"Laura," Tory said, "I'm innocent. I understand why you're doing this, but you have to believe me... what can I do to help you see that I'm not a Cylon?"

Laura leaned against the wall of the airlock and sighed. "I don't know, Tory, that's the difficult part." It hurt her to see her aide like this, pleading and hollow-eyed, hands and feet tied just in case she was a Cylon and decided to try something... Whatever was happening downstairs between Lee and his wife was bad enough, but Tory was one of the only people Laura had truly trusted, except perhaps Bill... It was unthinkable that she was a Cylon.

But it was also unthinkable to Apollo and his father that Dee was. Hence the current predicament.

"Try to think of anything you can that might help us," Laura continued, crouching down so she could be eye to eye with Tory, who was sitting dejectedly on her mattress.

"I've already told you everything I can." Tory sighed. They had been here before what already seemed like a hundred times.

"Try again. Come on, Tory. The Admiral is threatening more extreme measures if we can't figure this out soon."

Anybody else might have asked Laura to talk him out of it – but she could see in Tory's eyes that she knew she wouldn't. What had to be done had to be done; that was Tory's own philosophy more often than not.

Tory shook her head slowly. "There's nothing," she said bleakly.

Laura squeezed her eyes shut, massaging her temples. "Let's start again from the beginning," she said after a moment, stepping across the small space to sit down next to her aide.

"We've been over everything. There's no point. There's nothing there."

Laura put a hand on Tory's arm. "Indulge me."

Tory looked at her. Laura looked back.

"Alright..." Tory said reluctantly. She shrugged. "I arranged everything a month ago. I did consider the dangers of having you and the Admiral travelling on the shuttle together, but I decided they were negligible due to the shortness of the trip. Obviously I was wrong about that." She gritted her teeth together, and didn't go on until Laura squeezed her arm in reassurance. "When we boarded the plane I spoke with Madam Vardon for a minute or two, then I went to get some food from the buffet table. That's when I looked across and saw Dualla doing something to the communications panel. I went over and asked her if everything was alright, and she said she was just giving Galactica our ETA. I stupidly didn't see anything suspicious about that, so we chatted for a while and then we were attacked. And no, I haven't suddenly remembered any convenient details which prove my innocence, and no I don't expect to either." Tory sighed, flexing her fingers.

Laura sighed. "Alright," she said, giving Tory's arm a final squeeze before getting to her feet. "Thank you." She looked at her aide, making sure she was looking back. "We'll figure this out somehow, Tory."

Tory smiled bitterly. "I hope you're right, Madam President."

Laura tried to smile a little more brightly, and knocked on the airlock door to be let out.

"Are they still down there?" she asked Gillen as he re-sealed the airlock.

He shrugged. "Don't see where else they could be, Madam President."

She ignored his bordering-on-snide tone of voice and started down the corridor. "Thank you, Mr. Gillan," she said over her shoulder. She didn't wait to see his reaction – the man was seriously beginning to get on her nerves...

Madam Vardon was still standing by the hatch leading to the hold when Laura arrived. "How do you think it's going?" she asked Scorpia's Quorum representative.

The other woman raised an eyebrow. "Well, they seem to be resolving some of their marital issues, but I don't think that tells us a thing about whether or not she's a Cylon."

"Hmm." Laura stood closer to the top of the ladder, trying to make out some of the conversation going on below.

All she could hear was crying.

"Dammit," she muttered under her breath, and was about to leave when she heard footsteps climbing slowly back up the ladder.

Dee emerged first, her face tear-stained and her hands noticeably unbound. Lee was close behind her, looking only a little less the worse for wear. They both stopped short when they saw Laura watching them.

"Madam President," Lee said, swallowing.

Dee merely glowered – but at least this meant she had regained some of her spirit.

"Major; Lieutenant," she acknowledged them, trying not to let any emotion show in her face or voice. She knew they wouldn't appreciate it when all she was going to do – all she could do, but she doubted they would see it that way – was send Dee back to be locked up again.

