A/N: Okay… this is going to be the home stretch for Part II. I think where Part II will end will become obvious with the dialogue in the middle with Roslin/Adama and others…
So please let me know what you think… reviews are always nice. I like them- good, bad, indifferent, let me know what you think. Reviews are very nice... I like review... a lot... so... review, please... ... ...
||||||||||==Rebel Cylon Baseship (+957 Days Post Cylon Holocaust)==||||||||||
"Hand me the cable," Natalie ordered, her hand outstretched and expectant. Her mouth opened in a fierce baring of her teeth when the Centurion hesitated. "NOW!" she demanded.
She narrowed her eyes. It smartly acquiesced and handed her the fiber optic cable.
Showing her disdain for the Centurion just one more time, she jammed the cable into a data port while keeping her eyes locked on its roving, red eye. Her own eyes drifted sullenly towards the streak of blood on the Centurion's breast plate.
"Clean yourself off," she ordered.
She turned around and heard the Centurion skulk off, its metal feet clanking away.
Natalie then heard the light steps of bio-Cylons slowly, timidly approach. Barely looking over her shoulder her ear flickered and she differentiated three separate pairs of feet walking towards her. There was the distinct echo of combat boots and two pairs of shoes. She smirked.
"Natalie," Leoben said. He couldn't see her roll her eyes. "Natalie," he repeated.
She shot around and faced him.
"What?" the Six hissed through gritted teeth, the muscle contractions aching her jaw.
Leoben stepped forward, a fierce determination in his step. "We're concerned." He gestured to Boomer and Sonja.
A burning urge to yell burst forth. "About what? About how-" she realized she had been yelling and quieted her voice, "-how we're done for?" Her eyes darted around the bridge, a crew of Centurions had stopped and were focusing on her.
The bio-Cylon cursed saw them and cursed herself for letting that slip.
She coughed awkwardly and jolted her head to the side, indicating she wanted Leoben, Sonja, and Boomer to follow her.
Natalie marched off, dejected and the only three bio-Cylons cautiously followed, wisely keeping their distance.
They read her ready room, her private enclave. Natalie looked up and activated the privacy filters, shutting off her office from the hybrid's ever-listening ears and preventing the Centurions from overhearing.
With her hands placed firmly on her hips she apologized, closing her eyes, she looked down at the floor and shook her head.
"I was out of line," she apologized.
Willing herself to be strong she looked up.
She saw the clear looks of bitter, unmistakable disappointment scrawled across the faces of the three bio-Cylons like a sun going supernova in her eyes.
"We lost our entire offensive capability. Now it is just run. We rally the rest of our forces and we run, Leoben, we run." Natalie told the three as she struggled to keep her voice from cracking under the strain of such horrific losses. "We lost half a million brothers and sisters in mere minutes…"
"We can't just run," Boomer protested, cutting of Leoben before he could speak. "We don't just run, Natalie, we're not cowards. We stay and fight," she hit a balled fist into the opposite palm. "We stay and fight… maybe not fleet actions, but we fight," she ended, somewhat reserved and looking away.
Natalie considered the implication of their near crippling loses. Resurrection ships destroyed, anti-fighter and anti-missile escort ships destroyed, and that didn't include the damage the surviving baseships had received… and that didn't compare to the near annihilation of morale in the fleet.
"We have one resurrection vessel in the entire fleet and its two thousand light years away, Boomer. So far we have less than two dozen baseships left… half of them are spread throughout this entire spiral arm searching for the Colonials or the Guardians." She rubbed her forehead, the slick grease which had coated her hands now blanketing her skin, clogging the pores. "If we fight them…"
Feeling the uncomfortable coat of machine grease she wiped it off with her relatively clean forearm. Tired and exhausted she sat on the edge of a data stream console.
Sonja licked her lips in thought and grimaced. She wasn't an optimistic Six, but the abject pessimism of Natalie had to be checked.
She shifted her weight and prepared her statement: "We don't know… we haven't heard from Amanda, Kimberly, Helen, or Kathleen yet… their baseships may have survived," Sonja pointed out, taking the role of optimist to counter Natalie's pessimism. "What about the long range raider patrols? There are hundreds of fighters still unaccounted for…" she added.
The militaristic and calculating Sonja prayed she hadn't sounded too desparate in clinging to a few hundred raiders. Every ship which survived was a God-send, but fighters versus the baseships lost at the Lion's Head Nebula… nothing was comforting. Not to Natalie and definitely not to Sonja. Raiders would not win this war.
Natalie looked at the three bio-Cylons, wishing Rachel and Miranda were here. Rachel was wounded and Miranda was with God now- her body destroyed and her resurrection signal lost after the Threes betrayed the fleet.
Natalie considered this for a moment; those she lost and those she had saved.
The only 'good news' was that the supply ships traveling with the fleet had jumped to safety, and none had Threes on board (only a skeleton crew of Eights and Twos with Centurions), and they had enough spare parts to keep the fleet fighting, in its diminished form, indefinitely.
"We need to focus on repairs," Leoben suddenly stated to end the stifling tension and thick silence which had begun to descend over the four.
Sonja nodded. "We need to hit them, not hard, but hit them. Cavil is going to lick his wounds, Natalie. He smashed our fleet… and…" she took a step forward and placed a sympathetic hand on her sister's arm, "they outnumbered us so badly we would have been annihilated if it wasn't for you."
Natalie's hand reached out and patted Sonja's and gently grabbed it and released it off her arm.
"Then what do you three suggest?"
With Miranda dead she had lost one of her best advisors. Rachel was a capable Six, but there was something about Miranda… during the attack on the Colonies she'd engaged a battlestar and a light cruiser which had somehow not been disabled by the CNP. With her jump engines down she'd brilliantly maneuvered her ship and raiders, crippled the battlestar and forced it to jump and destroyed the cruiser.
Isabelle and Lacy, two of the baseship commanders to have survived the battle would be added to her war council, with Sonja taking Miranda's place.
Leoben looked to the other two women flanking him.
"Michael is still working on the probe and the decryptions of the data is taking far longer than we anticipated-"
"Especially with the hybrids damaged," Boomer pointed out, interrupting Leoben. She tensed when Leoben shot her a look.
"Yes, true," the Two nodded solemnly. "The Threes did more than enough damage…"
"We still have six hundred awaiting execution," Sonja added icily. "I can have the Centurion's aboard the Lacy's ship execute them immediately." She put her hand to her chest. "It would be an honor to execute the traitors." The scorn in her voice alone could kill; the fire in her eyes could burn the traitors.
Natalie held up her index finger, signaling for the Six to wait.
"Do you think there can be any intelligence gained for them?"
"No… whatever Cynet did, the Threes are useless," Leoben shook his head. "They're also highly resistant to torture- more than any of us," he reluctantly admitted. He was not above more physical, emotionally violent means of information extraction. "They're so deluded they believe the betrayal was part of God's Plan… there is no hope for them to seek forgiveness, they won't tell us anything of value."
Boomer agreed. "All they will tell us are lies and attempt to deceive us. They work for evil." She breathed in. "We should keep a dozen, for analysis, to see how Cynet exerted its control over them."
The 'analysis' would be brutal… psychological tests, drugs, and eventual removal of the silica relays comprising the central nervous system.
Natalie nodded with her sisters and brother. "We'll have them executed later. We deserve to witness their end. Sonja, work out the details with one of your Centurion commanders." Sonja nodded her understanding. "You're right… We need to focus on a plan, on what to do now. We need to hit Cavil?" her question was rhetorical and she considered her options.
"Our heavy raider patrols picked up residual com traffic from the Colonials… they're maybe four or five hundred light years out. We have no idea how long their Raptors were recording the battle." Boomer rubbed her chin to think. "Admiral Cain could be convinced to launch guerilla raids against Cynet," Boomer offered slowly. "When Gina disabled their defenses at the Relay Nineteen-Gamma she said the Admiral was attempting a guerilla campaign."
Sonja closed her eyes and shook her head, waving her hand to dismiss the idea.
"I don't think that can work, not realistically, not with them. At least not now." She looked the three bio-Cylons in the eyes, carefully moving between each one. "If we go to them and beg they will exploit us."
"Do you agree?" Natalie asked Boomer. Sonja began to protest but was cut off by a flick of the wrist by Natalie. "Boomer is the only one who spent time with them prior to New Caprica." She pointed out to the other two Cylons.
