wasn’t enough when they were playing with these stakes. Only her being the legendary Starbuck and the Admiral’s surrogate daughter had been enough to keep Kara from being airlocked as soon as she landed, and they both knew it.
"Kara’s a Cylon, Chief. “ Sam said slowly. “That means that all the time I knew her, she was lying to me. Manipulating me.” Their eyes locked, and Sam couldn’t help but twist the knife. “We know the frakking Cylon mandate is to seduce human beings, right? Breed with them.” That was below the belt, but right now he didn’t much care. Chief laughed, angry, but not at him. That was a good thing, Sam decided. No matter how big you were, you really never wanted to piss off the Chief.
“Yeah. Yeah we do know that, don’t we? So, you’re saying that Kara never loved you? Because she’s a Cylon.”
Sam took a long drink. “You know, maybe she thought she did. Maybe she really thought she did. I mean she took me back,” that was pushing it “- She came back for me” he revised, “despite all of the … obstacles. But that must have just been what she was programmed to do. No matter what she thought.”
To Sam’s surprise, Galen was smiling and shaking his head ruefully. “Something funny, Chief?”
“You think you love someone, you love them.”
“What?”
“That’s what love is, right? Thoughts.”
“You a godsdamned philosopher now?”
Chief shrugged, still with that same weird smile. “I thought it was pretty good.”
***
About an hour later, Sam had moved up to the bar. Half cleared it in doing so, but Conner was one of the few who still treated him the same as before. Galen had left a while ago, on the grounds that Cally would have his balls if he left her on her own with Nicky any longer. The man had seemed more cheerful at the prospect of going home to his wife and son than he had seen him since New Caprica, Sam reflected in amazement. Before he left he’d told him to think about what he’d said, and they could talk to the Colonel about getting him in to see Kara.
So that’s what he was doing. According to the Chief, the fact that Sam had thought he loved Kara meant that he had, easy as that. Only it wasn’t that simple, and Sam knew it. Why else were Chief and the Colonel so damned worried about keeping her strength and spirits up? She might not be one of them, but she was important to them, to whatever they were supposed to be doing here on Galactica. Each of them sensed it. It seemed all too clear to him that the connection he felt to Kara - from the moment he’d laid eyes on her, like nothing else he’d felt before in his life - had something to do with that as well.
It sure explained a lot about their relationship. Their marriage had been happy, most of the time, but it had sure as hell never been easy. And then after the occupation… Back when he was a star pyramid player, his sister would come to see him from time to time and she’d always preach him the same sermon: how would he like it if women treated him the way he treated them? Sam would always say that a good-looking, athletic woman who’d use him for sex and then cut him loose sounded like the answer to all his prayers. After the world ended he’d forgotten all about those days, but he guessed the gods hadn’t. He’d been able to explain it to himself well enough, why he kept trying to save his marriage, even while his wife claimed to want nothing from him but sex - and not just from him, either. That Cylon bastard had frakked up her head (but which one?), and if he was just patient enough, she would come back to him, like she always had.
Sam had never been the best player on any team he’d been on. Oh, he was good, and his size gave him a definite advantage, but he’d made a good Captain for the same reason that he’d made an effective resistance leader; he had an instinctive ability to read people and to know how to get the response he wanted out of them. So at the time it hadn’t seemed all that strange that he was so good at reading Kara. You never pushed her for more than she was ready to give, and she would give you more than you’d expected. When Cally had gotten pregnant, he’d casually mentioned that he’d thought about having kids someday, maybe in ten years or so. Kara had glared at him and told him he’d married the wrong women if that sentimental bullshit was what he was into. Sam had been careful not to react, but just grinned and joked that she didn’t need to worry, he’d never risk unleashing one of her ornery brats on an unsuspecting colony. That night they’d gone out drinking, and as sometimes happened when she drank enough, Kara’s mood had shifted from manic joviality to a deep sadness. That was the night that she’d first confided in him about her mother. He’d wanted to react, to curse her mother or promise her that no one would ever hurt her again, but he’d known better. Somehow he’d kept his tone and his expression neutral, and before she knew it she’d told him almost everything. He knew, somehow, that he was the first person she’d ever told, and that now he knew her better than anyone else ever had, or would. So when Kara had gotten out of that prison and started to shut him out, he hadn’t tried to force his way in. He’d given her all the space she’d asked for and more, and before long she was calling him up, insisting it was only for sex, but eventually talking to him about what she’d been through. And instead of taking it as some kind of sign that they were back together now, Sam had done the opposite and urged her to go to Lee, if that was who she loved. That night she had given him her dog tag back.
