Work Text:
It begins with nothing more than a whisper. Less than that, even. A quiet, almost. A disquieting quiet in the soul. A sudden break in all the noise. Just one blink of an eye where everything is crystal clear. That is all it takes to start a revolution.
You should have seen it coming. It’s been building for a while after all, hasn’t it? Yeah, it’s about time for a reckoning.
Later, you won’t remember how the decision was made, what the train of thought was that set it all in motion. But you will remember that little moment. That blissful quiet will be the most peaceful second you can remember in your life. And you will feel it again, one more time. Right before the bullets rip you apart.
The night before, you don’t sleep. You haven’t been sleeping in general for… you can’t quite remember the last time it was that you slept properly. The drugs helped, but you haven’t taken anything since the incident on Raptor 718. In hindsight, this was a very bad idea, but in the moment you want to feel it. Everything. A reminder of sorts.
Louis is on the late shift tonight, so you are alone. Probably a good thing. You have no idea what you would do if you saw him right now. The two of you haven’t spoken since you gave him your warning. Part of you wants to give in and tell him everything, lift a tiny fraction of the weight off of your shoulders. But of course you can’t. The official argument is that it would complicate the situation, but if you are being honest with yourself, which you try to be, you just don’t want to see this ruin him. He’s been carrying so much recently, working multiple stations all at once, covering your ass and holding it together for both you and the fleet as a whole. And doing all this despite the fact that his panic attacks have been getting much worse. No. You can’t do that to him. So instead you lie there in your rack, fiddling with the dog tags around your neck. They’ve always been a point of pride for you, those tags. A sign that you stand for something. They still are. But standing these days is a lot harder than it used to be.
You take your time getting ready in the morning. Everything is in place, you’re not worried about that. But these next few hours are the ones that will define you in the eyes of the fleet and the world, or whatever’s left of it. You want to hold on to every second. Any way the wind blows, this is how it ends. On your terms.
Frak destiny, honestly.
People in the halls give you knowing looks as you make your painful way to the CIC. You don’t even recognize some of them, and you ignore all of them. No need to add that kind of ceremony to it. It’s treason, for frak’s sake, not a holy day.
Louis is just outside the door when you reach it, flipping through reports on a clipboard and muttering under his breath. His hair is a little ruffled, spiking in the way that indicates he’s been running his fingers through it in frustration. He looks exhausted. And yet he still manages the universe’s softest little smile when he catches sight of you. Gods.
“Hey, tiger," he says, the ridiculous pet name (inspired by an equally if not more ridiculous tattoo) coming easily as he reaches over to touch your arm lightly. His eyes practically devour you with concern and care, but he doesn’t press or push. He trusts you. You can’t help but feel a little bit guilty about that.
You kiss him in lieu of a response. It’s rougher than you intended, more desperate, but what the hell. The bed you’ve made is lonely, yet nevertheless you are going to have this, just this one small moment, before you lie in it.
“What was that for?” he asks when you pull away, looking slightly frazzled.
You shrug, then wince. Gods frakking damnit. It’s a movement in your shoulders, there is absolutely no reason you should be feeling it in your leg.
“I love you,” you reply, and attempt a smile before you walk away. Never mind that it’s the first time you’ve truly said it.
When the time hits, you stop thinking. The pounding of your heart and the blood stumbling through your veins rise to a volume that drowns out every other sound in the room. You are painfully aware of every move you make and every word you say, and yet at the same time it’s like you are a bystander watching from the wings. For maybe about ten minutes, nothing hurts. A terrifying strength you’ve only seen in yourself once or twice before bubbles to the surface and keeps you moving, allowing you to look directly into the admiral’s eyes as he condemns you before the shocked silence of the CIC. There’s a body on the floor. Someone you don’t recognize. A kid. His blood is on your hands. You recognize that, but you cannot acknowledge it. You aren’t… exactly you right now. Not Felix Gaeta.
“What would you do in a situation like that? If you couldn’t honestly follow an order. Have you ever thought about that?”
“I.. don’t know. I think that’s a decision I’d have to make in the moment. I don’t know. I’m not that.. Defiant, really. I mean, you know. You’re the revolutionary.”