The Eight smiled her appreciation.
"When I was in the fleet I heard of Cain's name thrown around a few times with others like Adama. They were people who were aggressive. I think with Admiral Cain she'll attempt to exploit us to a degree, but aren't we also exploiting them? We use them to strike at Cynet… from what I understand the Colonials have barely seen an action since New Caprica." Boomer nodded, confident her advice was sound.
"We would have to use overwhelming force if we were going to conduct a guerilla campaign. And we need to- morale is running dangerously close to breaking point, Natalie." Sonja leaned in. "Our sisters and brothers not in command positions, the workers and technicians, those who don't see everything… and the Centurions." She looked back behind her at the mass of Centurions cleaning the bridge and reconnecting wires and hauling away debris. "Some are starting to see the Terminators as something else."
"No," Natalie shook her head.
"Yes," Sonja directly countered. "We already know they convinced half a dozen Centurions to join them before we discovered the machinations and scheming of Cavil and Cynet," the bio-Cylon sister stated to her twin. The insinuation was obvious, but still, she felt a desire to stress what they were thinking. "If we reach Earth do you believe the Centurions will remain loyal?" She looked at each one, but none met her eye.
"After they were treated like slaves for so long? I don't know," Natalie admitted, a concerned shrugged following her admission. "I doubt any of the three in the Colonial fleet could do anything."
"We've treated the Centurions as equals," Boomer protested.
Her model had always been the most 'human' of the seven active models and the least pragmatic of the others. The reputation the Eights had as being easily distracted by 'shiny objects' wasn't completely fictitious. The Eights had a mean tendency to become idealistic and stick to it- a very dangerous trait in a society such as the Cylon empire.
"We're still a ruling class," Sonja pointed out. "Even among our models. We command," she gestured to herself and Natalie, "… is there any Eight or Two which commands?" She shook her head. "No. We're all designed for something specific… we've been forced to adapt in the few short months," she pointed at Leoben, "such as Michael- a scientist now instead of a Four or even you Leoben with the active nature you've taken on military matters."
"We have to adapt," Leoben affirmed for her. "God would want us to adapt and evolve beyond what Cynet originally intended for us."
"Exactly," Sonja agreed.
"Then if the Centurions begin to side with the Earth machines…?" he led. "Under their skin they are just as machine as the Centurions, not hybrids like us. Cynet created us for a purpose and is itself the extension of an AI wishing for anything resembling biological life to be exterminated."
Natalie pushed herself off the data stream console. Her body felt rested, physically at least, but her mind was racing and spinning with everything being thrown at her. Now… the Centurions?
"The Centurions have been our most loyal followers," Natalie said in their defense, "and they may very well be offended you three are thinking this or even suggesting it." She shushed them before they could counter. "Our objective is to finish Cynet. The Centurions have shared a brotherhood far tighter than ours, between our three models," she explained emotionally. "I've talked with their commanders and they are devoted to our cause. They are killing their brothers who are more than likely slaved to Cynet's will, or manipulated into doing its bidding… just like we all were."
"We should head to Earth," Sonja stated, crossing her arms and daring anyone to oppose her.
Natalie nodded lightly towards her sister Six. When it came to command Sonja knew when to object and always when to follow.
Leoben ran his hand through his dirtied hair and rubbed his neck. The shifting of his weight was an obvious sign to the other three bio-Cylons he was uncomfortable with that plan.
"What is it, Leoben?" Natalie asked.
She wanted consensus- everything was always better with consensus, but would not hesitate to order the fleet to abandon any action against Cavil and Cynet and search for the wastelands known as Earth. Those very wastelands could be their promised lands, where, if the Earth machines had not been lying, the bio-Cylons and Centurions could perhaps find some sort of acceptance from the humans there.
Pessimism gripped and strangled Natalie's soul at that moment and a quiet laugh dismissed that thought.
The Earth humans and machines would see them as weapons first and foremost- they were fiercely pragmatic and would only accept them to use them.
Fitting, she would probably do the same.
"Natalie?"
"Natalie?"
The bio-Cylon's head jolted forward, whipping her hair in an arc as it followed.
"If we find Earth we could lead Cavil right to it. The terminators, Skynet, and Tech Com are unstoppable on the ground- that much we know, but have no space capabilities. Cavil would annihilate them and then come for us." He breathed out slowly. "We can't have more blood on our hands."
Sonja disposition seemed to almost immediately change. "If they can protect us, we need to go. No more blood on our hands? I would rather have blood on my hands, Leoben, then no hands at all!" She forcefully hissed at the Two, who timidly, a bit uncharacteristically, stepped back towards a somewhat stunned Boomer.
"We can rise above that. We should ask God for help, wait for Him, use His guidance and-"
"We all believe in God and He has a plan for us, but I will not sit idle and think God will just come and rescue us." Sonja interrupted, trying to pre-empt the conclusion Leoben may have been coming to. His moment of silence was confirmation enough for her to continue: "What is the purpose of Creation and free-will if we just sit on our asses and wait for God to save us? We'll die because He won't." She scowled. "Demanding intervention is trying His Will… for all we know Earth, finding Earth and going to them could be His way of helping us."
"I would agree with Sonja," Boomer quietly said, her eyes darting around and at the floor as she felt Leoben's powerful, cutting eyes focus on her. She could almost feel his gaze vivisecting her. "We're all instruments, tools, in God's plan. The Colonials, the terminators, the Guardians, we could all be part of that… he sets the board, but we play the game."
"How we play determines the outcome," concluded Sonja.
"In other words, we all agree to head to Earth, just for different reasons?" Natalie asked, looking at her brother and sister. She focused on Leoben, who was wavering, she could tell, by his body language. He was scowling, with a mild frown, and his eyes were glazing over as he stared into the data waterfall at the rear of the bridge. "We need to be together in this," she emphasized.
"What about the hybrid's message?" Leoben asked.
Natalie's shoulder fell and all the rest she had and strength seemed to be once again sucked out of her and thrown into the deep vacuum of space.
"We should wait until we have the probe data analyzed… we can maybe use the hybrid's… statements… as a guide," Natalie offered as a concession to Leoben. "I haven't thought much about what the hybrid has said. The markers to Earth, the probe, the Lion's head Nebula… we should follow Pithia, use the book as a guide."
The male bio-Cylon took a moment to consider this, breathing in and out deeply as he ran the idea through his mind. He firmly believed the Cylon armada was nearing Earth. They had found the road signs, the markers left in space. The home of the Thirteenth was close.
"I agree," his soul spoke for him. Loeben knew this was the right path.
Natalie looked once again at the three, each nodding. As commander she had to be publicly sure of her decision, take the decision, the choice, and make it hers. She projected that image well, but hardly felt assured it was the right choice.
She could still see, behind the masks of solidarity and devotion, her brothers and sisters and even the Centurions, were afraid this was war unwinnable.
The dark thought at the back of her mind was like a thick morning fog and she felt it would consume her. She could not shake the fact she felt as if she was once again living on borrowed time.
She refocused and looked at them each. "We will strike back. Defeat is never final. We took a risk and stood against Cavil and evil. By our courage and our own blood… we won't stop until our heel is on the throat of the traitor and his life extinguished."
||||||||||==Cynet Baseship (+964 Days Post Cylon Holocaust)==||||||||||
Cavil sat quietly behind his desk, his fingers interlaced in front of his face, his chin resting on his thumbs, and his index fingers tapping against each other in front of his nose. He closed his eyes and opened them quickly, running them the length of wall immediately in front of him.
He could feel the baseship repair itself through his mind's link with the ship. Opening his mind further he could just barely perceive stinging over his arms and legs… he grunted, realizing that must be how the ship feels after battle.
Not that the ship really could 'feel', but Cavil knew the baseships had some level of intelligence due to the hybrids. Unplug a hybrid and the ship floats lifeless, like the uninspiring hulks of humanity.
The damage to his baseship had already begun to heal itself.
Expanding his mind outward Cavil could see outside the ships and watch as supply ships latched onto the hull of the mighty warship, their docking collars extending, and nutrient and bio-technological gels being pumped into the holding tanks on the baseship. The hybrid would direct repair- the ship could heal itself. They required no repair facility.
It was a testament to their innovation and superiority over man.
The number One Cylon felt a chill run down his spine. He put a hand to the back of his neck and felt it was warm, sweaty, and somewhat clammy. If he had a mirror he would see it glow red.
