Battlestar Galactica: Pieces
Virtual Season 4, Episode 8
By Senmut
October 11, 2018


Prologue

     "Okay, how much?" asked Bojay, with a sigh. A long one. "Huh?"
     "A hundred a bottle," said Starbuck, pausing to take a slow drag on
his fumerello, while punching keys on his tabulator. "For a total
of...let's see..." 
     "A hun..."
     "That being, of course, for the standard stuff. The Proteus Stash,
of which I am sad to say so little remains, is five."
     "Five?" said Bojay, as taken aback by the price as he was annoyed by
Starbuck's grin. "As in five hundred? What do you think I am? A
specieator?" *
     "Hey, don't look at me, Bojay. I'm just quoting what the market will
bear," replied Starbuck, all innocence. "I mean, hey, it's not like we
had time to bring back a whole warehouse full of the stuff." He leaned
back, sighing as he lamented that fact. He shrugged a shoulder
indifferently. "So sad. Anyway, take it..."
     "Or leave it. Yeah. I hear ya. Gouger. Hades Hole, I'll bet Baltar
didn't charge the Cylons so much for the tylium from Carillon!"
     "Wanna ask him?" grinned Starbuck.
     "Alright, alright," surrendered the other pilot. Like Starbuck, he
did a quick tabulation. "Yeah. Okay. But this is gonna just about clean
me out, Starbuck."
     "Hey, you can always get it back, some pyramid night, ya know."
     "Oh yeah. Get it all back, from Lieutenant System, himself."
Starbuck grinned again. "Alright. The party's in three days. Is the day
after tomorrow soon enough?"
     "Sure," said Starbuck. "Not a problem. Of course, I'll need a bit.
On account, you understand."
     "Okay, Greedy," said Bojay, getting up from his seat, and tossing a
pouch onto the table. "I'll meet you here?"
     "Works for me, Bojay. Oh, and my regards to Gayla," he grinned,
peering into the money pouch. "She's getting such a great guy."
     "A pauper is what she's getting!" snorted Bojay, and turned towards
the door. Once beyond the dim lighting of The Mong-Faced Cylon, one of
the seedier watering holes on the Rising Star's lower decks, he made for
the lift, to head back up to the shuttle deck. 
     Despite his economic slaughter by Starbuck, through the purchase of
ambrosia he was actually quite happy. After many trials, his near-loss
from a crash-landing on the backwards planet Kradina, his recovery from
his injuries inflicted by the minions of a military dictatorship,
recertification to flight status, and getting to know a number of the
newly liberated Earth refugees, he and Gayla were, at last, going to be
sealed. After getting close, during their time on the bizarre weather
planet, and slow, cautious approaches by both of them, he putting his
lingering feelings for Sheba behind, as did Gayla, with her betrayal by
the multi-married Twilly, it had finally come to be. In four days, he and
Gayla would stand before Commander Adama and celebrate their sealing.
Despite her "fierce atheism", and avowed aversion to any and all
religious trappings, she had agreed to a slightly modified formal
ceremony, with its symbolic moment of consecration where Adama would wrap
the ceremonial medallion of the Lords of Kobol about their wrists as he
declared them sealed. The tradeoff though was her insistence that Adama
not utter the line "under the eyes of God" that was part of the usual
sealing declaration.     
     He smiled, as the lift headed upwards. After a few days furlon for
their meadluna, he'd be heading back to duty. They had both managed to
agree on a billet aboard the Galactica, and once they had settled into
regular married life aboard the Battlestar, then, along with some of the
other married couples...
     The lift stopped, opened, and two others got in. Like him, they were
headed to the main area of the ship. He pressed the control, and...
     A spark flew from the panel, and the car lurched. It seemed to
freeze, then lurched again.
     "What's wrong?" asked one of the others.
     "I don't know," said Bojay. "Feels like the solenoid is..."
     He didn't get to finish, as the car slipped loose, free-falling
towards the bottom of the shaft.


* Old-fashioned Colonial term for a banker. Usually implying ill-gotten
gains.


Chapter One

     Beep.
     Beep.
     Beeppppppppppppp......
     Awareness seeped back. With a slow, almost surreal progression, he
gradually became conscious of the world around him. He could hear voices,
but couldn't make sense of the words.  His throat burned.  His breathing
felt unnatural, involuntary.   His eyelids jerked and twitched as he
fought to open them. Bit by painful bit, he slowly felt himself rise to
the surface, through a fog of drugs, as he collected himself, into
himself. Or tried to.
     "...tor, he's regaining consciousness."
     "Good."
     Sounds. More voices. Nearby, yet somehow quite apart from him. He
tried to open his eyes, but they refused to obey.
     "His vital signs, Doctor."
     He knew that voice. He was sure he knew it. Didn't he?
     "Incredible. That this man is alive at all is a semi-miracle," said
the other voice. "Lieutenant. Lieutenant, can you hear me?"
     "...uuuuuhhh..."
     "It's Doctor Salik, Lieutenant. You are in LifeStation. Can you
understand me?"
     Slowly, he fought his way through the miasma, trying to open his
eyes. His throat was equally uncooperative, and he tried to croak out an
answer, but couldn't.
     "I want you to squeeze my hand, Lieutenant, can you do that?"
     He felt a hand touch one of his and he gripped it lightly.  His
opposite hand started dully throbbing as if in response.  
     "Good. Well done."
     He snorted. Things had to be bad if he earned accolades for
squeezing his hand.
     "You have a tube down your throat, Lieutenant. It's been helping you
breathe.  You don't need it anymore so we're going to remove it.
Suction."
     "Suctioning."
     He could hear the sucking sound very close to him.  Bojay slowly got
his eyes open, and after a few moments, they began to focus. There was
the Doctor with Cassie next to him.  It occurred to him he was sitting
upright in the bed.  Monitors surrounded him on all sides and tubes
seemed to be coming out of him from every orifice.  Dr. Salik was talking
at him again, and he nodded his head although he was a bit fuzzy on what
the man was actually saying.  Suddenly, it felt like someone was ripping
his throat out and he coughed weakly as they pulled a tube out of his
throat.  
     "Well done," Salik said.  
     "Dog....doggggkk.  Doc. Cassie," he whispered. His mouth felt like
the Scorpius Desert on Borallis. "I..."
     "Do you remember what happened, Bojay?" asked Cassie.
     "Uh..." Bojay had to struggle for a few microns, trying to pull
things together. He tried to speak, but coughed again.  Cassie held up a
small cup with a straw, offering him sip.  
     "Just a bit," she told him.  "Don't overdue it."
     He took a small sip, realizing that with the tiny amount of fluid in
the cup it was all but impossible to "overdue" it. He also wondered why
it always had to taste like landing-gear lubricant. Regardless, the cool
fluid bathing his throat was absolute heaven.
     "Better?" Cassie asked as she lowered the head of the biobed.
     He nodded before saying, "Starbuck."
     "Starbuck?" asked Salik, glancing at Cassiopeia in concern.
     "I remember... I was with Starbuck. On...the Rising Star. Got into
the lift..." Bojay tried raising his head, and found it easier than he'd
expected. "It dropped!" he said suddenly, as the memories came back. "The
car dropped suddenly. I remember it...then nothing."
     "That's right," said Salik. "The car dropped, and the emergency
brake kicked in only just before impact with the bottom of the shaft. You
barely survived."
     "There were two other people in it with me, Doc. What about..."
     "They didn't make it, Lieutenant," replied the Doctor. "I'm sorry to
say, you were the only survivor."
     "The only... Oh God. But..." he tried to move, to sit up, but Cassie
gently pressed him back down onto the biobed. "But how? I mean..."
     "The engineers are looking into it, Bojay. At least be thankful that
you've...that you've survived."
     Something in the way she said that disturbed him. He looked from one
to the other.
     "How...how long have I been here, Doc?"
     "The crash happened four days ago, Lieutenant," replied the CMO.
"You've been in a medically-induced coma."
     "Medica... But...but why? If I survived..."
     As the drugs slowly began to wane, Bojay realized, even more slowly,
that something did not feel right. Yes, he'd been in a bad accident,
something he was not altogether unfamiliar with. But still...
     "Where's Gayla?" he asked, interrupting the Doctor's reply. "Is she
here? I want to see her."
     "She's right here, Bojay," said Cassie, looking from him to Salik.
"She's been close by, ever since this happened."
     "I want to see her," he said, voice a little stronger, now.
     "Hey, she's been working her can off over on the Agro Ship," said
another voice. It was Starbuck, whose grinning visage hove into view.
"She's beat."
     "But I'm here anyway, Bo," said a female voice. Starbuck's mug was
replaced by Gayala, and the injured Warrior at once felt his pulse jump.
     "Looks like I'm going to be a bit late for the party," Bojay said,
trying to smile.
     "Hey, I wasn't counting off for tardiness," said Gayla. 
     "That's okay, Bojay," said Starbuck. "This time, the ambrosia's on
the house."
     "On the house? Are you feeling alright, Starbuck? I thought I was
the one in LifeStation."
     "Such a cynic!" snorted Starbuck.
     "Everything's going to be okay, Bo," said Gayla, her voice strained.
"You're going to be just fine."
     "Better be the Proteus Stash," Bojay grinned back, weakly.
     "Hey, would I cheat you?" said Starbuck, all innocence. Cassie made
a rude nose, but said nothing. Repeatable.
     "Well, at least save me a mug," said Bojay. He looked to Gayla.
"What is it, babe? You look..."
     "Don't worry. When you get out of here, we're gonna toast your
release from Life Station like you never saw before," she told him.
"It'll be terrific."
     "Yeah. Yeah, Doc, when can I get out of here?" asked Bojay. His
voice was clearer, now, and his vision was almost...wait. He was looking
at them all out of one eye. His hand brushed his other eye.  He could
feel a hard dressing.  He couldn't see out that one.  Bandaged? What the
Lords...
     "Easy, Bo..." Starbuck began, putting a hand to his shoulder.
     "Doc, what's wrong?" asked Bojay. As the drugs continued to fade, he
tried to reach up, to touch Gayla's face. He tried, but something didn't
feel right. Something wasn't right. Something...
     "Lieutenant, there's something I have to tell you," said Salik.
"Something you have to know."
     "Something...what is it?" All their faces were somber. "Come on,
Doc. Give it to me straight." He tried to sit up again, but felt off
balance.  Nothing seemed to feel right. It was almost as if...
     "Lieutenant, you must brace yourself. This isn't going to be easy,"
said Salik.
     "Come on, Doc!' Bojay shouted, his throat hurting at the effort, but
not caring. "What the Hades Hole is it?"
     "Please, Bojay," said Gayla. "Please, don't..." she was almost in
tears. 
     "What is it?"
     In the outer ward, people stopped and looked towards the door as a
scream, like a soul in torment, rent the very the air.
     "Noooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"     


