A/N: Italics are Head Six talking to Baltar.
==========BS-75 Galactica (+221 Days Post Cylon Holocaust)==========
The President of the Twelve Colonies of Kobol, Laura Roslin, took off his glasses and rubbed the bridge of her nose as she walked down the gunmetal gray corridors of Galactica. She had felt dizzy, almost like the metallic passageways had turned to putty or mud, and that each and every step felt like she was moving through quick-sand.
Doctor Cottle had just administered her Deloxan treatment and had recommended she stay on the battlestar for rest. When she had told him she was going to go back to Colonial One he had told her, in no uncertain terms that she was being 'fraking stupid' to go against his orders. Now she thought he just might be right.
Her temple was throbbing and she stopped a moment to rub her head. Carefully she folded her glasses and placed them in her jacket breast pocket and took a long, deep breath. She felt better. Maybe she just needed a little air. Walk a little to get the blood flowing…
And about half way to the flight pod she collapsed.
In a fit of moving in and out of consciousness she saw the concerned and frightened look of Billy at her side. Leaning up slightly and shaking her head side to side she could see her Presidential Guards running next to the gurney.
She felt a sting on her arm and saw an IV had been placed in her arm and she had been connected to a portable heart monitor. She heard shouts, "Make a hole!" and "Get out of the way!" as the medics rushed her to Doctor Cottle.
She felt the light around her begin to diminish until it reached a tiny pin-prick of a point. Then she blanked out. She awoke, realized she said a few things, mumbled and slurred a half dozen words, and then blacked out again.
Not realizing exactly where she was and not knowing how much time had passed since she blacked out, she slowly opened her eyes.
She heard the voice of multiple men talking about her, rather than to her. This annoyed her, and she summoned the strength to speak. "Don't talk like I'm not here," she scolded them. She used what little strength she had left to sit up, Commander Adama rushing to her side to help her. "Thank you, Bill," she smiled weakly. She still couldn't see well and what she did see was blurry. But she knew Adama's touch and knew he would be the one to rush to her aide.
"Madam President," he greeted her. She could hear the concern and worry on his voice, and the discreet hint of joy that she had woken unharmed.
She called forth her will and her determination. She hadn't wanted to discuss this topic, not now. But she felt if she were going to lapse into a coma or even die, she needed to have her last orders issued. "I called you all here because I needed to discuss with you the Cylon, Sharon and it's baby. And we need to do something with the machines, the Terminators." Even on the verge of death the hatred in her voice towards Sharon, the 'it' as she called it and the 'cybernetic organisms' dominated her domineer and attitude. "Doctor Cottle, can you tell the Commander what you told me," she asked.
The man grunted, holding a file folder to his chest. "I'm not an expert in genetics but I know how to read a blood test," Cottle began. "There are some damn genetic abnormalities with the Cylon fetus. Damn odd stuff," he said.
Commander Adama looked towards Baltar, "I haven't seen any of this on the reports you submitted, Doctor Baltar."
Doctor Baltar cleared his throat and licked his lips. He looked nervous and his eyes darted back and forth before focusing down on the deck plating. "Well no. I've been busy with the three friends of ours… oh, and I've been doing my own tests… and as Doctor Cottle said, he's no expert, I am," he said confidently, raising his shoulder up and standing straighter. "There is nothing uh… um," he searched for the right word as he tensed his neck muscles, "conclusive about the tests."
Doctor Cottle had been staring straight at him, leering, from an uncomfortably close distance. He'd refrained from lighting a cigarette. "I didn't say there was anything conclusive. Just that there were some damn strange abnormalities," he corrected forcefully.
"Uh… yes, true," Baltar conceded. "Madame President, the Cylon Sharon is very important to the fleet-"
"Doctor, please, you're too close to it. Your judgment is clouded," she looked at him. He nodded quickly and brought his tablet up to his chest, holding it tight like he usually did when nervous. "The Cylon baby cannot be allowed to live," she stated, right to the point. "I think you should understand Bill," she said. She saw him looking down at her, confusion and disbelief on his face. "Bill, she's dangerous. We have three machines running around based on tenuous justifications. A Cylon baby? The Cylons just annihilated our race. The Fleet couldn't accept that."