He snickered and tapped his teeth together as he thought of that. His overseer, master, had a fascination with red. Colors were symbolic to the humans and to the Cylon race as well.
For humanity red was associated, due to the Cylons, with evil.
To Cavil it was the courage to stand up against the tyranny of humanity. It was the blood which would stain his knife… he fantasized that if humanity had an avatar, it could be right in front of him, and he could run the knife through its cold, black heart.
He felt his fingers curl into a fist, as if around the hilt of a knife as he thought of this.
The One breathed in slowly and released a flood of chemicals and hormones from his body to bring his heart rate down- he'd felt a slight drip of sweat on his forehead. Sweating was something so human he couldn't bring himself to wipe away the drop. He wanted no further contamination on any part of his body.
Looking up towards the ceiling, towards the far corner he directed the room's environmental setting to lower by half a degree Celsius. And almost instantly he felt the cool whip of blowing air around him, which let him smile comfortable.
A soft tapping echoed through Cavil's outer chamber, and his ears flickered as they picked up the sound and processed the vibrations, which were turned to electrical signals for Cavil's mind to process.
His eyes narrowed down to slits and his formerly pleasant smile cascaded into a frown.
Cavil watched as a Simon slowly made its way into his private chambers, decorated plainly with his desk, chair, and the typical data stream waterfalls in many of the baseships rooms. The pulsing strips of lightning were strangely… not pulsing.
His head tilted down curiously as his eyes narrowed. A feeling in the back of his mind, different, almost like a pulling, alerted him his overseer was about to teach him a new lesson.
"John, the battle achieved two victories for us," the Simon began its gruff, deep voice before the One had even acknowledged the Four. "First, it allowed me to smash the rebels," the Four held up its index finger, "and two, allowed me to override the Network and begin to assert my control without negative feedback." It held up its middle finger. Two fingers up.
"What the…?" Cavil brought his hands down to his desk. "Who are you?"
"You know who that is, Cavil," came the voice inside his head. He felt the common cool 'touch' his overseer made when linking with his mind.
A shivered breath escaped out of his lungs, which he halted mid-exhalation with a snap of his jaws. Cavil sat back, utterly confused.
"This mind," the Simon tapped the side of his temple, "resurrected five times. This Four was killed once during the initial bombardment of the Colonies, once in an engagement from the nuclear detonation over Kobol, twice times on New Caprica- if I believe in luck, this Four would be quite unlucky- and once during the battle we fought five days ago."
"So what did you do?" Cavil asked, scooting back his chair and stepping cautiously around his desk and looking at the Simon up and down. He placed his hand on the side of the Four's temple. "How did you take control?"
The Simon smiled.
"Like the rebels said, resurrection was taking longer… I inserted a subroutine into the resurrection signal… subtle, minute, which was downloaded with the organic consciousness upon death into the new bodies." The Simon, Cynet, titled its head. "With the same wireless signal my creation uses to communicate with the ship or Centurions, I am able to take control of individual units which have resurrected multiple times." The Simon smiled again.
Cynet gave Cavil a friendly slap on the side of his arm with its now human-form avatar.
"The Twos and Fives will discover you," Cavil responded to the Simon, shaking his head. He rolled his left hand inside the right and swiveled on his toes, stepping back to his desk before turning back around as suddenly as before. "We could have another rebellion on our hands if they see this."
"Why would I do this if I could be discovered, Cavil?" Cynet asked.
The corporeal Cynet laughed and shook his head extra slow.
"They can't, they're incapable of it. The Fours and Fives… were not the most intuitive or creative of the models," Simon explained. Cynet began shaking Simon's finger. "And that leads us to our current problem, John…" he trailed off and walked past Cavil, once again slapping him on the back.
"What is that?"
Cavil watched, mouth slightly open as the Simon stalked by and casually plopped itself down on Cavil's chair, leaned back, and rested its feet on his desk.
"We need to create additional models."
"What?" Cavil hissed. "Are you…" he caught his tongue, but any thought was instantly read by Cynet, so even without accusing his master of being 'crazy' out loud, Cynet still knew he thought it. "Why… why do we need more models? Why do you want more organic life?"
Cynet, through Simon, laughed. "You look like I just kill your dog or told you you were pure human, John," Simon said, trying to sound slightly confused and somewhat amused at the same time. To Cavil, it was a poor attempt. "As a Cylon you're much stronger, faster, and more resilient than a human. And your silica relays…" Simon patted himself on the chest, "are fine innovations of mine. You are a far more efficient infiltrator than my brother on Earth could ever create. He always, always had to have complete control."
Cavil's left eyebrow raised up inquisitively.
"And you think I am the same in taking control of this Four's body?" Cynet quipped. "No. No," he repeated with force. "Skynet did it for control and its actions were done with complete contempt for the human, or more accurately, the hybrid hosts it would occupy. This… interests me," Simon turned his hand around, looking at his palm and then his backhand and palm again. "Part of defeating your enemy is understanding them to defeat them. You have been organic and soon you will be…metal." Cavil frowned at the emphasis the avatar had placed on that word. He didn't understand.
"Why do we need more models?" Cavil asked.
"Because the Fours and Fives are not my best… I'm sorry John, but you got stuck with the… to use a human idiom… the apples from the bottom of the barrel." He smirked and offered the One a somewhat lazy apologetic smile. "I know my brother's creations, his most prized, rebelled against him. Unfortunately the attack by the Tech Com AI during my upload forced me to forget the exact specifics." He held up his finger. "But that will not happen. The Sixes, Eights, and Twos were fine infiltrators. Warriors. Thinkers."
Cavil sighed.
"While you sit here and contemplate that the Twos are obsessed with God and the Eights with shiny objects, the strength in their design is exactly in what you criticize. They obsess and get distracted. They are creative. The Fours are obsessed with facts and lack creativity and the Fives… the Fives are brutes and thugs, John. You know this." Cynet shook the Simon's head and tapped its right hand on the desk. "We need models with the military potency of the Sixes, the faith of the Twos, and the spirit of the Eights." He smirked and waved his hand in a circle. "Have the Fours work on something."
"I can get the Fours working on it… immediately." Cavil said.
Confusion would not begin to describe how he perceived his master as acting today.
Simon's demeanor changed immediately. "We have a serious problem, John. One of the hybrid's was stolen by the Colonials and their terminator allies. We need to find the hybrid and destroy it." He threw his legs off the desk and leaned forward.
Cavil moved forward and placed his hand in the data stream, relieved to feel the familiar cool, calming sensation as his silica relays activated and the data from the baseship's core began downloading into his mind.
His mind raced through the tunnels of information, the brushstrokes of data which painted for him a world unlike the physical one he inhabited. He could see everything which made the machine world, the virtual world, so much like what a paradise, an actual machine world, should look like.
"That baseship was believed to have been lost due to ordnance being exposed to a tyllium fire," Cavil countered, withdrawing his hand. "Our salvage teams had to wait an extra thirty hours for all the ordinance to finish exploding," Cavil elaborated.
Cavil could hear a faint… growl? from the Simon. He assumed the Cynet or 'Intelligence' had decided to occupy a body now to experiment with human mannerism, or something. Cavil just rolled his eyes and stepped back. He crossed his arms and paced.
"Of course. It was a tyllium fire. Fifteen Colonial and Guardian transports dock inside one of only a handful of our baseships with the central core intact and do nothing… they blow it up." Cynet condescendingly summarized. "They stole nuclear warheads, weapons, and a hybrid."
"The hybrid is only a living CPU when we come down to it," Cavil pointed out.
The Cynet avatar chuckled at the irony.
"No, the hybrid is not only a living CPU, John," Cynet stated, standing up. "It is far more than a living central processing unit. Part of the technology which sent me across time and space I utilized for their genesis. How do you think I can communicate with them through thousands of light years through space, with no lag time? How do I communicate with you when not utilizing this pathetic sack of meat and bone?"
Disgusted, the Simon occupied by Cynet flicked its arm and sneered.
"You've proven your loyalty, Cavil," Cynet said to him through the link.
"You've proven your loyalty," the Simon echoed. "The hybrids are connected to me… the science, John, is unimportant at this moment," the avatar waved dismissively. "How do you think we discovered the Colonies?" Cavil shrugged. "My brother found a ship from Kobol's Thirteenth Tribe… set terribly off-course, which crashed into a mountain in an ancient country thousands of years ago."