Lee put an arm around his wife's shoulders and escorted her back down the short corridor to the airlock.

Laura sighed. "Alright," she said to Madam Vardon as the other woman turned to follow Apollo and Dualla. "I think it's time to distribute today's rations."

Madam Vardon nodded over her shoulder as she walked. "Yes, Madam President."

Laura stepped back into the main cabin and beckoned Sebastian Woods over to help her distribute the food. They had put the crates containing the food and champagne in the corridor near the airlock, so that whoever was guarding the prisoners could keep an eye on those as well. Sebastian helped the two Quorum members deliver rations to the prisoners, while Laura returned to the cabin to give Melissa her food and to silently hand rations to the Adamas, who were standing close together and stopped talking to each other the moment they caught sight of Laura. She decided not to take this personally and returned to the crate for her own food.

She sat down by the airlock next to Sebastian, who was joining her in taking over from Gillan and Vardon while the Quorum members got some sleep in the makeshift barracks in the hold.

The reporter held his camera up to the tiny airlock window as he chewed his hard cheese, as he had done on the previous two occasions when Laura had shared this dubious duty with him.

"Haven't the batteries in that thing died by now?" Laura asked, raising an eyebrow as she chewed her own food.

"They're extra long-life, Madam President." Sebastian grinned and turned the camera to her. "And how are you faring today?" he asked.

Laura smiled wryly. "I'm fine, thank you for asking."

"Come on, Madam President, you've gotta give me more than that!" the reporter admonished, kneeling down to get a better angle on her. "The fleet will want to know what you're feeling in this dark, desperate situation."

"I have every faith in the people working to get us back up in the air," Laura answered, her Presidential mask perfectly in place. "And that's all you're getting, Sebastian, so turn that thing off."

Sebastian shrugged. "Yes ma'am," he said obligingly, turning the camera off and setting it down next to him after joining her on the floor.

"So how are you holding up, Mr. Woods?" Laura said, trying to chew a peanut slower than was humanly possible.

"Not so bad, Madam President." He popped one of his own peanuts into his mouth. "I've been kept busy, though. Not sure how I'd fare if I had nothing to do like those two in there."

Laura sighed. "Do you think we're doing the wrong thing in locking them up, Sebastian?"

"No!" The reporter looked appalled at the mere suggestion. "No. I'd much rather have them in there than potentially murdering me in my sleep. I just wonder how sane the innocent one is going to be after this is all over."

"Believe me, I've thought about that too," Laura confessed. "Probably more than is healthy for me."

Sebastian regarded her. "You shouldn't feel guilty, Madam President. You should be pissed with whichever one of them put you in this situation in the first place."

"That's the trouble, Mr Woods." Laura stood up, giving him a sad smile. "I don't know which one that is." She gazed through the window at the prisoners, who were demurely eating their rations. "I can't help feeling that my anger is the last thing this innocent woman needs, whoever she may be."

Laura let her eyes wander from Tory to Dee and back again. Neither of them looked particularly fiendish. One of them was, though.

And one of them was just the hurting woman she appeared to be.

Frak it.

She sat back down after a moment, trying to smile reassuringly. Sebastian made no further attempt at conversation, and the hours passed in silence and boredom and guilt until Madam Vardon and Mr. Gillan appeared to re-take their places as sentries.

"I'll go see if there's any more repair work I can do before I turn in," Sebastian said, grabbing his camera and heading down the corridor.

"Everything's the same, I take it?" Madam Vardon said.

"Yes." Laura stole a last look through the small window and saw that Tory was leaning against the wall, staring into space with tears running down her cheeks. Laura swallowed, trying to ignore the twisting feeling in her gut. "The same."

She smiled weakly and made her way back to her little room.

Passing thorugh the main cabin, she noted that it was curiously empty. She wondered briefly where everyone was, and then she saw the crates of food and champagne sitting in the middle of the room and had a sudden urge to steal a bottle or two and get so drunk she could forget about... well, everything.

