CHAPTER 27

PILGRIM'S PROGRESS

"Kara, you're fidgeting, and I don't think that paper clip can take much more abuse." Sam Anders looked pointedly at the now thoroughly misshapen piece of metal in Kara's hands. Tension was radiating off the Adriatic's commander in waves. "Why don't you go get something to drink … something that will calm your nerves?"

"Sam's right," Ponytail agreed. Deitra Symonds was currently manning the short range communications console, but it was hard for her to concentrate on her job when the boss kept drumming her fingers on the central console every ten seconds or so.

Ponytail cast an envious glance in Athena's direction. The Eight had come up behind Kara, and was busily massaging her shoulders, trying to knead the tension out of strained tendons and muscles. Deitra idly wondered if Kara truly grasped the obvious—that Athena was as much her minder as her lover—but her attention was really centered on Athena's hands. Cylon hands were a gift from the gods, strong yet supple, and the young human couldn't wait to finish her shift and return to her quarters. Sixes were reputedly the best masseuses of all, and Ponytail was eager to find out whether Rachel had a few very special tricks hidden up her cylon sleeves, techniques that she had never shared with anyone else.

"Better yet," Ponytail added, "why don't you and Athena go back to your cabin and take care of business the old fashioned way?"

"Can't," Kara laconically replied.

"Why not?"

"Cousin It's taking a nap; the damned thing's curled up and gone to sleep on our bed. If you want to piss off a fully grown and perpetually grumpy cython by waking it up, Lieutenant, be my guest. Myself, I would prefer to live another day."

"How in the name of the gods did you get stuck with the cython," Luke Hammond asked.

Kara shrugged her shoulders, as if the answer was so obvious that she needn't say it out loud. "What can I say? It turns out that all that spitting and hissing we witnessed when the monster first came on board is some kind of complicated cython mating ritual …"

"It was love at first sight," Athena grinned wickedly. "It turns out that John was more right than even he realized. All hybrids seem to have a natural affinity for one another. The cython somehow instantly sensed that Kara's a near relation. So, here's a word to the wise: when that snake is slithering around, you don't want to do anything that it might construe as a threat to Kara. Between the centurions and the cython, Kara's ass is off limits to everyone but me!"

"Nevertheless," Lucifer cut in, "Maker Sam is right." Everyone in the control room could detect the reproachful tone in the IL's metallic voice. "Kara, you are even beginning to get on my nerves. My most delicate algorithms have become distinctly twitchy. I am on the verge of adding two plus two, and deriving seven as the answer. This is unacceptable."

"For once, Goldenrod's dead on the mark," Luke concluded. "Come on, Kara, what do you say? How about you and me … we go down to the gym, we put on the gloves, and we punch the crap out of each other for a couple of rounds? Naomi and Sharon keep accusing me of getting soft … especially around the middle."

"The hazards of a deep space mission," Kara mused. "The longer we're out here, the harder it becomes to stay fit." Kara climbed suddenly to her feet, and swept the room with an angry glare. "I swear, half the people on this ship are asleep at the switch. Do you want to know why I'm a bit on edge? I keep thinking about the fact that the Adriatic's outfitted with four enormous fuel nacelles loaded to the hilt with tylium, and we've got a new cylon playmate sitting out there less than fifty kilometers to port—a refugee from a war that didn't exactly leave her feeling all warm and fuzzy about the human race. One shot, that's all it would take … just one lousy, little burst from any of Alpha's guns, and we'd be blown clean into the next dimension."

"Alpha won't betray us, Kara." Sam's voice was tinged with impatience. He was happy to have Lucifer on board; the IL's had a capacity for deception that made Sam want to keep the overseer model close to hand. But he entertained no such doubts about the female cyborg. "As long as we keep to our end of the bargain, she'll keep to hers."

"Yeah, yeah … so, how long do you reckon it'll be before we reach this temple of yours?"

"It's difficult to say. Remember, we were travelling at subluminal speeds. But, unless you want to push the red line all the way, it's going to take weeks … maybe months."

"Months," Kara cursed; "months. And it's only a way station. Artemis alone knows how long it's going to take us to reach Earth, and if Baltar's right, all we're gonna find there is a planet that glows in the dark. Two thousand years, and the odds are that we still won't be able to eat or drink a damned thing on the surface."

"But the planet may be habitable for the centurions," Sam pointed out, "and that's the deal. We give them a home of their own … a planet of their own … man and machine become partners in the fullest sense of the word, and the war ends. We finally break the cycles."

