Fic: I'll Dish All the Dirt (Thrace Agathon Remix), G

[lanalucy]

Remix of kleenexcow's delightful drabble Thrace Agathon.

Thrace Agathon is her creation.

Thanks to newnumbertwo and laura_mayfair for the beta!

It was her birthday, near as she could figure, and she’d wanted to see Karl, and she knew it was stupid and sentimental, but since she’d died, she couldn’t seem to stop herself from being stupid and sentimental. So she’d come to visit him again and what did she find? Karl. Mooning over some of her stuff. Why had he kept that crap anyway? And why wasn’t he out somewhere getting trashed celebrating her birthday instead of this? Sweet Lords of Kobol.

~*~*~*~*~*~

It had been a long time since Hera’d heard that voice.

“Oh, my gods, Karl! When did you become such a sap?”

She peeked around the corner, and sure enough, Starbuck was pacing on the other side of her parents’ bedroom. Dad was looking through the pictures and papers he kept in that box under the bed.

“Seriously? You are in here pawing through my old crap because it’s my birthday, Helo?” Starbuck had come around the bed and smacked Dad in the head. He didn’t notice, of course.

Hera leaned against the doorframe, out of sight of her father.

“You miss me that much? Gods, Karl, I’m dead. Get over it. I have.”

Dad sniffed. Was he crying?

“Oh, will you look at that?” Starbuck’s voice had softened. “Weren’t we something, Karl? Gods, that was a good season! The two of us were unstoppable.”

Hera couldn’t stand it, she had to see, so she carefully peered around the edge of the door frame. Starbuck was kneeling on the bed behind him, her arms around his shoulders with her hands linked on his chest and her chin on his shoulder. Dad was just looking at the piece of paper. His hand was shaking a bit. And Starbuck looked kind of...sad.

“I know you want to know, but it’s not time to tell him yet. Okay, nugget?”

Hera looked up at the question, realized that Starbuck had seen her even if Dad hadn’t, and she nodded. She’d wait and talk to Starbuck later, when no one was around. Her family had gotten used to her talking to her imaginary friend, but she’d learned that she should answer carefully when other people could hear her.

~*~*~*~*~*~

Kara couldn’t resist. She wanted to visit Karl and Lee and the Old Man, but Hera was the only one so far who’d ever been able to see her. Not even Kacey could see her. Every time she visited Helo and Athena, that boy looked less like Athena and more like Helo’s sisters. He was going to be a ladykiller someday. Unless he was gay. She spared a moment to laugh hysterically at the male population being as mesmerized by the Agathon genes as females always had been. Thank gods she’d always been immune. Mostly. There had been that one time, but she was pretty sure he’d been drunk enough that he didn’t remember the way she’d fallen for his line. She had certainly never brought it up.

~*~*~*~*~*~

Hera and Thrace were hiking the hills near the house. Mom had said she thought it was a pretty day, and they should get the frak out of her hair for an hour or two.

It wasn’t long before Starbuck was striding along beside them, a finger stroking down Thrace’s light brown waves. “He looks more like your dad’s sisters every day.”

“Dad had sisters?”

“Two of ‘em. Gorgeous. Whole frakkin’ family was too good-looking for their own good.” Starbuck laughed and Hera grinned. “Got your dad more than a few girls - that charming, good guy grin. Aah, but you don’t want to hear about that.”

“Who are you talking to, Hera?” Thrace looked around. “Daddy had sisters? Like you’re my sister?”

“Oh, frak. He’ll ask your dad now. I hate it when Helo gets all misty.”

“Thrace, I was just talking to myself, thinking about a story I might write.” She did want to ask about Dad and other girls. She’d never really put much thought into her parents before they knew each other, but they must have had lives before they'd met. She’d have to wait until Thrace wasn’t around, though. Starbuck was always willing to talk more when it was just the two of them.

“Quick thinkin’, nugget. Gods. I can’t get over him naming your brother Thrace. Thrace Agathon.” She muttered the next bit, and Hera wasn’t sure she heard it right. “Wishful thinkin’, Helo. Woulda made you take my last name.” When Hera looked over, Starbuck was shaking her head. “Hey, kid, gotta go. Bug your dad for a while. I like watching him work.”

“Wilco.” That was one of the first things Starbuck had taught her: instead of okay or yes or something else, to say ‘wilco’ if she understood. Mom and Dad had overheard her a couple of times, and always looked at her funny when she said it.

Dad had even laughed once and said, “Guess you were born to be a pilot, kiddo. Too bad the Colonial Fleet doesn’t need pilots anymore.”