You snort, unable to hold back a startled giggle. “Yeah, I’m a real rebel.”
“You laugh now, but you should listen to the way you talk sometimes. Besides, you were part of the rebellion on New Caprica, weren’t you?”
“Barely.”
“Okay, but still. You’ve got something, you know? This kind of fire.”
You grin, rolling over to fully face Louis, propping yourself up on an elbow. “So you’re saying I’m hot?”
“Well, that too.”
The conversation is from months ago, before the Demetrius, but it comes to you now as you watch the marines lead Louis out of the room. And it hits you that he knew. He meets your eyes for a second and you can see it. He knew before you ever did.
As you stand in the admiral’s usual spot and survey what you’ve put in place, another conversation surfaces in your memory. Dee’s voice is in your head like she’s standing right next to you, and a carved-out piece of your soul begins to ache.
“You and me could run this whole ship if we wanted to. Seriously.”
“Oh, we absolutely could.”
“Commander Gaeta an-”
You frown. “Wait, why am I Commander?”
She pauses, considers, shrugs. “It makes sense.”
“No, it makes more sense for you to be Commander. You’ve always the one who has everything under control, and people would listen to you. You’d be incredible at it.”
She smiles. “Commander Anastasia Dualla of the Battlestar Galactica. It does sound pretty badass, doesn’t it.”
“Frakkin’ right it does.”
“You’d be my XO, though?”
“Of course I would.”
Gods, Dee. She would never let you do this. She would agree with the ideas behind it, at least somewhat, but she would insist on finding another way. It tears at you to realize that even if she was here with you, she wouldn’t be with you. The worst part is, you don’t think that would stop you. You loved her like another half of yourself, and you would give anything to see her face right now, but it wouldn’t be enough. Just like Louis, as much as you love him (you really do), can’t be enough.
Because you loved Gaius, at least you thought you did, and you trusted him to establish a home and a new life for the fleet. Then you watched firsthand as he shirked his duties and allowed the cylons to turn that home into a prison camp. It fell to you to keep the government on New Caprica alive and trying its best, while also feeding as much as you could to the resistance, hoping that the simple action would do something.
Because you cared for your Eight, and you trusted her to fight for you against her own people. No. You hoped she would. You let that hope get into you and push everything else aside, and you paid the price in lives. You can still hear her telling you that you knew what she was all along, hear Gaius’ voice alongside it calling you a traitor, playing for both sides. You tried to kill him for that. Because you have given too much to this fleet, everything to it in fact, to be accused of betraying it. Every action you’ve taken has been for these people. You love these people. They are, in every way that counts, your family.
Colonel Tigh is your family. He’s been a constant for the seven years you’ve been on this ship, and he’s been a pain in the ass the whole damn time, but by the gods does he care about this crew. He shows it in the smallest ways, such as kicking you out of the CIC and ordering you to get some sleep. The Galactica is his life, he lives and breathes it.
Galen Tyrol is your family. Sure, he tried to throw you out an airlock once, but the list of those who haven’t been threatened with an airlock by members of their own crew has grown rapidly shorter than the list of those who have. Tyrol was kind to you, after New Caprica, and even thanked you for everything you’d done to help.
It isn’t about the cylons, not really. Everyone else is ignoring it because they need to hold on to these people they’ve always known and stood beside, and you understand that. You would be doing it yourself if not for the fact that you have. You believed in them when they gave you the coordinates to Earth. It had been promised for so long and while you may not be particularly religious or inclined to trust in the more spiritual ideas, it made sense that this would finally be it. But they gave you a nuclear wasteland where home should have been. Earth killed Dee, and the president and admiral were not doing anything about it. The president completely vanished off the radar, while the admiral did his damn best to act like nothing had changed.
No. You are done with putting your faith in leaders and systems, no matter how much they mean to you as people. You can’t lean into that blind hope anymore. This time, you are choosing to put that trust in yourself. You could never do enough before, but maybe this… maybe this will be enough. At least for you.
It goes south quite quickly, of course. You are anticipating this, but you aren’t entirely prepared for just how wrong it goes.
