Setting: Immediately following the mini-series.
Spoilers: mini-series + additional backstory provided throughout season 1 & 2
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Day one...I guess.
Seems useless to bother recording the calendar date here. After all, the starting date of the Colonial calendar that we've used for the last 2,000 years was set to commemorate the first landing on Caprica – the first colony of humankind to be settled once the exodus from Kobol began. Our calendar system has tracked the passage of time throughout the Colonial era, after the Kobolian era ended. Now, the Colonial era has also come to an end. The colonies are gone. So we are at the beginning of days once more. What name will our descendants give to this new era? I am assuming, of course, that there will be subsequent generations of humankind, who will continue to mark time long after I am gone. Considering our current circumstances, that may be a big assumption, but it's a leap of faith I have to make. I have to believe this is not the end.
I should be sleeping now. I haven't slept in... I'm really not sure how long it's been. I'm tired enough to sleep, but my mind is not in a state that will allow me to rest. I should still try, just lie down, close my eyes, even if I can't quite sleep. In truth, though, it's difficult to even just sit still right now. My nerves are shot. I keep jumping at every sound. And the images that fill my mind when I do close my eyes just make things worse. Maybe writing this out will help. I've always found keeping a journal to be nicely cathartic. It's a habit I picked up from my father a long time ago.
Which brings me right to where this whole nightmare started. I won't bother recording my entire contentious relationship with Dad now. I've done that in plenty of other journal entries before... though my previous journal is by now blown to dust. I am on board Galactica now. Yes indeed. The one place in all of creation that I hoped never to see, and now I must call it home. Lords Help Me. I have moved in with my father and his mistress; the Old Man and the Grand Ol' Girl. I first, reluctantly, set foot on these decks thinking that I only needed to endure this place for a few hours, and then I could get the frak out. I didn't come here by choice. The Old Girl was being officially decommissioned, and it was decided by someone in the fleet's public relations office that a family photo opportunity would be too good to pass up. The fleet does so love good publicity. So, as the son of the esteemed Commander William "Husker" Adama, I was ordered to attend the ceremony. It was not a request. It was an order. No way out of it.
My only hope was that the schedule of events would be so regimented that there would not be any time for family reunions beyond the required photo session. I didn't want a reunion at all. I certainly didn't want to be forced into one with cameras recording our every move and every word. As it turned out, things were worse than I feared they could be. The cameras snapped away while we faked our smiles, then they trotted off to the next item on their agenda, and Dad and I were left alone. At first, he practically ignored me, and wouldn't event look at me. Fine, as far as I was concerned. But when I was just centimeters from a clean getaway, he struck up a conversation after all. Small talk at first. Have some coffee. Congratulations on your promotion and sorry I missed it. Yeah right. But then, he had to do it. He had to bring up Zak. And as usual, he wanted to have his say while completely ignoring mine. He wouldn't even face me. I ended up speaking to the back of his head and may as well have been speaking to the wall. The wall would hear me as effectively as he did. So naturally, I lost it... pulled out the big guns... and fired point-blank.
Kara was right. I haven't changed. I can hold in my temper through an awful lot, but when I blow... I go nuclear. Gods, I know I was cruel. I'm not proud of it. But frak I'm tired of talking to a wall! I tried my entire life to make him hear me. He never has, but up until just 2 years ago I forgave him anyway. I just put up with it and forged ahead on my own in spite of him. Then Zak died, and I refused to accept my father's indifference any longer. He never listened to Zak either. If he had, he'd have known that Zak didn't belong in a cockpit... where he died. So, I gave up begging to be heard. I gave up speaking to him at all. There was no point in trying. But then the fleet intervened and forced us back together, where Dad proved that he'd still rather live under his own delusions of who his youngest son was rather than admit to the truth... and where I proved how much of an asshole I'm capable of being. I've been doing that a lot lately, come to think of it. I'm sure Gianne would agree... but I can't think about her now.
