Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Lee came out through a break in the trees.  What the frak is that?  It’s the size of a dog.  And it’s furry.  Ha!  That’s adorable, the way it’s licking her face.  But don’t let her hear you think that, Leland.  He took another few steps then stopped dead.  Kara was facing the other way, but there was a much larger version of that - well, whatever it was - stalking slowly toward her.

“Ka -” he started to call out, but the thing’s ears twitched and it looked in his direction and he was frozen.  That thing’s twice Kara’s size.  Muscular.  It looks kinda like a cat, only really frakkin’ big.  And it looks pissed.

Kara was oblivious, playing with the thing in her arms, pretending to fight off its errant tongue and batting paws, but even from where he was, Lee heard the low rumble from the larger beast.  Kara spun around.  “Hey.  Where’d you come from?”  She looked at the one in her arms, clearly comparing it to the gigantic one standing in front of her.  “Is this one of your babies?  She’s cute!”  Kara put her hands under the baby’s belly and held it out to that thing.

Lee was still petrified.  Kara, what the frak?  Even Starbuck is no match for one of those!  He whimpered at the idea of it tearing Kara apart, and it turned its head in his direction again, letting out a “whuff” of warning at him.  Frak no, I’m not coming over there.  Do you think I’m stupid?

Kara was still standing there, and the thing snarled at her.  Kara being Kara, she just cocked her hip and yelled, “What?  I’m not hurting her.  She’s right here, you idiot!”

The thing crept closer, its whiskers moving continually, its giant nose wrinkled as if in disgust.  It opened its mouth slightly and stuck its nose right in Kara’s belly.

Lee clamped his eyes shut, not able to watch while Kara was shredded from the guts out.

Moments that seemed like millenia later, Kara laughed and he opened his eyes.  Kara was sitting on the ground and that cat-thing was walking away with the smaller one held carefully in its mouth by the skin of its neck.

Kara bounced up and came skipping toward him.  “Did you see it, Lee!?  The baby must have wandered off and the mama came to get it and man was she pissed!”  Her grin was brighter than the sun.  “She’s strong.  Knocked me to the ground with her nose!”

His limbs were jelly and he slumped to the ground in relief.  

“Lee?  What’s wrong?”  Kara sat in his lap.

He threw his arms around her and hugged her so tight she protested.

“What the frak, Lee?”

“Gods, Kara.  Can you please not scare me like that?  I thought for sure that thing was tearing you limb from limb right there in front of me.”

She put her head on his shoulder. “Aww, Lee.  I was perfectly safe.  She just wanted to know that I wasn’t hurting her baby.  Once she figured that out, everything was fine.”

Trust Kara to think it was just that simple.  Frak.  I need a drink.  Has Chief got that still working properly yet?

Her hands petted his jaw, and he couldn’t help pushing her off his lap.  “Gods, Kara, that smells disgusting.  What is that?”  

Yet again, Kara was laughing at him.  “I guess it’s what those animals smell like, Lee.  It doesn’t turn you on?” she teased.

“It’s nasty, Kara.”

“Wanna give me a bath?”

How is it she still does this to me after all this time?  From so scared I wouldn’t be surprised to find out I’d messed my pants to so frakkin’ turned on that...Lords of Kobol, Kara.  “I need to frak you, right now, and since I’m not doing it until you don’t smell like that anymore, then yes, Kara, I want to give you a bath.  Where’s the damn stream from here?”

“I bet I can make you forget about the smell, Lee.”  She pounced on him, pushing him to his back in the grass.  

He rolled her over, crushing her lips with his.  You could.  When she got her hands loose, though, the scent was overpowering again.  He ground her into the grass.  “Bath.  Then frak.”  He hopped to his feet and held his hand out.  Ugh.  Will that ever come out?  “We’re going to need soap.”

It took them an hour to get back to their place - Kara kept tackling Lee to the ground, trying to lead him off-mission.  She was very distracting.

As they came around the corner of the cabin, Lee’s eyes widened and he stopped, pushing Kara behind him.  Me, trying to protect her?  What the frak am I thinking? 

Six feet off their front porch, there was an animal carcass, expertly killed and obviously laid out as an offering.

Lee laughed, not quite on the edge of hysteria, and said, “Only you, Kara Thrace, can have secret admirers who aren’t even human.”

She grinned cheekily at him.  “What can I say, Lee?  Everybody has a skill.”