Chapter Two

     "How is he taking it?" asked Commander Adama, looking up from the
incident and medical reports, and across his desk at Salik. 
     "Pretty much what you'd expect," replied the Battlestar's CMO.
"Pain. Anger. Denial. But he is stable, for the moment, from a purely
medical perspective."
     "Yes," intoned Adama, looking again at the medical report. Bojay's
free-fall down the elevator shaft had done more than kill the other two
passengers. In fact, he had somehow ended up partially atop them, their
bodies cushioning what would otherwise have been a terminal deceleration.
However, the floor of the car bent upwards, sharp and deadly, it's jagged
edge like a knife. "Loss of both legs, above the knees, left arm from the
elbow down. Damage to the right eye." Adama was looking at the report
again. "My God, it's almost worse than death."
     "Which seems to be the way Bojay is taking it, Commander."
     "You've fully informed him?"
     "Of course, once he was conscious again."
     "The prognosis?"
     "At this point, physically, he's out of any immediate danger. The
vital organs are undamaged, incredibly. But he's having serious
trouble...well, I don't think he's fully absorbed what's happened to
him."
     "No chance of any sort of re-attachment surgery, Doctor?"
     "While we can certainly mend simple fractures, Commander, Bojay's
legs and arm suffered the worst of the impact from the fall resulting in
something resembling crush injuries. He must have been standing, and fell
onto one arm. At least, that's the only way I can imagine him ending up
with these kinds of injuries. Somehow when they were all tossed about
with the impact, he ended up on top of the other occupants, somewhat
cushioning the impact to his other body parts. This wasn't a simple
amputation suffered from the accident, it was instead multiple comminuted
fractures, microvascular and tissue damage, compartment syndrome . . ." 
He paused as Adama's brows arched in question.  "His legs and arm were
turned to pulp, Adama. Like stepped-on mushies. They weren't salvageable.
We amputated knowing we couldn't save them.  Even if we had had a top
notch microvascular surgeon-which we don't-the chance of being able to
successfully providing him with limbs that not only worked, but also
didn't give him paralyzing, chronic pain, was infinitesimal."
     "That, and he has no family aboard, either." Adama thought a moment,
then looked to Salik. "What about Gayla? They were going to be sealed,
soon."
     "She's been with him every centon off-shift, Commander. What do we
know about the accident itself?"
     "The cable slipped off, and the car dropped. Deputy engineer Cabe
aboard the Rising Star thinks it was sabotage."
     "Sabotage?"
     "Not recent. Something left over from the Il Fadim and their plot,
it looks like. For whatever reason, it didn't trigger until now. He's
investigating. But..."
     "Yes. That still leaves Bojay."
     "Yes."

     "Go away," said Bojay, turned as best his condition would permit,
towards the side of his biobed.
     "Lieutenant, you have to eat," said Cassiopeia, standing over him. 
     "What the Hades Hole for?" said Bojay, almost a whisper. "So I can
live?"
     "Lieutenant, that sort of attitude does no one any good. Now..."
     "Just go away!" he moaned, almost like a soul in torment. "Go away
and leave me alone! Let me fracking die in peace!"
     "Lieu..." Cassie began a retort, but thought better of it. When
Bojay finally fell asleep, she'd feed him intravenously. She turned as
the door slid open. "Oh, hi Sheba," she said, moving to the far side of
the ward.
     "How is he?" asked his old squadron mate from the Pegasus. Almost a
whisper.
     "Physically, he'll make it. But the limbs are a total loss, I'm
sorry to say. I've never seen injuries this bad, before."
     "If only we were close to a base," said Sheba quietly, looking
across to Bojay. 
     "Yes. Prosthetics. But way out here..." She shook her head.
     "Where's Gayla?"
     "I made her go take some rest, in the outer room. She has to be on
duty aboard the Agro Ship in three centars. As it is, she's been here
like adhesive, since he was hurt.' Cassie looked at Sheba. "And how are
you?"
     "Oh, I'm fine," smiled Sheba. 
     "No morning sickness?"
     "My share, but not like I was expecting." 
     "Good," said Cassie, smiling at the unintended pun. "Where's
Apollo?"
     "Patrol. Checking out a system on the edge of our scanners, for
possible Risik activity." She looked over at Bojay again. "Honestly,
Cassie, what do you think will..."
     "The wounded animal will just crawl off and die!" said Bojay,
suddenly raising his voice. "Or, since it can't crawl, just lie down and
do it instead."
     "Bojay!" said Sheba, "How can..."
     "Just go away," hissed the Viper pilot. "Damnation, just fracking go
away!" 


     "And just before they were going to be sealed," said Apollo, later
that day, in the OClub. "Always seems to be something, doesn't it?"
     "Yes," said Sheba, across from him, mineral water in hand. "First,
he was nearly killed on that crazy weather planet, then crashes on,
uh...Kradina, and gets tortured by those military thugs. Now this."
     "Any good news?"
     "Some. Doctor Salik says that he won't lose the injured eye, after
all. The restorative enzyme treatments, and some time in the hyperbaric
chamber, seem to have done the trick, or so Cassie says. Another day or
two, and the healing patch can come off."
     "That's something, anyway," said Jolly, sipping his ambrosia slowly.
"At least he'll have both eyes."
     "Thank the Lords," said Sheba, signaling Freeman the barkeep for a
refill.
     "But he won't be able to fly, Sheba" said Starbuck, "and that's the
rub. You know Bojay. He lives to fly." Starbuck smiled. "I told him once
I thought he must have been born in a cockpit."
     "I remember that," said Apollo, setting his tankard down. "It
annoyed him so much, he challenged you to a one-on-one on the Academy
Triad court."
     "Yeah. Yeah, he did,' said Starbuck, clearly not liking the memory.
     "And?" asked Sheba.
     "That was a long time ago," smiled Starbuck, the "charm" coming on.
"I can't possibly remember every..."
     "Bojay made mushie paste out of him," said Apollo, grinning over the
top of his tankard. Starbuck shrugged. "Beat him three times in a row."
     "Yeah, well, it wasn't my best day. Those bio pulse lines were out
of sync. You know..."
     "Know what, Starbuck?" asked Sheba, blasting him with her smile. 
     "Well, will you look at the time," said Starbuck, glancing at his
chrono. "I have to debrief the new pilots. Uh, gotta run." He stood
quickly, and decamped the OClub.With speed.
     "I guess Bojay must have really pummeled him but good," said Sheba,
her laughter getting the better of her.
     "Well, Starbuck was Academy Triad champion, two yahrens running,
until Bojay came along, Sheba," said Apollo. "And when he found out that
they had an audience, mostly female..."
     "HA!" said Sheba. "I get it. Bojay wiped him up off the court, and
Starbuck never lived it down."
     "And never will," quipped Jolly. Then, it was all seriousness again.
"So, Skipper, if Bojay can never fly again, what now? It'll be hard to
imagine the squadrons without him."
     "Sure will," said Sheba. "Apollo?"
     "I don't know, Sheba. Jolly," said the Strike Captain. "I hate to
admit it, but I just don't know." 


     As she punched the keypad, entering the last bit of germination data
into the system, Gayla let out a deep breath, and looked around. She
liked her tiny little office, off the main corridor aboard the Agro Ship,
and her duties here, helping to keep the Colonial Fleet fed.
     Or rather she had. Until Bojay's horrific accident, she had felt
really at home here, among plants and soil, and the warmth of living
things. After her disastrous relationship with Twilly ("Chaos take him!
Him and his new plaything!"), she had felt more kinship with green,
growing things, than with most of the people in the Fleet. Green, growing
things, and even the ones that weren't green, didn't lie to you, cheat on
you, make a complete fool out of you. They didn't act as if it were all
some kind of big joke, that you were the butt of, behind your back. 
     "Huh? Oh, thanks," she said, as Oagh, brother of Agro Supervisor
Eldritch, handed her a data card. 
     "Are you alright, Miss Gayla? How are you holding up?" asked the
hulking Libran with the scraggily beard, still working through his own
personal ordeal. Once a decorated combat vet listed as MIA, he had been
captured, and horribly tortured by the Cylons. After rescue, he'd been
unable to function in normal society, and had been finally
institutionalized due to his paranoia, delusions, flash backs and panic
attacks. Now, with the help and the love of his brother, his only
remaining family member, he had made great strides in returning to
society and had even been, along with Eldritch, instrumental in raising
awareness, and funds, for other victims of Combat Stress Syndrome.
     "Oh yes. I'm fine, Oagh," she smiled back. A forced smile. "I'll be
okay."
     "Yes, you will."  He folded her in his beefy arms and held her close
for a moment. "I suspect that right now it doesn't seem that way, but in
time, you will."  He stepped back from her, pulling at his beard
ritualistically. "How is Bojay? You know, we're all pushing for him. We
even were praying for him in chapel, yesterday."
     An array of meaningless and trite answers filtered through her mind. 
She discarded them all.  "I think it will be a long road, Oagh," she
replied, straightening up, and sliding the data card into her console.
"You'd understand that."
     He nodded. "Yes. A road, sadly, well-traveled, yet it rarely makes
it easier for the next man."
     "It's hard to see him so . . . dispirited. Like he's giving up."
     "A broken spirit is not an easy thing to gaze upon. Or out from."
     Gayla shook her head in agreement, tears prickling her eyes.  "I
should get back to work." She looked from Oagh, to her screen. Water
filtration plant data. Tedious, but vital, if the whole system was to be
kept going and functional.
     He squeezed her arm lightly.  "If there's anything I can do . . ."
     "Thank you," she whispered.
 

