Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

As Press Secretary, CJ had spent so much of her day giving and receiving orders while on the move. Walking while talking had become second nature. After three weeks on the job, she'd started to dream in motion. After six months, she'd grown impatient with the rest of her life. She craved smooth, synchronous movement. Why couldn't every relationship be an easy coming together and a natural drifting apart, all while communicating just enough to be understood and not too much to complicate matters?

When she was appointed Chief of Staff, the amount of hallway slaloming had decreased. Now, people came to her: staffers, elected officials, foreign dignitaries. But time, time continued to move at the speed of a hurried walk. Fielding questions, dodging answers, delivering orders...everything she said and did was pressing, urgent, and made her feel as if she was careening through the halls of the west wing, on wheels and wearing a crash helmet.

There was only one place these days where time slowed to the pace of a sigh. Where all the noise—all the inputs—were reduced to the sound of the second hand on an antique clock.

That place was where she was headed, right now.

She took her last step, pivoted slightly, and came to a stop in front of the thick oak desk.

"Sir," she ventured, bowing her head slightly, out of respect and a lifelong desire to not be the tallest person in the room.

"CJ." The silver haired man didn't look up from the blue folder and the economic briefing he was obviously determined to absorb before his one o'clock with the Chairman of the Federal Reserve. As urgent as her news was, this wasn't a person to push.

"Mr. President..." she pressed.

As President Bartlet looked up over the top of his glasses, she felt the same sense of timelessness she always felt at these moments.

Maybe it was the gravity of the office, of the man, of history itself, but she always surprised herself with her ability to speak in a clear, measured tone, no matter the enormity—or insanity—of the words coming out of her mouth.

This time, she exhaled, before she spoke.

"Sir, we've made contact with aliens."

Chapter Text

The sound in the CIC was deafening.

Bill scanned his beleaguered crew. Every alarm system on Galactica was blaring. The earsplitting noise seemed to prevent the handful of survivors from thinking clearly. No one was taking action.

He looked up at the blank DRADIS console with frustration.

Had a Cylon baseship followed them? Were they sitting in a radioactive cloud from some recently imploded star? It was a miracle Starbuck's blind jump had worked at all. Whether its salvation was temporary or permanent remained to be seen.

Bill raised his voice above the fray, bellowing for medics to help the downed communications officer, for Saul to man the damage control panel, and for someone to get DRADIS back up and running.

Galactica’s alarms were her way of communicating. Bill wasn’t fazed by their presence or their insistence. No, those weren't the sounds he was concerned about. It was the other sounds, the ones in the background, the ones coming from all directions. Echoey metallic, brittle, severe sounds. Sounds that reminded him of creaky old bones making their last complaint before completely giving way.

Galactica shuddered as if the ship was ripping itself apart, bulkheads pulling in opposite directions.

Bill tuned in to a third, menacing layer of sound: uncontrolled, undisciplined electricity. It snapped and sparked, trying to catalyze its wild and destructive cousin: fire.

He stole a protective glance at Laura. She was leaning heavily against the other end of the Command and Control Table, forehead lowered and eyes closed, bony fingers gripping its edges. She seemed singularly determined to clutch this piece of driftwood in an otherwise endless sea.

His resolve melted away, exposing raw fear. He needed her to never let go.

As if sensing his concern, the President of the Colonies opened her eyes and lifted her chin—looking right at him.

Her expression was grateful, then directive. Her message was clear: Stay focused on your crew. I am a lost cause. They aren’t.

He swallowed reluctantly, then turned away, calling for reports from his battle stations.

Saul reported the status of the fore and aft defense shields as he channeled power from the emergency generators accordingly. From the FTL Station, Starbuck called out that the drive and its diagnostic systems were both fried. Helo silently punched the keyboard at the Tactical Officer Station, visibly sweating as he tried to fix DRADIS.

The ship shuddered again, more violently than before, as if giving Bill a final warning before breaking in two. He braced his knees.

His stomach dropped as it hit him that the greatest danger to his crew wasn’t crashing into an asteroid DRADIS couldn’t detect or being pursued by Cavil’s loyal Cylons, it was falling victim to the lifeless maw of space.

He grit his teeth and prepared to raise his voice over the chaos, to order Saul to close off parts of the ship that had already been breached, its human and Cylon occupants surely frozen, their bodies being sucked into the abyss, even as they spoke. Saul interrupted his train of thought, reporting that exact call, announcing each compartment closure with a grave finality.

Bill glanced up at DRADIS as it flickered back on. It revealed a 360-degree scan of their surroundings.

He let out a breath he didn't know he’d been holding.

No Cylon enemies.

No radioactive clouds.

He would've doubted DRADIS was working, except that it detected a nearby planet and a small celestial body orbiting it.

"DRADIS," he announced.

Every face in CIC turned towards the console. The realization they had survived seemed to hit everyone at once: they fell silent.

Even the ship's creaking seemed to still.

Laura had told him how she’d felt when she'd been saved by Hera’s blood. She'd prepared herself for death; then, she'd awoken for an unexpected next chapter. The feeling should have been pure relief, but it wasn't. She'd felt burdened by the drive to make something meaningful out of her bartered time. Now, looking around CIC at the faces of women and men, human and Cylon, he recognized the disorientation in their eyes.

This was the beginning of their next chapter.

He looked to Laura for the next move they would make together.

She had pushed herself to a standing position, her shaky palms planted atop the table, her hips pressed against the console for support. Her pale skin and pronounced cheekbones only accentuated her deeply familiar, steady gaze. She was ready to plan their next move. She was ready to make the tough decisions.

“Bill…” there was a hint of warning in her voice. Her shoulders were taught, as if ready to convince him of a decision he would hate.

He nodded somberly. “Galactica won't survive another jump, even if the FTL drive is restored.”

Her shoulders released as if she’d been afraid of having to convince him that Galactica had made its last voyage. But he was already there.

Maybe it was seeing Hera in the arms of her mother and knowing his ship had made that happen. Maybe it was seeing Laura standing across from him in CIC one last time. Maybe it was Galactica’s audible throws that sounded like an imminent, inescapable goodbye. Whatever the reason, he accepted it. They had to leave the ship now, before her hull gave out and claimed their lives within.

He locked eyes with Laura before speaking. “We’ll send a raptor back to the fleet. They’ll rejoin us here so we can evacuate Galactica.”

Laura pressed her lips together and shut her eyes briefly. He could feel her empathy through her eyes. Smiling weakly, she placed a shaky hand over her heart, signaling that she knew just how hard this must be.

"Starbuck. See which raptors returned intact," he ordered. “Take one back to the fleet and relay our coordinates."

"Sir," Starbuck affirmed that she'd heard.

"Time is of the essence, captain," Laura prodded.

After a salute, Starbuck jogged out of CIC. 

He turned back to Laura. "I know none of the civilian ships are equipped for military operations, but one of them will need to be converted into the new seat of the military.”

She hummed in agreement. By the reflective look on her face, she’d already thought of candidates. “I assume you need a hangar bay that could be converted into a raptor..." she started.

"Admiral. Madam President," Helo interrupted from the Tactical Officer station. He pointed up at a new, more detailed DRADIS report. It included the predominant molecular composition of the nearby planet's surface. "This planet has H20. Lots of it." His voice was hesitant, almost as if he couldn't believe their luck. "I'll start a scan for minerals and other compounds."

Bill squinted at DRADIS's molecular readings.

Helo was right. The surface of this random planet was largely water.

"Captain Agathon, please scan for atmospheric composition, too," Laura requested, voice filled with purpose.

Bill knew it was too much to hope for a habitable planet. But he couldn’t blame her for checking.

She turned back to him, clearing her throat. She met his eyes, her expression determined. "After evacuating Galactica, fill up all the ships with water."

"I'm sure we will.” He assumed the civilian leader of the fleet would give that order when the time came, but the way she phrased it, she'd all but deputized him to take care of it.

The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end.

Before the mission, there hadn't been time to ask whether it was pure adrenaline or Cottle's magic that had gotten her out of sickbay to join the battle. He didn't want to think of her resurgence as temporary, but maybe that was what she was trying to tell him: she would soon be back to her bedridden self.

He didn't want to imagine leading without her.

In these past...minutes?...despite seeing CIC become a burned out shell, despite sealing off sections of the ship that had become icy tombs, he felt oddly calm, because he wasn’t alone. She was back; she was here; she was standing at the center of CIC. He wanted to believe she would never go away.

"Laura," he stepped towards her, extending his arm and touching her elbow. He implored, trying to find answers in her eyes: begging to know the future, begging not to know the future.

"Bill," she cleared her throat, "which civilian ships do you see as contenders for your new military command center?"

Before he could answer and turn the conversation to the subject of her health, Starbuck's voice came out of the Command and Control Table's speakers.

"Starbuck to CIC actual."

He picked up the transmission receiver, allowing Starbuck's voice to continue broadcasting throughout CIC. "Starbuck. What do we have down there?"

"It doesn't look good, sir. Three decent raptors. One was never outfitted for the longer jumps. One has an FTL drive that looks shot; maybe for good. One should be jump-ready, but when I try to spool her up, the drive powers down. I need an engineer."

Tyrol was looking towards him, eyebrows raised in a question. Before Bill could finish nodding, Tyrol was running for the hanger bay. The Chief’s sense of duty was probably only half the story: he seemed anxious to get away from the room where he’d strangled his fellow Cylon, Tory, just ten minutes ago. Bill shook his head to himself. Any concern about Tyrol's recent violence had to be suspended: these were desperate times. If they didn’t get a raptor to the rendezvous point in twelve hours, the fleet would move on without them.

"Starbuck, Tyrol is headed down there to help," he said, before putting down the receiver.

Suddenly, a new voice boomed through CIC’s speakers.

"ALMA a nave espacial no identificado, por favor, identificaros."

A feeling of dread coalesced in Bill’s stomach.

The voice continued. "ALMA to unidentified spacecraft, please identify yourselves."

Chapter Text

“Who else knows," Jed asked as he and CJ strode into the sit room and all parties rose. He scanned the faces of his military advisors, noting unusual traces of trepidation in their eyes.

"Chilean astronomers contacted NASA to see if we could corroborate what their radio telescopes were picking up,” Fitz answered. ”We don't know if they contacted their government or military. It depends what their procedures are for this sort of thing. It depends what sort of thing they think this is."

Kate Harper lifted two upturned palms. "We don't know how they'll assess the risk of being wrong versus the risk of being right. Become a chicken-little laughingstock on the one hand; fail to report an alien invasion on the other."

"And what are our procedures for this sort of thing?" Jed asked, taking his seat at the head of the long table.

"We have triggers in place," Fitz explained. “If a NASA technician picks up evidence of an unidentified presence in airspace – or outer space – she or he informs the on-duty supervisor, who reviews the data and contacts an NSA agent if the source cannot be identified."

"We have a UFO protocol?" Jed turned to his left out of habit, wanting Leo to clarify.

He swallowed stiffly.

From his best friend’s seat, CJ met his gaze. "Not exactly, sir. This protocol is in place in case a spacecraft from another nation deviates from its reported flight path."

Even though it was wrong to do so, even though he should be grateful for the intelligence and passion and commitment she brought to the role, Jed suddenly resented CJ for not being Leo. He shook his head back and forth, annoyed that she and the rest of the sit room had gotten riled up about ‘aliens’ instead of accepting the obvious.

“How do we know what we're detecting isn't a Russian or Chinese shuttle conducting clandestine research, or, God forbid, a military operation?” He slowed his pace and addressed the room like he used to address his university students. Instantly, he felt calmer, as he stepped into his old role. “America has always had a geopolitical advantage. England had to cross an ocean to fight the Revolution. During both World Wars, our citizens remained safe while European cities were ravaged.”

He paused, so his listeners could come to the realization before he said it.

“Maybe someone on Earth built a spaceship because it was easier than having to cross the Atlantic and Pacific and scale our gates." He visualized a spacecraft landing on the White House lawn, enemy soldiers pouring out of its belly, instantly waging a ground war within American borders.

"That is a possibility, sir," CJ answered in a placating tone, apparently unmoved by his explanation. "But if this craft is from a terrestrial nation, we've greatly underestimated the capabilities of one of our allies, and we have a very different kind of problem on our hands."

"Based on preliminary scans from commandeered commercial satellites,” Kate chimed in, “this craft is fifty times larger than the International Space Station."

The size hit him like a punch to the gut.

The US had lost the space race by assuming it was over.

Another country – or corporation – had obviously continued the quest.

Yes, it was hard to admit they were no longer the leaders in space technology. But that egotism was keeping his advisors from accepting the simple facts. He had to spell it out for them.

"Okay,” he sighed. “You are all brilliant people, with a veritable army of brilliant people at your command. It's unlikely that you've gone insane at precisely the same moment, so I'm trying to go along with you here. But I don’t see why we've jumped to the conclusion that this craft has anything to do with aliens.” He made pointed eye contact with CJ before continuing.

“There are very few nations who have the financial resources, technological intelligence, and sheer land space to create a craft of this size, in secret,” he acknowledged. “But what about a partnership? A wealthy individual or a powerful corporation financing the clandestine construction of a spacecraft that eclipses anything that's ever been built? It's not too difficult to imagine,” he shrugged, attempting to convey ‘this-is-business-as-usual’ even though it meant rethinking America’s technological status in the world.

“Russia and China are our allies, but what about a Russian billionaire or a Mongolian warlord?” he pressed on. “The Siberian and Mongolian plains are both massive stretches of earth. Isn't it possible that one of the planet's wealthiest individuals has been constructing a privately funded vessel, far away from the world's gaze?"

"We are investigating that angle," the FBI Deputy Director assured.

"We are too," the Director of the CIA chimed in. "But I can tell you, Mr. President, we have no intel that even hints at something like this. The construction site would have to be so obscure or so remote that neither our satellite imaging nor our spy planes have ever detected it."

"Another piece of evidence, as I understand it, sir,” CJ spoke up, seemingly undeterred, “is that this craft appeared out of thin air."

Jed wondered whether he had heard her correctly.

"The Chilean astronomers had telescopes pointed at the spot where the craft appeared,” she elaborated. “In the spirit of science, they shared the data with NASA. Unless ALMA is forging their own data, not only is this craft fifty times larger than the ISS, but it has propulsion technology so far out of our league that we can't hypothesize how it came to be in its current location. One second, there's nothing at those coordinates; the next second, the craft materialized."

For the first time, Jed allowed himself to imagine that this vessel might have something to do with aliens.

His mind instantly recoiled.

He was a man of science.

He was a man of faith.

Neither set of doctrines had room for extraterrestrials.

He stood up and put his hands in his pockets, pacing the two-foot distance at the head of the table.

Was everything he believed in – from Einstein to Saint Peter – fraudulent?

There was no canon to guide him.

He stopped moving and looked around the room at the faces of his advisors. He recalled a moment – years ago – when he suspected his university students of having organized a cheating ring for a macroeconomics exam. He cleared his throat. "Is there anything anyone wants to tell me about past extraterrestrial contact that their agency may have withheld?"

"We've never confirmed the existence of intelligent beings that were not from earth, if that's what you mean," the CIA Director answered evenly. "All we've seen are a long line of hoaxes and temporary misidentifications."

"There is no file on verified extraterrestrials at any government agency," Fitz picked up the ball.

Jed slid his hands deeper in his pockets and rocked forward on the balls of his feet. "Well,” he shrugged, “there's a first time for everything.” He hoped his outward act of nonchalance would make him feel calmer inside.

Weeks into his first term, he’d discovered this job was about making hugely impactful decisions he could only partially control. He’d learned to live with that responsibility. Now, nearing the end of his second term, he rarely felt overwhelmed by his office. He'd surrounded himself with brilliant staff members and friends, passionate people who also had heart. But after Abbey, there was one person he'd relied on most: the one person unavailable to him now.

He knew what Leo would ask next.

"Do they have weapons?"

"We can't tell, sir," Fitz admitted.

"Then how do we know this craft – if that's what we should call it – isn't poised to unleash a military Armageddon?"

"We don't know, sir."

"So how do we decide to shoot it down or not?"

"Sir, we couldn't shoot it down if we wanted to. It's well beyond our atmosphere."

Jed’s heart pumped faster. "What about our military shuttle? That was the point of the program: to weaponize space."

"We'd anticipated terrestrial threats," Fitz answered.

"Not extra-terrestrial ones," Kate clarified.

“I’ve just accepted your premise that an alien spaceship is overhead and you’re telling me we’re defenseless?”

Zoey.

Ellie.

Lizzy.

Abbey.

He had to protect his family. He had to protect his country. He had to protect his planet.

Someone – or something – was up there. He didn’t know what they wanted. But they’d built a massive ship that could appear in the blink of an eye. They were probably used to getting their way.

He wondered what security measures were available. He looked around, noticing the absence of his National Security Advisor. "Where's Nancy?"

"On the first plane back from Colombia," Kate replied.

"So what now?" he asked with determination, pulling out his chair and sitting back down, ready to defer to his advisors.

"We could try to contact the vessel,” CJ suggested. “Thanks to the rotation of the Earth, we can now hail them and Chile no longer can."

Chapter Text

The voice that called itself ‘ALMA’ stopped as suddenly as it started.

“Battle stations!” Bill shouted, spurring CIC into a flurry of noise and movement. His crew leapt to vacant consoles, punching access codes into keyboards, attempting to revive Galactica's crippled defense systems.

"Was that coming from the planet?" Laura asked, looking at him with unfocused eyes. She was obviously trying to hide a bout of vertigo. He surreptitiously stepped towards her and placed his hand lightly under her elbow.