So, I walked away from a horrific encounter with my father, feeling pissed off and guilt-ridden at the same time, just in time to be granted the dubious honor of flying my father's antiquated Mark II viper in front of the crowd assembled in the new flight deck museum. Yes, it's true. I had to fly that fossil with my father's name plate beneath the cockpit. The Galactica's CAG called it an honor, but I didn't seem him interested in trading in his Mark VII for the opportunity to fly a piece of history. The old crate felt slow, sluggish, and about as agile as a lame hippo, but somehow I had to make it look nice and pretty for the cameras and the crowd. I did my job, but I couldn't wait to drop the museum piece back off and retrieve my own Mark VII, then get the heck back to Caprica. Unfortunately, there were political dignitaries in the crowd, so I was assigned the extra post-ceremony butt-kiss duty of "escorting" the political carrier back to Caprica... in the frakking Mark II. Military escort. What a joke. My presence there in the Mark II was entirely for show. That old relic was nowhere near combat ready... and it proved it when all hell broke loose. One single missile detonated at battle range knocked out every flight system on board. The transport had to rescue me! Thank the Lords it was just the one missile and not a Cylon raider.
Yet, how was I to know that apparently my own Mark VII would have fared far worse against a Cylon raider than the old Mark II? For the next several hours on board the transport I heard reports from all over the fleet about devastating losses of even our most advanced and powerful warships. Entire squadrons of Mark VII's were being wiped out without firing a single shot. It made no sense. Stuck aboard the transport, there was nothing I could do but assist with the rescue operations initiated by our new President, Laura Roslin, while the reports of disaster poured in. That was how I heard about the Atlantia... and my old shipmates. In the cockpit of the newly renamed Colonial One, we received the news that I had been dreading: Admiral Nagala had led the Atlantia's battle group, comprised of more than 100 battlestars, into a major engagement with the Cylons near the orbit of Virgon. Only a few of the smaller vessels escaped to send out the word that the Atlantia was destroyed, and Admiral Nagala was dead.
All my old shipmates met the same fate as the admiral. Those brave and honorable souls, who became my family in the past two years since I lost Zak, are all gone now. They went down together... but without me. Reason tells me that my presence there wouldn't have made any difference. I would just have died with them, but a part of me wishes that I had. It's called Survivor's Guilt; a nice clinical term used by psychologists to simply tell a patient that they feel lousy about living when so many others are dead... as if the patient hadn't already figured that out... as if giving the guilt a clinical name makes it any less difficult to bear. My CAG and mentor, Ghost. My wingman, Tiny... all 215 pounds of him. Bear. Shrill. Smokey. Talon. Cyclone. Skipper. Lasher. Tipsy. Feline. Grunt... Lew always did hate that callsign but he was never able to shake it. Misty. Fiddler. Bullseye. Jigster... Damn it, I'm missing some, but my head can't keep it straight right now. And there are so many others beyond just my fellow pilots. The CIC crew. The deck crew. Medics, kitchen staff, weps team. I need to make out a list, record as many names as I can and write down anything I can remember about them. I may be the only person still alive who ever knew any of them.
Lords, what a thought that was. I had to put down this pen and just disintegrate into a puddle for a few minutes. I think I've got myself back together now, at least enough to form a coherent thought again.
Back to where I was, in the midst of the nightmare. With the admiral gone, command necessarily passed to the next surviving senior officer. As it turned out, that was my father. So far removed from the combat zone, the Galactica appeared to be the only capital ship in the fleet that had not yet been destroyed. Ironic. The oldest ship in the fleet, transformed into a museum, carrying no ammunition for her cannons, with a commander who already had one foot over the fence into retirement... is now the fleet's flagship. Yet, it was apparently that obsolescence that allowed the Galactica to survive. All the newer ships, including Mark VII vipers, used computer systems that the Cylons found a way to remotely compromise. All of our great technological advances since the last war became useless when the Cylons simply turned everything off and fired away at will. But the Galactica's old-fashioned computers were not compromised, and she alone remained functional.
For years I've thought my father was stuck in the past... refusing to allow many new technologies to be installed on the Galactica... unable to leave the old war behind and move into the reality of the present. Well, hell he was always stuck in the past and the fact is that his "backward" way of thinking has caused him to be passed over for promotion many times over the years. Yet, now it turns out that his old-fashioned thinking may have given humanity a future.
