Fic: Out of the Brig, Into the Fire, Kara, Helo, AU mini, no warnings, PG

[lanalucy]

A year ago (A YEAR!!) hobbit_kate prompted me on bsg_epics: What if Kara was stranded on the Raptor/Caprica with Helo, instead of Boomer?

It took me a while to figure out how to make it happen, but finally I managed to get the muse to cooperate.

Many thanks to newnumbertwo for the beta, and help with the title!

“Are you really going to press charges against Kara?” Bill walked out of the head.

“For striking a superior officer? You’re damn right I am.” Saul plopped down on the couch.

“Heard you started the day off pretty early.” He tried to avoid putting any judgement in his voice.

“I wasn’t on duty,” Saul retorted defensively.

“I couldn’t talk you out of it, could I?”

“Not a chance. She is insubordinate, undisciplined…”

Bill thought both those traits described the man who’d been his best friend for years as much as or more than they described Kara. “Probably one of the finest fighter pilots I’ve ever seen in my life.”

“Yeah,” Saul muttered.

“She’s better than I am. Twice as good as you.”

“Like hell.”

“Listen. I’m not gonna defend what she did. Especially the cracks about your marital problems. But you did kick over the table first.” Bill pulled at the spats over his boots.

“I did not…” Saul looked puzzled, as if he couldn’t remember. “...unless I did.”

“You did.” Bill finished retying his boots and stood up. “So what do you say we just drop the formal charges, and put her on buses until we get home. That’ll hurt her worse. I think she actually likes the alone time in the brig.” Bill wiped the towel over his face one last time and reached for his uniform.

“You always did have a soft spot for her.”

“Yeah. I guess I’m just a crazy old man.”

~*~*~*~*~*~

“Are you kidding me? Raptors? Come on, Old Man!”

“You shouldn’t have hit him, Kara.”

She shuffled her foot on the floor in front of her. “I know. I just...he won’t let the callsign thing go, and I hate it. It’s worse when he’s drunk.”

“Well, in a week or so, you won’t have to put up with him anymore. Saul’s takin’ some R&R after we retire the old girl, and you’re going to your new battlestar. In the meantime, until we get home, you’re driving buses.”

“Yes, sir.”

She said it quietly, without any of her usual heat, and he knew it had been the right way to go. She wouldn’t have him on her next assignment, and she needed to learn to think before she threw her fists. He reached over and pulled her in for a quick hug. “Dismissed, pilot.”

“Aye, sir.”

~*~*~*~*~*~

Kara listened to the Old Man’s speech over the wireless, and wondered if he was talking to her.

<i>“Sooner or later, the day comes when you can’t hide from the things that you’ve done anymore.”</i>

Frak. She was driving this bus because she couldn’t keep her fists to herself - she kept letting Colonel Tigh get to her. Once the Old Man retired, she wasn’t going to have him around to keep her in line. She needed to grow up. If she had to be here on this bus, though, at least she had Helo in the back seat. Not that anyone else had volunteered.

She listened as Lee identified himself to the Colonial Heavy carrying the SecEd, then spoke into the comm.

“Viper 7242, Raptor 312. Apollo, this is Starbuck. It was good to see you again. Safe travels.” She would have said more, but decided if she was going to grow up, she might as well start with staying professional on the comm.

~*~*~*~*~*~

She and Helo were still flying CAP with the fighter squadron when she heard Dee over the comm asking for positions and tactical status. Dipper told her to relay their position two hours off Caprica, and to let the Old Man know that he’d sighted a Cylon formation and was poised to attack.

She was itching to have a Viper joystick in her fists. She was a good shot, she could down at least a couple of these bastards, maybe keep somebody from dying. Helo knew her better than anybody, so he was right there, telling her to take it easy, take a deep breath and relay the information. For now, she was the squadron’s connection to home.

She knocked helmets with him. “Thanks, Helo.” She took in a breath, held it for a count of four, and opened the comm to <i>Galactica</i> and Dee.

Once that was done, she waited for Helo to tell her how many Cylons were in front of them, but his readings were off. The numbers kept changing. Dipper asked for confirmation, and Kara told him that they couldn’t be certain. The Cylons were jamming, and the dradis was acting odd.

“Just give us your best guess, Starbuck. Guide us in. We’ll do the rest.”

“Yes, sir.”

When they were almost within visual range, Dipper told her to fall back. She pulled above the squadron and let them continue toward the Cylons. Just as Dipper was giving his final instructions, the number of Cylons on dradis multiplied too quickly to be anything but squadrons of them turning off their jammers.

Dipper called weapons free, and again she wished she was in her Viper. She was wasted in a Raptor.

It was Helo who noticed the Vipers were free-floating and that the comm chatter was gone. She frantically tried to make contact, then they both watched, stunned and horrified, as what turned out to be only two Cylon Raiders blew the entire squadron away.  He didn’t even have to tell her to get the frak out of there; she was already turned around, flying at speed away from the debris field.

There were missiles away, and Helo tried unsuccessfully to jam the warheads. She dropped some chaff and caught one warhead, just in time to hear Helo’s “Aw, Frak! Check ahead!”

Frak was right. There were dozens of them. The remaining missile got a lock on their Raptor; she dropped her last swallow. It caught the missile, but she heard an odd grunt from Helo and the tell-tale hiss that meant shrapnel had penetrated the hull. “Talk to me Helo. What’s going on?”

“We’re hit. I’m hit.”

“No shit. You gonna live?”

“Yeah. Hurts like a motherfrakker, but I’ll live.”

“Then navigate for me. We have a fuel leak. We’re going to have to put down and repair it. Nearest world is Caprica.”

