Battlestar Galactica

'Culture Shock'

Prologue

Battlestar Galactica: Kobol System

Cylon Humanoid Model Number Six sighed as the energies of transport released their grip on her. The technology was sound yet she always felt uncomfortable when she had to use it.

Odd, she thought to herself. A Cylon with a human phobia.

She always wondered why she had the phobia, yet her sophisticated central processor could never come up with the appropriate answer.

Perhaps it is God's will, she mused.

Looking around she noticed she had reached her destination. God's technologies certainly worked wonders. She had gone from the ruined colony of Picon to the deck of humanity's last battlestar quicker than any FTL jump could accomplish.

Pressing a button on her arm, Six signaled that she had reached her target and that she was beginning reconnaissance.

Mark Kelan, the only Earthling within hundreds of light-years, sat watching the odd game being played before him. The best he could tell was that it was similar to poker, but with different rules.

"So tell me, Kelan, what's Earth like?" Chief Galen Tyrol asked him.

"Well, I can't tell you how it is now, but when we left it was a nice place. Sure there were problems, but I'm sure they've been worked out by now."

"So why did you leave?" Specialist Cally asked him for what seemed the hundredth time.

"I'd rather not talk about that," Kelan told her, then changing the subject, "So tell me again how this is played. What does this mean?"

"Frak, you win again," Cally told him, looking at the hand. "Are you sure they don't play this on Earth?"

"Well, it's similar to poker, but our cards are rectangles. I still can't get used to all these hexagons and octagons. You even cut the corners off your printer paper. What's up with that?"

"It's just how we've always done things, I guess," Tyrol chimed in.

"Makes sense, I guess," Kelan told him. "By the way, I've been wondering. What exactly does 'frak' mean anyway? Y'all sure seem to use it a lot."

"You don't know what 'frak' means?" Cally chuckled. She and Tyrol exchanged a look and burst our laughing.

"Somehow I feel I'm the end of a bad joke here," Kelan observed.

Cally leaned over and whispered in his ear. In the span of a few seconds, Kelan's look went from one of confusion to one of amusement.

"I see," he said when she was finished. Laughing to himself he told them, "Well, guess it makes sense. Everyone has their own word for it."

"Well, we wouldn't exactly say it around the President, but it's a fairly common word," Tyrol told him. "What do you say on Earth?"

"We say a lot of things," Kelan told him. "Not sure the exact number, though."

Behind them, someone cleared their throat. Turning, Kelan was greeted by the face of Dr. Gaius Baltar, acting President of the Colonies.

"Excuse me, Mr. Kelan, sorry to interrupt your little game here, but, well, I was about to leave for a Quorum meeting on the Cloud Nine and was wondering if you'd like to accompany me?"

"A meeting on the what?" Kelan asked, confused.

"Oh, forgive me. It's hard to remember you're not one of us," Baltar told him with some scorn in his voice. "It's a government meeting on our recreation ship."

"Well, that makes sense, but why do I need to be there?"

"Well, seeing as you represent the Thirteenth Colony of Kobol…" Baltar began.

"Look, I don't know what you've been smoking, Doctor, but Earth is no colony."

This drew looks from everyone around him.

"What did I say?" he asked them.

"You don't know of Kobol?" Cally asked him.

"Never heard of it until I got here," he told her. "And this nonsense of Earth being a colony of it is new to me as well."

"But doesn't your holy book begin with the words 'Life here, began out there'?" Tyrol asked him.

"No, it begins with 'In the beginning, God created the Heavens and the Earth'. Why?"

Behind him, Baltar nearly exploded.

"Look, I don't have time for a theology lesson. I've got a frakking meeting with the frakking Quorum of Twelve in fifteen frakking minutes and I just want to know if you want to attend?"

"Easy, man, I never said no," Kelan told him. After thinking a moment, he said, "Ok, I'll attend this government meeting of yours, but on one condition. And that's no one knows I'm from Earth. As far as I've been able to tell, no one other than a few people on this ship knows I'm from Earth. And I'd like to keep it that way."

"And why's that?" Gaius asked him.

"Because I don't know how to get us back to Earth," he told him.