"That's the part I still don't get." Kara was absolutely determined to rain on Sam's parade. "You keep telling us that, four thousand years ago, you died in that temple—that you were offered up as a living sacrifice to the old, nameless cylon god … a human sacrifice. How is that possible? For that matter, how can you possibly know that you've already died on four separate occasions inside those walls? How long have you been at this, Sam? Ten thousand years? Fifty? A hundred? And I thought that Leoben was crazy … all that gibberish he kept tossing out when we were in the brig, about how the last time I was the prisoner, fell in love with him, and gave him three kids. Zeus almighty! Where do you people keep coming up with all this crap? How can the story always end the same when everybody gets to play a different role in each incarnation?"

"I don't know what to tell you, Kara; I really don't." There was a pained expression on Sam's face. Even to his own ears, his narrative of the grisly fate that had befallen him in so many previous lives sounded preposterous.

"So, how's it gonna be different this time? Have John and I always been the key to everything? Well, if that's the case, then how many times have we already frakked up? You know, Sam, I really do like to keep score, so tell me: how many times have I personally botched it? Have I already committed some huge, mind-boggling mistake that condemns us all to another round of failure? I really want to know, because if it's all over but the shouting, then I'm sorely tempted to take a long walk out the nearest, damned air lock!"

"Sam, I don't blame the Twos for spreading gloom and doom, but after all the years you spent on the Pyramid court, you should know better." Deitra was in the mood for lecturing, and of late Sam Anders made for an especially inviting target. "You know as well as I do that humans do not like to think of themselves as rats in a maze, or even worse, caught up inside one of those spinning wheels where you run and run but never get anywhere. Without free will, we're nothing. You can't take away hope, and expect us to endure. So, unless you want Kara to have to stand in line outside the nearest available air lock, you should keep this nonsense about past lives to yourself."

"Maker Sam, your stories really are most unlikely." Now Lucifer sounded like a comforting parent, who was trying to find a gentle way to explain the difference between fairy tales and real life to a small and gullible child. "The existence of this manifestation you call the soul is improbable enough, but the likelihood that such a spiritual essence would be reborn into the same body over and over again is less than 0.00137 percent. However vivid they may appear in your own mind, these deaths that you keep describing in such microscopic detail are nothing more than the product of what humans have labeled the imagination—the imagination run wild, is that not the expression?" Lucifer looked at Ponytail for confirmation.

The former ECO nodded enthusiastically, encouraging the golden-robed machine to continue.

"They are hallucinations," the IL stated emphatically. "Are there no pills or potions that, properly administered, will make them go away?" Lucifer's understanding of psychosis was vague, but he knew enough not to introduce that particular word into the conversation.

"Sam's problem is that he's not getting enough," Kara decided. "Anders, get packed. I want you on the next shuttle to the basestar. I'm getting reports that Melania's moping around over there like the proverbial fifth wheel, and depressing the hell out of the centurions, never mind the resident marine contingent." Adama had assigned a full squadron of Galactica's finest to the Adriatic, and half of them were now stationed on the huge cylon craft. "So, go cheer her up. And take your time. I don't want to see your ass on this ship again until you've got your head screwed on at least halfway straight. Are you reading me, Mister?"

"Kara, the closer we get to the temple, the worse it's going to get."

"And that's weeks if not months away. Sam, I cannot afford to have this crew fall victim to deep space psychosis. If that happens, we'll never even make it to this frakked up planet of yours. So, enjoy your R&R … and try and find out if the rumors about Alpha's sex life are true. If a little lovin' is all it takes to make her happy, do your bit for the cause. And in the meantime …"

Kara once again glared at the various faces gathered around her in the control room.

"In the meantime, I want this crew to get down to some serious frakking. Meaningless sex and booze are the answer to most of life's problems, but we're going to be out here a long time, and even they may not be enough. A few pregnancies are the obvious antidote to what ails us."

"Are you making that an order, Captain?" Luke Hammond was grinning from ear to ear. Sharon and Naomi were absolutely voracious, but he was getting a hard on just thinking about the possibilities.

"Make it so," Kara replied.

. . .

"Your husband doesn't trust me, does he?"

Aspasia looked pointedly at Sharon Bierns, defying her to disagree.

"No, he doesn't," Sharon conceded. She stopped in mid-stride, and turned to confront the Six. The corridor was empty. "John is a trained intelligence officer, and he doesn't believe in coincidence. He regards your 'escape' as too convenient by far. The Ones are fond of extravagant gestures, so sacrificing a basestar in order to plant an agent in our ranks is not as farfetched as it sounds."

