Disclaimer: Don't own a single bit.
If Helo didn't get his ass back up to this room in the next ten seconds she was not going to be responsible for what would happen to its other occupants. If he left Lee down in the parking lot, that wouldn't be the worst thing in the worlds either. Was it bad that she was picturing him stuck in Red Head's car banging on the windows and screaming?
It's not like Helo told her Lee was going to be there. This was game night. Fun night. The night they got to forget about training exercises and simulators and combat strategy. Who was she kidding? She did that every night. The fact was, Helo had just told her he was inviting a friend. That big bastard sure was sneaky sometimes.
Sneaky but smart. He knew Kara, and he knew when something was bothering her. It was a good thing he had such a subtle way of letting her know that he knew, or she might be obliged to kick his ass.
"What do you ladies say to getting this party started right now?" Pie Face looked expectantly around the room, but the red head just glared at him and then turned back towards the blonde as if he had never even said a word. He seemed oblivious to the slight and began unpacking the liquor from the bags. Kara chuckled and decided she might actually try to be social. Could be fun.
"Hey, Bobcat. You go up against Rocco in the sims today?"
"Yeah. That frakker blew out my wing in the last three seconds. He laughed the whole way to the Mess." Kara made a sympathetic face like she understood poor Bobcat's humiliation, but let's face facts: Kara had no idea what it was like to lose in the simulators. In most situations, she would have laughed and said "I'd have smoked your ass too," but this was Helo's girl, and he had specifically asked her to be nice. So she was going to be nice. Like it's hard or something.
"And he arrives just in the nick of time with nourishment!" Helo roared into the room followed by Lee. "One at a time ladies. One at a time. I may look big, but there's only so much Agathon to go around." Bobcat stood up and kissed Helo on the cheek as she grabbed the bag of food from his hands. Lee smiled awkwardly and ducked past them to set his bag on the desk. Kara watched him over Pie Face's head for the next few moments as he busied himself with the food. He hadn't looked in her direction once since he came back in, and he wore a peculiar half grin on his face that she could tell was barely containing the broad smile he very obviously wished to conceal. What was that bastard up to?
This was Apollo after all. He sucked at keeping secrets. Shortly after she met him, Lee was involved in an incident with her that involved a certain personal item of their instructor's being displayed without permission on the old general's statue in the quad that got them both thrown in the brig overnight. He could have gotten out of it by just admitting to his role in affair, but silence ensured neither one of them took the fall officially. Lee kept quiet all night, astonishing her, and when they were released the next day he assured her that he could be trusted. But as soon as the rumors started to circulate that Starbuck's new cohort in crime had done the deed, he was like a kid sitting on his hands to keep them from flying about. He went one whole day with his eyes lighting up anytime someone whispered as he went by before he told anybody that would listen that he was most certainly the rebel he was being made out to be. He'd never know how much trouble she had gone to in order to keep that fact from getting back to their superiors, but dammit if that mischievous light he got in his eyes wasn't completely worth it. And as much as he claimed otherwise, he couldn't hide it if he tried.
That blue twinkle usually amused her much more than the prank itself did, but tonight it made her nervous. He wasn't looking at her. That was never good. He told her once that his grandfather always said his guilty clients never looked him in the eye. So what exactly was Apollo guilty of?
"Starbuck!" Helo yelled. Her head turned suddenly towards him and he frowned. "I asked if you wanted a beer or the good stuff." Helo's red head was hanging off of him possessively, and now they were both staring at her. Helo looked quickly to Lee and then back at Kara and arched an eyebrow. Her eyes widened for a split second before she looked around the room to see everyone staring at her, including Lee. Frakkity frak frakkin' frak.
"Come on, Karl," she said leaning back in her chair and smiling easily, "you know I start off with nothing less than two shots of the good stuff!" She laughed deeply and Helo smiled as Bobcat played with his tags, and out of the corner of her eye she saw Lee smirk. Frakkin' flyboy was making her angry. And he damn well knew it, too!
"Alright, here you go, Trigger." Helo placed two shots of whatever cheap brown liquor they had in front of her, and Lee chose this moment to finally make his way to the table and sit down across from her.
She looked down and contemplated her shots for a moment. Better put on the Starbuck face. That's what the people came to see. When she looked up she found two blue eyes staring at her. Whatever game he was playing with her, she intended to win it, so she held his gaze but spoke to Helo. "Better make that one more." When three small glasses sat in front of her and all eyes in the room rested on her, she downed each drink one after the other without so much as making a face.