     It was customary each day for Baltar to receive what was called the
standard "daily data dump" from the Galactica, that kept him up to speed
on all happenings and developments in the Colonial Fleet. Of all the
things he dealt with as part of his daily routine since reintegrating
himself into the periphery of Colonial society, this was the one thing
that was the most bureaucratic in nature. The kind of work that a man of
his position would in the past have looked down on as beneath him, and
gladly palmed off to an obedient subordinate. But while not all of the
instinctive distaste for it was gone, he'd found it over time to be less
annoying than he might have in the past. Perhaps that was due in part to
the fact that he could at least sound off about the things he had to read
to Ayesha. She would always listen to him. And at some point, he was
sure, she'd say something that would at least provide some needed
intellectual stimulation.     
     "Interesting," he said aloud, as he read. 
     "What?" asked his wife, looking up from her own terminal. "What's
interesting?"
     "One of those newsy little items from the Galactica, my dear," he
replied. "It seems those Il Fadim lunatics were not entirely done with
causing trouble."
     "The Il Fadim? What did they do?"
     "It seems they had sabotaged one of the lifts, aboard the Rising
Star, during their activities. However, nothing happened, until
recently." He explained to her Bojay's accident, and the deaths of the
others. 
     "They are certain?"
     "Apparently. Forensic evidence, or something, is conclusive." He
turned the screen towards her. 
     "How tragic. Those people dying for no reason."
     He noticed right away the empathy in her tone and expression. A
reminder to him of how she had left behind all of her vanity and
self-centeredness in the Fires of the Destruction, and, until Baltar had
re-entered her life, had sought to make amends as Claudia, the social
worker aboard the Senior Ship.
     "Indeed," shrugged Baltar offering only minimal concession to his
wife's humanitarian streak. Personally, he felt little, one way or the
other. After all, he had never liked Bojay. 
     "I hope they can do something for this Bojay. How awful to have to
suffer like that. A complete cripple, and not even in combat. So terribly
disabled, and such a young man."
     "I would think it was somewhat worse for the other two victims of
the crash, My Dear."
     "They are beyond their injuries, now, Baltar. Lieutenant Bojay is
still in the heart of the maelstrom."
     "Yes," sighed Baltar. "Yes, he is."
     "I wish we could do something for him," she said, unexpectedly. "I
really wish that we could."
     "Oh?" said Baltar, surprised at her sentiment, and wondering if he
was going to get a firsthand look at how she had conducted herself as a
social worker. "Such as?"


Chapter Three

     "Cassie?" asked Salik, looking at his star pupil. "Ready?"
     "Ready, Doctor. Readouts are all nominal."
     "Good." Salik looked down at Bojay. "Lieutenant?"
     "Yeah," said Bojay. "Let's get it over with."
     "Right," said Salik.
     With instruments hovering over the stricken man, he slowly began to
remove the covering over Bojay's right eye. With the caution-informed
practice of yahrens, and the healing rays humming softly, he lifted the
patch off, and waited.
     "Bojay?" asked Cassie.
     The Lieutenant blinked, then blinked again. The eye rotated slowly,
then fixed on her. Cassie pointed the bioscanner towards it.
     "I can see fine," said the Lieutenant, raggedly. He switched focus
from Cassie, to Salik. "It worked, Doc. Thank the bloody Lords it
worked!"
     "Well, that's what we want to hear," replied the CMO. 
     Although a bit less impiety might be nice!
     "The tissue regeneration therapy was successful," Cassie intoned.
"We'll still need to run more tests, but so far..."
     "So far, it looks like it worked," said Bojay, blinking the restored
eye several times.
     While little at present could be done for Bojay's savaged limbs, his
injured eye was another matter. While badly hurt, it was not destroyed.
After surgery to remove as much blood and damaged tissue as possible, it
was injected with a m‚lange of regenerative compounds, which, in concert
with cloned photoreceptor cells, had served to greatly enhance and speed
up the natural process of healing. What once would have been a death
sentence for the damaged organ, was now yielding to Colonial medical
technology, originally developed to treat combat injuries similar to
this. The eye's inner structures, including neural cells, had begun to
regrow and reknit, almost at once. Now, after four days, the restored eye
was ready for the light, once more.
     "That's what we want to hear," said Salik.
     "You never looked so great, Cassie," said the injured Warrior. Then,
his face went somber once more. "But I still can't ever..."
     "One thing at a time, Lieutenant," said Salik, letting a bit of
sternness creep into his voice. "You now have both eyes back. Be
thankful."
     "I...okay, Doc," said Bojay, glad, despite all, to have normal
vision back. He blinked as Salik covered the renewed eye with an
instrument. "Hey..."
     "Constant monitoring is required, Lieutenant," said Salik. 
     "There'll be a lot of follow-up," added Cassie. "But, so far,
there's no sign of chemical imbalance, or allergic reaction to any of the
drugs. The cloned cells show no sign of rejection."
     "Well, that's good to hear," said Bojay. "Where's Gayla?"
     "She'll be here in about fifteen centons," replied Cassie. "Her
shift ended a while ago. I called her, and she signaled she's on her way
over."
     "I just wish that I could stand up to greet her," said Bojay, the
pain in his voice obvious. To..."
     "One thing at a time, Lieutenant," said Salik. "You hear me? One
thing at a time."
     "Right, Doc."


     "Excellent news," said Adama, on the bridge, as Salik personally
informed him of the procedure just past. "At least he will have full use
of his vision."
     "Yes. If only it were as easy, regarding the rest of his injuries."
He waited a beat, as Rigel brought him a data pad. 
     "All patrols report clear, Commander," she said. "No sign of Risik
activity, or Cylon pursuit. All scanner and communications channels are
clear."
     "Patrol status?" he asked.
     "Lieutenant Boomer's patrol will return first. ETA twenty-five
centons to vidcom range."
     "Very good, Rigel," he replied. He scanned the information, then
signed off on it. "Carry on."
     "Commander." She saluted, and left. "Adama turned back to Salik.
"I'm sorry, Doctor. You were saying?"
     "Bojay's sight is back to normal, yes. What worries me is the rest
of it."
     "Yes. The other injuries."
     "As I said, without the immediate perioperative facilities of a
baseside hospital, and a microvascular surgical team, nothing can be
done. Brushing aside the fact that we have no limbs to reattach. We are,
as the Earth refugees like to say, stuck."
     "How is Bojay, emotionally?
     "That's my biggest concern at the moment, Commander. While he is
pleased to be able to see normally again, he is still struggling with the
fact that he will never walk or function as he did before. We can fit him
with prosthetics, but they are extremely limited, compared to what we
could do, back home. I am not certain how, or even if, Bojay will ever
truly come to terms with his new state."
     "You are afraid he might attempt suicide?"
     "I have known it to happen, Commander. When I interned in the rehab
ward of the President Theron Fleet Hospital, I saw a lot of horrific
injuries. Not just a few of the men attempted to kill themselves. More
than a few were successful." 
     Adama shook his head. He'd known some, early in his long career,
who, when faced with a savaged body, and the limits of even the most
advanced technology that modern medicine could offer, had chosen to avail
themselves of that sort of relief. 
     "Have you spoken to Therapist Tarnia, at all? Perhaps she has some
insights that might be useful, in this situation?"
     "I have sent her a message, yes. But I have had no reply as yet."
     "And Gayla, Bojay's fianc‚? How lie things there?"
     "She's with him, now, in LifeStation. I'm sure I'll hear all the
details from Cassiopeia, when I get back."
     "Well, keep me posted, Doctor. The health of our Warriors, both
mental as well as physical, is of the utmost importance to me. As you
know."
     "Very much, Commander. And I shall."
     "Good." Adama watched as his CMO left the bridge, then turned, as
Athena called to him. "Yes?"
     "Signal for you, Commander."
     "From?"
     "It's from the BaseShip," she replied. "On Baltar's private
channel."
     "Bal...Transfer to my station, Athena."
     "Commander."


     "She what?" said Starbuck, in the OClub, that evening. Several of
the pilots had just come from debriefing, and were relaxing.
"Cla...Ayesha?"
     "You heard me," said Sheba, nursing a mineral water. "Ayesha,
Baltar's wife, contacted the Commander, and suggested it. All her idea,
from what I heard."
     "I've never heard of anything like that," said Boomer. "I'm no
doctor, but can that even be done?"
     "They're still working on the details," said Sheba. She looked up,
as Apollo and Giles entered the room. They got drinks, and joined the
rest. "I was just telling them about Ayesha's suggestion, Apollo."
     "Yeah, it's pretty incredible," said her husband. "But if it can
work..."
     "Well, I've never heard of anything like that," said Giles.
"Replacing parts of a Human body with parts from a Cylon?"
     "It's a new one on me," said Boomer. 
     "No pun intended. But if they can do it, will Bojay go for it?"
mused Starbuck. 
     "Yeah," said Giles. "That's the big question. It's one thing to
collude with them and another to want to become one."
 

     "This is unprecedented," said Command Centurion Moray, aboard the
BaseShip. "There is no record of a Cylon-Human fusion."
     "True," said Ayesha, "but there's nothing that would make it
impossible, is there, Moray?"
     "I am unaware of any obstacles. However our knowledge of Human
anatomy is limited in this area," replied Moray, after what to a Cylon
was a prolonged silence of consideration. All of 3.2 extra microns. 
     "We have extra limbs, for Centurion repairs and construction, in
ship's stores, correct?"
     "Correct," replied Moray, after his interface scanned the ship's
entire inventory. "And what is not in stores can be fabricated, at need." 

     "Very good. You can coordinate with the Galactica's medical staff,
and investigate further."
     "Can the Humans not restore the lost appendages with organic
replacements?"
     "Sadly, no. That is beyond the capabilities of the doctors, given
our current circumstances, Moray. Back in the Colonies, perhaps. But not
here."
     "Understood. I shall consult with our technicians."
     "Very good," said Ayesha, pleased that Moray seemed bereft of any
serious objections. Now that she had a plan, she prayed the Lords would
help see it through to it's consummation. She had seldom felt so
determined upon a course of action. "Let me know what you discover."
     "By your command,' replied Moray. Internally, the Command Centurion
was "puzzled", in his Cylon way. Why would the Commander's female
counterpart want to do this? Certain aspects of Human behavior and their
motivations still eluded him. Especially the emotion they called
"compassion". It was all strange and complicated. Of course, it never
crossed his digital mind to consider the injured pilot as anything other
than a now-dysfunctional Human, the analogue to a damaged and off-line
Centurion. 
     He obviously needed more analysis, his operating system told him. 
     A lot more.