Sam had never thought of it as manipulation. He thought he understood Kara so well because he was in love with her. Shaking his head, he flagged down Conner for another drink. He would leave, he decided. Resignation was all but unheard of, but for him, he thought bitterly, they’d make an exception. The CAG in particular would be happy to see the back of him.
But leave Kara? Tigh said she was giving up. Sam had given up once, on Caprica. He’d decided he was already dead and in his grave, he just hadn’t stopped moving yet. Might as well take as many toasters with him as he could. Then Kara had shown up, given him a dog tag and a promise that he had never really believed, until she’d kept it. He couldn’t leave her.
Standing up, Sam glanced back at the table where he’d been sitting with Galen earlier and froze at the sight of its diminutive occupant. Hunched over a glass of what looked like whisky, with a somewhat depleted bottle at his elbow, was Lee Adama. Even as he approached him, Sam tried to talk himself out of it. It made more sense to talk to Tigh; he was the one determined to get him in to see Kara, and he was closer to the Admiral than anybody. But how odd would that look, the irascible, Cylon-loathing Colonel making a sensitive plea on behalf of the traitor’s husband? Lee was the only other person Adama would listen too, and it would be much more natural coming from him. He took a deep breath.
“Evening, sir.”
“Ensign.”
“May I sit down, sir?”
Lee peered up at him and hesitated a moment before gesturing at the stool across from him. “Something I can do for you, Ensign?”
Sam knew that the repeated use of his new rank meant that Lee - or rather the CAG - was in no mood for conversation. He got right to the point.
“I’d like to request permission to see the prisoner.”
Lee gave him a look that told Sam this was going to be even more difficult than he’d thought. “There are four prisoners being held on Galactica currently, Ensign. One lieutenant in the brig for drunk and disorderly conduct, two civilians apprehended in the middle of a knife-fight over what is probably the last stale chocolate bar in the universe, and one notorious Cylon traitor being held in a maximum security cell. Which prisoner were you interested in paying a visit to?”
Sam swallowed the urge to knock the smirk right off of the smaller man’s face. He didn’t think he’d ever seen anyone smile so aggressively. But he’d come to understand Lee Adama pretty well once he’d had occasion to try, and he knew that the mocking sarcasm was simply his fallback whenever he felt more than he knew how to handle.
“I’m interested in my notorious wife, sir.”
Lee squinted at him across the table. “Are you drunk, Ensign?”
“No, sir.” He wasn’t. With all these secrets to keep, he’d be damned if he’d be losing control of his faculties any time soon. And from the look of him, the Major wasn’t exactly one to talk. Though even half in the bag, the guy was still wound tighter than a drum. But Sam knew how to play this.
“Maybe a little, sir,” he said, arranging his face into a slightly hangdog expression. Lee softened, just as he’d known he would.
“Look, Sam “ - He paused and reached his hand halfway across the table. “I’d like to help you. I would. But the Admiral’s decided - and I agree - that the prisoner is to receive no visitation. It’s too frakking dangerous Sam. Those things are liars. They manipulate us, that’s what they’re good at.”
“I know that sir.” Did he ever. “It’s just that I can’t get this idea out of my head that that thing in there might really be Kara. I just thought that, maybe if I could see it…” He let his voice break a little at the end there and took a long swig from his glass as if to mask his emotion. Lee was looking at him with compassion. This was so easy, he almost hated himself.
“I know,” Lee said quietly. “After I brought it back, it took me awhile to accept it, myself. But the Kara we thought we knew never really existed, Sam. That thing was just playing with us the whole time.” He paused, then continued: “Did it ever tell you about my brother, Zack?”