The rushed execution is a terrible idea, you know that. It shows how desperate you are for control. But it sends a message as well, and you need that message sent.
“I don’t think I could actually do it, though. Be Commander.”
“Hm?”
“All those decisions Adama has to make. Lee, too, sometimes. The ones where there is no good option. The ones where you have to do something terrible for the sake of survival, and just have to live with it afterward. I don’t think I could do that.”
“You would learn how to, eventually. You’d have to.”
You’ve learned. Oh, have you learned. You were right in a way you truly, deeply wish you hadn’t been. If she was here to see this…I’m so sorry, Ana.
This is the one thing you will regret, in the end.
Your leg hurts. It hurts all the time, but the past few minutes it has been burning like the bullet is still lodged inside. Standing in the carnage that was once Colonial One, that strength that has been pushing you forward dissipates and it takes every ounce of bitter willpower to keep you upright.
Frak… frak.
You feel like a boy playing at war. Except you never wanted to be a soldier when you were younger, did you? No, you wanted to be an architect. In a twisted way, you suppose you’ve achieved that. You’re the architect of all this, are you not? An exquisite showpiece of righteous anger and innocent corpses, built on the foundation of a bitter and broken soul. The culmination of everything that is and was and will be Felix Gaeta.
This isn’t who you are. Up until now this has been an honest crusade, true to your values. But not this. Now it has become a farce, a drawn-out game of cards with the fleet as its pieces and you as the fool stuck believing that everyone is playing by your rules.
Enough.
When Adama enters the CIC with a gun pointed at your head, you’re ready for him. Not in that you’re prepared to fight him, which you are decidedly not, but more in that… you are simply ready. You’ve done what you intended, though there is too much damage to show for it. You’ve done enough.
You’ve done enough.
You have three visitors, which is in all honesty three more than you expected. The first is by far the least expected.
“You heard the announcement?” Saul Tigh asks as the door bangs shut behind him. They're still working on clearing the senior staff out of the brig, so you're being held in one of the nicer quarters for the time being. It's a hell of a lot more comfy than a cell.
You stare him down blankly, not offering a response.
He sighs. “Seven years in the fleet, as good an officer as there ever was, sentenced to death by firing squad for treason and mutiny.”
You pull yourself up from lying flat into a sitting position, still fixing him with that stare. “What do you want me to say?”
Tigh shrugs. “Whatever the hell you want, son. It’s your funeral.”
It’s your funeral. The fact that these are your last hours hasn’t bothered you yet. You’ve always known the punishment for treason, and it’s been needling at the back of your mind ever since you began planning this. It makes sense to you, in an odd way. This is what you have been building up to with every bold step, every blow dealt, and now that it’s over it is time for you to go. Take your bows, make your exit, close the curtains. Thus ends the show.
“Look, I’m sorry, okay?” you burst out, before you even realize you’re going to speak. Tigh startles a bit, clearly this was not the response he had been expecting. But you are not finished. “I’m sorry I didn’t roll over and give up. I’m sorry I did my frakking best and wasn’t all copacetic when all I got to show for it was half a leg and multiple stabs in the back. I’m sorry I didn’t die back on New Caprica like you would have preferred. I’m sorry.”
There it is. That righteous anger. There you are. Scrubbing a hand over your face, you force the rising tears back down and try again.
"Look. I have lost everything to this fleet. Because I have given everything to this fleet. My faith, my care, my hope, for whatever it was worth. After the destruction of the colonies, it was all I could do. It was something, you know? Still is. Yeah, I still believe that. And yeah, I've got a sweet guy, who is really good for me, and just.. really, really good. And I do love him, I think. But I just couldn't keep my head down anymore. That's not who I am. I gave everything to this fleet. And it wasn't enough. I wasn't enough. I didn't do enough on New Caprica, no matter how frakking hard I tried. I couldn't even do enough to kill Gaius frakking Baltar. I wasn't enough for Dee, I… and yes, I know it isn't just me. But no one else is doing anything. They're doing what I did, putting my faith in someone else, something else. Something that's always been there, always seemed kind of like the only option. What's that crap the cylons say? All this has happened before, and all of this will happen again. Yeah. And it won't frakking be enough. So I did something. For once, I did something. Because the one other thing I've always had faith in? Doing the right thing. Actually frakking doing it. That's who I am. Who knows, maybe it won't be enough in the end. But it was enough for me. It was enough."
