Ron Moore reimagined Glen A. Larson's original idea; but then again, most people who would be reading this already know that. My use is in no way meant to challenge any established copyrights. This piece is not intended for any profit on the part of the writer, nor is it meant to detract from the commercial viability of the aforementioned or any other copyright. Any similarity to any events or persons, either real or fictional, is unintended.
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VII – The Wisdom of the Mob"I have to admit I'm a little surprised you're willing to talk at all anymore today, let alone with me," Tabitha Donner said with a friendly smile as she picked up her teacup, cradling it in her hands as the president settled in for their interview.
"The worst of it is over," Roslin replied, wearily leaning back in her chair. "I think that may very well have been the most brutal press conference in the history of mankind. In retrospect, talking about how the cylons can look human was a cakewalk."
"What was the worst part?" Donner asked, placing her cup on the table next to her and turning on her tape recorder. "Was the worst part having to go out there and tell people that we're facing an epidemic that could be the end of us?"
"No," Roslin said immediately, surprised at Donner's choice of words. She almost sounds like an alarmist. She remembered to speak more carefully – Tabitha Donner was an autobiographer, not a political ally. There was no telling what the novelist might come up with in her story of humanity's flight and Roslin's leadership through the crisis; the president had enough political experience to know that how facts are presented is far more important than the facts themselves. "Not that explaining the latest emergency was easy," she added. "The people have had enough lately. We've all had enough pain and loss to last two lifetimes; this piling on of crises is… I don't even have a word," she concluded with an exhausted shrug. "Unprecedented seems like an obvious choice, but it doesn't even begin to describe what we've faced, and to be honest, I'm tired of always being the bearer of bad news. I could even see it in the eyes of the reporters – I told them about the flu, and I could tell that most of them just wanted to throw up their hands and scream out, 'Not again!' Facing that kind of increasing hopelessness was the worst part."
"You did well, all things considered."
"And I would have done better if I'd thought things through beforehand and prepared myself for what should have been obvious."
"Which is?"
"They already knew," Roslin answered. "Some of them, anyway," she amended, remembering the suspicious glint in the eyes of those who had not seemed completely stunned by the fact that they had yet another crisis to deal with.
"You think so?"
"Yes, I do." Roslin began rubbing her temples, wondering at how tired she suddenly felt. Is it because of the hellish day I just had, or is it because I'm that much closer to dying? she wondered. She could not remember ever feeling so weary, despite some of the crises she had faced in her early days in politics; but at the same time, the fatigue had never been quite this bad. She decided that given the alternative, she would choose to believe that it was the press that wore her out so.
"How could they have found out?"
"Tom Zarek," Roslin said at once, not a hint of doubt in her voice. As soon as she said the name, she cursed herself. I was just reminding myself to be more careful, and then I go and throw his name out there as if it's Billy I'm talking to. "Maybe we should continue this tomorrow," she said, her tone conveying a disappointment that she did not even begin to feel.
"I understand." Donner clicked off her recorder and put it in her bag. "You still have to be very careful around me," she added. "You know I want to include everything you say, to record it for later, but you also can't have me going out there and spreading stories about how you see Tom Zarek as the enemy lurking in the shadows, waiting for an opportunity to bring you down. It might make you look paranoid. At the very least, it would alienate a lot of the people who consider him a friend, or at least a political ally."
"You do understand," Roslin said. "Maybe you should sit back down."
"Yes ma'am," Donner said with an ingratiating smile that hinted at guile Roslin had never seen in the writer before. "I'm no politician, but that doesn't mean I'm an idiot."
"Perhaps we should set some careful ground rules," the president suggested. "I can't tiptoe around you, afraid of what you're going to include in your book. But I also can't hold much back, or I'd be doing a disservice to you and to everyone who eventually reads your book, thinking that it's a comprehensive account of what happened."