"A Cylon ship must have followed us here," he shook his head, unable to feel anything but the need to fight and the desire to flee, neither of which Galactica could do. He turned and called to Saul, “Colonel! Get ready to receive fire from enemy Cylons!”

"But where? Where are they?" Laura lifted a shaky hand, pointing at the tranquil DRADIS console.

He grimaced. The Cylons must have developed ways to mask their electronic markers.

"Have someone check the planet. Maybe that’s where the transmission came from," Laura urged hoarsely, then coughed. Coughs suddenly ripped through her, unrelenting. She doubled over the console for support.

He put his hand on her back, protectively. Her body shuddered and shook as his heart vibrated in response.

Without needing to be asked, Saul stepped into command, hollering to the crew to revitalize all systems for battle.

Laura’s coughing fit slowed, then stopped, as Bill lightly ran his hand up and down her pronounced spine. More urgently than ever, he wanted to deal with their invisible Cylons pursuers, fix a raptor, and get the rest of the fleet to join them. He'd put her on the first evacuation transport and send her straight to whichever ship had become Doc Cottle’s new headquarters.

This mission to the Cylon colony had caused a dormant spring of hope to return in his chest. Somehow, Laura was on her feet, which was more than he could say about the last few weeks. Whatever new treatment Doc was trying must be working.

Now, she was probably just exhausted from battle. After a few days of bed rest and more of Doc’s new approach, she’d be on her feet again and no longer confined to sickbay. She’d move back to Colonial One. And without Galactica to call home, maybe he’d move in with her, and feel just a little less displaced.

“The planet,” she repeated in a raspy voice, straightening her back and patting his arm, letting him know she was okay.

He stared at DRADIS, narrowing his eyes, waiting for an enemy blip to appear. His teeth clenched. “There’s a ship out there. We just can’t see it.” He turned away and bellowed orders to channel the ship's waning power into something resembling an arsenal.

"Admiral! Madam President! The atmospheric scan finished,” Helo interrupted, distressed voice cutting across the chaos. “The planet has nearly the same molecular composition as Caprica: a breathable ratio of oxygen and nitrogen to carbon dioxide. And I'm starting to pick up signs of...I don't know what to say..."

"Please, Captain, what does the data show?" Laura encouraged. She seemed to be bracing for the answer by leaning against the console.

"The readings aren't of Cylon technology. But there are signs of something organized. Look, ribbons of complex composites like steel, asphalt, things we consider to be..."

"Markers of civilization," she finished.

A chill ran up Bill’s spine. Maybe there wasn’t a cleverly masked Cylon ship out there. Maybe there was a cleverly masked Cylon planet.

“Prepare to receive fire from the planet!” he shouted. Under his direction, the officer at helm control rotated the ship so that what was left of Galactica's shields faced the now ominous sphere.

As he marshaled his defenses, he watched Laura out of the corner of his eye. She had made her way to the Tactical Officer Station and was reading the molecular scans of the planet's surface, asking Helo to run modified tests for certain compounds. She probably wanted to be sure they weren't misreading nature-made patterns as indicators of something more.

He kept hoping she would shake her head with a laugh and point out what they had misread. He preferred a single crisis at a time: he wanted to evacuate Galactica before her seams gave way, not fight a battle with a stealth Cylon planet.

But by the growing expression of wonder on her face, he felt more and more certain that she too believed she was staring at organized systems, not random convergences.

Just their luck.

Kara, where the hell did you take us?

"Cape Canaveral to unidentified spacecraft, please identify yourselves."

Bill’s heart raced. A ‘cape’ was a land formation. The Cylons were on the planet. “Weapons target: planet!” he announced.

"Cape Canaveral to unidentified spacecraft, please identify yourselves."

“Nuclear warhead: at the ready!” he added. 

“Bill…” Laura appeared beside him, gripping his upper arm. “We don’t know whether they’re hostile. We don’t even know if they’re Cylons.”

“Prepare for attack!” he declared, receiving immediate affirmative responses from his crew. He replied to Laura in a low voice, “And how are we supposed to find out?”

“By asking them,” she said, opening her palm.

He blinked at her.

Her gaze was steady and certain.

She was right.

“Helo, man the comm station!” he hollered, nodding once to Laura as he handed her the transmission receiver. More intel would be useful before deploying his limited arsenal, anyway.

"Cape Canaveral to unidentified spacecraft, please identify yourselves." The increasingly insistent voice hailed them in a string of unrecognizable languages.

As Helo donned headphones, Bill called, “Patch us through!”

Laura cleared her throat. “How do I sound?” she asked. Her voice that had been raspy from sickness and strained from the recent battle, now sounded calm and stately. She implored him with raised eyebrows, in what appeared to be a rare moment of self-consciousness.

He felt awestruck – not for the first time – to be in her innermost circle. Apparently, his slight smile was all the response she needed. She firmly pressed the button on the transmission receiver. "We come in peace." 

Crackle.

She'd cut through the hails as if cutting through a quorum argument or a hostile press conference.

Silence.

Bill could hear himself inhale and exhale.

Silence.

The quiet was more unnerving than the noise.

Laura bit her lip and looked at him, fearful eyes confiding her concern.

Maybe a verbal response was all ‘Cape Canaveral’ needed for attack protocols to kick in. Maybe they were being targeted for destruction.

He looked up at DRADIS, waiting for a swarm of Cylon raiders to rise off the planet’s surface and pounce on them in a coordinated surprise attack.

"Please identify yourself,” the foreign voice resumed, insistence replaced with thinly veiled trepidation. The plural had also been replaced with the singular. Instead of being treated as an impersonal ship, Laura was being referred to a person.

"We have wounded on board,” she continued, in a deliberate, diplomatic tone. “We seek medical and technical assistance..."

Fear rose in his chest. He reached out and pressed the transmission hold button. "You may be giving us up to enemy Cylons. We can't afford to reveal our weaknesses."

“Bill, we can't afford not to.” The lights in CIC flickered dramatically, as if emphasizing her point. “I am not a ship technician or a medical doctor, but I know Galactica took heavy damage just now. Women and men are bleeding to death in the bowels of this ship. Who knows which of her life support systems are failing, even as we speak. We may not have the chance to fix a raptor and send it back to the fleet before time…” Her eyes looked momentarily misty. Maybe it was the low light, playing tricks. “…before time runs out.”

“Besides," she continued, before he could respond, "even if we could reach the rest of the fleet, we can’t order civilian ships to jump here into harm's way until we’ve treated with whomever we’re speaking to. Friend or foe, there is someone out there. We need a life raft right now and if one isn't thrown to us, we are drowning anyway."

"Please identify your name, rank, and country of origin," the voice elaborated, insistence rising again.

He took his finger off the hold button, stepped back, and nodded.

Laura exhaled, then raised the receiver to her mouth. "We are refugees from the Twelve Colonies of Kobol. We are both human and Cylon. To whom are we speaking?"

Silence.

Bill counted to ten in his head.

Maybe they had lost the signal.

"Hello?” Laura tried again, “Is anyone..."

"This is Admiral Fitzwallace, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the United States of America.” A new voice boomed, resonant and firm. “State your name, rank, and point of origin."

United States of America. Bill searched his memory but found nothing.

Admiral Fitzwallace's request for identification carried an unspoken threat. He sounded like the type of leader who had his hand over a red button and a poster over his shoulder that read: destroy first, ask questions later.

Bill remembered how Admiral Cain had launched vipers against Galactica because her rules weren't being followed. Now, he watched Laura intently. As much as he chafed at the demands of an external authority, it was probably wise of her to follow this new Admiral’s protocol.

"This is President Laura Roslin, leader of the Twelve Colonies of Kobol. We come from all twelve planets in the Colonies.” Laura’s chin was elevated, her back straight, eyes focused on an invisible point in the distance. Cancer be damned: she still looked Presidential. “Our survivors are both human and Cylon. We are seeking help, not harm. Admiral Fitzwallace, may I ask, are you Cylon or human?"

Again, there was a conspicuous pause. He pictured a room of high-ranking officers discussing their next move. But he couldn’t picture their faces. Were they the faces of Twos, Sixes, and Eights? Or were they the genetically unique faces of human beings? His heart pumped with simultaneous fear and hope.

"President Roslin,” a new voice traveled across the airwaves. “This is President Josiah Bartlet of the United States of America. We, and everyone else on our planet, consider ourselves human. The species Homo sapiens sapiens, to be precise. How did you come to be here?"

Humans.

Or so they claimed.

His heart thudded as he looked to Laura, to see whether she believed this so-called President.

She pressed her lips together, revealing slight relief. She was probably grateful to have gotten a seat at the table with the civilian leader. But concentration covered her face as her mind seemed to churn.

She was likely thinking through the same permutations that he was. Josiah Bartlet could be a Cylon, masquerading as human, luring them into a trap. Although he didn’t sound like any known Cylon models, if they’d found ways to mask their technological markers, maybe they’d found ways to mask their duplicative voices. Or, Josiah Bartlet could be a human survivor of genocide who escaped the Colonies and reestablished civilization on this distant planet. If so, he would be innately afraid of Cylons and horrified at the thought that Galactica harbored them.

Either way, one ill-placed statement from Laura could cause President Bartlet to nod to his Admiral, who would then push the red button that would bring Galactica’s story to an abrupt end.

"President Bartlet," she addressed him in a measured, ambassadorial tone. "We ended up in your solar system by chance, when we were forced to make an unplotted jump. On behalf of the Battlestar Galactica, I am asking, humbly, for your help."

Chapter Text

Even as a kid, CJ had known how it felt to be singularly focused.

Now, she felt her body drop into the familiar sensation. Her breathing remained steady. Her purpose, crystal clear. The world consisted of the situation at hand and nothing else.

Solving problems is what she was meant to do.

In crisis-handling mode, Josh spun upward into a manic frenzy of enthusiasm. Toby became flustered by his principled anger. The bigger the crisis, the more laser focused she felt. She’d often wondered if that was why she’d gotten the job.

But remaining cool under fire wasn’t all it took to be Chief of Staff. Decisions had to be rendered, directions set. Tradeoffs between worthy causes had to be accepted, along with the fact that sincerely made promises might not be kept.

Now, in this moment, there was no Alzheimer’s consuming her father. No Danny Concannon to equivocate about. This situation was exponentially more momentous than anything she’d ever faced.

That’s why she’d never felt more alive.

Quickly, she scrawled a note on her legal pad and turned the words in the President’s direction.

Tell her you need to take ten.

President Bartlet eyed the words, then nodded.

“Madam President, would you mind if we paused our radio transmission momentarily?” he ventured, ever the diplomat.

She closed her eyes as she waited for the response, trying to determine whether this woman sounded like a truthful person or a deceptive person.

One thing was certain: Laura Roslin sounded like a person, not an alien.

“I’ll be here…” There was a slight quaver in Laura Roslin's otherwise composed voice.

Was it CJ's imagination or did President Roslin sound reluctant to get off the line?

“I’ll be here when you’re ready to resume, Mr. President,” President Roslin completed, resolutely.

“Until then,” President Bartlet concluded.

Admiral Fitzwallace nodded to the tech wearing headphones in the back of the room.

“Before you go, Mr. President,” President Roslin’s voice returned, unexpectedly. Her tone was suddenly candid, as if a shell of pretense had fallen away. “I understand the intricacies of government. I’m familiar with having to navigate layers of power and decision-making.” She sounded as if she had taken him aside in the hall and was speaking privately, President to President. “I urge you, no, I plead with you: whatever conferring you must do with your advisors, please do so quickly. We need humanitarian aid, urgently.”

CJ was shocked, then in awe. Not only had President Roslin correctly assessed the reason for President Bartlet’s request, but she’d displayed the indisputable carriage of a leader. It wasn’t just the content – the sense of responsibility towards her people; it was the countenance - the easy confidence of authority and the touches of humility that came with tenure in the role. Being President didn’t mean you had absolute power. It meant you knew the edges of your worldly control.

“We’ll speak again soon, Madam President,” President Bartlet assured.

The green indicator light turned red. CJ opened her mouth to address the room.

“A ‘Battlestar’?” President Bartlet burst to all those present before she could speak. “I don’t know what that is, but it doesn’t sound like a harmless passenger vehicle. I do not buy her story of helplessness.”

CJ glanced around the table. Military brass were nodding. Expressions were turning from dazed to defiant. The President’s skepticism was prompting everyone to revert from an uncomfortable investigative limbo back to the offensive mindset they knew best.

“Battlestar or not, President Roslin made no military overtures,” CJ jumped in, attempting to deflate the growing physical tension in the room.

“Speaking of things I don’t buy,” President Bartlet continued, addressing the table without acknowledging she’d spoken. “They’re claiming to be human?” he shook his head back and forth, forearms resting on the sit room table, upturned palms in the air. “When I accepted the alien theory, I was picturing colossal bug-men with laser guns. Not a woman who speaks American English, styles herself President, and asks for our help.”

“She said they’re human and something called Cylon,” CJ clarified. She’d been rolling the term around in her head, trying to figure out if she’d heard it before, but nothing came to mind. “The context implies,” she posited, refusing to become a spectator as the President conversed with his military strategists, “there are two different species on their vessel, both of whom are refugees, seeking…”

"We’re being taken for fools," Defense Secretary Hutchison interrupted.

CJ sighed to herself, prepared to receive the brunt of what was likely to be an aggressive Hutchison rant. “What makes you think they need help at all?" he continued. "This ‘we’re wounded’ ploy is a cover for their military operation."

She turned in her chair, to face him. “Why bother introducing themselves before launching an attack?” She steadied her voice, speaking in a rational, deliberate tone. “Assuming their motives are military, they haven't maximized their hand. If their goal is obliteration and they have a weapon to unleash, they could have unleashed it before we knew what hit us. If their goal is domination, they could have come right out and negotiated from a place of power, holding us hostages of fear.”

The President furrowed his forehead, looking towards her.

"You’re right, CJ," he said. "For all their engineering genius, they've made a strategic blunder. Why waste the incredibly valuable element of surprise on bad-theater where some woman pretends to be a human from another planet?"

"Exactly, sir," she agreed, meeting his eyes, solemnly. "Why bother playing the part of the wounded in need of help…” she spoke softer now, "...unless they do need some sort of help.”

"So they could appeal to your bleeding heart and convince you to let them land!” Hutchison burst with unfiltered disgust. “At which point, a massive alien army would pour out of the belly of that metal whale, starting a war on Earth.” Hutchison rolled his eyes.

The sit room had been the hardest place to earn respect since taking this job. Most around the table looked at her with indifference, assuming she had nothing to contribute to military or security matters. Some had started to respect her opinions, but without Leo’s military credentials, she knew she’d never be afforded the same esteem. Then there was Hutchison. He still looked at her as an actively offensive civilian presence who reeked of liberal ideals and infected their surroundings with pacifist tendencies.

Whenever she and Hutchison had sit room tete-a-tetes, his condescending comments undermined her efforts to build a relationship of trust with the President.

“Well, we’re nowhere near inviting anyone to land,” she shook her head in emphasis, attempting to calm a stewing Hutchison before turning her attention back to the President. “I think you should ask President Roslin what happened and why they need help. Ask her where exactly these twelve planets are. We have experts standing by, for corroboration,” she nodded to the Director of NASA, a sweating, spectacled man who shrunk from her gaze.

She turned back to the President. “Her story will unravel or something will start to make sense. Find out as much as you can through conversation.”

"I strongly disagree, Mr. President," Admiral Fitzwallace shook his head gravely. “We need to curtail conversation and initiate offensive strategies, limited as our options may be.”

“We lure their ship into our atmosphere,” Hutchison interjected, apparently sharing the idea as it came to him, “then use antiaircraft missiles to shoot it down. To deal with debris, we do it over the Pacific.”

Admiral Fitzwallace appeared to consider the plan, but the crease in his forehead revealed reservations. “We need time,” he continued, “to develop tactics, weigh our options, and test them."

“She explicitly said that she doesn’t have time,” CJ spoke up.

“What I am saying, sir,” Admiral Fitzwallace raised his voice slightly but sternly, his tone obviously meant for her, "is that asking questions of President Roslin exposes what we don’t know. We can’t afford to reveal our weaknesses.”

The President’s eyes narrowed, deep in thought.

CJ looked at him in silent anticipation.

"It seems to me that we can't afford not to reveal our weaknesses,” President Bartlet revealed. “We don't have a way of conducting outer space espionage, beyond detecting the approximate size and shape of this craft. The brightest minds in this government are sitting here scratching their heads, offering cautionary words and criticism, or suggesting rash interventions that may do us more harm than good.”

He turned his head and met her eyes, his gaze revealing trust. “No, I'm with CJ. How else will we increase our intel, except through conversation?” He frowned at her, as if he could detect the secret feelings of triumph flowing through her body. “I’m still open to radical military options,” he clarified. “Let's just find out who—or what—we’re dealing with.”

Chapter Text

"Madam President?"

Laura lifted her head and stood up straight, hearing Josiah Bartlet's voice travel across the airwaves once again. She pressed the button on the handheld receiver, which she’d been clutching as if it were a towrope. “I'm still here, President Bartlet."

"You referred to your ship's inhabitants as refugees. Can you please explain?"

She cleared her throat and tried to clear her vertigo, willing her voice to continue resembling a strong, healthy countenance, despite the double-edged elixir coursing through her veins.

“We are humans from the former Colonies. We've made peace with a faction of Cylons, who also no longer have a home. So all of our ship's inhabitants can be considered refugees.” And now we need refuge from our own failing ship.

"Why did you leave these Colonies of yours?" Josiah Bartlet prompted. "What happened?"

Frak.