No. She shouldn't.

There was plenty of champagne, though... It wouldn't be missed like the food...

No, she told herself. No, I mustn't.

Unfortunately she thought these thoughts only after she had already grabbed a bottle and run with it into her private cabin, leaning against the door in sudden exhilaration. And by then it was, of course, too late.

Oh well.

She sat on the bed and let herself sink backwards into the sheets, cradling the bottle to her chest as if it contained actual salvation rather than an illusory substitute. The moment of guilt she felt was quickly surpassed by the promise of her greater, more penetrating guilt being masked by a haze of alcohol. Pushing herself slowly into a sitting position again, Laura opened the bottle, wincing a little at the small popping sound. Would there be people out in the cabin again now? Would they have heard?

She raised the bottle to her lips – then stopped. What if there was a crisis and she was needed? It would hardly do to be drunk; wouldn't set a good example, never mind the possibility of Sebastian catching it on film.

...But what crisis could possibly arise where she could actually help here, anyway? she had no technical expertise, and their group of survivors was small enough for her to not be able to do much by simply showing her face and 'placating the masses'.

Besides, now that the bottle was open she could smell the champagne.

Laura drank.

A lot.

Almost immediately she began to feel pleasantly dizzy and warm – a side effect no doubt of her rather restricted diet. She started to giggle at the sheer improbability of her situation and had to put her fist in her mouth to stifle the noise – biting herself accidentally in the process.

Laura held her bleeding knuckles up to her face and studied them. She shrugged, lowered her hand and took another sip of the warm champagne... and then looked at her wounds again. There was something unpleasantly riveting about watching the blood slowly trickle over the back of her hand...

There was a knock at the door. "Madam President?" It was Bill's voice.

"Yes?" she called absently, still fascinated by the red liquid spreading gradually across her skin.

Bill opened the door. "Lau—Gods, are you alright?"

"I'm fine..."

The blood was starting to clot. Laura flexed her fingers.

Clearing his throat, Bill closed the door behind him and sat down next to her on the bed. "What happened to your hand?" he asked quietly.

"Hmm? Oh, nothing." Laura made to take another swig from the bottle, but Bill pried it from her fingers before it reached her mouth. "Hey..." she complained.

"I'm not sure drinking any more of this is the best idea," Bill said, picking up the cork from where it had fallen on the floor in front of him and pushing it back into the neck of the bottle.

"Why not?" Laura said petulantly, trying to forget that she had not intended to drink any of it at all...

"Laura..."

She sighed. "I'm sorry. It's just... getting to me."

Bill nodded, putting the champagne bottle on the floor by his feet. He took her uninjured hand in his and squeezed it comfortingly.

"Why is it that things seem to go wrong every Colonial Day?" Laura laughed almost bitterly. "Maybe we should just stop celebrating it anyway. 'S kinda redundant now, right?"

"Laura."

"I'm sorry," she said again. "I'm... tired."

"You should try to get some sleep."

"Hmm." Laura shrugged noncommittally.

"Laura," Bill repeated. "We are going to fix this."

"I wish I had your confidence."

He looked at her silently for a moment, then pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and held it to her mouth. "Spit," he commanded.

Laura did as she was told.

Bill set himself about the task of cleaning the blood from her hand, squeezing her fingers in apology when she hissed at the sting. When he was done he folded the handkerchief up and put it back in his pocket, pink with diluted blood though it was. For some reason Laura found herself vaguely amused by this.

Taking in her faint smile, he returned a warmer one. Running his thumb over the back of her hand once more he proceeded to get to his feet, taking the champagne bottle from the floor as he did so. "Get some sleep," he said again, opening the door to leave.

"Bill." Laura looked up, into his patiently expectant eyes. "Thank you," she told him.

He nodded and left, and she again did as she was told and got some sleep.