"Can I speak freely?" Donner asked. Roslin nodded. "You see, Madame President, I've been considering this very problem. It seems to me that the best thing we can do is to mutually agree that no one will see my work until you're dead."
"That is the obvious solution," Roslin agreed, hating the sound of the words even more than the mental image they conjured in her head. Until I'm dead, she thought, feeling a stifling combination of fear, anger, and frustration. Rather than getting better with time, the idea of her impending death only grew worse with each passing day.
"I know you still might not like sharing some of your thoughts and feelings, but at least that way you get the assurance of knowing that history will judge you as it will, and you won't have to put up with the ignorant bastards if they decide you were lacking." She laughed slightly, and Roslin could not help but join her.
"Fine," she said. "I know there's nothing I can do to hold you at your word, and there's certainly nothing I can do to punish you if you decide to change your mind."
"I won't change my mind."
"And neither will I," Roslin said, taking a deep breath, mentally steeling herself to open up and let her thoughts, feelings, and opinions out for all to see. Well, for all to see once I'm not around to hear what everyone thinks about my opinions. "I think Tom Zarek was behind me getting ambushed at that press conference."
"So you believe he knew about the flu before you released the news?"
"No doubt about it," Roslin said. "He has people all around the fleet, looking for the slightest problem, anything he can use to discredit me and bring me down. He won't be happy until he has power."
"He says he has a better way of doing things," Donner commented.
"So did President Adar when he okayed deployment of the Command Navigational Program project that his predecessor had developed," Roslin said, feeling dirty as she condemned the decision of the man she had long seen as her mentor. "Adar was wrong, and it cost us all dearly. Zarek is just as wrong, and he doesn't have the intelligence and humility to admit – or even accept – that."
"And Adar would?"
"If Adar were here, he would have accepted full responsibility for the consequences of his decisions," Roislin said confidently. "Zarek is not that kind of man. Twenty years in prison did nothing for him – he still blames the government for all of his problems, even when that government is a pale imitation of the bureaucracy that screwed his people. He killed civilians to make his point, and he doesn't seem to have the vaguest notion that what he did is wrong."
"So you believe he wants to punish the people, all the non-Sagitarrons he blames for the suffering of his colony?"
"I don't think even Tom Zarek knows what he really wants," Roslin muttered. "He wants power, he wants to be the president. Lacking that, he probably wants control of the Galactica, to be the military head of the fleet. Even with all the years he had to think it over, I doubt he's given an hour's worth of honest contemplation as to what he would actually do with the power he wants so badly. I've seen his kind before, and they always hurt people. They hurt people on their way to the top; and once they're there, they hurt people because it's become habit, because they never learned to help people, as is the responsibility of people in government."
"You truly believe that?"
"I do," Roslin said. "But then again, maybe it's easier for me. I was only the Secretary of Education. My decisions helped children all across the Colonies, and I was rarely put in a position where anything I did could ever really hurt anyone. Refusing to include your novel in the Colonial Curriculum was probably the cruelest thing I was ever forced to do."
"In the whole scheme of things, I guess that's not a big deal," Donner commented. Roslin smiled and paused to take a sip of tea, marveling at how much she had divulged in only a few moments. It was liberating, but strangely frightening.
"But remember," Donner commented, interrupting Roslin's thoughts, "I've gained perspective from an apocalyptic assault by sentient, warlike machines. At the time you had me thrown out of your office, I felt like my world was collapsing around me."
"Funny how things like that don't seem to matter anymore," Roslin agreed. "We may have lost almost everything we've ever valued, but in return we had the chance to realize that maybe we were valuing all the wrong things."
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"I miss cornbread," Marcus said, tossing a piece of barely re-hydrated flatbread back on his tray. "This sucks."
"Better than starving," Tyrol replied, ignoring Marcus' latest complaint. The young man had only been in the service for a little over a year and had never expected any action. Like many others, he'd only wanted to have his college education paid for; he had never even dreamed of anything like their current situation.
