Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Kara was in agony.

She had managed to safely land the damaged Raptor, but her need to maintain a tight hold on the controls meant she couldn’t escape the flames. She had briefly examined her hands, but after seeing the melted gloves and ruined flesh, she felt bile in her throat. She didn’t want to look more closely.

I’ll get some morpha. Once I take the edge off, I can figure out what to do.

She was sitting on the floor, behind the pilot’s seat. She had managed to open the emergency med kit and extract the tin with the syringes. Between the gloves and her injuries, she didn’t have the necessary dexterity to do anything with it. She wanted to cry, both due to pain and frustration.

The corner of her eye caught a moving shadow, and she thought she heard footsteps. She felt a burst of adrenaline with a temporary reprieve from the pain. She reached for her sidearm and aimed it at the door.

The footsteps approached the door, and a figure appeared in the doorway. Backlit, she couldn’t see its face. But she recognized the silhouette. And the haircut. She took aim and fired.

She didn’t have a strong enough grip on her sidearm. The shot went wide and the recoil made her drop it. Leoben moved quickly, kicked the gun out of the way, and was kneeling down in front of her before she could even attempt to recover it and try again. He held her wrists and gently turned her palms up. After just a moment’s examination, he transferred both wrists to his left hand, opened the tin of morpha with his other, and quickly prepped the syringe and gave her a dose. He spat out the needle cap from between his teeth and asked, “Is that better?”

She felt immediate relief from the hurt in her hands, but she wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction. “What are you doing here?” she demanded.

“I knew you were in trouble and came to help.”

“I don’t need your help.”

“This system’s star is unstable. It’s going to blow very soon. When it does, you won’t want to be around.”

With that, he released her. He pocketed her sidearm and began assessing the Raptor. He pulled one of the panels away and started sorting through cabling.

With his attention diverted, she spent a bit more time studying him. He was dressed similarly to the copy the Admiral had met (and killed) on Ragnar Station—cargo pants, short sleeved shirt, some sort of vest. She noted he also had a handgun. He was covered in dust and she wondered how far he had come on foot.

“Forget it, the avionics are thrashed. Why can’t we take your ship?”

He answered without interrupting his work. “It’s too far—we’d never make it in time. And I don’t think you’d like the company.”

She forced herself up and dropped into the ECO’s front seat. The effects of the first dose of morpha were fading. She sucked in air through her teeth and tried to breathe through the pain.

He stopped what he was doing and quickly gave her a second dose. This time, in addition to knocking back the pain, the morpha made her drowsy. She noticed he was talking again.

“…structurally intact. All that’s busted is the fly-by-wire. That’s easy enough to bypass.”

He worked quickly and without her direction. Figures he’d be good with machines. She watched him pull a knife from one of his pockets and start splicing wires. She closed her eyes and drifted off.

She woke to the sound of the Raptor’s door closing and Leoben flipping switches. From what she could observe, he was working through the steps of an abbreviated preflight checklist. It was just as well that he seemed to know how to operate the Raptor—she was in no condition to fly.

Their takeoff and flight out of the atmosphere were smooth. And not a moment too soon. Judging by the eerie light, the star was going to go supernova any time now. There was still a tangle of fiber optic cabling between the seats. She didn’t understand why—it seemed like Leoben had stowed everything else neatly before takeoff.

A flash of light redirected her attention out the canopy—the star had just blown. The explosion was rapidly expanding. In her periphery she noticed Leoben was fiddling with the cable, but she was focused on the approaching shockwave. It terrified her, but it also seemed familiar.

“Gods damn it—if you’re going to jump us away, you need to do it now!” She could see the planet start to disintegrate below them. She threw her hands up to block the light and felt a jolt as they jostled together. She groaned and closed her eyes, but she could still see the afterimage of colors.

She felt the sting of a needle followed almost immediately by the sensation of an FTL jump washing over her. Then everything went dark.

Chapter Text

Kara woke slowly. She first noticed that she was tucked in tightly in a bed. And as she tried to push back the covers, she felt an answering ache in her hands. She remembered how her mother reacted to her trick with the rubber bugs. It was worth it to hear her scream.

Now she was further awake. This looked like her apartment, but it was way too clean. It wasn’t her place in Delphi; it was where Leoben had trapped her on New Caprica! But I escaped and took Kacey with me! Had he recaptured her? Or had her escape and everything after been a dream? She started to panic. She couldn’t get the covers off; she couldn’t get out of bed.

She heard quick footsteps and was disappointed, but not surprised, to see Leoben make his way quickly to her.

“Stay away from me, you frakker!” Now she was thrashing and she finally got her hands free. They were bandaged in unfamiliar dressings. In one quick, smooth motion, Leoben grabbed both her wrists in one hand, sat beside her on the edge of the bed, and with the other splayed above her sternum, pressed her into the bed. His hand was close to her neck, but he wasn’t choking her. She tried to lift herself up, but it was useless. He just sat there and didn’t look like he was making any sort of an effort to restrain her. She had forgotten about his strength. She thought about all the times she had killed him, and it became apparent that for many of them—maybe even all of them—he had let her.

“Kara, I need you to listen to me. You were injured, and the star was going nova.” She remembered fire in her hands and a familiar swirl of colors. She quickly looked around. It was dustier than she recalled, and she didn’t hear the unceasing whine of Raiders in the sky. There was also a slight staleness to the air. I guess I did escape after all.

“We had to leave. I brought you back here…”

“To play house again!” she growled.

He took a light breath and continued. “I brought you back here because I knew how to get here, and I knew that there was food, fuel, and medical supplies still here.”

“Why didn’t you take me back to my fleet?” She left the “or yours?” unsaid.

“We got distracted by the nova, and then both fleets were gone. I brought you here so you could rest and heal before you complete your destiny. But we have to make a deal.”

Her stomach lurched. She suspected she knew what type of deal he was thinking about. “Tell me what it is and I’ll think about it.”

“There are no resurrection facilities here or nearby. We both know that sooner or later, you’d be able to find a way to kill me. But if you do, I’m gone for good.” She felt the hint of a smile start to form and began scanning for the nearest weapon. His hand on her wrists tightened the slightest fraction.

“Kara, you don’t understand. Without me to plug into the Raptor’s nav system, your jump range would be too limited. You’d run out of fuel or air before you found your fleet or fulfilled your destiny.” As he said this, she glanced down at his left wrist. It was bandaged. She hadn’t noticed until now.

They looked at each other. Several moments passed in silence and stillness.

“All right,” she said in frustration. “I promise I won’t kill you.”

As abruptly as he had pinned her, he let her go and stood up. As he started to walk away, she asked him, “What’s my destiny?”

He paused and turned around. “The same it’s always been—to find Earth.” And then he continued walking. She heard the familiar sounds of him walking up the stairs and closing the door, but there was no sound of the door locking. Because Sam and the rest of the Resistance blew the hell out of all the locks in this place.

After he was gone, she appraised her situation. She started with her hands. Things were starting to come back to her. She remembered the Raptor crashing and her burned hands showing through her damaged gloves. She must have been pretty zonked out when he treated her wounds. Her hands were bandaged with something unlike anything she had seen before. She had thin clear gloves on. The closest comparison she could think of was the cheap gloves that she’d seen food cart vendors wear. They were fastened tight at her wrists and filled with some sort of milky fluid.

