For all the time they spent together, and as well as Gaeta thought he knew Louis, the other man never really talked about Pegasus. Nobody did; after Cain's death and the battlestar's absorption into the rest of the Fleet, everyone just seemed to want to put it behind them.

Maybe that's part of it. Maybe it's the obvious pain, or not just comparing Gaeta to to the former admiral anymore: comparing him to the entire crew, to Louis himself, no longer singling him out to bear the full weight of his anger.

But by the end of Louis' small speech, his own fury gutters low, curls up, and winks out.



(He's so godsdamn tired. And he knows for certain, now, that he's not the only one.)




Cautiously, he begins to pick his way forward across the tiny room, one awkward half-step at a time.