"Sometimes I wonder whether starvation is the better fate," Cally joked, throwing a piece of her own flatbread at Marcus, bouncing it off his forehead. "Galactica was well known as having one of the worst mess halls in the fleet, and now there's no chance of ever making it better."
"Better than starving," Tyrol repeated.
"I miss wine, too," Marcus added. "Good, strong red wine. The kind they made on Tauron."
"That's enough," Tyrol grumbled.
"Yeah, it's not like you'll ever see a good bottle of Tauron red ever again," Cally said. "Or Caprican sparkling wine, either, for that matter."
"Seriously, Cally… stow it," Tyrol said. "It's not gonna do any of us any good thinking about what we left behind. We all have a job to do."
"Yeah, forget it all and focus on the work," Harper said from across the table. "Wake up, eat, work, sleep. Same thing, every day of the week. Or maybe I should say it's more like activate, work, recharge. We're becoming more like machines every day, just like the toasters, and it's never going to change."
"Except toasters don't get sick," Marcus pointed out. "Now that the Trojan Plague is spreading through the fleet, we get something new and different."
"Not exactly what I had in mind," Cally put in, dropping her fork on the tray. "Maybe we should do something about it."
"About the plague?" Marcus asked with a chuckle. "You gonna quit the flight deck to become a doctor?"
"It's the Trojan Plague," Cally pointed out. "As in, it came from Troy. Anyone here happen to know anyone from Troy?" No one answered, but Tyrol's stomach sank. "Don't know about you guys, but I happen to know someone from Troy. Well, something that claims it's from Troy."
"Valerii," Marcus said. "Oh frak, I can't believe I didn't remember."
"Me either," Harper said. "So what are we gonna do about it?"
"You're gonna shut the frak up, that's what," Tyrol growled, staring down each of the three deckhands in turn. "Then you're gonna get your asses back on the flight deck."
"Not on duty right now," Marcus shrugged.
"That just changed," Tyrol replied. "I expect you all down there in fifteen."
"Chief, come on," Cally complained. "I only have two hours, and then I have to work a double."
"And we're not getting paid overtime anymore, Chief," Harper added.
"Sitting around here talking crazy isn't going to change anything," Tyrol said. "So if you don't have anything constructive to do, you may as well get back to work." Cally was staring at him, launching mental daggers, and he was certain he knew what she was thinking. She's thinking about me and Sharon. She thinks I'm trying to protect her. She thinks I'm blind to what's going on.
"Fine," Marcus hissed, grabbing his tray with one hand and storming off. Tyrol was certain he also heard Marcus add some colorful language as he got out of earshot, but the chief ignored it. I have more important things to do. I'll check on Sharon, and then I'll make sure those grease monkeys are so tired at the end of the day that they won't have enough energy to speak.
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"I was wondering when you'd show up," Baltar muttered, looking up from his microscope and seeing that Six had joined him.
"Missing me again?"
"Simply anticipating your predictable jovial mood." Countless hours spent writing new computer programs to help Cottle with his research – in addition to his own responsibilities as vice-president and resident genius – had definitely started to take a toll on Baltar's attitude. He hated to think he might be described as cranky, but he was willing to acknowledge that innocent bystanders made subject to his ire might be willing to tag him with that label.
"My jovial mood?" Six asked, her wide, obnoxiously toothy smile belying her innocent gaze. "Why what ever do you mean, Gaius?"
"The Trojan Plague," Baltar spat. "I suppose you had something to do with this."
"Are you going to blame me for everything that goes wrong?" Six asked, acting absolutely scandalized at the proposition.
"Perhaps it is a bit unfair of me," Baltar answered sarcastically. "I mean, other than annihilating billions of my people in a surprise attack and nuking our home planets into oblivion, what have you and yours actually done to deserve such suspicion?"
"Your people could have been exposed just as easily by some careless gardener on Cloud Nine, digging up a tree that had been planted in soil contaminated with the dormant virus," Six responded, leaning casually against a wall. "As a scientist, you of all people should be careful about drawing conclusions that aren't based on any hard data."