She’d been playing the we-are-both-Cylon-and-human card as much as possible, hoping that whomever these people turned out to be – humans or Cylons masquerading as humans – they would think twice before shooting down members of their own kind.

President Bartlet’s line of questioning felt like a trap, designed to make her repeat the horrific events of the past and reveal whether her allegiance was with the despotic humans or the genocidal Cylons. If she picked a side, even subtly, it would allow him to see her as the enemy.

"Why did we leave?" She repeated his question, buying herself time. She felt the familiar feeling of grief rising in her chest. No matter how much time passed or how many new sorrows arose, that fundamental, pivotal pain was one that would never abate. "Our planets were destroyed during a nuclear genocide. The few human survivors fled." A vocal tremor revealed a hint of grief and an edge of rage.

“I see…” President Bartlet paused, as if wanting choose his next words carefully.

Her heartbeat and headache both pounded. She hoped Josiah Bartlet hadn't detected her emotion. Most people wouldn't have.

Since becoming President of this ailing civilization, she'd heard reporters and pundits call her cold and impassive. That analysis surprised her, because the emotion was there; she couldn't make it go away, even when she tried. But not everyone could read her micro-expressions, her every pause and twitch and tremor.

Bill was the one person in the fleet who seemed able to read her like a book. It's what made him a challenging adversary in their early days. It's what made him the love of her life now.

She looked up and met his gaze from across the Command and Control Table.

His blue eyes brimmed with empathy, as if he’d seen what she hoped President Bartlet would not: the pain of the past was not forgotten.

"Once your planets were destroyed, where did you go?" The long pause from President Bartlet abruptly ended. "Where are you going now?" 

She didn't know what he was waiting for her to reveal, but she got the distinct feeling he was listening for something. Was he hoping to hear something damning or something absolving? Did he want her to be a friend or a foe?

"We went in search of a new home,” she explained neutrally, her tone calm and even. “We were looking for our long lost brethren and the planet our ancestors called Earth. We found it a few months ago, a hundred thousand light years from here. It too was a nuclear wasteland. We're now without a map, searching for a habitable home. But I can tell you this…”

She flicked her eyes across CIC towards Colonel Tigh, then over to Athena who was sitting on a step, cradling a wide-eyed Hera. She allowed passion to seep into her voice, suddenly emboldened by the familiar feeling of conviction. "...No matter where we go or what we find, we are committed to forging a new society, ceasing the cycle of destruction, and coexisting as Cylon and human citizens.”

There. She'd said it. Her cards were on the table. She held her breath, unsure what emotion her soliloquy had evoked in her listener. Maybe President Bartlet was a Cylon who would shoot them out of the sky for the infraction of cross-race allegiance. Maybe he was a human who would do the same for the same reasons. But she meant what she said. If they were going to survive, she wanted them to survive together.

She'd never made a grand proclamation of her change of heart. Instead, she'd slowly started to trust specific Cylons, then slowly started to accept the Cylon alliance. The day of the mutiny when she'd almost lost Bill was the first time she truly believed that partnership was possible. She'd been on their baseship, commanding from their console, completely vulnerable personally, and completely reliant on them presidentially.

Something changed in her then, though she hadn’t articulated it until now. It's part of why she'd come on the mission to rescue Hera. The future was no longer a mythical place called Earth. The future was a state of mind: a new way of thinking and being as humans and Cylons. If they had a chance of survival, an integrated society was the first step. She wouldn’t be there to see it come to fruition, but in the day or so of life she had left, she vowed to chart a course for integration.

“President Roslin,” President Bartlet spoke in a measured tone. "Something about your story rings false..."

She pressed her lips together nervously, closing her eyes as she awaited condemnation. Perhaps Josiah Bartlet was really a Cylon Two whose memory drive recalled her airlock execution and had no intention of ever trusting her again. Perhaps he was a human genocide survivor, like Admiral Cain, who now tortured Cylons for sport. Either way, she was certain he had been unnerved by her tale. She could tell by the slight hitch in his voice.

“...You couldn't have found Earth a few months ago. You are speaking with Earth right now.”

Chapter Text

CJ winced.

She’d advised President Bartlet to identify paradoxes in the other President’s tale, but she hadn’t expected him to take the first opportunity to directly challenge Laura Roslin.

CJ tried to make eye contact, to see inside his mind and understand what he was thinking and why he’d decided to risk pissing off the alien President by using the overly polite tone that world leaders brandished when they were calling each other’s bullshit.

Every once in a while he was like this: internally validated and hard to predict. Did Abbey and Leo develop techniques for anticipating when he’d go off-script, or had they just learned to accept that from time to time, Bartlet would be Bartlet, but without bringing along his closest advisors?

His expression was patiently expectant, gaze fixed on the indicator light on the sit room table, like he’d just ordered takeout and was waiting for the person on the other end of the line to repeat back his order.

“Earth…” President Roslin pronounced cautiously, as if saying the word for the first time. But she had said the word just one minute ago, when telling her fantastical story about her band of refugees finding Earth ravaged by nuclear war. “You call your planet Earth,” she restated in a chastened whisper.

Maybe that had been his plan: to provoke the composed leader, take her out of her conversational comfort zone, and find out what existed beneath the reasoned appeals.

“I…” President Roslin’s voice cracked. “…Please excuse me…” The line went silent.

President Bartlet turned to his left and made eye contact with CJ. His furrowed brow seemed to be asking: did she just hang up on me?

CJ nodded.

He turned back to stare quizzically at the indicator light on the table, as if the green dot was the disembodied President Roslin.

The dot turned red.

"I don’t know why she attempted to appropriate our name,” President Bartlet shook his head, then abruptly looked up and scanned the faces around the table. “So who do we have up there?” Apparently, he wanted to use the unexpected break to plan their next move.

"No one, sir," CJ answered. "Our next mission isn't scheduled for two and a half months."

"I know that," President Bartlet flared. "I don't mean Americans. I mean any of us. Anyone from Earth. Russians, Chinese..." In only half an hour's time, his perspective on who constituted ‘us’ and ‘them,’ seemed to have changed.

"Two Russian cosmonauts on the International Space Station conducting research, two weeks left in their mission. One scientist on the Chinese Space Station, scheduled for rotation with another scientist in three days,” Kate answered, impressing CJ with a memorized logbook of space.

"Why haven't they noticed these...visitors...yet?" the President asked, forehead creased.

"Both space stations are currently on the opposite side of the planet,” Kate explained in her typical levelheaded tone.

No matter the subject – terrorist threat, hostage negotiation, or what it’s like to be married and divorced – Kate maintained an air of having ‘been there and done that.’ Even though she'd never dealt with aliens before, she still sounded cool, calm, and collected. Thank goodness she was on the team.

"Would it be feasible for the Russian cosmonauts or Chinese scientist to use a transport of some sort to dock with this ship and meet with the..." The President cut himself off, as if exasperated. "What are we calling them?"

CJ couldn't remember ever seeing the President at a loss for words. "I don't think we've decided on a name yet, sir," she shared. Usually, she arrived at the sit room after a mission had been named, if not fully planned. Margaret would hand her a military brief, thicker than what she could possibly memorize in the five minutes she had before a meeting.

Now, for the first time, CJ felt like she was on the frontier. There was no intel. There was no history. The first record of how nations on this planet interacted with beings from other planets was being transcribed, as they spoke. "Until scientists can suggest otherwise, how about Colonials,” she offered, “since that's how they style themselves.”

"As long as we don't morph that into Colonists," President Bartlet grumbled. "Colonials are ominous, but Colonists are downright threatening."

“Understood, sir,” she assured him with a nod, then looked across the table, pivoting her gaze between Kate and the Director of NASA, who was patting his brow with a Kleenex. “What about the President’s idea? Is it possible for a Russian or Chinese astronaut to transport themselves to the Colonial spaceship?”

"We don't know what short-range shuttles the Chinese have, though I can make an educated guess,” Kate responded matter-of-factly. “We do have two pods on the ISS. One could be fueled up and manually navigated to the alien craft. Sorry, to the Colonial craft. Then, a short spacewalk could get the cosmonauts to whatever airlock the Battlestar Galactica may have."

It suddenly hit CJ that the reason she'd only spent a few initial minutes suspecting the spaceship was a hoax, was because Kate had vouched for the data.

CJ had learned early on that the Chief of Staff’s responsibilities were more complex than one person could hold. So it all came down to trust. Did you trust your information? Did you trust the briefing on your desk and the people who wrote it? She had to trust. If she didn’t, she would drive herself crazy with second-guessing and self-doubt.

So even though she couldn’t look through a telescope and see the Battlestar Galactica with her own eyes, or personally trace the source of the encrypted radio frequency, she had to believe the ship existed and that the woman they’d been talking to was on it.

"Sir,” Admiral Fitzwallace spoke up. “What you are contemplating is incredibly dangerous for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that we’re on the brink of a potential war, here on Earth, between Russia and China. And, if we let the Russians in on our secret before the Chinese or vice versa, we may receive heat in Kazakhstan for playing favorites."

"Who said we'd pick one over the other?" The President shrugged as if his plan was obvious. "They're both up there. Why not get the UN to deputize an international delegation comprised of two Russian cosmonauts and a Chinese scientist, and send them over together?"

"To do what exactly?" Hutchison growled. "These people aren't trained negotiators. They’re not spokespeople for their nations, much less our nation. And they certainly aren't trained military operatives. They are in no way prepared to deal with these invaders."

She wryly noted that Hutchison hadn't even tried to use the term, ‘Colonials.’

"We just need the Russian and Chinese delegation to talk to the Colonial leaders," the President reasoned. "To see for themselves who we're dealing with and report back to us – to the nations of Earth – with their findings."

She pictured President Chigorin and President Lian using their astronauts as pawns in a three dimensional chess match. She adored President Bartlet for his idealism, and she respected him for his rationalism, but right now, he was being overly optimistic.

"Given the situation in Kazakhstan, I don't know that we can trust them to work together," she cautioned.

"Maybe this is just what they need," the President lifted his chin, righteously. "A compelling reason to rally around something undeniably bigger and more important than either of their enormous, easily bruised egos."

"Sir, I want peace in Kazakhstan as much as the next person," she empathized, "and I believe we will get there in our talks with President Chigorin and President Lian. But I don't recommend the Colonial situation be leveraged for the Kazakhstan peace process. Both situations are too high stakes to try to kill two birds with one stone."

"Even if the Russians and Chinese pretend to make peace for the sake of the mission," Hutchison frothed, "once they're in direct contact with these invaders, we can't control what they do. What if President Chigorin invites them to land in Siberia? And as soon as the alien ship crosses the atmosphere, he unleashes antiaircraft missiles, and the aliens retaliate with a nuclear warhead that ends us all?"

“Or,” Hutchison continued, “what if President Lian plays the international community for fools by making a back channel offer to grant citizenship in exchange for weapons technology?"

"I agree with Hutchison, sir," she surprised herself as she said those words. "I don't think it's an option to tell even our closest allies about the Colonials. When a new player enters the game, alliances shift unpredictably and behaviors become erratic. We don't know how other nations will react until we tell them the news. And we won't be able to control their actions, once we do."

“Lucky for us,” Kate’s lips tweaked upward, “we aren’t violating any United Nations edicts around extraterrestrial communication.” She nodded to the Director of NASA, prompting him to corroborate.

“That’s…that’s…right,” he stammered. “The UN's Office for Outer Space Affairs was going to appoint a delegate to be the official point of contact in the event of extraterrestrial communication, but once the media got hold of the story..."

“It became a laughingstock,” CJ realized, aloud. “I remember.” She looked Kate in the eyes, for confirmation. “So the good news is, there are no UN edicts for us to break if we decide to keep this conversation with the Colonials to ourselves?”

“That’s right.”

CJ nodded, looking towards the President to gauge his current opinion. His frown made it clear he still wanted to involve his fellow world leaders. “Also, Mr. President,” she continued her argument, this time pulling from her years as Press Secretary. “The more governments who know, the greater the chance the public will find out.”

She knew, as well as anyone, that once a story hit the wire, there was no controlling the spin. "If this leaks to the citizens of the world, we could experience global panic on a scale we've never seen. Mass hysteria, riots, markets crashing. Vigilantes and religious fanatics getting paranoid and trigger-happy. Mass suicides..."

"Okay, okay," the President interrupted. "You had me at mass hysteria. So, let's say we take this window of time, before other nations find out, to negotiate with the Colonials in some way. What then? We can’t talk forever. What’s our end game?”

“I have an idea, Mr. President,” Kate spoke up, then turned to Hutchison. “But you,” she underscored pointedly, “are not going to like it.”

“And none of you,” Hutchison snorted, looking up and down the table before resting his eyes on CJ, “are going to like my idea.”

Chapter Text

Laura closed her eyes and pressed her palm against the hallway wall.

Almost there.

“Laura…” Bill’s garbled voice appeared behind her.

She squeezed her lips together, steeling herself. 

“I’m fine,” she lied, as she turned around.“Just going to the head.” She found his blurry face with her eyes and tried to deliver reassuring eye contact. If he found out about Cottle’s syringes and what the temporary boosters were costing her, his heart would shatter. 

When Josiah Bartlet said ‘Earth’ moments ago, obsessive hope and bitter disappointment ripped through her; the people around her disintegrated into borderless blobs of color, their voices decomposed into a hazy cacophony. Her shaky hand dropped the transmission receiver and she staggered out of CIC in a sensory fog.

Now, she needed to revive herself as quickly as possible and return to the urgent work of negotiating assistance with the planet below. Even without being able to see Bill’s expression, she knew his heart ached with concern.

“Go,” she pleaded, waving him off with her free hand, doing her best impression of a person who could see straight and hear clearly.

“…Lee…remove…carry the bodies of the fallen…” Bill’s muddled voice delivered orders that were hard to make out. He must have turned and left.

“…visual report…observation deck…” His voice receded further, then cutoff, probably as he crossed the threshold to CIC.

If she didn’t return shortly, he’d surely come after her. Until then, she had the privacy she needed.

She resumed her lurching walk.

Come on, body.

She loathed herself for physically faltering at a time like this.

Using the full weight of her body, she opened the door to the head.

The lights were still working. Thank the Gods.

She stumbled towards a stall, reaching the swinging door just as her knees gave out.

Extending her arms and bracing herself on both sides, she ran her hands down the slick metal walls, lowering herself into a sitting position on the toilet seat. She leaned forward, reaching for the latch on the stall door, and found herself swiping at air, her depth perception off.

She pawed again, this time connecting with the latch, her trembling fingers sliding it closed.

Sinking back, she was relieved to be supported by the metal seat. Her spine slumped, resigning from the duty of keeping her upright.

If only she could sleep.

She shut her eyes.

Please, Gods, let this be the Earth we’ve been seeking.

Finding a home for her people had always been her dying wish.

This time, maybe the wish would stick.

Because this time, she was really dying.

She fumbled with her waistband, fingers gripping one of the hidden cylindrical tubes.

The aberrant liquid was her connection to life and her pact with death. She simultaneously craved it and hated it.

She tugged up her sleeve, exposing her pale flesh. Her teeth pulled the rubber stopper off the needle’s tip.

Realizing Ishay hadn’t bothered teaching her to sterilize injection sites, she scoffed. For a patient whose prognosis was forty-eight hours, it was pointless to worry about infections.

She tried to steady the syringe in her hand. Anticipating pain, she flinched.

Quickly, she jabbed her inner arm, then sunk the needle deeper under her skin.

It didn’t hurt.

It was a small infraction compared to the full-body, wracking heaves of Deloxin, and the unreachable, throbbing ache in her breast.

She placed her thumb over the plunger and pushed the contents of the syringe into her arm.

Doc Cottle’s potion traveled through her, mixing and commingling with her own biochemical cocktail. Her mind started to clear, the clashing emotions momentarily purged by the neuromolecular deluge. Even her muscles regained a bit of energy, artificial and temporary as the boost may be.

A vividly beautiful blue-green world appeared in her mind's eye.

She let her palm fall open, dropping the empty syringe in the trash.

Maybe this was it.

She was truly dying.

And her people were truly home.

Her glasses rode up as she rubbed her eyelids with the tips of her fingers. She blinked at her knuckles.

Every wrinkle and vein was vivid and clear. Her shaking had stopped.

And now, she only had two vials of life left. She touched her palm to the cylinders in her waistband before standing up and testing out her temporarily more-steady step.

She let herself out of the stall.

They were afraid.

She didn't know why it had taken her so long to recognize it.

Probably because she was reeling from the news that there were beings who considered themselves human, other than the 38,000 in the fleet.

Her working theory was that by a stroke of luck and Kara’s random punch code, Galactica had found itself in a system that a band of survivalists from the Twelve Colonies had established. Perhaps they’d been criminals or religious extremists living off the grid, beyond jurisdiction, storing their own supply of food and weapons. When the attacks came, they'd been prepared. Somehow, they escaped mass genocide, traveled a million light years, and found themselves a habitable planet.

In the last three years, while the fleet had been fleeing Cylons and seeking Earth, this band of humans had set up a colony and managed to keep themselves safe. Their cover story of not being part of the Twelve Colonies was a calculated attempt to distance themselves from the conflict that had destroyed their species, in case any Cylons ever came calling. Their plan was to claim ignorance while firing up their nuclear arsenal or boarding their escape-ready ships.

They probably thought they were the only humans left in the universe. They must have been surprised – then appalled – to hear from her, a fellow human, who was promoting peace with a faction of Cylons. 

She used both hands – noticeably less shaky than five minutes ago – to push open the door to CIC and step back into the busy command center. If DRADIS revealed a fleet of old Colonial ships, rising off the planet's surface and jumping away, it would confirm her half-baked hypothesis.

