=TRUTH=

She watched Roller protectively. In her state of being she knew the plan. Soon, she would get to fulfill her small role.

...

I knew the machine was a boy. I reached out and touched the Centurion's arm. His single red ocular receptor followed my hands. I did not know why I was doing it, but in that second everything flashed.

...

In the instant it took to blink my eyes I found myself back on Picon, standing in the center courtyard of the Roma Uptown City District. The sun was rising over the surrounding skyscrapers. The sound of birds in the distance resembled musical notes. The wind blew easily past my face. It was warm from the morning sun, and cool from the lingering night. It smelled fresh. The humidity was high, but the temperature was borderline warm. It felt wonderful. This place felt amazing. I wasn't asleep, but I didn't feel totally awake.

As I turned around in wonder, I saw him. A boy. He was barely a teenager. His clothes were torn and he was covered in blood. He looked like he had been through a horrible accident. Aside from the dried blood, his hair was trimmed short. He was wearing the remains of a suit, which was now wrapped around him like a mummy. The kid couldn't of been more than fourteen. He looked at me with watery eyes.

"Are you okay?" I asked. He cocked his head sideways, like a dog when it was curious. "Who are you?" He looked around me, then down at his feet. The kid seemed to be worried. I reached out and touched his face. He looked up and stared at me. When I blinked, the environment changed again.

...

We were in a bright, solid white room. I took a step back. Instinctively I began to motion with my hands. An interface activated and the boy became surround with a red light. Floating around him were the symbols that made up the Cylon datastream. I began to move my hands and fingers through the floating information and manipulated code sequences. I didn't know exactly what I was doing, but I knew I was looking for something. It felt as if I was using a keyboard my mind had long forgotten but my fingers remembered.

I began to quickly understand the code. It was the boy. Something led me to the destination I desired. I shuffled through coding blocks and found what I guessed I was looking for. It was secured with a frag-mental security encryption. I did what I do best, I broke into it. The wealth of knowledge coming at me was amazing. I began to remember things I never knew I learned. It all helped to get through the security.

Once inside the encryption I changed a single variable in the sequence, and relocked the section with a new encryption. Instantly, the boy looked at me and spoke. His sudden awareness caught me off guard. "I. . . am. . . me." Each word came out of his mouth with relief.

"I am me!" he exclaimed. He sighed and his eyes watered. He took a deep breath as he realized I was there. "Thank you."

"Who are you?" I asked.

...

The environment shifted in sync with my eyes blinking. It was dusk and we stood in rubble. Then I realized we were surrounded by the remains of a mall. The building appeared freshly destroyed. Smoldering embers still burned all around. Dripping water fell from the totaled cathedral ceiling. A haze of smoke drifted around and I couldn't help but cough. "Where are we?"

"Home." He looked at me and began to cry.

My view of the rubble flashed red and I felt a tingle of electricity.

...

We returned to the reality of the resurrection room. The chrome Centurion in front of me seemed more alive now. Looking around the room caused his servos to hiss and his motors to churn. Like a baby exploring his environment, he began to touch the objects in the room: the 3 pods, the walls, his exoskeleton, and my shoulder. He studied the one remaining pod with a dark figure in it, an un-birthed. . . whatever I am.

It was then my modesty caught up with me and I realized I was still wet and naked. "Are there any clothes anywhere?" His eye focused on me, then went to the side, as if in thought. Then he left the room. I followed.

We followed a pulsing red strip of light running horizontally along the walls. The temperature was significantly lower because I could see my breath. The skin on my feet stuck to the metal floor. That was not good because it meant it was really, really cold. I started shivering uncontrollably. If I had to guess, it was well below freezing.

The walk along the corridor was short. To my relief we entered a room that was warmer. It was a small locker room. Two rows of lockers lined the walls. A shower was on the far end with four different nozzles, and sinks were wedged between each nozzle. I looked at the markings on the lockers, they were all in a sequential sequence that represented something.

The first locker said 7-1.1.A. The second locker was 7-1.2.A and so on. "These are for the birthed humanoids?" I asked the Centurion. His servos hissed as he nodded his head. I opened a locker and found folded clothes, shoes, blankets, a few hygienic items, and a gun. I picked up a razor from the locker and noticed that it had been sitting there for a long time. Then I analyzed the locker room. Nothing had been touched in this room in years.