"Perhaps you just bring out the intuition in me, dear."
"Is that all I bring out in you?" Six asked. Baltar glanced over and saw that she was suggestively playing with the top button of her blouse. He was not in the mood for this at all.
"I'm busy, and I'd appreciate it if you left me alone."
"But I have something I want to tell you."
"You've had at least a minute to do so, and yet you stand there and play games, instead," Baltar spat. "I don't think I should have to suffer for your inability to use time efficiently."
"It's about our child," Six said. Baltar hated to admit it, but that was the one thing that would always get him to drop everything and give his uninvited cylon guest his undivided attention. "I have concerns." The smile was gone, and now she looked downright nervous.
"What is it?"
"Our unborn child is on a ship that has a confirmed outbreak of the Trojan Flu," Six answered. "You do the math."
"Our child is in no danger."
"You only say that because you insist on believing that we're the ones who introduced the virus," Six shot back. "You're assuming that we wouldn't put our child at risk, and that's correct. But like I told you already, we didn't release the virus in your fleet."
"Mm-hmm."
"Gaius, I'm serious."
"Frak…" Baltar pushed his seat back from the desk and locked gazes with Six. If she were human, I would have no problem believing the earnest sincerity in her eyes. But she's not human; if I were the cylons, I would make sure I wrote a behavioral subroutine that would result in that very same expression…
"Gaius, we have to check on our baby."
"Valerii has been completely segregated from the rest of the crew," Baltar reasoned. "There's no one there to infect her; from what I hear, even the one guard they have watching over her stays outside the door and only goes inside the brig to bring her meals. Other than that, there's no one to get her sick."
"Are you willing to take that chance?"
"Well, I'm not a medical doctor," Baltar barked, his patience now completely exhausted. "If the virus is there, there's no much I can do about it. If Valerii is ill, I'm just going to call Cottle the same as her guard will if he discovers she has the Plague."
"Listen to yourself, Gaius," Six responded. "If she has the Plague! You don't think that's important enough to take ten minutes out of your day? This is our child we're talking about."
"No, you're right, of course," Baltar answered. When she puts it like that… Just what the hell is my problem, anyway? Of course I should check on our child.
"Thank you, Gaius. I'll make it up to you later," Six promised as he walked out the door.
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"Got a few minutes?" Apollo asked, poking his head into the commander's quarters.
"Sure," William Adama answered, putting aside a book he had been reading. Apollo had not seen his father take a book down from his shelf for some recreational reading since the cylon attack; the sight was so strange that he did everything he could to catch a glimpse of the title, all with no luck.
"One of my pilots had an idea," Apollo said.
" 'One of my pilots,' " the commander repeated with a grin. "Is that code for Starbuck?"
"No, this time it's Ares," Apollo admitted. "It's about the flu."
"What is it?"
"He and his crew were out there all by themselves for a while, tracking every signal they detected," Apollo explained.
"That's how they found us," the commander said, nodding slightly. "The alert beacon that went off on the Astral Queen when it failed to reach its destination."
"Right." Apollo had not even known that the beacon existed, and the commander had needed to explain to him that all prisoner transports had a beacon installed in their navigational and communications systems when they were carrying enemies of the state. Zarek had certainly qualified for that distinction. The beacon transmitted on a classified frequency that was notoriously hard to track for non-military vessels. Of course, Ares had explained that, as a bounty hunter, he had found it necessary to invest in equipment that could help him find prisoner transports that might be adrift after an escape.
"But this isn't about the Astral Queen, is it?"
"No. While they were out there, they came across the Chiron Medical Station."
"Chiron? It's intact?"
"It was three weeks ago," Apollo answered. "Ares said there are two scientists left, and they weren't interested in hopping aboard a small freighter with no destination. Assuming the cylons haven't found them, they probably still have the place up and running."
