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2020-11-05
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I Dream of Galactica

Summary:

Permission to archive: to WWOMB, yes
Fandom(s): BSG (original)
Genre: het/slash
Pairing/Characters: Apollo/Sb, Apollo/FC
Rating: FRT (this chapter)
Summary: A pretty girl on a deserted beach teachs Apollo to be careful what he wishes for: he just might get it. ;)
Warnings: None
Notes: Crossover
Submitted through the BSG_Fantasies mailing list.

Work Text:

I Dream of Galactica
by MultiMedea

"Well, Captain, as every gambler knows, it's the Law of Averages. It was bound to be your turn sooner or later."

"I'd have rather it be much later than sooner, Starbuck. Better yet not at all."

"Hey, at least it's pretty sunny down there with some great coastlines. Think of it as your big chance to get away from it all. You could work on your tan while you're waiting."

"Just get back to the Fleet as soon as you can and requisition a tech crew and a shuttle. I've never been much of a beach bum."

"We'll be back before you can get your toes wet and order an ambroisa mai tai. And if you see any Piscean girls down there in those little grass skirts, save one or two of them for me. Recon Viper Two, out."

Apollo heard a nasty chuckle reverberate over his Viper's comlink before he shut it off and his mouth twitched up to one side. He was certain that within two centons of Starbuck setting foot on the Galactica's landing deck the story would make its way around of how the ship's valiant Strike captain was doomed to make a flaming crash landing on some forbidding little watery planetoid-with no supplies and a gushing, near-fatal wounding-perhaps never to be heard from again. And only through the quick actions of his even more valiant yet humble wingman could any hope for a last-minute rescue be attempted.

He could just bang his helmeted head against the Viper's cockpit in frustration. For one, he was making a *controlled* forced planetary insertion, not a crash landing. He'd already picked out a lovely spot next to the seashore where he would set down his ship as lightly as a butterfly's kiss upon a rose petal. Two, he'd barely scratched his left arm when his Viper had made the sickening lurch that told him something was very wrong with its coolant system before the warning systems did. And third, the sickening lurch wouldn't have happened if the Fleet wasn't forced into using a synthesized tylium derivative for the Viper squadrons coolant systems to save every gram of pure tylium for the Fleet's drive systems.

Wilker and his lab cronies had managed a fairly useful stop-gap measure to the Fleet's constant fuel crises when they brewed up the derivative. But occasionally a batch slipped through that wasn't up to par. And through no fault of his own Apollo's Viper was cursed with such a batch. Not that that would make any difference to the squadrons after his good friend Starbuck was through with them. His wingman was sure to bring up the subject of Apollo's last squadron briefing. On how the Fleet could ill afford to have even one of its valuable attack craft or its pilots out of service for frivolous or careless reasons. And how anyone who did go out of service better damn well have a Cylon raider trying to chew a hefty chunk out of his afterburners.