"Now that's what I'm talking about!" Pie Face shouted while pointing at Kara. Helo clapped above his head and whooped while Lee and Bobcat followed his lead. The quiet blonde, Nanny, simply stared and mouthed the word "damn."
"Starbuck, marry me?" Pie Face was on his knees sliding toward her chair. He took her hand and made to kiss it, but she yanked it from his grip and smacked him on the head.
"Godsdammit, Randy!" She hit him again and pointed towards his chair. Pie Face sheepishly got up and found his seat. Helo was doubled over and shaking with laughter, but Lee just smiled, shook his head and patted him on the back as if to say "better luck next time."
An hour later and fifty odd cubits gone, Kara giggled and raked her winnings over the cards on the table in front of her. The alcohol had relaxed her and coaxed enough Starbuck out onto the surface to make the room hers. As if it would be anyone else's.
Helo threw his cards on the table and shook his head. "I need a beer break. You take anymore of my money and I'm gonna have to beg my dad for grocery cash. And you know I don't like talking to my father, much less asking him for something." Helo did his best to glare at Kara and let her know he meant business, but she just laughed and threw a piece of popcorn at him. "Fine, I'll just let you ask him then," Helo laughed and returned fire with a few pretzels.
While Helo got up to get more drinks, Kara looked around the small room jammed with laughter and people and furniture and smoke. It was totally trashed. Bottles and wrappers or boxes from food seemed to cover every flat surface, and she marveled that any of them could move so much as an inch without causing a domino-effect crash of the evidence of the night's merriment. Somehow Helo seemed to be able to rifle through the mess on the desk turned make-shift bar without looking too drunk or knocking a single bottle over. Who said flying Raptors took no finesse?
Pie Face suddenly laughed out loud and comfortably draped an arm over Nanny's shoulders. She smiled as she leaned in and said something softly just to him, and he laughed again. Kara had to chuckle. And gape. For some reason, Pie Face doing well with a girl – an attractive, reasonably intelligent girl at that – was something she didn't expect to see before graduation, or at least not without money changing hands. Lee seemed to be thinking the same thing, and he and Kara exchanged half amused, half impressed smiles and eyebrow raises before each of them abruptly looked away.
"Anybody else ready for another one?" Helo's question was met with the shooting up of five hands holding bottles or glasses. "Guess that means I'm the bar tender," he said to himself.
"Tell you what, Karl," Kara said with a grin. "If you really need that money you lost so badly, maybe we can work something out."
"I can't beat you at triad. I've tried, and you always walk away with my cash."
"Who said anything about cards? You've got drinks to serve, and I need to be entertained, so let's make a deal. I'll give you five cubits if you lose that shirt while you tend bar." Kara's grin was almost wider than her face. Helo held her gaze for a moment, considering before his face broke out into a grin that matched her own. Without a word he removed his tanks and threw them onto the nearest bed. He put his hands on his hips and stood there posing while the room looked on in seeming disbelief.
Helo broke his pose and found a bottle opener to quickly open two bottles before he stopped and put his hands on his hips once more. "Five cubits for all this," he said indicating his chest with an up and down motion of his hands.
"Maybe if you're good I'll give you a nice, fat tip." Kara smirked for as long as she could before a loud cackle rolled out of her with the force of a caged animal breaking free. Pie Face and Nanny joined in, but the red head frowned. Lee seemed to be finding the exchange amusing, but he looked at Kara with his eyes slowly narrowing for just a little too long after his short chuckle. She had him. He could be a smug-ass, cocky little bitch if he wanted to, but she could still rile him into jealousy, and that made her feel more like Starbuck than she had all night.
Helo made the rest of the drinks and somehow managed to reassure his date at the same time. Kara had to hand it to him. He sure had a way with women, because by the time he was putting a bottle in front of Lee and a glass in front of her, Bobcat was smiling and pouting at him. Apparently Helo deprivation caused mood swings in red heads.
Kara tossed Helo ten cubits and slumped back in her chair. She closed her eyes while she drank two mouthfuls of brown liquor, and when she opened them she caught Lee glance away from her hastily. She had been trying for the past hour to read anything other than mischief from the usually transparent Apollo, but tonight he was more like tinted windows. Shit, she had taught him too well. She figured she had little chance of stopping him in whatever he was doing or going to do – he could be so damned stubborn sometimes – so she might as well not worry about it.