"And you, sister … what do you think? Am I an assassin? Better yet, how about a bomb waiting to explode when we reach the control center? Boom! The possibilities are endless."

"You won't explode." Sharon thought that the Six was making a feeble attempt at humor, but she wasn't quite sure. In any event, she saw no reason to disclose the fact that her companion had already been scanned for a wide range of chemical agents. "John suspects that you have been programmed for murder, but will only act when you are within reach of your target. He was actually disappointed to discover that he wasn't your intended victim. Now, figuring out what you're going to do is all guesswork."

"Is he paranoid?" The question was not meant to be insulting; the Six had never been exposed to humans or hybrids, and she wanted to learn as much as she could about the complex personalities with whom she was now interacting on a daily basis. One day, she would mate with a human, and give him a child. She needed reference points to help her make her selection—and she did not want to embarrass her daughter. It would not do for the mother of Kara Thrace Six to be dismissed as a toaster.

"Yes, and I would not have it any other way. Paranoia has kept John alive, where false hopes have killed other men. His mistrust of others will keep me and my child safe."

"So paranoia is a good thing?" This was not at all what Aspasia had expected to hear.

"It is a primal instinct … what the humans call 'survival instinct'. We ignore it at our own peril."

"I envy you your child," Aspasia sighed. She stared longingly at Sharon's swollen belly. "To feel new life growing inside you …"

"But you have already had a child, Six; you know what the experience is like." Sometimes, she thought, talking with this particular Six is like trying to read a book backwards.

John had given Sharon her first book, encouraging her to try learning the human way. Initially, Sharon had considered the exercise to be a waste of time—after all, she could download everything that she needed to know directly from the baseship's data stream. She didn't really need to 'learn' anything, and what could she possibly do with her newly acquired understanding of the Libran criminal justice system?

And then Racetrack had given her a copy of Kataris, and the universe had shifted beneath her feet. Poetry was a web of many-layered images, a subtle construction whose meaning seemed to depend more on her mood than on the words themselves. Kataris was a mirror that enabled her to look deeply into her own soul. Now, she was also grappling with music and art, and trying to come to terms with the full power of the human imagination. Philosophy had introduced her to the many shades of gray that dominated human thinking, and inspired their oft spoken regrets. She was beginning to appreciate how difficult it could be to distinguish between right and wrong, good and evil. She was addicted.

My child will learn this way. I will keep her away from the stream as much as possible. The Twos are right … it is our destiny to walk the human path …

"I knew nothing about pregnancy, and the Ones did not bother to fill in the gaps." Aspasia's brutal admission interrupted Sharon's reverie, and abruptly brought her back to the harsh realities of the present. "I was so sick, and I did not understand why. I was hot, and cold; I begged the Ones to satisfy me, and hated them when they gave me what I wanted. And then I could feel this … this thing … crawling inside of me … like a parasite. As my stomach grew bigger and bigger, I was convinced that it was eating me alive … that I would die when it exploded out of me. I was terrified, Eight … terrified. And the Ones were so smug, so sure of themselves. My suffering pleased them."

"They're sadists," Sharon murmured; "and we never saw it." She sadly shook her head. I'm beginning to accumulate regrets of my own, she thought.

"And then Kara was born." Aspasia's voice was filled with wonder, her thoughts far away, reliving the moment. Sharon wondered if she was projecting.

"And the monster turned out to be this tiny, beautiful creature—a true child of God. And she looked so much like me. How was such a thing possible? In that moment, inside of me all the pieces fell into place, and I knew love. But Cavil also saw what was happening, and he used my feelings against me … twisted the knife. He told me exactly what he was planning to do to my daughter, and I felt a new kind of pain … something so terrible that it made all of my previous suffering fade into insignificance. Anxiety, fear … I did not know these concepts, but feeling does not require understanding. I was hurting so badly that, when Cavil killed me, it was an act of mercy."

And to think that there are still humans who believe us incapable of feeling … who regard our suffering as simply a matter of programming …

The immensity of the tragedy that had engulfed all of their lives left Sharon doubly determined to keep her child safe from all harm.

"When you and Kara are reunited, talk to her, Six. She needs to know how much you loved her … how much you still love her. The Cavils did a lot of damage …"

"She is unhappy … starved for … love … affection?" Six was trying hard to understand because she wanted to be a good mother, but the psychological terrain unfolding before her was completely alien.