She flexed her fingers experimentally. The dull ache was still there, as well as some sharper pains in the folds of her skin. But it was much better than she expected based on what she remembered from her injuries. Maybe there was some sort of anesthetic in there.

It was just as well, because now she needed to use the head. The thought of asking for assistance was more than she could bear. She got out of bed, noticing that she wasn’t wearing her boots or flight suit. She had an image of Leoben undressing her and felt her skin crawl. At least she was still in the same clothing that she had worn underneath.

She walked over to the bathroom. Once inside, she tried the sink. There was still running water here. She tested out her gloves under the stream of water. They seemed waterproof enough.

There was nothing to do. She paced around the apartment. That had been one of the worst things about her imprisonment here. There was just too much time. She wasn’t sure which had been worse—the extended solitary, or having to put up with Leoben’s company and his talk of visions and destiny. This time there was no hope of Sam rescuing her. Would he even want to? She had been treating him terribly. Lee, too.

Stop it! You can think about your messy love life later.

She had to focus on her current situation. She was stuck on this planet with a machine who was obsessed with her, and she wouldn’t be able to leave without his help. So what could she do? She was going to try to learn more about the Cylons, anything that she could bring back to the fleet when she returned. And she was going to have to resist the urge to kill him, no matter how creepy or annoying he was. At least, not until she no longer needed him.

She stopped pacing. Like she had so many times before, she sat on the couch and waited.

He returned after several hours, with multiple bundles in his arms. “I’m glad to see you’re still up,” he said. “It’s time to change your dressings.”

“Where have you been?”

“Gathering supplies. Seeing what we can salvage.”

He set his bundles down on the kitchen counter.

“Why don’t you come over to the table?” As she moved over and sat in one of the chairs, he carried a bowl of water and some other supplies over. He sat down across from her. “Put your hands on the table, palms up.”

She did. He had a knife in his hands. She noticed the slightly wary glance he gave her, but he seemed satisfied when she made no move to reach for it.

With a slight smile, he said, “The gloves are coming off.” He then looked at her expectantly. For a moment, she wondered if this reference to his interrogation was a threat. But when she didn’t respond, he turned his attention back to his task. He cut the gloves off, moistened a towel in the bowl, and began to gently clean her hands. As he did so, she was surprised to see her wounds were already showing signs of new skin growth.

“What is that stuff?”

“It’s what we use in our resurrection tanks. I knew it could help with tissue regeneration, but it’s working better on you than I expected. How’s the pain? Do you need some morpha?”

“No, no more drugs. It’s bearable.”

“You don’t have to suffer, Kara. Nothing is going to happen to you.” He sounded like he was trying to reassure her.

She didn’t want his reassurance. “I told you, I’m fine!” He didn’t react to her frustration. She took a moment and changed the subject. “I thought you said you didn’t have any resurrection facilities here?”

“We built some auxiliary tanks planetside, but they’re useless without a Resurrection Ship nearby. We still had some of the supplies for them here.” Her hands were clean and he started painting on another batch of the goo on. She eyed the paintbrush.

“Too bad you never shared this tech with us when you came here. It might have spread some goodwill.”

“Well, we never tried it on humans before. Believe it or not, we don’t have much experience dealing with injuries. Most Cylons would prefer to download to a new body rather than wait for their damaged one to heal.” He paused and looked down towards the floor. “But I have experience using this on wounds, which is where I got the idea to try it out with you.”

“What’s it like?”

“What’s what like?”

“Downloading. Resurrection.”

He had finished applying the goo and was helping her into a new set of gloves. After they were fastened, he sat back in his chair. She appreciated the extra distance between them.

“The first time is the most disorienting. You’ve just experienced death, and as your consciousness is being transferred to a new body, you get flashes of your previous life. Sometimes other things—foreshadowing of events yet to come. Then you wake up. The first time a Cylon is resurrected, we like to make sure they are greeted by their brothers and sisters. It helps calm them.”

“Does it hurt?”

“The Cavils always complained that each resurrection was more painful than the last. By the third time, one of them said it felt like a white hot poker in his skull.”

At least six times here, plus once out the airlock. No wonder he’s crazy. He didn’t look crazy now. He’d been surprisingly sane since he picked her up on the algae planet.

“But the Cavils always tried to deny their humanity,” he continued. “Out of all of us, they aspired to be the best machines they could be. To those of us who embraced our biological nature, it wasn’t as bad. There’s always a bit of pain, but more confusion. Like waking from a bad dream.”

“Well, you would know, wouldn’t you? You had plenty of experience.”

He smiled somewhat ruefully at her. “Yes, I did.”

Chapter Text

Kara was restless and in a bad mood. Leoben had insisted on sleeping in the apartment last night. She knew there must be other places he could be in this facility, but he said he wanted to be near in case something happened. In case she needed him. At least she got the bed and he was stuck on the couch.

They had eaten breakfast and done another dressing change. Now her hands were itching. It was maddening. She paced around the apartment. Leoben hadn’t left yet—he was sitting serenely in the living room.

“You know, if the décor wasn’t so uptight, this would look like my old apartment.” She had always thought that, but never wanted to admit it to him during her imprisonment. She went on, “I’m surprised it’s so stark and minimalist. Judging by your stupid shirts, I figured you’d have a bit more color on the walls.”

She glanced over to see if she had gotten a rise out of him. He had a look of amusement at the dig at his fashion sense, but nothing more.

“It wasn’t a coincidence. I thought that if you were in more familiar surroundings, you would be more comfortable,” he admitted. “I couldn’t match your sense of style or housekeeping habits.”

“How did you know what my place in Delphi looked like?”

“I’ve been there. I was looking for you. I learned you were on Caprica after the Six you killed at the museum downloaded. I found your apartment’s address in your military records and thought I might find you there. But I was too late. I could tell you had been there, though. The lock was broken.”

She suppressed a mild shudder. She hadn’t realized how close she had come to getting captured. Leoben must not have noticed, because he was still talking.

“…lost track of you for a while. Did you have a vehicle or something? I was surprised to learn you got up into the mountains so quickly. You escaped the hospital before I could get there.”

“Wanted to hook me up to that equipment yourself?” she spat out.

Now he had that offended look, like she was the one in the wrong.

“No, Kara, you don’t understand. You were never destined for a Farm. After the success with the Eight, we were going to try a different strategy.”

Sharon’s words on Caprica came back to her. “Maybe even set you up with someone you like.”

“So you missed me on Caprica and decided to try again on New Caprica. It wouldn’t have worked there, and it didn’t work here. Just like it didn’t work when you came here and invaded. You can’t show up in force and demand love! It doesn’t work that way!”

“But the Eight and Agathon…”

She didn’t let him finish. “Don’t you toasters understand? You didn’t make Helo fall in love with Sharon. He had been crushing on Boomer for months aboard Galactica. But he knew she was with the Chief and he held back.”

She thought she could see his circuits processing this information.

“That’s it, isn’t it? You threw Sharon at Helo and thought that you made them fall in love. It’s not that easy. You didn’t make it happen—it happened on its own. They had a preexisting connection, extended time alone, and shared dangers. The seed was already there, it just needed the right conditions to grow.”

