Chapter Text
Serenity Shuttle, you are cleared for landing.
It’s been a hell of a long time since Mal has had to report at 0800 for anything. He can’t particularly recall liking it very much then, possibly even less now. He stands at Inara’s shoulder, even as she twists in her seat to look at him, and tells him to please stop.
“What?” Mal shrugs. “What exactly am I doin’ that is so troublesome?”
“You’re hovering.” She turns back to the controls, focused on bringing her shuttle in for a landing in the unfamiliar bay.
“I don’t know what you’re talkin’ about,” he says, digging his hands into his pockets. “I just wanna get a look at our new friends’ ship, is all. It’s fascinating.”
Inara looks like she’s about to protest when Kaylee pushes forward, crowding into the last of the small space around Inara’s seat. Her eyes are bright and wide, her jaw hanging open. Mal nods towards her, flicking his gaze to Inara. See what I mean?
Minutes later, when the shuttle’s hatch opens, Mal steps out into a sea of blindingly orange jumpsuits and metallic olive flight suits. It doesn’t seem to matter much what they were doing before their shuttle arrived, but it seems all anyone wants is to get a good look at him and the chunk of his crew that he brought with them.
Mal hears a man’s voice shout “Come on everyone, you’ve got work to do.” He turns to see a wiry-looking man clap his hands once and the others go about their work. When the crowd parts, he sees Lee Adama wearing the same suit from yesterday.
“Good to see a familiar face,” Mal says, approaching the representative. “Almost didn’t recognize you without your squad of marines.”
He gives a short nod. “Captain Reynolds. Welcome to Galactica. ” Lee’s manner is as guarded as it had been the day before. Can’t exactly blame him—Mal’s never really gotten along with government types and he supposes it doesn’t matter what end of the ’verse they’re from. He watches as Lee’s gaze travels from him to Zoë with another nod of acknowledgment, and then towards the other three who have emerged from the shuttle.
“This here is Inara,” Mal says as she extends a hand.
Lee takes her hand, shaking lightly. “You’re the ambassador Mal told us about?”
The glower she turns on Mal is sharp and fast and he offers only a shrug in reply. “It seemed like the best introduction. Didn’t feel like explaining, your, you know… job. And you are a government trained…representative… of a kind.” He clears his throat. “You know, I’m bein’ a hell of a lot nicer than I normally am on the subject. Thought you might ‘ppreciate that.”
“I have no shame in what I do; you seem to be the only one here who does.”
Lee’s gaze flicks back and forth between the two, one eyebrow starting to creep upwards. Mal offers by way of explanation, “See, professionally her job is to take care of the wealthy and powerful. In bed.” Inara looks like she would hit him if they weren’t with their present company. “But it really is a highly respected position.” He shakes his head and points out the rest of his crew in turn. “This is Simon Tam—resident medic on my ship—and Kaylee, our mechanic.”
The doc steps forward, shakes Lee’s hand. Kaylee doesn’t seem to take much notice of the introduction, her eyes are wide and shining with that kid-in-a-candy-store look at she watches the flurry of deck activity.
“If you’ll all just follow me,” Lee says, turning to lead them through yet another new ship.
“What about the shiny government ship ya’ll had us on yesterday,” Mal said, keeping step with the shorter man. “Any reason this meetin’ need take place on a warship?”
“Our Chief Medical Officer is the President’s primary care physician at the moment,” he replies. “She’s been living aboard Galactica for medical reasons. Based on her condition this morning, we decided it was best to hold the meeting in one of the wardrooms here.”
The sentence certainly seemed to pique Simon’s attention. “The President is ill?”
Lee’s lips set in a grim line and he keeps on walking forward. So intent, Mal muses, that he fails to notice they’ve lost one member of the group.
======================
Galen’s not supposed to be down here, guess no one trusts a toaster on the hangar deck, even though he’s worked here, alongside them all for years. He isn’t sure he really gives a flying frak right now—what the hell are they going to do? Stick him in the brig? Wouldn’t that just be exactly what he needed right now? One more thing to add another punchline to the sick cosmic joke that his life has become.
It doesn’t matter right now too much—when he’s surrounded by the familiar smell of engine grease and tylium fuel and everything that used to make his life feel normal. Seems like Laird is doing a good job keeping the deck running smoothly, everyone in their place doing their job.
Except for one glaring incongruity.