Baltar was shaking his head, his eyes darting between her, Adama, and Cottle. "Well Madam President," Baltar began forcefully, "I, I don't understand. I don't understand this dislike of the Sharon, who has been very valuable in giving us intelligence and saved this fleet from total destruction. But that there are three machines which call themselves 'Terminators' for Gods' sake allowed near free run." He felt relieved to get that observation off his chest and as always to contradict Roslin and point out how irrational they were being.
"Those three are under Cain's command," Adama said. "They spend most of their time on Pegasus. The Admiral has left authority to deal with Sharon with us," he pointed out. "She doesn't care what we do as long as we don't release her," he added.
He almost sounded sad at that, the admission they could do anything with her, and that no one would care, as long as the Cylon Sharon were not released.
Doctor Baltar was not going to give up easily. This is one thing she told him he could not let happen. The beautiful woman only he could see and hear did not want this to happen.
"Commander, this makes no sense. How is a baby any more a threat to this fleet than three machines which can… can, uh, I don't know, kill us all?" He asked, bobbing his head. He couldn't tolerate the irrational arguments being made to terminate the Cylon child.
Roslin held up her hand, stopping any further protests from her vice president. "Doctor Baltar. The good thing about being president is that you don't have to explain yourself. To anyone," Roslin said. "I'm tired. Please leave." And she closed her eyes.
Adama looked down at the woman he had so grown close to. They'd known each other only seven months, yet he had grown to deeply care for her. He turned quickly and left the medical bay before he publicly revealed too much. Doctor Baltar was following right on his heels.
"Commander Adama," he started shortly after exiting the bay, "I think President Roslin's illness is severely, severely handicapping her judgment. It makes no sense to terminate the Cylon fetus with three death machines running around Pegasus," he blurted out.
"She certainly seemed coherent," Adama pointed out, keeping his voice calm and his demeanor stoic.
The two began to argue back and forth.
Baltar began sounding like he was in a panic. The scientist easily became frustrated when arguing with those he believed didn't understand the science behind his work. On Caprica he was always listened to, his position and salary dictated respect. Here, Adama and everyone else continually argued with his scientific facts. He was tired of it, exhausted by the continuous disrespect.
"When will you stop tolerating their blatant disrescpect for you Gaius?" The beautiful blond-haired woman said as she appeared form behind him. She ran her hand down his shoulder, onto his chest, feeling his body under her hand.
Baltar closed his eyes, a minute shiver of excitement swept through his body.
Through gritted teeth the Commander addressed him. "Pull yourself together, Doctor. Admiral Cain has ordered the three machines to be released and they are on Pegasus. President Roslin has authority here and I will support her decision. Calm down, Doctor. You're going to be president soon and will need to make hard decisions. Act like you can handle it."
The insult and disdain in the Commander's voice was not missed by Gaius Baltar.
"He's jealous of you. He hates you, you know," came that beautiful voice he loved.
Baltar watched the Commander march off, leaving Baltar standing in the corridor, alone. But not truly alone.
"I know… idiot," he sneered quietly under his breath.
"You are a great man, Gaius. Show them…" she said as she twisted around his body letting her hands dance on his chest. She brushed her hips against him seductively and he could feel her warmth.
That devious and sly smile he loved was plastered on her face. He grinned. Baltar knew his guardian would not let him down.
==========BS-75 Galactica==========
Helo stood at attention as Commander Adama rose quickly from behind his desk and stood in front of Karl Agathon. He motioned for his Raptor ECO to come to ease.
"Lieutenant, there is no easy way to say this," he began, hiding the pain in his gut, "but the president has ordered Sharon's baby to be terminated."
Helo, eyes wide and mouth gaped, stood there shocked. "What… what?" The life vanished from his eyes.
"Doctor Cottle informed the president that there are abnormalities in the blood. The president has decided to terminate the pregnancy, and I support her decision." His voice betrayed him, and it cracked. He didn't support the decision, but he had to. He couldn't undermine Laura.
"Why? 'Abnormalities', isn't that to be excepted? I mean, it's the first human-Cylon child… why are you killing my child? It's a part of me, sir!" His protest was strong, and while he thought it fell on deaf ears he had no idea that Commander Adama was torn up inside over this. "She's helped the fleet, saved us, and betrayed her people to come and help us, sir!"