Chapter Four

     "You're kidding, right?" said Bojay, now sitting up in bed. "You're
kidding me. You want to...rebuild me? With parts from a Cylon?" His tone
was incredulous. "You are kidding. He is kidding, right, Cassie?" 
     Cassiopeia shook her head.
     "Not at all," said Salik. "I'm being quite serious, Lieutenant.
Baltar's wife Ayesha is the one who came up with the idea, actually.
We're still investigating, but so far, there doesn't seem to be any
obstacle to it actually working, from a medical standpoint."
     "Well, there's an obstacle from a Bojay standpoint! I don't want my
body full of those...things! They're Cylons! They slaughtered ten billion
people, including my own family. Lords know how many more, since the War
began! Why by all the Lords would I want to accept anything from a
fracking Cylon? And I sure as Hades Hole don't want anything from the
Human traitor who made it all possible. Or even anyone related to
Baltar!"
     "Bojay," began Cassie, but he waved her off with his remaining hand.
     "No" he said, with a snap. "And that's that."
     "Bojay," said Cassie, with a studied patience, "You..."
     "I said NO!" shouted the injured pilot, trying to sit up. "Now just
go. Get out! Leave me the fracking Hades Hole alone!"
     "Maybe Gayla can reason with him," said Cassie, once they were
outside the ward. There was a crashing sound. "I think he hit the door.
At least his aim is still good."
     "When is she next due to visit?"
     "About 1800."
     "I think you're right. Give Gayla a chance to try and talk some
sense into him. If anyone can make him see that this is his only chance
for a normal life, it's her."
     "Of course, it still wouldn't exactly be normal, would it? Bojay
would always be the Warrior that was... patched up with Cylon parts."
She'd almost said "the freak show", and kicked herself mentally for so
unprofessional a thought.
     "It's a revolutionary idea, Cassie. No question about that.  Maybe
Bojay just isn't ready for it yet."  Salik sighed.  "Are we pushing him
too hard towards a possible medical miracle that he just isn't ready to
think about? Hades Hole, would any of us be ready for something like
this?"
     "He's still grieving about his loss. Angry. In denial. Maybe he just
needs more time."
     "Well, time is one thing we have. It doesn't matter if he agrees to
do this today, or ten yahrens from now. So much of this is hypothetical,
and we could have failures as well as successes before we finally get it
right. He needs to be prepared for that, too."
     "Right, Doctor. I..." She stopped, as the outer hatch opened, and
Starbuck entered. 
     "It's still visiting centars, right?"
     "Yes, Lieutenant," said Salik. "However, I wouldn't recommend it,
just now. Bojay isn't quite receptive to having visitors, at the moment."
     "Hey, it's me, Doc. Don't worry about it." He moved towards the
hatch.
     "Uh, Starbuck..." 
     "Hey, don't worry about it, Cassie," smiled the other, utter
self-confidence radiating from him, as always, and leaving puddles on the
floor. He stepped through. "Hey, Bojay! How ya..." The hatch slid shut.
     Crash!
     "ow...hey!"
     The hatch slid open again, and Starbuck leapt out, hand to his face.
A snarled obscenity worthy of Commander Cain followed him out, till the
hatch shut once more. Cassie pulled his hand away, and looked at him.
There was a slight cut under the right eye, and it would make a really
nice bruise. Part of lunch was dripping off his uniform.
     "Mong! He threw the platter at me! For crying out loud!"
     "I did warn you, Lieutenant," said Salik, arms crossed.
     "Doc, can I charge him with assault with a deadly food tray?" 


     "No, he won't budge," said Gayla, later, in the common room aboard
the Agro Ship. Across from her were Aurora, taking a break from
diagnostics on the ship's support electronics, and Oagh. "It's like he's
determined to reject sense."
     "Funny," said Aurora. "I always thought Bojay was pretty easygoing,
and flexible. Not the kind to shut his eyes to sense, like this."
     "He has changed," intoned Oagh, sorting through some culture dishes
of plant spores. 
     "How so?" asked Aurora.
     "He was captured by the people on the planet Kradina. Tortured for
information. That changes a man. Believe me."
     Aurora could well believe it, since Oagh had personal experience
from his time as a prisoner of the Cylons. 
     "And now this. There is no way that it has not changed him."
     "But he's still Bojay," said Gayla. "Isn't he?"
     "He has also suffered great trauma," continued the former POW. "I
knew many in the hospital when I returned who had suffered grievous
injuries, Gayla." 
     Indeed, Oagh had seen much. Almost too much, in some ways. Warriors,
people known for strength of character and mind, some he had known,
trained with, served with. Some bitter, some distant, some reduced to
complete psychological and emotional cripples, by what the war had done
to their bodies. 
     And souls.
     Not unlike myself, he mused. 
     "Bojay is a man. A Warrior. This is not just a position with a
uniform. It is also a state of mind," he went on, aloud. "His dignity,
his sense of who he is, has been as wounded as his body, by what has
happened to him, Gayla. And he loves you."
     "Well...I don't see what that has to do with...ah."
     "He's afraid," said Aurora. "Afraid that you won't be able to look
at him as a real or complete man."
     "I knew many marriages that did not survive the return of a badly
hurt Warrior, Gayla," added Oagh. "And before you say that this is a
foolish position to hold," he held up a hand, "well, perhaps this is so.
But right now, Bojay has little else to call his own, as he sees it. His
wholeness as a person has been taken from him, and so he holds on to his
loss and pain, like talismans." He took a sip of water, and considered
his next words. "I was in many ways the same, when I returned to the
Colonies, Gayla. While I did not lose a limb, I lost something inside. My
sense of Humanity. All I had, for a long time, was my anger and
bitterness. Hatred for the Cylons, hatred at what they had done to me. It
seemed as if I had nothing else remaining, to call my own, and I clung to
them like a lifeboat. I became hateful, and eventually violent. It was a
long road back, to recovery, and I cannot say that I have, or ever will,
fully arrive."
     "What helped you, though?" asked Gayla. "How did you recover?"
     "My brother. He would not give up on me, when everyone else wanted
to. The doctors, the Veteran's Advocate's Office, and society in general.
After our parents died, there was no one else. It was my brother's
unswerving love, and his firm belief in The Book of the Word, that have
brought me to where I am now."
     "I...I don't believe in any sort of religious stuff, Oagh," said
Gayla, shaking her head. "I just don't."
     "Do not be quite so ready to toss away something that has been of
help to many another," said the big man. "In any case, no matter what
betide, it will not be a quick resolution. Bojay must, like each one of
us in our turn, work through this, in his own time."
     "And he'll need you," said Aurora, leaning close to the other woman.
"You will be an integral part of his recovering himself, Gayla."
     Gayla frowned, considering the other's words, but said nothing. 


     It was like he knew the place. As he moved along the dark hallway,
Bojay was certain he was somewhere that he knew. The walls, the floor,
the doors. The creak of the boards under his feet. Even the smells. As he
hefted his pistol in his hand, he slowly worked to remember. Of course.
It was his grandmother's old house. The rambling old mansion on
Sagittara, where he had spent so many pleasant summer days as a boy. But
why was it all so dark? Why was every table and room filled with... 
     What were they filled with? He peered into one dimly lit room.
Old-style tables and chairs, some hundreds of yahrens old, just like what
his grandmother had had, keeping the place much as it had always been.
But the tables were covered with strange objects of all kinds. Stacks of
old-style printed paper books, music disks out of their covers, albums of
photographs, all pre-digital, some pre-electronic. A fireplace, carved
elaborately out of some decorative stone, cold and dark. Lamps, made of
glass and fired by flammable oils, dark and coated, like everything else
in here, with dust
     He heard a noise, and spun, laser at the ready. Someone else was
here. Slowly, with the caution born of training, he moved towards the
sound. 
     Thump. Thump.
     Slowly, hugging the shadows, he moved down the hallway, past more
rooms, as dark and full of old objects as the first. The sound was
getting louder, and he felt his pulse quicken.
     Can't be a Cylon. Doesn't sound like a Cylon.
     Light was coming from around a corner, and he moved closer. As he
drew closer, he gradually recognized where it was coming from. It was his
old room, the one he had often occupied as a boy, when here. Weapon at
the ready, he came around the corner...
     And saw the door, standing open, light streaming from inside. He
moved closer...
     "Hold it!" he shouted, his voice sounding oddly flat and toneless in
the hallway. 
     In front of him was a dark figure, tall, and shrouded in a robe. It
held something in one hand, and was perfectly still.
     "Now turn around," he said, slowly and distinctly. "Slowly, and
don't try anything."
     The figure did so, turning it's hooded face to him. In it's right
hand, it held a long, jagged piece of metal, stained red. 
     "Drop it! Now!" ordered Bojay. "Who are you?"
     The figure dropped the weapon, but made no other move.
     "I said who are you? What are you doing here?"
     Slowly, the dark form drew back the hood of it's cloak. At first,
Bojay did not recognize the old, somewhat wizened face that started back
at him. Sunken, lined with age, it was an old man's face, one that seemed
to bore into him with it's eyes. 
     "I asked you who you are, fella. Now answer me!"
     The other spoke no words, but one corner of his mouth curled up in a
smile. A smile that sent a chill through the young Warrior. It was cold,
cruel, and malignant. 
     "Wait...wait, I know you!" he said, suddenly. "You're that cult
leader. The Il Fadim! By all the Lords, what are you doing here, in my
grandmother's house? Gran! Gran! He shouted. He turned, and looked about,
then looked back...
     And almost screamed. The old cult leader had changed, and Bojay
found himself looking into a cruel, evil version of his own face! He
recoiled in fear, and with a swirl of it's robe, the figure was gone,
vanished in a wash of dark mist.
     "Holy frack!" said Bojay, who then did scream, when he looked down
at the floor. There, bloody and battered, was what the dark figure had
been striking with it's weapon. There, staring up at him through
blood-dimmed, terrified eyes, was the battered, crippled form of...


     "Ahhh!!!" came the loud scream, and Cassie popped awake from a brief
doze. She heard it again, a choked scream from inside the ward. She
opened the hatch, and saw Bojay, in the throes of some horrid nightequa,
thrashing in the bed. She went to him, shaking him.
     "Bojay! Bo..." she cried, grabbing hold of him. He was thrashing
madly, eyes open and fully dilated. Despite his depleted condition, the
Viper pilot was proving to be a challenge. He clamped his remaining hand
on her throat, and snarled like a beast.
     "Leave me... you... monster! No! No I will not!"
     "Cassie... Oh frack," said a voice, and at once Medtech Waheeb was
there next to her. He pressed a hypo to Bojay's neck, and slowly, the
man's thrashing ceased, and he sank down, back into slumber.
     "What the Hades Hole?" breathed Cassie, as she pulled his now-limp
hand from her throat. She took several deep breaths, massaging her
injured anatomy, then moved to check her patient's vital signs.
     "You okay?" asked Waheeb.
     "Yeah. Yeah, I'm fine."