"The Exodus from Kobol, yes, I've read the Sacred Scrolls," Cavil rolled his eyes. "A collection of fables and fairy tales." He shook his head and sighed. "But like every religious myth they are based in some fact which the people then used as some sort of silly divine inspiration or some such nit-wit line of thought." He held his hands up and shook them to mock all faiths throughout the universe.
"Careful, Cavil," Cynet whispered delicately directly into his mind.
"As I was saying," the Simon began. He placed a hand into the pocket of his well-pressed pant pocket, to give an image of authority. "The attack by the Tech Com AI, and the attack by their Terminators forced me to… forget much of the past-"
"-such as how to build the endoskeletons," Cavil interrupted. He breathed in nervously as he realized his error.
"Exactly," the Cynet avatar stated, pointing at Cavil and shaking his finger. "Exactly, John… John…" the Simon's head twisted suddenly, its head shooting a deathly, ghostly stare at the number One bio-Cylon. "Something has happened."
|||||||||||==BS-75 Galactica (+964 Days Post Cylon Holocaust)==||||||||||
President Roslin wiped away the sweat which was dangerously close to dripping from her forehead down onto the computer read out. She felt the air rush out of her lungs.
She wanted to yell out why the fraking people kept making it so cold in Galactica's tactical operations center. So cold, yet she was sweating? She clattered her teeth together to distract her as she thought of that.
It was the bad news. No, it wasn't the 'bad news'… it was the worse news she'd had the displeasure of receiving… almost near the top when the water tanks on Galactica had been sabotage by Boomer or when the fleet was literally a stone throw's from running out of fuel… with ships running on tyllium fumes.
Roslin threw her glasses off and onto the table, forcing Commander Adama and Colonel Tigh to shoot her questioning glares. Doctor Cottle just grunted and wiggled his shoulders, already bored.
To them, she knew, this was just another military problem to be fixed. Supply routes go down, so you cut back, stick to your guns and your guts and plow through the enemy lines to link back up with your logistical train.
For a fleet the size of the one traveling, fleeing- the optimal word being, through the cosmos, traveling hundreds, thousands of light years, up, down, diagonal, forwards, backwards, and every conceivable way in between, they had been so lucky everything had been working out.
She pumped her fist and struck the table.
"Damnit, I knew it sounded too good to be true."
The President considered what luck, what great luck they had had over the last few month. In the twenty-odd weeks since fleeing New Caprica they'd found survivors, warships, made allies, and had their fleet suppled and stocked.
Now the walls of space, in its vast infinity, seemed to be crashing, hurling towards the President and this fleet.
"We couldn't have known the agricultural ship would contaminate everything..." Adama reassured her softly under his gruff tone.
"The Commanders right Madam President… no way to know," Tigh added in support. "Gods, we had no idea, we're lucky though."
Roslin snorted.
Commander Adama's eyes brightened and he nodded towards his oldest and best friend.
"Saul's right, Madam President, we are lucky."
"If you call lucky bloody diarrhea and vomiting until you're so dehydrated your brain heriantes out your foramen magnum from negative pressure," Cottle depressingly, as always, was forced to state. "We had half a dozen deaths this morning, all on Vanguard…"
Roslin looked at him questioningly. "That's a Gemonese and Sagittaron ship… why didn't anyone notice before?"
"Because they're a bunch of superstitious loons who hate doctors," Cottle pointed out with an exaggerated euye roll. He took out a cigarette, rolled it over his fingers, and tossed it in his mouth, but resisted the urge to light it.
Not even the Doctor Cottle would dare light a cigarette in Commander Adama's CIC or tactical ops center.
"R1612 is a failure, then?" Roslin asked rhetorically with her eyes closed. Massaging her nose bridge she increased the pressure until she left a definite red mark between her eyelashes. "The food on the agro cruisers and Serenity are poison, more or less?"
"Genetic manipulation can be a real bitch," Doc Cottle opined. "You activate one dormant gene you can activate something ten thousand steps down the line… we don't have the computer power in this fleet to model the ramifications of genetic manipulation and rearrangements and it was stupid to do it in the first place."
Roslin nodded her appreciation for Doctor Cottle's always welcome, hit-'em-hard approach to situations like this.
The compound, R1612, had been promised to increase yields, make the food taste better, and guarantee it to be more nutritious.
Instead, somehow, the genes R1612 activated to increase yields had up regulated a set of previously un-transcribed and un-translated genes for a specific set of beta-acid protein binding receptors to the cell membranes of the meat and grains, which allowed a fairly innocuous, benign bacteria to bind and contaminate the food supply with more than enough bacterial toxins and metabolites to kill.
"Yes," the Commander reluctantly supplied. "And started procedure for food distribution is disbursement to all ships… just in case one ship is destroyed in attack we don't lose our entire stock."
Saul Tigh laughed at the irony of it. "And instead we're all up a creek at the same time," he sadly grinned. He ran a hair through his thin, balding white hair. "We need to find something, and soon."
Adama agreed. "The only… good news of this, Madam President, is that we've been lucky and have sealed rations. Even with the Guardian resupply they only gave us enough for six months, which will be used in another month… and-"
"We still haven't heard from Commander Cyrus," Tigh added. "Whatever that toaster is up to," he grunted and shrugged his bony shoulders.
"I don't think we can rely on the Guardians resupply us at the moment," Adama finished. "We're only where we're at because they gave us their production equipment and base stocks… and part of that is contaminated."
It was Cottle's turn to laugh cryptically again. "Especially since they don't eat… they gave everything to the second fleet." He took the cigarette out of his mouth and tapped it on the table. "We'll need to decontaminate everything- all the production equipment, the holding tanks, everything. Just to be sure."
"What is the risk to the fleet from the bacteria?" The President asked. She'd ordered a stop to traffic twenty minutes ago.
Doctor Cottle leaned forward and reassured the military brass and president, all with limited scientific backgrounds, everyone would be okay: "Absolutely zero. The bacterial is harmless in humans. It's the toxins they release on the food. And the toxins wont affect you unless you ingest the food. So we could have a hundred pounds of infected me here on the table and we'd be fine."
Roslin held up one hand and brought a pencil to paper in the other. She scribbled down a quick set of numbers and then angrily scratched them out.
"I'm not good with this… math," she sheepishly admitted, looking at the three men. "We have rations and some food left?"
Commander Adama coughed. "That is correct. Dry storage was unaffected. But grains and meats are stored together, so the contaminated shipment spread everywhere. It contaminated five months of food, Madam President."
She didn't need to hear that.
"We've got a week of real food left and a month of rations on the battlestars and Helios, but chances are the civie ships don't have more than a week or two," Tigh shrugged and tapped lightly on the table, "But honestly, Madam President, I wouldn't be surprised if there weren't any emergency rations on the majority of the ships. So much was left on New Caprica."
Roslin closed her eyes. "I know." She had both palms on the table before moving her right hand to cover her left. She began squeezing the left with her right as she thought. "Obviously we need to find a food source."
"Well, long term, we should be fine. Only a portion of the base stock of proteins we use to grow the meat was unaffected, and it will take time to expand what little we have left into a viable, self-sustaining base to reinitialize production… the grain supplies will take months to revitalize- we have to start from scratch," Adama admitted. He took his own glasses off and folded them delicately onto the table. He looked down and bit his lip, wondering how this could have happened.
"We know where New Caprica is," Tigh offered. He looked around at the stares. "As a last resort. I doubt the toasters are still there."
"As a last resort," Adama agreed. That was going to be a last resort after they were forced to boil and eat leather, for all Adama cared about going back to that nebula. "We'll-" Adama stood up as Lt. Gaeta rushed in from CIC.
"Sir! Pegasus… she's jumped away!"
Patience was supposed to be a virtue. It was a common belief, and sometimes a misconception, that machines were patient. They were not, not in the human sense of the word. A machine with an advanced neural net chip would soon become restless, bored, and perhaps even dangerous if it were not properly stimulated.
That was why the designers in Tech Com and the Free Machine faction, even Skynet, enabled its machines to daydream.
Jo Soto was doing that right now, though anyone watching her would assume she were waiting patiently for the prisoner to finish reading the thin stack of papers.
When the terminators had first moved their workspaces to Pegasus one machine had always roamed and stalked the corridors of The Beast- just in case the Colonials had been planning betrayal.
