"It looks just like Caprica," Serena said. Lee smiled at the child-look of wonder on her face. The beautiful blue, green and white ball that he'd been seeing every day from his Viper cockpit hung in space before them. And it did resemble the Galactica's old home planet, at least from this height.
Everyone in the packed shuttlecraft was looking in the same direction as Serena. "There's a rain storm, I'll bet," said an older woman as she gestured at a thick white cloud mass drifting across the dark green of a continent toward the terminator that divided day from night. A man and woman were pointing out the white polar caps to a little girl who looked no older than six and who probably remembered only the insides of crowded starships and nothing of the comfortable world where she had been born.
The view in the other direction was almost as spectacular. To the galactic north, the fan-shaped Slasenger Nebula painted a pink and orange dance of light across the sky. Nothing Cylon worked quite right in there. Unfortunately the nebula was also hard on humans and starships, but it would form a fence of sorts.
All over the cabin fingers pointed this way and that. Every face looked reverent and, best of all, hopeful. Optimism had been a long time coming, but had blossomed at last. Humanity had a future and its name was Zodiac. With plentiful food and water, and even weather, it would be the Ninth Heaven for a travel weary humanity.
Lee felt like he owned the planet or had personally discovered it, although that honor belonged to the astrometrics team up in CIC. But as a soldier sworn to defend his people, their home belonged to him in a very special, personal way.
Putting an arm around his wife, Lee bent forward and pointed out their destination, a spot halfway down a long coast where a huge river mouth carved a notch. The geophysicists had finally settled on the larger of the two polar ice caps as north, and that made it the east coast of the Alpha Continent -- what some of the more religious were already calling Koboland.
Serena accepted Lee's explanations with wide-eyed awe, reminding him of the child woman he'd married two years before. He almost wished that she'd throw one of her famous tantrums. It would have made what he had to do easier, but gathering up his worn-out emotions and taking Serena's hand, he gave it a go. "I won't be staying with you on Zodiac."
She glanced sideways at him, reluctant to look away from the planet. "Of course, you won't, darling. You haven't packed up yet, but I'll have our love nest set up by the time you get back." Her eyes returned to the front canopy window where details like mountain ranges and lakes were becoming visible even to the untrained eye.
"Please look at me," Lee asked. He could have said goodbye on the Galactica and let Serena fly down with her circle of friends, but it hadn't felt right. And neither would it be right to take her to the new settlement only to suddenly say, "Oh, by the way, you're on your own now." She had to know. He'd put off telling her as long as possible and he was about to pay the price.
With a sigh of irritation Serena looked at him. "Yes?" she said, raising both the pitch of her voice and her eyebrows to indicate a question.
Lee spoke slowly and steadily to make sure that she understood. "Serena, I'm going to leave with the Galactica. I may never come back." He'd planned to say next, "I know you need me, but my father needs me more," and if she started crying, maybe even, "I love you," but he didn't get a chance. Serena had leapt to her feet.
"You're what?" she yelped loudly. The eyes of everyone in the shuttle left the planet and turned to her. "You can't leave me! I'll … I'll divorce you! Yes, that's what I'll do! I'll divorce you!"
Dragging Serena behind him, Captain Lee Adama marched down the dirt path leading away from the open field the settlers euphemistically called the spaceport. Serena protested his rough treatment in squawks only slightly less raucous than the scaled, bird-like creatures overhead, but he ignored her. Lee was angry, very angry.
A hand-lettered piece of white packing foam nailed to a massive fern-like plant proclaimed the path to be Colonial Boulevard and that Salvation City was one klick away. Plant fronds arched overhead, blocking out some of the day's too warm sun. White, pink and yellow cascades of flowers hung from still larger, tree-like plants, making the forest resemble the tropical arboretum on Sagittaria's south continent, which was a beautiful, wild and unspoiled piece of paradise, or at least it had been before Judgment Day.
Three of the ten starships designated for this site's temporary living quarters had been landed, but so far only one was buried. The new colonists had been having trouble with a large and apparently territorial fauna -- half-ton eight-legged creatures some wag had named frakkin' farters after their main weapon, a truly horrible stench. Fortunately the smell dissipated quickly and the farters were easy to intimidate, although they definitely would never be a food source.
After three years of Galactica's climate-controlled environment, the burning sunshine felt good to Lee. This visit would be his only chance to check out Zodiac and he was soaking in every shade of color as well as the mixed natural perfumes of crushed chlorophyll and disturbed soil. The planet was humanity's new home and it was good.
The two large duffle bags Lee carried over his shoulder held everything Serena considered necessary to survive. He'd originally come to settle her in and say a last goodbye, but her tantrum on the shuttle had changed that and now Lee had something else in mind. But he had only one hour until the shuttle returned to Galactica. He'd have to hurry.
"Lee, I'm sorry. I didn't mean it. Really I didn't. I just don't want any babies. I'm not good with them. You know that. Please, Lee." Serena's whining was reaching truly annoying proportions and attracting the attention of the dozen or so people within earshot.