"There are three Sixes playing the role of surrogate mother, and one of my sisters has been tasked to care for her day-to-day needs, but she needs you! She needs to see the love in your eyes, and hear the heartache in your voice. Tell her exactly what you just said to me, Six; hold nothing back, and you will set her free. You can make her whole."

"I want to have more children, Eight. Am I being selfish? Should I devote myself instead to Kara's happiness … give no thought to my own needs?"

"I don't know how to answer that question, Six; I'm not even sure that there is an answer. I love my daughter." Sharon ran her hands gently over her stomach; she could feel the beating heart within her womb, a pulsating presence that never went away. "I would give my life to save her, and yet I too want more children. Perhaps," she said resignedly, "perhaps we really are nothing more than programmed machines. I have yet to give birth, and yet I am already planning for our next child. Is this what our makers had in store for us? Are we nothing more than a complexly interlocked series of hormonal response mechanisms? I sometimes think so, and then I look at the humans, who also breed so mindlessly. Perhaps this is life. Perhaps we're all machines, programmed by God to fill an empty universe with sentience. Have you observed that the female of every species has but one indispensable function, and that is to breed? Whatever else we may be, we are the instruments of God's plan for us all."

Sharon and Aspasia continued on down the corridor, slowly making their way to the control room. Aspasia had questions for Natalie as well, but they did not concern baseship operations. What feelings did she experience when she held Pyrrha, the human child whom she had adopted, in her arms? What hopes, and fears, did she harbor for the child's future? Aspasia Six had far too many questions, and had so far received far too few answers.

. . .

"Thank you both for coming." Bill kissed Ellen lightly on the cheek, and then shook Saul's hand. The bond between the two men was as strong as ever, tested over the years in barroom brawls and the fires of combat.

"Ah, it's good to be back," Saul confessed. "Oh, don't get me wrong," he added hastily. "Life down on the surface is wonderful … wouldn't give it up for anything. Got all those kids to look after … the grandkids … but, you know, sometimes I miss the old girl. I'm glad to see that my replacement is staying on top of things. Galactica looks good, Bill; Sonja's doing a fine job."

"Yeah … yeah, we've still got a good crew, and the refit's coming along well. When it comes to making do, Colonel Phillips is a genius. It never even crossed my mind that the centurion manufacturing ship could be retooled to turn out armor plating for the hull. Chief Tyrol's going to be in for one hell of a surprise when he gets back."

"He's not gonna be happy,"Tigh chuckled. "All those dents and dings gave him something to complain about. You know as well as I do, Bill, that chiefs don't know what to do with themselves unless everything's falling apart at the seams."

"Where's Shelly," Ellen blurted out. "And where's Creusa and the baby?" She was looking steadily at Lee Adama, who was the only other person in the admiral's quarters.

"All three of them are on the resurrection ship," Bill politely answered.

"Well, then, let me rephrase the question: where's the resurrection ship? And don't try lying to me, Bill; it's no longer in orbit. I know, because I looked for it on our way up here. It's not there."

"You're right, Ellen." Adama's voice was little more than a whisper because he had been the object of Ellen Tigh's wrath on more than one occasion, none of them pleasant. "After consulting with the President, I decided that for the time being it would be a good idea to have the resurrection ship leave the nebula."

"How many jumps?" Saul Tigh got straight to the point.

"At least ten, maybe more … it's up to the Threes."

"Ten jumps!" Ellen was aghast, and then her temper flared. "Are you crazy? You've just threatened every Cylon on the planet with terminal death! Is that your plan," she shrieked, "to kill us all?"

"Now, Ellen …"

"Stay out of this, Saul!" Ellen was incandescent with rage. "This is reckless and inexcusable. Neither you nor Baltar have the authority to do this!"

"Actually, Ellen … he does." Apollo had decided to enter the lists on his father's side. "The Admiral still has the right to make military decisions without consulting civilian authority. As it happens, however, my father did seek presidential approval. I'm here representing the President, in my capacity as his principal advisor on matters of national security, and I concur in this decision."

"Of course you do; that's why Creusa is on the resurrection ship! The Adamas will cheerfully risk the lives of every Cylon on New Caprica … oh, except for their own precious wives!" Ellen looked at Apollo with undisguised contempt. "Lee, you've always been holier-than-thou, but even for you, this is a new low!"

"Ellen's right, Bill." Saul was in no mood to mince words. "Whatever you're doing, the two of you are not dealing from an honest deck."

