DISCLAIMER: Battlestar Galactica is the property of Glen A. Larson, Sci-Fi Channel, R & D TV, Sky and NBC Universal.
SPOILERS: Up to and including Season 3: Rapture. Part of this is adapted from something I wrote for a femslash_today porn battle earlier this year.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: Written for the Fragments of Sappho Challenge 2007 on dogged_by_muses.
ARCHIVING: Only with the permission of the author.
The Light Everlasting
By Celievamp
Fully formed into the world she rises. Resurrection isn't what it used to be. The answers she seeks remain elusive the truths she wants so badly to forget are with her still.
The others do not understand. They are beginning to believe that there is a fault and it lies within her. There is talk, though not yet in her direct hearing, of boxing, of terminating her whole line. She supposed she should feel sorry for her sisters, for condemning them all through her obsession to find the truth, the One. But she does not. She has learnt enough to realize that martyrdom is all too often part of the price one pays for uncomfortable truths.
She thinks of herself as D'Anna, as separate, unique. The other Threes may share her face, her memories but she alone has experienced them. She alone has touched the face and form of god.
The humans had the Lords of Kobol. Gods in multiple variant forms enough to cover the multitude of human behaviours, human frailties. A god for every occasion, every quirk of fate.
D'Anna as with the others of her kind held true to one god and one god alone. The god that was their creator. The god at whose whim they had the face and form of the humans they affected to despise.
God it seemed had a sense of humour. A rather sick one maybe, but that was neither here nor there.
The light and chill of resurrection eats into her more every time. The schizoid plainsong of the hybrid is a sweet high refrain in her mind. She remembers the planet, the temple. Gaius Balthar's blasphemous request. Was he the one? Was he God?
No. She had looked upon the face of God, realized the depth of her transgression, asked and in the moment of her death been granted forgiveness. To die and rise again. To know.
"You know the drill, long deep controlled breathing…"
Her brother welcoming her home. His solicitousness did not fool her. She knew the depth of his duplicity. God's will.
She blinked. In the shadows someone moved. Dark red hair, pale skin. That maddeningly enigmatic smile. Once she had been granted total access. If only she had known what a gift that was.
"At least you'll never have to go through this again. The decision wasn't easy but the conclusion was inevitable. Your model is fundamentally flawed…"
"No…" she whispered. He should understand, he who had walked amongst the humans in the form of a priest, who had counseled them, studied them most closely. Behind him the red headed woman frowned, placed a finger to her lips, her meaning clear. They would learn by her example not by her words. But still, she had to try. It had been her purpose, after all. Communication…
"It's not a flaw to question our purpose, is it? To the one who programmed us, the way we think, our mind."
She would have understood. Laura. D'Anna had never been sure if the woman's conscious mind recognized who and what she was, the greatness within. She had been tempered within and without – the destruction of her species, the cancer that ate her own cells. Certainly she had glimpsed a little of the truth when she claimed to be a prophet.
Their first face to face meeting before D'Anna had been unmasked had been revelatory in so many ways though D'Anna had not truly understood the significance at the time. Roslin had proven herself more than capable of handling the reporter, firm in her presidential persona, just a little school ma'am, a tight rein kept on Adama her military attack-dog. She had given no hint of her inner turmoil, seemed immune to D'Anna's carefully judged flirting. D'Anna had guessed at hidden depths but had completely failed to grasp the complexity. It was a hard fact for the Cylon's to accept that humans seemed beyond their understanding no matter how hard they trumpeted Cylon superiority.
He was speaking again. One voice speaking for all. But not for her. Not any more. "That's the problem right there, the messianic conviction that you're on a mission to enlighten us. Look at the damage it's caused."
D'Anna focused beyond him, on the figure in the shadows. "I would do it all again." The figure nodded, accepting her fealty.
D'Anna knew how to use her sexuality. Oh, she wasn't as adept as the Sixes were but the Three's had nothing to be shy about. During her interrogation of Roslin in the cells on New Caprica she had sought to understand the woman by dominating her – and had failed again.
That second failure led her to here. A third and final chance. She would not – could not – fail again. All the human stories told her this. Third time was the charm. Sentence was being pronounced.
"Yes, we know. That's why we've decided to box your entire line, your consciousness, your memory, every thought your line has ever had is going into cold storage. Indefinitely."
Even now D'Anna knew she could not die. She would just cease to be for a space of time. She had tried to explain it to Roslin as part of her interrogation. They had talked for a time about the nature of death.
"Death to us is a mere inconvenience. A few hours and we will be resurrected in a new body. To begin again."
"But it must stay with you, the pain and the horror of that moment. Particularly a violent death," Roslin said.
"One adapts," D'Anna shrugged. "Your people have no such second chance."
"We live our lives to the full whilst we can," Roslin said. "And if by giving up that life we can strike a blow for the freedom of our people… as you said. One adapts."
D'Anna stared down at her. Without her spectacles the human had lost some of that reserve, that presence. She seemed… softer. Her skin was pale from her incarceration, and so soft to her touch. She was showing signs of age, there were wrinkles on her face, around her eyes and the curve of her cheek – laughter lines the humans called them though D'Anna could not remember ever seeing Roslin laugh. She let her fingers slide over the front of the white shirt Roslin was wearing, feeling the fullness of the woman's breasts, the slight flabbiness of the abdomen. Roslin did not resist, her expression did not change. The coolness in her eyes did not shade into fear or contempt. What happened happened. Her faith answered all.