“I thought we had a connection,” he said knowingly.

“We did—I prayed for you, for frak’s sake!” she blurted. She was too worked up; she hadn’t meant to say that. She had never told him that before.

“You did?” He had a curious look.

Might as well get it over with. “After Roslin threw you out the airlock. I told the gods I wasn’t sure you had a soul, but if you did, I asked them to take care of it.”

Now he was solemn, with no madness or mockery. “Thank you.” He nodded to her, then got up and left her mercifully alone.

After Leoben had returned, Kara demanded to see the Raptor. He led her through the complex until they arrived at some sort of hangar. On the way, they passed cells. A lot of cells. What had the Cylons been thinking? No wonder there had been such resistance to their occupation.

Kara was relieved to see Leoben had been correct about the Raptor’s structural integrity. She wanted to reverse the hasty bypassing of the fly-by-wire system before she would be willing to do any extensive exploring in it. It was proving to be a multi-day project, but it wasn’t as if she had anything else to do with her time. Especially while her hands were still healing.

Leoben was lying on the floor working on wiring under the front console, and Kara was sitting in a jump seat supervising. She was no knuckledragger, but she could read the manual Leoben had somehow procured. She wanted to make sure he didn’t do anything that was going to overload the systems.

Sometimes while he was working, they talked. It was easier to have a conversation with him if he was busy doing something else, if she wasn’t his sole focus. She had been thinking about it for a while, and finally she asked, “The other day, why did you refer to Sharon as an ‘Eight'?”

“That’s her model number,” he said, without stopping his work.

“Model number?”

“There are twelve Cylon models. The ones you knew as Boomer and Sharon are number Eights.” He paused for a moment. “I’m a number Two.”

“Who are the rest?”

“The Cavils are Ones. The Threes include the one you knew as D’Anna Biers. Simon was a Four, and Aaron Doral was a Five. Gina and Shelly Godfrey were both Sixes.” He stopped talking. She waited for him to continue. When he didn’t, she said, “That’s only seven. I thought machines would be better at counting.”

There was a long pause, and he had stopped working. She bent down to look at him. He looked like he wanted to talk but couldn’t form the words.

“I never heard anyone from New Caprica talk about skinjobs that we didn’t already know about. Are there still sleeper agents in the fleet?”

He still didn’t answer. She decided to lighten her tone. “It’s not like I can tell anyone.”

He finally spoke, with obvious effort. “Those are the Final Five.”

“What’s so special about them?”

“We can’t talk about them. Our programming doesn’t allow it.”

This line of conversation was going nowhere, so she sat up and tried a different course. “What’s with the jump between Six and Eight? Again, I thought a bunch of machines would be better at counting.”

“There used to be a model Seven. Our brother Daniel. They all died.”

“What was wrong with them?”

“Nothing, nothing at all. They were different from the rest of us. More creative. More artistic.” Bitterness crept into his voice. “The Cavils killed them. All of them. I think they were jealous.”

“And the rest of you just let this happen?”

“We couldn’t find proof. But I could follow the path in the stream. I know it’s what happened.”

She didn’t want to get the stream talk started. “Why do you never refer to the Cavils by their number?”

“They fear their biological nature, try to deny it, so I think it’s appropriate to use their name rather than their number.”

“That sounds petty.” But if it was true that Cavil killed an entire model line, he certainly deserved the disdain. She had never really thought about how the different Cylon models interacted with each other, what sorts of alliances and jealousies there might be. Then again, she had never really witnessed more than one model at a time. Leoben hadn't been one to host dinner parties.

“They think that because they’re the first of us, that they should be our leaders.” He sounded exasperated.

She grinned. “That sounds like something a number Two would say.”

“We have no desire to claim leadership of the Cylon. It’s best if all models work together to form consensus.”

“How does that work?”

“We vote. Each model votes as one.”

“There’s never disagreement within a model?”

He shrugged. “It’s never happened before.” Democracy was probably simpler if you only had to count to seven. He continued, “We share the same overall goals, but there may be nuances of opinion within a model. My brothers and I agree that you will lead us to Earth.” They way he said “brothers,” she knew he was referring only to other Twos. “It’s why we voted to stop the war and why we voted to come here. When we arrived, we knew there would be humans who would resist. Other models didn’t share our belief in your destiny. If you had been out there in the fight, they might not have spared you. That’s why we brought you here—to keep you safe.”

She snorted. “You didn’t need to recreate my apartment to keep me safe.” Her anger was rising. “You could have tossed me in a cell like the rest of the humans. You certainly had plenty of them.” She happened to look down at the toolbox and a set of spanners, each nearly identical to each other. A horrifying thought came to her. “Was it the same one of you each time? Or did you take turns?”

He sat up so he could look at her. He shook his head and said, “No. As I was saying, we all agree that you’ll lead us to our new home. But my brothers don’t share some of the other visions I’ve had. They didn’t understand…” he trailed off. He was smiling at her. She knew he thought he was being reassuring, but it was yet another instance where he didn’t realize how unsettling he was.

He must have picked up something from her expression, because all emotion was wiped off his face. Like a computer rebooting. He closed his eyes and started again, this time speaking more slowly. “I thought I could hurry God’s plan. That I could force the universe to fit into the patterns I saw. But it was folly.” He met her gaze. “I won’t try to alter the current. I’m only here to help you follow its flow.”

This time, she was reassured.

Chapter Text

She was in her Viper, flying over a gas giant. She looked down and saw a storm. It was a swirl of colors—the center blue, with bands of red and yellow. She was drawn to it, like it was calling to her. Without knowing why, she steered into its eye.

Rain lashed against the canopy. Suddenly there was a sharp bang and she was in a tailspin. She bounced around in the cockpit and couldn’t get control. An alarm was blaring. She strained for the eject lever, but she couldn’t quite reach it.

“Kara, Kara! Wake up!”

She opened her eyes. Leoben was holding her wrists and looming over her. She felt panic rise up. “Get away from me! Leave me alone!”

He immediately dropped her wrists and stepped away from the bed. It was then that she noticed he wasn’t wearing a shirt. She never left the bedroom in the mornings until after she had heard him up and moving around, so she had never given a thought to what he slept in. At least he has pants on.

He looked as though he didn’t know what to say. Finally, “You were screaming. I came in here, and you were asleep. You must have been having a nightmare, so I woke you up.”

She sat up and slowed her breathing. She rubbed her hands on the bedding—the feel of her bare hands was still a novelty after weeks in bandages. She felt calmer. Something about her dream was nagging at her, but she couldn’t remember what it was. Leoben leaned back against the wall and crossed his arms over his chest. He looked at her expectantly.

“I’m all right. It was just a dream. Thank you.”

He sighed. The motion drew her attention to something just below his ribs. “What is that?” she asked, pointing to his left side.

“What? This?” He lowered his right hand to rub over it. “It’s a scar. What did you think it was?”

“How did you get it?” she asked, but she knew what he was going to say.

He looked at her intensely. “From you.”

“I’ll never forget this moment.”

“Neither will I.”

“I thought I killed you.” The words came out as a hoarse whisper.

