************
The eyes were hollow and dark-rimmed, the face gaunt and pale, ghostly.  A
small, slender hand reached out.  Starbuck carefully gasped the tiny
fingers, then slipped the child into his arms.  He was so light, so small,
yet he was 7-yahren-old.  He snuggled against the lieutenant's shoulder as
the warrior sat down on the biobed to cradle the small figure.  Thin,
spindly fingers gripped the sleeve of his flight jacket.  Eyes closed and
the small boy seemed to drift off to sleep, looking so peaceful, serene,
angelic, yet so fragile and ethereal.

Starbuck looked up with at Cassiopeia, a deep pain reflecting in his eyes as
he asked, "How could this happen?  I thought that -- since we're in such
contained environments -- that . . . that something like this couldn't
happen."

Cassie sat down next to the lieutenant, brushing the boy's wispy hair from
his sleeping eyes.  "Even in these 220 self-contained, decontaminated
environments, we can't eliminate every virus.  They've learned to survive,
unfortunately, much like we have -- against and despite the odds."  She
shifted her gaze to stare into Starbuck's eyes, to offer as much comfort as
she could.  "When people visit the Orphan Ship, they bring with them
contaminants that might not affect them, but are harmful to someone else.
The odds are slim, but . . ." She gently stroked the boy's pale cheek.  "it
does happen."

"Will he --?"  Starbuck choked on the rest of the question.  He didn't even
know the child, yet his heart ached to the very center of his being as he
cradled this small, innocent victim.  Victim of so much.  The lieutenant had
encountered him two days ago when he had dropped in to visit Cassie after a
long-range patrol.  He had expected to see her smiling face and to share a
few flirtatious moments before returning to duty.  Instead, he had found her
embroiled in a battle to resuscitate this fragile boy.

He had been thin to begin with, she had explained.  A picky eater, someone
who just barely maintained something close to an appropriate weight for his
age.  The virus -- probably from someone who had visited, maybe from a
prospective foster parent, even -- had attacked with a vengeance.  The boy
had not been able to eat or drink for two days before being transferred to
the Galactica, and any fluids he had consumed had been violently expelled
through chest-racking bouts of vomiting.  He arrived at the Galactica's
Lifestation semi-comatose and dehydrated.

And then the even more unexpected -- respiratory failure.  Starbuck had
walked in on the middle of the fierce battle to revive him.  And they had.
Several centars later, he had awaken, drowsy but aware.  Feeble but not
without a hope.  After that, they had kept him sedated and on intravenous
fluids for the next two days.  Today, though, it was time to give him the
chance to pull himself through.  They needed to know which way events were
turning.  So the IV had been disconnected and the sedation allowed to wear
off.  Medicine needed to give way, at least for a little while, to let
nature's own defenses have time to work.

"We won't know for sure for at least a day or two,"  Cassie finally answered
softly.  But we should have the results of the blood test any moment now.
That will tell us whether or not the virus is gone.  Salik's running the res
ults through the computer right now."  Cassie shifted her gaze to the
lieutenant's troubled blue eyes.  "You know," she said quietly.  "I love you
for this.  You didn't have to care about this little boy."

Starbuck  met her gaze briefly before returning to stare at the peaceful,
yet ghostly form in his arms.  "How could I not?"  was all he said.  And no
other words were needed.  She knew that this boy reached out to another lost
boy that had survived his own, personal Holocaust thirty yahren ago on
Caprica. And she knew that he wished fervently that he could change the past
for this child -- and every child that had lost his or her family during the
Destruction.  The Cylons had taken everything from them, the innocents of
all of this, the children of this Horrible War.  The Cylons he could fight.
Defeat in battle.  But not this microscopic terror.  In the end only this
small, frail boy could do that.  Would he?  Starbuck held him more tightly,
rocking gently back and forth, closing his eyes to try to will the virus
away . . .

He jumped when the door to the lab swooshed open.  Looking up, he saw Salik
with an impassive expression that slowly washed into a relived smile.
Cassie stood to take the medpad to read the results for herself as the
doctor spoke.  "Tests show no trace of the virus, Lieutenant."  he said, "He
should be fine."

********
Two days later, Starbuck watched the happy, bubbly boy that followed Cassie
around the Lifestation and wondered how this could possibly be the same
child.  He was still thin, still gaunt, still as fragile.   But his eyes
were radiant.  Somehow, the same winds that had sucked the very breath from
him and swept this boy so close to the precipice had swept him around and
blown the life back into him.  He caught sight of the lieutenant, jumped
down from the biobed he had been climbing on and ran gleefully into the arms
of his new friend.