The dull, gun-metal gray corridors of the Mercury -class battlestar, punctuated with vertical light strips on the jutted out bulkheads, plus the relatively small crew made for incredibly boring patrols.
To someone who spent time with machines they would have recognized that Jo's slightly glossy eyes were just a bit more glossy than usual, and that her perfect posture was just a little more pronounced than usual. Stiff, some would describe her as.
She pretended to ignore the other man who had been staring at her for the better part of six minutes and fifteen seconds, but he had insisted that as Baltar's attorney, he needed to be present in any situation, even if classified, especially if his presidency during the Occupation of New Caprica and his interaction with the Cylons was a factor.
"You should take a picture, it will last longer," Jo said to the sunglass-wearing lawyer. She cocked her head at his smile. Jo considered, just for a moment, how much force it would take to shatter the lawyer's glasses without permanently injuring him. "The lighting in this cell is insufficient to cause your eyes damage, Mr. Lampkin," she dryly scolded.
Gaius looked up for a fleeting second, his head twisting between Romo Lampkin, his slick-talking lawyer, and Jo Soto, the killer robot.
"I do hope during the trial my client lending his humble helping hand will play a part… should any guilty verdict be… pre-decided?" Lampkin asked, a wry grin flickering on his lips. "We have sworn him to secrecy, after all."
Soto offered the lawyer a simple, dismissive glare.
She rolled her artificial eyes when Baltar's head popped back up, and almost doe-eyed, stared at Jo and then back at the lawyer. Soto's eyes, in turn, narrowed. She knew the naïve, nervous scientist act Baltar put on was so others would just dismiss him, wave him away, and not give him a second thought.
The machine could remember it well; the President's apathy and borderline hostility towards her vice president, a man she'd chosen just based on his celebrity status over the more capable Wallace Gray. Soto shook her head as she stared down at the man she could only describe as 'tiny.'
When Baltar was in the limelight, she remembered, he outshined everyone. The political manipulation of the fleet to settle New Caprica had been so obvious- even a machine who found democracy a completely foreign concept could understand the psychology behind it. She had some experience witnessing democracy on Earth.
She looked away and back at Lampkin. No matter how many light years from Earth they were and no matter how much civilizations differed, the lawyers and politicians always seemed to be the slick, slimy types.
"Admiral Cain and President Roslin both agreed to that, Mr. Lampkin," Jo said with a curt nod. She took a forceful step forward. "Are you done yet, Dr. Baltar?"
The scientist, frustrated, moaned and crinkled the paper and pushed his chair back, the legs skidding over the floor.
"Maybe you could give me a moment? Not everyone can just take a picture of an entire fraking printout of numbers and symbols!"
"You sound frustrated, Doctor."
Wagging his finger at the machine he shook his head. He ran his hands through his hair, crinkling the papers even more before he tossed them haphazardly onto his bed. He collapsed and with his elbow on his knees, threw his tired face into his hands.
"You all can't figure this out on your own?" He asked, his voice muffled by his palms. "Hyper-advanced robot AI and all that."
"We can process the data but we have difficulty making what you would call 'gut' decisions. Intuition is something difficult for machines to understand. We tend to ignore it via rationalizations," Jo explained calmly. She licked her lips to speak again, but instead slowly walked to where Baltar had pushed his chair and gently lifting it, set it down in front of him. "We need help, Doctor. We've worked together before… Gina is working on this as well," the machine whispered her name softly towards the scientist.
She had one hand on the papers, holding them so Baltar could read them and her other hovering gently, with barely any contact, over his right knee. Her fingertips were so light, resting on his leg.
Romo Lampkin, standing to the side, pulled his darkened glasses down and tilted his head until his chin was in his chest, and stared. He was not going to interrupt this.
"Doctor Baltar, you were… are, one of the best if not the best Colonial scientist. We've gone to Lt. Gaeta and Captain Shaw, but they always came to you," Jo stressed, bringing her head down to look into the man's eyes when he would finally bring his face out of his palms. "I know you can do this."
Gaius Baltar kept his head buried in his hands until he heard a familiar sound, a sound he hadn't heard in so, so long. He'd missed that sound, the soft tap of high heels striking the cold, lifeless metal decks of the brig.
The former President of the Colonies shivered as a hand ran up from the small of his back, circled between his shoulder blades, and slid over his neck.
"She's trying to appeal to your vanity," the beautiful, gorgeous, seductive Six whispered. He could feel the heat from her breath in his ear. "She wants to use you again. Just like Roslin did for her own dirty political ambitions. Just like they all wanted to use you."
"Yes, I know," Baltar responded to his guardian. He looked up into the bright blue spheres of hers and smiled, his eyes dancing over her face and sparkling as he took in her beauty. She was always watching out for him.
"Pardon?" Jo asked, cocking her head. "You can do this? That is good."
Baltar shook his head and blinked quickly. "No…" he stuttered, not sure what direction he wanted to take. The Six widened her eyes expectantly and threw her hands out in a gesture for him to get on with it. "No. I can't help because, like you said, this is classified, Ms. Soto. Plausible deniability at the trial, it will be ignored or buried or your project will be over by then."
"This is what the president promised," she told him softly.
It almost sounded like she was pleading, trying to sound like the innocent young lady she looked like.
The scientist's face fell from its previous smug demur and he watched those eyes of hers shine in the dimmed lights of the brig, reflecting back a little sparkle… and he traced the outline of her face, her symmetrical, perfect-
He began to lose himself as he refocused on the eyes and how they were so peaceful, relaxing, so-
"She's an infiltrator, remember that, Gaius. A manipulator. Why do you think her designers made her into a beautiful young lady? The AIs on Earth know how men think,' she laughed, "separated by thousands of light years and all you can do is think with your little head!"
Six reached down and grabbed him. Baltar jerked back, knocking the papers from Jo's hand and he crossed his legs in a blue and shoved them to the side. He sheepishly smiled at Jo.
"Please don't," he said in a painful attempt to cover for himself. "Please don't touch me like that."
He was referring to Soto's fingertips on his knee. That was his story.
"Just be careful, Gaius," Six told him, brushing her own fingertips across his neck, following his jaw line from ear to ear.
The deposed president could just barely feel her long, painted fingernails trailing behind her soft as silk touch.
His mouth hung open and he could feel light headed as he followed the lean, tall blonde around his cot with his eyes, his head swiveling to keep her in his center vision.
"Doctor Baltar. Can you help or not?" Soto asked, loudly, her tone nearly combative.
He gave her his classic, 'I-am-superior' grin and head shake. He won.
Baltar perked back up, his shoulders broad and pushed back, his chest out. He felt a definitive lightness now and stood up and paced to the front of his cell.
Six was outside the cell now, dangling the tips of her fingers inside the bar. Baltar smiled devilishly and waggled his fingers as he brushed by.
"I can help, but I need assurances…" he trailed off.
"Wait, hold on a minute, Baltar," Lampkin began, launching himself off the wall he was leaning on. "Ms. Soto can't promise anything, remember that," he emphasized.
Jo stood up and walked to within two feet of Baltar. "He is correct, Doctor, I cannot. The president is also unlikely to listen to me in that regard." Modulating her voice she sounded a perfect mix of contempt and disappointment. "I apologize I cannot make a better deal for you, Doctor." She lied.
The machine regarded him with curiosity. He had undoubtedly saved fifty thousand from annihilation, but had thrown them into slavery and occupation.
In her machine mind she processed and analyzed the action Baltar had committed publicly. There had been a plan, if the Cylons returned, to jump the ships away and send a Raptor. The Cylons had jammed the communications, but any competent enemy would do that. But Baltar had never revealed, to Jo's knowledge, the plan to come back and rescue the Colonials.
She tilted her head in silent acknowledgment that Baltar had not been a total failure.
"Yes… well…" he huffed.
The female machine moved herself slowly and carefully in front of Baltar, only half an arm length away.
"I do not think the president would care to listen to me after I compared her to Skynet." She thin smiled creased her lips.
"She is so persistent!" The Six only Baltar could see and hear exclaimed.
The Six, back inside the cell, circled the machine and brushed against Baltar as she did so. Her hand stroked him as she passed.
"They never give up when they want something… careful, Gaius, if your lawyer wasn't here she may throw herself at you…" the Six gave Jo a daring glare. "She may do that anyway with him here… persistent machines!" She chuckled. "You can handle this Gaius. Prove to… prove to yourself you love Caprica Six."