“Come on, Kara. You know as well as I that a gut wound isn’t always fatal.” She successfully fought the impulse to reach for own abdominal scars. She wasn’t going to give him that sense of connection. “Some of my sisters found me when we were evacuating this place. They were going to kill me so I could resurrect, but I asked them to get one of the Fours to work on me instead.” A pause. “I told you I had experience using the resurrection fluid to heal wounds.”

“Why didn’t you just download and resurrect? You said it didn’t hurt much.”

“I didn’t want to give up on this body.”

Once again, she asked why before she could help herself. She wasn’t sure she wanted to know the answer. Something about the way he was looking at her now made her skin crawl.

“These were the lips that had felt yours. These were the ears that heard you tell me you loved me. I wanted to keep them if I could.” He said the words slowly and softly, like he was confessing a secret. He was getting that fanatic look in his eyes. She remembered it from Gemenon Traveller and her first imprisonment here, but she hadn’t seen it since they returned. I let myself get too comfortable. I forgot what he was.

“You realize I was lying when I told you that, right? I only said it so you would let me take Kacey.” She tried to keep her tone light—she didn’t like where this was going.

His expression went blank, and he dropped his arms. “Why would you say something you didn’t mean?”

She rolled her eyes. “Leoben, half the time you say things that aren’t true.”

“Never about you,” he said in a low voice.

“What about Kacey? You told me I was her mother! You made me care for her, and then she got taken away!”

“That was different,” he said defensively.

“Oh?”

“I was trying to protect you. Trying to show you the life you could have. I didn’t want you to try to leave again.” He glanced down at her left wrist, and without meaning to, she rubbed her fingers over the ghost of a scar.

“Well, I need you to leave. Right now.”

He walked out of the bedroom without another look or word. And he just didn’t leave the room. She heard him walk up the stairs and out the door. She was finally going to be able to sleep in this place without him around.

He came back the next morning with breakfast. They ate in silence. Finally, she decided to break the awkwardness. After all, ignoring him wasn’t going to change the fact that she needed his assistance to get off this rock.

“So, what’s the plan?”

“I told you, we need to find Earth.”

“How are we going to do that?”

“You know the way. You’ve seen it.”

“I don’t have visions.”

“You saw it on Kobol. In the tomb of Athena. Tell me about it.”

She explained the simulation that happened after she put the Arrow of Apollo in place and their theory that Earth was the location where the constellations that were the ancient symbols of each of the Twelve Colonies could be seen. He immediately understood the implications and what needed to be done.

“I’ll look through our astrogation data and work on extrapolating where those star patterns could have been seen from. I’ll also have to account for stellar drift that has occurred in the past 4,000 years.” Deep in thought, he abruptly started for the stairs.

“Wait,” Kara said. He did. “I’m coming with you.” He looked surprised, but then he smiled at her. She didn’t want him getting the wrong idea. “It’s boring here. Too quiet. Maybe I can help?”

He quirked an eyebrow at her. “Our systems are a bit different than what you’re used to.”

After walking through several corridors and down a set of stairs, they entered a dim room. Water was everywhere—it was in the tables and ran down clear panels. It looked more like a spa than a CIC. She couldn’t help but laugh. “I can see why you have a thing for running water.”

Leoben walked over to one of the fountains and put his hands in the pool. As he did so, images began to flash in front of him.

“As you can see, this really isn’t something you can help with. It only responds to Cylons.”

The images were slowing down. There were lots of star charts and also the flags of the Colonies.

“Where did you get all of this data?”

“Some of it is our own, from the exploration we’ve done. Then we gained access to the military databases. And all sorts of other information. Anything to better understand humanity and help us work undercover. Scriptures. Sports scores. Soap operas.”

“Soap operas, huh? I can see the appeal, particularly all the plot lines with evil twins. And recasting is sort of like resurrection. Although I wouldn’t say they’re the best representation of human behavior.” No wonder they had trouble blending in. She eyed his clothing. Today he was wearing a pair of particularly gaudy shirts. “Too bad you didn’t include fashion magazines.”

He looked down at himself, but otherwise refused to be baited. She decided to try a different tactic. “Do you have any music?”

Chapter Text

After telling him what she was looking for, Kara left the data room and did some more exploring of the compound before returning to the apartment. She had previously only been to and from the hangar where the Raptor was stowed, and that was always in Leoben’s company. She found some storerooms and offices, as well as what must have been the resurrection facility he mentioned.

Leoben returned with a music player and a slightly triumphant look on his face.

“You have it? I’m surprised—Dreilide Thrace wasn’t exactly a household name.”

He found a place for the player and started the tape. She sat on the couch and closed her eyes as the familiar piano music filled the room. She heard Leoben take a seat, as well.

“I used to sit next to him when he played. I loved it. He taught me a few songs, and I tried so hard to get them right. I knew if I did, he’d be proud of me. Then the son of a bitch ditched us. Never called, never wrote. And I’ve never played a note since.

“We had boxes of these tapes after he left. My mom would take them around and try to sell them. Music shops, local clubs, even cafés. Anything to try to eke out a few cubits. She took me along with her—she probably thought she’d have better luck with a kid in tow. After she died and I had to clear out her crappy apartment, I found a box of them in her footlocker. I kept one, and left the rest at a thrift store.”

Leoben didn’t say anything. She was reminded of another time she had shared her father’s music with someone. All she was missing was a cigar. She opened her eyes and half expected to see the ramshackle color of her former residence.

Color, that’s what this place was missing. She could fix that. It would also give her something to do while Leoben was working on the calculations, which he said were going to take some time. She knew enough basic astrogation to maintain her Raptor qualification, but it wasn’t why she flew. Leoben was clearly better at it than she was. And more interested in it.

She jumped up and saw Leoben startle. “C’mon, let’s get out of here. I want to do some redecorating. Let’s see what we can find. I should have some supplies in my old tent.”

Leoben seemed reluctant. “You might not like what you find.”

“New Caprica was a crappy planet to try to settle on, but it was never dangerous. Let’s go. Or don’t. I’ll go without you.”

She practically jogged up the stairs. It felt good to have a sense of purpose, to have something to look forward to. Leoben got up and followed her.

She strode to the tent she had shared with Sam. The remnants of the city were in shambles and she hadn’t walked this way since the day the Cylons came, but she had no problems finding it. Leoben was walking behind her, but he wasn’t following her. He knew the way, too. Had he been spying on Sam while holding her captive?

The tent was still there and still up. Mostly. She ducked in the entrance. She found herself staring at their bed. At the last place she had seen Sam before everything went to shit.

“Do you have any idea what you put me through? Put us through? Sam and I may not have married for the best of reasons, but we were making it work. And then you took me away. When I came back, I was so angry I didn’t care who I hurt, even if it was him. I tried to push him away, but he kept coming back.”

“You should try to work things out. You aren’t meant to be enemies.”

Just what I need, marriage counseling from a lovesick toaster. She wanted to say it, but she thought it would be too dangerous. It was obvious that Leoben still thought he was in love with her. She was grateful that since their return here, he never said so directly. But she saw it in the way he looked at her and heard it in the other things he said. She appreciated their uneasy truce, and she didn’t want to take the conversation down any paths that would lead to him discussing his feelings for her or demanding reciprocity.

