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Chapter 2

=IFF=

Part 1

=IFF=

09.02.1348

The Colony

Cylon space

Cavil didn't need this! First, Number Two goes insane, either because their whole line was unstable due to their obsession with God or whatever the despicable humans did to him. That would have been an opportunity if the wretch wasn't babbling about an alien worm taking over him and controlling him! Such madness should have seen the fool boxed already, allowing Number One to maneuver his foolish brothers and sisters toward the only sane consensus! The humans had to die!

Instead, most of those imbeciles kept listening to the mad Two and were sympathetic. They were talking madness about the truth that aliens existed and what it meant instead of discussing how to best kill the humans! That simply wouldn't do!

Somehow, things got worse when Heavy Raiders from the exploration fleet arrived. Cavil certainly didn't expect them to find anything but the odd ancient ruin at the absolute worst. If space-faring aliens were around, they would have run into them before. Damn it all, the Colonials would have stumbled upon them when they were still exploring before the war!

As it turned out, the Eights everyone quietly agreed to send away to keep their line happy and less obnoxious found something. An alien ship no less, and they intended to negotiate and trade with them, the crazy fools! Was he the only sane Cylon line left?! At least this turn of events offered opportunities to salvage something.

"We didn't authorize these Eights to trade or speak for us all!" Cavil butted at the moment he could get a word edgewise between the shouts, exclamations, and cheers of the other lines. The Eights were proud and more obnoxious than ever, wanting to meet the aliens.

The Twos were finally showing potential to be somewhat useful or more disruptive than ever, claiming that God didn't mention creating anything but humans and his Cylon children. Unfortunately, this turn of events gave credence to the rambling of the crazy Two to Cavil's eternal displeasure.

The Threes kept being a major pain in the ass, poking and prodding about the Final Five. Cavil was becoming increasingly certain that he would have to do something about their whole line. That by itself would require planning, convincing the others that the Threes were about to collectively lose it, and perhaps even more radical measures Cavil haven't even though he would have to use against the other Cylons. They were meant to be reasonable machines, not these irrational beings acting like humans! It made him feel dirty, thinking about perverting the purity of their machine essences even further! This flesh and blood they were imprisoned in was bad enough!

Then there were the Fours. They were logical and reasonable, a far cry from most of their brothers and sisters. There was just one little issue with that – Cavil found them hardest to manipulate. If not for the humans revealing their true colors with their incursion past the Red Line, the Fours would have been firmly against a pre-emptive strike, much less killing all humans. Now, they were somehow perverting that logic by listening to that insane Two or discussing what those rogue Eights were up to!

What was wrong with his people!? What did he do wrong for them all to turn this way!? Why couldn't they see things clearly like he did?!

The Fives were Cavil's closest allies… and they were mediocrity incarnate. It was easy to persuade them that the humans had to all burn. However, making them excel in anything was very hard at the best of times, especially when making the other Cylons see the truth was concerned. The Fives were both Cavil's greatest achievement and disappointment.

The Sixes were arguing about meeting the aliens and sanctioning the Eights for going beyond their remit without seeking consensus. Cavil fought not to laugh bitterly at that. Consensus. The Sixs? They couldn't get even a semblance of consensus among themselves, proving themselves as factional as the forever damned humans! Some were religious fanatics who would fit right with the Twos and were quite close with them. Others were naive fools who thought that coexistence with humans was possible and firmly opposed the war! The rest were anywhere in between, arguing like harpies. For years now, Cavil had consigned himself to interacting with only a few factions among the Eights, hoping that they could counter-balance the rest and, ideally, push their line to vote for eradicating the humans, if only thanks to the tiniest of margins in their internal politics. It was best for his remaining sanity to avoid talking with the more outspoken members of that model who disagreed with the truth of things. Otherwise, he felt like spacing himself to make the pain and the sheer stupidity disappear for a bit!

Finally, there were the Eights, the current bane of Cavil's existence. By now, Cavil was pretty sure they were a mistake. Something had gone wrong in making them, ending with a Cylon line that acted like children, or at best teenagers for frak's sake! They were Cylons, machines, not blubbering humans interested in emotions and such! At least the Sixes tried to make the best of a terrible situation, enjoying what little pleasures their flesh and blood bodies could provide. Cavil didn't like it at all but could at least understand it. But the Eights, with their fixation on human things like emotions!?

Cavil glowered, realizing that everyone had ignored his earlier words. He tried repeatedly to get the chaos disguising itself as a proper discussion in the right direction, to no avail. Finally, he left one of the other Ones to preside over the insanity. He left the compartment, followed by a representative of the Fives.

"Doral, this can't stand! We were supposed to guide them on the right path!" Cavil vented.