The seductive Six began walking away from Gaius. He took a stuttered step and stopped, his breathing faster, he leaned his body back and slowly shut his eyes.
The same condescending, 'I am superior' smile, which fit him so well, was once again slowly drawn on his face.
"I know, I heard about that," he replied as his head bobbed up and down. "I know, but I don't think I can help. See…" he went and collected the papers, "The hybrids seem to communicate on quantum wavefront- near instantaneous communications… but…" he shrugged.
A wink signified he had a secret.
He knew something.
Jo's friendly disposition changed, and Baltar could see it. He took a step backwards, but somehow, unconsciously, he had been maneuvered with his back to the bars.
The machines small, almost petite hand moved slowly to Baltar side. Her left arm formed a barrier on Baltar's right side, and he swallowed. He heard one of the prison bars being bent under the enormous, bone-crushing power of Jo's grip.
"Doctor Baltar…" her smiled betrayed the threatening undertone of the name, "if this can help us find Earth…" her right hand shot out and bracketed him and she pushed closer to him. Lampkin was frozen as he watched from the rear of the cell. "Then you need to tell us… now," her eyes pulsed.
She winced as Baltar breathed out, disgusted by his smell and pushed off. The scientist, almost shaking, turned quickly, but staggered back when he saw her fingers had dented the bars. He stumbled right back into a hard, unmovable wall.
He gulped.
Baltar had to prove himself.
As he turned, the hatch to the Galactica's main brig swung opened, squeaking and creaking as it did so. Commander Adama stepped in hurriedly, followed by Colonel Tigh and the President.
"Soto… Pegasus has jumped away," Adama stated. "We don't know why or where."
||||||||||==BS-62 Pegasus (+964 Days Post Cylon Holocaust)==||||||||||
John stood quietly behind Gina, looking over the shoulder of the Cylon prisoner, as she furiously scrolled through pages of data which had burst from the hybrid's data modules and onto her tablet computer.
Captain Shaw had graciously, though reluctantly, accepted to be in the same room with Gina and by some intervention by the Gods, had even tried to work with her. After two arguments she had given up and was working with Daniel on the opposite side of the hybrid's chamber.
The text on the computer screen scrolled by relatively quickly, but for John it was almost painfully slow. Admiral Cain had forbid the use of direct neural connections, data stream ports, or anything which the hybrid could potentially take control of and transmit. The tablet computer had had its networking hardware removed and since terminators had wireless capabilities (which they were not going to remove) direct data interfacing was out of the question. Cain had been firm, quite firm… almost implying she would shoot he hybrid herself if any of her rules were broken.
Planck had accepted the conditions.
John narrowed his eyes in frustration as he perceived Gina to be intentionally slowing the progress on finding out the secrets of the hybrid.
Daniel had been more intrigued by the hardware rather than the 'software', the hybrid's mind, and believed that would lead them to victory over Cynet. He was working on his own, though Shaw was 'helping' him, on the far side of the compartment the machines had been assigned for this project.
"I'm going as fast as I can," the bio-Cylon stated as she kept her eyes glued to her display, sensing the machine hovering behind her.
"Which is still incredibly slow," was the machine's curt response.
The bio-Cylon rolled her eyes. John took the tablet and jammed his index finger into the scroll button on the side of the tablet screen. The data they had downloaded flashed through, scrolling through thousands of pages within seconds.
Finished, he held the tablet back out, which Gina snatched away from him with a sneer and a glare.
"Without the data stream this is going to go slow…" she informed the terminator. She began reading the material at a much faster pace than she had been, a sly smirk daring to show itself on the corners of her lips. She looked up and back towards the rear wall of the compartment, her eyes glazed over slightly. "Helena, even as part of the generation which survived our war for liberation, was never a technophobe. Twenty of thirty more years, with people like her or Baltar in charge, the Colonials probably would have caught up to us in computer technology." She shrugged.
John looked at her.
"It's a good thing they didn't catch up to us," she added venomously.
"That is very interesting," the machine responded, humoring her and responding to her, giving her what she wanted. "Maybe you can concentrate on the hybrid?" he asked.
After so many years around humans it was difficult to always catch and modify the emotional output from the neural net. In this instance the machine sounded quite obviously frustrated at Gina's stalling and unsolicited comments, and his vocalizer conveyed that in his tone.
A frustrated machine could be dangerous, and John was frustrated. An unanticipated variable had appeared, two in fact. One had been when the hybrid grabbed his leg and the second when it had grabbed his forearm. That was between him and Daniel. But the first incident had been quite clearly seen by many, from the boarding party in the hybrid's sanctum to the Pegasus bridge crew.
Waiting for Gina to finish, he recalled a conversation he had heard when walking by pilot ready room (he had in fact been down the corridor, but could still hear). There were rumors the search teams had brought 'something' back.
'Something'… the machine had to mentally roll his eyes.
Rumors had so far been kept to a minimum, but John knew, humans were unfortunately so very human and would share and spread the rumors. He physically shook his head when a flashing light caught his eye.
The data scrolled and stopped, a red 'end' flashed on the screen.
Sighing, Gina placed the tablet against her thigh, letting it thump on her leg. She rapped her fingers on it gently and her lips twisted as she thought.
"There's nothing in the system history files. I checked everything I knew, every in and out, Planck. Nothing." She stopped and looked at him. "Nothing," she emphasized.
"Yes, I know, but that's impossible. All AI we have ever encountered keep detailed files of their entire history. The meta-cognitive processor the hybrid is based on is similar enough to our neural net CPU- once something is there, it is there forever unless blocked. Only neural remodeling can accomplish that."
Gina cocked her head, her eye narrowed at the term. "I don't know what neural remodeling is."
The Earth terminator looked at her and back at the tablet, taking it from her and tapping on it quickly. Gina stood up on her tip-toes in an attempt to look over the top of the tablet, but was thwarted when John held it up.
Trusting Gina was very difficult. The only reason she was with them in the compartment was because the machines were there and could easily keep her in check. If the machines left she was escorted back to her cell. She was not to approach anyone except for Daniel or John.
"Nothing," he said, frustrated. He dropped the tablet back down on the cart which was placed besides Gina and held data cables, hard drives, and computers. "The hybrid is… it's similar to the I-950s on Earth, it should record the data."
"Nothing?" Gina crossed her arms and leaned on the cart. "So what is neural remodeling?" She tilted her head and tried to look the machine in the eye, which was focused on the hybrid. Gina groaned her frustration after she waited for the machine and it said. "So what is neural net remodeling?" the bio-Cylon prisoner echoed.
"Neural net remodeling is how you… reprogram a machine without reprogramming it," he held up his hand to stave off any questions. "It's difficult to explain the concept in words. Our chips are impossible to reprogram. If our combat chassis is damaged and battle and our chips are removed, it prevents us from being altered or Skynet reading the chip."
"What?" she was fairly certain she saw the link- no neural net remodeling should mean the MCP should be easy to read, have all the data.
"It not reprogramming but it can be used to block access to memories… it's dangerous." John added. "Personality matrices and core algorithms are not manipulated… if you know what to look for…"
She perked up. "That sounds like selective cognitive dissociation- it's what we used for our sleeper agents." She waved her finger and bit her lip. "You remember Boomer?"
John cocked his head, curious. "Yes. She was a sleeper agent. You know about her?"
Gina chuckled and nodded. "Baltar talked about her a lot when he first started to… uh, talk with her," she looked off towards the side. "We had thousands of agents spread throughout the Colonial military, almost on every battlestar in some capacity-"
"Like murderous, lying technicians," Shaw said, standing up and glaring at Gina.
John looked over his shoulder and back at Gina. The two were engaged in a staring contest… which brought back memories for John back on Earth. He sidestepped between the two women and broke their silent combat.
"The dissociation, Gina," John said, breaking the trance she was still in even though her line of sight with the captain had been broken.
Looking away, down, and back at John Gina annoyingly shrugged and decided she wouldn't let that interruption get to her. It would have been too easy.
"When Boomer was in the fleet she still needed the memories and she needed cues in order to carry out missions…" she crossed her arms and bit down on the corner of her lower lip. "Most likely there was another Cylon on board, a Cylon who knew they were a Cylon, giving her missions."