Dad wasted no time in taking command of the fleet after news of the Admiral's defeat reached us. He immediately sent word to all colonial ships to rendezvous with the Galactica at the Ragnar Anchorage. But I promptly received orders from a higher power, President Roslin. Under her orders, I sent word to Dad to have him rendezvous with us and assist Colonial One with rescue operations. Needless to say, he didn't react supportively to his new orders, or to the new President, and for the second time that day we argued. I can understand his frustrated reaction to having a civilian intervene in the midst of combat, but this was no ordinary civilian. She's the President, lawfully sworn into office according to the Articles of Colonization. He may be the acting fleet admiral, but she still outranks him. What else could I do, but refuse his orders in favor of hers, however furious that might make him?
It's an odd thing to say, but luckily the Cylons attacked Colonial One before this newest argument with Dad could take as nasty a turn as our previous encounter had. With a trick dug up from my days at War College, we eluded the Cylons and resumed our search for surviving civilian ships, gathering everyone we could find together into a kind of ragtag fleet. By the end of the day we had assembled 60 civilian ships in total, plus a scattering of vipers that had managed to escape from earlier engagements with the Cylons. It took hours, and the valuable assistance of a fugitive raptor from Galactica's own decimated squadron, to round everyone up.
We made no additional attempts to communicate with Galactica during that time, since it was possible that our earlier long-range contact might have been the means by which the Cylons found us before. As a precaution we maintained communication silence on all long-range channels. But the Cylons still found us. We had nearly 20 ships in our convoy lacking FTL capability. Fighting back would have been futile. The only thing we could do was run. As a warrior, it galls me to say that. How often do we declare amongst ourselves that we don't leave our people behind? It's drilled into our heads in basic training. We promise it to one another. But Lords forgive me, I knew by then that we were past the point where winning was a consideration and survival was the only goal remaining to us. And the only way to ensure survival was to leave the slower ships behind. The choice was ultimately not mine to make. That fell to President Roslin, but I was the one who pressed for that course of action. Others argued against leaving so many people, thousands, to die, but I knew in my gut those people could not be saved. Trying to save the few would have cost the lives of all. The President agreed with me. Still... though technically the responsibility was hers... I know I will carry the guilt of that action for the rest of my life.
As we counted down to the FTL jump, and I heard the pleas from the ships we were abandoning... pleas that I will hear in my nightmares for as long as I live... the Cylons attacked. I could try to ease my conscience by saying that the timing of the attack confirmed that my recommendation to jump immediately was the right one. But I can never forget that just as the surviving fleet reached "safety" above Ragnar, thousands of abandoned people were dying who had only a short while earlier entrusted their safety to my hands.
Back again. Once more I had to put the pen down and take a few minutes to pull myself back together. This is harder than I expected. But I suppose it's better for me to fall to pieces now, in private, than to have a meltdown in front of the crew later.
At Ragnar, we rendezvoused with Galactica and my service aboard Colonial One ended. I'd already learned from Boomer what happened to Capt. Spencer and the rest of Galactica's squadron, but I had no idea that the other museum display pieces had been also been put into service in the Galactica's defense. The Old Girl had even taken a hit on her one usable flight pod from a small payload nuke, and 85 members of the deck crew had perished. The Galactica hadn't quite been entirely outside the combat zone after all. So, I suddenly found myself in much the same position as my father... promoted to command only because I had survived where others had not. I am now CAG for the Galactica. Senior pilot. I didn't really have time to think about it right then. If I did, I probably would have found a dark corner to hide in for at least an hour or two... kind of like I'm doing now.
I used to want this, once upon a time. Well... I used to want to be a CAG anyway... but never like this. Way back when I first earned my wings, my ambition was to one day command my own squadron, though that all changed after Zak died. Funny how things turn out. Now I do command my own squadron... and I wish I didn't.
I've written long and many times about this in my journal recently. I don't really want to do it again, but my old journal is back home... lost now... along with everything and everyone else. And... frak I don't want this! I was so close. Just another few weeks... Irony just keeps rearing its head. Dad was on the verge of turning civilian, in retirement, but the Cylons prevented that. No one else alive knows this... I only spoke of it with Mom and Gianne... and I may never be able to tell anyone else now... but I too was on the verge of ending my military career. The Cylons have prevented me from leaving too. Just one more thing my father and I have turned out to have in common.