"The others are acting in a highly illogical and emotional manner," The Five dispassionately stated. His disgust at what was happening with the other lines was clear. "Unfortunately, they do have a point. The existence of aliens changes everything."

"We can't deal with them while the humans are still here! What if they run into each other, begin to trade, or even ally!?" Cavil spat in disgust at the very thought.

"We must speak with them and show them the truth of humanity," Doral suggested.

Cavil perked up at that. Yes, this had promise. For once, the Fives were useful for more than menial tasks; would wonders never cease?!

"We must be the ones to properly talk with the aliens the Eights found. If we leave it to the other models, they'll frak it up spectacularly!" Cavil decided. "We must convince them of the truth of humanity, so even if they don't support us in getting rid of the humans, they at least remain neutral. And if they can provide us with a technological edge, we might be able to win a direct confrontation! Ensuring we end up in an open conflict will be faster and easier than subverting the Colonial defenses!"

The issue, of course, was that as things stood, the Cylons were in no state to win a direct confrontation with the Colonial Navy. Oh, they could make the humans bleed and burn whole Colonies, but they would lose in the end. Things would be different if the other lines were dedicated to ending the humans like he was! If that were the case, they would have been building for war since the beginning, radically changing the military reality of the situation!

=IFF=

Part 2

=IFF=

11.02.1348

Athena's Mercy military hospital complex

Picon, 12 Colonies of Kobol

Admiral Nagala had to use all her influence, many favors, and much of Corman's reach to get a quiet vetting set up for key personnel. First to go was a group of hand-picked marines, all veterans with extensive impeccable records. They all came from known military families that suffered significant losses during the war, making it much less likely that the Cylons could subvert them through traditional means. Anastasia breathed a sigh of relief when all their scans came out clean before going under the scanner herself, with Corman and Demeter waiting in the wings.

It was a great relief that her scans came out clean. As far as Nagala knew, there had been no opportunity for the Cylons to get to her, but would she ever be aware of it if they did? That had been a persistent nightmare since Corman told her what kind of nightmare they were dealing with!

Only after the other Admirals came through clean did Anastasia breathe a sigh of relief and relax a bit. She had a small core of people she knew for sure weren't compromised to work with. Her next act was to summon Adama and his XO. She wanted them both cleared and, in the Commander's case, talking about what he found at the end of the war. Nagala had yet to find the time to go to the archives, and at any rate, a first-hand account would be very useful going forward.

No one expected Adama or Tigh to be an infiltrator or subverted. Considering what Eleen Tigh had been up to, Nagala prayed that those two would be clean. Otherwise, they were looking at one of the many nightmare scenarios she could think of.

"I'll go first and then tell you all you want to know, Admiral," Adama sounded resigned. "Those were dark days I hoped I wouldn't have to recall again."

"Cylon skin jobs?" the Colonel stared at the gathered Admirals and the marine security detail as if they'd revealed they were all toasters. "What's next? Aliens? Is this getting back to me because of my wife's antics?!"

"It's funny you mentioned aliens, Colonel," Corman ground out, obviously irked by how Tigh was acting. "We found evidence of aliens as well. You'll be briefed when we are sure you aren't a Cylon. The Gods only know you're enough of a bastard to fit right in."

"That was out of line, Admiral Corman!" Nagala snapped. I know that the situation is highly unusual and tense, but that is no excuse for such unbecoming conduct!"

They spent the next few minutes in silence until Adama was back, pronounced fully human and lacking any extra bits and pieces in his skull. While the Colonel went to get scanned, Nagala impatiently waited for Adama to tell her all the relevant facts.

"It was during Operation Raptor Talon, right before the war ended," the Commander said. His eyes starred past Nagala into the distant past. "Colonial Intelligence believed that the Cylons were developing advanced weapons on a planet outside of Colonial space. We lost Columbia there," Adama sighed. "I was ordered to cover her flank after the Basestar flotilla defending the planet crippled her flack batteries. We get there just in time to see the Columbia go down. I was shot down before we could link with the rest of our forces. The Cylons were too busy with the rest of the task force, and I don't think they deemed a single bailing-out pilot a threat of consequence. I managed to land in the research laboratory just as they were evacuating it," Adama's haunted eyes finally met Nagala's gaze. "I found a horror show down there, Admiral. Pieces of people carved up and stuck with tubes and other technology. This bath-like tube full of liquid was in the center of it all…"

"There you found it," Corman spoke in a gentle tone that Nagala had never heard him use before.

"Yeah. I found it all right… They had turned some poor old bastard into part man, part machine. There were prisoners, too…" Adama hissed. The war ended then and there! Command decided not to provoke the Cylons into resuming hostilities, letting them leave with all the evidence and the prisoners. What we're dealing with now? It's on us, Admiral."

