BSG Fic: "Back to Earth" (2/8)
Title: Back to Earth
Author: trovia
Pairings: Helo/Gaeta, Helo/Sharon. Can be read with the occasional Gaeta/Baltar undertones if you're so inclined.
Genre: It's a gen story overall but with some slash and het b-plot. So it's kind of a gen hybrid. Decide for yourself if that's to your liking.
Rating: PG-13 for some sex, PTSD, bad language in the face of danger and, ya know, people killing robots.
Characters: Gaeta, Helo and Athena (minor characters are Anders, Dualla, Zarek and Hot Dog as well as some Eights and Sixes)
Spoilers: all the way up to 4.10
Beta: done by ebuchala. Thank you very much!
Summary: The Cylons find the fleet just when all high-ranking personnel is off ship. Galactica's b-team has to execute a rescue mission but Gaeta is depressed, Helo feels guilty, something's going on with Sharon, and everybody knows the plan is suicide anyway.
Chapter summary: Helo deals with politics and with his wife.
Chapter 1
The silence reigning in the conference room was awkward. They’d come here because none of them felt comfortable using the Old Man’s office. But Helo thought now that maybe, doing so would have given them an edge. He was standing with his hands crossed behind his back, flanked by Sharon on one side and Gaeta on the other, sitting on a chair. He was very aware that for all the calm he tried to project, he wasn’t Admiral Adama.
Judging by how little the display impressed Zarek, the Vice President didn’t think so either. For a change, he had none of his secretive smiles plastered on his face, the ones proclaiming that nobody would fool him. That itself was pretty disturbing. It also didn’t help that Zarek was speaking in a low tone of voice suited to humor a child.
“You see, Captain Agathon,” he was saying, “I understand your point but still, whatever did you think you were doing?”
Helo shifted his weight, trying to stay calm. “We executed an emergency jump after the enemy detected the fleet, sir, using the emergency jump coordinates prepared for this event. There was nothing else we could have done. It’s a standard procedure...”
“Yes,” Zarek agreed easily. “But it’s not standard to leave the president and the command staff behind.”
“Actually, it is as per command regulation six oh three...” Gaeta remarked without looking up. Helo knew there was history between these two from New Caprica and he hoped that it was a history of friendship and respect, considering how badly they needed the support.
Zarek shot Gaeta a dirty look. Screw that thought then. Helo resisted the urge to smirk. “You know I don’t care about command regulations, Mr. Gaeta,” Zarek said. “I have half the Quorum on my back that wants to know what in the Gods’ names is going on and I can’t blame them. The fleet is livid. I don’t know if you’re aware that it has leaked already that more people than just Adama are missing. That press conference of yours wasn’t exactly a stroke of genius, Captain.” He was addressing him, of course. Helo hardened his jaw. He knew he hadn’t handled the press well but godsdammit, what else could he have done? They’d cried for answers immediately. Since it seemed he’d taken over command of the fleet, the public could just as well know about it. Helo couldn’t blame them. He was just a face without a name and without any qualification whatsoever. He didn’t even fully disagree. “So this has to be dealt with,” Zarek continued. “We have to make a decision now.”
“It’s actually not likely that the Cylons will find Earth camp that fast,” Sharon chimed in. Helo automatically turned around to look her a thanks but as he should have expected, her eyes were trained on Zarek, expression and tone reasonable. “We can plan on having a few days until they do. It’s not that basestars have sensors to detect life forms, and they don’t even know for sure there are people down there. It’ll take them a week at least to execute a search pattern and they’ll most likely assume the biggest continent was their best shot. That isn’t the continent our people are on,” she added.
For a moment, Zarek just looked at her, unblinking. “Are you telling me you want to go back?” Oh, Helo had known nothing good would come out of this meeting the moment Colonial One had asked for permission to dock. Uneasily, he shifted his weight, trying to keep his tone level.
“Our command staff is on Earth, sir.”
“All of them dead if we don’t get ‘lucky’. Have I got that?,” Zarek asked.
Gaeta looked up at that, frowning and putting his pen down. “We can hardly leave them behind, sir,” he said, obviously not quite comfortable about the new position he was in, the one where he was supposed to speak out in a meeting. Helo got the sentiment. “There are about 550 people on Earth. Even if we considered them... expendable...”
