The Day After

[more_flexible]

Yesterday had been going so well. Jack had his pimp on, curled up with the Doctor, Izzie, and Jaime, and so many people had joined in watching Casablanca. But afterward...

He didn't want to think about it.

They had fought. It seemed like it began with the Doctor not approving of Jaime, but eventually it was clear that wasn't what it was about at all. He knew he shouldn't dwell on the missing time, knew that it didn't do any good. Knew it was eating him up.

Jack flopped back on the sofa and put his feet up as the jukebox ever-so-appropriately began to play the blues. Some of the songs, Jack even knew already.

Comments

[captainjack.livejournal.com]

Eyebrows rose high and Jack didn't know what to do but laugh nervously. "Two years of my memory were erased by the people I used to work for. I'm not entirely sure what I'm capable of, but I didn't used to be a very nice person, Leoben. Not at all," he admitted as he looked down at his hands. His nails were a mess.

"He does...he...he's the Doctor. He showed me how to be a better person. When I joined them, I had a real purpose. I stopped being a coward and...I'm a better person because of him. He makes me want to be good. He makes me feel," he paused and took a deep breath, looking up with a smitten grin. "He makes me feel."

[seer-of-god.livejournal.com]

"Whatever you did, it can't be that bad," the Cylon said. "And it can't be as bad as what I did." His people pretty much cornered the market on evil masterplans.

And yes but are you special to him?, Leoben wanted to know. What is it you make him feel? "You should be careful," he advised, wary because Jack didn't seem to be wary at all. The Doctor had to be a decent person but Jack didn't seem to be ranking extremely high on the guy's priority list.

[captainjack.livejournal.com]

"I've never been careful, Leoben," he teased, smirking at the man. He knew he should probably listen. It was love that usually got him in trouble...coming between couples and such. Not everyone was so amiable as his executioners had been.

"Why do you say that? What would I have to be careful for?"

[seer-of-god.livejournal.com]

Leoben eyed Jack for a moment before pointing to the human's chest, letting his fingers rest over the human's heart. "You feel and you feel good, but sometimes addictions don't last. Sometimes this breaks."

[captainjack.livejournal.com]

Jack looked down at his fingers then reached up to push them lower. "I don't feel it there," he said. "I feel it there."

Leoben's fingers sat at his navel and Jack simply smiled. "I'm not in love, Leoben. I don't want to get married and make babies and be forever sweethearts or any of that shit. He has his...whatever, and I have...everyone else. We're friends that fuck, but we're very good friends. I just don't like that I hurt him and he let me. I'm, god, that goes into my training at the academy and if I start that, you'll be here for three days."

[seer-of-god.livejournal.com]

Leoben didn't see what was wrong with making babies or any of the 'shit' Jack had mentioned but that was rarely what humans wanted.

"I guess I'm just not sure why it has to be so complicated," Leoben admitted. "But...okay. What Academy did you go to?"

[captainjack.livejournal.com]

"I went through the academy to become a Time Agent. We travelled through time and space to supposedly keep the timeline on track, but more often than not, little changes had big repercussions by my own time. And we'd take things, move them around. Stole them, whatever means necessary. So the trining was intense. I'd coerce, charm, lie, seduce...whatever I had to do and they taught me how. But the training, see, you can't have people shooting through time if their violent and stuff, so we went through special training about sex. Negative reinforcement against rape or anything like it. Positive reinforcement for becoming very good lovers. It helped that by my century sex was seen as healthy and normal and good...and anyhow, it's complicated with he and I..." he trailed off.

[seer-of-god.livejournal.com]

"Ah," Leoben said with a frown. Humans trying to be like Cylons. A frakking mistake, really. Cylons couldn't be humans either although he was better at it than most.

"Well, sex is great so I can't fault you there. But you and this guy... it just sounds messy. I can't decide if that's good or bad."

[captainjack.livejournal.com]

"He's worth messy," he said with a shrug. "He's alone in the universe and I'm his friend. I don't blame him for anything he's done, but I'm not scared to tell him I think he's an ass when he's being one. And he does the same. You're in love with Starbuck, was it? Tell me about her so I can see if it's the same."

[seer-of-god.livejournal.com]

"She's special. My people and I say that to humans we mean to manipulate but when I saw her, it meant something else. Leoben found it hard to say anything too personal about Kara because there were parts of Starbuck's past he thought she would have preferred even he didn't know. The only reason he did know had been to use it against her during the interogation back in the fleet.

"There's all this hurt inside of her," he added quietly. "I thought that made her weak but I have that too. The need to mean something. And she forgave me for what my people did to her. She... She made me different from the rest of them, I guess. Love makes you different."