Sticking out from underneath one Raptor, he can see a pair of legs covered in what are distinctly non-military-issue coveralls. For a moment, he wonders if Laird the Civvie can’t tell the difference after all. Galen shakes his head, crossing the deck in long, sure strides. He snaps at the intruder in the best Chief voice he can muster. “What the frak are you doing in here? This is no place for civilians!”
The owner of the legs shimmies out from underneath the Raptor, gets to her feet, wipes smears of grease onto her coveralls with a bright smile on her face—not deterred at all by the edge in his voice. “Sorry, mister. Curiosity got the better of me, ’s all.”
Great, he thinks getting on his knees and sliding on his back to check the undercarriage. “You can’t just come and mess around with military equipment. Do you have any idea what kind of damage you could’ve caused? People’s lives depend on this equipment and—I had Figurski working on this for weeks.” He blinks hard, remembers that this Raptor has been out of commission since before he had been demoted. The undercarriage had taken some hits, and most of the connections had seemed to have massive, irreparable structural damage. He doesn’t know how she’d done it, but every connection is now jerry-rigged back together and it looks like it should be able to work.
Tyrol slides out from underneath and stares up at her. “How did you do that?” He glances back at the ship and then to her. “You’ve worked with this kind of vessel before?” She reaches out her hand to him and helps him to his feet. She’s got a good grip, he thinks.
“Heck, no,” she says with a shake of her head.
“Then how did you—?” He looks back and forth between her and the Raptor and the woman just shrugs.
“Machines got a way of talkin’ to me.” There’s even a little bit of a twinkle in her eye as she says it. “My daddy always said I had a natural talent. Used to work for him for a while and now I work for Mal.” She holds her hand out to him again. “Kaylee Frye,” she says.
She has to be one of them—one of the people from the Bug as people have taken to calling it. Sort of fitting for the small ship that showed up out of nowhere and seems to be obnoxiously hanging around the fleet. Hell, the thing even looks like some kind of insect. He shakes his head and shakes her hand. “Galen Tyrol.” He glances around. “How did you get over here anyway?”
“Flew over on a shuttle with the Cap’n and Simon and Zoë and ‘Nara, but I uh… I got kinda lost.” A slightly sheepish expression crosses her face, hands digging into her pockets. “But you look like you know your way, so why don’ you show me what you’ve got to see’ round here.” She nudges him with her elbow, a wide and eager grin crossing her face, and. gods help him, there’s something about her smile that’s really infectious.
He casts a wary look over his shoulder. “You know, I’d love to but, uh, I’m not actually supposed to be down here either.” He gives a slight shrug, as her eyes narrow slightly—not in anger, more like she’s studying him.
“And just what kinda trouble did you get in, mister?” she asked.
He brushes a hand over the back of his head. “That’s… kind of a long story.”
“Well I figure the others are all gonna be busy with their meetin’ type thing for a while, so I got plenty of time.”
She rocks back on her heels a bit and keeps just looking at him. He drops his hands to his sides and offers, “Do you… want to go get a drink or something?”
She nods eagerly and the two of them head off to Joe’s Bar. Galen ignores the looks he gets for daring to show his face, he’s gotten used to them. Kaylee doesn’t even seem to notice, just talks excitedly about the “wait, what’s it called again?” “It’s a Raptor.” “Raptor. Right. ” They sit together at the bar and she asks him again what the long story is. Under most circumstances he’s pretty sure he’d need to down a couple of shots before he could even start to talk about his dead wife, but talking to Kaylee is surprisingly easy. She doesn’t judge him, doesn’t look at him with pity, just sits and listens and when it’s all out there—all except the cylon part, he’s not sure she’d know how to deal with that—he feels surprisingly lighter than he did before.
Over the next round, she tells him all about Serenity—her home, her girl. She tells him every detail of the engine room that he could imagine and then some, never once asks if she’s boring him, and that’s okay because she isn’t at all. “Sounds like an amazing ship,” he says.
“You have no idea.” She grins. “Wanna come check her out? I guess we’ll be hangin’ around here for a while. You could come over and I could show you around.”
“Next time I manage to grab some leave,” he says. “I’d love to.”
Things get quiet for a while, comfortably so, but still quiet. It strikes him as strange since she hasn’t stopped chattering really since he met her. “What are you thinking about?”
