(no subject)

[adifferentpath]

A lot of the time, Lee doesn't know how he feels about the coffee shops in Darrow. Truthfully, they're not a whole lot different from the ones in Caprica, but even after all this time, Lee finds that he still sometimes has trouble with the currency. He's used to cubits, to cornered coins, and the money here feels weird in his palm. It's something the people behind him always seem to notice as they yell at him to hurry up with his order.

Today, the lady behind him is about as obnoxious as they come, sighing loudly and making broad statements about the time.

"Just give me a regular coffee," Lee says to the guy behind the counter, and the woman behind him nearly pushes him out of the way to get the counter after him.

"Soy cappuccino," she demands, only for the server to evenly tell her that they don't have anymore. She huffs an "unbelievable" under her breath before storming out, and Lee looks down at the counter to see that she's left a folder on the counter.

"Hey, wait!" he calls behind her, and grabs the folder, though by the time he makes it outside, she's long gone, off to ruin someone else's day.

Hoping that maybe there's something in it that'll give Lee an idea of who she is and how he can find her, Lee opens the folder, only to see something he didn't plan on.

PASSENGER MANIFEST: OLYMPIC CARRIER

He nearly drops it then and there, his head starting to swim as he pours over the list of names. Pages and pages of names of the people who left on what was supposed to be a short voyage only to either get taken over by the cylons and killed, or killed because he pulled that trigger.

He hadn't been able to look at himself in the mirror for a long time after that, and just now, remembering that day, he doesn't think he can move from his spot on the sidewalk.

Comments

[jianhuo]

Saffron's walking along, thinking about what kind of pies she wants to make tonight, when she nearly gets bowled over by some woman storming huffily out of a coffee shop. "Watch it," the woman snaps, even though she's the one who wasn't watching where she was going, and Saffron's eyebrows lift as she steps to the side.

"Watch it yourself," she replies in Chinese, mildly irritated, and the woman shoots her an angrily puzzled glance, but keeps going.

Rolling her eyes, Saffron is about to continue on her way when she sees Lee burst out of the same place the woman just left, seemingly looking for someone - maybe the woman she'd just nearly run into, for all she knows. He's got a folder of some kind in his hands, which he opens up as she walks over to say hi, and by the time she reaches him it seems from his expression what he sees is upsetting to him in some way.

"Hey," she says gently, to get his attention. "You okay, sugar?"

[adifferentpath]

It takes Lee a second to register Helen's voice, and he blinks several times as if the words on the paper are going to somehow change, like maybe he's read them wrong. He's finding that he doesn't have that kind of luck. At least, not these days. He shakes his head, and looks up at her.

"Yeah, uh, he says, "I'm fine. Hi, Helen."

[jianhuo]

"Hi, Lee," she replies, her expression softening into a smile, though she doesn't believe for a second that nothing's wrong. She'd like to think they're friends, but she's not going to try and force a story out of him. "I didn't just catch you on your way somewhere, did I?"

[adifferentpath]

"No, just on my way out, actually," he says, gesturing back toward the coffee shop he's just come out of, still visibly shaken. He remembers Ilithyia finding a mask in the park once, something that wasn't supposed to be there at all, and he wonders if this is anything like that. Because that woman, whoever she was, if she'd been from any place the passenger manifest in his hands could have come from, she probably would have known his face.

It was an unfortunate side effect of being the Admiral's son.

"...and I forgot my coffee. Frak."

[jianhuo]

Saffron glances over at the entrance. "Did you want to go back and get it?" she asks, turning back to Lee. "I could go for a hot tea, myself. Chilly weather like this, a hot drink is practically a requirement."

[adifferentpath]

"No, I think I'm okay," Lee says, almost as if he's worried that going back in will bring something else from home that shouldn't be in Darrow in the first place. He can't imagine why anyone on Galactica would even have it now, much less anyone in Darrow.

"I'm awake now, anyway."

[jianhuo]

"You did seem like you just had a bit of a shock when I first saw you," Saffron says, glancing down at the folder he's still carrying. She gestures towards it. "Did it have something to do with that?"

[adifferentpath]

"I uh, I found it in the coffee shop," Lee says, and he glances briefly down at the folder. He's decided by now that the woman couldn't have left it, though any other way of it ending up there doesn't make any logical sense at all.

"It's from where I come from. It shouldn't be here."

[jianhuo]

She nods as understanding dawns on her face. "Ah, I see. One of those things," Saffron says with a brief, wry smile. "An unexpected memento from home, sometimes highly upsetting, sometimes not so much, always surprising." It's one of the things Darrow has in common with the island Saffron could do without.

[adifferentpath]

She doesn't seem as surprised by it as Lee expects she might be.

"Don't tell me this is normal around here," he says, because of all of Darrow's oddities, suddenly finding files from Galactica that no one should have access to— or whose paper has probably been repurposed by now— isn't something he thought he'd see.

[jianhuo]

"It is, I'm sorry to say," Saffron replies, giving Lee a sympathetic cringe. "It doesn't seem to happen too terrible often, but it's one of those mess-with-your-mind things a lot of us have experienced." She seems to have been lucky so far - on the island, all she'd gotten was her lipstick laced with the Goodnight Kiss, and here she's just gotten one of Vincent's paintings. That doesn't mean her luck will continue to hold, though.

[adifferentpath]

"Great," Lee says, and his tone is sarcastic as he clenches his jaw, "because there weren't enough ways for this place to frak with us already."

He wonders if somewhere on Galactica, this folder's missing, or if it works the same way that it seems to work with people. He's left here with his list of names, 1,344 people he tries not to think of when he can help it, and no one there is the wiser.

[jianhuo]

"I'm guessing it's something you'd rather forget, or something along those lines," Saffron says gently. Not all the things people get from home are like that, but she knows some are, and judging by Lee's reaction, she thinks it's a safe guess. At the very least, it's a reminder of something that's upsetting to him.

[adifferentpath]

"Yeah, something like that," Lee says, though he doesn't think the Olympic Carrier is something he'd ever be able to forget, even if he wanted to. Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it. And besides, someone he admires once told him that you have to be able to admit your mistakes, even if you can't do it publicly.

The Olympic Carrier was a mistake. Over a thousand people lost their lives, even if it saved tens of thousands.

[jianhuo]

Saffron may not have any regrets about the many, many things she's done in the past that most folks would probably be horrified by, but she understands having memories a person would just as soon forget, even if they can't. "We could go somewhere and talk, if you want," she suggests. "Or if you'd rather get your mind on something else, I could maybe help with that too."