Chapter Five

     "Come on," said Gayla, sitting next to Bojay. "Tell me. You can
trust me, Bo."
     "Just a dream, Gay," replied Bojay. He looked away, but Gayla was
not to be denied. She reached out and touched his face, and turned him
towards her.
     "Tell." He opened his mouth. "Or I go, and have a little chat with
Tarnia."
     "You wouldn't."
     Glare.
     "You would? Really?"
     Glare.
     "Alright. But if you ever tell Starbuck, so help me I'll..."
     "Bojay!"
     "Okay." He took a deep breath, and looked away. "It was...it was me,
on the floor, Gay. The figure in the robe was beating me, with that hunk
of metal. But the body on the floor was me too. It was...I mean I guess
it was. Or one version of me was doing it to another version." He leaned
back. "Hades Hole, none of that makes any sense. It was all just a
drug-induced dream!"
     "Bo..."
     "Or I'm just flat insane." He snorted a wry laugh. "That would make
my grandmother happy. She said I was crazy to join the service. It'd make
Tarnia happy, too. She doesn't get to meet too many really certifiably
crazy folks in the Fleet."
     "Bojay!"
     "She needs the practice, I bet. After all you have to be half-nuts
to even be a Viper pilot in the first place, really, and..."
     "Bo-JAY! Stop it!" Gayla stood up, hands on her hips, and glared at
him. "So you..." He opened his mouth, but she made a chopping motion with
her hand, "...no! Stop it! Now you had a lousy dream. Well, I ate some
Borellian pickles, and I had one too! So get down off your high equinius,
and think for a centon!"
     "Alright," he huffed, quietly. He tried crossing his arms, then
remembered he couldn't.
     "You had a lousy dream. That's all it was. Do you hear me? That is
all it was. Your old house, your old room, big deal. I dream about home,
too. A lot. And there's nothing to it. Nothing in it but a lousy dream!"
     "But...Cylon prosthetics? Come on, Gayla." He looked her hard in the
eyes. "Do you want someone holding you, embracing you, with Cylon parts?
I mean...well...half a man?"
     "Come on, Bojay. It isn't like that."
     "Then what is it like, Gay?" he asked, holding up the stump of his
missing arm. "Tell me. What is it like?"


     "Hades Hole!" growled Gayla, as she left the ward. "He's impossible,
Cassie. Impossible!"
     "No go?"
     "Won't budge a micron. He's bound and determined to suffer! What in
Hades Hole does he think he is? Some holy saint out of The Book of the
Word?"
     "He's grieving. And feeling sorry for himself," said Cassie, shaking
her head. "I've seen it before. Way too many times."
     "Do you honestly think he'll snap out of it, Cassie?"
     "Only Bojay can answer that one, Gayla. Grieving is a process. It
takes time. Most do snap out of it, as you say, but, yes, there are some
who just never do. In some...well, twisted way, they seem to almost revel
in their injuries. Loving them, sort of. They almost always end up
pushing people away. Especially those who care about them the most. I
don't get it, but there it is."
     "Well, there has got to be a way to break through his shell. There
has to be!" She pounded a fist on the desk. "I...I can't bear to look at
him, wasting himself this way. If there's even a chance..."
     "We still need to do all sorts of tests. After all, you can't just
snap a Human body back together, like a Cylon. And even if they work
out..." Cassie shrugged, leaving the sentence hanging. She saw Gayla,
staring off into the distance, as if lost in thought. "Gay? Gay, what is
it?"
     Gayla said nothing.


     "You want to talk to who?" asked Technician Hummer, over the circuit
in Doctor Wilker's lab, several centars later.
     "You heard me, Hummer," said Gayla, from her tiny office one the
Agro Ship. "So, when?"
     "I don't know if Doctor Wilker will like that. Never mind the
Commander..."
     "Well, I wasn't going to be asking them, Hummer. Or telling them,
for that matter. At least not till it's a done deal." She waited. "Well?"
     "Gayla, I can't. The rules..."
     "Hummer? Do you remember that little incident, that time in the Agro
Dome Four, when you and...Oh, what was her name? Her brother Lou, from
the Saggitarius..."
     "Gay..."
     "And I heard he wants to do some really interesting things to the
'fracking neck' of the guy who..."
     "Gay..."
     "Anatomically impossible stuff, too."
     "Gay?"
     "Yeah?"
     "How soon can you be here?"
     "Less than two centars," grinned Gayla.
     "I'll get things ready."
     "Right. On my way."
     "Lords of Kobol," said Hummer, as the screen went blank. "I am so
getting stripped and moduled for this!" He looked over at the shelf.
"Aren't I?"


     "Gay?" said Aurora, bumping into her friend on the way to the hangar
deck. "What's up?"
     "Just heading back to the Galactica. I have some hybridization test
results and stained cell samples to take to Doctor Wilker." She lifted
her satchel.
     "Gonna check in on Bojay?"
     "Of course."
     "Dinner, later? I managed to get a seat in the Second Class Lounge,
on the Rising Star."
     "Sounds good," said Gayla. Watching her, hearing her voice, Aurora
sensed something different. Not the hurt, anguished Gayla, not the angry
and exasperated Gayla, fried at Bojay for being such a defeatist. No,
something was different. Something...
     "Uh, Gay? What..."
     "All aboard shuttle Thrax, for the Galactica," said the voice over
the speaker, as they reached the bay. "All aboard shuttle Thrax for the
Galactica. Shuttle launching in ten centons."
     "You boarding?" asked Gayla.     
     "Stuff to finish up here, first. I'll catch the shuttle on the next
loop."
     "Right."
     "Uhh, Gayla, what...
     "See ya on the Rising Star, Aurora," said Gayla, and headed towards
the shuttle.   


     "Ready?" asked Gayla, seated next to Hummer in the lab. 
     "Yeah, but if we get caught, Gayla, I'm going to..."
     Gayla cleared her throat. Loudly.
     "Okay. Here goes."
     Click.
     Hum. 
     Hum
     Humm
     Humm...mmm...mmm...mmm... 
     "Got it," said Hummer. "Now..."
     "Well hello, Technician Hummer," said object of his efforts. "It is
agreeable to see you again."
     "Ah, yeah. Hi. I'm..."
     "And who is this? I do not recognize you."
     "I'm Gayla."
     "Hello, Gayla." The speaker turned to look at Hummer, then back to
Gayla, before returning to Hummer. "Why have you reactivated me, Hummer?"
     "That was my idea," said Gayla. "You see, there is a problem, I was
hoping you could help me with."
     "A problem?" said the IL Cylon, and former BaseShip Commander,
Septimus. "How precisely may I be of help to you, Gayla?"


Chapter Six

     "Holy frack!" said Bojay, trying to believe what he was seeing.
"Gayla, what in the..."
     "Come on, Bojay. Just..."
     "But it's a Cylon!" shouted the injured Warrior, backing his
hoverchair up several metrons. "What in..."
     "Come on, Lieutenant," said Hummer, next to Gayla. "Calm down. We're
only trying to..."
     "Calm down??? But..."
     "Excuse me," said Septimus, and the sound of his humming systems
increased, as if to emphasize his request. "May I ask you something,
Lieutenant?"
     "Ask...uh, I..." Bojay stared at the IL's oscillating eyes for a few
microns, then managed to sputter out: "What?"
     "What is a frack, and how exactly is it 'holy', might I ask?"


     "You what?" said Starbuck, almost choking on his drink, in the
OClub. "You're kidding me!"
     "You heard me," said Gayla, she and Starbuck in a secluded corner.
"I reactivated him. Well, I got Hummer to reactivate him, actually."
     "An IL Cylon? How the mong is a hot-wired IL going to help Bojay?"
     "Starbuck," she sighed, shaking her head, "you really can be awfully
thick at times. You know that?"
     "Well, actually, Cassie appreciates my th..."
     "Starbuck, please!!!" she said, louder than she had meant to. "I
don't have time for your puerile turboflush humor! This is serious!"
     "Okay. Explain it to me, Gay."
     "Ayesha's idea got me thinking. Given that the Cylons used to be
organic beings, they must have developed surgical methods during their
advance from totally organic to machine, right?"
     "Well, yeah. I suppose so." 
     "I checked into the Cylon technological database that Ayesha got
Baltar to transfer to the Fleet. Way back when, they did develop methods
of combining flesh and machine."
     "Well, so did our people, Gay. Colonial medical tech..."
     "Had a lot of it left behind when we fled the Colonies. I did some
digging. While we have a lot of surgical texts in the system, what there
is there is either dated, incomplete, or we just don't have surgeons with
the sort of expertise to actually do it. Microneuro-vascular surgeons
were a prime commodity back home, in both civilian and military
hospitals. And while Doctors Salik and Paye are great at what they do,
their expertise is basically battlefield medicine. Synthesizing organic
replacements, or even Colonial prosthetics, is totally out of their
league, Starbuck."
     "Okay, I get that, but why plug Septimus back in? How can a has-been
Cylon be of help?" He signaled to Freeman, and they got refills.
     "Septimus was hacked up, remember? Dismembered and tossed over a
railing by his loyal crew. It's taken some work on Hummer's part to
restore him to an even limited degree of functionality."
     "And..." said Starbuck slowly, as the idea finally began to soak in,
"you thought that maybe, since both Bojay and Septimus had lost limbs,
were left crippled, basically, that maybe Septimus, Cylon though he is,
could somehow reach Bojay? In a way that we flesh and blood Humans
couldn't? Make him...well,  reconsider?"  
     "Crazy idea, I admit," she shrugged. "But I'm desperate, Starbuck. I
have finally found the one person I want to spend the rest of my life
with, and frankly, I don't care if he touches me with prosthetic parts.
It's the man inside, and what he can give me. What we can give each
other." She shook her head, slowly. "He's the one, Starbuck, and I'm not
going to give up on him. I can't. I just can't."
     She looked at him, and he understood. At least a little. After her
disastrous marriage to the serial polygamist Twilly, Gayla had almost
ended up hating men. Hating Humanity in general, really. But, in Bojay,
she had found someone who had, despite her best efforts, reached inside
of her, touching her in a way no other Human Being ever had. She could
not, would not, lose him now.
     But Lords, what a crazy mash-up of an idea.  
     "Okay, I get it. I think," replied Starbuck. "But you said it
yourself, Gay. We don't have the sort of surgeon or such that could do
that sort of work, even assuming we had all the right parts, and it
checks out medically. Who...?" He stopped, as Gayla just looked at him,
and raised one eyebrow. Slowly... "You're kidding?"
     Gayla shook her head, a tiny smile turning up one corner of her
mouth.