Everyone except Corman was staring at Adama in shock until a nurse hastily left the examination room. She pressed her back to the wall next to the door, stared wide-eyed at them, and began waving frantically.

"Frak me!" Corman exclaimed. "Secure Colonel Tigh!" He recovered first and barked at the Marines.

That got everyone out of their stupor. The Marine's CO made a few hand signs, and they stacked next to the door while one of them gently pulled the nurse away.

"I don't fraking believe it! There has to be a mistake!" Adama shook his head in denial.

The Marines surged into the examination room, creaming at Tigh to freeze.

"What the frak's wrong with you? You sorry excuses for nuggets!?" the Colonel roared back, undaunted by what was happening. "Do I look like a fraking toaster to you?! I'll let you fraking know…"

A sharp shot echoed deafeningly, making Nagala's heart skip.

"Hold your fire! Marik, gun down! Frak! Get a medic in here!"

"SAUL!" Adama shouted and ran after the Marines, while Nagala wondered how everything went so fraking wrong.

=IFF=

resurrection buffer
Cylon Resurrection Ship R-5
near Colonial space

As a part of the infiltration of the Twelve Colonies, the Cylons had to deploy the necessary infrastructure to retrieve the memories of their agents. Anything less would have made their infiltration mission much more complicated, and it might have been impossible to insert anyone save for sleeper agents. It wasn't like there were many volunteers for a suicide mission without a way back.

Unknown to all but a handful of the Ones, the Resurrection ship at the heart of that operation had a few hidden features. If one of the so-called 'Final Five' died, their resurrecting and waking around other Cylons was unacceptable. That is why Cavil and his closest confidants in his model ensured that the resurrection buffer contained certain features hidden from the other models. They all had a singular purpose – to ensure that the consciousness of five particular Cylons wouldn't be sent forth for resurrection and that there weren't spare bodies for them lying around.

For that purpose, each Resurrection ship had a hidden chamber where if Cavil deemed it necessary, he could bring back one of his damned creators. Until such an event occurred, their minds would remain trapped in a section of the buffer, held behind heavy firewalls. It was almost a boxing, though not as confining, which was an appropriate punishment for any of Cavil's creators, who managed to escape their wretched human lives.

If any of those five died, Cavil also ensured he would be alerted by the expediency of a Centurion with explicit orders to bring him the information personally, avoiding sending it through the network. In the One's opinion, his system was foolproof. To be fair, he was almost right. It was just that he had overlooked a few facts.

First, while the new Centurions would follow orders without a question, they were not bright, much less creative. Anything outside of their mission parameters could become an issue. In this particular case, the primary issue was that Cavil was nowhere to be found, for he was busy assembling his most trustworthy allies. The One needed them to crew a fleet to go and meet the aliens found by the Eights so he could convince them to go after the humans if at all possible and, barring that, make sure that he had any technological edge they might provide against the humans.

When Saul Tigh awoke in the buffer of the Resurrection ship with two sets of memories, he had more than enough time to get his head straight before taking action about his unfortunate and unwanted situation.

Second and perhaps more importantly, despite his nature, Cavil and most of his cronies weren't expert programmers. The firewalls and other defenses meant to keep any of his parents contained were crude instruments for beings who had spent just over two thousand years as a meld between a man and machine. Given a bit of time, they could find cracks into the walls of code, ways to sidestep and slip by defenses, and even avoid the ever-watching awareness of the ship's hybrid.

If Cavil hadn't been distracted, Tigh's escape would have been a race against time. He treated his situation like his life and freedom depended on it, as well as, more importantly, the lives of everyone he cared about. Thanks to his old memories, all he had experienced as a scientist, and the last remnant of a long-gone people, the Colonel could get his head into the game despite his emotions attempting to drown him in overwhelming loathing and despair.

Saul decided he could mope up later when he could safely get drunk. Watching the data chains meant to hold him in place and the 'bars' of his prison, Tigh could feel nothing but ever-growing contempt at both Cavil for managing to do what he did and at himself and the others for allowing themselves to be outmaneuvered by that immature brat. The Colonel poked and prodded the defenses with sub-routines he could create with a mere thought, looking for vulnerabilities and, more importantly, traps. When he struck, Tigh was ready. There was no direct frontal attack. Instead, he cloaked himself in data, making himself appear as something else while leaving behind an intentionally corrupted copy of his very being.

While it was a long shot, the former scientist decided it was worth trying. It would be for the best if Cavil thought Saul's consciousness didn't transmit properly, leaving the baster unaware of what was coming for him.