She and Thrace kept going, intending to check out some of the caves that had been marked as safe, and Starbuck strode off into the distance until it seemed like she just vanished between one step and the next.

~*~*~*~*~*~

This was her chance! Thrace was spending the weekend with Nicky, and Mom and Dad had said she could stay home by herself while they went out for a couple of hours. She watched them walk toward the center of town and waited a few extra minutes to be sure they hadn’t forgotten anything, then walked slowly toward their bedroom.

“What’re you doing, nugget?” Starbuck stood right in the middle of the hall, blocking her way.

“I’m going to check out that box.”

“You sure you wanna do that? I don’t think he’s ready to know about me yet.”

“I’m sure. I just wanna understand why he looks at the stuff in that box. What it is.”

“Your funeral, kid.”

Hera carefully folded the bedspread up on top of the mattress so it wouldn’t get in the way, and she slid the box out. Despite what she’d told Starbuck, she wasn’t sure, but it was like a sign from the gods that she was all alone in the house for the first time ever.

She set the box on the bed and carefully opened the lid. Wow. She’d only ever seen Dad looking at papers and pictures. There was a bunch of stuff in here, though - small paintings and paint tubes, a formal letter from something called Colonial Fleet Flight Academy, a jacket, more pictures, and some newspaper clippings. She hadn’t seen too many of those - mostly in the library at school. They were a relic from before Earth. Not much got printed on paper anymore.

She flipped slowly through each picture and paper, mostly people she didn’t know. There was one with Dad’s friend Lee and a red-headed woman. He was in a flight suit, so this was obviously from before they’d settled here.

The next one caught her attention, though. Thrace, Agathon Lead Fleet To Champ Win Over U. Tauron! Her brother’s name, and underneath that a picture of Dad swinging Starbuck around, huge smiles on both their faces. They looked so young, maybe not much older than she was now. She was engrossed in examining the picture for every single little detail and didn’t hear the front door or her dad’s footsteps in the hall.

“What are you up to, kiddo?”

She started, glancing down at the stuff spread out around her and at the paper in her hand.

“Oh.” Dad sat down on the corner of the bed.

She set the paper down between them, smoothing the edges, and pointed. “Who’s she?” She wanted to know why her "imaginary" friend was in a picture with Dad.

Dad smoothed one finger lightly over the picture, as if by doing so he could go into the memory. “Her name was Kara.”

Kara? She looked up at Starbuck and tilted her head.

“Yeah, nugget, my name’s Kara. Starbuck’s my call sign. Like your dad’s Karl, but sometimes I call him Helo.”

Dad continued as if he hadn’t heard that, which of course, he never did. “She was with Mom and you and me on Galactica, but she died when you were very young. Right after we got here.” He picked the paper up, and he was smiling, but it was one of his weird smiles - the not-happy, not-sad ones. “She was my best friend in all the worlds.”

“Now you know why I told you not to tell him about me,” Starbuck said. She’d walked over and sat on the bed next to Dad, her head on his shoulder, one hand covering his. She had tears in her eyes, and both she and Dad sniffed at the same time, which might have been funny on any other day. “I wanted to wait until you were old enough to understand.”

Hera wasn’t sure she did understand. The memories were good ones; Starbuck had told tales for years, laughing all the while, but today they made Dad and Starbuck both sort of sad. They must miss each other a lot. She put her hand down over Dad’s and Starbuck’s, and Starbuck curled her fingers between Dad’s.

She hesitated. “If she was your best friend, she must have been somebody really special, Dad. Maybe you could tell me about her sometime.” She looked up and Dad had tears in his eyes, too. “I bet she’d like that.”

Dad laughed, a short, sharp laugh. “Yeah, she’d love to know that her exploits were entertaining a whole new generation of humans. Not tonight, though. Your mom is probably already wondering where I am.” He looked at the stuff from the box and sighed. “You’ll put all this stuff away before we get back? Put it all away and one day soon, you and me, we’ll sit down and I’ll tell you about Kara Thrace.”

“Thrace?”

Dad nodded. “Kara Thrace.”

“Mom said you named him after your best friend. She never said your best friend was a girl.”

Starbuck - no, Kara - had her arms around Dad’s shoulders and she kissed his cheek. “Your dad’s a good guy, nugget. Best guy I ever knew. Best friend I ever had.” Then she smiled, and her teeth flashed. “But he won’t tell you the really good stuff, so listen to your dad’s stories, and when you’re a little older, I’ll dish the real dirt on Kara Thrace and Karl Agathon. Deal?”

She looked at Kara, then at Dad, and answered them both. “Deal.”

Dad smiled, and it was a real smile this time.