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Apollo was no stranger to nightmares. He’d begun to wonder how the rest of the warriors in the bachelor officers’ quarters managed to get through the night when there he was, jumping out of bed with a shout every time his unconscious mind replayed an image of Zac’s Viper being hit.
The last few weeks had been different. It wasn’t Zac who kept reappearing in his dreams, gloriously alive and well only to die yet again and again and again; no, ever since the slow but certain destruction of the colonies hot on the heels of Zac’s own demise, it wasn’t just Apollo’s kid brother visiting his dreams anymore.
Waking from yet another nightmare in a relentless cycle, Apollo sat upright and rubbed his eyes, unsurprised to find that they were wet from unshed tears that had been welling in them in his sleep. He looked around the room but saw no evidence of anyone else being awake. A few gentle snores confirmed his fellow warriors’ slumber.
When his heart stopped racing, Apollo leaned back against his pillow and his too-cold mattress. Without thinking, his hand reached out and found- nothing. He was alone in a bunk surrounded by comrades sleeping off Starbuck’s black market ambrosia, all praying they wouldn’t be called out on some emergency fight against the Cylons. Apollo shut his eyes and willed sleep to come quickly.
Just as he was nodding off, a hand found his. He bolted upright yet again, swallowing another shout and squinting into the darkness. Before him stood a familiar face. “Shh,” Serina whispered, pulling him to his feet. Apollo stayed silent; what was she doing here? He followed her out of the room, looking around to be sure no one had stirred.
As Serina led him down the hall, Apollo frowned, thinking. “Where are we going?” He asked in a whisper, conscious of the sleeping crew’s quarters they were passing.
Serina didn't answer, but she looked over her shoulder and smiled at him.
Apollo’s frown remained. “Serina–”
Letting go of his hand, Serina lifted her finger to her lips to shush him again, and stopped in front of the door to private civilian lodging. Boxey’s room. Apollo turned to Serina with another question, but she wasn’t by his side anymore. He looked around wildly; where had she gone? Then suddenly, the emotions from a nightmare he hadn’t yet experienced hit him in full force.
Apollo fell to his knees in the empty corridor, bringing his hands to his head, where a sharp ache was blooming between his temples. Of course she was gone. Of course. Of course. She had never been there to begin with.
She was dead.
A hundred images flashed through Apollo’s mind: the first time he met Serina, back on their devastated planet Caprica; the moment she was shot on Kobol; their wedding; the instant she fell to the ground on Kobol, eyes wide; the first time he saw her in her uniform; her sickly body, back on board the Galactica, far beyond saving. Over and over again, her gentle, loving smile, followed by her lifeless body.
Apollo was used to nightmares, but he wasn’t used to experiencing their cruelty when he was awake. He had seen his wife, felt her touch; it was more than a nightmare.
Gasping for air, Apollo rose to his feet, his hand firm against the wall for balance. There must have been a reason that his vision had brought him to Boxey’s room. Apollo opened the door slowly, taking great care not to make any noise. The room was dark, but he could make out Boxey’s sleeping figure, Muffit standing by. Apollo let out a sigh of relief. It would have destroyed him if Serina had brought him here to see Boxey have the same nightmares Apollo himself endured each time he closed his eyes.
Apollo pulled the door shut silently and rubbed his eyes. Boxey was fine, and so was he. It was time to go back to sleep. He looked down the hall in the direction of the bachelor officers’ quarters. He hated the thought of going back there only to be woken up by Zac or Serina or whoever else decided to visit him in his dreams, but sleep he must. He forced one foot in front of the other and returned to his bed.
His disappearance had gone unnoticed, thankfully. Everyone else was as asleep as he’d left them. Apollo fluffed his pillow and settled back in, trying to think good thoughts. Boxey was sleeping peacefully, and it seemed Starbuck, Boomer, Jolly, Greenbean and all the others were too, so maybe Apollo himself would join their ranks. He closed his eyes and allowed himself to drift off.