I love to fly and I've done very well at it. But after Zak died I gradually came to accept the fact that I made the same mistake my brother did. I joined the military for the wrong reasons. I did it because I knew that was what my father expected of me, and I'd never allowed myself to consider doing anything else with my life. As much as I loved my time in a viper, and the people that I served with, I had to finally admit that I was staying in the military because I was afraid to leave... because my father had so brainwashed me from the day I was born into ignoring any other options. I decided I had to leave, or I'd never respect myself again. Whatever I did with my life, the choice had to be one that I was sure I wanted... not a bowing to what my father was willing to accept.
But the Cylons have changed all that. It's not about what I want anymore. There are greater considerations at stake than whether or not I might be happier flying a civilian commuter shuttle, or even running a fish and tackle shop in the mountains. Those options are gone. All options are gone. Only duty is left now. Whether I want it or not, I am CAG. The simple fact is that my life no longer belongs to me. It belongs to the people that I've sworn to protect. Maybe someday things will change again. Hopefully. Until then, my wings will stay in place and I will command this squadron of decrepit, obsolete vipers from this ancient, last-remaining battlestar, to the very best of my ability and to my final breath, if necessary... all while under my father's direct command.
Under my father's command.
What's the old saying? "There is nothing so like a god in corporeal form than a commander on his battlestar." Well, I am now a subject in my father's dominion. I don't know whether to be comforted or frightened by that fact. Earlier, I would have been sure that fright was the appropriate response, but now...? He's always been SO stoic. Unshakable. But there is something undeniably different about him now. Perhaps it's simply that he's as shell-shocked as the rest of us. Perhaps he's just as terrified inside as I am about being forced to step into command under the most dire of circumstances. Whatever the reason, he surprised the heck out of me today.
When I returned from Colonial One, I was certain that he would nail my ass to the wall for refusing his earlier orders. But when I met up with him again in his quarters, there were no reprimands. I couldn't help tearing up when I saw the picture on his desk. It's an old picture of me and Zak with Mom. I don't even remember when it was taken, but I couldn't have been more than 10. And when I saw Mom's face... It didn't even occur to me until then that she is really dead. Everyone back home is dead. Dad always hated it when Zak or I cried as children. He just couldn't stand it. But today he didn't disapprove or lecture... either about the tears, or my earlier insubordination. He just told me he was sorry, about Mom I assume. Despite the failure of their marriage, I know they loved each other, so I guess he couldn't fault me for grieving her. Yet, such emotional displays and signs of weakness have never been acceptable to him before. I felt like I needed to break down, if only for a few minutes, but I couldn't do it in front of him. If he wasn't going to take the opportunity to yell at me, then I figured I'd best leave while I still had some measure of control. But he stopped me from leaving... and hugged me. I swear I can't remember the last time he did that. I must have still been a very small child, if he ever did it at all. I still can't quite believe it. I know this nightmare hasn't been mine alone to suffer. Dad has seen as much of this horror as I have. More even. I heard from a few members of Galactica's crew that I was believed to be dead after Colonial One disappeared from the scopes. I suppose I have to conclude that Dad was pleased to find me still alive and expressed that to me the only way he could.
Here I go, being an ass again. For all of our problems, I know in my heart that my father has always loved me, in his own way. Maybe he just couldn't tell me in words how he felt to have me back any more than I could tell him in words how I felt to lose Mom and Gianne. Obviously we still don't know how to communicate very well, but I feel like we've at least both acknowledged that we need to start trying. I can't shut him out of my life anymore, and he can't ignore me anymore. We both have to find a way to make this work. And there is some undeniable comfort in knowing that I haven't lost my entire family. So many others can't say the same. I may be a stranger to the rest of the occupants under this roof, but this is my father's house.
Of course that could complicate things in other ways. To the crew, I'm a stranger. Yet, I've been placed in a high-profile command position. Fleet regulations would ordinarily not allow a father and son to serve together if one would be placed in command authority over the other. But there's nowhere else for me to go now, so everyone knows there is no choice in the matter. Still, there will be those who will be slow to fully accept my place here, because of my parentage. They won't see me as just "the stranger taking over as CAG". I'll be "the stranger-taking-over-as-CAG-who-is-also-the-commander's-kid". A double barrier to have deal with in my new squadron. They don't know me and I don't know them. Yet, I'm supposed to lead them.