“No, not enemies. Just a world-class frak up and her eternally patient husband.” She took a deep breath. “He was the easy choice. Simple.”

“He may be uncomplicated, but that’s not the same as simple.” She turned and looked at him. What the hell did he know about it?

“I saw him play a couple times. He was good. But I could tell he was destined for more. More than a being a bit of scoreboard trivia. More than being an ‘eternally patient husband.’ I got the sense he was waiting for something.”

“Waiting for what?”

Leoben paused, trying to find the right words. “Waiting for a singular moment of clarity.”

She didn’t want to talk about Sam any more and certainly not with him. “Why don’t you use that clarity and help me find the paints? I know I had a whole box of them that I had bartered for.”

They took a different route back. She made Leoben carry the box. He was the one with the super strength, and she had no problems taking advantage of that. They were walking near the gate that led to the former shipyard. There were still craters and other signs of bombardment from the day they all escaped. Those weren’t the only signs. In the distance were a couple of shapes that were clearly bodies. She stopped and so did Leoben.

“Why are those there?” she asked as she pointed.

“I warned you that you might not like what you find. Our peoples were both in a hurry when they left this place. The dead were left behind.”

“But why are they still there? We’ve been here for weeks!” She was angry at him and everything he represented, but she knew she was also angry at herself. She had been here for weeks, and it never crossed her mind that there were bodies left exposed, unhonored. It should have. She knew what sort of chaos there had been on that last day. Of course they would not have been able to collect them. Maybe on a subconscious level that was why she hadn’t tried to leave the compound until today. “You need to take care of this. We can’t just leave them there.”

“What do you want me to do?”

“Gather them and build a pyre. We will send them off all together.”

“Kara, after all this time, it may be difficult to tell the humans and Cylons apart.”

“I’d rather honor the enemy than risk leaving one human unmourned. Gather them all together.” She grabbed the box out of his arms. “Clean up your mess,” she snarled at him. She turned away and headed back into the building.

Chapter Text

After that, they settled into a routine. They ate together, but Leoben slept and showered elsewhere. Outside of mealtimes, the only times he sought her company were to update her on his progress or ask for her advice. Leoben continued his work in refining calculations for stellar coordinates. While the modeling programs were churning through the necessary calculations for each iteration, she knew he was going out and gathering up the dead. Sometimes she saw him in the distance when she was running outside, but she stayed away.

Kara had done more exploring in the complex and had found a room filled with clothing. Based on some familiar ugly shirts, she presumed it was for the Cylons. She also found some Colonial uniforms, which she appropriated for herself. She didn’t understand why the Cylons seemed to be prepared for infiltration when they arrived in force. But she was learning that a lot about their occupation of New Caprica didn’t seem well thought out. Nevertheless, she was thankful for the comfort of familiar tanks and fatigues. Wearing them on her runs brought to mind her training at the academy and running laps through Galactica. She had added daily exercise to her routine—she had lost too much stamina during her months of captivity here, and she wasn’t going to let it happen again. She wanted to be in fighting form when she returned to the fleet.

She was spending most of the rest of her time painting. Actually, she was probably spending more of her time planning what she was going to paint. It was a far cry from her usual impulsive style, but she didn’t want to waste her limited supplies. The same storeroom was the source of the oversized shirt she was currently using as a painting smock.

She had saved the mural at the base of the stairs for last. She was nearly finished painting the familiar concentric bands of color on the wall when she heard Leoben enter. He didn’t say anything as he walked through the door and descended the stairs. He walked up right behind her and reached out and touched the red portion, which was still wet. She started to turn to lash out at him, both for invading her personal space and messing up her painting. But whatever she was going to say died on her lips when she saw the expression on his face.

He wasn’t looking at her. He was looking at the wall, or maybe looking past it. She sidestepped to get some space and observed him. He took his hand away and kept examining the painting, and then shifted his focus to his red-stained fingers.

“I’ve seen this before,” he finally said.

“Of course you have. You saw it in my apartment in Delphi, when you were stalking me.”

“No, that’s not it.” Now he was repeatedly tapping his thumb to his fingertips. The paint was tacky and she could hear the sound it made every time his fingers parted. She thought of a time he painted the path of a stream using his own blood, but she kept her silence. “No, I’ve seen this symbol before. I even painted it myself, back on Gemenon Traveller.” He lost the faraway look in his eyes and finally turned his gaze to her. Now he looked almost sheepish. “I’m lucky I wasn’t caught when I was working on my version,” he said, nodding toward her copy on the wall.

“It’s just something I’ve been doodling since I was a kid. I always liked the pattern and the colors. How can we both have painted the same thing?”

“It’s not just the two of us. Our baseship intercepted some of the Colonial communications. It sounds like the temple your people found on the planet was decorated with this same symbol.”

“So this could have come from the Thirteenth Tribe! What does it mean?”

“Maybe it was another landmark, like that beacon they left behind?”

Kara stepped back and regarded the painting again. She closed her eyes, but she could still see it in her mind. Except this time the colors were exploding in light. In light, just like the supernova she remembered right before they jumped away from the algae planet.

She opened her eyes. “It’s the nova! It’s the same colors we saw in the nova!”

Leoben mirrored her enthusiasm. “Maybe the nova was the Eye of Jupiter! But how is it supposed to guide us to Earth?”

“Could they have seen another nova along their journey? Maybe it’s on the way to Earth?”

“I can go back to the star charts to look at nebulae. We’d need one that would have been from a supernova visible from Kobol around 4,000 years ago.”

“How much time would that take?” She was restless and wanted to leave this place. Besides, she was nearly out of paint.

“Not long. Looking for a single nebula of that age will be far easier than the simulations I’ve been running to find Earth.”

He walked over to the kitchen sink and washed the paint from his hands. As he was drying them, he spoke again. “I came here to tell you that the calculations to find Earth are complete, and the pyre is ready. When would you want to conduct the ceremony?”

“Tonight.”

They walked toward the pyre as the sun was low in the sky. Kara was carrying items she had scavenged from the settlement, and Leoben was carrying a torch. He had built it by the river, and as they got near, he stayed a few steps behind her.

Kara stood next to the pyre and raised a glass filled with ambrosia. Maybe it was the last ambrosia in the galaxy. “Lords of Kobol,” she said in a strong voice, “hear my prayer!” She upended the glass of ambrosia, pouring it as a libation onto the ground in front of her. She placed the empty glass on the pyre and dropped two cubits into it. They were all she could find, and they would have to be enough for everyone. “For the ferryman,” she whispered.

She took the torch from Leoben and set it to the logs at the base. After she was sure the fire was catching, she stepped back from the pyre and began to pray. She thought back to all of the funerals she had attended in her life—her mother’s, Zak’s, the many ceremonies since the Cylon attack on the Colonies, and even a few from the first year of settlement here. She tried to pick the best prayers, the most meaningful words from all of them. She ended with the words from the ritual used when parting from comrades on the eve of battle. “Their enemies will divide them. Their colonies broken in the fiery chasm of space. Their shining days renounced by a multitude of dark sacrifices. Yet still they will remain, always together.”

After she finished, she asked Leoben, “Is there anything you want to say for the Cylons?”