This time, when Apollo woke, there was no shout rising in the back of his throat. He smiled to himself. It was about time! Finally, a good night’s sleep. He stretched and sat up, pleasantly surprised to smell breakfast cooking. It reminded him of a meal his mother used to make–
Apollo froze. His mother. His heart sank as he looked around the room, taking in the warriors sleeping in the bunks around him. He inhaled again, and the scent was still there. He held his breath until his lungs ached, but when he breathed in, the aroma hadn’t dissipated.
Apollo knew what he needed to do. He got to his feet and followed the smell out of the room and down the hall, wondering what–or rather, who–he was going to encounter. The sinking feeling in his gut was right: there before him stood his mother, just as she’d looked the last time he kissed her goodbye on Caprica.
It’s not real. She’s not real, Apollo tried to convince himself, but she looked as real as he remembered her. “Mother?” He croaked.
She turned her head, and a wide smile broke out across her face. “Apollo!” She reached out to him, holding him at arm’s length to fully take him in.
“What are you doing here?” Apollo asked, his voice cracking. A wracking sob wasn’t far off.
His mother shook her head, a nonanswer. “I’m so proud of you,” she whispered. “You grew up to be everything I’d hoped you’d be.’
Apollo shook his head. His mother didn’t know about Zac, that he was gone, that it was Apollo’s fault for leaving him behind. “I’m not. You always said I was just like Father–”
“Hush, Apollo. You are just like him. He’s made difficult decisions, too, you know.”
Did she know about Zac? Her youngest child, her baby. Did she know that Apollo had left him alone to die at the hands of the Cylons? “Mother-”
Her smile remained, but she turned away from Apollo. He blinked, and she was gone. Just as before when Serina had vanished, he looked around, desperate to find her, but his mother had never really been there to find. The stabbing pain between his temples returned, distorting Apollo’s vision. He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to block out whatever new nightmare was coming for him on the next wave of agony.
When he opened them, there was a warrior walking down the hallway toward him. “Apollo?” The young man said, voice dripping with concern.
Zac. That was who Apollo had come to expect in all his dreams; it had been a long wait tonight, with his brother being his third visitor.
Apollo choked out a laugh. “What took you so long?”
Zac looked confused, not like their mother or Serina, who had both been the picture of calm. Zac was exactly how Apollo knew him to be, though. Slightly uncertain only because Apollo, the older, more experienced brother, was near. Otherwise, Apollo knew, Zac would have had a confident edge to his enthusiasm. “Apollo, are you alright?”
Apollo felt his heart breaking yet again. Apollo, are you alright? The words rang in his ears. When was the last time someone had asked that? Everyone on the Galactica had lost someone; maybe that was why no one was worried about Apollo. So what if he wasn’t alright- who was? Everyone else was probably so busy thinking of their own parents or spouses or siblings or children who had died that they didn’t have time to consider who everyone else had lost.
Standing in the hall with his brother watching closely, Apollo straightened up. “I will be,” he whispered. “I’ll be just fine… Someday. Soon, I hope.”
Zac still looked worried. “Father needs you. Everyone on the Galactica needs you. Don’t doubt that, Apollo. You did the right thing, like you always do.”
Shaking his head, Apollo reached out for his brother. “I don’t always. But I’m glad you think I do.”
Zac’s confusion finally made way for a smile as he put a hand on Apollo’s shoulder. “Of course. You’re my big brother.” The air was heavy with sentiments he couldn’t capture in words. When he turned and walked toward the bachelor officers’ quarters, Apollo followed.
Zac stopped Apollo before he could enter the room. “You’re not going to see me again,” he said softly. Sadness clouded his eyes. “You… you need to focus, Apollo. On the Cylons. On your squadron. On the colonies and finding Earth. Not on me and Mother.”
Apollo could feel his throat closing. As much as he hated the nightmares, he was willing to endure them if it was the only way he could see the loves he’d lost to the war. “I got married, you know,” he said quietly. “Lost her, too.”