He wouldn't be able to show his face in the Officers' Club for two day shifts at least.

~~~

As inhospitable planetoids to be marooned on in the middle of nowhere went, Apollo supposed the place he was stuck in for the time being wasn't so bad. The island was of a good size with lush, swaying vegetation and no large predators showing up on his scanners. Soft rolling green waves lapped at a shiny black sandy shoreline and a balmy sea breeze blew a spicy-not-salty tasting kiss against his cheek. Apollo bent down and let a handful of the fine black grains tumble loosely from his spread fingers. Evidence of some volcanic activity in the planet's dim past? his scientific mind wondered.

**Heh. If Starbuck was here he wouldn't care what volcano it came from. He'd say what a great contrast it was against sunbathing skin. Then he'd mock me for being too shy to sunbathe without tan lines. Then he'd take off for the waves like a bat out of hell with all my clothes after I was dumb enough to listen to him about the tan lines.**

He quickly stood up and brushed the remaining grains from his hand against his pant leg. Where had that flight of fancy come from? He was marooned on some Lords-forsaken backwater. Again. He wasn't looking to set up some beachfront vacation home. Perhaps the silly little daydream popped up to take his mind away from how alone he felt standing on a forlorn alien shore with only the tide for company. No Starbuck. No Boomer. No anyone.

"Oh, enough of the pity party already, Captain," he chided himself. "Your emergency beacon's set, you've got ration bars, and the water's safe. I think you can hold out for the seven or eight centares it'll take for the shuttle to get here. Without cracking up and hallucinating your friends being stuck with you."

Still, it would have been nice to share the truly scenic view with someone. The entire Fleet could use a rest, a brief beautiful sojourn from the endless running and hiding. Boxey would love this place, he thought. He could visualize his son tearing down the beach head with Muffet nipping at his heels and both trying to terrorize the sea birds he'd barely glimpsed at the other end of the shore. He could see Athena's splendid swimmer's build cutting swiftly, gracefully through the frothy waves as Boomer labored manfully but in vain to catch her. And over there, on that smooth outcropping of rock Cassie and Sheba would sit, sharing their own secrets, their faces upturned to the warming rays as naturally as sunflowers.

And beneath him, at his feet, he saw wind-tossed honeyed tresses resting on folded, sculpted arms. A broad, smooth back tapering to a trim waist and running to well-muscled thighs and rounded calves. Golden, sun-kissed skin against black sands.

**Lords of Kobol, help me.**

And not a tan line anywhere.

**I promised I wouldn't torture myself like this anymore. I promised.**

But his traitorous heart only laughed at his conflicted mind's feeble protest and let the fantasy spin itself out. The vision at Apollo's feet turned its head toward him and broke out a lazy, satisfied smile of dazzling whiteness. The sun shades perched on the tip of its nose couldn't mask eyes as blue as the depths of the Pacifica Ocean. The vision then turned onto its back and refolded its arms under its head, displaying everything a touch-starved captain could hope to see.

And Apollo would swear to his grave that it said, "Since you're blocking my light like that you might as well do the job of a sunscreen properly and join me...Sir."

"Shut up, Starbuck." Apollo sent a hard kick into the sand to banish the too- tempting, utterly annoying mirage.

"Ow! Frack! What the h-?"

He dropped to the sand in a slump, cradling his damaged left foot. He felt like he'd just kicked a lump of collapsed durotylium. How in the nine hells could sand be so hard? **That's what I get for indulging in wishful thinking, he groused. A lot of pain.**

It wasn't bad-tempered paranoia on his part speaking but calm, reasoned experience. Except for the accident of his birth, he knew he'd never been a lucky man. Every thing else that had come to him had been the result of hard work, his own intellect, and his punishing drive to be a success in his family's eye. Anytime he had wished for anything for himself, without having earned it, the results were spectactularly bad.

On the day of the Great Destruction, he hadn't been sorry that Zac and Starbuck had pulled a bait& switch on him for that last patrol. He had secretly wished for a chance to show off for his baby brother, to show him how they flew in the big leagues. Perhaps it was childish one-upmanship on his part but he so wanted Zac to see him as dashing and ready-for-anything as Starbuck was. Only, he wasn't ready for such gross betrayal and his beloved little tag-along paid for Apollo's vanity with his life.

And after he and Adama landed in the blackened, ruined gardens of their home, while his father delicately picked through the still-smoking, twisted cinders for anything to prove they were once a family there, Apollo desperately wished for something to fill the yawning void of complete loss. For anything to save him from the hollowed-eyed pain writ upon Adama's soot-smudged face for the theft of his wife and son and his world.