The two Adamas exchanged swift but silent glances. Lee nodded slightly, encouraging his father to go on.

"I suppose you've both heard the rumors about Baltar frakking the hybrid on the baseship?"

"Rumors … what rumors," Saul scoffed. "The perverted son of a bitch doesn't even bother to wipe the goop off his face before he runs home to his wives, one of whom happens to be my daughter!"

"I don't know what's actually happening over there, but I do know that it's all misdirection. The President is covering his tracks … drawing attention away from his visits to Galactica and the experiments that he's conducting here."

"What are you talking about, Bill?" Ellen's eyes had narrowed, but she was still fuming.

"Biological warfare," Adama responded. "Baltar and the Fours are running a live test right now. They've been searching for something that will not only kill Cylons but also infect the download. If all else fails, the idea is to contaminate the resurrection network, and force the Ones to shut it down. Once the Cavils become mortal enemies, the hope is that they'll lose their enthusiasm for the war, and we can get on with our lives."

"So, this is some kind of doomsday weapon? Gods on high, Bill; biological warfare! There's no way this doesn't come back to bite us in the ass!" Saul shook his head in despair.

"Saul, it comes strictly under the heading of 'if all else fails'."

"A live test: tell me, Bill, which of my children are you using as guinea pigs?" Years of simmering resentment, which were born out of the conviction that Bill Adama had spent a lifetime trying to undermine her marriage, now came boiling to the surface in Ellen Tigh. She was out for blood.

"Ones and Fives," Adama glared.

"Doesn't this fall under the heading of crimes against humanity? Oh, I forgot, we're talking about Cylons … machines!" The ice in Ellen Tigh's voice would have frozen a lava flow. "You acknowledge our sentience when it suits your purposes. And when it doesn't … we're lab specimens."

"Ellen, you don't know what the frak you're talking about." Bill Adama despised Ellen Tigh. Her promiscuity had made a mockery of her marriage, cuckolded her husband, and driven him to take refuge in the bottle. Saul Tigh was Bill's one true friend, and she had almost destroyed him. The admiral was also in no mood to mince words.

"Do you remember when Bierns disappeared for a few days, just before Kara left to find Earth? What do you think that was all about? He wanted to find out whether Cylons were vulnerable to Mellorak. After he got the answer, he disposed of the evidence." Bill poured two glasses of whiskey, and offered one to Saul. "Bierns kick started this entire program," he continued. "He gave the Simons that we captured on the Hippolyte and the Eurykleia a choice: work for us, or go out the airlock … permanent death." Adama shrugged his shoulders, and drained his glass in one long pull. The whiskey burned going down. It felt good.

"So, now you're trying to shift the blame to my grandson?" Ellen looked contemptuously at Adama. "Bill, you really are a pip. You made XO on the strength of Carolanne's connections. Is that why you drove her to drink? Did she make you get down on your knees and work for it?"

"Hey, wait a second!"

"Shut up, Lee." Ellen was just warming up. "Bill, you've spent your entire career passing the cubit. It's always been everybody else's fault … everybody but the great Bill Adama. You've kissed so much ass that it's a wonder you've still got lips. The only thing that surprises me here is that you're not laying the blame at Baltar's door."

"I can't," Bill shrugged again. "Baltar's Colonial Secret Service; he works for Bierns."

"What?" The color was literally draining from Lee Adama's face. "Dad, you can't be serious!"

"Fleet had Bierns under a microscope. He was so close to Adar that Command figured Berriman was driving the cuts in the defense budget. Everyone knew that Bierns was Berriman's hatchet man … the Lord High Executioner indeed. And, there was no love lost between the admiralty and the CSS, not with control of the Armistice Zone at stake. Then Bierns disappeared. He just vanished, for an entire month. When he resurfaced, which was what … four months before the cylon attack? Everything changed. Son, you have no idea. Interplanetary shipping routes were altered, and thousands of civilian ships … thousands … were brought into the yards for unscheduled maintenance. Military intelligence saw what was happening, but it had no frakking idea what was going on. Well, now we know. Now, we know that the CSS resupplied Ragnar, and stockpiled supplies from one end of the Colonies to the other. Now, we know that Bierns doubled Caprica Six, and that she had Baltar on a short leash. Bierns ordered Caprica Six to sabotage the defense mainframe … ordered her to do it! If you have any doubts about this, talk to her … talk toher! Baltar gave her access … he thought that she was just another ambitious defense contractor on the make … but he didn't have a frakking clue, not until Bierns sat him straight. Now, our illustrious president is scared shitless."