"We can't take the fleet back that way," the commander commented, thinking out loud. "We have to keep moving away from the cylons. You say Ares has a plan?"
"Simple enough," Apollo answered. "We use the Chimera and a couple of Raptors, fly on back, pick up supplies, then haul ass back here as fast as we can."
"Simple enough," Adama repeated. "Not much risk for the potential reward."
Apollo nodded – to him, this was a no-brainer. Chiron was a remote, classified medical research facility, situated at the edge of known space, well out of the shipping lanes. One of the so-called Six Sisters, Chiron was an infectious agent research lab. Apollo had no doubt that biological weapons were developed there, but each of the Six Sisters doubled as a medical emergency port, capable of supporting a full military fleet in the midst of a large-scale health crisis. All while keeping that fleet safely out of the public eye, preventing hysteria and any chance of having commercial traffic stumble upon a new disease they could carry to the civilian population. The Six Sisters were built because of the problems associated with the Trojan Flu; what better place to go now that it's back?
"Can you trust the information?" Adama asked unexpectedly.
"Huh?"
"You said Ares came to you with this?"
"Yes."
"Then can you trust it?"
"He's not a cylon," Apollo answered. "The tests were very conclusive on that."
"That's not what I asked," Adama replied, his expression having reverted to his stony commander's mask. "When he showed up here, you said that you and he had known each other but had never been great friends," Adama explained. "You didn't seem too thrilled with his arrival, and I've looked at the flight logs enough to know you've been reluctant to use him as much as I would expect, given that he's an experienced pilot and you're about fifty pilots short of what you need to provide minimum preparedness for a fleet this size. Say what you want, but I see your flight assignments – I know you don't fully trust him."
"It's not that," Apollo objected. "I just… I don't know. Maybe I just have trouble seeing that he's changed is all. Sir."
"You don't have to 'Sir' me in here, Lee," Adama said, his expression softening once more, just like it had when he had joked about Starbuck. "And I know that you and Ares were very good friends at flight school."
"Huh?"
"You don't think everyone there who knew me wasn't eager to pass on stories?" Adama asked. "I heard a lot about what happened."
"You never said anything."
"You didn't want me to," Adama pointed out. "I wasn't blind to how you viewed me and my perceived influence on your career. There wasn't much I could do about that, so I tried to ignore it and hoped that you'd do the same."
"So you know what happened."
"I know one of your best friends was killed in a crash," Adama admitted. "A woman named Carrie Starke."
"Athena."
"Yeah, Athena. I heard all about my son, the frosty-cold pilot who was so skilled that he earned the name of a god as his callsign. You're the kind of pilot they say only comes around once every four or five years, and in your class, they had three of you."
"I should get going," Lee said, making to stand up when his father raised his hand.
"I'm sorry," Adama muttered. "I didn't mean to chase you out of here by bringing up the past. It's just… No, I'm sorry."
"It's fine," Lee responded, easing back into his chair. "I never talked about it. Never wanted to, and I didn't realize you knew about it. Though I guess I should have expected you to. Yeah, Ares, Athena, and I were pretty tight. And we were also young and stupid. We all took to a Viper like a duck to water, and we spent far too much time egging each other on to push harder when we should have been paying more attention to the limits of the aircraft."
"And yourselves."
"And ourselves," Lee agreed. "Athena got it in her head that she should try flying Demeter's Canyon at Mach 1."
"In a Viper?"
"It wouldn't have been a challenge in planetside fighter," Apollo answered. "The Viper is built to operate in space, high-, and low-atmosphere. Multi-purpose to the extreme, but lacking some of the features that make planetside fighters far more maneuverable in low atmosphere flight. She should have known better… it was perfectly frakking clear in hindsight."
"Mistakes usually are."
"It was Ares' idea," Apollo continued. "He was going to fly the canyon and prove he was the best of us… we were always trying to one-up each other. But he got caught off base – with Admiral Benjamin's daughter – and got himself grounded. So Athena took the opportunity to do it first. I didn't even try to stop her."