Luckily the water still worked. I had a hot shower. It was a bit weird having the Centurion watch me the whole time, but I was feeling warmer and much better. I dressed, put the gun in the holster, and attached it around my waist.

"Where to now?" I asked the Centurion.

He looked across the room, them back at the door, then to me. It looked like he was listening.

I heard something. A whisper?

I heard something. A voice?

I heard something. A woman's voice? It was!

"Daniel!"

...

The Centurion had heard it also. He walked out of the room and I followed.

Once in the hallway, I saw a my visual field pulse with a red tint. Then the hallway was gone, and I was walking through the streets of Roma. The streets were deserted, and eerily quiet. The only other person was the boy in front of me.

Seeing him in this way allowed me to immediately realize that we were in a conscious mental projection of my surrounding space. The boy was the Centurion walking in front of me. The city streets were the hallways of the corridor I was walking down. It was making sense very quickly.

The streets were devoid of cars and people. Aside from my new friend, no other Centurions were around. I followed him down a back alley. Then into an old abandoned building. I climbed a flight of stairs, then came out in an old dusty room. I woman laid in the middle of the room. She was blond, and very clean. Too clean for the surroundings she was in.

...

My vision pulsed again and the projection was gone. However, the woman remained. She was sleeping on a mattress in the middle of the room. The room was shinny, artificial, synthetic, and irradiated an alien feel.

The Centurion pointed to the woman laying down. I walked over to her and reached down to touch her. I shook her shoulder. She rolled over with a casual expression. Looking up, she gasped with fear, but didn't react any more. She smiled and her eyes glazed over. She fell back asleep. Sitting down on the mattress, I shook her awake. While trying to wake her it dawned on me that this woman was drugged, heavily.

"Do you know me?" I asked as I shook her firmly.

Her eyes opened a bit. "Daniel. . ." she whispered. Her eyes locked onto mine. I could tell from her tone that she thought my name was Daniel. Then, with what little strength she had left, she placed both her hands on my face. "My baby boy. . ," she whispered with a hoarse voice. She began to weep.

"My name is Ryan," I whispered as I wiped away her tears away.

She nodded and smiled. The drugs in her system caused her eyes to roll back and shut. I shook her awake again. "He couldn't find you all," she whispered. "We did it. Your father, Tory, Sam, Galen, and I. We did it."

"Ma'am, I don't know you," I said firmly. "Are you a Cylon?" I asked while grabbing the butt of my gun.

Her soft laugh turned into a cough then a faded smile. She was a very pretty woman, but something about her made me feel vulnerable. "Yes." Then she looked deep into my eyes and spoke with startling clear conviction, "SO ARE YOU DANIEL!" She passed out again.

I stood up and backed away, dropping her head on the mattress in the process. I knew it was true, but a place deep inside me didn't want it to be. I teared up, but quickly gathered my composure. "What model are you?" Her eyes rolled back into her head. I knelt down and shook her again, "what model are you?"

"There is only one of me." She opened her eyes and saw my confusion.

"Are there more of me?" I asked enthusiastically. I was thinking about my brother.

"We saved three of you. . ." she whispered under the drugs.

"Only three," I spoke to myself. "The room had three tanks. One of the resurrection tanks was already empty though. What does that mean?" She didn't respond. I shook her again. "Stay with me. One of the three tanks was already empty."

Her expression changed. She closed her eyes and cried. She spoke so low I had to place my ear directly over her mouth. "There are now only a pair of Sevens left in the universe. You have one brother. . . out there. . . somewhere." She reached up and began to touch my face. "Your brother is alive. Find Galactica." Her eyes rolled back into her head and she went limp.

I grabbed her hands and shook them. "How do I find my brother?" She didn't respond. "Lady?"

It was then the Centurion watching me turned to look at the entrance to the room. His attention to the door startled me. I quietly listened for a second. I couldn't hear anything. I looked back at the woman.

The Centurion's gun deployed. I quickly stood and drew my sidearm.

...

A Basestar jumped in next to the Colony. In the instantaneous moment of its arrival, the hybrids began talking to one another. The hybrid on the arriving Basestar was pleased to learn of the return of the Seventh.

Just moments after the base ship jumped in, a Heavy Raider took off from it en-route to the Colony. On board were two humanoid Cylons: Cavil, and Boomer.