“You,” she says point blank. “There’s somethin’ different about you. But I can’t quite put my finger on it.” Giggling, she taps her finger against his nose as if to prove a point. She blinks twice and then her eyes go wide. “I think I figured it out.” She sits back on the barstool a bit stirring her drink.
“Figured out what?” he asks, his stomach starting to feel like lead.
“I said earlier that machines got a way of talkin’ to me.” She leans over the bar and motions for him to do the same, her voice dropping to a whisper. “And you, Galen, are some kinda machine.” She says it with a smile that goes straight to her eyes and it nearly knocks him off his bar stool. The secret’s out, but it doesn’t mean he’s come to like it any more. Whereas everyone else in the bar keeps giving him the stink eye since he walked in, she’s looking at him like it’s the greatest thing in the worlds.
Galen sits up a bit straighter in his seat. He takes a deep breath and looks at her. “I’m a cylon.”
“Cylon,” she repeats with a slight tilt of her head. Something determined in her voice like she’s trying out the word to see how it works. After a moment, the smile is back. “Shiny.”
====================
Simon can’t help but think it’s unfair to make such an unwell woman conduct this kind of circus. Aside from the self-righteous, consistently contrary politicians that seem to make up their government, several people who appear to be members of the press have shown up and are circling like vultures waiting for her to drop. The whole thing is starting to make him sick.
Over the course of more hours than he cares to count, the points of the Unification War and the Alliance government’s takeover are belabored again and again. He is not prepared for the barrage of rather insulting questions that follow his statement that he had supported Unification following Mal’s tale of fighting for the Independents. Inara faces much of the same scrutiny. After what seems like an interminable length of time, it’s finally decided that no further move will be made until a solid plan is voted on and approved.
When the wardroom clears, Simon stares glances back at the door. “Well that was… that certainly was.”
“I couldn’t have said it better myself,” Inara says. Despite all her training and poise she looks as uncomfortable as he’s ever seen her.
His voice drops to a whisper. “Has the captain, by any chance, lost his mind? What good will it do to get us all caught up in this mess?”
“I’m sure he has his reasons. I’m just not entirely sure they’re sane reasons.”
He’s about to open his mouth, complain a little more, when he hears the Admiral’s voice from across the room. “Someone get Doc Cottle in here, right frakking now.”
The President is passed out, slumped forward over the table, glasses still in her hand. How shi sung chung. While the one remaining representative in the room—Simon assumes the Admiral’s son, as they share a last name—goes for the phone, he goes for the President.
Pulse, breathing—both good signs. He left his gorram medbag back on Serenity and mentally kicks himself for doing so. Then again, he never really expected this turn of events when Mal told him he was coming with him to the piece of gou shi warship.
He’s not entirely impressed with the speed at which the stretcher arrives to take the President away. He’s not entirely impressed with the medical facility on the ship. He supposes, though, that having been on the run for the past three years, things could be considerably worse.
Simon’s suppositions on that matter are confirmed the moment he lays eyes on the Chief Medical Officer. “Are you sure it’s a wise idea to smoke around a cancer patient?”
“She’s got breast cancer, not lung cancer,” he grunts and takes another pull on his cigarette, leaving Simon slackjawed and choking on a mouth full of second-hand smoke.
After thrice being shoved aside and growled at—“You’re getting in my way, kid”—he finally snaps.
“I am a doctor, you know.”
“Of course you are. Why don’t you find some nice young thing to go play doctor with.”
Simon glares, but recedes, standing quietly to the side until the doctor determines she’s fine. “Probably just worn out from all the excitement.” He imagines he could’ve told them that himself if he’d just been allowed some decent equipment and a chance to look at the president.
The doctor—Cottle, they called him—arches an eyebrow and looks at Simon. “Suppose you’d like to weigh in with your fancy training and all?” The man seems to be smirking, but he holds out a medical chart.
Simon snatches the file out of his hands and mutters “ke-wu de lao bao jun”. He flips a page in the report, skimming it over. He turns another page, turns it back. His brow furrows and this was most definitely not what he was expecting.
“Well, doctor?” Cottle grunts.
He closes the file, eyes fixing hard on the other man. “I’ve never ever heard of any of these treatments in my life.”
The major snatches back the file, giving Simon a paper cut in the process. “Someone get this kid out of my sickbay.”