"Didn't you realize how dangerous it was?"
"Of course I did," Apollo replied. "That was the whole point. I don't think it ever occurred to me that she couldn't do it. She was the best of the three of us, no doubt about it. Starbuck is the only pilot I've ever seen who might be better. I never tried to stop her."
"And neither did Ares."
"He tried a little," Apollo said, "but only because he wanted Athena to delay until he could do it first. It wasn't like she didn't realize what he was up to. So she went out one morning and didn't come back. Ares and I didn't talk much after that. I can't even say why… we just didn't."
"And that's why you're being careful with Ares."
"I'm not going to be careless again," Apollo said. "And I won't give Ares an opportunity to, either, whether he wants to or not."
"So you trust his information, but not necessarily his judgment."
"I guess so," Apollo admitted.
"Then make certain he doesn't have an opportunity to make command decisions," Adama instructed. "Pick your crews. The Chimera and two Raptors. You'll be flying one of the Raptors."
"Yes, sir."
"I'll inform the president that the military may have a solution to her problem."
"A sensible military solution to a health crisis; that'll amuse her."
"I'm sure it will."
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By the time he reached the brig where Sharon Valerii was being held, Baltar was already able to make out many of the specific threats that were being made and connect a few of the voices to faces and names he knew.
"You really just better go, Chief," Cally called out, her voice clearly indicating that she was at the end of her rope. "You weren't supposed to be here."
"I'm not going anywhere," Tyrol growled, his confrontational tone apparently the only thing keeping a mob of his crewmates at bay. Baltar turned the final corner and took in the scene before him. His guess had been correct – there were at least a dozen people standing there, and none of them looked like they were making a social call. The only one standing against them was Chief Tyrol, and any influence and authority he had over his shipmates was rapidly fading.
"You can't stop us all, chief," a young man called out.
"I know," Tyrol admitted. "But I can guarantee that I'll kill the first one of you with my bare hands. Maybe the second one, too. The third might take me down, but you all have to ask yourselves whether you're willing to be the first or second one to try getting past me. Is getting past me important enough to die for?"
"She brought the plague with her," a woman cried out from the back of the crowd, just several feet in front of Baltar.
"You can't believe that," Tyrol answered. "There's no evidence of that. You're just panicking."
"Frak you, chief," another woman spat. "We're not panicking, we're being smart! If anyone's panicking, it's you. You have to know your girlfriend is responsible."
"She's from Troy," another crewman shouted. "And the Trojan Plague didn't break out until after she got here."
"Space her!" another voice shouted. "Space her before she can spread the plague!"
"Quiet!" Baltar shouted. He almost fell over in shock when everyone did an about-face toward him all at once, with the precision of graduating cadets. "You all have to get out of here immediately."
Several moments of silence followed as the assembled crewmen were clearly considering their options, weighing the consequences of defying the vice-president against their desire to kill a cylon. Baltar thought he might have gotten through to them, only to have his hopes shattered when someone yelled, "No, space her!"
"Space her!" Cally echoed, and the crowd turned as one back toward Tyrol, who suddenly looked extremely vulnerable in front of the door to Valerii's cell.
"Are you all mad?" Baltar shrieked, trying a tactic that occurred to him suddenly and seemed so insane that it could not help but work. "This is what it might want!" That got through to them once again, and the screams ebbed to furious murmurs.
"What are you talking about?" Tyrol yelled from the front. "She hasn't done anything."
"How do we know?" Baltar asked him. "What they're all saying makes a kind of sense."
"Yeah," someone echoed. "It makes sense, Chief."
"But we can't just pull her out of there," Baltar added, turning once more to the crewmen. He had felt them take him into their little mob, he knew they had accepted his first statement and began to use his voice of authority as justification for their actions. Now he had to redirect their paranoia and rage, slowly and extremely carefully. Here goes the most dangerous part. "What if pulling her out of there is the whole idea?" he asked Tyrol, making certain he did not engage the crowd until he was certain they were ready to listen to reason.