Lee got up for another beer and Kara noticed not for the first time that night that this had turned into a couples evening, a six headed monster. Bobcat was in Helo's lap, and Pie Face and Nanny were on his bed talking softly. It's not like nights like this had never happened before. She got paired with Lee automatically in these situations. The scenario would usually begin with fun and drinks with a group but divide as the evening went on into pairs ignoring the group and acting as if they were alone. By the time Starbuck and Apollo realized they were only talking to each other it was too late.
That's what happened the night of Semo's party. Only she realized as soon as they left campus. Helo had shown up at their bunk room alone but said he had to make a quick stop at Hockney Hall before they left for Brim's. They stopped and he came out of the building laughing with a red head, arms around each other's waists. This was a double date by way of sneak attack, and completely Helo's doing. He knew that was the night Kara had planned to pull her prank on Apollo and he had 40 cubits riding on its success, so why the hell would he bring a date? Helo had to get his kicks too, she guessed, but Kara fumed and "frakked" under her breath for most of the walk.
By the time they reached the bar, Kara had decided to make the most of it – she could have had a much worse date – and have as much fun with her best friend as possible before she made him pay. Of course that meant she would have to be incredibly drunk. Everything was set, so she just had to stick to Lee and let it play out. Why not get wasted and enjoy the Apollo Humiliation Show that much more?
But it hadn't exactly gone as she planned. Oh, no, the next morning turned out almost exactly as she had planned; it was the night that had gone off course. She had drunk too much. Simple as that. She had made sure Lee had enough at Brim's to cause alcohol-related amnesia, but she hadn't exactly restrained herself. Once they got to the party the ambrosia flowed and Starbuck never turned down the good stuff. Especially if it was free. Playing that damn game was where it all went to hell. Helo left with his date, and Kara was too drunk to object to a stupid game that she was sure she could make add to Lee's punishment.
She remembered "Sir" as an almost harmless, juvenile academy truth and dare game that got old after they made it through their first year. And it had started that way with ten people in the kitchen that night. Murphy said "Sir, yes sir" and got the game going by revealing which instructor he would rather frak. The game went from person to person, each answering a potentially embarrassing question or saying "Sir, no sir" and acting on a dare. The first round was fairly tame with cadets taking shots or dancing ridiculously or, in Lee's case, pretending to be a horse for two timed minutes. By the last round, no one was answering questions anymore and they had the rest of the party goers watching what stupid, crazy thing one of them would have to do next.
Nope. No. Nuh uh. She was not going to think about it. It was bad enough that she left her only good, date night bra on the floor of Semo's kitchen, but she had to sneak into Boyd Hall the next day and tear apart Freight Train's rack to find her fleet ID card.
Lee was looking at her again. He was grinning at her like the cat that ate the canary. That was it. No more of this couples crap.
"Hey, let's get another game going. It's not even close to curfew, and I'm out of here if I have to watch Randy flirt anymore."
"Gee, I'd love to play some cards, but someone already cleaned me out," said Helo with mock enthusiasm.
"Them's the breaks then, Karl. Guess you'll be a spectator."
"I'm out of money too," Nanny said.
"Okay, fine. New game then."
They all looked at each other for a moment. Creativity was clearly not a requirement for admittance to the academy. Helo spoke up with a twinkle in his eye and a smirk. He caught Kara's gaze. "How about we go old school, and play a nice game of—"
"Strip triad!" Pie Face suggested, no, shouted triumphantly. Evidently his success with the blonde chick had gone to his head.
"Careful there, Helo. I've already got your money and the shirt off your back. You feel like losing more?"
"We'll see who ends up naked," Helo answered.
"Uh huh, we'll sure see something… even if it's just a bit disappointing."
"Don't worry, Kara. I'll help you out of your bra soon enough," Lee said without a trace of false bravado.
Frak.
Kara was by no means a blusher, but it took every ounce of self control she had to keep her eyes from going so wide they could pop out of her head. She focused her eyes on Lee's and didn't dare break the stare. No way was that bastard going to get the satisfaction of seeing her squirm. Oh, but the look of arrogant triumph in his eyes told her everything his voice and words hinted at was true.
He knew.
Frak.