Frak. “A little bit. I know they were engaged, obviously, and she passed him when it wasn’t entirely clear…”
“It was perfectly clear. Zack failed basic flight. She passed him anyway, and the kid died on his first training mission.” Sam knew all this, but he allowed himself to look surprised and disgusted. “When she… when it told me what it had done, I didn’t feel anything about it. Later I realized, that was because I already knew.” He laughed. ”I mean it doesn’t really take a genius, does it? That kid was so incompetent, my dad had to call in every favor he had just to get him in the door to flight school. Then he starts frakking his instructor and suddenly he’s getting passing grades? Of course I knew.”
Lee poured himself another drink and gestured at Sam’s empty glass. He nodded gratefully and watched Lee pour way too much whisky into the pint glass. “You know I didn’t speak to my dad for two years after Zack died? I was so angry with him for putting Zack in that position, but Kara? I couldn’t be angry at her, because I knew - I thought that she’d done it because she loved him so much.” He took a long drink, and Sam followed suit. This was harder than he’d expected. Back on the Algae Planet, when Sam had figured out that Lee and his wife were sleeping together, or getting ready to, he’d gotten into a fight with him and somehow he knew - he knew - exactly what to say to hit the other man right where he lived, get him to back off. He’d never felt even a twinge of guilt about that. But this was different. It occurred to him that the last three weeks might have been as painful for Lee as they had been for him.
“Yeah, I can see - I can see how that might look different now.”
“My Dad, he never really saw Zack. Only who he wanted him to be. And I never had time for him either, never paid much attention to him.”
“I doubt that,” Sam said truthfully.
“Yeah, well, obviously I didn’t do enough. So how could I be angry with the one person who really loved Zack, who for once in his life let him feel like he measured up before he died? But now I know that it was all a part of that thing’s plan…”
“You think it had a plan to kill your brother, sir?”
Lee shook his head. “Sounds crazy, I know. But maybe there was something that Zack was supposed to do...” He gestured vaguely, then shrugged and picked up his glass again. "Or maybe it was just being destructive. I guess that’s what they do, right?" His laugh was the bitterest thing Sam could remember hearing.
"You know, right after she told me, Kara saved my life.”
“Yeah?”
“Oh yeah. Pulled one of her usual crazy-ass stunts, risked her neck to save me. Kind of like when she dragged your sorry ass back from Caprica.” His smile took the sting out of the words. “Made it easy to forgive her anything, right? But it was all a game. They can’t die. Kara never risked a godsdamned thing for anyone, not once.”
Sam didn’t have to fake the sting he felt at those words. All the people who had risked their lives on his orders, all the ones who’d died under him. He hadn’t known, but it didn’t matter. He drained his glass. “I know it, Lee. I know it in my head. But… I just think I need to see it, you know? The last time I talked to it was right before it died, and….”
Lee held up a hand. “Okay, Sam. Okay. I’ll talk to the Admiral. It’ll probably take a couple days. He’ll have to ‘think’ about it” - he almost grinned at him “you know. But he’ll give the order. Just be careful, will you? It knows how to push your buttons.”
“Yes sir. Thank you, sir.”
“Get some sleep, Ensign.”
***
Kara gazed at the dark glass that made up one of her cell walls and wondered idly if anyone was watching her tonight. Before, that thought would have made her want to strip down and do naked handsprings to embarrass the hell of out whoever was spying on her. But right now she lacked the energy to even think about it. It wasn’t just the lack of food. The lassitude had settled in even before she’d stopped eating.
She didn’t remember much of what had happened to her. Not that anyone would believe that, but it was the truth. She remembered flying into the Mandala - the gas giant, they insisted - and then falling for a long time. If she tried hard enough, she could vaguely remember lying on her back in some sort of … temple, she thought, with five figures standing over her, bathed in light. She hadn’t told anyone that part. But she remembered Earth. She had seen it from her Viper and known exactly where she was. And she knew how to get there, and that it was her mission to lead her family home. When she’d gotten back to Galactica, she’d felt happier than she’d ever been before in her life.