“Lot of company between us and there,” he groaned.

Sudden inspiration struck, and she killed the engines.

“What the frak?”

“No power signature - maybe they won’t see us. Inertia will take us forward more or less in a straight line. I think we can make it to Caprica without being detected.” She turned off her helmet light for good measure.

“Not bad, Starbuck. Always knew you were smarter than you looked.”

“Frak you, Helo.”

“Little busy right now.”

“Probably for the best, anyway. You’re used to girls, not women,” she quipped.

He laughed, and the sound of it comforted her in a weird way. They floated through the debris field of destroyed Colonial ships, their Raptor beginning to rotate without the thrusters to keep it even. Once they hit the ionosphere, she powered up and found a place to land. They could see mushroom clouds in every direction, but they’d managed to find a relatively untouched piece of ground.

She got out the manual, told Helo to make himself useful by standing guard, and crawled under the Raptor to see what she could do about the fuel line. She didn’t like the looks of his leg, but if she couldn’t fix the Raptor, his leg wouldn’t matter. She heard him mutter, “That’s six,” right before he asked how she was doing on the repairs.

“Think I’ve just about got it. We ought to be airborne shortly.”

He limped away from the Raptor, and she was just about to light into him when he said, “Kara? Grab your sidearm.”

Whatever it was, she was going down swinging. She was next to him, gun in hand, before she followed his gaze to the crowd of people rushing toward them.

Helo opened fire first, shooting into the ground to get people’s attention. “That’s as close as you get!”

“Helo?” she asked, eyes still trained on the milling people. “What are you doing?”

He never answered, because everyone started yelling, some offering money, some just flat-out begging. She was inclined to shoot ‘em all. They’d never get them all off the planet, and they’d be dead within days if they stayed here.

He tried reason. “This is a military vessel,” he yelled above the din. “We’re not a rescue ship, and we’re not taking money.”

A burly guy started toward them, and Kara fired over his head. “Not one step closer.” The crowd settled a little, but several women were still shouting about them taking the children. What the frak good were they gonna be to children? This was war, and there was no place for kids on a battlestar. She gave a sideways look at Helo, and groaned under her breath. “Frak, Helo. You’re gonna make me take those damn kids, aren’t you?”

He lowered his voice, too. “There aren’t that many of them.”

“But what the frak are we going to do with them? It’s a battlestar, for frak’s sake!’

While they’d been hashing it out, the crowd had pushed the kids to the front, and everyone was watching them warily.

“Fine!” She spat the word out. “Just the frakkin’ kids.” She waggled her gun, and the children trudged toward the Raptor. She did some quick calculations. “What do you think, Helo? Two more? Three?”

“Three. Small people.”

Still holding her gun out in front of her, she raised her voice and said, “Okay, three more. We’re going -” The rest was drowned out by the crowd immediately offering anything and everything to secure a spot on the Raptor.

“Shut the frak up!” She all but screamed it, and the roar died down but not out. “I’m serious! If you don’t shut up right now, I’m leaving all of you behind.” She eyed the people in the crowd, one at a time, and dug into one of the pockets of her flight suit. She looked hard at the deck of cards in her hand and tossed them to Helo. “Tear ‘em in half.” She looked toward the crowd. “Everybody gets one half, we keep the other. We’ll draw out three cards, and those people get on the Raptor. Everybody else will back the frak off until we’re airborne.”

Helo passed the cards out, ripping them in half a few at a time, until they were sure everyone had a card.

Kara turned toward the Raptor. “Hey you, Kid!”

He looked down at her. “Boxey.”

“Fine. Boxey. Grab my helmet and bring it to me.” When he was standing in front of her, she snatched the torn halves Helo had and dropped them into the helmet. “Shake it kid. Boxey.”

He shook the helmet while she called out, “Okay, Boxey here is going to pick the cards, so there’s no bitching about me cheating. If you have the card we call, get on the frakkin’ Raptor. If you don’t, too frakkin’ bad.” She nodded at Boxey. “Pick ‘em, kid.”

There were a few minutes of confusion as cards got called out and compared, and people pushed to the front to get on the Raptor. Helo kept looking into the crowd and she hissed at him. “I don’t know what the frak you’re thinkin’, Helo, but stop right the frak now.”

He turned and whispered to her urgently. “Kara, I think that’s Gaius Baltar. Dr. Gaius Baltar.”

“So?”

“He’s probably the smartest man on the planet. I can give him -”

“No! No frakkin’ way, Helo! Get your flat ass on the Raptor and get ready to navigate us out of here.” He looked into the crowd again and she grabbed the front of his flight suit. “That’s an order, Agathon.” She shoved her helmet into the kid, and he winced. “Sorry kid. Go ahead and get on board. We’ll make sure everybody’s strapped down in a minute.”

Helo held the crowd off while she put the tools back where they belonged, and she ordered him to check everybody was secure while she watched warily. One guy looked pretty close to chucking it all on a run for the bird, and that Baltar guy Helo had pointed out looked scared out of his mind.

When Helo called out that they were ready, she backed up the ramp and banged her fist on the button, watching until the hatch blocked the crowd from view. She stowed her pistol and zipped up her flightsuit. She and Helo verbally ran through the preflight and jammed their helmets back on. She scanned the frightened people in the back of the Raptor, nodded at Helo, and got the bird off the ground.

She felt a bump and assumed that guy had decided to go for it after all. She got them twenty or so feet in the air, waggled the Raptor from side to side, and headed for the outer ionosphere without another thought. Her only job now was to get this bird and its cargo back to the Old Man. He’d know what to do.


If you're into smut, Better With Age happens because Helo's in the fleet instead of stuck on Caprica.