Chapter Text

She hadn’t come home last night - he couldn’t feel her in the house.  Lee got up and got dressed, gathering his gear for a hike.  He knew the general direction she’d gone last night, but who knew where he’d actually find her?  He opened the front door and froze.  Kara was lying on the ground a few dozen feet from the door, sprawled in what he hoped was sleep.  He dropped his stuff and ran to her.  No, Kara.  Don’t do this to me.  I’m not ready yet.  He got closer and saw her chest rising and falling.  Thank gods.  What the frak is that all over her?  He knelt next to her and just past her head he noticed the claw marks in the ground, as well as the flattened grass behind Kara.  He could still smell the cat, so she hadn’t been gone long.  I don’t know why you’ve appointed yourself her guardian angel, but thank you.  Maybe next time you can knock on the door and tell me she’s home? He laughed at himself, but it came out a grunt as he hefted her up into his arms.  

“Cmon, Kara.  Let’s get you into the bed.  It’s got to be more comfortable than the ground.”  Her head lolled toward his shoulder, and he picked up a whiff of - something - in her hair.  Sweet and smoky.  He put her in the bed and tried to figure out how to undo whatever she was wearing.  Skirt?  It was open all the way to the knot at her hip.  “Where are your clothes, Kara?”  He fumbled with the knot, and finally managed to get it loose.  He tossed it open, planning to try to ease it out from under her, but his gaze was arrested by the sight of her, bare, covered in some kind of drawings from her cheeks to her knees.  Someone got very - personal - with you, Kara.  He pushed at her leg to look at the ones on her inner thighs.  Very personal.  

He was constantly amazed at the way Kara connected with people.  Or animals.

She had happened upon a group of natives during a recent hunt with Artemis, and the natives had been so in awe of her standing there, poised for action, Artemis snarling at her back, that they’d fallen to the ground as if in worship.  Kara had managed somehow to communicate enough to get them to take her back to wherever they lived, and she told him later that Artemis had stayed at that spot until Kara came back, as if waiting to escort her home. 

She’d been high on the interaction, talking almost too fast for him to keep up, telling him about what she’d seen - the way they communicated, the kinds of tools they used, the way they dressed.  Or mostly didn’t.  She’d laughed at the expression on his face.  “Oh, Lee.  My favorite prude.  Relax.  There’s no rules to break here.”

He ran his fingertips over the drawings, trying to decipher if there was some meaning behind them.  They seemed almost ritualistic in appearance, much like some of the Tauron tattoos he’d seen when he was young.  The hair on her arms stood at attention as his fingers passed, and when he touched her collarbone and her chest, the skin on her breasts reacted the same way, inviting attention.

What the frak did you do last night, Kara?  

Kara curled toward him, snoring slightly.  

Lee leaned further over her, skimming the skin of her back.  “They’re all over your back, too.”  He pulled at her hip.  “All the way down to your knees.  Wonder if there’s some significance to that?”

Kara’s sleepy voice startled him.  “Erogenous zones.  The most important ones are above the knees, Lee.  At least they believe so.”

“Hey.”  He leaned back and smiled at her.  “How you doing this morning?”

“Good, I think.”  She stretched, drawing Lee’s eyes back to the tattoos and her bare breasts.  “Mmmm.  Yeah.  I’m good.  Tired.  You wanna come back to bed?”  She grinned at him, pulling gently at the front of his shirt.

“Erogenous zones?  What kind of party was this?”

Kara chuckled.  “You would have hated it, Lee.  Naked people.  Drinking.  Making out.  Dancing.”  She bent a knee and pulled her hand up her skin, teasing at her belly.  “The stuff they use to paint these drawings?  Some kind of mild topical aphrodisiac.”  She stretched again.  “And maybe some lingering feel-good.  I’m not as sore as I could be.  We’ll have to mention it to Cottle on our next trip in.”  

“You want me to come back to bed, maybe you could talk about Cottle later.”

“Who?”  She pulled at his shirt more insistently.  “Come back to bed.  I probably had more resistance than they did to it, but I’m not entirely immune, Lee.”

Lee held back.  “How’d you get home?”

“Hmm.  You know, I don’t know.  I don’t actually remember leaving the party.”

“I don’t know how you got home, either, but Artemis played watchdog once you got here.  I found you outside a few minutes ago.  She’d left not long before I went outside.”

She pulled him down on top of her.  “She’s a good girl.  Maybe she waited for me again - made sure I got home.”  She held his face as she kissed him lingeringly, then stopped.  “Wait.  You found me outside?  Asleep?”

“Asleep on the grass in this poor excuse for a skirt.”

She laughed at him.  “Aww.  You don’t like it?  Easy access, Lee.”  

“Not too easy.  That knot was a pain to get undone.”  

“You’re not supposed to have the take the thing off to get busy.”  She grinned up at him.  “So, Lee…..wanna have a little fun?”  She licked a finger and rubbed one of the tattoos, then held the finger up to Lee’s lips.  “This stuff’s edible.”

“Oh, really?”  His gaze flicked down her body, looking at the tattoos even as his tongue played with her finger.