“And they aren’t,” Sharon added hotly and Gaeta gave her a thankful look.
“Even then,” the watch officer continued, “we’d be missing the fleet admiral, the XO, the President of the Twelve Colonies, twelve deckhands including the Chief of Deck, one squad of marines and seven viper pilots in key positions including their vipers.” Yeah, Helo thought, that was one hell of a list. “They are essential to the crew of Galactica even if we only count manpower. We can’t possibly fly on without them.”
Not to mention the fact that now that they’d lost Earth, they didn’t even have an inkling on where they should turn. But Helo had a feeling that none of them was ready to go there.
There was also that tiny problem with President Roslin suffering from late stage cancer and needing to get treatment, ASAP. Helo had already talked to Cottle about that. This, too, was something they just couldn’t afford to think about right now since they couldn’t do anything about it at all.
“You know, I really see your point, as hard to believe as that may be,” Zarek answered after a moment, obviously concentrating on regaining his self-control. “But you have to think about the well-being of the fleet. You can’t make this another New Caprica mission, can you? The last time I checked we didn’t have another Pegasus to sacrifice and as I understand it, Galactica wouldn’t hold up to breaking atmosphere again.”
“This isn’t New Caprica. There are other plans.” Sharon’s voice was downright hostile now.
Zarek grimaced. “The protection of the civilians should have priority.”
“With all due respect, sir, it does. It’s why we need to jump back. I’m sorry that we don’t agree with your assessment here, Mr. Vice President...” Helo steeled himself to say his bit, to do what had to be done but Zarek interrupted him as soon as he took a breath.
“Acting President now, if you’ll have a look at the articles. Frankly, Captain, if the military has been too decimated to function properly, there are ways...”
“Nobody here wants to declare martial law,” Gaeta said with deceptive calm just when Helo opened his mouth. His whole body tensing, he closed it. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Sharon shift like she wanted to feel the weight of her gun just for reassurance.
There was a moment of heavy silence after that one.
Watching Zarek’s face change when he looked from one of them to the other re-evaluating the situation, Helo felt his skin crawl. The fact that they could, would, if necessary, declare martial law had been present in their minds from moment one. If that was what it took. Galactica had lost a part of her crew and there was no way they’d leave these people behind. Adama, Tigh, Starbuck, even Tyrol and Laird, they made up the center of Galactica’s family and they would be brought home.
It was their call to make. It was a military decision. They hadn’t even had to discuss it.
Although they had no more than the vaguest idea as to how they would do it.
“So you have a plan?” Zarek asked in a skeptical tone.
“We have a plan,” Helo claimed firmly.
It was Gaeta’s plan, proposed when none of them had come up with anything better in their first impromptu briefing. The idea relied heavily on computers and on a lot of people Helo didn’t exactly trust right now, either in terms of loyalty or sheer capabilities. It wasn’t the kind of plan the Old Man would use. It had too much computer code in it, too few pilots, too many uncertainties.
Instead, the admiral would have instituted one of those plans that relied on Kara or Sharon doing something completely outrageous, most likely in a viper. But Starbuck wasn’t here and Sharon’s part in this was too risky already in Helo’s opinion. They would have to do it as a team. If he was honest, he liked that kind of plan better in the first place. But still...
“I see,” the acting president finally said. “I hope it’s a good plan.”
Helo had a feeling that his smile didn’t quite reach his eyes.
“I don’t know about you guys, but that could’ve gone a lot better,” Sharon remarked after Zarek had left.
Gaeta sighed. “He’ll do what he thinks is best for the fleet. He needed to mark his territory, I guess. Zarek isn’t... he isn’t incompetent. He just had to go up against us and find out who’ll come out of it with their head up, you know?”
“I think that was us.” Sharon didn’t sound too sure.
“For now,” Helo added, leaning back against the wall tiredly. He watched on for a minute while Sharon busied herself with a pile of sheets she’d prepared for Racetrack, who’d been assigned with making up something resembling a flight schedule. The duty roaster was shot. A frantic search for the next Chief of Deck in line had unveiled Figurski. And watching Sharon not looking at him at all, Helo remembered that he also had an angry wife to deal with.