“No! ” he protests. “Don’t you understand? I am an experienced medical professional and, well, a genius, and I don’t know about these treatments. Clearly, they are treatments used by your people, your doctors. They’re treatments that people in this end of the galaxy have never discovered. Obviously, our medical practices differ greatly and—”
“I don’t need to hear any of your excuses.” Cottle takes a pull on his cigarette.
“I have a point!” Simon splutters.
“Then just make your point, already.”
“The point is that it stands to reason that my people have treatments that you have never heard of.” He adds a jab of the finger for emphasis. “Effective treatments that you have not introduced into the President’s regiment.”
Simon casts a look at the unconscious woman before turning back to Cottle. His voice drops as he continues. “Your report shows that her prognosis is grave. This… doloxan or whatever it is you’re giving her clearly isn’t doing the job. If you would allow me some time, I could work up an entirely new course of treatment for her.”
Simon pinches the bridge of his nose. In all the excitement over his realization, he’s forgotten that he is stuck in the middle of nowhere with incredibly limited medical supplies and certainly none of which are suited to curing cancer. “There isn’t much that I will be able to do with the resources aboard Serenity but there are many prestigious hospitals on the Core worlds. I’m sure we can find a way to set her up there, forge medical records so that it looks like she is transferring from one doctor to another.”
“Would it improve her chances of surviving?” Simon turns to see the Admiral standing behind him. Apparently he’d been listening to the entire exchange.
“In my professional opinion, yes. I think there is a possibility that it may very well save her life.” Nothing really changed in Adama’s solemn demeanor at the words, but Simon thinks maybe there’s something about him that looks more hopeful—or maybe just more desperate. Simon presses on. “I don’t want to give false hope. The cancer is very advanced, it will take a lot of work, but there are some Core hospitals that boast a very high survival rate for their cancer patients.”
The Admiral’s gaze travels from Simon back to Cottle. “Well, what do you think?” he asks.
Cottle takes the remaining stub of his cigarette and puts it out against a metal tray. He holds the President’s file back out to Simon. “He’s the doctor.”
=======================
Hours after the meeting, Lee lingers in the deserted wardroom. He’s got charts, maps, papers spread out over several tables and a pen clutched in his hand. He’s been going through the systems planet by planet trying to determine how many people could be safely hidden in each of the cities or towns without getting noticed.
He taps the end of his pen against the table, scrubbing a hand over his face and thinking back to the earlier events of the day. Though it seemed like many members of the Quorum were inclined to agree that settling here, especially with the threat of the non-allied cylons still looming, was the best course of action. Yet, no course of action could really be agreed upon. A second meeting the next morning would determine the plan for settlement, which would be put forth for the citizens of the Colonies to vote upon.
Of course, that meeting is in another eight hours and Lee doesn’t have anything remotely resembling a course of action to show for the hours he’s been sitting here. His mind just keeps wandering to everything that’s gotten them into this position. The new ship, Serenity. The name sounds like such a joke. Serenity—peace, tranquility, calm… the exact frakking opposite of everything that fleet life has turned in to—showing up out of nowhere. And the captain, Mal, something about him just rubs Lee the wrong way, but he can’t quite put his finger on it.
Frak. He needs to focus. He turns his attention back to the pad of paper he’s been scribbling on and reaches for the chart of another solar system sitting on the next table over. He needs to just buckle down and get this done now. He writes down on his pad Georgia Star System. Okay. He can do this. He clicks his pen closed and open and is about to set back to work when he hears the hatch squealing open.
“Hey.” Kara’s voice is not a distraction he needs right now, but, gods, he is glad to see her. Lee is unable to hide a smile as he looks up at her.
“What are you doing here?”
She crosses the room in a couple of strides, standing across from him, leaning her hands on the table. “Heard you were holed up in here. I spent a lot of time staring at star charts for a while, figured you could use my expertise.” She flashes him a quick grin before her gaze drops down to the table. Her eyes wander over the mess of charts and maps.
“Enlighten me,” he says, shaking his head.
She drags one towards herself, her lips tightening in a straight line. When she speaks again, there’s a strange tone to her voice—almost bitter. “So. This is our new home.”