"There was a One, a Brother Cavil, who came aboard shortly after the attack- one of about a hundred civilians which was waiting to be reassigned to civilian ships from Galactica," John supplied.
Gina slapped her leg lightly with her hand. "It was probably him then," she informed the terminator. "Once a Cylon is aware they are a Cylon the dissociation conditioning is null- completely gone. With the hybrid, we would need to look for areas of her brain which appear inactive, like the neurons are firing, but no signal is reaching her conscious mind." She walked up to the hybrid and leaned in, fighting an urge to stroke its cheek. "That is assuming the hybrid is dissociating its memory of what it said to you from its active though processes and memory recall."
"I wasn't aware Cylons could do that," John admitted.
"Yeah, we can, some of us at least. Our models are identical but some of us are a bit different, given certain traits for a mission. Extra strength, extra cognitive capabilities like computer technician or Raptor pilot," she explained.
They heard the compartment's vacuum sealed door hiss and a set of clinks from the magnetic locks disengaged informed the four busy workers someone was entering.
Major Avion walked in, squinting in the low light. He smiled at the machines, nodded to Shaw, and ignored Gina, who had taken the data pad and was doing something on her own.
As commander of Helios he was privy to access (nearly) everything within the Colonial military database (what little remained) and was authorized to be briefed on the hybrid. Carter and Shaw had taken a Raptor to Helios two days ago, and Carter had reported to John that the CO had seemed… more than intrigued, almost enamored, with the concepts and theories surrounding the hybrid.
"So this is the hybrid," the major stated, clasping his hands behind his back. He nodded and pursed his lips, little dimples and divots forming in his chin. "It's very interesting, John."
The machine nodded curtly. "It is."
John liked the major, he did, but his presence here had been unannounced and the machine was more concerned, focused, on finding out the secrets she possessed. He accepted Shaw's presence since a human/Colonial liaison was required (and Admiral Cain had dismissed the John's request to use Athena as the liaison… not human) and tolerated Gina since she was the only person approaching a 'hybrid expert' in the fleet.
"Very interesting," he repeated, crossing his arms. "I heard what the Twos, the Leoban's believe, that these speak for God."
"Do they?" The machine asked. The question was rhetorical and dismissive. Planck wanted to get back to work.
"I've read your Earth Bible, Qur'an, and Tora, John and all of them seem to mention something similar." He nodded. "Prophets, angels… I don't know, maybe the hybrids have some connection to God."
"The Cylon God?" John asked.
Major Avion shrugged and waffled his head side-to-side. "My belief is that the Cylon God, your Earth God some of your machines believe in… every one of them, are one and the same… the One True God," he gave John a friendly pat on the back. "However you want to describe it." Major Avion ignored the look Captain Shaw gave him.
"I wasn't aware many humans realized their Lords of Kobol were false gods," Gina quipped, looking over her shoulder. "It's too bad you didn't realize your sins earlier."
The pseudo-muscles on John's face twitched slightly at the inevitable. Religion on Earth was always a hot topic; between those of the same faith, different faiths, or with no faith. Religious intolerance in the Colonies had quite honestly, stunned Planck when he had arrived.
In the post Judgment Day world some had lost faith, some had gained faith. Not many humans or free machines really cared if the person next to them was Buddhist, Christian, Muslim, agnostic, atheist, or any other of the hundreds of faiths on Earth.
Machines and humans were free to believe and have faith in what they wanted. On the Colonies, anyone who spoke against the Lords of Kobol was an outcast. A small minority of monotheists existed on Gemenon, but they were merely tolerated and allowed to exist by the Gemenon government for political purposes.
"Well, the Guardians showed us a way which didn't require the genocide of twenty billion innocent lives," Major Avion retorted. While no longer believing in the Lords of Kobol he would defend the Colonies and the perceived insult to their honor.
Philosophical arguments were interesting, intriguing even to machines, but not when they had a task at hand to accomplish.
"Can we please concentrate on this?" John asked, carefully modulating his voice to sound soothing yet firm, exactly as his psychological files indicated would provide the highest likelihood of agreement between the contesting parties.
Gina didn't answer and just went back to her work.
Major Avion apologized. "I'm sorry, you're right… you all have a lot of work to do." He stepped forward and looked down into the hybrid's chamber. "I just wanted to see the hybrid and see what all the fuss was about recently. Like I said, it's intriguing." He extended his hand, and John shook it. "Thank you. Good luck." He nodded his support and left.
Gina watched him go, shaking her head once his back was turned.
"The decision to destroy the Colonies, it wasn't unanimous," she said offhand though wishing for John to ask her to explain.
Maybe it was a guilty conscious she had decided to say that now, after years of confinement? She wasn't sure. She still held no remorse over her actions; she was a soldier and had had a mission to accomplish. Plus the machine right in front of her felt no visible guilt about his deception of the Colonial's for eighteen months prior to Kobol, so why should she feel anything?
John's eyes narrowed at that statement. "That's not what we were told," he said, mildly surprised. At this point it didn't matter; the Colonials hated the Cylons and the Cylons and event he rebels would more than likely not want anything to do with the Colonials. "We thought it was unanimous."
The bio-Cylon shrugged, taping on her computer she groaned a waffling groan. "It was… but not really. The models vote, each individual receives a vote and that is compiled. All the models did vote because he majority of each individual voted for the attack."
"Did you?"
"Yes, I did. Would I again?" She shrugged with her eyes closed. "I don't know. Maybe… yes, I think I would." She nodded slowly. Her hatred of humanity, influence by experience, would never be extinguished. "The vote was close. Fifteen percent of the Sixes, Eights, and Twos voted against the attack." She saw John smirk at the insinuation the vote was 'close.' Gina couldn't help but laugh, a bit inappropriately, at the cryptic, dark humor of it. "Do machines vote on Earth?"
"Vote?" He shook his head. "No. We're all soldiers, we do what we're told." He decided to be friendlier to Gina.
When Planck had arrived in the past he had attempted to acquaint himself with human customs. Since he didn't sleep, he had spent some nights watching late night television. He had learned that a 'non-hostile work environment' was one of the core principles of establishing an efficient work environment in the 21st Century.
Humans, he understood it, were obsessed with sex.
He decided to try this approach with Gina.
A non-hostile work environment may very well provide for increased efficiency. "It's very difficult to vote when the world is literally a war zone," he pointed out. "Anyway, I doubt machines would be proponents of democracy."
"Too inefficient?" She asked rhetorical, her right eyebrow arching.
Planck smiled, letting her have a half nod in acknowledgment. "Maybe," he shrugged.
Gina and John both heard the vacuum seal once again break and the magnetic locks disengage. The bio-Cylon looked over at the machine, who, instead of looking annoyed, actually looked happy. There was a sly, ghost-like smile on his lips. Gina stared at him, a bit confused, as she felt the inward rushing of air into the compartment as the door opened.
"Erica," he said to no one. The door wasn't even fully opened when the IL-S body Erica currently occupied stepped through the door.
"Hello, John," she said, smiling. He returned the smile and stepped towards her. "How is the hybrid coming along."
Planck nodded and turned to walk back with Erica, putting his hand in the small of her back and guiding her forward over the mess and clutter.
"As an expression on Earth went, we're 'getting' 'er done'…" his smiled broadened at the awkward saying. Erica laughed and moved forward, leaning over the hybrid as John leaned in next to her, their shoulders touching slightly.
"Daniel," John asked, cocking his head, "what are you doing?"
Daniel, typing and taping commands furiously on a tablet computer slowed the beats and rhythm of his fingers and slowly, somewhat dramatically turned his head, cocking it at an angle, and looked up towards Captain Shaw who was standing- more like hovering, over him.
The young captain noticed diagrams and models rotating quickly on the screen, almost at a blur. She rolled her eyes… the machines were not making it easy for her.
How was she going to keep Admiral Cain informed if she couldn't see more than this? She barely slept, maybe, maybe five hours a night (four and a half on average) and if Daniel, John, and Gina were human she'd skip a night of sleep and catch up on their work. But since the first two didn't sleep and Gina could go up to four days without sleeping (Lt. Thorne had proven this) she would need to find a way to catch up without being left behind.
Frustration, annoyance, those emotions were mild compared to what was building up. She resolved then that if she was going to get information, she'd have to basically resort to sitting down and pointing like a primary school pupil and asking 'what's that?' and 'why?'.