     "What's this test for?" said Bojay, somewhere between a snarl and a
sigh, as he was hovered into position under a bank of equipment.
     "Checking the progress on your repaired eye, Lieutenant," replied
Cassie, as she got the machinery into alignment. 
     "I can see fine out of it, Cassie. What's the problem?" She did not
answer at once. "There's no problem. Right?"
     "While this therapy has a very good success rate, it nonetheless
requires follow up and evaluation, Bojay. Most medical procedures do."
     "Yeah. I heard about that, after that bug laid all the pilots out,
over Kobol."
     "It was close, yes." She pressed some keys, and the scanners read
the interior of Bojay's repaired eye. Cassie "hhmm"d a few times, but
said nothing.
     "Well? Cassie?"
     "Your eye is coming along nicely. Retinal tear has completely healed
and the corneal abrasion has regenerated.  Neuro-electrical scans are
right where they should be, and your intraoccular pressure is within
tolerances."
     "That's good, then," sighed Bojay, relieved. "Right?"
     "Yes, it is. As far as the eye is concerned, Lieutenant." She slid
the scanner array back into it's stored position. "But there are other
concerns, as you know."
     "Come on, Cassie!" cried Bojay. "I've told you. I'm not going to go
through life looking like something out of an old horror holoflick."
     "I see. You would prefer to go through life as a legless cripple
with one arm."
     "Look Cassie. Why can't you all just leave me alone, on this one?
Huh? It's my decision!"
     "And what about Gayla, Bojay? Have you considered her decision, at
all? Isn't she worth some consideration?"
     "Lords of Kobol, I..."
     "They aren't here, Bojay," said Cassie, with a bit of heat. He tried
to turn his chair and get around her, but she grabbed his good arm, and
squeezed. "Gayla is." She glared at him, eyes like lasers. He'd never
seen her like this before. "Now, you can go on playing the object of pity
all you like, but..."
     "Hey! I don't have to take that!"
     "Oh, right. The object of abject pity all you like, but if you can't
summon the spine, to look past your...whiney-astrumed self-pity, then
frankly?" She raised her voice a few stages. "Maybe Gayla is better off
without you!"
     "Hey! Back off!" he snarled, hotly. "You're not my mother! It's my
decision, Doctor! And only mine!"
     "So was whether to swallow your baby cereal or spit it out,
Lieutenant. And I must say that you are showing much the same level of
maturity, when it comes to deciding this!"
     "You little..." he began red-faced now. He tried to leap at her, out
of the chair...
     And ended up flat on his face on the floor.
     "Now, are going to tell Gayla about this display of adult
behavior...."
     "Damn you, Cassie!" hissed Bojay, not looking up at her, standing
over him, and pounding his fist on the deck. "Just...just damn you!"
     "Or," she leaned close, almost eye-to-eye, "would you like me to do
it for you?"


     "Why can't they just respect my decision?" said Bojay, on his first
outing from LifeStation, at a table in the OClub. "After all, it is my
body. My injuries. My life."
     "But ye have responsibilities ta others, Lieutenant," said Freeman,
the barkeep. "The Fleet needs her pilots, and from what I hear, ye be one
o' the best, boy-o."
     "Starbuck's better," said Bojay, glumly, and took another sip.
     "So says Starbuck," replied Freeman. "But even so, we need all the
pilots we can get, Lieutenant. Ye never know when those sneaky tinheads
will show up, or Baltar decides to be going back to being Baltar, or the
Ziklagi, or some other slimy alien scum. And, no offence to ya, but all a
pilot seems to need is one functioning hand to press some wee buttons,
and half a brain."
     "Half a brain?"
     "Aye, I heard your friend, Starbuck, say just the other day that he
had half a mind to fly across the stars in his Viper to try and find the
edge of the universe."
     Bojay lifted his glass to the barman, acknowledging the play on
words.  "Starbuck waxing poetic?"
     "He had more than one."  Freeman nodded at his tankard."
     "Starbuck? More than one? Say it ain't so!" 
     "Alright. I won't", grinned Freeman.
     "Lucky sod," said Bojay, looking at his single drink, then up at the
barman.
     "No," said Freeman.
     "Yeah," grunted Bojay, burying his face in his tankard. He was
allowed only one drink by the doctor, so he was making it last.
     "The Doc is right, Lieutenant," said Freeman.
     "Oh Lords of Kobol. Not you too?"
     "Aye, me too," smiled Freemen, and moved to behind the bar again. He
checked the chiller, and noted both the temperature, and system pressure.
Shaking his head, he adjusted a valve, and went to his walk-in. Now, if
the deliveries from the Agro Ship had been on time for a change...
     Bojay stared into his almost-drained tankard, and cursed. Damn it,
if even the barman from Proteus had an opinion about him, and what he
ought to do. If Cassie acting like his mother wasn't bloody bad enough...
     He tossed back the last of his grog, belched loudly, and looked at
the bar. Freeman was out of sight, and Bojay felt like another. Yeah,
Salik had told him, one drink, period, but right now Bojay didn't give a
rodenton's astrum what any doctor had said or decided. He wanted another
drink, and...
     He looked about him, and saw that he was the only patron in here, at
the moment. Perfect. Sliding his chair into motion, he moved towards the
bar. Since the OClub here was identical in construction and layout to
that aboard the Pegasus, plus this wasn't his first tour aboard the
Galactica, he knew just how far to reach around, to get to the right
chiller. Hopefully, things were still stored in the same places. Now, if
he could just fill up before Father Confessor Freeman returned, he
might...
     "Oh, hi Bojay," said a voice, and he stopped, turning. Damn! It was
Ensign Hunley, along with her husband, Captain Dante. "What's..."
     She got no further, before a deafening roar filled Bojay's ears, and
he was sent sprawling from the chair.


     "Commander!" said Athena, on the bridge.
     "Yes?" 
     "Internal sensors have just recorded a massive power drop in the
Officer's Club, sir. And an explosion."
     "Explosion?"
     "Yes."
     "Get me whoever's on duty there, now. And notify damage Control."
     "Right away, Commander."


     Bojay shook his head, trying to clear his vision. He had not totally
passed out, but had been stunned a few moments, things spinning like a
gyrating Viper. His injuries hurt like Hades Hole, along with his head,
and he was on his left side, his stump of an arm under him. He raised his
head, and looked around. The bar had broken almost in half, metal bent
outwards, and tables, chairs, and bottle fragments, were scattered
everywhere.
     "Holy frack!" he groaned, trying to raise himself up. He pushed with
his remaining arm, and tried to clear his vision. His chair was lying on
its side, an arms length away, but he could hardly reach it. In the other
direction, he could see a pair of boots sticking out from under an
overturned table. There was a sudden pop, and a hot cable shorted
somewhere, filling the room with the acrid stench of ozone. Without
thinking, he tried to drag himself towards the victim under the table.
     Bang!
     He flinched at the sound, and looked up. A cable had fallen from the
ceiling, and was lying perilously close to whomever was under that table.
Frack, it they moved, and touched that hot cable...
     "I'm...I'm coming!" he groaned, trying to pull himself along,
towards the trapped Warrior. "I'm..."
     "Anyone...anyone alive in here?" came a voice. Bojay could not see
who it was, and the accent was unfamiliar, but he kept on trying to reach
the injured Warrior. He could hear someone close by, clearing a path. 
     "Careful!" he shouted, his ribcage hurting like mad. His head was
beginning to swim, along with his vision, but he soldiered on. Had to get
to whomever it was. Had to! He heard a cry of pain, and didn't realize it
was his.
     Have to get to them! I have to! Warrior's duty! I can do it! I...I
can do this! I don't need legs! I...don't need any God damned...
     He reached out, grabbing something, and a massive bolt of pain shot
up one side of his body. He screamed and passed out.


Chapter Seven 

     "Not sabotage, Commander," said Chief Shadrach, a few centars later,
report in hand. "We're clean on that score."
     "What then?" asked Adama. They were in the waiting area of
LifeStation, Adama waiting for word on the injured personnel. 
     "An accident, sir."
     "An accident?"
     "Yes. It seems a valve jammed up on a refrigeration compressor. The
pressure built up, till it went. It was an older type unit, sir. Lowest
bidder, I'm betting. That, and fewer safeguards."
     "Why wasn't it replaced long ago?" asked Adama, somewhat irately. It
was a recurring theme in the Fleet.  
     "With all the battle damage and other concerns since fleeing home,
sir, maintenance inspections on ambrosia chillers weren't seen as a
priority. To be honest, generally it was accepted that there was more
damage resulting from ambrosia or grog consumption than its storage
chiller, And the chiller was working fine, despite it's age." Adama
opened his mouth to speak, but Shadrach held up a hand to forestall him.
"I've already ordered inspections on every chiller on the ship,
Commander. And the units in every mess aboard, from the Cadets to the
Officers have been taken off-line, till we can check them all out,
completely. Those relics, with the old-style refrigerants, can pack quite
a kick, as you saw. The only ones not powered down so far are here, in
LifeStation."
     "Good work, Chief. Keep me posted."
     "Sir." 
     Adama watched him leave, then turned to Cassie, as she emerged from
within. She read his expression, without need of words. 
     "No fatalities, Commander," she said, and Adama visibly relaxed.
"Freeman was inside one of the walk-ins, and was shielded pretty much. He
was just stunned for a few centons. Dante and Hunley both were hit by a
flying table, and will be in a regen unit for a few centars more. She
broke her left femur, and his right shoulder was badly dislocated. That
and some abrasions from flying debris. A lot of ambrosia bottles
shattered when that thing blew, but most of that missed them, incredibly.
It's a semi-miracle they weren't cut to bits."
     "Good. And Bojay?"
     "He got a pretty good concussion from the explosion, which is
responding well to treatment. He also took some good-sized fragments in
the stump of one leg, but we've stopped the bleeding, and he will
recover. He'll be in a regen unit for a while, as well."
     "What about the electrical shock?"
     "Talk about lucky, Commander. Bojay tried to pull a fallen cable
away from Hunley. It had come down dangerously close to her foot. If the
power hadn't been cut just then, Bojay would have been electrocuted on
the spot, when he grabbed it. As it was, he got only a relatively small
jolt. The burn to his hand is minor."
     "Thank the Lords for that," said Adama. He was interrupted by the
beeping of his commpad. "Excuse me." He opened the screen, and read the
message. Cassie watched him frown.
     "Bad news, Commander?'
     "Just Council business, Cassie. Siress Lydia. Again"
     "Ah!"
     "Though I will confess that when it comes to her, anything can be
bad news." Cassie laughed softly. Like the Commander, she had little love
for the scheming, self-absorbed Council VP. 
     "What is it, now?"
     "She has some program in mind. Regarding the Prison Barge. I suppose
I will have to go and see her." He closed the pad. "Anyway. Bojay. When
can he have visitors?"
     "It'll be a while, Commander," replied Cassie. "Sure is lucky, those
Earth refugees showing up just when they did."
     "Yes. Father Fisher and Commander Allen. Maybe luck had nothing to
do with it," Adama offered. 
     "Yes, knowing Allen, thirst would more likely be the culprit." 