Actually, I've already had my baptism by fire, so to speak. I led the squadron through a brief holding action that allowed the civilian fleet to jump to safety away from Ragnar. It was so close on the heels of the rest of this ongoing tragedy that no one really had time to think about who was who, what was next, or what any of this would mean in the long run. Everyone, including me, just jumped in and did what we had to do at that moment in time. There would be time for thought later, which I guess is now. We've made our escape... at least I pray we have. Now is when it all starts to sink in. Now is when we all start to get scared... angry... mournful...
Dad recognized the need for all of us to formally mourn those we've lost. He ordered a memorial service in the unused hanger deck of the starboard flight pod. We assembled there in ranks. The bodies of the crewmembers lost earlier in the day were laid out before us as representatives of the billions from all 12 worlds who died. We couldn't bury our loved ones back home, but we all needed some form of official commemoration of what was lost. I stood in the front row, beside my father, looking over the rows and rows of flag-draped bodies. After the first few words by Priest Elosha, I didn't even hear her prayers. I just saw in my mind the faces of my friends... my mother... my fiancée... my old schoolmates... and Zak too, though I buried him two years ago. I stood there in the company of hundreds... feeling completely alone.
Then Dad took his turn to speak. I'm not sure what to say about that here. He was trying to be inspirational and give us hope. But I don't know. He promised that he has a refuge in mind, and that we aren't just wandering aimlessly through uncharted space. He said he knows how to find the legendary 13th colony, Earth. But I don't quite believe him. I have the suspicion he was fibbing to us, just to keep us all from losing hope and prevent the fleet from falling into total chaos. If that's the case, I can't fault him for trying. I think everyone else bought it though. The cheers he inspired at the end of his speech would certainly support that conclusion. But I couldn't join them. People were crying with relief, smiling and hugging each other, but I just stood apart from them, alone.
That's essentially how I feel right now. Alone. I was only supposed to be here for a few hours, then leave. I was supposed to return to Caprica, and set things right with Gianne. I was supposed to start my new life with her... and without the military. I'm not supposed to still be here, in this place, wearing this uniform. I don't know this place. I don't know these people. There is no one here I can talk to.
Yes, I still have my father... who has never really known me and who I don't know how to talk to. I tried, after the memorial service. There were so many things I wanted to try to say to him... even to apologize... but he declined to let me. Some other time, Son. What else is new? He still doesn't really want to listen to me.
And there's Kara. She saved my life in our escape from Ragnar today. We were friends back when she was seeing Zak, but we lost touch after Zak died. Now she seems more inclined to listen to my father than to me. She even threatened to hit me today rather than listen to my side of the story. And then there's the bombshell she dropped. Confessing her sins, she said. Zak never earned his wings. Kara lied. She's been lying all this time. Zak failed his basic flight course, but she passed him anyway. I always knew Zak wasn't cut out to be a pilot but the fact that he had his wings was the source of Dad's clinging delusion. Now I KNOW those wings weren't an odd stroke of luck in his final flight test. They were an outright lie. It wasn't Dad alone who pushed Zak into a cockpit where he didn't belong. Kara did it too. At least she recognizes her mistake, and regrets it, which is something Dad has never done. But how can I trust her again? Zak was going to marry her, and she couldn't be honest with him, even when her lie put his life in danger. Then she deceived us all for two years, only finally admitting to it because it was The End of the World. Is that what it takes to make an honest woman out of her? I owe her my life... but how can I trust her?
This isn't the first time I've stepped into a new post and a new job. There's always an awkward period where you get to know your shipmates, and they get to know you. In that respect, I've been through this before and I'll get through it now. But I've always had my old friends and family to lean on, while I'm trying to get my bearings. I don't have anyone now. Not really. What I wouldn't give to have just one familiar face that I know I can trust and who will listen to me. Lords, I don't know how I'm going to get through this on my own.
Did it again. Fell apart. Frak, I still feel like I could crumble again at any second, so this may be about as much as I can manage to record for now. After Zak died, I remember asking Mom how she was getting along. "One breath at a time," she told me. I guess that's my goal for now.
One breath at a time.