Boxman Valerii Tyrol followed the Chief down the passageway. It was funny. Boxey always thought of himself by that name now. It wasn't as though he'd forgotten his father, but even when the Colonel had been alive, he'd been gone for months, once even a whole year at a time, leaving Boxey with one or another of his aunts and uncles. And his mother had died of pancreatic cancer years before the Judgment. Boxey missed both of his parents, but he'd felt the same empty ache most of his life.
Missing Sharon was something else. Every day it hurt with a freshness that didn't seem to go away. The Chief had warned Boxey that seeing her tonight was going to be even worse. But he had to do it.
He was fifteen years old, sixteen in ten months, and by Colonial law he'd be an adult on his next birthday and able to vote and enlist. He was ready to make adult decisions and this one felt right. He and Elosha had talked it over and agreed that Sharon wasn't a Cylon by choice. She hadn't marched into Cylon headquarters and said, "Where do I sign up?" She'd been as deceived as the rest of them.
The Chief stopped to rest a minute, leaning against a bulkhead. He'd never really gotten his old strength back after that bullet in his arm. Boxey said, "Is it much further, Galen?" He had no idea where they were. He thought he'd checked out every compartment and passageway on Galactica but he'd never seen this one before. Presumably it led to the high security brig.
The Chief shook his head. "Maybe another hundred meters then down some stairs." Gesturing for Boxey to come close, he put an arm around the growing shoulders and said, "Box, old man, she looks like hell. I just want you to know that it'll be okay if you want to leave. She won't remember."
"I have to see her. She saved me off Caprica then took me in. I don't care if she's a Cylon, she's still Sharon, isn't she?"
The Chief's hand stroked the long hair Boxey kept tied back in a ponytail. "Yeah, some of her still is." He straightened up. "Come on, let's go."
The security guard stationed outside Sharon's cell nodded at them. "Evening, Chief," he said. "She's been really quiet today, but you can try your luck." There was a large rectangular machine next to the guard's desk with an array of colored lights that flashed in seemingly random, meaningless patterns. It hummed. A large helmet with an unusual crest lay on top.
The Chief nodded at the guard perfunctorily. Boxey didn't like him either.
"Don't get too close. She can't always control herself," the Chief reminded Boxey then he called out in a much louder voice, "Boomer, you in there? Sharon? Got someone to see you." The cell was dark and full of shadows.
A stick figure arose slowly from the bed, ambled drunkenly across the floor and half fell against the bars. "Hi ya, Gay," the thing that once had been Sharon Valerii said in a slurred voice. The black glory of her hair was gone, shaved completely away. The Chief hadn't told Boxey why. Dark smudges circled her eyes and she'd lost at least twenty pounds. She'd been stripped to her underwear and was barefoot. She was dirty. She was crying.
"Oh frak," Boxey gasped. He'd been warned about how Sharon would look, but not enough, not nearly enough.
Her face lit up. "Boxer!" she cried and held out her hands through the bars. Sharon was the only one who called him Boxer. It was Sharon, it was still really her.
Boxey took a step toward the cell, but the Chief pulled him back. "No closer."
Shrugging off the restraining hand, Boxey said, "Yes, Sir," but it hurt to stay in place. He silently watched as Sharon pulled her arms back inside.
"Miss you," she said. Tears slowly tracked down her cheeks. Her red-rimmed eyes were sunk into her head as though they were hiding from the light.
"I miss you too, Sharon." Boxey glanced at the Chief then quickly away. The Chief's eyes were also wet. His own eyes stung. Jesus, it was hard to be a grown-up. "Galen and I, we're getting along, but it's not the same without you."
"He's going to take care of you. You do what he says."
"Yes'm." The Chief's hand had returned to Boxey's arm. He resisted a desire to shrug it away again. The Chief was hurting. They all were. He should get this over with. Taking a deep breath, he tried to remember just exactly what he wanted to say. "Sharon, I wanted to thank you for being my mom and taking care of me so good." Sharon was staring at him and he felt like he had back on Judgment Day when everything had ended for everyone, only this time it was ending just for him. "You are special and you saved my life. I just wanted you to know that I love you."
Sharon sobbed and started to turn away. "Oh Lords, I can't take this."