     "You just keep piling it up, higher and higher, don't you?" said
Gayla, the next day, looking down at Bojay in the support tube.
     "I tried to reach her," he said, as much to the ceiling as to her.
"I...I couldn't reach her, Gay."
     "But you tried to, Bo. You tried. That's what matters. And she's
okay. A couple of those refugees from Earth showed up just then, and
helped in the rescue. No one was killed, Bo. They are both going to make
full recoveries. You just can't blame yourself for what happened. You
didn't make that old chiller unit explode. It did that all on it's own."
     "But they could have been, Gay," shot back Bojay. "Just had to have
another drink. If I hadn't been thinking only of myself, I'd have been
closer, and I could have gotten to..."
     "And if Cimtar had been closer to the Colonies, maybe we'd have
survived the Cylon final assault. But it isn't, we didn't, and you
weren't. Besides, I told you. If you were actually listening to me." She
cleared her throat, theatrically. "They are going to be fine. So."
     "So." The Viper pilot was quiet for a moment. Then another one.
     And several more, after that, as well. 
     "Bojay?"
     "Let me talk to Hummer again," he said at last, crisply and coldly.
He then took a slow, deep breath, letting it out equally slowly. "And..."
There was resignation in his voice, yet he seemed to be unable to finish,
as if still conflicted within.
     "And?"
     "Yes. And...yes. It."


     "You actually expect me to believe that you're here out of concern
for my welfare?" asked the man, sitting on the small bench, looking
through the Security door. "No one cares about us, Siress. They slam the
door shut, and that's it for us."
     "Oh but I do," replied Siress Lydia, her expression a mixture of
maternal empathy, and thinly-veiled predation. "You, and your state here,
are of considerable concern to me. What happened to you was hardly
equitable."
     "If it hadn't been for that old boray Kronus, yeah. I'd be a free
man today, if not for that..."
     "Exactly," said Lydia, nodding. 
     "That, and Adama's fracking son..."
     "Well, he is daddy's little boy," said Lydia, with seeming
agreement. "What in Hades Hole could one expect, reasonably?"
     "If Adama hadn't put that damned marionette in charge of the
industry ships, everything would have been fine! We weren't hurting
anyone. We kept the Fleet running! So Aurora and her toadies missed a
couple of meal breaks now and then. Tell that to the Cylons!"
     "Yes, one often has to crack a few ovons, if you want to make an
omeleta. How sad that so few seem to understand that, is it not?"
     "Adama sure doesn't seem to. He just..." He stopped, as a guard came
to the door, platter in hand, with the man's meal. Both remained silent,
till the food was delivered, and the guard was gone.
     "Yes, he is difficult at times," Lydia resumed. "Being on the
Council, you have no idea the trials I have to go through, just trying to
keep him within bounds. Believe me."
     "Boray!" spat the other. "Monging boray!" He turned, as the security
door slid open, again. His surprise was obvious.
     "As Council Vice-President, one has certain privileges, my friend,"
she said, smoothly, as she entered his cell, the door sliding shut behind
her, and pocketing her security key. The man's face suddenly became more
wary. She would have to tread with greater care, here.
     "Come on, Siress, what do you really want?"
     "Oh, I want many things, believe me. A great many things. One of
them is to see that injustice is corrected."
     "Corrected?" He shook his head. "I'm in here for the killing of
Kronus, during the commission of a mutiny. How is that going to get
'corrected', tell me."
     "There are certain possible steps, my good man." Lydia fingered a
small object in her pocket. "Steps that might make life a great deal less
onerous for yourself, and your fellow inmates." She moved as she spoke,
he turning to follow her. Finally...
     Yes!
     "Such as?" he asked, hands on hips. "Not a lot one can do with a
prison barge, you know!" Obviously, he would not be easy to convince, but
no one had ever accused Siress Lydia of not being prepared for all
contingencies. 
     Instead of words, Lydia stepped closer, and put her arms around the
man. She pressed her lips to his, and she could feel the shock race
through him. He obviously had not expected anything like this, during a
prison visit. And certainly not from the Colonial Vice-President. 
     Not that he was exactly kicking her out of the room, either. 
     "What in Hades Hole..." he breathed, as she released his lips from
hers, her arms still around him. One arm moved closer to his meal
platter, hand over his cup...
     "You like?" she smiled, feeling him respond.
     "Well, it isn't like we get a lot of..."
     "Pleasure?" she asked, eyes bright with both merriment, and lust. A
predatory lust.
     "Yeah. Yeah, not a lot of that, for sure."
     "There can be more." She emphasized the words with the movement of
her hands.
     "What...what would I have to do?" She kissed him again, letting her
lips linger upon his, longer this time. 
     She did not at once answer, but lifted the cup from his platter, and
withdrawing a small flask from her robes, poured him a small drink. He
took the proffered libation, and she sipped from her flask, as well. The
smile on her face only increased, at his response to the liqueur. She
looked into his eyes, as he swallowed, and knew that she had him.
     Yes!
     "Just wait, and follow my lead, my dear Charka," she replied, the
predatory gleam in her eyes stronger now. "It won't be long."
     "Long?" he asked, as a slight fuzziness began to slowly creep over
him. "What do you mean?"
     "Trust me."

Chapter Eight

     "Hey, I hear you're going to getting out of this tube today," said
Hunley, standing over Bojay's support tube, leaning on a steel cane.
While the bone mender had done it's job well, she was still in some pain,
from the residual inflammation, and the cane would be with her for a day
or two yet. 
     "Yeah. The Doc says I don't need this anymore," replied Bojay.
     "Well, good. You need to get moving again. And thanks, from both of
us, Bo."
     "I just did what I had to, Hun," replied the crippled pilot, a bit
stiffly. "No..."
     "For which we are both grateful," said Dante, suddenly coming up
behind her. He still had a mobile thera-cast on his shoulder. 
     "Hey, I..."
     "Just did what you had to do," said Hunley, with a smile. "Yeah, we
heard that one."
     "So, you are going to go through with it?" asked Dante."Really?"
     "Yeah," sighed Bojay, somewhere between surrender and...surrender.
"Yeah, I guess I am." He looked at them both. To all outwards signs, the
perfect, loving couple, who had found a way to mesh the stresses and
tensions of married life, with those of a military career. "I guess I can
contribute something."
     "Uh huh," said Hunley. "The heart of a Colonial Warrior."
     "You mean he has one?" said a voice behind them. "Can I see?"
     "Ah, come on, Starbuck!" said Dante. "Talk about kicking a man when
he's down!"
     "One of his best battle tactics," said Hunley.
     "Well, when you've got it," said Starbuck, all innocence. "So, when
is it, Bo?"
     "Well, if all goes well, tomorrow."
     "Bojay," said a voice, and they all turned. Cassie was just entering
the ward, Gayla next to her. And, between them, on a small hover chair...
     "Hello again, Lieutenant. How are you feeling?"
     "Best as can be expected, I guess, Septimus."
     "I'm so glad," replied the partially reconstructed IL Series Cylon.


     "I assure you, it is entirely legal," said Siress Lydia, in her
private quarters aboard the Rising Star. Chakra, out of his prison attire
and considerably better fed than as an inmate, looked at the document
before him. "Six inmates from the Prison Barge have been paroled into my
custody. You, and five others."
     "For how long? It doesn't say."
     "That all depends upon how well you behave," she told him, her lips
never losing their predatory smile. "The Chief Magistrate in the State
has the power to both pardon, as well as remand sentences. As Council
Vice-President, I share many of those powers with Adama." She smiled as
Chakra growled softly at the mention of the Commander's name. "If it can
be shown that you and your fellow cons can be productive citizens once
more, a further lessening of your condition can be reasonably expected to
follow."
     "But only Adama has the power of pardon," said Chakra. "The Colonial
Charter of Governance hasn't been amended on that point. I know that much
law."
     "True, My Dear Chakra. Quite true. But, if all works out as it
should, that may well become a moot point."
     "Adama isn't going to just up and resign," said Chakra.
     "No," said Lydia, moving closer, and pouring two goblets of the best
in her liquor cabinet. A rare and hideously expensive liqueur from a
small estate on Aquaria, it had come originally from the cellars of the
late, unlamented President Adar, who had gifted it to his friend and old
comrade, Sire Antipas the Elder. After a brief sojourn with, and
following the fall of, Antipas the Younger, it had somehow, mysteriously,
found it's way into her private reserve.
     "Never let someone else's calamity go to waste," her first lover had
told her, and she had never forgotten the wisdom of those words. 
     How tragic that he had not heeded his own advice.
     "But?" asked Chakra, taking a tentative taste.
     "Adama may not be a problem for much longer."
     "I like the sound of that," said Chakra, taking a deeper draught of
the Siress's offering. "What are you going to do? Kill him?"
     The flash in her eyes might have been a warning to a
less...preoccupied man, but with a stomach full of the choicest foods, a
glass of the finest drink in the known star system, and an hypnotically
sensual woman in front of him, Chakra was not as perceptive as he might
otherwise have been well-advised to be. 
     "I know how much that would please you, Chakra. Believe me. And yes,
revenge there shall be, but no. Nothing so crude." She slowly sipped her
drink, and he followed suit. "At least, not yet." Her smile spoke
volumes.
     "What then?" he asked, his voice growing smoother, as the goblets
contents, known and unknown, did their work. 
     "So many questions, Chakra," she smiled, setting down her goblet,
and moving closer to him. "So many questions. We have time."
     "Time?" he asked, slowly. 
     "Yes, My Dear," she replied, and put her arms around him, slowly
pressing her lips to his. Within moments, the clasp at the shoulder of
her clinging gown had opened, and her garment began to slide towards the
floor.
     "That's more like it," slurred Chakra, coming up for air, and Lydia
smiled, as his tunic loosened also, and he fell totally within her power.

     "Yes, we have plenty of time." 