As did D'Anna's. Or so she believed. "God sees all that we do. We succeed or fail by his will. But… why did our god make us in your image? What is the true significance of that? Why make us so alike and yet so different? You are ephemeral, we are eternal."
She had not meant to keep touching the woman. Not at first. But something about her called to her. She understood from Loeben how useful the threat of rape was to both female and male subjects. She understood from the Sixes how it felt to be brutalized, humiliated, to live in fear. Something inside her wanted to see how far she could go with this woman. She began to undo the button's on Roslin's shirt then lost patience with it, gripped the two sides of the material and forcefully pulled them apart.
"You call us skinjobs," D'Anna said. She caressed Roslin's breast through the utilitarian cotton underwear, her other hand sliding down to unfasten the woman's trousers, tug them down over her slim hips. She could feel the human woman's muscles quivering beneath the skin. Her thumbnail grazed across the sensitive nub of flesh she could feel swelling beneath the cotton. Roslin made no sound, her expression did not change but D'Anna could smell the change in her, see the minute beads of perspiration begin to form on the woman's brow. "Skinjobs," she drawled out the word as she pressed long fingers against the soft hair that masked the woman's sexual centre, feeling the warmth the deepening scent of musk on the air. Roslin's jaw tightened minutely. "Less politically correct than humanform but you can get some real feeling into those words, some real hatred."
"What do you hope to achieve by this… line of questioning?" Roslin asked. Her voice quavered slightly as D'Anna continued to caress her.
"A better understanding of what it is to be human, perhaps," D'Anna said. "A little more insight into the psyche of the infamous Laura Roslin." She could feel the woman tremble at her touch. She could sense no fear in the woman, indeed, Roslin's legs had parted a little more to allow her better access. D'Anna leaned in, pressing Roslin into the chair as her hand moved from her shoulder to tangle in her hair, pulling her head back so that D'Anna could kiss her. Roslin's lips were cool and unresponsive at first but then she started to kiss back and D'Anna knew a small moment of triumph. Whatever else she was, Laura Roslin was a human and like all humans could be manipulated. What it cost her was immaterial. This was God's will after all.
Then she realized. Roslin was giving in to her, submitting willingly to her touch, her domination. She still believed she controlled the situation. Perhaps she did… D'Anna was suddenly racked with uncertainties. She drew back, lifted her hand and struck Roslin hard across the face. A trail of blood eased slowly down her chin from a split lip. Roslin just stared at her.
Blood birthed revelation. D'Anna knew that if she was injured or killed she would bleed and bleed and as long as there was a resurrection ship close enough she'd wake up tomorrow good as new. Physically anyway. The pain inside was another matter. The cancer of her soul ran deep and dark.
Roslin had no such assurance. But she did not care. Life for the average human was a one-time thing. But Laura Roslin was not the average human. And D'Anna realized with a thrill that she was just a little bit afraid of her.
She ran her fingers over Laura's bared breasts, pinching the dark nipples, watching Roslin quiver. She could smell Roslin's arousal and her own. "Tell me what I need to know and this pain will end," she whispered in Roslin's ear before catching the lobe between her teeth, biting and twisting. The muscles in Roslin's jaw tightened slightly, her eyes slid closed. The pulse in her throat jumped, just a little. D'Anna dragged her sharp nails over the soft skin of her captive's breasts, her belly raising red welts. "Tell me about Earth. About the thirteenth tribe. Tell me what you've seen." She moved her hand lower, through the soft pelt, parting the slick folds and penetrating the woman on two stiff fingers. Her other hand was still wrapped in Roslin's dark red hair. "Tell me about Earth. Has the Galactica made contact?"
She pushed and twisted her fingers deeper, nails deliberately raking delicate tissues. The hot wetness that greeted her touch was not just arousal. Copper tainted the air. Yet Roslin was ignoring the pain, pushing herself against D'Anna's hand. D'Anna is intrigued, wondering how far Roslin was willing to take this. D'Anna pushed her thumb against the nub of flesh so important in the human sexual response and was not disappointed. At last Roslin cried out, moaning deep in her throat, the sound enough to start a secondary sexual response in D'Anna.
It would be easy to kill Roslin. The hand in her hair wrapped around her throat instead would be enough. Just a little pressure and it would be done. The light in those eyes would die away. Perhaps that was what Roslin really wanted from her. Sacrificing her life to push D'Anna over the edge. To end it all.
But what if it didn't end. What if somewhere else on a resurrection ship somewhere as one life faded another flared. There were so many unknowns, so many mysteries. Who was to say that Roslin was not just another one. Five remained faceless. Perhaps she was one. Or more than that. The One. So D'Anna believed in that moment. This was her truth. But no one would hear it.
In the temple staring from face to face she saw her again over and above them all, the curve of red hair against her cheek, that enigmatic smile, the wisdom, the truth. This time she understood. This time she did not, would not fail.
Her brother, her executioner pressed a button and it was done. The light of all her other days faded, the cold took her down and down and down. The light died. She died. But the truth, the wisdom remained, immutable and bright.
The last thing D'Anna saw was Roslin's enigmatic smile.
The End