Her eyes fluttered closed.  “Mmm-hmm.  How do I taste?”

“I think I need more information before I answer that question.”

“Plenty of information here, Lee.  More than enough to make an informed decision.”  

He sat up and Kara gasped as he sucked at the creased skin behind her knee.  “Maybe a random sampling would be sufficient.”  

“I’m at your service.  Sample away,” she moaned.

~*~

Report to Cottle:

Natives shared topical application.  Combination of plants appears to be key to achieving desired aphrodisiac effect.  Natives use the liquid derived to “paint” designs on each other preparatory to mating/fertility gatherings.  Tattoos are ingestible and such ingestion increases the effect.  Sweat created by physical exertion makes transfer via bodily contact more easily accomplished.  The combination of sweat, bodily contact and ingestion amplifies the aphrodisiac effect exponentially.

Additionally, there is a lingering physical pain-relief/anti-inflammatory effect while the tattoos remain.

End report.

Cottle chuckled as he read the report.  So like the younger Adama to try to be clinical when it was obvious he’d obtained this information first-hand.  He examined the plants Adama had included with his report.  There wasn’t necessarily a great need for aphrodisiacs on Earth, but the pain-relief and anti-inflammatory effects were needed, and knowing that plants could be combined for different effects was definitely useful information.  Ellen Tigh would be delighted to have something on which to experiment.

Chapter Text

There was a trail of blood in the snow leading toward the treeline. Lee took off running. He found Kara facedown in a clearing, and he rolled her over, checking for injuries before he saw the bruise on her face.

“What the frak, Lee? You scared them off!”

“Blood in the snow,” he said numbly. “What happened? What got you?”

“I strung the bow wrong, Lee. I did it to myself.”

“Thank gods!”

“You’re still touching me, Lee.”

When he looked, he could tell she was laughing at him.

Kara reached under her top and pulled at something, and her layered pants were loose. She pushed his hand underneath them. “This what you were looking for?” she teased.

He gaped at her and groaned at the feel of her at the same time. Hot and wet, like she did it magically just for him.

She laughed out loud this time. “Toldja the clothes the natives wore made sense.”

He leaned down, kissed her almost violently, and sniffed at her hair.

Kara pushed hard at his shoulder. “No, Lee. I have not seen the cats today.” She pushed him over onto his back and straddled him. “You don’t have to worry about me so much, Lee. I’m still Kara Thrace, ya know, and I can still out badass you.”

He reached up and tucked her hair back, then used it to pull her down. “I know. It’s why I worry, Kara. We found this place, this planet, and it’s a great one, and I’m so happy we’re thriving. But it’s not all safe, Kara. Every time you walk out the door…”

While he hadn’t been paying attention, she’d gotten his pants open and his cock out. She rose to her knees and sank down on him.

He grabbed her hips, still covered in those loose pants. “Gods, Kara. I’m so -”

She smiled that only-for-him smile and said, “I know, Lee. Me, too.”

Chapter Text

What in the gods’ name was that racket?  It sounded as if something was dying in the front yard.  Lee put down the book he’d been trying to read and went to the front door, throwing it open.  Baby was standing there, paw raised as if she were getting ready to knock on the door.  Knock the frakkin’ door down, more like.  She’s getting big.  She yowled at him, though it wasn’t nearly as intimidating as her mother’s.  

Lee shook his head and started to close the door - the cats were Kara’s friends, not his - but Baby stuck her paw in the doorway and yowled again, softer, looking over her shoulder then back at him.  Kara thinks these things are intelligent.  Maybe Baby’s trying to tell me something.  “You want me to come with you?”  She sort of meeped at him, and he decided to take that as a yes.  He left the door open while he went to get his pack - he and Kara kept them ready, because they just never knew when they’d need to walk out the door on a moment’s notice.  Like now.

Baby was pacing, tail twitching, when Lee came back to the door, and she immediately turned and started trotting off toward the hills.  Lee slammed the door behind him and jogged after her.  

He’d been following Baby for nearly an hour, at a pretty substantial lope all the way, and he was beginning to get winded.  Kara would laugh her ass off when he told her, especially when he told her that he been chasing Baby at the time.

Baby slowed down, and Lee heard what sounded like Artemis growling.  Frak!  I hope she’s not pissed, because I’m pretty sure she only tolerates me because Kara smells like me.  That had been a fun introduction.

Kara held Lee’s hand, her other on Baby’s scruff, and said, “Artemis, this is Lee. He’s a friend.” Artemis sniffed in Lee’s direction for several minutes, then stuck her nose in Kara’s crotch. Kara laughed raucously, and Artemis shook her head vigorously, as if to shake off the noise. “Yes, Artie, he’s that kind of friend.”

He shook the thought off.  