Bill poured himself another drink, and downed it in one gulp. He smacked his lips as he stared unseeingly at the painting that dominated one entire wall of his quarters. With its heroic theme of resistance to the Cylons the Monclair, an astronomically expensive gift from Julian DiMarco, his former commander on the Columbia, mocked Bill Adama's entire, pointless career.

"It's a joke," he bitterly concluded; "the whole, frakkin' war is a stupid, bloody joke—a CSS operation that was designed to get us to this point, and now it's all blowing up in our faces. Gods, what a joke!"

"Bill, come on … what the hell are you talking about?" Saul was in so far over his head that he couldn't tell up from down, but his stomach was tied up in knots. Bill Adama looked like something was eating him alive, and Saul guessed that they were all standing on the edge of a cliff, with a stiff breeze howling at their backs. When he peered over the edge, it was a long, long way down.

"The Eights," Lee murmured. "Something's gone wrong. You designed them to have babies … to be in the vanguard of the reconciliation between man and machine. They've done well, taken husbands by the hundreds. But they're not getting pregnant, and you can taste their collective frustration in the air. The Sixes aren't doing much better. If they both come to the conclusion that this grand experiment of ours has been a waste of time … we could lose them."

"And where would they go," Ellen snorted. The Adamas … both of them were pathetic. And then it hit her. "My God," she said in a voice steeped with horror, "this doomsday weapon of yours … it's not the Ones that you're worried about. You're going to kill our daughters if they turn against you. You frakking sons of bitches, may you both rot in Hades!"

"Ellen, calm down!" Adama's voice was utterly devoid of emotion. "Lee and I … the President … we're trying to get Bierns' plan back on track, not derail it. For gods' sake, use your head! Nobody wins if this all goes south; we need you to determine why the Sixes and Eights aren't having babies, and fix the problem."

"There is … no … problem," Ellen countered through gritted teeth. ''`Love' is an overused word to describe a straightforward biochemical reaction … a series of predictable hormonal responses. When a Cylon 'falls in love', these responses are triggered, which in turn collapses a firewall preventing impregnation. After that, it's just a matter of time."

"So, what are you saying," Lee pressed. "Are you implying that the Eights aren't really in love with their husbands? All of them? That's ridiculous."

"There's a better explanation," Bill interrupted. "The One that Creusa interrogated … he bragged about the fact that his model had found a way to defeat your programming. He said that they had added a second firewall, and he implied that it was something so obvious that we would all kick ourselves in the head when we discovered what they had done. It's time for the two of you to get to work, and solve the problem."

"We can't, Bill." Saul was apologetic, but there was no altering reality. "Cylon reproduction … it's one of the things where the five of us … where each one of us has a piece of the puzzle."

"That's not good enough, Saul. I'm not asking you to modify the original design. Cavil has found a way fatally to undermine it. I want you to go after whatever it is that he's done, and eliminate the threat. Surely, that bastard isn't smart enough to slip something by two of the exalted Final Five. Fix the problem."

"Wouldn't it be easier just to download the One in question, and torture the information out of him?" Ellen Tigh was relentless.

"Not possible," Bill conceded. "That particular One is gone … and he's not coming back."

"The Mellorak experiment," Saul hazarded.

"Yeah," Bill sheepishly answered.

"That's pretty bad planning," Ellen caustically commented. In her mind, Bill Adama's reputation had just taken another bad hit. The man was only one step removed from complete idiocy.

"Bierns never does anything by chance," the admiral retorted. "He knew what was coming. The odds are good that this entire conversation is pretty much following his script."

"How much time do we have?" Saul Tigh was, once again, coming straight to the point.

"We don't know," Lee confessed. He let out a deep sigh. "The strike that Xeno Fenner's called has exacerbated tensions throughout the settlement. Latent resentment of all things cylon is starting to come out into the open, and the numbers are alarming. The Sixes are weathering the storm, but the Eights … I suspect that some of them are having second thoughts about the whole arrangement. The question is … how many?"

"We burnt our bridges when we crushed the Sagittaron uprising," Bill concluded. "We can't afford another civil war. If we don't get ahead of this problem, it could destroy us."

. . .

"It's time," Six sighed. She began fumbling in the fading light for her clothing, the garments violently discarded when her body had begun to respond to Eric's overtures, the sex frantic and desperate.

"I know," he breathed, the resignation in his voice doing little to temper the anxiety in his heart.