Boxey looked at the Chief. "Please, just let me touch her hands, that's all."
The Chief glanced at Sharon with a pained expression then he nodded slowly. "Okay, but stay as far back as you can." The guard stood up and his hand went to the grip of the electric prod he wore at his waist.
When Boxey took a few steps closer and stretched out his hands, Sharon's came eagerly out through the cell bars. They touched fingertips. "Honey," Sharon said. "I love you too. Just pass our love on. Give it away to as many people as you can."
It felt so good just to touch Sharon again and hear her say that she loved him. The Chief said it once in awhile but Sharon had always said it a lot. Boxey missed it.
Sharon would feel better if she knew about their plan to adopt legacy babies. "I will. Me and Galen, we've got a plan. We're going to …"
From behind him, the Chief said, "Don't tell her, Boxey. She can't know."
Abruptly Sharon's head turned towards the Chief and her hands dropped away from Boxey's. She was changing. There was an opaque look to her eyes, as though the real Sharon was stepping out for a bit and leaving someone else in charge. In an oily voice that dripped mockery she said, "How long you going to let Gay boss you 'round, Boxer? He's just embarrassed I fooled him for so long." Sticking an arm back through the bars, she gestured to him. "Come closer and I'll tell you a secret."
The Chief had once again taken Boxey's arm. He didn't try to pull free but he did lean as close to Sharon as he could. "What is it?"
She spit on him, a slimy glob of white bubbles that dripped down the sleeve of Boxey's shirt, then as the Chief pulled him up the stairs, struggling and fighting to look back, she laughed like a striped kill-dog. "Gotcha!" she shouted after them.
At the top, Boxey broke free and when he tried to speak he realized he was blubbering like a baby. "If I go back, Sharon will be herself again. I know she will. It's gotta be easier for her when we're there. Let me go back, please, Galen. Please." He'd forgotten all about being grown up.
"You can't go back, Boxey," the Chief said, and he was in a bad way too. He'd stuck his chin out so far that he was in danger of falling over on it. He always did that when he was upset. "I can't let you go back down there. We're going to … She's not going to be in there anymore, Box."
Boxey stopped breathing. They couldn't do this. No. Oh no. "You're going to kill her?" He shook his head violently. Humans weren't supposed to do things like that -- kill people in cold blood. That was supposed to be Cylons.
"She's volunteered to … " -- Boxey turned to run back down the steps to Sharon but the Chief grabbed his shoulders -- "Boxey, no! She's volunteered to go on this mission to the Cylon home world. She wants to help us win. She wants to …"
The Chief said two more words as Boxey struggled away and broke free. He tried not to remember them as he ran as fast as his legs could carry him down the passageway, then up stairwell after stairwell until half the Galactica was between him and Sharon. But still the Chief's last two words rang in his ears.
" … die human."
.
Chief Tyrol bent over a workbench in the darkened, almost empty tool locker. A pool of light illuminated the helmet-shaped tangle of tiny buses, connectors and multi-colored wires under his hands. With a screwdriver the size of a toothpick he made an adjustment then moved the helmet under the lamp's magnifying glass to check his work.
Even when every ship in the refugee fleet had still been jammed from top to bottom with human beings, the Chief had found peace and privacy in here. Now that two-thirds of the Galactica's crew had landed on Zodiac, it was quiet almost everywhere onboard, but this was still his personal refuge. Once it had been his and Sharon's.
Tucking his blunt fingertips between two small buses, the Chief made another tiny adjustment. The Redleken helmet was almost ready to test on Sharon again. He'd managed to improve the charge capacity to a full hour. The Commander and his committee had asked for a miracle and he'd done his best.
A couple of hours ago the Chief had come down here after giving up his search for Boxey. The boy knew the ship better than he did now and had a thousand places to hide. Tomorrow he'd try again, but more than likely Boxey would avoid him until the Galactica left for the Cylon home world. They'd fly down to Zodiac together on the last shuttle out and that's all that mattered. Then they'd have the rest of their lives to work things out. The Chief hoped that it would be time enough.