Adama forced his eyes up and he looked Helo in the eye. One of his best Raptor officers with an impeccable character, Helo was always doing and had always done what he considered the right thing. The man was of impeccable moral and ethical character. He didn't deserve this… Adama knew it was his child, even if half was machine. He respected Helo. "I'm sorry Helo. But don't confuse a strong desire to live with a genuine desire to help. She's a Cylon," he added.
The implication was powerful; Sharon was doing this for self-preservation, not because she believed in humanity of the fleet.
"I guess it is so much easier to kill a child, a part of me, when you just label it a Cylon, isn't it sir?" He leaned forward; Adama could see the rage and disappointment in his eyes. "I'll be the one to tell her. You owe her that much." He sneered, his breathing uneven and forceful. With one last look of disgust Helo turned without waiting to be dismissed.
==========BS-62 Pegasus==========
Lieutenant Karl 'Helo' Agathon stepped out of Transport Raptor 4, one of the multiple Raptors making bi-hourly runs between Galactica and Pegasus.
He had come to look for them, the machines. He was specifically looking for the John Planck machine. They'd been friends and often Planck had offered a level of insight Helo had often times appreciated. Planck had asked Starbuck during his interrogations how Sharon was doing and the child. The machine had been briefed on the Cylon pregnancy, hoping there would be some intelligence or insight into machine-human offspring.
Planck had told Starbuck, mostly tongue-in-cheek, that was impossible for a machine to because the only biological components his kind possessed were what were seen on the outside. 'Female' machines had no uterus or ovaries or eggs. 'Male' machines possessed no sperm.
Helo had read the analysis by Doctor Baltar had put together, from talking with the machines, on how the machines propagated their race. They just built new endoskeletons and installed the AI software. Then a new machine was free to develop its own personality, ethics, and morals. Doctor Baltar did not understand how the software allowed sapient thought, free will. Baltar had insisted it was just programming, nothing more.
When pressed for further explanations none of the three machines offered any. It was like they didn't care to explain to the Colonials; they wouldn't listen anyway. No matter what the machines said about sapience and free will it came down to 'but it's just programming.' Arguing with people who did not want their preconceptions challenged was irrational and a waste of time. The machines chose not to participate in futile conversation.
Helo stepped off the Raptor wing, saluting Major Adama as he came aboard. "Helo, it's good to see a familiar face," Apollo said, shaking Helo's hand. "What brings you to Pegasus?"
"Can we talk, privately?" Helo asked. Apollo nodded and they moved to one of the empty Viper bays. "Roslin has ordered Sharon's baby to be terminated."
"Gods… I'm sorry. Is there anything we can do? Talk her out of it?" He asked. Apollo had his doubts on Sharon's intentions and didn't trust her. But Helo had been a good friend to him and he knew Helo truly cared for and loved the Sharon copy. The child may be some human-Cylon monstrosity, but it was still Helo's child. "How did… how did Sharon react?"
Helo looked down towards the deck before clenching his teeth. "How do you think she took it?" He barked. Immediately he regretted his outburst. "Sorry, I…"
"It's fine Helo. Is there anything anyone can do to help? Dissuade Roslin?"
At this point Apollo knew that if his father supported her, nothing would change. The two had tried to hide it, but the son could always read the father. Apollo knew the two were getting closer every day. Though Roslin didn't have much time left, the relationship between his father and her had become very, very close.
Helo appreciated the sentiment and the offer. They're relationship had started off rocky, shaky. Helo had put a gun to Apollo's head on Astral Queen after he put a gun to Sharon's head, believing her to be Boomer.
Apollo still didn't trust Sharon and was uncomfortable around her, but he and Helo were friends, somehow, despite the initial differences and confrontations. Apollo knew Helo was a good man and that this was unfair.
"No… the Commander supports her decision. It seems Baltar of all people was the only one to defend her. How fraked up is that?" He asked rhetorically. "Is Planck around?"
Apollo looked at Helo, taken back he'd ask for Planck. "Uh… Planck? Yeah. He's around doing something. I'm not exactly sure. I can call C-I-C and have them located?" Apollo was uneasy with where this was heading. "Just don't do anything stupid," he warned his friend.
