arrow_of_apollo: (Civilian | Look over shoulder)
2009.11.A.5 - Song Lyrics - "Baker Street", Gerry Rafferty

This city desert makes you feel so cold
It’s got so many people but it’s got no soul


We were here for three weeks before I realized it.

Three weeks of work, of sweat and strain and exhaustion. The emergency shelters were first, half-cylinder huts made out of collapsible titanium ribs and heavy plastic skin. We leveled ground and turn blasted fields of rubble into landing strips. Massive generators were flown down, and are still providing half of our power, burning through our precious tylium stores because we still haven't come across any decent locations for geothermal energy.

After three weeks, the shelters had been joined by small, squat gray blocks made out of a kind of homebrew concrete that some crewman who used to be a contractor came up with. Beyond that mix of what you could barely call buildings were where people had tried to set up living spaces in what was left of burned-out buildings.

By that time, most of the people still ate at the long metal tables in the communal mess area in the center of this encampment, this new home of ours. They walked up to the chow line, heads bowed, and stayed that way until they scraped their plates into the reclamation buckets and stacked the trays.

Conversations were kept to a bare minimum. The whole world had been eerily quiet when we'd first landed on Earth, and it seemed like no one wanted to break it. I don't know if there was a fear we'd jinx things and the other Cylon faction would find us or if we'd somehow scare up something that had been left behind here.

Every face I saw wore a similar expression: weariness. No matter if it was a human or a Cylon, we were all so tired. We are all so tired. This is the place we live, though it's hard to call it home. This is where we've come to be, where we've stopped running, because we can't run anymore. But it just doesn't feel like our world.

It was three weeks in when I realized that our place here, our encampment, our town... didn't even have a name.

(345)
arrow_of_apollo: (Soldier | Two Vipers)
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)
arrow_of_apollo: (Soldier | Memorial Wall)
23.B.1 - "The art of war is simple enough. Find out where your enemy is. Get at him as soon as you can. Strike him as hard as you can, and keep moving on." - Ulysses S. Grant

"Simple" and "war" aren't words that belong in the same sentence.

Not this war, at least )

(345)
arrow_of_apollo: (Either | Conflicted | Wedding Ring)
OOC: Completed RP with [livejournal.com profile] number_eight, [livejournal.com profile] burnandrave, [livejournal.com profile] cylon_prophet, & [livejournal.com profile] notmyfate. Takes place in the AU Future!Earth universe. Cross-posted to same.

Kara was dressed in her uniform for the first time in several weeks. It felt strange after so much time in civilian clothes, but she found she was glad to put it on. Kara was a soldier, and while she'd always been a bit unpredictable, there were aspects to military life she enjoyed. The familiarity of something as simple as dress was actually somewhat welcome at the moment, when her entire life felt like it was in such upheaval.

Despite everything that had happened--finding Earth, defeating the Cylons--Kara had to fight back the feeling of impending doom, as if it was all going to be snatched away from her. She was pretty sure it wasn't just her--she wasn't the only one who went outside at night and stared at the night sky, wondering if any of the cold lights above marked the approach of a Cylon basestar--but, as with everything, Kara felt it with an intensity that left her occasionally moody and tense. Having something to do that wasn't working on the house or painting, it was good for her. She'd been nervous about getting her orders, but she shouldn't have been; as she'd thought, the Admiral had told her that she'd be flying a few recon missions, doing some routine patrols in her Viper, but that her primary job would be training new recruits.

Are you grounding me, Sir? she'd asked, standing at attention, not entirely sure if her smile was genuine or forced. It was hard to tell, sometimes, even for her.

I'm giving you a chance to live your life, Adama had said in his gravel-rough voice. As...interestingly...as you've chosen to live it.

She should have expected that. Her domestic arrangements weren't a secret, after all, and she knew it wasn't going to be easy when she went back to work. Everyone had an opinion, and she was pretty sure she was going to hear about it.

Kara had saluted without saying a word. She pushed back the old longing she had, that desperateness for the Admiral's approval, and had simply taken her orders without comment. (There was a first time for everything, after all.) On her way out of the building that housed the provisional government, she saw a familiar figure ahead of her. Smiling, Kara rushed to catch him, forgetting for a moment everything that lay between them. "Hey, Lee. Or do I have to call you Mr. Vice President, now?" Kara teased, falling into step beside him.

Lee and Kara re-connect, Sam & Leoben are domestically cute with Kara, a surprise dinner is had, and Sharon confesses to Kara that she's having an affair with Lee... )
arrow_of_apollo: (Aphena | Soldier | Want)
16.B.6 - Phrase: The price of failure

OOC: This response is set within the Earth!AU timeline.

Payment )

(405)

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