Pulling Apollo into a firm hug, Zac tried to comfort him. “You didn’t lose her. You didn’t lose any of us. We’re just… a little further away. You won’t see any of us for a time, Apollo, but you’ll still feel us by your side.”
Tears stung the backs of Apollo’s eyes. “I left you,” he croaked. “Why shouldn’t you leave me?”
Zac let go of Apollo, pulling back to look at him properly. “You didn’t leave me. You saved countless lives. You ensured the Galactica’s escape. Apollo, I know you’d never abandon me. I wouldn’t abandon you, either; but my staying here, like this, is torturing you. I have to go; you know that. Mother and Serina need to go, too. And you need to let us.”
Apollo was desperate to get a proper look at his brother if it was to be their final goodbye, but the tears clouded his vision. He couldn’t be sure if Zac watched him retreat to his bunk, or if Zac was already gone. Either way, Apollo fell into bed and closed his eyes, this time believing that he might be undisturbed until morning for the first time in sectons.
A noise invaded his slumber, shrill and insistent, but Apollo was certain that it was his own voice, crying out yet again. He clamped his mouth shut, but the noise went on. Surely the other warriors will wake for this. He hated the thought of waking them, but he couldn’t make the sound stop. A hand grabbed his shoulder, shaking him into reality.
“Apollo! Apollo, wake up,” Starbuck said, pulling on his jacket as he shook Apollo awake. “Didn’t you hear the alarm?”
Apollo’s eyes scanned the room, falling finally on Starbuck. A pit formed in his stomach. No, please, not Starbuck, too. “No!” Apollo said, pulling away from his friend. Everyone who had woken Apollo up tonight had been dead; but Starbuck had gone to bed at the same time as Apollo, in the bunk right across from his. How could Starbuck be dead?
Starbuck looked surprised. “Well, you can hear it now, so get up! Come on, Apollo, get your uniform on.” Starbuck tossed what he could reach–a jacket, a belt, a holster devoid of its gun– in Apollo’s direction. “They’re getting our Vipers ready, so you better get yourself ready.” He marched out of the room behind Boomer.
Apollo frowned, still trying to orient himself in this strange new nightmare. Boomer had been there, too; did that mean he was also gone? Apollo shook his head, trying to clear the fog from his mind. It occurred to him, then, that everyone else in his dreams had been acting exactly as he expected them too: Serina was so gentle, so soft, thinking first of Boxey and his peace; Apollo’s mother was bright and laughing; Zac was steady, if somewhat anxious.
Starbuck, though… He wasn’t quite himself. Under normal circumstances, he would’ve been awake after Apollo, his jacket only half on as he ran down the hall after the rest of the warriors. Apollo got to his feet, pulling on his uniform as his mind raced. Starbuck couldn’t be dead. He must’ve woken up to the alarm and saw that something was wrong with Apollo. He noticed that the squadron’s leader, usually the first to jump into action, was trying to push the noise away, trying to go back to sleep, and Starbuck took that as a sign that he himself needed to step up; no matter what Athena said, Starbuck was someone who could be relied on in crisis, and he must have considered this one.
With his uniform on and a gun strapped to his thigh, Apollo ran down the hall after the other warriors. Starbuck was already in his Viper, preparing to launch. Apollo pulled on his helmet and jumped into his own Viper beside Starbuck’s.
“I was starting to wonder if you were coming,” Starbuck called out to Apollo. “Must have been some great dream you were having; you’re not usually that deep of a sleeper.”
Apollo almost laughed at Starbuck’s assumption he was having a good dream. “You don’t know the half of it,” he said with a wry smile.
A disembodied voice told them they were clear to launch. As Apollo’s thumb grazed the turbo button, he saw from the corner of his eye a warrior who looked startlingly similar to his brother. He shook his head. Zac had said he wouldn’t be back, and Apollo was inclined to believe him. “I’ll miss you, brother,” he whispered to himself.
Launching into the unknown with Starbuck and Boomer on either side of him, Apollo got the peaceful sense that when–not if–they returned, he would fall into the first good sleep he’d had in sectons.