"She's not infected," Tyrol stated flatly.
"You don't know that," Baltar argued. "Like your own shipmates said, you might think of her as your girlfriend. Your mind might be clouded by your feelings."
"No."
"She could be in there hoping we pull her out, hoping that everyone who helps space her gets infected and spreads the plague around Galactica," Baltar pointed out. He saw a slight glimmer in Tyrol's eyes, and he realized the chief had just caught on to what he was planning. Baltar spared a moment to take in the mood of those around him. Everyone seemed suddenly absorbed with the test of wills between the chief and the vice-president.
"She wouldn't come in here just to get us sick," Tyrol replied. "She wouldn't do that. You can even test her if you want."
"And if she's infected?" Baltar asked. "If we can prove she brought the plague here to kill us all?"
"Then we'll space her," Tyrol said through gritted teeth, reluctant to speak the words but possessing enough common sense to play along with Baltar's plan.
"Do we have your guarantee you won't try to stop us next time?" Baltar asked.
"Yes."
"Cally," Baltar said, turning to the woman who had seemed surprisingly comfortable at the front of a mob. "I need you to go to the bridge and tell the commander that I need full access to the prisoner. I need to run some tests, do you understand? And tell him to get some more guards down here; we can't risk her trying to escape and infect us all in case we've caught on to her plan."
"Sure," Cally responded, pushing her way toward the back of the small group and heading toward the bridge.
"And the rest of you better clear out of here and get to sick bay," Baltar advised. "Those air holes in the brig aren't there for show – you might have just exposed yourselves to the plague." Most of the crewmen seemed aghast at the idea and raced out, though three young men stayed behind.
"You'd better leave," Baltar advised.
"We're not going anywhere," one of them said.
"Not until we know if we're spacing her," another added.
"Granted, I haven't been on Galactica for all that long," Baltar said, "but I've definitely noticed that news seems to race amongst the crew faster than seems rationally possible. How long do you think it is before – what's his name, Helo?" he asked Tyrol. The chief nodded. "Yes, Helo… How long do you think it'll be before Helo comes down here to make certain you all leave?" Baltar asked. "Of course, perhaps Colonel Tigh will get down here first and accuse you of slacking; I hear he isn't very forgiving of crewmen who shirk their duties. Then again, if the commander is the first one down here and thinks you've been threatening to space his valuable hostage..." Baltar was not sure which man's arrival concerned the three crewmen the most, and he didn't much care. All that mattered to him was that all three left without another word.
"Thanks," Tyrol said, leaning back against the door. Now that the crowd had left, Baltar could see Valerii curled up in the back corner of her cell.
"Don't mention it," Baltar answered, turning and walking back to his lab. He had not gone more than twenty feet before four armed marines passed him going toward the brig. A little late, Baltar thought, wondering where the scheduled guard had gone when the mob arrived.
"That was magnificent," Six commented from behind Baltar. The doctor did not even break stride; he simply glanced back and grunted. "I truly don't think you could have managed that before your time on Kobol," the cylon added. "You've definitely grown, Gaius. You're not the same small genius you used to be."
"Mm-hmm." He refused to give her the satisfaction of an answer this time. She manipulated me into going up there, he fumed. She knew what was going to happen… somehow, she knew… and she sent me up there to stand up to a mob. "I could have been killed," he muttered.
"Our child could have been killed," Six countered. "But you saved her. You just stood up to a dozen soldiers who were planning on murdering our child. How does that make you feel, Gaius?"
Baltar knew that she wanted him to saying something along the lines of, 'It made me feel like I was unstoppable, like I had been touched by god,' or at least, 'It made me feel powerful.' He decided to disappoint her. "It made me feel like I could really use a drink."
To be continued…………………………