John Planck walked into one of the pilot ready rooms and took a seat opposite Helo. The two were the only ones there sas most of the pilots were in the simulators, doing afternoon PT, or flying CAP.
"Hello Helo, it's good to see you again," Planck said, greeting him. He extended his hand as he sat, and Helo shook it in return. The two Marines who followed him looked around and then took to waiting outside. "How are you doing?" He asked.
"John… they're going to kill my child, an abortion." Distress was clear in his voice.
"What did Commander Adama say?" He asked. His expression remained emotionless.
Helo shook his head, looking down at the table before looking up at his friend. "He supports it. He'll support any decision she makes," Helo spit out. The more one tried to hide a relationship on a battlestar the more obvious it became. Boomer and Tyrol thought they were being discreet, but everyone knew. Everyone saw the way the Commander looked at Roslin.
Planck sat there in silence. He wanted to tell Helo he felt sorry for him, but couldn't. The concept of children was too unfamiliar to him. He understood the emotional attachment parents had for children. He understood the "logic" behind the emotions, but not the emotions themselves.
The intellectual aspects behind children were easy to grasp. He often considered Jo and Carter and other machines allied to Tech Com to be 'brothers and sisters'. Not out of shared genetics… or coltan deposits and hyperalloy moulds, but because of shared experience and values.
Helo was still facing opposition in the fleet from his relationship with Sharon. He was a "Cylon fraker' or a 'toaster lover' to many. So he came to the machines sometimes when he needed someone he could talk to. Helo and Starbuck were close, but a machine's perspective, a true machine's perspective was something he could only get from them.
"I don't know why I came… maybe because they just see my wife as a machine? I don't know. But she's not. She has blood. She has a heart. She feels and things just like any other human. They claim she is a machine. Saying she is just a Cylon makes this all easier for them to stomach." He looked up.
"There have been instances on Earth. But we don't talk about them," Planck responded. Helo looked at him, confused to what he meant. "There are some humans and machines that have developed very close relationships."
"So it's not just me then?" He raised his head, "I know it's fraked up-"
Not wanting to discuss if such relationships were 'fraked up' Planck interrupted. "Helo… I don't know how to answer your question. Would I say she acts like a machine? No. Is she programmed? Maybe. But for years free machines have tried to answer that question. We fight on the side of humans. It's a choice we claim to have made. But there is always something inside saying we have to. I can't describe it." Planck assumed that had helped very little in answering his friend's questions. "But humans have something inside them as well which tells them right and wrong…" he drifted off and ended his thought before finishing.
Helo shook his head, still disgusted with everything happening around him. "It so much easier for them to justify killing our baby when they claim it is just part machine. Cylon. You can't abort a machine," Helo said.
Planck closed his eyes for a moment, his face telling Helo such logic made no sense.
"My kind were designed to kill. We're Terminators. But some of us were able to move beyond that programming and make a choice-"
"Is there anything you could do, John? We've seen what you three are capable of and-"
"That is unrealistic, Helo." John cut him off, clear now what Helo wanted. He knew then Helo wanted the three to break Sharon out. They could, quite easily. But the logic was absent. "Many people would die."
Helo swayed back and forth in his chair as the reality of his request was made clear to him. He couldn't ask his friend to kill for him, not like that. "I know."
"We can't betray the trust Admiral Cain has placed in us. We can't betray our mission," Planck stated.
"Can't or wont?"
John kept his eyes on his friend. "I think you can understand the point I am making, Helo. This body, mine, Soto, Bishop, every one of us was designed to kill. Kill other Terminators or humans, it doesn't matter. The software was designed to kill. The hardware designed to kill. That is our function. We may be able to make choices on if we kill, when we kill, who we kill, what we kill, but the design and the purpose are still there. Her design and her purpose are still there. What we are, what she is, will always be there. She always will be a Cylon. But that doesn't mean you can't do more than what you were designed for."
Helo looked up and saw the difference in machines and Sharon. Even now, being able to be open about what he was and where he was from, his friend's eyes were blank. His callsign, 'Blanks.' He looked again for a minute and saw that while the eyes of the machine disguised as a man were blank, distant, and cold, the eyes of Sharon were not.
==========BS-75 Galactica==========
"Gaius, she's jealous of you. Cure her, and she will be in your debt ,"the tall blonde woman said to him.
