Thanks for such a lovely comment. I too adore unusual pairings. Sometimes they drive me crazy, but I'm always happy with the result because they really challenge me to better writing.

They recognize that the other one's experiences serve as a counterpart to their own problems. Yet they are wrong in their assumption that the other one can help them out.
Yes, this is exactly what I wanted to get across. Thanks for validating my efforts! They are both really damaged, aren't they? I sort of kept asking them myself, "What are you guys doing????"

It's powerful and real in its hopelessness.
But yes, in all seriousness, this was what I was hoping for. I wanted it to end in hopelessness. Even though in canon they seem to have reconciled, they have shared one of the most disturbing connections two humans can share, and I really wanted to be honest about that. I wouldn't have felt good about a pat resolution.

There are many details I enjoyed a lot, like that Dee made friends on the Pegasus and that Gaeta talked to a child therapist.
I remembered that Helo had once mentioned to Kara that Hera had been seeing a child therapist and it made me ask for the first time, huh, where are the therapists? If there are any, they must be extremely busy! BSG is not a happy place. I liked the idea that like with everything, there'd be shortages of therapists, or maybe none for Felix. It served to heighten his lack of emotional release, which I thought was crucial for this fic.

I'll forever be fascinated by depictions of depression in fic ... It's quite a fic kink of mine.
No, you've never mentioned that about your history. I'm glad you're well these days. :) I can see how it would interest you in fic then. I hope you think I did it justice, having never suffered from depression like this, not by far. I did read up on PTSD though for background on Felix in my fics. I do think all that time on NC fearing for his life and then the Circle had to have quite an effect on him!

You know, when I had a first look at the fic (when the HTML didn't work), the quotation marks were all gone. I didn't read all of it then, but as a measure of style, this actually accentuated Gaeta's feeling of disconnection.
You know, blue_crow mentioned something like that as well, I think. I was annoyed with Semagic at the time, but in retrospect, I can see that. But I don't think I'd ever have done that intentionally. But it's an interesting stylistic idea that I could see maybe adapting deliberately in some other fic sometime.

That said, I really liked the dream sequence with Baltar. It made me rather uncomfortable to read the sex scene, but in a good way.
You know, I got such interesting reactions to the Baltar/Gaeta sex scene. I'm curious what made you uncomfortable about it? (Not that I can't see lots of possibilities, but I'm curious what specifically made you uncomfortable with it?)

...and a clever bit of symbolism (or characterization, depending on your definition of symbolism).
Yay! I'm glad you didn't feel it was heavyhanded.

If somebody takes care of Gaeta/Jake, Gaeta/Cottle and Gaeta/Figurski, I promise I'll write the rest and we can actually declare Gaeta to have been paired with everybody. :D I tried my hand at Gaeta/Cottle. But it was just too disturbing.
I still have to ready lls_mutant's fic which I hear has Gaeta/Jake (sort of). :) Cottle/Gaeta too disturbing? Was it because of the doctor/patient relationship? The age difference? The grumpiness factor? ;)

And thanks for providing a great challenge that really pushed me beyond my comfort zone.