“All the Cylons here successfully downloaded and resurrected. No prayers are needed. All we are burning are empty shells.”

No wonder the Cylons had been so ruthless. Death came cheap when they could discard a damaged body as easily as a dirty shirt. “What if some hadn’t made it? Would you have anything to say then?”

“We have a prayer we use when we believe a final death is near. It’s the Prayer to the Cloud of Unknowing.” He recited for her, “For those that we have lost in the past, and so those that we are burying today, we must remember, there is a higher purpose. Heavenly Father, grant us the strength, the wisdom, and above all, a measure of acceptance, however small.”

“So say we all,” she said. Leoben did not join in the refrain.

They stood side by side as the sky darkened and the fire burned low. Leoben turned to face her. “I’m sorry, Kara,” he said. He looked at her, at the pyre, at the complex behind them, and then back to her. “For everything.” He waited for her to respond. She didn’t. She could listen to his apology, but it didn’t mean she had to forgive him. He then left her and started walking back to the building.

She stayed at the pyre late into the night. She had to make sure it burned itself out. She didn’t see Leoben until the next morning. He carried another bundle into the apartment. It was a new flight suit, neatly folded. Her missing sidearm was on top of it.

“The Raptor is refueled, and I have supplies stowed. But we need to decide on a destination,” he said.

“I thought the plan was to find Earth.”

“I have that route plotted. But I also found the remnants of a supernova that fits the requirements.” He handed her a printout. “The Ionian Nebula. We could make it in ten jumps.”

“Why would we go there?”

He shrugged. “You thought it might be a marker on the way to Earth.”

“We don’t need it. You’d said you plotted the course to Earth itself?”

“That will take us many more jumps. At least twice as many. I’ll want to review our positioning at each stop to cross-check the calculations.”

That reminded her of something. “When Sharon was guiding us back to Caprica, she implanted a data port in her arm. It might make things easier for you.”

He smiled. “I’ll need your help.”

Once again, they were seated together at the table, and once again Leoben had a knife in his hand. This time his attention was directed to himself.

“You know, a smart Cylon would turn off the ol’ pain software about now,” she said lightly.

He grinned in response. “Maybe I’ll turn it off and you won’t even know.” He turned serious. “I wouldn’t.” She didn’t know if he was referring to then or now.

“Why not?” she asked as he slid the knife under the skin on his forearm. She noted the healed cut from their trip here. Blood from the new one was welling up.

“Part of being human,” he replied. He set the knife down and picked up the data port. He closed his eyes in concentration as he worked it in, twisting it slightly. “The Cavils disabled their sleep subroutine years ago.”

He opened his eyes and nodded to her. She blotted at the blood with some gauze and then grabbed a roll of medical tape. As she was wrapping it around his arm, she remembered five days measured in increments of 33 minutes. The exhaustion and the way tempers flared. “Maybe that’s why they’re such assholes.”

When she had finished, he flexed his elbow and wrist experimentally. “Thank you.”

“All right. Let’s go find Earth and fulfill my ‘special destiny.’”

Chapter Text

Earth was a ruin.

Kara stood on the shore of what had once been a harbor and looked out over a shattered skyline. Her mouth tasted ashes. Leoben stood behind her. He had been silent since they landed.

She was sure this was Earth. Leoben was certain the star positions had matched his calculations at each stop. When they made the final jump, they both saw some of the same constellations in the sky that she had seen back in Kobol. But DRADIS hadn’t shown any signs of life on the planet below them. What it did show was residual radiation. Still, she had needed to see it for herself.

Finally, Leoben spoke. “I’m going to take a look around. Do you want to come with me?”

She shook her head and kept looking out over the water. He left her.

She gathered some driftwood and started a fire before it got too dark. She was sitting on a log and watching the flames when Leoben returned, awkwardly carrying a metallic object. “What’s that?” she asked. In response, he dropped it at her feet.

“I found it back there, closer to the city.” He gestured with his head. Then he knelt down next to it and started clearing away more of the accumulated sand.

She examined it. It was a Centurion head, but not. It didn’t look like the bulletheads she had fought on Caprica and New Caprica, and it didn’t look like the older style she remembered from pictures of the first Cylon war. But it had a similar feel. “What does it mean?”

Leoben shrugged. “It’s old. I found several of these, along with some skeletons. This was in the best condition, so I brought it back to see if we could recover any data from it. I’m guessing the Thirteenth Tribe had their own robotic uprising. And both sides were destroyed.”

It figured. All of this has happened before. And was happening again. She wondered how the fleet was doing. Where they were on their journey here. If they ever found this place, she wasn’t sure morale would recover. Tensions in the fleet had already been high, and people would start to turn on each other. They just needed a push.

As she was contemplating this, Leoben walked back to the Raptor and came back with the med kit. He opened it and wordlessly handed her the tin of anti-radiation meds. She took the tin from him and administered a dose. “We can’t stay here,” he said.

“Thanks for your insight,” she snapped. She stood up and looked into the fire. This whole planet burned up. “You’ve got some special software for detecting radiation? Or maybe just your previous experience destroying planets?” She glared at him. “I think you’ve been listening to the wrong stream. Got your wires crossed. This place is a graveyard. There’s nothing for us here!”

She was surprised to see him look as lost as she felt. He took a few steps back and looked confused for a while, but then he recovered and reverted back to his usual know-it-all self.

“It’s not the end, just a bend in the river. Who knows what wonders await us downstream?” He spoke slowly, and she was fed up with the frakking water metaphors. He continued more confidently, “Maybe we had to come here to see that we’re free now. Humans no longer need to be bound by ancient prophecies, nor Cylons enslaved by our programming. We can allow our paths to converge; we can choose where to go and to become who we really are.”

She looked over at him. He was always so sure of things, so sure of what her destiny was supposed to be. She wanted to wipe that earnestness off his face. She stomped over to him and slugged him with all the force she could muster.

Leoben stumbled back, wiped at his busted lip with the back of his hand, and then looked back at her.

“I listened to you! You made me believe! That I wasn’t just a frak up. That maybe I did have some sort of special destiny. And what did it get me? This nuked-out cinder? Frak Earth, frak you, and frak my destiny!”

She felt tears in her eyes. That only added to her frustration. She had never let him see her cry, and she didn’t want to start now. But she was drained and didn’t have the energy to fight anymore. Not to fight him and not to fight her own feelings.

Leoben closed the distance between them. He put his hands on her cheeks and used his thumbs to wipe away her tears. He spoke gently. “Kara, I’m sorry.”

She leaned forward and rested her head on his shoulder. She closed her eyes—she didn’t want to look at him. She didn’t want to look at anything. She listened to the sound of the waves. She felt his arms move to embrace her, but she kept hers at her sides. He was offering comfort, and here, on the shore of this dead world, she was willing to accept it.

She woke to a dim grey sunrise and a pain in her neck. She had slept in the pilot’s seat. It probably would have been moderately more comfortable if she had tried to stretch out on the floor of the back of the Raptor, but that’s where Leoben was.

“Now what?” she asked him. “I know we can’t stay here, but where can we go? Try for the Ionian Nebula? Then what? It’s just a gas cloud in space.”

“There’s another place we can go.”