[captainjack.livejournal.com]

Jack just nodded. "That's what we fought about, I think. I want to be different. Stay different. I want to stay...Jack. I don't want to get tied to anyone. Not even if I love them. Does that even make any sense at all?"

[seer-of-god.livejournal.com]

Leoben nodded. "I felt that way for a long time... But if I had to be with one person here, it would be Starbuck and...really there's nowhere else that I could have been with her." Back home, she would have killed him again or something. "That and I love her."

[captainjack.livejournal.com]

"I don't know what that's like...just one person. Neither does he."

Jack sighed and tried to wrap his mind around monogamy. In theory, he understood. It made sense in certain cultures and at certain times, but he'd never done it. Never even tried to...and really didn't want to.

"I just want to be special. The one he doesn't leave behind," he smirked, "again."

[seer-of-god.livejournal.com]

"Hopefully you will be," Leoben said, thinking that that need made sense at least. Although he thought monogamy was safer because there was a less chance of you using other people to fill the void the person you liked continually created. "What about the other people you're seeing?"

[captainjack.livejournal.com]

"I'm not seeing anyone," he replied as he looked at Leoben in confusion. "He's seeing Rob Chase, but I'm just like I've always been."

[seer-of-god.livejournal.com]

"You don't have anyone you frak regularly or you like that he doesn't?" He rubbed his forehead. "Why would you argue about these other people if they didn't matter?" Although he thought he knew the answer. It was easy to fight about things that weren't the real issue.

[captainjack.livejournal.com]

"I keep going back to Jaime...that's what started the fight, actually. He doesn't like him. I like him enough to go to bed with him more than once. I got upset because, see, the Doctor? When something isn't the way he likes it, he 'fixes' it, and I didn't want him fixing anything so I can't do what I want."

[seer-of-god.livejournal.com]

"Ah, well it's good that you make your own decisions then," the Cylon said, somewhat relieved.

"How would he 'fix' this?" Leoben asked curiously. He sort of wanted to meet this Doctor but he thought they probably wouldn't get along very well.

[captainjack.livejournal.com]

"Before here, he would have ruined him. Not killed...he doesn't kill. Not exactly. But now? He knows all he has to do is ask me not to see him anymore in that way he does and I won't. I wouldn't like it...but I won't."

Simple as that. Jack trusted the Doctor implicitely, loved him, nearly worshiped him. If he asked Jack to change, he'd try, and he'd keep trying until he'd succeeded. They both knew it...

"So we fought because I was afraid he might. Might try to do something to Jaime...but really that he'd try to change me. Tie me down. Ask me to change."

[seer-of-god.livejournal.com]

Yeah, they wouldn't get along. Leoben still couldn't decide if that Doctor was a frakking asshole or not, but he didn't want to find out.

"What a mess," he said despairingly, shaking his head and feeling even older than before. God, what tangled stupid webs of bullshit humans wove around each other.

"What's going on with Chase and the Doctor then?" He felt like telling Jack that the two of them should stop playing games and just get together or let it go before someone else got hurt, but he wasn't the human's therapist or father.

[captainjack.livejournal.com]

"The Doctor loves Rob. Rob...cares about the Doctor. I don't know. I think it's a lot like how I feel. It's sweet to see. I don't think it's a mess."

He cocked his head, thinking about that before looking ino Leoben's eyes.

"You think it's a mess?"

[seer-of-god.livejournal.com]

Leoben sighed thoughtfully. "I don't think it's a mess yet," he admitted reluctantly. "I just think there might be one someday."

He eyed Jack gently, keeping any hint of reproach out of his tone. There was concern and mild curiosity though. "What is it the Doctor plans on giving you? What do you plan on giving him? I mean, sure, you love each other but will you both just feel this way forever and go through people on this island like a starving man would a garbage can because he can't afford to pay for the loaf of bread he actually wants?"

[captainjack.livejournal.com]

"Um...what?" he asked, cocking his head. "You lost me with garbage and bread."

[seer-of-god.livejournal.com]

Leoben rolled his eyes. "If you two have something, why are you dragging other people into it? Why make do with second-best?"

He struggled to come up with words for what he wanted to say. Frakking human relationships. "Why not just decide you two can't be together and find happiness where you can? You don't have to commit to anyone but why...why bother with being so miserable when there's options?"

[captainjack.livejournal.com]

"Oh!" he replied, understanding finally. "I love him. He loves me. We'd be more miserable if we weren't together at all. This way works...it's just new. Trust me, I might not know about love, but I know misery. This isn't it," he assured Leoben with a laugh and a soft hand on his arm.