Warily, Helo let his eyes wander to Gaeta, the next problem on his list. Currently his XO was blinking hard as if trying to stay awake, his uniform rumpled and dark circles under his eyes. It hurt to even look at Gaeta and the... well, the stump. It hurt seeing another friend damaged. People were talking about how unwell Gaeta looked, and not just physically. He hadn’t rejoined Galactica’s social life at all, or so Helo had heard.
“You know, you should go check in with Doc Cottle, Felix,” he said cautiously, thinking this probably was a sensitive topic. “It’s gonna be a hard couple of days. Maybe you want to take stims.” While he hadn’t really had time to approach Gaeta as a friend lately, he had to think of the welfare of the fleet now. Their crappy plan depended on Felix Gaeta functioning. Stims in the CIC were never a good idea but Gaeta wouldn’t be working in the CIC much and, if that was what it took...
Gaeta stiffened. “I wouldn’t get clearance for stims, sir, I’m on painkillers. It won’t be necessary.”
“Racetrack is waiting for me,” Sharon said abruptly, brushing past them, out of the room.
Strangely, Helo couldn’t decide whether Sharon or Gaeta was responsible for the fact that the atmosphere in the room seemed to have iced over all of a sudden.
An hour later he met up with Sharon again in the pilots’ ready room. When she explained the changes made to the schedule in painstaking detail, hands clasped behind her back and frowning at the board, Helo was forcefully reminded that they’d had a heated fight on raptor patrol just some hours ago. He couldn’t even figure out what it had been about. He’d just wanted to know what had been on her mind lately, why she wouldn’t frakking talk about it and suddenly they’d been fighting about thousand things - the Cylons for some reason, Demetrius and Kara of all people came up, too, none of it connected. Just thinking about it set him on edge again. If she wanted to be prissy, all right, but how was it his fault? She’d been so damn cagey lately.
“All remaining vipers are scheduled for prep drills now but we’ll make sure they’ll all get some time off before launch,” she was saying. “I’m positive we can replace the lost flight time by raptor patrols but I’m worried about the nuggets. I wouldn’t plan on the pilots on Earth joining the battle by chance, so we’ll need all six of them out there and none of them has even made an unguided landing yet. I’ve heard Kara bitch about them.”
“Kara always bitches about the nuggets,” Helo answered tightly. Okay, so the subject of Kara seemed to be off the table for now, whatever that meant. “Sharon...”
“Then again, landing might not be an issue on this mission.”
Oh no, not like that. Helo hardened his jaw. “You know that whatever it is, you can talk to me?” There, that was a peace offering. They could resolve this and get back to being friendly. It wasn’t that he didn’t understand when the occasional issue came up in their marriage. Of course they fought every now and then. It seemed even his patience had a limit though and Helo much preferred when all was calm and nice in his marriage.
Sharon glared daggers at him. “There’s nothing to talk about, Helo.”
“Right,” he said testily before he could stop himself. “Like the time there was nothing to talk about and suddenly Cavil was a Cylon.”
Yeah, that one had set her off before but still, Helo couldn’t get himself to feel sorry. It had been hard enough to come back from that mad hub mission and find his wife in the brig after shooting an ally for some strange reason connected to a dream and some painting of Hera’s. It was hard to get the whole story from a wife who didn’t talk.
Helo happened to think of himself as a good listener. He’d offered a shoulder to lean on to people numerous times, helping them sort through their problems. So whatever the problem was, there was no reason for Sharon to shut him out like that because that happened to hurt, and that made him angry. A marine (not Sharon, but a marine) had told him she’d been talking to Caprica Six all the time when they were in the brig. It was frakking infuriating and if Helo knew something, anything he could do about it, he would if she would just let him. Especially if it concerned his daughter. Sharon would just have to suck it up for a change.
“Sharon,” he said again, more firmly this time. “Sharon, we need to talk.”
Sharon’s face darkened.
“You know we’re in the middle of a crisis, right?” she asked pointedly and stared at him until he turned back to the board, his lips pressed into a line because there was hardly anything he could say to that.
Sharon took a deep breath, turning toward the duty roster again, and continued to talk about the viper pilots.