DRADIS was serene.

Its stillness contrasted starkly with the maze of moving people in CIC. Anyone not manning a battle station was removing bodies of those who'd fallen during the battle at the Cylon Colony. 

Even though the lights were dim, the air covered by a thin haze of smoke, every person was outlined with a distinct, bold border. Each color was bright and saturated, competing with those around it. The arresting visuals and brilliant hues fought so strongly for her attention, she squinted to keep the stimulating world at bay. What a difference a drug makes.

“Excuse us, Madam President.”

She cringed, as if Lee had just shouted into her right ear. Her vision wasn’t the only sense on overdrive. Lee hurried quickly towards her from a few feet away, the body of a fallen officer hanging between him and Baltar.

Stepping aside, she averted her eyes from the deep red, technicolor blotch on the young officer’s chest.

Maybe vividness and volume was her instinctual gift to herself, since each sensation might be the last she'd ever experience. 

"Report from the observation deck..." Caprica Six appeared in the doorway opposite, breathing heavily, probably winded from a quick round trip. "It's a gorgeous blue planet. Green continents. White clouds.”

Laura's heart pounded. What she'd visualized in the bathroom stall wasn’t her imagination. It had been a vision.

She strode towards Bill, who was putting down the intercom.

"Galen is struggling with the raptor's drive," he shook his head. "I put out the call for every engineer that's still standing to head down there to help. We'll get a raptor back up and running. It's just a matter of time."

"We ordered the fleet to abandon the recon coordinates if we weren't back in twelve hours," she replied gravely.

He pressed his lips together with determination, silently letting her know he was already well aware.

She crossed her arms as an idea came to her.

If the beings on this planet were humans from the Twelve Colonies who managed to escape during the fall, they must have developed longer jump technology. Otherwise, how could they have travelled a million light years and set up house, within a few years' time?

If the beings on this planet were actually Cylons who’d successfully masked their technological identifiers, the good news was, they’d have Cylon jump technology. Perhaps she could leverage their allegiance with the rebel Twos, Sixes, and Eights to convince these newfound Cylons to lend out a ship that could make the jump back to the fleet. 

She tapped her bicep.

If the beings on this planet were neither Cylons nor humans from the Twelve Colonies, and were instead some evolutionary offshoot of the Thirteenth Tribe, she hoped in their society, there was no better reunion gift than the loan of a jump-ready ship.

"Laura?" Bill raised his eyebrows, asking her to reveal whatever was on her mind.

"I'm figuring out how to ask Josiah Bartlet for the keys to his ride."

Chapter Text

“We arm the military shuttle with newly developed DARPA weapons,” Hutchison projected, exuding hubris.

Kate bit the inside of her lip. If she could resist the temptation to interrupt the Secretary of Defense, he’d continue spinning flawed plans, and hers would sound sane in comparison.

She was intimately familiar with the research being conducted by the Department of Defense’s Advanced Research Projects Agency. Yes, they were developing breakthrough technologies that could have as big an impact on national defense as their previous contributions, like stealth aircraft and GPS. But the high-energy liquid lasers and electromagnetic streams of molten metal that her friends and acquaintances were working on were still years away.

“With the HEL weapon or MAHEM,” Hutchison continued, displaying inexplicable confidence, “we could destroy the alien invaders where they sit, in space, without having to lure them into our atmosphere.”

“What’s the HEL weapon?” CJ asked.

“A high-energy laser, prototyped by the Israelis and recently tested at White Sands.”

“And MAHEM?”

“A high-voltage pulse weapon, propelled by electromagnetic fields.”

Next, he’d probably suggest they use DARPA's in-development humanoid robots to fly the shuttle.

Kate couldn’t take it anymore.

“Respectfully,” she spoke up, meeting Hutchison’s preemptive glare, “arming the military shuttle with a hundred and fifty kilowatt laser is more of a danger to the shuttle’s would-be crew than to any outer space target.”

"Kate, what do you think we should do?" President Bartlet asked.

Most days, she couldn't believe she had the ear of the President. On her way to work in the mornings, she'd get to wondering how she became a trusted advisor to the leader of the free world. Even when he didn't agree with her, President Bartlet respected her opinion. He’d still call on her with higher ranking officers present. And he often asked her into the Oval for one-on-ones: winding conversations that roved from the practical and tactical, to the philosophical.

She’d leave their meetings, close the door behind her, and ask herself if she had really just suggested the President impose sanctions on a country that had previously been a loyal buyer of American arms, or host a peace summit for a pair of nations that were historically more likely to destroy one another than shake hands. But other days, she'd be in the sit room with Hutchison or in the Oval with senior staff, and she'd hear the ignorant or idealistic suggestions coming out of people's mouths. In those moments—like this one—she knew she had a place and a purpose: her job was to save the President from idiotic ideas.

She found his eyes. "Sir, I think we act now, unilaterally, on our terms. Don't wait for another nation to discover the Battlestar Galactica or for the Colonials to find a different government to negotiate with. Ask them to lock orbit with us now, so their ship remains within our visual and communication range.”

She kept Hutchison in her peripheral vision, anticipating an objection to the next part of her plan. “Request that they send down a small, unarmed delegation in a non-military vehicle. Require that the party be comprised of only their President, their top military leader, and a couple of aids.” She paused, allowing the idea to sink in. “Warn them that if any hostility is detected, we will shoot them out of the sky."

"Can we do that?"

"Probably not. But that's a question they can't afford to ask themselves,” she answered honestly. “If the story they tell is true and they weren't aware of us until now, this is our best chance to meet them on level ground. The longer we wait, the longer we give them to conduct research, figure us out, and contact other nations. On the other hand, for us, waiting longer doesn't mean we have more options. Before they realize we're at a technological disadvantage, let's get their leaders on our turf where we can monitor them. And hold them hostage,” she lifted a single shoulder, to punctuate her final point, “if need be."

"We don't even know if these people—if that's what they are—will be able to breathe our air."

"That's right. But if we're lucky, they don't know either. They'll be cautious instead of confident. Think about fighting wars in unfamiliar territory. Remember when you pointed out that our troops needed warmer clothing before deploying to Kazakhstan? The Colonials don't know what to expect on our planet and we should use that to our advantage."

President Bartlet nodded slowly, deep in thought, apparently considering her plan. "We should put them straight into quarantine and check them for disease,” he strategized. “Dr. Bartlet would tell us the biggest threat to our planet is a biological one: introducing new organisms to an ecosystem can wipe out entire species. I want our best military doctors and pathologists onsite, in hazmat suits, ready to take blood samples the moment this delegation arrives. Grant the Surgeon General security clearance so she can advise on the mission."

"Understood," Admiral Fitzwallace confirmed. Kate hid her delight that even the Admiral hadn’t shot down her proposal. The tide of opinion was turning her way.

"Assuming the Colonials go for this plan, where would we do it?" the President broached.

"We need them to land on an air force base where civilian towers won't pick up the signal," Kate outlined. "It needs to have laboratory facilities onsite so we can contain and study them, but it needs to be secure enough that we can protect ourselves and manage the situation if they attempt a military attack."

"It also needs to be outfitted for us to host them as a diplomatic delegation," CJ weighed in. "If this were a normal peace talk, we'd treat them with honor, roll out the carpet, and make sure they're comfortable, even as we run standard security procedures."

"But these won't be standard security procedures," Hutchison barked at CJ, as if he wanted to be un-muzzled so he could bite her head off. "Nothing about this is normal! This is time for military control, not manners lessons. Who cares if we offend them?”

Kate had always found Hutchison challenging to work with, but she managed just fine. CJ, on the other hand, always seemed to be in his crosshairs.

"I'm not asking to usher them into the Mural Room,” CJ replied, clearly modulating her voice to conceal her anger at his overt disrespect. “I just want to make sure we abide by basic human rights standards and don't lose our own humanity as we're trying to evaluate theirs."

"Understood, CJ," the President bridged. "I'm assuming whatever site we select for its military and quarantine facilities can be made suitable for diplomacy as well. Don't we have something designed for this in New Mexico?"

Kate stared at him quizzically. Her colleagues looked at one another, probably also waiting for someone to decode his reference.

"You know…" President Bartlet rolled his hand through the air in a visual etcetera. "Roswell..." he trailed off.

"Although a New Mexican military base is probably a good candidate,” Admiral Fitzwallace responded, “there isn't anything equipped for this yet. As I said, we've never had real extraterrestrial encounters..."

"I know, I know. I just thought we'd prepared for the possibility."

"We wouldn't have known what to prepare for.”

“Admiral Fitzwallace is right, sir,” Kate added. “Even now, we’ll prepare as if the Colonials are human – or at least the size of humans – but if they turn out to be giant creatures of some sort...” Her mind flipped through a slideshow of Hollywood aliens. “Well, for one, we’ll know they’re liars. And for another, our facilities may not be able to contain them.” She lost a little of her nerve, but didn’t let it show. “At that point, it’ll be up to our weapons to control the situation.”

She pictured a drooling velociraptor-like alien queen locked in battle with Sigourney Weaver. But this time, she was Ripley. She saw herself throw her suit jacket on the ground and pick up an M16. Behind her was the American West, about to become an alien nesting ground. She was the last line of defense before the Grand Canyon became a gooey egg-pit: hungry creatures hatching, climbing out of the massive crevice, their appetites clearing the plains of people, like people had once cleared the plains of buffalo.

For the first time since she’d made her pitch, she questioned her own idea. What would it feel like to carry the guilt of humanity on her shoulders? What if this one decision to invite the aliens to land was the end of the world, as they knew it?

“Actually, Mr. President,” Kate gulped. Forget my idea. Let’s go with Hutchison’s. She opened her mouth to speak. “We have a mission to plan and the sooner we extend the invitation, the sooner we can prep the landing site.” Her outward resolve was a mockery of her hidden doubt, just like it had been all her years undercover, one slip-up away from death-by-torture. “Besides,” she said, with a faint hint of sarcasm, “the President of the Twelve Colonies is on hold.”

President Bartlet nodded decisively, obviously ready to move forward with her proposal. "We'll need a ruse to get me to New Mexico last minute, without raising eyebrows,” he concluded.

"Mr. President," Fitzwallace interjected sternly. "You are not going anywhere near New Mexico. If I could, I would send you to Japan or Australia right now. I want you as far away from President Roslin’s delegation as possible, until they've been cleared of biological, chemical, and physical threats.”

“And what if President Roslin and her Colonials get angry when they discover that this is less of an invitation to a civil sit down, and more of an invitation to sit behind bars until we see fit? I doubt there’s a planet in this universe where deceiving someone is a positive way to start a relationship.”

“Once they land, if they’re upset about not getting to meet with you,” Kate reasoned, “I don’t think they’ll be sending an order up to their ship to open fire on our planet. We’ll have leverage. We’ll have their leader,” whatever she turns out to be: human-President or velociraptor-like-alien-queen.

The President didn’t retort, which signaled his acceptance.

“I’ll go on your behalf, sir,” CJ announced.

Kate swiveled her head. She knew CJ had the courage to stand by her convictions, no matter how unpopular. She also knew CJ was brave enough to make tough decisions and live with the consequences. But this was a different kind of mettle. This was about putting your body—your life—in harm’s way. She didn’t know her boss had it in her.

Kate amused herself by watching Hutchison’s shocked expression. Even he seemed to think it was daring of the Chief of Staff to volunteer to join the alien welcoming committee.

President Bartlet nodded once, apparently accepting the offer. "When Nancy arrives, leave her in Washington. If this breaks, we'll need a senior voice to calm Capitol Hill behind closed doors, and a senior face to calm the public from behind the podium.”

Was the President implying that Will Bailey’s youthful energy was not what the country needed during times of crisis? Kate made a mental note not to share that insight with her secret beau.

“Kate,” the President continued, “I'd like you to go to New Mexico on Nancy's behalf. No offense Kate, but the press doesn’t really care where you go." 

Kate smiled sardonically; glad to share a moment of familiar ribbing with the President, despite the utter insanity of the situation. "No offense taken, Mr. President. It’s my honor.” Besides, if she’d just drawn up a plan that initiated an alien Armageddon, she’d rather die on the spot as one of the first casualties, than die of guilt later on, gazing upon the carnage.

Chapter Text

Laura crossed her arms tighter against her chest as she waited for Josiah Bartlet to reveal his proposition.

"You, your highest ranking military leader, and no more than two unarmed escorts form a peace delegation,” he announced. “Fly an unarmed, non-military shuttle to coordinates we give you. Upon arrival, you will be treated as diplomatic guests of the United States of America.”

She instinctively made eye contact with Bill. His scowl echoed her concern. This sounded like a trap.

Josiah Bartlet was bolder than she’d expected. His opening move was to ask for an unconditional surrender, dressed up as a diplomatic invitation.

She nodded at Bill, letting him know they were on the same page. “Thank you for the invitation, Mr. President, but as a fellow leader, I hope you can understand. The Admiral and I can’t leave Galactica when our ship, and our wounded, are in need of aid. Our presence sends an important signal to our people.”

“Instead,” she offered coolly, “I propose we conduct diplomatic discussions over this frequency. Let’s establish a verbal treaty, guaranteeing that neither of us will attack the other. Then I can share our specific humanitarian requests, which I hope you’ll consider fulfilling.”

The airwaves were silent.

“Madam President,” President Bartlet replied in a considered tone. “I understand that as heads of state, we support our people by standing with them, but I also know that to do our best work, we must go where not everyone else can. We lead from the front, not from the pack.”

She rolled her eyes at his ineffective Presidential guilt-trip. “I completely agree, President Bartlet,” she smiled calmly. “With that in mind, I’m extending an invitation to you. Meet me on the Battlestar Galactica. We look forward to welcoming you with diplomatic honor.”

“Thank you for the invitation, Madam President,” President Bartlet cleared his throat uneasily, “but I’m afraid I can’t accept your generous offer.”

Hearing his slightly unnerved voice was deeply gratifying and exactly what she expected. She smiled with satisfaction and pressed the transmission button, ready to reiterate her original proposal to establish a treaty over the airwaves.

“I would accept,” the voice of the other President continued unexpectedly, “but as you just intimated, your ship itself is in need of help. I presume it’s damaged in some way and if harm came to me while visiting, you can only imagine how my planet would retaliate…”

Her smile dissolved as her blood heated up.

“…That’s why it’s safer, for all parties involved, to meet here on Earth, not in space. You won’t be abandoning your people. You’ll be serving them by coming here, where we can meet properly, face to face.”

She narrowed her eyes, frustrated at herself for hinting at her ship’s frailty.

She had no leverage.

The rest of the fleet was unreachable until a jump drive was fixed. Even then, in order to efficiently evacuate Galactica, they'd need to bring another ship to this location. If she hadn't reached a peaceful understanding with the planet by then, Admiral Fitzwallace would shoot both vessels out of orbit.

Her chest rose and fell as she recognized her only bargaining chip: her life.

If this was a trap and their intention was to throw her in their brig, they would be sorely disappointed. The cancer and chemicals were going to kill her, before they would get a chance. They could torture her to death and it wouldn't matter.

“I have a counter proposal,” she spoke quickly, avoiding eye contact with Bill. “I will meet with you, but only two aids will accompany me. Admiral William Adama, the military leader of the Colonies, will remain onboard Galactica as her commander.”

The pregnant pause told her President Bartlet got the hint. Admiral Adama would be monitoring the planet from above, wielding the power of a battlestar.

“I believe we understand one another,” President Bartlet spoke cagily. “You’re proposing that your Admiral remain where he can tend to his ship. Just as our Admiral will be here, tending to our planet...”

Laura rested the transmission receiver on the command table as she snorted aloud. President Bartlet was meeting her threat for threat.

Bill’s hand appeared over hers.

She looked at it for a prolonged second, noticing its weathered contours, appreciating its olive tone, before turning her gaze upward and meeting his eyes.

He was as determined as she’d ever seen him. It reminded her of their last exchange before she boarded the escape raptor during the mutiny. He’d been dead set on risking his life to save Galactica, and her.

He was equally adamant now.

There was no way he would let her travel to this potentially hostile planet. Not in her condition. Not without him.

She reached up and touched his cheek, flooding her with longing and regret. Why had they waited until she had so little time left?

“…With that in mind, we agree to your proposal,” President Bartlet declared, interrupting her reverie.

Bill squeezed the back of her hand, jaw insistent, eyes imploring.

She nodded to assure him they would talk before any plans were finalized. She needed to convince him this was the best strategic option, without disclosing why. If Josiah Bartlet took her hostage, it would be like stealing a briefcase of money, only to find it empty. She’d be dead in less than two days anyway, and Lee, the new civilian leader of the fleet, would be safe and sound on Galactica. The Earthlings would have played their hand, and Bill and Lee would have that knowledge to guide them.

“As our guests,” President Bartlet continued, “you must agree to be quarantined, to ensure you don't carry organisms that pose a biological threat to our citizens. Of course, this precaution will benefit you and your aids, too."

But something about the provision made her stomach curl.

He was uncomfortable.

He had sounded sure of himself until he mentioned quarantine, at which point, his voice carried a furtive undercurrent. Maybe he was afraid she would buck the suggestion, or maybe he was concealing unspoken objectives.

"How long would quarantine take?" she treaded gently.

"We're not certain. It depends on what we find."

"I ask, because time is of the essence.” In more ways than you can know.

She hadn't yet revealed they had more ships waiting at a recon point they couldn't reach on their own. She intended to keep that information secret until she needed to pull a new level. Making Galactica sound like the vanguard of a larger fleet might work for or against them, depending on how she positioned it.