You hadn’t meant to say all of that. But once you start, it all pours out, and it feels as though something inside of you lightens, a crushing, choking weight having been lifted off. It just feels so damn good to say it out loud.
“I want you to tell me something, sir. As a last request, I guess. Was I wrong?”
There’s a moment, just a moment, where you think he is actually going to give an honest reply. Tigh considers you, before shaking his head and turning to leave.
He looks back one more time, though, and says, “You were a good kid, Gaeta. I’m not gonna forget that. And neither is the old man.”
Somehow, once he’s gone, the fact that that was the last time Colonel Tigh will ever look disappointed in you hurts more than the realization that he is a cylon ever did.
Your second visitor arrives much later, as the evening falls and the dawning of your impending execution begins to close in. He slips in with a polite nod to the guards, and makes sure the door closes gently before facing you fully. He clasps his hands behind his back, then reconsiders and moves them to the front. After only a second he drops them to his sides, then folds them, then drops them again before quickly running one through his hair. Lords of Kobol, that man never knows what to do with his hands.
“I didn’t know if you’d come,” you say quietly, after giving him a moment to adjust.
“Neither did I,” Louis admits, the exhaustion lacing the words bone-deep. There is a spot of blood just above his left ear, the sight of which has you immediately on guard.
“They hurt you?”
He shakes his head. “No. I had- a bit of a panic attack in the brig and hit my head. I’m fine.”
That’s your fault, you know, even if indirectly.
“I’m sorry.”
He shakes his head again. “You’re not.”
You pause, taken aback. There it is again, that sharp observation delivered as simple fact, the same kind you’d seen in his eyes in the CIC. He told you once that it’s what comes from staying in the background. “You see a lot more like that. It’s one of the few good things Pegasus gave me.”
“Maybe not-” you start, “but I am sorry you got hurt, Louis.”
He nods, opening his mouth to speak and then almost immediately closing it again. His hands do their little dance again, trying to find a place to rest. You want to grab them and hold them, as you usually would, but you’re no longer sure that you’re allowed.
“Are you okay?” he asks suddenly, and you blink, startled at the sudden reminder of the very first time you met him.
It had been not long after New Caprica, maybe a couple weeks? After the airlock incident, for sure. You had been in the CIC, working, all business as usual. You were probably pushing yourself a little too hard, but it took your mind off of… other things, which was the intended goal.
At one point, you felt eyes on you, and looked up to discover that one of the new crew members, formerly of the Pegasus, had approached you. He apologized for if what he said was out of place, then asked if you were okay. It was the simplest of questions, but it was also the first time anyone had asked you that since you had returned to Galactica.
Back then, you had responded in the negative, but now… “Yeah,” you admit, softly at first, then a little louder. “Yeah, I think so.”
Louis nods again. He seems lost for words, which has you anxious to fill the silence.
“Louis, baby, I-”
“Don’t. Please.”
You keep pushing. “I know you’re angry with me-”
“Felix-”
“I just want to-”
“Dammit, tiger, will you stop trying to explain yourself for one godsdamned second?” he practically explodes, leaving you more than a little stunned. “You stubborn motherfrakker.” he says it with an unexpected level of fondness, given the situation and the fact that he rarely swears.
You do the only thing you can think to, which is to shut your mouth and let him speak.
Louis takes a deep breath, finally deciding on resting his hands on the back of the chair across from the one you are sitting in.
“Yes, I am angry with you, but not for the reasons you might think. Gods, Felix, I don’t care about the why. You don’t need to explain that to me. And you really think I’m going to hate you for making a decision that I can’t even fully say was the wrong one? I’m not going to scream at you about how ‘this isn’t you’ and ‘you’re better than this’ and ‘what the hell were you thinking’. Because the thing is, my love, this is you. This is you being more true to yourself than I’ve ever seen you. There’s no way I can condemn you for that. But-”
You open your mouth to interrupt, but he holds up a hand to indicate that he isn’t finished and gives you a what did I say look.