He and Baby rounded a curve in the path, and Artemis was lying on the ground, apparently on high alert - her tail was flipping back and forth almost faster than Lee could see it - and she was growling down at the hole in front of her.  Periodically, she whuffed, as if she were talking to someone.

He stopped where he was, waiting.  Artemis turned her head in his direction, her muzzle pulled back, ears tuned behind her.  Lee took a step forward, and when she didn’t protest, he moved again.  One step at a time, until he was looking down at the hole from beside the cat.  Kara!  Guess Baby was trying to tell me something.  Is that one of Artemis’ kits?  Kara had told him that she thought the cats lived in groups, and that as far as she could tell, Artemis was the Head Bitch In Charge of her particular group.  So the kit might be one of hers, or it might just belong to the group.

He thought he might be able to get down in there from the other side, but there’d be little room to maneuver.  He couldn’t tell from here if Kara was breathing, but it looked like she wasn’t injured, so hopefully she’d just lost consciousness.

“Okay.  I’m going to try to get in from the other side.  I don’t have any rope, so if I can lift the kitten and Kara to you, you’ll have to help me get them the rest of the way out.”  He looked at Artemis, and he swore her expression said, “Duh.”

“All right, then.  Here goes.”

He walked around to the other side of the pit, examining for places he could put his hands and feet on the way down.  Movement in his peripheral vision.  The kitten was awake, licking Kara’s face, and she groaned.  Thank gods.  Now just to get her out of there.  He slowly and carefully climbed down into the pit.  He wasn’t sure what had made the earth collapse here, but it seemed stable enough at the moment.  

He ran his hands over the kitten, and as much of Kara underneath it as he could reach.  He looked up at Artemis.  “Okay, I’m going to try to lift it up to you.”  She was looking down at him, impatiently if he was any judge.

The kitten was heavier than he’d expected - apparently, these things were far more muscular than he would have thought.  It was a strain to get it over his head, but he managed to hold it up long enough for Artemis to get its scruff in her teeth.  Frak.  How’s she gonna get hold of Kara?  Never mind, Lee.  Focus.  Artemis disappeared from his overhead view, but Baby stayed, staring down at him.

He knelt to check over Kara.  She didn’t have any injuries - no bumps on her head or any breaks that he could find.  Maybe the kitten had landed just right on her and knocked her out.  “Kara.  Come on, Kara, wake up.”

She groaned.  “Leemee alone.”

“Kara.  Time to wake up.”

“Don’ have to.  Lemme sleep.”

“Starbuck!”

She started awake.  “What?  Frak, Lee, what’s your problem?”  She looked around her, up at him, up farther at Baby, her mouth rounding in an Oh.  “Guess I fell in.”

“Either that or you decided to play hide and seek without telling me.”

“Funny, Adama.”

“Come on, Kara. Let’s get you out of here.”  He was about to wonder out loud if Artemis was coming back when she rawred softly from above.  “Okay!  Just about ready down here.  You ready up there?”

She whuffed and Kara giggled.  “You’re talking to a cat, Lee.  You know that, right?”

“Frak off, Kara.  You talk to her all the time.”  He grinned crookedly at her.

“Yeah, but I’m crazy.”

“Good point.  I have to lift you high enough that she can get hold of you, or you can get purchase on something and pull yourself out.”  Just as he said that, Artemis turned and dropped her tail over the edge of the pit.  “Okay, then.  Your cat really likes you, Kara.”

“I think it’s more like I’m her human, and more like she tolerates me because Baby likes me.”  She looked up, then over at him.  “How’d you find me, anyway?”

“Baby came and knocked on the front door.”

Kara called out, “Thank you, Baby!” and Baby’s response was a brief, soft roar.

“You ready, Kara?  Can you get on my shoulders?”

She gave him an inscrutable look and laughed.  “I knew some day I’d have you kneeling at my feet.”

He stood and kissed her fiercely.  “Every day if you’d let me.”

“Don’t get mushy on me, Adama.”  But she was smiling as she said it, the special smile that he’d never seen her give anyone else.

The rest of it went fairly easily, though for a moment, Lee wasn’t sure exactly how he was getting out of the pit.  Once topside, he gave Artemis a careful pet on her head, and rubbed Baby vigorously behind the ears.  She returned his thanks with a nudge on his hip that knocked him down.  He and Kara and Baby ended up in a pile broken up only when Artemis growled.  She must have been irritated, because Baby immediately got to her feet and trotted after her mother.

“Guess it’s time for dinner,” Kara said.  “C’mere, Lee Adama.  I think I owe you something for saving my life.”

He let her kiss him, then wrinkled his nose.  “Kara, you smell like cat.  You need a bath.”

“Gods, Lee.  Always trying to get me naked.”