“I’m not going back to New Caprica. There’s nothing there. Besides, I’m not sure we have enough fuel.”

“No, not that. The Colony.” At first she thought he was referring to one of the Twelve Colonies, but they were even further away than New Caprica. He went on to describe the massive space station that was the closest thing the Cylons had to a home world.

“Why should we go there?”

“We can refuel, for one. But more importantly, we can talk to the Hybrids.”

“Like Hera? You have more?” Had they finally been successful at one of their farms? She felt nauseated. “I thought she was the first and only, and she died.”

“She lives. Roslin swapped her with another child. She was hidden, and we recovered her on New Caprica.” Kara wished she could tell Helo his daughter was alive. She didn’t have any time to process this news as Leoben continued, “But I’m not referring to human-Cylon hybrids. These are a hybrid of biology and technology. There’s one on each of our ships—they control all functions. They essentially are the ships. They experience the universe on a completely different level. And they speak to us. Most of our siblings believe their utterances are meaningless, but my brothers and I think we can hear in them the voice of God. Prophecy.”

“You said we didn’t need to be bound by prophecy anymore.”

“A Hybrid told me of a blue planet surrounded by clouds. I cried when she described it, thinking she was speaking of Earth. That planet could still be out there.”

She heard the voice of the Admiral. “Sometimes you have to roll the hard six.”

“Take me to them.”

Chapter Text

“Next time, warn me that we’re about to jump near a singularity’s accretion disk!”

All the debris, plus emitted radiation from the black hole itself, made DRADIS useless. Although maybe that was for the best—patrolling Raiders were visible in the distance. Leoben unplugged, moved up to the front seat, and directed her to a landing area. It wasn’t apparent from a distance, but the Colony was almost unfathomably large.

After they had landed, Leoben pulled over a supply line to refuel the Raptor. She had always heard the term “umbilical” used for lines like this, but she had never seen one look so…biological. It made her uneasy, just like their walk through the corridors of the Colony made her uneasy. They were in a maze of twisty passages, all alike.

Without warning, they came to a large room. There were a handful of data terminals, like the ones on New Caprica, on one side of it. Beyond those, at the opposite end from the entrance, were three tanks, also similar to the resurrection tanks she had seen. They were arranged in a triangle, and each one was filled with a milky fluid and occupied by an identical woman.

As they approached the tanks, she said, “I thought you said each ship had one to control it?”

“It’s the Colony. It’s always had three,” Leoben said, as if that explained everything.

“So now what? Ask them to tell us how to find this beautiful blue planet of yours?”

They were now in front of the closest tank. The other two were equidistant behind it. “It doesn’t work like that. You listen to what they have to offer. The stream washes over you, and you try to detect the direction of the current. Allow their words to caress your associative mind.” He stood there with his eyes half closed and a rapt expression on his face.

The three women were steadily chanting, overlapping and interrupting each other.

“A number of massive ancient red supergiant stars are inexorably moving…”¹

“Have you ever delved into the realms of the astral and wondered about the afterlife?”²

“Time for each class of service for single switchboards, power equipment, cords in service, wire chief”³

“In both cases, our knowledge of the reaction cross section is limited by the availability of experimental data”⁴

“Destiny in a world where time and space do”⁵

“Do not worry if you are not computer”⁶

“Planetary nebulae…the last gasp of dying stars…visible from both hemispheres in the summer and winter”⁷

“Everything happens so much”⁸

“No flow of bile to speak of. Later…later…later…”⁹

She understood why Leoben liked to listen to their chatter, but the overlapping babbling made her head ache. She wondered if Perseus had felt this way when he consulted the Graeae. If only they had a shared tooth and eye I could steal to get them to speak sense!

“Decrease power consumption in node 6 0 8 0 2 by a factor of 0.07,” said the hybrid in front of her.

The one on the left repeated, “Seven.” Then the one on the right. Then the three of them said it in unison. Leoben had come out of his reverie, and they exchanged a quick glance before returning their attention to the Hybrids.

“Starbuck,” said the one in front of her.

“Seventh in the Circle,” said the one on the left.

“You will lead them all to their end,” said the one on the right.

The pauses between each of them speaking shortened.

“Kara.”
“Loved by two.”
“Enemies now joined as one.”

Now one started speaking just as the previous finished. Their voices didn’t quite overlap.

“Kórē.” “Half of Seven.” “Not an end, but a beginning.”

“End of line,” they all said as one. There was a long pause. Then they resumed their individual babbling. It was the same gibberish as before—bad poetry mixed with ship status updates.

She looked over at Leoben. “Did that mean anything to you?”

He chuckled slightly. “That was much more lucid than we normally get from them.”

“I could understand the first part.” She briefly explained the Circle and her role in it. She continued, “‘You will lead them all to their end.’ Earth was certainly an end. A dead end.” She couldn’t keep the bitterness out of her voice. Talk of death reminded her of another part of the Hybrids’ speech. “Kórē is another name for Persephone. She spends a third of the year in the underworld.”

“Or half, depending on which scriptures you read,” Leoben elaborated. “Her return from it is celebrated as the rebirth of all life. ‘Not an end, but a beginning.’”

“What about, ‘Enemies now joined as one’ and ‘Half of Seven?’ Do you think that means an alliance between humans and Cylons? Leading to division among the Cylons?”

“Maybe,” he said. “Or maybe something else.” He looked at her thoughtfully, then slowly approached her. Without warning, he grabbed her and dragged her over to one of the data terminals.

“What are you doing? Let go of me!” She struggled, but it was no use. He gripped her wrists and shoved her hands in the water.

Chapter Text

The first thing she saw was the familiar swirl of colors. Always this godsdamned mandala. She could hear a low droning. It was just on the edge of resolving into a tune. Like an orchestra warming up before a performance.

The image dissolved.

She heard the plinking of a piano. The tune sounded like something she distantly remembered. “Buy a gal a drink?” The swagger sounded familiar, but it wasn’t her. A blonde woman in the uniform of a Colonial Marine was leaning over a piano and addressing the unseen player.

Another scene.

A man and a woman were sitting side by side, perhaps at a café. She recognized them as her parents, but she had never seen them so young. Or so happy.

“Why did you join the military?”

“I come from a long line of warriors. I guess you could call it the family business.”

Her father smiled at that but then turned serious. “I wanted to separate myself from my family.”

“You’ve never talked about them before.”

“I come from a large family. But I never want to see them again. You wouldn’t want to meet them, either.”

Another shift.

She recognized her childhood home. Her father was at the piano, obviously trying to work out a tune.

Her mother entered the room. “You need to stop that,” she snapped. “I just got Kara down.”

“She likes the music.” A beat. “You used to like it, too.”

“I still do, but it’s not enough. My salary alone isn’t enough to support us, and your gigs don’t even cover the cost of a sitter. You need to do something else.”

“I’ll figure something out.”

“Why wouldn’t you sell your tapes? I spent most of our savings on them, but you keep them to yourself. All those cubits, wasted.”

“I didn’t ask you to do that.”

“It was a surprise. I thought you’d like it. You’re special. You have a gift. Why won’t you share it?”

“I don’t play for praise or fame. I don’t need it. I don’t want it.”