How fate had answered that plea. His wish made flesh and bone, descending from the blackened hillside like God's own gift from the mount to him. He still remembered her that way, in sweat-drenched restless nights when the morning was too far away. Glowing oval face, fiercely defiant eyes, wielding her weak torch like a flaming sword set to smite her enemies. She should have been ridiculous, with her tiny bedraggled frame standing toe-to-toe to the mighty Commander Adama and shaming him into continuing the fight. But she wasn't. She was glorious. The Cylons had hurt her, hurt them all, but they didn't come close to beating her down. At that moment he knew he wasn't defeated, either. How could he be, when he now had her?

And when her child, her fatherless son, who'd just lived through a horror no child should bear, looked up to him with shining eyes as his hope for the future, he knew it was all meant to be. His family. His new world. *His gift.*

Apollo's chin dropped to his clenched knees. The rolling green waves before him shimmered and broke into a thousand thousand pinpoints of radiant white light in his sight.

"What the Lord giveth," he whispered, "the Lord taketh away." A hot tear splashed onto his pant leg and soaked through the material. No matter how many times he repeated that truth to himself it didn't relieve an iota of his pain. It didn't make the loss any more fair to him or Boxey. And it didn't excuse him for his secret, selfish thought after Starbuck was reunited with them on dead Kobol.

**Now I can have them both.**

He, of all people, should have known it didn't ever work that way for him. He didn't know how, he didn't know why, he couldn't even admit it to Starbuck, but fate had marked him out for something. For a long time he had laughed off such a nebulous fear as paranoia, or a Sire's son's too-swelled head. Then he encountered Iblis, the Ship, John...and knew it for bone-chilling fact. Some big laugh on a man who'd never considered himself a fatalist. But he could no longer deny it and remain sane. Fate's focus was on him and whatever task it demanded of him. Everything else in his life apparently was considered incidental.

So, hell yes, he spoiled Boxey dreadfully and couldn't bear to let his son out of his sight. Damn straight Starbuck could really do no wrong in his eyes. He cherished his every moment with both of them. Greedily stored away their laughter, their touches, and their smiles until the universe noticed his quiet joy and redressed the balance. It was only a matter of time.

Apollo dashed his jacket sleeve across his eyes. "God, man, if you aren't the most pathetic thing ever, I don't know what is." He kicked at the dark sand with the heel of his boot in chagrin. "If this is what a day at the beach does to you, you need to stay locked in a Viper cockpit. And now I'm talking to myself. With Starbuck's voice. Maybe the sun's baking my brains. This is so boring, something needs really to happen..."

His heel continued thumping against the shifting sand.

The tidal froth edged up and retreated ceaselessly.

Shore birds cawed and wheeled in the air in their play.

The golden red sun inched infinitesimally across the sky.

"Like now!" he yelled to the sky. His boot heel made a glassy *clink* against something buried in the sand. Intrigued, he dropped his gaze to the shallow hole he'd inadvertently dug up. Something smooth and round, but crusted with sand, poked out of the depression.

"Hello?" He reached down and pulled the object free. It seemed rather oddly oblong to his eye to be an actual rock. But he supposed a piece of volcanic glass could have formed that way. He thought Greenbean might like it to add to his xenogeology collection. After it had been cleaned and safely gone through decon first. At least he could manage the cleaning part now. Apollo let the rock thing drop to the sand as he pulled off his boots and socks. He then pushed up his pants legs and unsealed the bottoms of his pressure suit. He snatched up his prize again and waded out into the surf to his calves. The waters were blood-warm and felt delicious against his skin. Maybe a bath and a swim wouldn't be completely out of the question, he wondered as his toes curled and flexed against the soft sandy bottom and his fingers gently rubbed away the crusty deposits on the object.

The more debris he removed the more Apollo grew convinced his `rock' wasn't a rock at all. Crumbly sand clumps gave way to smoothly polished surfaces and unnaturally even indentations. He straightened from his bent-over posture and held his prize up to the sunlight.

It was...a bottle. Like none he had ever seen before. Though it did remind him of some of the ancient glasswares of Scorpia's deep-desert regions. It was almost gaudy in its colorful ornamentation and its flaming specks of encrusted gemstones. Evidence of a civilization capable of sophisticated glassblowing and gemstone cutting? On a supposedly uninhabited planetoid. Was it native to the world? How old was is? How long had it been buried on such a deserted beach? The questions intrigued him but he knew Adama was the anthropologist of the family, not he. From this one artifact he bet the commander could suss out the culture, habits, age, and religion of this theoretical civilization. Their probable drinking preferences, too.

