The Son Also Rises

27.A.2 - Lyrics:
Wrap me in a bolt of lightning
Send me on my way still smiling
Maybe that’s the way I should go
Straight into the mouth of the unknown
- "Call Me", Shinedown

Officially, given his position, Lee had every right to request an inspection of the flight school. And given his background, it was even less unusual a request. That was only half right, of course, as he was also there to check up on their head instructor, Kara Thrace. There was a time when he wouldn't have hesitated for a moment putting her in charge of a group of would-be pilots, when he wouldn't have doubted her right to sit in a cockpit.

But that was before he had to watch her die.

It seemed like Kara Thrace dying in her Viper in a ball of fire had always been a given for everyone who knew her. Being a jock was such an intrinsic part of who she was, at least on the outside, that no one had ever given any thought to the way she would finally punch her ticket. One day, some Raider-- or probably Raiders would get the drop on her and it would all be over in a few seconds.

Lee had thought that was Kara's attitude, as well. Flying felt like her element. Out of the cockpit, he'd always wondered if she was never able to find the same level of comfort and control.

Then again, Lee supposed it made a certain amount of sense. If the Kara he knew and loved was able to pick her own death, then it would be one that was utterly and completely a product of her own hands. So when she had pointed the nose of her Viper down into that storm funnel, it was with as much purpose and intent as when she was chasing Cylons in the middle of a fight.

She had known what she was doing. The voice in Lee's ears was at peace... almost content.

So if he had trouble imagining his friend climbing back into a cockpit, Lee hoped he could be forgiven for it, because although everyone else had felt her death, he'd been the only one who'd had to watch.

(339)

20.A.2 - "Help Me Make It Through The Night" Lyrics

I don't care what's right or wrong,
I don't try to understand.
Let the devil take tomorrow.
Lord, tonight I need a friend.

I was married, at least legally, if not in fact, to a wonderful woman I'd always known was way too good for me and definitely way too good to me, not with how badly I'd always done by her. She was married in every possible way, to a man I called my friend and who was probably respected by the crew of Galactica just a little bit less than the Admiral.

She had a child with her husband, a beautiful baby girl who meant more to her than the entire human race. I had no kids, but I had responsibility over every man and woman that flew a Colonial spacecraft.

I didn't love her, and she didn't love me. Hell, I'm not even sure if we like each other at all.

There was nothing right about any of it... except for the way it made me feel.

( OOC: Warning - Contains graphic adult material )

(777, not including lyrics)

9.C.5. - "Life is a series of collisions with the future; it is not the sum of what we have been, but what we yearn to be." - Jose Ortega y Gasset

Lee Adama doesn't know who he is; more importantly, Lee Adama doesn't know who he wants to be.

Believe me, I've been hearing those criticisms my entire life. And frankly, there are all kinds of reasons that any decent head shrinker would assign to my particular personality flaws, and don't think I haven't been tempted to actually talk to one. I know I'm frakked up sometimes, and it's not like the Gods don't mind reminding me.

Captain. Lieutenant. Captain again. Major. Commander. Major again. Civilian. Attorney. Delegate. President.

I haven't missed it. I've been wandering, looking for an anchor point, trying to find the one thing or one person around which I can start to really define myself and my life, the way the human fleet has been wandering, trying to find Earth, someplace to call our own again so that we can start rebuilding a civilization.

But what have I found?

It's not duty. No matter how good a pilot I might have been, no matter how good a CAG or XO or even CO I might or might not have been, it got clearer to me with each passing day that I wasn't destined to wear a uniform forever. And it isn't Kara. There's a love there that can't really be explained, but it's not something you make a life out of. It isn't Dee, although it probably should have been.

[private]

And then there's Sharon. It can't be Sharon. There's more than frakking going on here, I'm not stupid enough to not realize it. But I don't know what it is, and that can't be. I think I might finally be closing in on a life I can call my own, and I can't let it fall out of control. Even if, around her, that's what I want to be.

(303)