When she had finished dressing, Six kissed the Sagittaron deeply, and then she abruptly turned and began walking across the last stretch of open ground that separated the two lovers from the landing field and the ship that would permit them to escape from the planet.

In the distance, she could see a number of centurions—obvious sentries patrolling the perimeter.

If they recognize me, this will be over very quickly. Still, I will have to buy time for Eric to escape.

As she cleared the last of the tall grass, Six sat off boldly in the direction of the nearest unit. When she entered its field of vision, the roving red eye stilled, and she knew that its recognition software was kicking in.

"Centurion, take me to the nearest data stream." It was a simple enough command, but if Six had been human, at this point she would have been holding her breath.

The machine did not hesitate. Unable to distinguish one Six from another, it turned and set off in the direction of a distant hangar. Six followed a few steps behind, walking with a confidence that she did not feel. She tried to stay in the shadows. Humans wouldn't give her a second glance, but her fellow Cylons would not be so easily fooled. The best way to avoid detection was to behave as if she belonged there.

The centurion paused in front of the cavernous entrance, and waited for her to close the distance.

"Thank you," Six purred. "You may now return to your duties." She waited, still hugging the shadows, waited for the centurion to disappear from her line of sight, while she rapidly scanned the bright interior for signs of movement. If she had to kill, she didn't want any witnesses, human or otherwise.

. . .

Humming cheerfully to herself, Philista Liu peered out into the wan morning light. Her kitchen window overlooked the Agathon's cabin, so she could see the smoke from the wood fire in Sharon's kitchen curling lazily into the sky. There was no other sign of activity next door, but Philista knew that Hera would already be putting Sharon through her paces. The Queen of Heaven was a demanding baby, so no one could blame Helo for fleeing at the first light of dawn. Besides, the cabin that Marc and Karl were raising for Esther Cohen wasn't going to build itself. The decision permanently to remove the hybrid babies from the settlement meant extra work for everyone.

Morning sickness still held Philista firmly in its grip, and the cramps were getting worse by the day, but pregnancy, she reflected, also had its upside. Her breasts had become noticeably heavier, and incredibly sensitive. Her sex life had never been better; what Marc didn't know Sharon did, and vice-versa. And when the two of them conspired to pleasure her simultaneously … well, Philista likened herself to one of those old-fashioned rockets that blasted into orbit, carving a fiery trail across the heavens that left everyone on the ground speechless.

The coffee pot began to whistle, and she carefully removed it from the wood stove. She poured a steaming cup, and carried it into the bedroom. This was a treasured ritual; Sharon was awake, but would not stir until Philista had served her.

"Good morning, sweet mistress," Philista teased as she deposited the cup on the night stand. "Your overworked slave is here to serve you." Philista climbed onto the bed, mounted her cylon wife, and leaned forward to plant a sloppy kiss on her lips. Philista loved to bathe Sharon with her tongue; the Cylon's skin was so sensitive, and her passion so easily aroused.

But Sharon ignored her. She twisted beneath the pretty, young human, and reached out to grasp the cup. Wordlessly, she sipped the still scalding hot brew, leaving Philista to her own devices.

Philista frowned, and a look of displeasure flashed across her features. Sharon had grown increasingly moody in the days following the Sagittaron insurrection, and there were times when, like now, she simply withdrew completely.

"Sharon, please … come back to me, talk to me … please! I know how much you want to have a baby, and how hard this is for you. I'd give anything for our situation to be reversed, but I can't … there's nothing I can do! Please … talk to me!"

"Yesterday, I went to see Doctor Cottle," Sharon murmured. Her hands were clasped behind her neck, and she was staring up at the ceiling. "I wanted him to examine me … to make sure that all of my parts are in working order. I was actually hoping that he would tell me something was wrong- that the machine had a broken part somewhere, but not to worry because he could repair it. Do you want to know what he told me?"

Philista dismounted, so that she could rest her head on Sharon's shoulder. She reached out to hug the Eight close.

"He said … he said that the way our creators designed us … a Cylon can't conceive unless she's in love, and feels love in return."

"I love you, Sharon," Philista softly cried. "I belong to you, body and soul. You know that … you know that!"

"So, I went to see Mama. I wanted to find out if it was true. She said that, yes, it was true- that there was a safeguard in place, and that I would never become pregnant unless I fell in love, and felt certain that my husband loved me. Isn't that amusing, Phi? Imagine a universe in which machines can have children, but only if they have a certain range of feelings. Isn't that funny?" Sharon took another sip of her coffee.

"But you love Marc," Philista protested.