“The sooner you and I can meet,” she underscored her point, “the sooner we can reach an understanding and the better our chance of saving some of our wounded.”

"I understand your position, Madam President. We’ll see what we can do.”

His answer was vague.

He was sounding more like a President, by the minute.

"President Bartlet,” she pushed. “Can you assure me we’ll begin diplomatic discussions while quarantine procedures are still underway?"

“Madam President, I look forward to rich discussions,” he answered quickly, in an offhand tone. “I will sign off so my team can work out the logistics with your team."

"President Roslin,” Admiral Fitzwallace chimed in, before she could call out President Bartlet for his noncommittal statement. “I must make it clear that if you deviate from the agreed upon flight path or show any signs of hostile intent, we will shoot you down, without hesitation."

She snorted, recognizing the handoff that had just taken place. She and Bill had played “good cop” “bad cop” for one another countless times.

"Admiral Fitzwallace, I have no interest in starting a conflict with you or anyone on your planet. We are seeking assistance, both medical and technical,” she responded soothingly, yet solidly. “Before we finalize our plans, would you give me ten minutes to consult with my advisors?"

“Of course, Madam President. Let us know when you’re ready to reconvene.”

She put down the receiver with a sigh.

Smoke still billowed throughout CIC. Sparks shot from dangling cables. Colonel Tigh, Lee, and even Baltar were staring her way, concern in their eyes.

It struck her that there was no Vice President Zarek, no Quorum, not even a reasonable number of citizens to give a voice and a vote to. In some ways, it was like it had been in those first few hours after the fall: it was just her and him.

"Bill, your thoughts," she said in a low voice, crossing her arms and leaning against the console.

He raised his eyebrows and looked at her over his glasses, knowingly.

“I guess I don’t need to ask,” she smiled sheepishly.

“No, you don’t,” he donned the sweet, roguish smile reserved for her. Then his expression turned grave, his palpable tenderness moving from playful to serious. “You’re not going down there.”

“Bill…” As if on cue, her voice was raspy again: a strained sound, befitting her true physical condition, not this amped up adrenaline act. She cleared her throat, hoping to project strength for just a few more minutes. “I was being hyperbolic about the importance of my presence. The fleet doesn’t need me. They have Lee. They have you. If I go down there, what’s the worst that could happen?” She shrugged slyly. “I’ve been thrown in the brig before.” She flashed a teasing smile, hoping he’d lighten up at the memory.

His countenance didn’t change.

“Laura,” he spoke in a controlled voice that belied his emotion. “If they so much as lay a hand on you…”

“I know,” she interrupted. “But what I’m trying to say…” she swallowed. “I don’t have much time anyway…”

“No one knows how much time they have,” he cut her off. “Look at you. Cottle’s latest treatments are working. A wise woman once told me to never give up hope.”

She bit her lip, stilling her emotion. Until now, she hadn’t been sure what Bill suspected about her recent revitalization. She assumed he’d realized her resurgence was too good to be true.

“Bill, there’s something you need to know…” I signed the terms of surrender already. The war I’ve been fighting...it’s over. She brought her hand up to massage her stinging heart.

He squinted, as if trying to predict her words.

Stabbing pain ripped through her chest. She winced. She couldn’t do this to him. There was no way to stop what had been set in motion. Why torment him with the lack of control?

“You’re right,” she sighed. “Never give up hope,” she quoted herself, wistfully. “I hope they’re afraid of Galactica’s Admiral. They’re not likely to act rashly if they know you’re up here, ready to act. The fear of you will keep them from doing anything to me.”

Bill shook his head. “If you’re determined to go down there, I’m going with you.”

She shook her head in return. “The point is for them to feel threatened by you, because you’re up here.”

“Saul can command on my behalf, just like Lee can lead on yours. For all Bartlet knows, our seconds in command as more trigger-happy than us. We’ll plan the mission so Saul knows when to scramble vipers, release the warhead, or fall back. If a raptor’s drive gets fixed, Lee can make contact with the fleet, without waiting to communicate with us.”

She couldn’t let the fleet lose both its leaders simultaneously. On the other hand, if she traveled to Earth without Bill and she came in harm's way, he’d compromise Galactica in a futile, irrational attempt to save her.

She nodded to herself as she made her decision.

No matter what lay ahead, she and Bill would face it together.

Chapter Text

Will stood in the hallway, pretending to be absorbed by the day’s press releases, which he was reading out of a manila folder. Using his peripheral vision, his eyes were glued to the top of a stairway where a collection of high-ranking officials would eventually emerge. 

His heart beat with excitement as he spotted his favorite one of those people.

"Kazakhstan?" he asked, jumping into step with Kate as she flew by. She glanced at him with confusion, as if she was barely registering his presence.

"Israel?" he tried again, convinced his twenty questions style of info gathering would pay off, even if all that happened was recognition would flicker across her face.

"A terrorist threat within our borders?" He was running out of plausible guesses, but her pace hadn't slowed.

"What are you talking about?" Kate snapped, stopping in her tracks and turning towards him, more annoyed than amused.

He was taken aback. This was an innocent game they'd played since he'd become Communications Director: if she couldn’t talk about a situation, she’d smile cagily and brush him off. Now, she seemed distracted by something so monumental, she'd forgotten their typical banter.

"I’m talking about whatever you guys are talking about,” he flashed a smile, trying to remind her how much she liked to tease him. 

“Will…” she shook her head as an unusual emotion flickered across her face.

Did he just glimpse fear in the eyes of the most badass person he knew? When wars, ethnic cleansings, or terrorist attacks occurred, Kate was solid. She was probably emotionally affected deep down, but on the surface, she was clear-headed and ready to act. That was part of his attraction to her. At an animal level, he knew that in a crisis she was exactly the person to be with.

“I have to go,” she said flatly, turning away, back to her unflappable self.

He broke into a trot to keep up with her.

“I watched CJ literally run through the halls forty-five minutes ago.” He kept his voice discreetly low. “I saw Admiral Fitzwallace and the heads of the CIA and FBI get ushered downstairs, one right after another.” They swerved around the newest batch of interns. “Something's happening, Kate. And as White House Communications Director, I need to know."

She picked up her pace.

"Wait, wait," he begged, reaching for her arm, his feet coming to a halt and hoping hers would do the same.

She stopped walking and pivoted to face him, the sharp twist of her shoulders revealing her exasperation.

Dropping pretense, he lowered his voice further and squeezed her arm gently. "Something has you in a weird headspace, Kate. As someone who cares about you, I just want to make sure you're okay."

Her eyes momentarily softened.

"I'll talk to you in a few days, Will.” Her gaze lingered on his face, as if memorizing its contours.

She stepped backwards and his hand fell from her arm.

For the last few months, they'd seen each other every day at work, and they'd been together nearly every night. Her cryptic response could only mean one thing: she was leaving Washington.

His heartbeat quickened as he watched her disappear down the hall.

He didn't call after her. He didn't follow her. He was too private and too professional to do anything that might reveal the nature of their relationship.

Blinking at the empty corridor, he missed her already.

And he was even more curious than before.

He pulled his cell phone out of his pocket.

It was time to do some careful, tactful investigating of his own.

Chapter Text

Kate squinted at the glistening tarmac.

Morphing elongated shapes danced across the horizon like eerie mirages, foreshadowing alien creatures that would soon land. To the left and right of the thirty-thousand-foot stretch of concrete runway, reflective gypsum formed a sea of white sand. The dry mineral bed of the ancient lake extended as far as the eye could see, surrounded by silent mountains that protected the alabaster dunes from the rest of the world.

If she didn’t know any better, she’d say she was staring at an alien planet.

“This is the onsite mission commander,” she reported into the handheld radio the lead site technician had handed her minutes ago. “Landing site readiness confirmed.”

New Mexico’s White Sands Space Harbor was the emergency-landing site for the Space Shuttle and International Space Station. Only the Columbia STS-3 had ever needed to use it back in 1982, but during every mission, the site remained ready to land the shuttle with three hours notice. That’s how long it had taken her to fly in from Andrews today. And in that time, they’d done an admirable job preparing.

A bead of sweat dripped down her neck as her black blazer baked her beneath the brutal, late afternoon southwestern sun.

She turned towards the shiny surface of the giant metal hangar behind her. It glinted, forcing her to squint and heating her face even more. As the only structure in sight, it loomed above the sandy wasteland. Remoteness had been one of the criteria in site selection. The city of Las Cruces was too close for her liking, but at least they were separated by sixty miles of barren army-guarded desert.

If the aliens relied on human blood for fuel, they wouldn’t find much between here and the City of Crosses.

Craning her neck upwards, she began walking around the outside of the hangar. Small platforms jutted out from its side at the third and fifth stories. On a normal day, they were observation decks. Today, they were perfect sniper stations.

She pressed the talk button with her thumb. “North East and South East sniper locations confirmed.”

Her confidence about the mission grew as she reviewed and approved the other outdoor perches. They’d have the alien leaders in their sights the moment the hatch doors opened. If Laura Roslin bared fangs, or if anyone in the party drew a recognizable weapon, Kate would give a single swift signal to her high-precision marksmen.

Stepping inside the hangar to evaluate the interior sniper posts, she immediately appreciated the various heights and angles of the hidden locations. You never knew which vantage point would give you the best headshot. If they were lucky, alien anatomy would be obvious at first glance.

She took a deep breath and imagined delivering the order to fire. Would it go down in history as the shot that started a devastating interplanetary war? Dr. McNally, Admiral Fitzwallace, and the President would be in her ear of course. But if emergency struck or if she had to make a call based on sensory input her sit room superiors couldn’t see or hear, she was deputized to make decisions.

She was honored by the responsibility, but she also knew if the shuttle landed and unleashed a deadly attack, no one wanted valuable officials to be wiped out.

CJ was too important to lose, so she was being cloistered a short distance away on the premise of meeting with tribal leaders until the aliens—no, the Colonials—passed the security check. CJ had protested, wanting to be present for the landing so she could diplomatically represent the government. But Kate had talked her down, explaining that in a firefight, CJ would be too easy to spot. Her six-foot boss hadn’t cracked a smile, but had tacitly agreed to the precaution.

Kate checked her watch.

Right now, CJ was being transported from Kirtland Air Force Base to her sit down with the Sandia Pueblo's Governor and Warchief. She wouldn't be flown the remaining hundred miles down to White Sands unless the Colonials were successfully quarantined and their shuttle proved to be a harmless transportation vehicle. Until then, she was devoting her attention to the worthiest of causes, but probably twitching within anticipation each time her cell phone buzzed.

“Commander,” the Major jogged up, then saluted. “All Marines are assembled and ready for briefing.”

She nodded, smoothing down the front of the suit she’d traded for her Navy uniform and CIA guises.

“Get me a sidearm,” she said to the Major as she strode towards the makeshift briefing room. No matter what went down, she planned to be ready to do what she did best: conceal, cover, and shoot. “Not a revolver,” she clarified as he opened the door for her. “Get me a Glock.”

Chapter Text

“Locked and loaded,” Kara said to herself in a low voice, jamming the magazine into her spare sidearm.

She was alone in the raptor on the premise of a preflight check. Unbeknownst to the Old Man and the President—who’d naively agreed to make this an “arms-free diplomatic mission”—she was readying herself for anything the planet dwellers had planned. Whoever they were, they hadn’t built their civilization on love and peace. There must have been bullets and blood involved. So why waltz into their world without so much as a missile launcher? Too bad she couldn’t smuggle one onboard. She had to settle for a grenade in one boot, an extra magazine in the other, and this trusty pistol, whose second barrel she was loading with a single high-explosive round.

She heard the footfalls of the President approaching from across the hangar. They didn’t sound like they used to: quick, clipped, and forceful, as if she always had an important meeting to get to. Instead, they sounded hurried, then slow; sometimes they’d stop altogether as she probably caught her breath.

Ever since the President had moved onto Galactica from Colonial One, Kara had gotten used to running into the President and the Old Man, arm in arm, walking through Galactica’s halls like two retirees on an evening stroll around a lake.

She didn’t begrudge their love—they deserved what little happiness they could scrape together—but she didn’t particularly like watching it. Maybe seeing them all googly-eyed felt weird because they were the closest thing she had to parents. Maybe she was still sore the Old Man had sided with the President instead of her when she’d come back from the abyss and wanted to lead the fleet to Earth. She shook her head to herself. Maybe she was just nervous because once the President was gone, the fleet would lose the Old Man to grief until he managed to pull himself back together.

Kara tucked the small-bore semi-automatic pistol into the back of her waistband, then pulled on her flight jacket right before the President appeared at the top of the ramp.

“Captain Thrace.” The President’s voice was weak in volume, but it still carried a gravity that made Kara feel like she was in trouble, or cared for, or both.

“Madam President,” she nodded professionally, turning to a panel of switches and pretending to be absorbed with toggling the flight controls. “I think the Admiral is in the War Room with Colonel Tigh.”

“I’m aware, Kara. I’m here to see you.”

Kara flipped a switch back and forth for no reason, focusing on the metal lever instead of how uncomfortable she felt. She and the President didn’t have a good history of one-on-ones.

“Thank you for volunteering for the mission,” the President broached.

“Just doing my duty, ma’am,” she mumbled without turning around. The truth was, when she’d heard an envoy was heading down to the planet, she’d all but begged to go. She told the Old Man, “I jumped us here following an instinct I can’t explain, and I need to see this through.” What she didn’t say was that she was going to go crazy if she had to stay onboard Galactica, watching her husband stare into nothingness, while she stood idly by.

“I know we haven’t always seen eye to eye,” the President continued. Kara smirked to herself, recalling aiming a gun at the President’s head, and the President firing at hers. She also remembered arguing with the President, livid that a person who lay dying in a hospital bed was preventing her from fulfilling her promise to save the survivors on Caprica. Agitated, she haphazardly spun a row of dials.

“I also know,” the President pressed on, “we wouldn’t be here without the other.” Kara stopped fiddling with the controls and turned around, forcing herself to make eye contact out of morbid curiosity. Narrowing her eyes, she tried to figure out what the President wanted, but President Roslin didn’t smirk, didn’t flinch. Instead, her all-knowing gaze made Kara feel exposed.

“Some of the best things to ever happen to humanity came from us working together,” President Roslin reminisced. Kara saw herself in the Tomb of Athena, placing the Arrow of Apollo in the archer’s bow. She’d gone against the Old Man and her military oath, in favor of faith in the President and the Gods. Kara nodded, perfunctory, hoping the President was done making whatever point she was trying to make.

President Roslin smiled with surprising gentleness. “I’m grateful you’re coming down to the planet, Kara. I have a favor to ask of you. Not for me,” the President’s voice faltered. “For the Admiral. We’re reaching a point where he’ll need you more than ever. No matter what happens, please be there for him.”

Was the President talking about her own death? “Madam President, are you…?” Kara furrowed her brow, not wanting to put her foot in her mouth in case she’d misinterpreted.

“Can you do that for him? For the fleet?”

“Yes, of course ma’am. I’ll be there for him, but you’ll be there for him too, right?”

The President cleared her throat, then stilled her features. “I’m talking about when I won’t be there anymore.”

“I understand,” Kara swallowed.

“Please help him remember what’s important: his family. That’s you and Lee, but it’s also Galactica’s crew and the rest of the fleet.”

Kara nodded.

“And there is one other thing you could do for me…” the President opened the palm of her hand to reveal two liquid-filled syringes.

Kara stepped backwards without meaning to.

“Could you carry these on yourself, for me? When we’re on the planet, depending on what happens, I may not be able to think straight. I’ll need you…” For the first time ever, Kara saw the President tremble from vulnerability. “I’ll need you to inject one into me.”

“What are they?” Kara stepped forward again, peering down at the cylinders.

“They’re what’s keeping me alive.” The President sighed. “They’re also what’s killing me.”

“They’re some kind of boosters. Stims,” Kara realized, looking up into the President’s forlorn eyes. “That’s how you were able to get out of bed, but your body is going to crash and crash hard.”

The President nodded gratefully. Maybe she was glad someone understood without her having to spell it out.

Kara stared at the woman who was ready to die on the battlefield of an unknown planet, instead of tucked in a corner of the Admiral’s quarters where she could gently drift off. The President was a soldier in her own right. “How much time do you have?”

“More than one day; less than two.” Un-spilled tears welled in the President’s eyes. Maybe this was the first time she'd admitted defeat aloud.

Kara nodded, reaching for the precious syringes. Yanking up her pant leg, she bent to slip them in her boot, but stopped short. Her boots were filled with other contraband. She sheepishly shook her pant leg back down, quickly placing the syringes in her back pocket.

The President didn’t seem to notice the change in storage plans. “I need to find Lee,” the President half-smiled, obvious gratitude in her eyes.

Kara nodded silently, then suddenly stepped forward and wrapped her arms around the older woman, shocking herself with the gesture. President Roslin seemed surprised too, then cautiously reached up with her thin arms and returned the hug.

The President’s body felt frail within her arms, yet the life force at its core felt rock solid. Over the years, Kara had railed against this woman because she could. The President was undefeatable. She represented hope and strength and surviving against the odds: she could be sick, but she wasn’t supposed to die. Not now. Not ever.

The President gave an extra comforting squeeze, then let go and stepped back. Her expression was sorrowful, but also loving. She reached up and patted Kara’s cheek with a soft palm, then turned around and carefully stepped down the raptor’s ramp.

Kara watched her walk away, listening to the tinny footfalls one more time. She plopped down in the pilot’s seat, lifting her hip to pull the syringes out of her back pocket.

The keys to the President’s life—and death—lay innocently in her hand. For all the fear and fighting, the accusations of being a Cylon or something worse, at the end of the day, the President trusted her.