--> Chapter 3
Feedback would be nice. :-)
Author: trovia
Pairings: Helo/Gaeta, Helo/Sharon. Can be read with the occasional Gaeta/Baltar undertones if you're so inclined.
Genre: It's a gen story overall but with some slash and het b-plot. So it's kind of a gen hybrid. Decide for yourself if that's to your liking.
Rating: PG-13 for some sex, PTSD, bad language in the face of danger and, ya know, people killing robots.
Characters: Gaeta, Helo and Athena (minor characters are Anders, Dualla, Zarek and Hot Dog as well as some Eights and Sixes)
Spoilers: all the way up to 4.10
Beta: done by ebuchala. Thank you very much!
Summary: The Cylons find the fleet just when all high-ranking personnel is off ship. Galactica's b-team has to execute a rescue mission but Gaeta is depressed, Helo feels guilty, something's going on with Sharon, and everybody knows the plan is suicide anyway.
Chapter summary: Helo deals with politics and with his wife.
Chapter 1
The silence reigning in the conference room was awkward. They’d come here because none of them felt comfortable using the Old Man’s office. But Helo thought now that maybe, doing so would have given them an edge. He was standing with his hands crossed behind his back, flanked by Sharon on one side and Gaeta on the other, sitting on a chair. He was very aware that for all the calm he tried to project, he wasn’t Admiral Adama.
Judging by how little the display impressed Zarek, the Vice President didn’t think so either. For a change, he had none of his secretive smiles plastered on his face, the ones proclaiming that nobody would fool him. That itself was pretty disturbing. It also didn’t help that Zarek was speaking in a low tone of voice suited to humor a child.
“You see, Captain Agathon,” he was saying, “I understand your point but still, whatever did you think you were doing?”
Helo shifted his weight, trying to stay calm. “We executed an emergency jump after the enemy detected the fleet, sir, using the emergency jump coordinates prepared for this event. There was nothing else we could have done. It’s a standard procedure...”
“Yes,” Zarek agreed easily. “But it’s not standard to leave the president and the command staff behind.”
“Actually, it is as per command regulation six oh three...” Gaeta remarked without looking up. Helo knew there was history between these two from New Caprica and he hoped that it was a history of friendship and respect, considering how badly they needed the support.
Zarek shot Gaeta a dirty look. Screw that thought then. Helo resisted the urge to smirk. “You know I don’t care about command regulations, Mr. Gaeta,” Zarek said. “I have half the Quorum on my back that wants to know what in the Gods’ names is going on and I can’t blame them. The fleet is livid. I don’t know if you’re aware that it has leaked already that more people than just Adama are missing. That press conference of yours wasn’t exactly a stroke of genius, Captain.” He was addressing him, of course. Helo hardened his jaw. He knew he hadn’t handled the press well but godsdammit, what else could he have done? They’d cried for answers immediately. Since it seemed he’d taken over command of the fleet, the public could just as well know about it. Helo couldn’t blame them. He was just a face without a name and without any qualification whatsoever. He didn’t even fully disagree. “So this has to be dealt with,” Zarek continued. “We have to make a decision now.”
“It’s actually not likely that the Cylons will find Earth camp that fast,” Sharon chimed in. Helo automatically turned around to look her a thanks but as he should have expected, her eyes were trained on Zarek, expression and tone reasonable. “We can plan on having a few days until they do. It’s not that basestars have sensors to detect life forms, and they don’t even know for sure there are people down there. It’ll take them a week at least to execute a search pattern and they’ll most likely assume the biggest continent was their best shot. That isn’t the continent our people are on,” she added.
For a moment, Zarek just looked at her, unblinking. “Are you telling me you want to go back?” Oh, Helo had known nothing good would come out of this meeting the moment Colonial One had asked for permission to dock. Uneasily, he shifted his weight, trying to keep his tone level.
“Our command staff is on Earth, sir.”
“All of them dead if we don’t get ‘lucky’. Have I got that?,” Zarek asked.
Gaeta looked up at that, frowning and putting his pen down. “We can hardly leave them behind, sir,” he said, obviously not quite comfortable about the new position he was in, the one where he was supposed to speak out in a meeting. Helo got the sentiment. “There are about 550 people on Earth. Even if we considered them... expendable...”
