Chapter 45
(Cottle's POV)

It takes me half a second to take in the scene before me and when I do I have to struggle to keep myself from rolling my eyes at the two of them.

"You, out," I growl, glaring at Apollo and pointing at the hatch before turning my attention back to Starbuck who is not even trying to keep the smug smirk out of her face. "I will deal with you later, young lady," I warn her, wondering what is it that I did to deserve this. I mean, Roslin is supposed to be the kindergarten teacher around here, not me, damn it!

"I thought you had gone back to your wife," I say as soon as I close the hatch and I'm sure Starbuck can't hear us.

"Yes, well, I came back," he mutters, rather defensively, and it doesn't take a genius to figure out that there's trouble in paradise... not that that comes as much of a surprise.

"I see, and would you mind telling me what the frak did you think you were doing in there?" I ask, lighting a cigarette and fighting the urge to shake some sense into the major... especially because he is someone we can't do without if Starbuck is going to have as much as a snowball's in hell chance of getting over this.

"Nothing."

"So you weren't upsetting my patient?"

"I was trying to have a talk with her."

"Yes, well, I think it's safe to say that 'trying' is the operative word in that statement."

"Excuse me?"

"Tell me something, have you ever wondered why is it that when you are out there the two of you seem to know instinctively what it is that the other one is thinking but the moment you step out of the cockpit you somehow manage to mangle even the most basic of conversations?"

"That's none of your..."

"That's where you are wrong," I interrupt him before he can even finish that statement. "As long as she is in here, as long as she is my patient, it is my business."

"I wasn't trying to hurt her, damn it!" he snaps, sounding more than a little frustrated.

"Believe it or not, I know that, which is why I'm not going to tell you to stay away from her... all I'm saying is that you have to be careful here. Yes, she is doing better, she is not made of glass and she can even take some heat under certain circumstances... but now is not the time and you have to learn when not to push."

"I know, I know, it's just that..."

"That she knows exactly which buttons to push?" I ask, knowing her well enough to realize that blaming Apollo for this latest fiasco is probably more than a little unfair.

"Something like that," he admits. "I really wasn't trying to get into an argument with her but..."

"But she didn't give you much of a choice?"

"Yes. I mean, I contributed to it, there's no denying that. I knew I should probably have tried to back down, that I should have tried to defuse the situation but there were some things I wanted to know and..."

"It's okay, son... as I said, she is not made of glass but you have to keep in mind that that girl's been through hell. She trusts you and that means that you are in a unique position to help her here but it also means that you can do a lot of damage without even trying and I need you to be very aware of that fact. Yes, in spite of everything she's been through she is still Starbuck but at the same time she is already blaming herself for what she believes she 'allowed' Leoben to do to her and the last thing she needs is for you to be going on some sort of self-righteous tirade, do I make myself clear?"

"Yes, sir," he replies before asking, "is she... is she going to be okay?"

"The truth? I just don't know. Yes, she is doing as well as can be expected but... it's not that simple."

"Why not?"

"Because while there are some things that I would definitely describe as positive signs under normal circumstances, they are also more than a little out of character for her so I'm not even sure what to make out of them or where this is going," I explain after hesitating for a moment. I know that technically I shouldn't be telling him this but at the same time Apollo is one of the two people she trusts and he is probably going to be spending a lot of time with her --both with and without supervision-- so I need him to realize just what it is that he is up against... confidentiality be damned.

"What kind of things?"

"Little things, like the fact that while she was sedated you got in the habit of holding her hand whenever you were with her and your father got in the habit of ending his visits with a kiss on her forehead... and you are both still doing it. The good news is that she is not flinching away from your touch and that is more than I had dared to hope for, the bad news is that I'm not sure the 'old' Starbuck would have welcomed it, at least not openly."

"Is that going to be an issue?"

"It's too soon to tell... and right now that's not anywhere near the top of my list of priorities," I admit. "For the time being my main concern is helping that girl regain some semblance of a normal life but even though deep down she is still Starbuck, I can tell you that hoping that things will just go back to 'the way they used to be' is not realistic, far from it. Make no mistake about it, what the cylons did to her will be with her for the rest of her life and there's not a frakking thing we can do to change that."

"That bad?" he asks, rather hesitatingly.

"I didn't say that."

"But you said..." he begins but I interrupt him.

"I said that there are probably going to be some permanent changes... I didn't say anything about the nature of those changes," I explain, still trying to get him to understand. "All I'm saying is that right now it is still too early to tell where the pieces are going to fall but that even in the best of cases there are bound to be some scars... and that progress has to be measured against the way things were when she first came back from New Caprica, not against the way they were before she settled on that gods-forsaken rock."