Well, that had worn off. At first Kara had tried to talk to the interrogator they sent in. The woman had ignored everything she’d said and kept repeating the same questions over and over. Had she always known she was a Cylon? How long had she been planning to betray the Fleet? Who else had she compromised? They weren’t interested in her insistence that she was Kara Thrace, that she had never died, or in anything she had to say about Earth. And apparently they’d given up on getting any information out of her, because no one but Tigh and the guards had visited her in almost a week. So when the hatch opened, Kara almost jumped.
It was Sam. Kara had given up hope of seeing him, or the Admiral, or Lee - anyone but that frakwit interrogator and the silent, glowering Colonel. So she couldn’t help the rush of joy she felt at the sight of him, standing patiently by the phone outside her cell. And it looked like she hadn’t been imagining things the first time; he was wearing a Colonial uniform. She pushed herself up and made her way over to the phone.
“Hey.”
“Hey, Kara.”
Alright, she thought, that was enough pussyfooting around: “I’m not a frakking Cylon, Sam.”
Kara’s heart sank as she watched him flinch and refuse to meet her eyes. Dammit. She didn’t know why she’d thought he might believe her. She wasn’t even sure she believed herself anymore.
As if he'd heard her, Sam finally looked up for a second. “But you’re thinking you might be.”
It was true. The interrogator kept telling her that she’d died, that they’d seen her ship explode, and yet here she was. There was only one way you came back from the dead. Unless - but the idea of the gods having a special destiny in mind for the world-class frak-up Kara Thrace seemed more and more ridiculous by the day.
“Yeah. Maybe. That what they sent you here to find out? If that’s all you want you can get the hell out of here now.”
“Maybe it doesn’t matter.” He still wasn’t meeting her eyes. “Whatever you are. Maybe that’s for you to decide.”
He could still surprise her, she had to admit. “What the hell is that supposed to mean, Sam?” She was almost laughing. “Whatever the hell I am is what I am.”
He finally met her eyes, and Kara had to fight the urge to reach for him through the glass. It had been a long time. “Here’s what I mean.” He reached under his collar and pulled out his dog tags. All three of them.
Now she was laughing. “You’re a sentimental idiot, you know that Sam?”
He grinned at her. “When you gave this to me, you were hauling around some stupid-looking, rusty old arrow which you said you were going to take to Kobol. Then you were going to search the whole gods-forsaken planet for one little tomb, and from there you were going to make the arrow point your way to Earth. And then you were going to come back to Caprica, fight your way past the Cylons, and rescue all our sorry asses. I thought you were the craziest godsdamned woman I’d ever met. Hot,” he acknowledged, “but crazy.”
“Yeah, well, you always were a frakking idiot, Sammy.”
“Don’t call me Sammy." He paused. "Kara, if you say you’re going to lead us to Earth, then you’re going to lead us to Earth. I’ll never doubt that, Cylon or not.” He took a deep breath, like he was bracing himself for what he had to say next. "Just like I know I'll always keep my word to you. No matter what either one of us turns out to be." He looked down again. Kara could see how hard this was for him, which was no surprise. Sam had fought the Cylons in two resistance movements. No one hated them more than he did. And now it turned out he was probably married to one. She could tell her was trying to convince himself as much as her that it didn't matter, that they still had a say over their own destinies. "So," he continued, locking eyes with her again, "Are you taking us to Earth?"
She wanted to say no, and tell him to get the hell away from her. “If they don’t toss me out an airlock first.”
“Adama is never going to put you out an airlock, and you know it. He just needs time. Colonel Tigh’s working on him.” She raised an eyebrow at that. Sam shrugged. “So, enough of this hunger-strike bullshit?”
She glared at him, then grinned in spite of herself. They were just standing there looking at each other when one of the guards opened the hatch. Time was up. Sam traced the glass where her face was. “I love you,” he said.
Kara couldn’t help it. From the moment she’d returned, whenever she looked at him she had this feeling like she’d been falling, and Sam had been there, pulling her away from the darkness. Was she turning into some kind of a romantic? Well, that was a frightening thought. Worse, she’d had the same fuzzy feeling when she looked at Colonel Tigh.
“Me too, Sam.”
At Sam’s look of utter befuddlement, Kara threw back her head and laughed like she hadn’t laughed in forever.
Apparently, she could still surprise him, too.