Guilt ricocheted through her. She wrapped her hand around the semi-automatic tucked in the back of her waistband. Maybe she should follow orders and commit to making this a peace mission after all.

“Hey Starbuck,” Helo stepped into the raptor, carrying a pack over his shoulder, presumably with first aid supplies.

She left the gun in its hiding place, on her person.

Helo flipped on the electronic communications systems, as if this was any other mission.

Curiosity struck.

“Helo, why are you doing this?”

“What?” he asked, focusing on the mini-DRADIS screen he was waking.

“Why are you coming on this mission?” He’d just been reunited with his daughter. He should stay here and never let Hera out of his sight again.

“Why are you?” he returned.

“I have nothing to lose,” she shrugged.

“I have everything to lose,” he said, looking towards her. “If these do turn out to be humans, what if they have laws about burning Cylons on sight? I want to be the first to know where they stand so I can stand up to them, if need be.”

Pressing her lips together, she nodded. She and Helo were both married to Cylons. Her fight was his fight. “We’re in agreement then?” she licked her bottom lip, determination rising.

Helo furrowed his forehead, confused.

“Peace isn’t worth it,” she spelled out, “if they only want peace with part of us.”

His jaw hardened and his eyes burned. He looked how she felt.

Chapter Text

Laura smiled and inhaled as Bill bent over and leaned in, gently tightening the safety restraints on her jump seat. His familiar scent overtook her senses and she closed her eyes, enjoying the mixture of weathered blues, shaving lotion, and musk. 

“There you go,” he rumbled, close to her ear.

She lifted her eyelids and found herself staring into his blue eyes and contoured face, just inches from hers.

“Thank you,” she whispered. The warmth of his gaze sparked heat in her cheeks. “I love you,” she mouthed, not wanting to draw attention from Starbuck and Helo who were readying the raptor for takeoff.

The left side of Bill’s mouth turned upward, both roguish and tender. She beamed—heart skipping a beat—feeling just as smitten as when they’d first flirted, years ago. He was even more handsome now.

He straightened his back, kissing her forehead on the way up. She resisted the urge to reach up, grab his uniform, and pull him down into a kiss. I found the love of my life at the end of the world.

As Bill took his seat next to her, she relished the feeling of his thigh pressed against hers. She imagined they were kids in the back of a bus, Helo and Starbuck their unlikely chaperones. She snorted, then stifled a giggle.

“What?” Bill asked with humor in his tone, busy with his seat buckle, but wanting in on her secret joke. He looked up, lips forming an adoring smile, eyebrows raised expectantly.

Before she could stop herself, her hands were on his lapels and her lips were on his. The safety restraints over her torso held her in place and gave her something to push against; she could let herself love him without holding back.

The taste—the feel—of his mouth was intoxicating. Her eyes closed. His arousing smell was even stronger with her nose pressed against his skin. The more of him she experienced, the more ravenous she felt.

Nothing moved—nothing mattered—except his lips against hers.

“Sir? Ma’am?” Helo cleared his throat. “We’re ready to depart.”

She broke into a grin, curved lips grazing Bill’s jaw. Slowly, she opened her eyes. To her right, a pale-faced Helo stood still as a stone, his gaze respectfully fixed on the wall behind her and Bill.

Patting her palms gently against Bill’s chest, she turned forward and cleared her throat, signaling Helo that it was safe to make eye contact. 

“Sorry to interrupt, Madam President, Admiral,” Helo bowed his head slightly, as if they’d been busy with matters of state. She bit the inside of her lip, trying to tamp down her amusement. “If we leave now, we’ll arrive at the coordinates at the appointed time.”

“Thank you, Helo,” Bill nodded, smiling serenely, as if their momentary tryst had diffused all his tension from the battle at the Cylon Colony and near-battle with Earth. “We’re ready for launch.” His hand touched hers, punctuating his point. She entwined her fingers with his, equally unabashed.

She spotted Starbuck in the background—hands clasped behind her back, half military officer, half nervous child. Kara was the only person in the world besides Ishay and Doc Cottle who knew her secret. Perhaps that’s why the young woman looked stricken: she hadn’t wanted to disrupt a final moment of intimacy. Laura smiled gratefully at Starbuck, whose eyes widened, as if she didn’t want to be caught in the act of caring. She quickly turned and jumped into the pilot’s seat, flipping a few engine switches above her head. “Time to hit the road,” she announced, as Helo buckled into his copilot’s seat.

The engine revved up, generating a comforting white noise and lulling tremble. Laura gazed through the front windshield as Galactica’s deck fell away beneath her. The edges of the launch tube disappeared, replaced by black space. I’ll never see Galactica again.

“Going on missions really gets you going,” Bill’s sly, husky voice sent a pang of longing head to toe. “We should go on missions more often.” He removed his hand from hers and slid his palm over her thigh. Her leg tingled in response, but desire suddenly tasted bitter. This is it, Bill. This IS the final mission. She sighed.

“Hm?” he asked, turning towards her with curiosity. Concern flooded his face as he noticed what was probably an ashen expression. “Laura, what’s wrong?”

She shook her head dismissively and forced a wan smile.

“Are you feeling ill? Do we need to turn back?” The fear in his voice escalated. He was obviously willing to postpone meeting the mysterious inhabitants of the planet, even though Galactica’s survivors and the unreachable rest of the fleet needed them to act quickly.

“Bill…” his name caught in her throat. He was the only soul in the world she wanted to tell about her imminent death, but for his sake, and the sake of the fleet, he needed to be the last to know. She trusted him with the future of their ragged civilization in every circumstance except one. When there was a choice between protecting the fleet, and protecting the people he loved most, his judgment was compromised.

He furrowed his brow more deeply, and gently squeezed her thigh.

Steadying her quivering lips, she regained composure. "Just thinking about our future," she brought her palm to the back of his hand and patted it, reassuringly. His eyes stopped burning with concern and became empathetic, then hopeful. Maybe he heard “our” and thought she meant the two of them in particular, not their civilization in general. He turned his palm face up, linking their fingers again, his soft thumb stroking the side of hers, prompting her to turn wistful.

In the past few months, she’d grown used to the unexpected softness of his hands. She'd felt them on her tender, hungry breasts, and stroking her stomach, her hips, her thighs. During her dry heaves in his cabin, she’d felt their velvety smoothness as he rubbed her back. When she lay in sickbay, surrounded by harsh lights and beeping machines, she’d fallen asleep as he caressed her scarf-clad forehead. Beneath his touch, she’d never felt more at home.

“Bill…” she started again, unsure what she was going to say. How do I distill and bottle my love for you, so you can soothe yourself with my memory after I’m gone? She never wanted him to wonder about how she felt or what they’d shared. She shook her head, at a loss.

His smile deepened, clearly cherishing every part of her, even her consternation. “I love you,” he mouthed, mimicking her earlier discretion, even though Helo and Starbuck couldn’t now hear.

She closed her eyes, slowly lowering her head onto his woolen shoulder. Nestled against his firm deltoid and neck, she exhaled, sinking into him even more. Gods, if you exist and haven’t forsaken us, and if you grant last requests to imperfect leaders, please let me be holding Bill’s hand when I close my eyes for the last time.

It was tempting to give in to the exhaustion seeping back into her bones, and the feeling that she hadn't rested in hours, years, or maybe her whole life. How long ago did Doc Cottle’s first needle piece her skin? The jump from the fleet to the Cylon Colony was direct. The battle was unrelenting, but quick. The last few hours were a whirlwind of confusion and hope, as she prepared for both a reunion and a battle.

Eight hours.

“Keep resting,” Bill whispered, kissing the side of her inclined head, “when you do open your eyes, there’s a beautiful planet coming into view.”

I’ve brokered my last deal between my body and time, and in forty hours, Bill will know.

Chapter Text

CJ shifted her weight on the antique wooden chair, resisting the urge to glance at her phone to check the time. The Colonials had the rendezvous coordinates. Would they send a peace delegation or drop a bomb?

She nodded rhythmically at whatever the two Pueblo leaders seated across the conference table were saying. Given the Colonial technology, two hundred miles might be within the blast radius. Humming agreeably at the young Lieutenant Governor’s rhetorical question, she reached into her blazer pocket and patted her phone.

“…We were surprised you asked to meet with us,” the Lieutenant Governor smiled easily, apparently done with his introduction about Pueblo life. When CJ had Margaret arrange a sit down with tribal elders, she hadn’t imagined they’d both be in their twenties. “We were glad you reached out. Just surprised,” he raised his forehead in a question, probably hoping she’d illuminate.

“Our shared history cannot be changed,” the Warchief interjected flatly, without moving his head, “but you coming here may signal a new era of respectful dialogue.” His eyes—more haunted than a young man’s should be—grew darker. “Assuming this is the first of many sit downs with tribal peoples, not just a one-time PR ploy.”

“No cameras. No press,” she made reassuring eye contact while gesturing around the council chamber, empty except for her Secret Service detail. The stony Warchief continued staring at her, unblinking. The Lieutenant Governor grinned genuinely, apparently encouraged.

Swallowing dryly, she felt sick to her stomach.

She wasn’t using them for the press, but she was using them to avoid the press. No one had trailed her to New Mexico to find out more about her last minute meeting with the Sandia Pueblo. According to Margaret, no news outlet or individual had even asked for more information beyond the stock line CJ had given her. CJ was sincerely disheartened that no one cared about Native American issues, but distinctly relieved her decoy had worked.

Now, she just had to live with the guilt settling in her gut. She rapidly tapped the air with her foot. If Earth wasn’t wiped out by nuclear bombs within the hour, and assuming the Colonials didn’t spend the coming days forcibly installing Laura Roslin as the President of the planet, Bartlett’s term would be over in ten weeks and Santos would set an agenda dominated by the Colonial situation. The sins of the past would remain a non-priority while the government worked on averting the sins of the present.

The Warchief squinted slightly, as if detecting her lie, even as the optimistic Lieutenant Governor shared platitudes about partnership to come.

She squeezed her knuckles together tightly where they lay clasped on her lap. “So, gentlemen, I’m curious to understand how federal funds factor into Pueblo operations.”

“Here are the buckets of financial support we get from the US Government…” the Lieutenant Governor sketched a quick diagram and turned the notepaper in her direction.

The Colonials need support, but our money is irrelevant in outer space. Maybe they need a currency more basic: massive amounts of minerals, water, or other natural resources. And what can the Colonials give us in exchange: new nanotechnologies or the cure to cancer?

“Ms. Cregg?”                                                              

She snapped to attention. Widening her eyes at the Lieutenant Governor’s puzzled face, she reached for the pitcher of water on the table. “I must be dehydrated from the elevation. Could you repeat the question?”

“It takes time to adjust to the altitude,” he smiled good-naturedly, passing her a glass. “I was saying, we’ve had to accept that we can’t operate as if we’re alone…”

“None of us are,” she blurted. Since childhood—since mom died—she’d looked at the night sky and wondered what was out there. In just a few hours’ time, the question had changed from “Are we alone?” to “Who are they?”

“Agreed,” the Lieutenant Governor beamed. “So in order to grow our public health and education programs, we need an increase in gaming revenue or federal funding. Is the US Government interested in supporting more Pueblo projects?”

“We’re interested in finding out more,” she answered with feigned positivity, then sipped from her water glass.

The Warchief’s eyes narrowed.

She looked away. In almost two years as Chief of Staff, she’d become a master of noncommittal bullshit. No wonder she wasn’t capable of being in a relationship. She cringed, recalling the vague lines the President had fed the Colonial leader. Were they starting off on the same bad foot with the Colonials as they had with the Native Americans?

“Great. Let me start by sharing our educational vision,” the buoyant Lieutenant Governor continued. “We want our children to grow up with the opportunities of the modern era without losing access to the history and language of our people…”

Buzz-buzz.

She hurriedly reached into her pocket to retrieve her vibrating phone, while maintaining polite and apologetic eye contact with the Lieutenant Governor.

“How are we doing?” she asked, bringing the phone to her ear as she walked quickly away from the table, into the empty adjoining room.

“Well, since last Wednesday you’ve shown up at my place three out of six nights, and the most we’ve spoken to one another was at the wake. So I’d say we’re doing well in the sex department and terrible in the adult relationship department,” Danny replied, clearly amused.

“Danny? What are you doing on the phone?”

“I dialed your number and you answered.”

“No, I mean…” she blinked away her momentary confusion. “I can’t talk right now.”

“You haven’t been able to talk for days.”

“I know, and I’m sorry about that, but I can talk even less now.”

“I’m starting to think you did just want me for my body.”

“Danny, not now. I can’t…” I can’t think about you—much less us. “Goodbye.”

She hung up and strode back into the council room, shaking her head. “I’m so sorry. I was expecting a call.” Sitting down with exasperation, she clarified, “and that wasn’t it.” She slipped the phone into her pocket. “Please continue.”

Thankfully, the affable Lieutenant Governor seemed only slightly annoyed. “We want to grow our scholarship and internship programs so we can send more teenagers and young adults outside the reservation to…”

Buzz-buzz.

She raised her index finger apologetically and pulled her vibrating phone out of her pocket, this time looking at the caller ID.

The sit room.

“Excuse me. I’m sorry,” she apologized without looking up, already on her way into the other room. She nodded to a Secret Service Agent to close the door.

She took a deep breath.

“Where are we at?” she answered.

“The Colonial shuttle just appeared on the White Sands radar,” Admiral Fitzwallace announced. “No visual yet. Commander Harper’s welcoming committee is ready for any eventuality.”

“Is she ready for the possibility that these are unarmed people on a diplomatic mission?”

“CJ,” President Bartlett interrupted, wielding his parental voice, “you know we agreed to prioritize military procedures and health precautions over diplomatic considerations.”

Her chest rose and fell as she silently sighed. “Yes, sir.”

“With everything we have in place, first contact will be a success,” Admiral Fitzwallace reminded.

“By what standard?” she asked with more snap than she intended.

“By the only standard that matters: we—as a civilization—will remain safe.”

She cleared her throat, preparing to rant about Columbus, conquistadors, and generations of capitalistic pillagers who’d proven that if two independently evolving civilizations meet, one will absorb the other.

“We should have visual within minutes,” an unfamiliar sit room voice reported in the background.

Chairs scraped across the floor as people presumably stood to face the screen. Multiple overlapping conversations erupted, but the words were indistinguishable over speakerphone.

Damn it. I’m useless in this dusty purgatory between Washington and White Sands. I can’t initiate anything useful and I can’t stop anything terrible.

“CJ,” the President spoke over the din, “If they pass the security check, we’ll call again and you can head down.”

“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.”

“You can turn this off,” the President said to someone in the sit room.

“Are the snipers ready?” Hutchison’s voice rose above the chatter. Straining her ears, she listened for a reply.

Click.

All sounds disappeared except the mechanical hum of the council building’s HVAC system.

She inhaled deeply, then exhaled slowly, cringing at the defeated tone of her own sigh.

All this had happened before, and all of it would happen again, but now it was going to happen on her watch.

Chapter Text

Bill jolted against his seat restraints. Gripping Laura’s bony hand tighter, he pivoted to his right to make sure she hadn’t been hurt by the turbulence. She stared intently through the front windshield, as if by focusing on the planet, she could help them land safely. Thankfully, she no longer looked pallid, like at the beginning of the flight. He tore his eyes away from her and peered out the windshield too, trying to catch a glimpse of the planet’s surface, which was partly obscured by clouds.

His shoulders tensed as their ship barreled towards the ominous white fluff. He knew Helo was vigilantly monitoring for hostile electronic markers, but the truth was, they wouldn’t be able to protect themselves against anti-aircraft missiles or Cylon raiders. It would be up to Lee and Saul to lead Galactica and regain contact with the fleet. Laura had warned that his son and best friend might act rashly if the planet dwellers killed him. So the four of them had planned for multiple scenarios, including one in which the raptor disappeared off Galactica’s DRADIS, victims of a covert attack.

“Woooo-hoooo!” Starbuck erupted as they broke through the clouds. The cottony sea was replaced by a grey-brown landscape, barren and alien. The plains looked hot, even as the sun hung low in the sky. He didn’t resonate with Starbuck’s jubilance, but he let himself imagine the smell of air in his nostrils, the feel of dirt against his toes, and the heat of sun on his forearms. The last time he’d experienced all three markers of planetary life, he’d been on New Caprica with Laura.

She’d never looked more alive than she had that day: auburn hair blazing and blowing, framing her easy smile and suggestive gaze. He hadn’t expected her to be so playful and open, leaning in closer than was necessary, passing him clandestine herbs with an equally intoxicating, unhurried sensuality.

"I have to see," Laura mumbled, unsnapping herself from her restraints before he could stop her. She stumbled to the front of the raptor and anchored her shaky legs behind Helo, placing one hand on the headrest, one on the wall. "It's beautiful," she whispered as he came up behind her.

"Obviously not the capital," he grumbled, surveying the treeless mountains on the horizon, and the chalky white dirt and single building below. Laura had asked Bartlet whether the coordinates were for the capital city, but the planet’s President had said he couldn’t answer for security reasons. "At least an army isn't amassing to greet us,” Bill conceded.

"Colonial spacecraft, you are cleared for landing," a female voice blared over the wireless. A chill ran up his spine. A stranger was monitoring their movements. The last time he’d spoken with humans who weren't part of the fleet, his cautious disbelief had transformed into relief and elation, then disintegrated into paranoia: that power battle with Admiral Cain had nearly lost him Helo and Tyrol, a squadron of vipers, and control of his ship. If this planet turned out to be a bastion of high-ranking former Colonials, this time, he wouldn’t hand over command without a fight.