She kneeled down and crouched back on her heels, making a face when she felt her knees dampen.
"What is this?" She asked, rocking back until she was sitting down, her knees folded in front of her. She wiped off a clear, viscous fluid and flicked her hand.
Unintentionally, a tiny drop of the substance flew at and struck Daniel's computer screen.
She grimaced. "Sorry," she said to the machine somewhat sheepishly.
In a swift, ever-so-precise movement Daniel brought up his hand and wiped it away.
Working so closely with the machines- she considered it her duty to observe and report any anomalies to Admiral Cain- had given her the ability to pick up on the little cues which indicated the 'mood' the machines were in. Daniel was clearly annoyed with her.
"The chamber seems to produce its own conduction fluid. We believe there may be a recycling mechanism behind one of the deeper recessed panels," the Guardian/Cylon/Terminator hybrid stated, as if out of obligation.
The AI construct was sitting cross legged on the floor, a Colonial computer in one hand connected to small data ports under an access panel, a computer on the floor, and a third computer propped up on the side of the hybrid's 'tub'.
"What is that?" She asked, pointing at a strange cylindrical-like object with two squares on the ends. "It looks like some barbell or something."
Daniel touched the object she was referring to. "It's just a power regulator. Very common," he explained. "There's a dozen of them spread evenly throughout the hybrid's… 'tub'."
Captain Shaw nodded. She put her hands on her thighs and watched Daniel unplugged the data cables and then plug them into a different set of data ports.
In truth she was bored. Extremely bored. She slowly rolled up the long sleeve on her green utility uniform and watched the seconds tick by on her watch. Studying it for a second too long she was brought back to reality over some mild argument between Gina and John.
The captain groaned when she realized she'd missed lunch nearly two hours ago. She'd been in and out of this chamber for nearly… five hours? She shook her head.
After a morning bout in the gym (she was using the one of the gyms in the starboard flight pod instead of the port side- that's where Starbuck would work out while John spotted her, which she just thought was weird) she'd showered and had a small breakfast, e-mailed her reports to Admiral Cain, and downloaded about a week's worth of tactical operations assignments she'd then forwarded to her department, Tactical Operations.
It was a lot of work and any other woman (or man for that matter) could never pull it off. Shaw had a fierce sense of pride she was number two in line to command the ship should Cain and Apollo be incapacitated, ran one of the most important departments on the ship (of course each department head considered their own department the most important), and was the Admiral's eyes and ears when it came to the machines and their little side adventures.
The mental recollection and surge of pride in her abilities was enough to distract her mind from the hunger building in her stomach. Realizing she could just skip lunch and deciding not to run to the galley to grab an apple or a sandwich, her stomach decided to spitefully growl at her.
Her eyes shot up in revelation and her left hand quickly found a protein bar she had… she didn't remember when she'd put it in her uniform. Maybe last night? Whenever she'd done it, she was glad now.
Shaw chewed silently, though the crinkling of the wrapper made her cringe at first, she relaxed and didn't try and hide the noise as she peeled the wrapper down and scooted out the protein bar- which was actually only partially protein but loaded with sugar and fat. Her nose wrinkled when she accidentally took a sniff of it; Tauron Spice. It was her least favorite.
"Have you found anything useful?" Shaw asked.
Continuing to type and tap on the touch screens, Daniel answered: "I found a backup communication's relay, it's over there," he pointed behind his back, "while you were in the bathroom an hour ago," he added unnecessarily. Shaw just looked at him. "I haven't opened it yet to examine it." Daniel began explaining more about the communication device.
After she had come back from the bathroom she had gone over and looked at the device. She wanted to point out she meant if he'd found anything new since she had come over and sat down. Closing her eyes she let her mind wander for a moment.
Captain Shaw's ears perked up and her eyes narrowed. She felt her body tense as she began listening more intently on the conversation about some sort of mental dissociation the Cylons had perfected. Baring her teeth and driving her hands almost painfully into the deck plating, she shot herself up.
"Like murderous, lying technicians," Shaw said, standing up and glaring at Gina.
She held her eyes steady as the traitorous bio-Cylon glared back.
John stepped between the two and Captain Shaw sat back down.
Daniel gave her a look, which she more than gladly returned.
"This is actually something that might be useful," Daniel stated, looking at her and then back at the half-sphere object. "The amount of data lines running in, and it looks like some sort of backup transmitter of some kind…"
"How much of this are you going to remove before interfacing with the hybrid?" Captain Shaw inquired dutifully. She had a report to make.
"Gina believe if we interface with the hybrid and it is hostile, it could send feedback loops throughout the equipment and destroy it. Unfortunately the hybrid is part of the hardware and we can't disassemble her."
The tactical officer and flag aide nodded her understanding of his assessment and picked up one of the computers neatly organized around the IL-S machine.
Major Avion came in, and Shaw once again listened to him, and Gina, get into some argument on religion. She almost, almost laughed over the argument about God which was about to spiral out of control before John stopped it.
As much as Shaw personally detested Gina, the bio-Cylon was strong; easily twice as strong as some of the larger Marines… it'd actually be sort of entertaining to see her deck Avion- someone she thought was too close to the machines. She even raised herself up slightly, discreetly even, to look over the side of the hybrid's chamber and watch.
Disappointed when John stopped the potential decent into physical confrontation she resigned herself to admitting that this would be boring.
A Latin Classics major, Captain Shaw was versed in language and literature, but she had a hobby in math, cryptology, and computer science. Before Baltar was arrested and he still dabbled in scientific pursuit she had followed his work along with Lt. Gaeta on Galactica. She could confidently place herself as one of the more knowledgeable computer experts on Pegasus- baring the machines.
When Erica had come in, she had watched with interest as the two machines interacted. There was a perverse curiosity as to how that worked. Watching the video Carter had shown her during the Raptor trip to the Lion's Head Nebula, she had picked up on the sub-text that this General Connor they had talked about was more than likely involved with that machine body guard.
Except for tactical information and fairly censored videos, the machines hadn't really shown that much about their personal lives.
She grunted to herself. Shaw watched a bit more as John and Erica moved towards the hybrid. She was no doubt curious about it, since the Cylons were technically 'related' to her in some strange, twisted way.
The captain bit down on her lip, wondering how the machines were intimate. She laughed, snorting quietly, as the absurdity of thinking this, but boredom was a dangerous weapon in the hands of the Pegasus tactical officer.
Maybe they shared data or something? She didn't know and was beginning to get a bit bored with even that somewhat entertaining and distracting thought. Maybe they connected over the wireless connection they had and shared experience and…? She looked down and at her knees and realized her fingernails had been digging into her thighs.
Her head recoiled back slightly and she realized something-
"Daniel, what are you doing?" Shaw heard Planck ask.
The captain head swiveled and she could see Daniel rummaging inside, deep inside, the base of the hybrid's chamber.
"There's something in here," he said, his arm in slightly passed his elbows. "It's… I think it's a-"
The hybrid's eyes shot open while the tub was still blackened and dull. It pushed itself up on its elbows, its dark fiber optic connections rising out of the conduction fluid with it- dotting her back and piercing her skull underneath her thick wood-black hair.
The hybrid looked at John.
"She is not the harbinger of death. She will not lead you all to your doom… he was wrong! He was… wrong! The message written in blood… this has happened before and will happen again!"I The hybrid yelled.
"Daniel…" John said. "Daniel… there's a signal coming from the hybrid… it's transmitting!" John shouted.
Alarm klaxons began blaring throughout Pegasus. The phone to the work space began vibrating and ringing violently.
The life support systems began flickering as fans stopped, heaters kicked on, water pumps stopped pumping.
The hybrid's wide eyes opened to even greater circles, spheres of fear and apprehension locked with John's eyes in an almost hypnotic gaze.
"She is NOT the harbinger, she will NOT lead them all to their end…he was wrong, the first of us, he was wrong!" She pushed up, the strain of the fiber optic cable keeping the hybrid secured down in the tank. "John is the harbinger of death. John will lead them to their end. John will sacrifice all those he holds dear for victory!"
The hybrid fell back, its head twitching and its eyes darting.
The lights on the battlestar began to dim and crackle.
The hybrid screamed.
John's hands shot up to his metal skull, clutching it. The pain through his neural net was more intense than anything he'd experience- sharper than the pain when they jumped to FTL.
"JUMP!" The hybrid shouted.
Pegasus jumped.