Lee had had enough. He pulled his wife off the path to stand under a huge spray of creamy white blossoms that resembled a bridal veil. Fragrant petals floated through the air. "Serena, you just announced to everyone on that shuttle you want a divorce. Do you really expect me to hold you back? You don't want my babies; you don't even want to foster my legacy babies. You haven't slept with me for six months. All you can think about is what you want and what you need. I'm going to give you that divorce right here and now because frankly I don't need you anymore. I don't even want you."
It wasn't like Lee had years to wait for Serena to grow up. He had one week, actually six and half days before the Galactica cut off all ground communication. He didn't want Serena hanging around his neck. Not anymore. His life had become way too short and he had other things to think about, for one, planning humanity's last great battle with the Cylons. And Serena always landed on her feet like a spider cat. Despite that little girl innocent demeanor, she knew exactly whom to kiss up to and how, and since they were leaving, probably forever, it wasn't going to be Commander Adama and his son anymore. By setting her free, Lee really was doing her a kindness.
Or so he told himself.
Serena had sufficient humanity left to look abashed, even ashamed. "I'm sorry," she said. Then some of her old self came through and she reiterated her complaints. "But you wouldn't even tell me about this frakkin' mission of yours. I heard about it on the wireless broadcast, for Lords' sake! Please, you don't have to go, Lee. Your father won't make you." Lee knew better than to think Serena was worried about him. She just didn't want to be left on her own.
A passerby lugging a tiny baby and a single small satchel -- a former gunners' mate third by her Colonial insignia -- watched them curiously but snapped her eyes away when Lee glared back. One of the things he truly hated about being the Commander's son was the complete lack of anonymity, every single person on all forty ships knew who he was. Or maybe it was the Viper patch on his shoulder. Since his father had announced the committee's plan, most people looked at the Viper pilots askance, as if wondering how they could just choose to throw their lives away. A few civilian colonists had even dared to come up and hug him.
"My father doesn't make me do anything, Serena. I make me. Now come on. We're going to end this and if I know you, you'll have another husband by sundown."
Serena deigned to walk at Lee's side the rest of the way to the main square. White flowers had fallen into her dark curly hair, setting off her peaches and cream complexion and the baby blue eyes. She looked completely fresh, feminine and charming, like a wood nymph. Male eyes were following her even though she walked with Lee.
Most of the traffic on Colonial Boulevard moved in their same direction, into the new city. Ahead or behind them walked a dozen or so couples lugging their life's possessions in small bags, as well as assorted other individuals, many of whom towed children. They were all here to stay. Lee was the only one returning and he had only a little over a half hour now. Four burly men passed them headed for the spaceport, carrying among them a large machine, probably the buried starship's inertia regulator for shipping back up to the Galactica. Given their importance to a starship's flight control, the regulators were amazingly small.
"This has to be quick," Lee said as they reached a patch of open ground with a view of the nearby sea. A cool onshore breeze softened the heat of the sun. Temporary tents surrounded the open space and playing children and a few frolicking spider cats raced around like they'd lived on Zodiac all of their lives. The spider cats loved it here. Introducing them was probably going to prove an ecological disaster, but no one had suggested leaving them out of the settlement party. Putting Serena's bags on the ground, Lee held out his hand and ordered, "Give me your wedding ring."
Serena bit her lip, but did as she was told, pulling the tight platinum band off her thumb and dropping it in his proffered palm.
Lee quickly removed his own gold wedding band and handed it to her. "Now, are you ready for this? Because if you're not, I swear I'll do it on my own and you'll lose your honor." A unilateral divorce would be only one step away from calling Serena a whore.
She looked around the bustling square full of human settlers then back at Lee, nodded and held out her hand. "I'm ready," she said in a tremulous voice.
Lee held Serena's hand in the air and pronounced the first of the three public declarations required for a simple divorce under the new Colonial laws. "This woman, Serena Woolcott Adama, is no longer my wife."
Serena seemed near to tears, but she said her part. "This man, Lee Adama, is no longer my husband." It wasn't very loud, but the nearest onlookers must have heard.
They walked across the square and repeated it. Several curious people watched them, one of them was a handsome young man with glistening, dark brown skin whose wide disbelieving eyes tracked Serena's every move.
For the last repetition, they stood in the center of the square, looked at each other and said the words in chorus.
It was done. They were free of each other. Lee suddenly felt uncomfortable. He nodded toward a long tent. "That's probably the barracks there. You might be able to get a bunk on one of the grounded starships, but I doubt it." He held out his hand. "Good luck, Serena. I have to get back to catch my shuttle."
Serena didn't take the hand. Tears rolled down her cheeks as she shook her head and looked away. "The Lords curse you, Adama."
"Sorry you feel that way." After turning Lee quickly trotted in the direction of the spaceport. He looked back only just before entering the fern tree forest. Serena still stood in the middle square next to her bags, but she wasn't alone anymore. The dark skinned man had joined her, a look of concern on his face. Lee thought he saw one of Serena's friends on the far side of the open common, hurrying her way.
Serena was going to do just fine, Lee decided. Just fine.