"Here we go," Starbuck announced, engaging the landing system. The floor jerked side to side as the propulsion mechanism changed.

He reached for Laura, whose lips were pressed together, her hand turning white from gripping Helo’s headrest. “It’s not safe. You should sit,” he insisted softly.

She didn’t respond, apparently rapt by the nearing landscape.

"This ain't a viper, Ma’am—I'm out of practice landing busses,” Starbuck interjected. The raptor jostled left, then sharply right. "Fact is, I don't know if I was ever in practice." Starbuck took her eyes off the controls and flashed him devilish smile over her shoulder.

“Starbuck!” he reprimanded, then braced his legs, settling for placing a hand on Laura's waist. Starbuck would always be a cheeky hotshot pilot, and Laura would always be a proud, authoritative President. His adopted daughter and the love of his life were both going to land however they wanted.

As he slid his hand around Laura’s midriff, he caught her smiling. She closed her eyes, then opened them a split second later and leaned in. Her lips hovered near his ear; his skin felt charged with electricity. "From the moment the hatch opens,” she whispered, “we can be nothing to one another but President and Admiral."

His chest tightened, but he knew she was right. Projecting the legitimacy of their government had never been more important, and he had fallen out of the habit of keeping his love for her a secret.

After they’d found the nuclear wasteland of Earth a few months ago, the final barrier between them had dropped away. For years, their shared goal of finding a home for their people had prevented them from acting on their personal feelings. Once the hope of reuniting with the Thirteenth Tribe had dissolved into disorienting disappointment, there was nothing left to hang on to but one another. The soulful intimacy they had already shared, took on a physical form. She moved into his cabin—not as his ailing friend and fellow leader—but as his lover and soulmate. They didn’t even try to hide it. And for some reason, no one seemed to care. But President Bartlet and Admiral Fitzwallace certainly would.

Laura squeezed his hand where it lay against her side, as if signaling that she wouldn’t let go until she had to.

He watched Starbuck’s face crease in concentration as the ground rose up to meet them. The huge metallic structure a few hundred yards away looked uncannily like an old Colonial flight hangar. He squinted, trying to divine who created it. It didn’t have the unblemished sheen of Cylon handiwork.

“Almost there,” Starbuck murmured. “Damn it!” The raptor jolted to one side. Laura fell back against him and he held her close, suddenly noticing how frail she was. She readjusted her footing, but he didn’t let go.

White sand blew up around them as the raptor’s landing gear made rough contact with the ground. "Touchdown," Starbuck announced. He felt the hydraulic jacks adjust, then grow still. Laura turned in his arms to make eye contact, her eyes wide, filled with ecstatic wonder and solemn trepidation. He squeezed her upper arms gently, then dropped his hands.

The engine powered down and he immediately missed the sound. He felt like a wing-clipped bird, subject to the mysterious dangers of land, wishing he could be in the air again, master of his own fate. The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end as the cloud of sand dissipated.

He found himself staring across an empty, ghostly dessert. The hangar—if that’s what it was—loomed menacingly, concealing its contents. Inside, an army might be laying in wait.

"Colonial spacecraft, we are commencing quarantine procedures,” the woman’s voice returned. “Do not open your doors until you are authorized to do so."

“Colonial raptor, copy,” Starbuck grumbled resentfully into her headset, then yanked it off with a frustrated scowl.

“I’ll run another set of scans now that we’re here,” Helo unbuckled and stood up, taking the ECO seat at the back of the raptor.

Bill turned back to Laura, raising his eyebrows and gesturing toward the now empty copilot seat, which provided the best vantage on their new surroundings.

As she sat, he leaned into the cockpit between her and Starbuck. His forehead tensed as he scanned their environment for the first signs of human—or Cylon—life.

“Colonial raptor,” the voice spoke again, “please put President Roslin on the line.”

The request seemed innocent enough, but Bill’s heart thudded. Did they want to confirm she was onboard before blowing them up?

“Wait,” he reached for the receiver Starbuck was handing to Laura.

He needed to see who—or what—they were dealing with, before revealing the President of the Colonies was onboard.

Chapter Text

Holy crap.

Kate squinted at the screen in the hangar’s makeshift control room.

Sweat slid down the nape of her neck as the alien craft descended vertically, dropping deftly out of the sky like a flying saucer from the movies. It hovered above the runway, as if sentient, considering whether or not it wanted to land.

“Kate, are you seeing this?” the President demanded. One of her ears was wired to the sit room, the other was tied to the Marines’ local frequency. By toggling the switch in her left hand, she could broadcast to one channel, the other, or both.

“Yes, it’s on my monitor, sir,” she confirmed, striving to remain matter-of-fact as she scanned the vehicle for armed weapons. The boxy spaceship lowered itself to the ground, a cyclone of white sand rising up around it.

“Colonial shuttle has touched down,” she reported on both encrypted frequencies. Her voice sounded calmer than she felt. “Begin security and quarantine sequences.”

She activated the third channel on her control panel. "Colonial spacecraft, we are commencing quarantine procedures,” she announced. “Do not open your doors until you are authorized to do so."

“Colonial raptor, copy,” answered a caustic, human-sounding female voice.

Raptor? Kate’s eyes widened, remembering the mental image she’d conjured when she first hatched this plan: she pictured herself as Ripley, battling a velociraptor-like alien queen, the last line of defense before the Grand Canyon became a gooey egg-pit. Maybe the Colonials were velociraptor-like creatures, and their surly lead soldier was itching for a fight.

Kate shook her head and grounded herself in what she could actually see. The Colonial shuttle shimmered, reflecting the nearly setting sun in oblong flashes of light.

“Sniper 1, ready.”

“Sniper 2, ready!”

The hidden marksmen around the perimeter of the building continued sounding off in her ear as she flicked her eyes to the interior monitor pointed at the Marine heavies in hazmat gear. The twelve women and men wearing air-tight face masks, respirators, and full-body white suits rose rapidly from the prep area benches and lifted their M72 anti-tank rocket launchers across their chests.

“Go,” she heard the Major order.

The Marines jogged towards the giant closed doors of the hangar. The chemical-resistant suits should have made them ungainly, but the squad lined up side-by-side with precision, hoisting their mini-bazookas onto their shoulders, aiming at a target they couldn’t yet see. Once the hangar doors slid open, they’d be ready for action.

“Sniper 5, ready!”

“Sniper 6, ready.”

As the last sniper reported his readiness, Kate returned her focus to the monitor on the raptor. Now that the alien ship wasn’t moving with grace, and instead sat dully on the Tarmac, it struck her as small and unimpressive. It could be a Trojan horse: too innocent to be taken at face value.

She shivered, suddenly wanting proof that the Colonial leader, President Roslin, was onboard. If not, this raptor might be a well-masked weapon, the being within a trained mercenary, primed to self-destruct and release a nuclear bomb that would devastate the continent.

“Colonial raptor,” she hailed, “please put President Roslin on the line.”

“Good idea, Commander,” Admiral Fitzwallace praised in her ear.

She stared intently at the monitor, resisting the urge to blink.

By asking for President Roslin, had the aliens just realized their jig was up? Were they about to trigger an explosion?

She gripped the edge of the command table with both hands.

“Before we prove President Roslin is here, how about you prove President Bartlet is here…” the edgy female voice returned. Kate bristled at the challenge, narrowing her eyes.

“We can patch him through,” Admiral Fitzwallace assured Kate.

“…And before you think about putting him on the wireless, let me warn you that we’re not naive. Signals can be routed from anywhere. She doesn’t show her face, until he shows his. Present your President.”

Chapter Text

Laura’s heart pounded as she held eye contact with Bill. She bit her lip, waiting for the voice to respond to Starbuck.

Laura would put money on the fact that President Bartlet was nowhere near this dusty outcrop. This was obviously a barren outpost, strategically chosen to protect the center of power.

By having Kara ask the Earthlings for something they couldn’t provide—visual confirmation of Bartlet’s presence—Laura hoped to determine whether they were simply being cautious, like she would’ve been, or whether they were being deceptive for a more nefarious reason.

“Look!” Starbuck pointed.

The massive doors of the hangar were sliding open.

Laura squinted.

In the shadows of the building, human-sized figures were visible.

Her heart beat faster, with a mixture of relief and trepidation. Was this a welcoming committee?

The dozen figures stepped forward, into the light.

“Frak me,” Starbuck said.

“Can they not breathe their own air?” Helo wondered, staring at the eerily clad creatures wearing breathing apparatuses and encapsulating white suits.

The beings were too distant for Laura to determine whether they were human, Cylon, or a life form completely alien, but one thing was certain: they were not a Presidential welcoming committee.

They were soldiers.

Soldiers wielding rocket-launchers, aimed right at them.

“Laura, get back,” she felt Bill’s hand on her shoulder, her heart thudding in her chest as she stared at the large-caliber artillery.

She obliged, moving out of the copilot seat and away from the windshield, even though Bill was being irrational. If those guns were anything like the Colonial military’s, a single rocket would destroy their ship, killing all four of them instantly.

“What are my orders, sir?” Kara looked over her shoulder, hands hovering over the weapons control panel. Her lip was curled upward, her eyes like a cornered animal’s; she looked terrified, yet determined to blast her way to freedom.

Bill glanced Laura’s way, as if to double-check that the plan hadn’t changed. “Hold fire, Starbuck,” he ordered.

Six of the soldiers jogged towards them, guns cradled in front of their chests. The other six knelt, missile-launchers propped on their shoulders, barrels pointed and ready to shoot.

“Admiral, we can’t just sit here!” Kara blurted.

“Hold fire,” he snapped again.

“But sir!” She trembled, likely from the effort of restraining herself.

The six joggers stopped advancing, bent their knees, and hoisted their guns into firing position. One of them waved an arm and the rear six rose, running forward in turn.

Kara slammed down her hand on a green glowing button.

“Starbuck!” Bill leapt forward, “No!”

He yanked the abort lever just as the three-second countdown timer displayed “1.”

Looking left, he glowered at his hotheaded pilot.

If this were any other situation, he’d probably ask for Kara’s badge while she cooled her heels in the brig. Instead, he just shook his head and sighed.

Beads of sweat trickled down Kara’s forehead. “Sorry, sir. I, I don’t know what came over me.”

“Fear,” he snapped. “Get it together, Captain. This is a peace mission.”

“Did they get the memo?” She sounded truly doubtful, not intentionally insubordinate.

Laura shuddered as the twelve alien soldiers advanced with weapons drawn.

Chapter Text

As the armed Marines surrounded the Colonial spaceship, Jed had a flashback of the FBI standoff with military extremists in Idaho. It was months into his first term. They could have stormed the gates or backed off completely. Instead, he chose to send in a negotiator.

The negotiator was shot within minutes.

He stared at the shaky video feed on the wall-sized screen, the helmet-mounted Marine camera providing a first-person view of the mysterious vehicle. Other Marines were also in the frame, forming a secure perimeter around the raptor—as the Colonial had called it. The female-sounding voice had also demanded that he present himself.

A disconcerting numbness traveled down the left side of his chest. He felt sick that he was being deceptive, that he’d led their President to believe he would open peace talks in person, when in fact, he was well-protected in Washington, sitting behind an antique cherry table surrounded by military advisors.

“I want to speak to whomever is in the raptor,” he announced to the hushed room listening intently to the Marine frequency. The audio channel was quiet except for breathing, hazmat boots hitting hard ground, and Kate Harper’s orders to advance position six at a time.

“Sir,” Fitz shook his head, “they asked for visual proof that you’re onsite. If you speak to them, there are more ways that conversation could go wrong than go right.”

“Agreed. Keep them in the dark as long as possible,” affirmed Nancy McNally’s familiar tenor as she strode into the sit room, back from her emergency return trip from Colombia. “Mr. President,” she inclined her head slightly.

“Nancy,” he greeted, relieved to see the Director of the NSA.

“As you know,” she continued her advice as she sat down, “information is power.”

“And we’re abusing it,” he realized. “Connect me to the Colonials.”

In his peripheral vision, Fitz and Nancy exchanged alarmed looks. He kept his eyes on the live footage and squinted at the nearing windshield. Was that the shape of a person? Did a second person just leap into view?

Fitz placed a small control pad in front of him. “Hold down this button whenever you want to talk.”

Jed nodded, his mind set. He pressed the button. “This is President Bartlet, I’d like to speak with President Roslin.”

“Like I said, show your face,” snapped the female voice that was obviously not Roslin’s. “Or are you one of these goons running towards us?”

A baritone male voice erupted in the background. The words were indistinguishable, but the tone was angry and urgent.

A tingling heat shot up his spine, like an electric shock. Were the Colonials taking retaliatory aim at the Marines since he didn’t abide by their rules?

“Prepare the Marines to engage,” Fitz directed.

“Copy,” Kate answered.

Debilitating weakness suddenly overtook his body. Please God, not now. Abbey had warned that after his latest bout with MS, his disease could be triggered by any stress spikes. His arms felt like led appendages. He thanked his luck that they were supported by the table. Discretely, he breathed deeply, trying to push guilt out of his mind. Blinking at the video feed, he braced himself for the twelve Marines to become cannon fodder.

“President Bartlet, this is President Roslin,” Laura Roslin’s voice resounded across the airwaves.

Fitz and Nancy looked at him, eyes revealing their surprise.

He struggled against the feebleness in his extremities, lifting his fingers and pushing the talk button. “Madam President, how was your flight?” he inquired, trying to sound casual.

He thought he heard her scoff.

“Thanks for asking, President Bartlet. It was uneventful. How was the flight from your capital?”

Before he could press the button to respond, Nancy gestured to hold off. “Source of the signal?” she demanded of the speaker phone.

“It’s being routed through the raptor, but I can’t confirm its origin,” Kate’s voice responded. “They’re scrambling the frequency.”

“Damn them,” Hutchison cursed.

“President Bartlet, can you hear me?” the Colonial President repeated, probably wondering why he’d gone silent.

As soon as the room quieted, Jed rallied his muscles and pressed the button again.

“I can hear you, Madam President. But how can I be sure where you are? I understand you’re scrambling your signal.”

“So are you.”

“Are you onboard the raptor?”

“Are you inside the hangar?”

“I can’t answer that,” he rejoined.

“Then neither can I,” she riposted, sounding steely, yet amused.

Unsure what to say next, he cleared his throat.

“Well we’re off to a great start,” she continued, her teasing tone taking him aback.

He blinked at Nancy, who looked as surprised as he felt.

“Many a great negotiation started off worse than this,” he mused.

“Sounds like we have similar histories,” President Roslin commiserated.

“Human nature has a habit of repeating itself,” he concurred. “Different players, same situations.”

“Couldn’t agree more.” Her voice conveyed a new level of sincerity, as if no one else was listening and it was just her and him. She sighed a familiar, multilayered sigh, exposing the heavy heart of a burdened leader. “Can I be honest, President Bartlet?”

“Of course.”

“I know you’re not at these rendezvous coordinates,” she revealed. He should have felt panicked, but instead he felt oddly relieved. “Your Admiral is a smart, firm man,” she continued. “He never would’ve allowed it. So let’s stop playing games. I don’t have the time.”

He swallowed, staring at the Marine video feed of the ominous Colonial vehicle, which was 50 yards out and growing closer. He squinted, trying to catch a glimpse of Laura Roslin through the windshield, but to no avail. His imagination conjured a human-looking woman his age, well-dressed and stately, but capable of being witty and warm one-on-one. He ignored Fitz, Nancy, and Hutchison, who were all trying to get his attention.

“No more games,” he promised.

He tried to lift his fingers off the talk button, but his hand wouldn’t move.

Chapter Text

The shaky Marine camera was suddenly close enough for Jed to see the figures on the other side of the windshield.

Humans?!

An olive skinned man with a stoic military countenance was seated beside a younger, blonde woman who was glaring fiercely at the advancing Marines.

Were these shapeshifting monsters who adopted human form like preternatural, full body masks? Or did God create humans on other planets, not mentioning it in the Book of Genesis so that Earth’s humans felt special?

“Holy shit,” Hutchison mumbled. Jed couldn't agree more.

“Could you please repeat that, President Bartlet?” Laura Roslin’s voice traveled across the airwaves as Jed glanced helplessly at his unmoving hand, laying limp on the talk button. “I couldn’t quite hear you,” she continued, filling the silence.

He cleared his throat. “Just praying for your crew and mine, Madam President.”

“Are you religious, Mr. President?”

“Yes, I am,” he admitted cautiously. “And you?”

“I’ve had my moments,” she answered slowly, words laced with irony.

Nancy gestured at him to remove his hand from the talk button. She and Fitz obviously wanted to strategize, but he couldn’t reveal the left side of his body was immobile. Instead, he lifted his chin in the air, as if choosing to continue the conversation. “And is this one of those moments, Madam President?”

“I haven’t decided yet.”

“Fair enough…” Jed choked on his words as the blonde woman leapt to her feet and slammed her hands against the glass, apparently furious at the nearest Marine who was kneeling and taking aim at her head. Jed pointed urgently at the screen with his working hand and all faces turned to the front of the room. Moving quickly, he used his right hand to push his left off the button.

Nancy glanced back, visibly relieved the transmission channel was closed. She nodded at him gratefully. “Good news: our aliens look human,” she opened. “Bad news: that one looks like a hothead.”

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

“Starbuck!” the Old Man roared.

Kara sat down reluctantly.

She bit her thumbnail, watching the faceless soldiers form an armed perimeter while President Roslin tried to make nice with Earth’s President. Bartlet was obviously stalling, distracting them so his troops could get close enough to snipe their heads off.