"Do I? I love you, Phi, but what do I really feel for Marc? It's not the same. With you, I feel things that I never feel for him. Maybe God is punishing me for falling in love with you."

"It's not true," Philista moaned. "The One True God is a god of love, and compassion. He loves us!"

"Or perhaps Marc has no feelings for me," Sharon went on. She was thinking out loud, giving voice to her innermost doubts and fears. "Perhaps he's just going through the motions. Perhaps, in his eyes, I really am nothing more than a machine- a stupid, frakked up machine."

"Sharon, don't do this! I can't bear it when you run yourself down this way." Philista was crying, her happiness now completely shattered. "I love you. Don't you understand? I would do anything for you! I would die for you!"

"Oh, God," she screamed. Philista rolled away, blindly clutching her belly. The pain was beyond all comprehension. She doubled over, lost her balance, and crashed to the floor. Someone was screaming her name, she was sure of it, and then Philista Liu blacked out.

. . .

"They're in there," Cavil growled. He was referring to the nebula. "There's nowhere else they could have gone."

"Well, that's not exactly helpful, is it?" Cavil resented this intrusion on his time. Post-feminist studies had given him new insights into human psychology, and he was buried in work. "I do not want to spend the next five years chasing after a haystack in a needle … or is it the other way round?" Cavil was still having problems with the human penchant for reducing everything in life to a series of nonsense phrases.

"Five years, or five thousand … we're machines, and we've got the time, so what does it ultimately matter?" Cavil was having a hard time coping with his brother's all too human sense of impatience.

"It's inefficient, and machines are supposed to be models of efficiency," Cavil sniffed. "We should park Raiders inside all the rifts, preferably within asteroid fields that will make it difficult to spot them on DRADIS, and then sit back and wait for Natalie to pass by. She'll lead us straight to whatever planet the humans now call home."

"Unless, of course, our less than beloved sister got here ahead of us, and has already returned to base," Cavil retorted. "Your so-called plan might leave our asses hanging out to dry."

"`Asses hanging out to dry' … is that supposed to mean something?"

"It means that if we follow your lead, we're frakked."

"Boys, boys … enough," the exasperated Six shouted. She was really beginning to wonder whether being boxed might be preferable to sharing a ship with these prima donnas. Sacrificing an entire basestar in order to slip Aspasia under Natalie's personal DRADIS screen had convinced Six that the Ones were missing a few lines of binary code, especially since there was no guarantee that Aspasia would ever reach her assigned target. But this petulant display, coming as it did on top of all the others …

Can a machine possibly become senile? Six was sorely tempted to hang OUT OF ORDER signs around both of their stumpy necks. She wanted to get back to torturing Mara; inflicting pain and humiliation on the hapless Six not only helped pass the time but also gave Six useful feedback as she planned her assault on Lee Adama's ego.

"Why don't we split the difference," she suggested. "Let's position Raiders at all of the likely entrance … and exit … points from the nebula, and then systematically sweep it quadrant by quadrant. I want to get this done before Apollo turns old and gray!"

. . .

As she sat the Heavy Raider down on the outcropping of rock, Six marveled at their good fortune.

"God wants this child to be born," she commented. "He has cleared the path for us because He wants this child to be born."

Eric Lackey silently arched an eyebrow, which Six understood to signal skepticism on his part. After all that they had been through, she knew him well.

"It was all so remarkably easy," she added. And it had been.

"There was an Eight in the stream," she elaborated; "a pilot Eight, but her back was turned to me. She was prepping a Heavy Raider, so all I had to do was sneak up from behind, break her neck, retrieve her data, and bring up the navigational programs. The ship was fully fueled, but not provisioned … hence the detour."

Six had taken off, landed seconds later- just long enough to retrieve her husband- and then she had set a low altitude course through the mountains. Hugging the ground in such rough terrain was risky, but it reduced the chances of detection from orbit to near zero. Now, they were perched on the edge of the cliff, directly above the rock strewn gulley that they had climbed long days earlier. Their supplies were still cached near the bottom, and Six knew with the certainty born of absolute faith that in the morning they would find them undisturbed. It would take more than one trip to haul them up to the ship, but they would then be free to return to Gemenon, or to set off in search of a habitable world to call their own. It was a big galaxy, but a fully fueled Heavy Raider could travel far.

"Did you have to kill her? Couldn't you have knocked her out, or something?"

"Don't worry, my love; there's a resurrection ship in orbit, so she'll download. Oh, she'll be confused, but there's no real harm done."