"I'm afraid you won't be going to Greenbean after all, my friend. Your mysteries will keep my father entranced for sectons." He waded back to shore and loped over to the spot where he left his survival gear. He plopped the upright bottle into the sand next to his bag and began stripping off his uniform.

"I suppose you'll be safe enough here from any uniform sneak thieves," Apollo chuckled as he dropped his folded clothing on the sand. "Now, bottle, stay and watch my stuff."

Perhaps it was a trick of the sunlight against its surface, but he was sure the gaudy glass had winked back a flash of compliance to his wish. So it didn't at all seem strange to him when he patted its jeweled stopper and said, "Good girl." A quick check of the dermaplast against his left arm to verify its seal and then he was tearing toward the waves with a roar in his heart.

It was amazing how grubby life aboard ship could make him feel. On the Galactica all the air had been breathed before, all the waters drank before. The lights could only mimic a star's fire, never burn, never seep beneath the skin and warm from the inside out. Here the land, the seas, even the very air was ecstatically fresh and abundant. He could feel the breath of life press against him from every side and he almost grew drunk on the sensation.

Apollo returned to his small encampment and smiled at the bottle and its sentinel's perch atop his clothing. "Thanks!"

He dropped onto his back and let the sun's rays dry his torso as the radiant heat from the sand warmed his backside. He lay that way for several moments, feeling water droplets trickle down his sides and a light breeze flutter his hair. Everything should have been pleasantly perfect. But something disturbed his sense of peace. His head rolled over to the side and he stared at the mystery bottle. Its pretty, gaudy designs flashed back at him.

"I left you in the sand. I know I did."

Apollo sat up abruptly, his head swiveling in every direction at the dense foliage, the rocky shoreline, even the crashing waveheads. It wasn't possible that something or someone could have sneaked up on him during his swim. His scanner was set to detect any lifeform larger than a bird within .2 kilometres and warn him. He picked up the device to check its function. Except for himself, a few larger birds circling above, and some marine life offshore, he was alone.

He and the bottle, he corrected. And his curiosity about it was growing in leaps and bounds by the moment. He picked it up with his free hand and set the scanner to in-depth mode. The readout was mostly what he expected: silica and trace elements in the dioxazine purple glass, pure compressed carbon of the diamonds, beryl in the emeralds, and alumina of the sapphires and rubies. Traceries of gold in the swirling designs.

But, the bottle's interior showed as a void. Not merely air or some dense liquid, but a null reading. Bizarre. He knew his next move was completely reckless, probably dangerous, and throughly foolish. Not even Starbuck or a green cadet would do it. But he had to know. **Here goes nothing, or everything.**

The stopper worked out of the bottle's neck with surprising ease considering how long it had probably been wedged there. Apollo held a breath, then released it with chagrin. No noxious fumes he hoped. He twirled the bottle around with his fingertips. No slosh of liquid or anything else. He held it up to the sun and peered through the neck. Filtered purple light illuminated the interior dimly. There might have been something stuck to the bottom of it but he couldn't tell for certain.

He dropped the bottle to the sand between his knees with a touch of disappointment. No exotic perfumes or liquors. Not even the vaguely romantic notion of a rolled-up message tossed to the waves of fate. He fell onto his back and crossed his arms beneath his head as his eyes closed against the sun's glare.

"Well, my dear, as least Father will still want to see you."

"O, most Gracious and Noble Master, it will be thy humble servant's pleasure to meet thy honorable father."

Apollo's eyes popped open and he raised himself to his elbows. Between his outspread legs knelt...a girl? A beauty of a girl. Golden yellow hair against a creamy complexion. Slim, rounded limbs and a curvy body wrapped in filmy, silken drapings. A pretty heart-shaped face with merry sapphire blue eyes and a soft, pouty mouth made for kisses. The scent of jasmine incense wreathed her and covered Apollo in its spell.

He sputtered and gulped, not knowing what to say first. "Wha-Who...Who are you?"

She smiled prettily at him, slipped onto his chest, and wrapped soft arms around his neck. "I am thine, dear Master." She raised her face to his and gently, sincerely kissed his parted lips.

"Now," she asked as she settled into his embrace, "what mighty deed will thou have me perform for thee first?"

end