“And they aren’t,” Sharon added hotly and Gaeta gave her a thankful look.
“Even then,” the watch officer continued, “we’d be missing the fleet admiral, the XO, the President of the Twelve Colonies, twelve deckhands including the Chief of Deck, one squad of marines and seven viper pilots in key positions including their vipers.” Yeah, Helo thought, that was one hell of a list. “They are essential to the crew of Galactica even if we only count manpower. We can’t possibly fly on without them.”
Not to mention the fact that now that they’d lost Earth, they didn’t even have an inkling on where they should turn. But Helo had a feeling that none of them was ready to go there.
There was also that tiny problem with President Roslin suffering from late stage cancer and needing to get treatment, ASAP. Helo had already talked to Cottle about that. This, too, was something they just couldn’t afford to think about right now since they couldn’t do anything about it at all.
“You know, I really see your point, as hard to believe as that may be,” Zarek answered after a moment, obviously concentrating on regaining his self-control. “But you have to think about the well-being of the fleet. You can’t make this another New Caprica mission, can you? The last time I checked we didn’t have another Pegasus to sacrifice and as I understand it, Galactica wouldn’t hold up to breaking atmosphere again.”
“This isn’t New Caprica. There are other plans.” Sharon’s voice was downright hostile now.
Zarek grimaced. “The protection of the civilians should have priority.”
“With all due respect, sir, it does. It’s why we need to jump back. I’m sorry that we don’t agree with your assessment here, Mr. Vice President...” Helo steeled himself to say his bit, to do what had to be done but Zarek interrupted him as soon as he took a breath.
“Acting President now, if you’ll have a look at the articles. Frankly, Captain, if the military has been too decimated to function properly, there are ways...”
“Nobody here wants to declare martial law,” Gaeta said with deceptive calm just when Helo opened his mouth. His whole body tensing, he closed it. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Sharon shift like she wanted to feel the weight of her gun just for reassurance.
There was a moment of heavy silence after that one.
Watching Zarek’s face change when he looked from one of them to the other re-evaluating the situation, Helo felt his skin crawl. The fact that they could, would, if necessary, declare martial law had been present in their minds from moment one. If that was what it took. Galactica had lost a part of her crew and there was no way they’d leave these people behind. Adama, Tigh, Starbuck, even Tyrol and Laird, they made up the center of Galactica’s family and they would be brought home.
It was their call to make. It was a military decision. They hadn’t even had to discuss it.
Although they had no more than the vaguest idea as to how they would do it.
“So you have a plan?” Zarek asked in a skeptical tone.
“We have a plan,” Helo claimed firmly.
It was Gaeta’s plan, proposed when none of them had come up with anything better in their first impromptu briefing. The idea relied heavily on computers and on a lot of people Helo didn’t exactly trust right now, either in terms of loyalty or sheer capabilities. It wasn’t the kind of plan the Old Man would use. It had too much computer code in it, too few pilots, too many uncertainties.
Instead, the admiral would have instituted one of those plans that relied on Kara or Sharon doing something completely outrageous, most likely in a viper. But Starbuck wasn’t here and Sharon’s part in this was too risky already in Helo’s opinion. They would have to do it as a team. If he was honest, he liked that kind of plan better in the first place. But still...
“I see,” the acting president finally said. “I hope it’s a good plan.”
Helo had a feeling that his smile didn’t quite reach his eyes.
“I don’t know about you guys, but that could’ve gone a lot better,” Sharon remarked after Zarek had left.
Gaeta sighed. “He’ll do what he thinks is best for the fleet. He needed to mark his territory, I guess. Zarek isn’t... he isn’t incompetent. He just had to go up against us and find out who’ll come out of it with their head up, you know?”
“I think that was us.” Sharon didn’t sound too sure.
“For now,” Helo added, leaning back against the wall tiredly. He watched on for a minute while Sharon busied herself with a pile of sheets she’d prepared for Racetrack, who’d been assigned with making up something resembling a flight schedule. The duty roaster was shot. A frantic search for the next Chief of Deck in line had unveiled Figurski. And watching Sharon not looking at him at all, Helo remembered that he also had an angry wife to deal with.