The Old Man was sitting in the copilot’s seat, watching her like a hawk. His eyes were on her right hand, which was gripping the end of the armrest. She wanted to place it on the controls for the munitions pod, just as a precaution, but he’d probably clock her if she tried.

The twelve advancing soldiers switched roles again, the front six bending their knees and taking aim while the back six stood up and ran towards them.

"Peace delegation my ass," she grumbled under her breath.

The nearest soldiers were ten yards away—close enough to see the whites of their eyes. If they even had eyes. And if they weren’t wearing those godsdamned face shields. She squinted, daring the nearest masked Earthling to reveal itself and fight her, person to person. Or Cylon to person. Or fish-scaled, bug-eyed creature to person.

The recipient of her death stare adjusted its firearm slightly, repositioning it a few degrees to the left so that her head was probably squarely in its sights. How satisfying that even through a windshield and a face shield, she could make an alien soldier doubt itself and refine its aim.

“…It would make my crew a lot more comfortable if your soldiers would stop pointing their barrels at us…”

Kara rolled her eyes at the President’s naive request. “They’re not going to stop aiming at us,” she muttered.

The Old Man cleared his throat. She tried to muster the will to turn to him and make an apologetic face, but the hairs on the back of her neck stood on end. Something was shifting in the body language of the soldiers outside. They stopped staring through the sights of their rocket-launchers, turning their heads back and forth, looking at one another.

One at a time, they lowered their guns and moved them to holding positions in front of their chests.

All except for one soldier.

Its unseen face was still locked on hers. It adjusted its finger on the trigger.

She narrowed her eyes, challenging it to disobey orders and shoot. Frak, that’s what she would’ve done.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

“Marine, lower your weapon,” Kate repeated into her headset. Why the hell was he still aiming at the raptor? She toggled to a private frequency. “Major, get control of your squad.”

“Lieutenant Condon’s radio must be out,” the Major called.

She shook her head. Her control panel showed all twelve transponders were online.

“Commander Harper,” Dr. McNally’s voice startled her. Her boss must’ve just arrived in the sit room. “One of the Marines is still in firing position.”

“I’m on it, ma’am.” Personally, she disagreed with the President’s decision to lower arms, so it was hard to blame the Lieutenant for maintaining position, but if he kept twitching, he might just start World War III—or War of the Worlds I.

“Lieutenant Condon, this is Commander Harper. I repeat, your order is to lower your weapon. Do you copy?” The stubborn Marine didn’t move. “I can hear you breathing, Lieutenant. I know you can hear me. This is no time to play hero. Your superiors know what they’re doing.” Truth was, a military operative with a mild insubordinate streak was sometimes just what a mission needed. More than once, she’d defied orders and saved the skin of her superiors.

“Kate,” the President cleared his throat. “I just promised President Roslin we’d start quarantine procedures.” He sounded naively hopeful; maybe he thought he’d made a new friend. She cringed; the alien leader had probably played him. That’s why diplomats always had military advisors. They needed people with less optimistic world views to correct their decisions on the front lines.

Lieutenant Condon—God bless him—was the last cynic standing. When push came to shove, he had the power in his hands, just like she had the power in hers.

She turned off her Washington frequency and took a decisive deep breath.

She flipped the switch so she could broadcast to all Marines.

“Force recon team and snipers,” she licked her lips, “continue to hold fire. Hazmat team, commence docking protocol.”

Chapter Text

“Phase one is complete, Mr. President,” Nancy reported. The tunnel had been hermetically sealed from the door of the alien craft to a decontamination chamber that led to a holding tent within the hangar. Jed imagined the makeshift corridor as a yellow snake, motionless and sunning itself on the tarmac.

“We’re ready for you to give the order, sir,” Fitz said.

“Commence Phase two.” Jed swallowed. He wished the snake skin was transparent so he could see the Colonials emerge from their vehicle. It was risky not having eyes on the blonde for a few cloaked minutes, but this was the plan Admiral Fitzwallace and Millicent the Surgeon General had both signed off on.

Nancy pointed to the monitor broadcasting from inside the windowless empty tent; the monochromatic enclosure made Jed feel claustrophobic. The hatch between the decontamination chamber and tent suddenly opened—a figure emerged from the airlock. The camera zoomed in on the woman’s straight dark hair and glasses as she gingerly placed her leg in the yellow tent. Chin up and eyes sharp, the woman he presumed to be Laura Roslin was as he’d imagined—proud, composed, incisive. The only surprise was her clumsy gate.

Years of weightless space travel had probably caused her muscles to atrophy. Or maybe she sought aid for a communicable disease that was ravaging her people. He was relieved Millie had been meticulous in guarding against airborne illness, given the visible tremor in President Roslin’s knees. She reached out, trying to catch herself against the wall, but the wobbling tent canvass provided nothing to grab onto.

She awkwardly regained her balance—thighs trembling. He looked away, feeling guilty. Fitz had convinced him a barren tent was a security precaution and a psychological tactic: “Keep the aliens uncomfortable so they can’t get their bearings.” It now felt uncivil—even inhumane—to keep President Roslin standing indefinitely.

The airlock at the opposite end of the tent opened.

President Roslin straightened her glasses and smoothed her blazer, lowering her hand just as one of the Marines wearing a hazmat suit entered. He was immediately followed by another. Then a third. Then a fourth.

Jed cringed, hoping she didn’t feel accosted. It seemed ridiculous to order four Marines to guard a civilian leader who had been nothing but civil.

President Roslin placed her hands behind her back and squared her stance. Now appearing rock steady, she nodded a greeting.

The first airlock opened again and the stout, olive-skinned man stepped into the tent with the jaw and carriage of a military leader. His grey uniform bore distinct military signifiers: a decorative sash, burnished medals. The man’s thick brows furrowed as he noticed the four imposing Marines standing face-to-face with his leader. He strode to her side, lifting his chin to make eye contact with the Marines as he reached for his President’s elbow.

Jed cocked his head, intrigued. The man had reached for his President like Abbey reached for him: supportive and selfless.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Facing the entrance to the decontamination chamber, Kara glanced over her shoulder and up the yellow tunnel toward the raptor’s open door. The quickly treated gunshot wound Helo had earned during the battle at the Cylon Colony was forcing him to limp slowly down the corridor. “Want me to wait for you?”

“Go on!” he waved her ahead. She turned and entered the airlock the President and Old Man had disappeared into one-by-one.

A mist rose up around her in the small auto-sealing compartment. After a minute, a green light flashed on, presumably signaling she was clear to exit.

She opened the hatch and peered into the crowded yellow tent. Two white-suited thugs were standing guard at the far end by another door. A third was frisking the Old Man. A fourth was patting down the President.

President Roslin’s arms trembled as she held them out to her sides; she winced as the large, thick-fingered creature roughly patted her breasts. “What the frak!” Kara burst, stepping into the tent.

All four figures raised their heads and turned towards her. For the first time, she could see through their masks. They weren’t alien lifeforms; they weren’t Cylons. They were humans.

She breathed a sigh of relief, then stiffened: she recognized the shape and stature of the tall man with his hands on the President. He was the one who had stared her down through the windshield, even after his squad mates had lowered their weapons.

She raised her eyebrows, daring him to come on over and take a shot or at least take a swing. She watched his blue eyes narrow, then smirked at his frustration. It was obvious that he’d been kept from letting loose and now he was stewing about it. The coward broke eye contact and resumed manhandling the President.

“Seriously?” Kara took a step towards him, palms up, prompting him to frisk her. “Too scared to touch me?”

“Don’t worry, honey, you’re next,” he sneered under his breath.

“Did you just call me, honey?”

The cretin straightened his back, apparently done harassing the President. “Got a problem with that?” he asked in a low voice.

“Got a problem with you.”

Kara stepped forward as he stepped forward. Eye to eye with the mouth-breather, she lifted her arms out to her sides, inviting him to place his meaty fingers on her ribcage.

He reached for her with his thickly padded hands. Idiot. He wasn’t going to feel anything through those stupid gloves. She smiled, lips closed, maintaining eye contact.

“Turn.”

She rotated slowly, facing away from him as he ran his hands over her shoulders, arms, torso. His hand paused over the bulge on her lower back. Frak.

She looked over her shoulder as he drew his handgun and aimed it shakily at her head. “Hands up! All the way up!”

She raised her arms in the air and turned back to face him.

“Commander Harper, this alien has a gun in her waistband,” pretty-boy called into his headset without taking his eyes—or his gun—off her.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Laura’s heart raced.

Bartlet’s human-looking soldiers, who had simply been doing their jobs by patting her and Bill down, now had their weapons drawn. The tall one had his gun aimed at Starbuck’s face. Two others had their barrels pointed and her and Bill. The fourth was approaching Starbuck from behind while his comrade directed him. “…right there. Against her back.”

Had Starbuck disobeyed orders and brought a weapon? Of course Earth’s President wasn’t going to let her carry one through security. Laura glanced at Bill, who was gritting his teeth, anger rising. Likely, the only thing keeping him from frisking Starbuck himself was the gun pointed at his head.

Starbuck glared over her shoulder at the suited soldier behind her. “Watch it,” she snapped as he reached under her flight jacket and yanked an object quickly toward him.

He lifted the confiscated gun in the air, triumphant. “Got it.”

“Which means we got you,” said the soldier whose gun was trained on Starbuck.

Laura sighed. All the progress of the last few hours—from the first transmission from Earth to her most recent conversation with Bartlet—all that goodwill was gone. She’d have to ask Earth’s President for forgiveness and admit Captain Thrace had been insubordinate, which wouldn’t reflect well on her and Bill’s leadership.

“Finish patting her down,” the tall gun-pointer said to the one who was placing Starbuck’s weapon in his hip holster.

“Yeah, finish patting me down,” Starbuck grumbled, “because it obviously takes two of you to deal with one of me.”

“Captain Thrace!” Bill barked. “Stand still and shut up.”

Starbuck’s eyes flashed with defiance, then she bit her lip and kept her hands in the air.

The frisker paused with his hand over Starbuck’s rear. Slipping his fingers into her back pocket, he removed two syringes and stared at them, horrified. “Potential biological weapons,” he proclaimed into his headset, tripping over his words.

Oh no.

He kept his arm extended, holding the syringes away from his body, as if he didn’t trust his protective suit. “Send in a biohazard transport box to secure the specimen ASAP.”

If Laura spoke up now and explained away the syringes as medicine, they’d never believe her; not after Starbuck’s stunt. They’d take the vials to a lab and run tests; by the time the results came back, it would be too late. Laura would either be incapacitated or dead. For that matter, maybe they’d all be. Galactica’s hull would give way and space would suffocate the crew if she couldn't quickly convince Bartlet to share a long-range jump vessel that could reach the recon coordinates and the rest of the fleet.

Starbuck’s wide eyes flashed sideways, towards her. The young woman was afraid. Not afraid of the gun aimed at her head, but afraid of letting her and Bill down. The sound of a hatch opening at the tunnel-end of the tent drew everyone’s attention. “Another alien!” the gun-pointer yelled, moving his gun off Starbuck and onto a wide-eyed Helo.

Starbuck pivoted and kicked the frisker in the stomach; the syringes fell to the ground as he doubled over. She grabbed her confiscated gun out of the frisker’s hip holster and tossed it to Helo with one hand while she pulled something out of her boot with the other.

Bang.

Helo’s head hit the ground. Blood.

Laura flinched as the soldier who fired turned back to Starbuck.

Starbuck tossed a metal rod to the ground, which she’d pulled out of a round object. “Nobody move!” she yelled, raising what Laura recognized as a grenade. “I assume you people know what explosives are.”

The tall soldier nodded and moistened his lips, but didn’t change his aim. The one who’d been kicked in the liver backed away from Starbuck slowly, empty palms on display. The other two continued guarding her and Bill with guns drawn. Laura’s heart pounded as her eyes flicked between Starbuck and Bartlet’s soldiers, all of them looking jumpy than she would’ve liked.

“Let me spell it out for you,” Starbuck threatened. “If you drop me now, this drops,” she lifted and rotated the small grenade like a fragile champaign glass. “It’s a percussion explosive, the pin is gone, and damn if this isn’t a small tent, so if this hits the deck we’re all toast.”

Starbuck stepped backward, in Helo’s direction, without taking her eyes off the room. “Helo? How you doing, buddy?” Starbuck asked. Laura held her breath. Helo was eerily still except for a growing pool of blood. “Hang in there, pal.”

Laura realized one of Helo’s legs was twisted unnaturally beneath him; she felt nauseas.

“Helo?” Starbuck repeated, louder this time. “Karl?” she whispered, dread in her voice. Maintaining eye contact with the tall man pointing the gun, she knelt and found Helo’s neck with her free hand.

Starbuck’s eyes turned glassy and she pressed her lips together hard.

“No,” Laura gasped, covering her mouth with the back of her hand. Hera. She’d just gotten her father back. Laura closed her eyes and saw herself back on Colonial One, wiping a whiteboard with a shaky finger, then rewriting the final digit.

She opened her eyes and watched Starbuck step determinedly in the direction of the tall man who’d killed Helo.

“Starbuck!” Bill yelled as an order.

Starbuck stopped, but not because of Bill. Without taking her eyes off the room, she squatted and picked up both syringes with her empty hand. As she stood again, her gaze pierced each soldier in turn. “Listen here. You especially, Mr. President.” Starbuck fixed her eyes on a small camera attached to one of the tent’s metal ribs, which Laura hadn’t noticed until now. Starbuck gestured toward Karl Agathon’s dead body, her eyes moist. “He didn’t do anything wrong. None of them have. I was acting alone.” Starbuck’s chin trembled. “These syringes…they’re just the President’s medicine.” Starbuck turned to Laura, the young woman’s eyes were vulnerable, apologetic, and resolved.

“Starbuck,” Bill growled. “What are you doing?”

“Making things right.” Starbuck’s eyes were aflame.

“It’s okay, Admiral,” Laura reached out and gently patted Bill’s bicep with her hand. As if drawn by a magnet, she stepped across the tent toward Starbuck.

“If these were biological weapons,” Starbuck projected to the camera, “do you think I’d inject them into my President?”

Laura pulled up her sleeve and held her forearm out to Starbuck, veins disconcertingly visible beneath her nearly transparent skin. Her unsteady arm bore a distinct tremor, so she anchored her elbow against her stomach.

One hand still holding the grenade, Starbuck used her teeth to pull the rubber stopper off the tip of one syringe.

“What’s going on?” Bill bellowed. Laura heard the soldiers speak urgently into headset microphones in voices too quiet for her to make out.

Starbuck swallowed, hesitating for a split second, then hurriedly jabbed the needle into Laura’s vein.

Pain.

Starbuck couldn’t quite reach the plunger with her thumb. Laura pushed it down with her free hand while Starbuck held the syringe steady.

The now familiar chemicals coursed through her body, pumping her with stimulants, adding to her already amped up state of adrenaline. Heart speeding faster and faster, second by second, she squinted as the yellow tent became so bright, she felt blinded.

“I need to sit down.”

Up? Down? It was all one yellow blur.

Crack. The sound of a gunshot?

Blackness.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

“What have you done?” Bill snarled at Kara without looking up. He was kneeling by Laura’s side, gently lifting the back of her skull with the palms of his hands, feeling for gashes, checking for blood. It had happened so fast.

Karl shot dead. Kara threatening to kill all of them with a grenade. Kara shooting some kind of poison into Laura’s veins—probably a black market stim Kara was secretly on. Gods only knew why Laura let herself be injected. Laura had mumbled something unintelligible; her arms had flailed. He’d leapt across the tent towards her, not caring if the soldier guarding him chose to shoot. He was one moment too late and she’d fallen, head cracking against the ground.

Now, he was stroking her forehead, timing her racing pulse with the tips of his fingers, calling her name quietly, knowing she’d be angry he wasn’t sticking to ‘Madam President’ in front of their captors.

“Soldier, call for a doctor!” he barked at one of the soldiers who was locked in a stalemate with Starbuck.

“Yes, sir,” the soldier answered, then spoke into his headset. Even in this unknown solar system, a commanding presence demanded response.

Bill carefully adjusted his fingers on Laura’s carotid artery. Her pulse was still fast, too fast; yet she wasn’t opening her eyes. She probably got dizzy from the stims, then received a concussion from the fall.

“How many bad decisions are you capable of making in a row,” he spat in Kara’s direction, his voice low. He looked up and found her face, narrowing his eyes.

The sweat beaded on her forehead and rolled down her cheek. “It’s not what you think.”

“It’s exactly what I think. And you are done thinking. You are done doing anything, Captain.”

He slowly laid Laura’s head on the ground, glad the hair of her wig padded the back of her skull.

Standing up and reaching for the grenade, he grabbed it from the chastened Starbuck, her eyes downcast.

“Get me that pin,” he ordered, pointing to the shiny rod on the otherwise barren floor.

He held the pin and grenade in opposite hands and turned toward the small camera. “I am Admiral William Adama, military leader of the Colonies. I apologize for the actions of Captain Thrace. She has acted against orders, which were to accompany us on a peaceful, diplomatic mission. To ensure we don’t lose another one of our people, I request a doctor tend to our President, as well as your assurance that we will not be harmed by your men. If I have your word, Mr. President, Admiral Fitzwallace, then you have mine, and I will reinsert this pin into this grenade, so your soldiers can lower their guns.”

The four white-suited Marines stared at him intently, obviously listening to the bugs in their ears.

“Admiral Adama,” one of them spoke, “the President is amenable to your request and a doctor is being suited up to enter this chamber, as we speak. On one condition: we can place Captain Thrace in custody until further notice.”

“Take her,” Bill responded. “I want to throw her in the brig myself.”