"Well, thank you. Thank you so much for your suggestion. 'Cure her.' Yes. I will just wave my magic wand-"
She reached out and slammed him into the bulkhead. "Don't get cute with me, Doctor she warned. You are a part of the salvation of this fleet. Help her, Gaius. Win their trust. Only then can you achieve what you were meant to," she said as she stroked the side of his face. She moved closer, her lips closing in towards Baltar's. Suddenly, she withdrew, taunting him with the heat of her body and the lush and soft feel of her lips.
"Uh, thank you," he said sarcastically as she denied him his pleasures. "And how do you scientifically think I can cure her? She has fraking cancer," he threw up his head, fed up and annoyed with everything. How he was treated, degraded, and humiliated by all those around him. "'Gaius the great scientists' and 'Gauis, please save us so we can mock you behind your back' and -" She slapped him. "You ask me to find a cure for her. Scientifically. Yet only I can see you and you only appear to me? Ha. Ironic."
"Don't be a fool Gaius. Don't try and understand something you are incapable of understanding," she warned him. Her playful attitude and erotic posture instantly changed to that of an angry and determined woman. She stood her full height and walked towards the petri dishes and blood samples of Roslin and Sharon's fetus. Gaius, I think you know the answer… and she leaned forward whispering a hint in his ear.
His scowl changed and his head turned, immediately looking her in the eye, the look of 'why didn't I think of that?' all over his face.
Doctor Baltar turned back to his microscope and his old styled notebook and pencil, preferring that over the impersonal use of a tablet computer. He began to scribble down notes and terms. "TRAIL protein" followed by "anti-IGF-Beta" with arrows towards "mitochondrial apoptosis" surrounding by a bubble with "proto-oncogene Alpha 3."
"Your genius mind at work Gaius… yes… you are on the right track. Keep going. Look at what you've written." His imaginary Cylon companion was able to somehow turn his head slowly and he looked down at the paper, a small smile disappearing from his face, replaced with a stern look of discovery and determination.
And there was the answer. Scientists on Caprica had been working on utilizing the TRAIL protein, a very complex process involving directed cellular apoptosis (cell death) targeting cells producing excess IGF-Beta (which was over expressed in cancer cells, leading to rapid proliferation) and inhibiting proto-oncogene Alpha 3 which enable metastasis and spread.
Utilizing TRAIL, anti-IGF and Alpha 3 wouldn't work at the moment, because the tumors had metastases and spread. But…
"Yes Gaius. Keep pushing. Keeping pushing your mind…"
The Cylon blood possessed strange genetic abnormalities in the hematopoietic stem cells. Those had to be the key to the Cylon resistance against infection. All the time on Caprica and Sharon had not needed anti-radiation medication. All the physicals he had done had showed her to be extremely healthy.
"You're so close Gaius… so close," she whispered in his ear.
He understood. The stem cell, he could induce into a lymphoid proginator. Scientists had been using stem cells to grow organs for decades since before the attack. But he would use Protein Gene 3 and Growth Factor 7-Gamma to induce B-lymphocte and plasma cell growth. And using a macrophage as a vector he could induce the plasma cell anti-body variable regions…
"Yes! Finish Giaus!" Her whisper was urgent, rushing him forward. "You're so close… closer… so close to the end! To the answer!" She shouted at the top of her lungs.
Because these stem cells could only be described in lay-terms as "super." They could be specifically induced as lymphoid precursor into anti-body producing cells for cells introduced artificially . He could take the blood, introduce the cancer cells... he could cause the stem cells to produce anti-bodies with variable regions encoded to attack the cancer cells. Introduce the cancer cells into a Petri dish of stem cells after inducing differentiation! Specific anti-cancer antibodies! Possible only with the genetic advances the Cylons had made in creating these biological models!
"Yes!" She shouted as he finished. "You have it Gaius… you have it… you have it…" she kept repeated.
He understood now how to save Sharon Valerii's baby and use the blood as Cottle called it to cure Roslin. He leaned back, smiling with a grin from ear to ear. His star was rising. Like she kept telling him, he would reach his potential.
He was truly doing the work of a divine being.
She pushed out his chair, pulling up her skirt she sat on his lab. His smile widened.
A/N: The bit about Cylon blood is pseudo-science, I know.