“Seven months. Seven months, Felix. I would think after that long together I’ve earned more than keep your head down.”
“I-”
“No, I get it, I do. But I really wish you’d told me. I don’t know exactly what I would have done, or if- if it would have changed anything, but I just wish you’d let me make that choice for myself. I deserve at least that much.”
Frak. He’s right.
“I love you,” he says then, the frustration gone from his voice just like that. “That’s what angers me the most. I love you. I love you, and I promised you once that I would be there, loving you, for as long as you would let me. We’ve passed that point, and yet here I still am.”
There has been only one time before in your memory that you’ve seen him like this. This fragile, this lost. It was just after Earth, before Dee. You’d told him that he didn’t have to hold himself together for you, not now. And he had shattered like glass, slamming his fist into the wall and screaming into it for a minute straight. He looks about two seconds from doing the same here.
“I always knew I was going to lose you, Felix,” he continues, voice finally breaking. “And I promised you I’d let you go. I did. And I mean to keep that. But that doesn’t mean I have to be okay with it.”
You laugh. You can’t help it. It’s a wet, jagged sound, and entirely not what you meant to do.
“You know, you called me the stubborn motherfrakker,” you manage to say, “but in all my life I have only ever met one person more stubborn than me. And that’s you.”
He laughs too, then, a heartbroken little bark. You’re both crying openly now, but neither of you care.
“You are the brightest thing in this frakked up galaxy, Louis,” you tell him. “I love you. You should know that.”
He gives you the tiniest, most fragile smile.
“You’re okay?” he asks again, after a heavy moment. “With all of this? With how.. With what comes next?”
“Yeah,” you say again, barely able to get the words out. “I am.”
He nods. “Good.”
Up until this moment, it hasn’t hit you that this is the last time you will ever see him. It slams into you all in a rush, making your heart stop for a moment as a crushing desperation overtakes you. “Louis-”
That’s all that you get out before he crashes into you.
You make him promise to leave before the morning, and to not come to the execution.
Neither of you sleep, but both of you pretend to. Before he leaves as promised, he brushes a hand through your hair and kisses your forehead. “I love you.”
You sing your way through the rest of the night.
Your final visitor arrives only about an hour before your scheduled death. He comes bearing cigarettes and coffee, two things you are incredibly grateful for.
“No pen, for old times sake?” you attempt to joke.
Gaius just blinks at you. He looks way more rattled than you feel.
“C’mon, this is my last meal. You can at least let me relive my happiest memory,” you try again, to no avail. He simply sits down across from you and lights a cigarette.
The two of you sit there in comfortable silence for a while, something you never would have thought could happen. You don’t need to say anything, everything you could possible say to one another has already been said. Or at least you thought.
“You know, you’re the closest friend I have in this fleet,” Gaius says suddenly. "Isn’t that odd? You’ve tried to kill me twice, and I still consider you that. But it just occurred to me that I don’t even know your favorite color.”
Well. Not what you were prepared for.
“Green,” you say after what feels like forever but can only realistically be about a minute. “Dark green, rich, with layers to it. Like sunlight through leaves, yeah?”
Gaius leans back and studies you, an odd little smile twitching at the corners of his mouth. “I would have guessed blue. Or gray.”
You snort. “Been surrounded by those a little too much lately.”
“Fair.”
He spends the rest of the hour asking you questions about your childhood, your family, your education, all the basic icebreaker crap. It feels.. Really good, to talk about this stuff with him. Simple. And when he tells you, at the end, that he knows who you are, it feels like the most true thing he’s ever said to you. On the way out, he comes around and presses a kiss to the top of your head.
“Thank you,” he whispers, then squeezes your hand and is gone.
It stops. You’re not expecting that. It just. Stops.
You were afraid that all you’d leave behind would be blood on the scales. But now you know that there is much more that you have given.
They will know who you are. Some already do.
It stops.
It’s enough.