Because of what the Chief and Sharon had used the tool locker for, he'd never oiled the hatch hinges. They creaked a loud warning when the Commander pulled open the hatch and stepped through, his face briefly illuminated by the hangar's bright overheads. When the hatch closed again, the locker's light was once more reduced to the puddle on the tool bench.
"Don't you ever sleep?" the Commander asked as the Chief stood up and tried to come to attention. His left arm still didn't want to bend quite right.
"I could ask you the same, Sir," Tyrol said. His wrist chrono. said oh-three hundred. They didn't have enough crew left for a full three watches, so for these last few days only second watch had anything like full staff. It didn't begin for five hours yet and only a few people should be up. In the room's dim light the Chief couldn't see the Commander's face clearly, but he'd sounded tired.
"Well, you know what they say -- when you're going through hell, there's never time for a holiday. Sometimes I just need to get away." The Commander had moved closer to the lamp. Stray upward rays of golden light emphasized the Commander's bronze skin tones and made his face resemble a roughcast metal sculpture. He looked beyond tired. He looked exhausted.
"Not too many places to get away to on the Galactica, Sir. Have you been down to Zodiac?"
He shook his head. "No time. Lee went down for a few hours. He said it was beautiful, a paradise. It'll be a good place for you and Boxey to make a life."
The Chief and Boxey. Not the Commander, nor his son, nor two hundred and twelve of his crewmates. And not Sharon. "Yes, Sir," the Chief said.
The Commander said, "Sit. Don't let me keep you from your work," and looked around for a second chair. Settling for a tall stool, he sat down and began to pick through the litter on the workbench as though he expected to find treasure instead of a week's accumulation of trash.
The Chief hadn't cleaned up since he'd begun the helmet project. He had the unfinished helmet in his hands, but he hadn't found the little screwdriver. It didn't matter. He couldn't concentrate on that right now. "Sir? Can I ask an off-the-record question?"
The Commander sighed and put down the length of gold wire he'd found. "Go ahead, Chief."
"Why didn't you choose me to go with you? Was it because of Sharon? I need to know, for my peace of mind."
Everyone not chosen must have asked the Commander the same question because he didn't have to think about the answer. "It's nothing personal, Chief. It's just that the colony needs you more than we do. The Galactica's not going to be much more than a flying cannon. If something goes wrong, we won't have time to fix it."
They sat silently for a moment, the Chief with the Redleken helmet still in his hands, the Commander gloomily staring at it. "I guess I need permission to speak off the record too, Galen," he said.
"Sir?"
"Don't 'sir' me. This isn't military." The Commander seemed embarrassed, almost shy. "I want to ask a very personal favor. Call me … call me, 'Bill.'"
"Bill, Sir? Okay … Bill." The Commander was going ask him to build a memorial to the Galactica's crew, he was sure of it. He'd been planning to do one anyway. Something grand and beautiful so that future generations would know just how much had been sacrificed.
The Commander had folded his arms tightly across his chest. He rocked back and forth just a little. "I've heard through the grapevine that you and Boxey are going to foster some of the legacy babies."
Oh … Boxey's baby project. Boxey had been studying the Holy Scrolls with Elosha and she'd suggested it as a way for him contribute to the Colony and the future. But the Commander? Somehow the Chief had assumed he would find someone special to raise his children. But he had. He'd found Boxey. "We'd be honored, Sir."
The Commander's raised eyebrow and soft chuckle spoke even more than his words. "I'm that obvious, am I?"
"Only to those who know you, Sir. Did you get your match card yet?"
"Yeah, it's up in my quarters. Can't decide what to do with it." The Chief had to smile. Even for the Commander it must be tough to ask women to let him father their children. Especially for the Commander. He wasn't a young man.
"If the mothers have no objection, just write my name across the top of their cards or next to your sticker. Boxey will take care of the rest."
"I'm sure he will. He's going to a very special man some day." The Commander stood up again. "Let me know if you need anything, Chief."
"There is one thing, Sir. If you wouldn't mind."
The Commander's raised eyebrows asked for further details.
"If you should happen to see that grapevine again, tell him that I'm sorry and that I'd really wish he'd come home."
"He's sleeping in my quarters. Why don't you come and get him in the morning?"
"I will, Sir. Thank you."