“Yes. This is the ‘Union of Allied Planets.’” He pushes himself out of his seat and grabs the bigger chart. It doesn’t have all the details he needs to work out a plan, but it gives a good overview of the star systems. “According to Mal, this is the Core.” He points to a system in the center labeled White Sun. “I don’t think it’s a good idea to send anyone here. Most of the Alliance activity goes on there, and it’d be the quickest way to get caught. Apparently, some planets you need a certain level of clearance just to land.” He shakes his head. “And here.” He points to another labeled Blue Sun. “Small system. It looks like the least habitable of all the systems, it also has the smallest population.”
“More likely to get noticed,” Kara finishes his train of thought. He tilts his head to look at her but her focus remains fixed on the chart. “So that just leaves these three systems here. Red Sun, Kalidasa, and Georgia.” She points to each in turn.
“Apparently, each one has populations in the billions and at least fifteen habitable worlds. Easiest way to get lost.”
He watches as she traces her finger along the orbits marked around the star Kalidasa, and he goes back to staring at the Red Sun map. There are a few moments of silence before Kara mutters something to herself.
“Huh?” Lee glances up; her expression is unreadable.
“Nothing,” she says. He looks over to where her finger still rests on the map—it was right next to a planet labeled Delphi. He’s seen a few planets on the map that shared names with the Lords of Kobol and cities from the colonies, but he hasn’t noticed that one yet. There it was—a planet named as the very same city where he first met her. Next to the label there is a little symbol that denotes that the planet is uninhabitable.
Kara slides her hand away, gripping the table so hard her knuckles go white. “We divide the fleet into three groups. Send one-third to each system with enough information to split themselves up, get themselves onto the planets in small enough groups not to be noticed.” She nods her head. “Split the Quorum up into committees—four representatives to a group, have them come up with each plan on their own. They need to get their lazy asses in gear.”
“I really need to get you to do my work more often,” he says. She’s always been good at planning, he’s known it since the op at the tylium asteroid.
Lee stands up a bit straighter, folding his arms over his chest. “So tell me, since you seem to have this all worked out already, what do we do about the people aboard Galactica?”
“Same. Split everyone up into three groups, keep families, maybe even friends, together if we can. Keep enough of a crew around to find a place to park Galactica permanently, have the rest take off in raptors or shuttles or something like that.”
“Anyone ever tell you that you should be a bureaucrat?” He quirks an eyebrow at her.
“You’re the first. And you’re gonna be the last,” she says, finally looking up at him. Her eyes are narrowed into a glare but there’s a tiny quirk at the corner of her lips.
He bites back a smile as he watches her straighten, her hands planted on her hips. “Well, you’d have to do something about your public speaking skills. Telling people to ‘get their lazy asses in gear’ doesn’t generally get you very far in politics.”
“Is a little groveling so much to ask? I just did all your work for you.” She rolls her eyes, obviously fighting back a grin as well. “See if I come help you out again.”
“Thanks for the great ideas, Starbuck. I still need to turn them into a presentable report in the next,” he checks his watch, “eight hours.”
“Well then, don’t let me keep you,” she says, turning for the door.
Suddenly, his heart drops into his stomach. On some impulse, he reaches across the table and catches her wrist before she can get away. “Kara…” He’s not sure where he’s going with that but she turns back to him. Her grin has faded somewhat, but there’s an almost expectant look in her eyes.
“What?” she asks after he’s paused a moment too long.
He gropes for the first words he can find. “Thank you. For your help. With the work. It’s a good plan.”
“Any time.” She frowns a bit as she looks at him, really looks at him. “Frak, Lee, when was the last time you slept?”
He hasn’t gotten a wink in days now, just gone from crisis with the cylons right into planning the end of the three-year journey that’s brought him here. “I’m fine. Maybe I can actually get some rest after I get this presentation together.” He just holds onto her hand tighter. “Why don’t you pull up a chair. It might go faster with two people working on it.”
She squeezes his hand back. “Well OK, but only because you look really pathetic right now.”
“Your charity is touching. Really.”
She pulls up a chair, sits across from him at the table as they work from her general plan to get to the specifics. They talk about the pros and cons of forming small communities of their own in isolated areas, moving into small towns, and getting lost in the big cities. They talk about the lack of identification and living expenses, and just how the hell people are going to get on their feet.
They don’t talk about them. They don’t talk about where they’re going to end up or what they are going to do. It feels too abstract right now, like they’re spinning some fairy tale, for any of it to be real. He cannot fathom that they might be separated—that he really might lose her in this vast universe and never find her again.
--To Be Continued--