04th landing . video, locked from felix gaeta

[landfall]

So.

What do you guys do when you're really mad at someone?

Productive and unproductive tactics welcome. I also enjoy colorful stories.

[ Private to Felix Gaeta, later ]

[ Okay, it's time to confront this. She's calm. She's good. She's going to say something elegant, and Felix is going to respect her, and they will be friends.

Here goes! ]

You're stupid.

[ wow not as planned ]

Comments

[landfall]

You're stupid for not talking to me.

What I do isn't logical, Felix! What I say isn't logical. I go by feelings. And I feel stupid. And betrayed. And disappointed. And like I might have just been a pawn between two sides that were both driven by anger and guilt and being stupid.

And I know you've been taking this opportunity to feel more guilty.

[ She doesn't know this, actually. This is a whole lot of guesswork, and her pinning down what made her feel stupid in the first place - thinking that the part she had to play was just Felix Gaeta trying to make up for sleeping with an Eight down on New Caprica. That was what really made her mad. Because she'd trusted him. ]

...right?

[itstopped]

[Actually, he's been taking the opportunity to feel paranoid and trapped and insane, but guilt is a part of that. Still, he's already shaking his head, because this much he knows: she's right and she's wrong.]

Of course I was angry. We were all frakking angry.

[landfall]

But it wasn't supposed to be just anger. That was the point.

[itstopped]

It wasn't. It had nothing to do with-- with that. Only the fact that finding out the truth about her made me realize the truth about them.

[landfall]

No. It was about the fact that a military commander who wasn't elected shouldn't be able to say what happens to the fleet. That he shouldn't be able to put someone down because they wouldn't do what he said. What was happening wasn't right. The fact that Cylons and Cylon technology was involved was - what's it. A catalyst.

[itstopped]

And I agree with that. I did then, too. But we let them do other things, make other decisions, for the safety of the fleet -- because we knew it would keep us safe. Because humanity, our survival, our world was the most important thing.

[And sometimes the decisions that wound up being made instead weren't the right ones, he can admit to that much, but no: the mutiny was never about erasing the past. It was about reclaiming the future.]

They put all of us in danger. If what happened changed anything for me, it was only that it made me realize how dire the threat really was.

[landfall]

And here I thought if we were going to make such a big deal about the survival of the human race, maybe we should try to stay human.

[itstopped]

I'm sorry -- are you angry at me because people died, or because I didn't finish the job? First it was one, now the other.

[landfall]

This is not about logic, Felix Gaeta!

[ A thunk, as she kicks something metal.

And then she drops back into view, rage momentarily assuaged. ]

I'm mad at you for losing, and I'm mad at you for leading us wrong and getting the Quorum killed, even though they weren't exactly beautiful people themselves. And I'm mad at you for being a frakking idiot who trusts the wrong people.

And I'm mad at you for not being what I wanted you to be, and that's on me, okay? I know that's on me. I'm not not taking responsibility, I just -

Argh!

I really want to take Iris's advice and punch you right now.

[itstopped]

[His eyes narrow, challenging; he's stinging more than she knows over the comment about staying human, after what happened over the weekend.] I'm in my cabin. I'm not even crippled anymore. You wouldn't have to feel guilty.

[landfall]

Yes, I would.

Because you're all I've got.

[itstopped]

[That quiets him, sobers him. He doesn't want to fight with her. It's the whole reason he's stayed away from her, barring that incident on the lunch line. It's not entirely true, of course: she has whatever she has with Mal and whatever other friends she's made, and he has Dean and Barbara, but-- she's still the only one who was there. She's still the only one who will ever really understand.

He sighs, slouching very slightly, rubbing a hand over his mouth.]

Then I want you to believe me when I say that I did believe in what we were doing. I always have. I always will. I just... I don't know what I could have done differently, aside from Tom, but it should have been different.

[He's quiet for a second, then:] I was one of them, this last flood.

[landfall]

Then what if Tom is what you were supposed to do differently?

...what do you mean one of them?

[itstopped]

I was a-- [Not a Cylon, not really.] --a robot. I switched with David. It wasn't... he's very primitive compared to the ones we know. Somewhere between being a skinjob and a chromejob.

[He's staring down at his hands, now, because he doesn't want to see the look on her face.] And I ran... simulations in my brain, because I could. How things could have been different. How they would have changed. Where the clues I missed were.

[landfall]

...okay, I'm not trying to be a smartass here, but if you missed the clues, how would they make it into the simulation?

[itstopped]

Because it's amazing how much more clearly you can think when you're not bound up in... feeling things. [He says it a little dismissively, almost embarrassed.]

[landfall]

I want you to lift your hand up and just smack it right on the back of your head for saying that.

Feeling is way better than thinking.

[itstopped]

Not when it comes to judgment calls. Not... when you're so desperate to see something done that you think you'll do anything to get it. [That's an admission, quieter than before.]

I don't think either of us could have stopped what happened on New Caprica. Every version of events that I ran... there was no way we could have known. Not about Gaius, not about the Cylons. I can wish I had let Roslin steal the election, but how could I have known what that would do? Or what would have happened next? For all I know, it would have just turned her into a tyrant sooner.

But... the Eight, and Tom... [His mouth tightens for a moment.] I was desperate. That's the frakking truth.

[landfall]

But when something feels wrong you have to trust yourself. You can't rationalize it away because this is the best thing to do, even if you hate it. You have to listen to that part of you.

And the right thing at the time might have bad consequences in hindsight, but that doesn't make it any less the right choice at the time.

[itstopped]

[He's quiet for another moment, and doesn't look up when he continues.]

That's what people keep saying to me. That I should have listened to myself. That it must have felt wrong. Everyone's assuming I could have felt it and known, but... what if I couldn't? What if that... part of me doesn't work?

[landfall]

It does, Felix. Of course it does. If it didn't, why would you have felt so strongly that mutiny was necessary in the first place?

[itstopped]

Because it was. [He's about to leave it there, but-- she knows about the Eight now. She was worried it had led him to something, and it had. Just not in the way she was thinking.] Because I saw what they were capable of. Even the ones we thought we could trust.

[landfall]

So you were real suspicious of Cylons but not at all suspicious of Tom Zarek?