Litany
***
Billy:
Her hands are fragile in his. When he walks her from room to room, he avoids looking down. When he does, he can see the veins under her skin. Blue and dark, they crisscross her hands in an odd little map.
Billy hates this fragility. Hates it more that there is absolutely nothing he can do except what he is doing.
That makes it worse somehow.
***
He is reading her the morning report when he catches her staring at the whiteboard in the corner. They're almost back to 50,000.
The writing is still hers and he has no idea how he'll react when Baltar changes it. It has to change eventually. Either more deaths or more births. Who knows, maybe they'll find another battlestar. It's happened once already.
"Ma'am?"
She doesn't turn. Just stares at the whiteboard, an odd half-smile on her face. For one heart-stopping moment he thinks she's gone. Just died there in front of him.
Then she shakes her head and turns to look at him. Her voice, when she speaks, is brittle and dry. "I'm sorry. Please continue, Billy."
And they go on with their day.
He doesn't remember when her voice got like that. A day ago. A week. It could have even been a month. But behind the weak raspy voice and the shakes, he can still see her. Catches her watching everything, and knows that her mind is not gone. Fogged by drugs and pain she is still sharp enough to cut.
He's terrified of not seeing that anymore.
***
There are moments when he remembers that he's only known Laura Roslin for five months. That realization always trips him up, no matter how many times he has it. The life before Colonial One. Before Galactica and Cylons and everything else seems so very far away. Years and years away.
He doesn't remember his twenty-fourth birthday until three days after the fact.
Even then, it's only because Dee hands him two pairs of socks and kisses him softly on the forehead.
He knows the only person who'd even have a remote idea of when it was is President Roslin. She'd seen his application. He's not mentioned it to anyone else. Ever.
He kisses Dee back.
Later, when he refills the President's water pitcher and helps turn her sideways so that she can breathe between coughs, he whispers 'Thank you' near her ear.
He never does find out if she heard him.
***
Billy will always remember Laura Roslin standing in the rain.
The nightmare drop onto Kobol and subsequent hike through underbrush is a rather large - thankful - blur, but her greeting is not.
Standing there surrounded by greenery and rain and wild things, Laura Roslin smiled and told him that she missed him.
She looked whole then. Real.
He will always remember her in rain.
***
"I could get you a job in munitions. After, I mean." He met Dee on the day the world ended. Saw her smile at him, flirty and sure, and was smitten. Lost in her composure and energy. He wonders if he would have asked her out, had things not gone differently.
"Excuse me?"
They are in Galactica's mess. Admittedly, the food is better on Colonial One - one of the perks of being the Presidential Aide - but he's always told himself the company is better here.
Dee shakes her head, tilting it a bit to the side before reaching over and smoothing a piece of his hair down. "Do you want to stay when Baltar becomes President?"
He hopes the complete and utter brain-stall he's just had doesn't register on his face. Knows it does.
"No." He whispers it, before turning away. Staring at something, anything else.
"Yeah. I can find something for you. You're strong and smart." She smiles at him a little then. And he can almost see that thing, that spark he used to see aimed at him exclusively. He almost smiles in return, but then remembers the conversation they're actually having.
"Okay." He says it because he can't imagine staying where he is with Baltar. Being that close to a man loonier than pack of hyenas on stims and being able to stay with it. To keep his eyes on the ball.
"Good. Besides, I don't know why you're even still with Roslin. Not to speak ill of the dying, but she's a little bossy."
He bites his tongue then. Watches Dee turn away, something - or someone - else catching her eye, and doesn't say "She at least asks."
The shuttle ride home is quiet and in the back of his mind, he hums something pretty and sad.
***
His mother had died on Picon. Whether it was in the first blast or by Cylon hand or even in what he knows would be the long radiation-filled aftermath, he knows that she died on her home soil.
He thinks knowing his mother died quickly is a blessing.
The President's breathing is shallow in the night, and he wonders when he'll ever sleep deeply again.
***
She collapses on a Tuesday. He holds her hand for the entire shuttle ride.
He thinks he may have even prayed.
Laura:
President Roslin doesn’t cry on the shuttle back to Colonial One. She is visibly sad. Distant in the still pictures taken and transmitted by an unnoticed reporter, but not distraught.
But the reporter notices the tremble in her hands when she’s given a glass of water. The story in his head changes subtly then. Words twisting just a little bit so that what had been ‘cold and unfeeling’ became ‘stoic and bereaved.’
Later, alone in her quarters, Laura only feels a little bit terrible at her steady hands.
The feeling stops when she remembers him cold and alone on that metal tray. Laid out like he didn’t matter.
She muffles her sobs in her sleeve until she remembers that there’s no on there to listen anymore. And then she doesn’t.
***
The day after Billy’s small funeral ceremony – Dee in a borrowed dress, Laura in her black suit – President Roslin makes a request for names. Five are given off the available listings, and appointments are made.
Her new aide is a young woman. She is competent and strong with a direct gaze and more political smarts than sympathy.
Laura hires her because the woman looks her in the eye, nods, and asks nothing but when she’ll be expected to move.
The days continue.
***
In the first Cylon attack since the destruction of the resurrection ship, Laura finds herself reaching for a hand that isn’t there. Groping for a full three seconds before her mind catches up and lets her grip the seat arm instead.
Later, when the call comes in from Galactica, she winces at the young woman’s voice. Too much, too raw. Has to quash the sudden and complete desire to scream at the girl and at the Admiral and at everyone on that godsforsaken ship who’d lived.
“Thank you, Petty Officer,” is all she actually says.
Smiles at how it sounds like she means it.
***
Her hands are always cold now. She’d thought she’d put that behind her when the miracle cure she’d hoped so hard for had magically appeared.
She knew the gods had an evil sense of balance but she never expected this.
It’s odd to be who she is now. To be the President. She’s so rarely Laura anymore. Because that’s all anyone sees anymore. She’d thought that was true before. Had known it.
She isn’t dying. Not obviously. No, she’s healed and stronger than she’s ever been.
She never realized how not-alone she was until after Billy’d died in a pool of his own blood.
Laura wonders if he misses her but won’t let herself finish the thought.
***
President Roslin visits the Cylon whenever she makes the trip to Galactica.
Asks her guards to wait outside for a few minutes, and she stands outside the two-way glass, watching the it grow larger and larger with child. She knows it knows she’s there. An idle part of her mind wonders if it thinks she’s beholden to it. That she’ll give pause if fancy demands she order its – their at this point – death sentence.
She knows she won’t. But it doesn’t know that.
No, that’s not why she’s there.
***
Admiral Adama is not a stupid man. She’s always known this. Learned it about him after he got over his pride and had run like she’d asked. She’d always wondered what had made him change his mind about that but had never asked.
Knows she won’t ask now.
“Madam President.”
He is not stupid. He only asks her to Galactica now when absolutely necessary.
“Admiral Adama.”
She smiles at him a little, nods and steps off of her shuttle. Only flinches a little when she notices Captain Adama out of the corner of her eye. Tries not to let the smile freeze.
Wonders if this part will ever get easier.
She lets her eyes drift back towards the father.
“We have everything set up to go over in command.”
“Excellent.”
Behind her, her aide’s heels click on the deck grating, a slow clomping beat that isn’t quiet or close or familiar.
Glances out of the corner of her eye at Adama, wondering how he looked before he lost his youngest son. Or if those lines on his face came after.
He takes her arm to help her over the bulkhead. It’s something he’s done a thousand times over and has done since the day she met him.
Neither of them say a word when she pulls away.
-fin-
Back.