Warily, Helo let his eyes wander to Gaeta, the next problem on his list. Currently his XO was blinking hard as if trying to stay awake, his uniform rumpled and dark circles under his eyes. It hurt to even look at Gaeta and the... well, the stump. It hurt seeing another friend damaged. People were talking about how unwell Gaeta looked, and not just physically. He hadn’t rejoined Galactica’s social life at all, or so Helo had heard.
“You know, you should go check in with Doc Cottle, Felix,” he said cautiously, thinking this probably was a sensitive topic. “It’s gonna be a hard couple of days. Maybe you want to take stims.” While he hadn’t really had time to approach Gaeta as a friend lately, he had to think of the welfare of the fleet now. Their crappy plan depended on Felix Gaeta functioning. Stims in the CIC were never a good idea but Gaeta wouldn’t be working in the CIC much and, if that was what it took...
Gaeta stiffened. “I wouldn’t get clearance for stims, sir, I’m on painkillers. It won’t be necessary.”
“Racetrack is waiting for me,” Sharon said abruptly, brushing past them, out of the room.
Strangely, Helo couldn’t decide whether Sharon or Gaeta was responsible for the fact that the atmosphere in the room seemed to have iced over all of a sudden.
An hour later he met up with Sharon again in the pilots’ ready room. When she explained the changes made to the schedule in painstaking detail, hands clasped behind her back and frowning at the board, Helo was forcefully reminded that they’d had a heated fight on raptor patrol just some hours ago. He couldn’t even figure out what it had been about. He’d just wanted to know what had been on her mind lately, why she wouldn’t frakking talk about it and suddenly they’d been fighting about thousand things - the Cylons for some reason, Demetrius and Kara of all people came up, too, none of it connected. Just thinking about it set him on edge again. If she wanted to be prissy, all right, but how was it his fault? She’d been so damn cagey lately.
“All remaining vipers are scheduled for prep drills now but we’ll make sure they’ll all get some time off before launch,” she was saying. “I’m positive we can replace the lost flight time by raptor patrols but I’m worried about the nuggets. I wouldn’t plan on the pilots on Earth joining the battle by chance, so we’ll need all six of them out there and none of them has even made an unguided landing yet. I’ve heard Kara bitch about them.”
“Kara always bitches about the nuggets,” Helo answered tightly. Okay, so the subject of Kara seemed to be off the table for now, whatever that meant. “Sharon...”
“Then again, landing might not be an issue on this mission.”
Oh no, not like that. Helo hardened his jaw. “You know that whatever it is, you can talk to me?” There, that was a peace offering. They could resolve this and get back to being friendly. It wasn’t that he didn’t understand when the occasional issue came up in their marriage. Of course they fought every now and then. It seemed even his patience had a limit though and Helo much preferred when all was calm and nice in his marriage.
Sharon glared daggers at him. “There’s nothing to talk about, Helo.”
“Right,” he said testily before he could stop himself. “Like the time there was nothing to talk about and suddenly Cavil was a Cylon.”
Yeah, that one had set her off before but still, Helo couldn’t get himself to feel sorry. It had been hard enough to come back from that mad hub mission and find his wife in the brig after shooting an ally for some strange reason connected to a dream and some painting of Hera’s. It was hard to get the whole story from a wife who didn’t talk.
Helo happened to think of himself as a good listener. He’d offered a shoulder to lean on to people numerous times, helping them sort through their problems. So whatever the problem was, there was no reason for Sharon to shut him out like that because that happened to hurt, and that made him angry. A marine (not Sharon, but a marine) had told him she’d been talking to Caprica Six all the time when they were in the brig. It was frakking infuriating and if Helo knew something, anything he could do about it, he would if she would just let him. Especially if it concerned his daughter. Sharon would just have to suck it up for a change.
“Sharon,” he said again, more firmly this time. “Sharon, we need to talk.”
Sharon’s face darkened.
“You know we’re in the middle of a crisis, right?” she asked pointedly and stared at him until he turned back to the board, his lips pressed into a line because there was hardly anything he could say to that.
Sharon took a deep breath, turning toward the duty roster again, and continued to talk about the viper pilots.
--> Chapter 3
Feedback would be nice. :-)