All through the argument, the droning she had been hearing finally transformed into a melody, playing counterpoint to the song her father had been working on. The one she remembered, the one that made her feel happy and sad at the same time.

It kept getting louder and louder, drowning out the sounds of her parents fighting.

“God damn it, Socrata! You don’t understand!” Her father stood up and slammed the lid over the keys shut.

The music kept crescendoing.

She heard a slam and felt a snap in her fingers.

The melody kept repeating.

Her hands were on fire, and a star exploded before her.

Everything was too bright and too loud.

She pulled her hands away from the water and opened her eyes. Leoben was now standing a few steps away from her. She couldn’t read his expression. It could have been fear. Or joy. Or awe.

“What the hell? Why did you do that?”

“I wanted to see what would happen.”

“You said it wouldn’t respond to humans.”

“It doesn’t.”

She realized what he was implying and felt nausea bloom in the pit of her stomach. “No, no, NO! It was that junk you put on my hands. It did something to them.”

“All it did was help healing. I told you it worked much better on you than I expected.”

“I can’t be a Cylon. I’m not one of your frakking Final Five!”

His expression changed to one of almost pity. “I don’t think you’re one of the Final Five.” She didn’t say anything. He continued, “‘Enemies now joined as one.’ That’s you, Kara.”

She started breathing faster.

“Your father—he was one of the Sevens.”

“His name wasn’t Daniel.”

“The names change, but players remain the same.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“It all makes sense now, doesn’t it? All of your high-wire stunts. Your strength—you fought a Six and lived. Kara, you made the Raider fly.”

“Every flying machine has four basic controls…”

“It flew for you.” He continued, “It’s the reason why you suffered and struggled for so long.”

“You were born to a woman who believed suffering was good for the soul, so you suffered.”

“Don’t you see? Your father didn’t abandon you. He was taken away. He must have escaped the initial purge but then been tracked down.” He frowned. “By Cavil.”

It couldn’t be true. “What about Hera? She’s the one everyone was so obsessed with.”

“Hera may be the shape of things to come, but it doesn’t mean she’s the only human-Cylon hybrid. Or the first.”

She was trying to think of another way to refute him when several things happened at once. The Hybrids abruptly stopped their chatter, and the lights flickered. She felt a low vibration in her ribcage and at the base of her skull and heard a throbbing static at the limits of her perception. She clapped a hand to her head, more out of surprise than pain. In contrast, Leoben staggered as if struck. She realized the noise she heard was the same sound that she heard at the beginning of the vision, or whatever it was, that she had when Leoben forced her hands into the Cylon data terminal. That more than anything made her finally accept the truth of his words—they both detected the same signal, but she wasn’t as affected.

After a few moments, Leoben shook his head, seemingly to clear it, and then directed his attention to the Hybrids, who were still silent. He cocked his head in anticipation. Each spoke individually.

“You’re about to wake up in the real world my friends.”¹⁰

“I just told you, he has no plan.”¹¹

“The only problem is they will shatter any chance.”¹²

Leoben put a hand in the water. He withdrew it after only a moment.

“We have to leave, now!”

They ran through the corridors and made their way back to the landing bay.

“What’s going on?”

“Someone knows we’re here. And they’re coming.”

They reached the door of the Raptor. She could hear distant mechanical sounds approaching. He pushed her in. “I’ll take care of the supply lines, you get things started. And get your helmet on—we may face resistance on our way out.”

She got the Raptor powered up and was waiting for Leoben. It was taking too long—he should have been done by now. Against her better judgment, she left the pilot's seat and poked her head out the door. “What the hell are you doing out here? Get your ass inside!”

He had disconnected the supply line, but was standing next to the Raptor, with his handgun aimed at the doorway. The mechanical sounds were getting closer, and Kara readied her own sidearm. A pair of Centurions appeared at the entrance to the hangar. They were older models, from the first Cylon war.

After an exchange of gunfire, both Centurions went down. They both entered the Raptor, Leoben staying in the back as she returned to the pilot’s seat. She closed the door, and they took off. He sounded out of breath. “Are you ok?” she called back.

“I’m fine. We need to go.”

The path from the hangar and out of the Colony and into space seemed longer than she remembered. “There must be some kind of way out of here,” she muttered. Finally, they were clear of the Colony, but a squadron of Raiders was closing fast. She cursed the debris field and the lack of maneuverability of the Raptor. From the back, Leoben said he was plugged in.

“Where are we going?”

“You just worry about the flying; I’ll take care of the navigation.”

She continued to dodge debris. She heard the telltale sound of a breach in the hull, whether from enemy fire or all the junk she was trying to avoid, she didn’t know.

Leoben sounded strained—they were losing air and he wasn’t in a flight suit. “I’ll seal it, but we have to jump now.” She engaged the jump drive, and they winked away.

Chapter Text

They were in a nebula. And they weren’t alone. She could see the fleet. The sight of the hulking behemoth that was Galactica brought tears to her eyes. She got on the wireless. “Krypter, krypter, krypter. Galactica, this is Starbuck. I’ve got a busted bird and need priority landing.”

“Starbuck?” There was disbelief in the voice, and she didn’t recognize the speaker. “We’re dealing with a power outage—it will take us a few minutes before we’re ready for you.” She then heard a thump behind her.

She rushed to the back of the Raptor. Leoben was slumped on the floor. He had sealed the breach in the ship, and the atmosphere inside had already returned to normal. She didn’t know why he would have collapsed.

She removed her helmet, knelt down, and rolled him over. His eyes were closed.

“Leoben. Leoben!”

His eyes fluttered open. He looked sluggish and was mumbling something, but she couldn’t make out the words. His right arm was crossed over his body and holding a wound in his side. Blood was spurting through his fingers.

“Can you hear me? Is there a resurrection ship in range?”

Leoben looked at her. He was barely conscious, but enough for her to see fear in his eyes. “I don’t know,” he whispered.

“You need to stay with me. I need you alive to talk to the other Cylons, so we can try an alliance.”

“You can do it without me. You can walk both paths. ‘Enemies now joined as one…’” He trailed off and closed his eyes again. If he was dying, she knew what she could do. She reached under his shoulders to prop him up further and gave him another shake.

“Leoben, look at me.”

He did.

She drew a breath and looked him in the eyes. “I love you.” This time it was true, although probably not in the sense that he had meant and hoped for. They had progressed from jailer and prisoner to allies, if not friends. She loved him for always believing in her and for his role in helping her to find Earth, ruin that it was. More importantly, she loved him for helping her discover the truth about who and what she was.

She leaned forward and kissed his forehead. When she drew herself back, she knew he was dead. He had a smile on his face. She closed his eyes and her own. She thought back to their last night on New Caprica and began to recite, “For those that we have lost in the past, and so those that we are burying today, we must remember, there is a higher purpose. Heavenly Father, grant us the strength, the wisdom, and above all, a measure of acceptance, however small.”

New squawking was coming from the wireless. She quickly returned to the pilot’s seat. A fleet of baseships had jumped into the nebula. She opened up a channel and addressed both fleets.

“Galactica, Cylon ships, this is Kara Thrace. I’ve been to Earth. I know where it is. I can take us there—all of us. But it’s not what we thought. It is an end—an end to this war.”