     "Can he really do it?" asked Starbuck, as usual over a tankard, in
the temporary O Club. "I mean, do Cylons even do that sort of thing?"
     "I guess they can," said Boomer, across from him. "For them, it's
all a matter of programming, so I'm told."
     "Still, it sounds kind of bizarre," said Captain Byrne, nursing a
small Skorpian ale. "One of your ancient enemies, working to actually
save a Human."
     "Everything's been bizarre, since the detente," said Sheba,
ubiquitous mineral water in her hand. "It's like everything we knew is
upside down."
     "Well, if Gayla's convinced Bojay, I guess that settles it" said
Starbuck, with a shrug. "I just hope it works."
     "I take it robotic medicine was rare for you folks," asked Father
Fisher, next to Byrne. He was finding the various alien
libations...interesting. 
     "Somewhat," said Boomer. "Partly because of all our medical
advances, it wasn't deemed all that needful. Most things could be
remedied, either aboard a ship, or at a base side hospital. And, I
suppose, a certain prejudice against things becoming too
machine-oriented, what with the Cylons."
     "Yes, I can see that," said the peripatetic cleric. "It would be
inevitable, in a way."
     "Well, let's just hope it works out," said Byrne, finishing his
drink, and rising. "I really like Bojay, and I hope he and Gayla get what
they deserve. Okay, gotta go, folks. The Constellation's heading out on a
long-range recon first thing in the morning, and right now, it's bedtime
for Byrnezo." 
     "Later," said Sheba, waving as the Earthman left the room. She
looked at the rest. "Byrnezo?" 
     "Ya got me, Sheba," smiled Boomer. He tossed back the last of his
drink, and pushed the chair back. "I'm going to check in on Bojay, before
hitting the bunk. Anyone coming with me?"
     "Lead the way," said Sheba. Starbuck nodded.
     "Well, I shall be offering up prayers for the Lieutenant, at
Compline this evening," said Fisher. He took a final sip. "You are all of
course invited." 
     "Yes, I think I'd like that" said Sheba. She looked from him, to
Starbuck.
     "Uh, well, I need to check out my ship, before..."
     "Starbuck," she said, simply.
     "Yeah," said Boomer. "We all know how devout you are, Bucko."
Starbuck looked around the room, and found no refuge.
     "Oh yeah," smiled Sheba, looking at Boomer, then the rest. "Book of
the Word on every table top."
     "Count me in," he sighed.


     "He what???" shouted Chakra, next to Lydia, the decadently wonderful
sheets, of Hassarian silk, sliding off the bed almost to the floor. "You
cannot be serious!"
     "Oh but I am," said Lydia, raising herself up on one elbow, and
looking him in the eye. "It seems to be a certainty."
     "This is disgusting!" exclaimed her latest lover, rising from the
bed. "To permit a Cylon to actually operate on a Human?"
     "I know. It's quite disgusting," she replied, agreeably.
     "And Adama is alright with this?" Chakra got up, and strode across
the room, anger on the boil. "Lords of Kobol, what is wrong with him?"
     "Age. Growing soft, under this d‚tente with Baltar and his Cylons."
She shrugged theatrically, rising from the bed herself. "Perhaps even a
touch of senility, for all I know."
     "This is...it's treasonable! And Bojay! He doesn't sound like the
sort of man who would ever countenance such a thing. Not from all I've
heard about him. Unless..."
     "Unless they've done something to him," said Lydia, her tone oh so
reasonable. "Perhaps...I don't know." 
     "They must have!" said Chakra, pounding a fist into the opposite
palm. He turned to look at her, her nakedness on full display. "They must
have done something to him. Has to be!"
     "Or perhaps they mean to," said Lydia, her tone almost...motherly.
She poured another drink, and Chakra took it, after a moment's
hesitation. "I agree, something is not right about this. Permitting a
Cylon to perform the tasks of a Human doctor. Fit a Human with Cylon
parts." She took a sip of her own drink. "Disgusting."
     "Damned right," said Chakra, taking a large swallow of his wine.
"What in Hades Hole about Doctor Salik? Or Paye?" He looked up from the
rim of his glass, and let his gaze slowly rake up and down her superb
form. Within  moments, he had, quite obviously, forgotten about Bojay and
Cylon surgeons. 
     "Oh where have you been all my life?" she moaned, as she let slip
the daggits of her lust, and began to lose herself in her physical
sensations. Chakra may have been many things, she decided, but a slacker
with a woman he most certainly was not.  
     "You really are a marvelous woman, Siress," said Chakra, after a
long stretch of silence. Lydia took a deep breath, savoring the
sensations still coursing through her body. "I can't thank you enough for
getting me off that filthy prison barge."
     "I think you just did, my dear Chakra," she cooed, almost
maternally. "You just did."
     "Well, I hope to be worthy of your trust." His eyes moved from her
still-sweaty form, to his goblet on the bedside table. Smiling, Lydia
handed it to him. He drank deeply, once more feeling the alcohol burn
sensuously, as it went down. Lydia took it from his hand, and slowly set
it back down upon the table. 
     "You shall be, I have no doubt. Whatsoever." They made long slow
love again, then settled back onto the bed. She held him close, stroking
his damp hair, till the sound of his steady breathing told her that he
was under. "Chakra?" She waited a beat. "Chakra, can you hear me?"
     "Yes," he replied at last, eyes closed, his voice laced with sleep.
"Yes, I can hear you."
     She smiled, again, as she spoke, looking up and down his taut, lean
male form. Of all her lovers, and they were many, Chakra was...well, best
not to dwell too much on that. Too strong an attachment could be
dangerous, even deadly. Chakra would serve his purpose.
     Until his usefulness was spent.
     "Good. Now, listen to me, Chakra. This is very important."

Chapter Nine

     "Now, give that to me again," said Chameleon, as he and his son
shared a light breakfast in the Senior Officer's billet. In different
times, the presence of a civilian here would have been permitted only on
Fleet Day, when relatives and others came aboard, and were given tours of
the Fleet's vessels. But then, Starbuck had never been accused of being a
slave to the manual. "I guess I'm missing something."
     "Well, it seems that way back, the Cylons, the original organic
Cylons, perfected a lot of surgical techniques, when they began to
augment themselves with cybernetic parts. That's all in the Cylon history
files Baltar sent over. That, and Doctor Salik allowed Septimus access to
everything in our databanks about Human medicine and surgery. Wilker and
Hummer have fabricated the neural interface assemblies that will be
attached to Bojay's residual limbs. If all goes well, he'll have a full
set of prosthetics, when it's all done."
     "Commander Adama has actually approved this?"
     "Yes he has. LifeStation has full clearance to do it." 
     "I've heard of artificial limbs, son. Even cloned body parts. But to
give a man pieces from a Cylon..." The old wagerer shook his head.
     "Yeah, it is kind of wild."
     "But can it...I mean he, do it? Really? He's never actually operated
on anyone before, has he? This Septimus."
     "No, but then the Cylons aren't like us. They don't need yahrens of
practice and experience to learn how to do complex tasks. Once the
programming is uploaded into their data banks, and integrated into the
operating systems, they can do whatever it is, as skillfully as a Human."
     "Still, it's kind of creepy, son."
     "Yeah, it is. I mean, it took yahrens for Apollo and I to learn to
coordinate our flying, to counter various Cylon tactics. To flow together
as a team. But the Centurions can set up a pinwheel attack fresh out of
the factory. It's just how they're made. And from what I heard, only
Cylons of the IL Group and above have the ability to absorb data this
complex. Medical stuff, I mean. The Centurions have a similar brain, but
a smaller processor array."
     "Is that why they're so stupid?"
     "Basically, yeah," replied Starbuck, with a smile. Then he recalled
for a moment Cy, the crashed and damaged Centurion he had repaired, on
the planet he had dubbed "Starbuck". Cy had been anything but stupid.
     "When does it happen?" asked Chameleon, finishing the last of his
water. "The surgery, I mean."
     "Later this morning. I called Cassie, and she said he was being
rolled into prep right about now." 
     "What are the odds, do you know?" asked his father. "I'm sure they
must be something."
     "Nope. Not going there. You don't take bets on a friend," said
Starbuck, gently. "Certainly not a wounded Warrior you've flown with."
     "No," said Chameleon, pushing back a bit from the table "You don't.
Well, I wish him all the best. The Lords be with him."


     "How are things progressing?" Lydia asked, across the chemical tanks
from Chakra.
     "Oh, just fine," replied the paroled convict, a bit unconvincingly,
hefting the spray gun he had been readying. They were in one of the
repair hangars aboard the Galactica, and Chakra was part of a small work
detail. The gun contained a fire-resistant coating, to be sprayed on
various exposed surfaces. The formulation was new, obtained from the
Zykonians, and Adama had approved it's use aboard ship. It was more
resistant to fire than the standard compound, and easily prepared from
materials readily to hand in the Fleet.
     "I'm glad," she replied, as he adjusted the settings. Part of the
conditions of Chakra's parole was "community service", as some of the
Earth refugees termed it. Since he was one of the cons with an extensive
technical background, he had been put to work as part of the Battlestar's
standard maintenance and upgrade program. She watched as he set to,
spraying the grayish-colored gunk over and around a service bay. 
     "Well, I'm not," said Chakra, after finishing his first pass. "I
mean, yes, I'm glad to be off the barge. Don't get me wrong, Siress."
     "But?"
     "But...ah Hades Hole. I don't know. I just..."
     "Wish you were free. No strings."
     "Yes! Exactly. Come and go as I please, and not on a leash."
     "I understand," she said, and stood back as he sprayed on another
coat. Chakra was good at this, she had to admit. The Fleet would be the
poorer, for the loss of his talents. "And I am working on it, Chakra."
     "Working on?" he asked, slipping his mask up off his face.
     "Making your freedom...permanent." 
     "Can you really do that?" he asked.
     "I think something can be worked out, eventually, Chakra. I am not
without a certain influence, after all." She watched his expression.
"Yes. Think of it. Never have to come back here, or to the barge. Never
again a convict. Your own man."
     "Well, I hope so. I..."
     "Chakra?" she said, her voice changing, becoming low.
Almost...dangerous.
     "Yeah?"
     "Listen to me, Chakra. Septimus."
     Almost at once, Chakra's face went slack, his eyes seeming to lose
sight of the world about him. "Do you hear me, Chakra?"
     "Hey, you!" said a voice. Lydia turned; it was Master Chief Varica.
"You, Chakra! You're not here to stand around gassing. Get back
to...uhh!"
     "Get rid of him!" said Lydia, and Chakra grabbed the insensate man,
and drug him to a small locker. "Good job. Now listen to me, Chakra,"
said Lydia. "You will go up to LifeStation. There, you will do what you
must do. Do you understand me?"
     "Yes," replied Chakra, voice becoming dull, eyes losing more of
their focus. "I understand you."
     "Good. Now, here." She handed him the small laser she had used on
Varica. "And remember, it is for Humanity, Chakra. You are doing this for
all of us."
     "Yes. For Humanity."
     "Yes. Now go!" 
     Lydia stepped back, watching Chakra head towards the lift. She
counted down the microns, then followed him. Once back in her ship-board
quarters, she dumped her mask and wig, and slipped out of her
non-descript cloak. Moving to the bar, she poured herself a drink. "To
Humanity!" she said, with a smile. Then, with a short laugh: 
     "To Lydia!"


     "Actually, I am quite gratified to have this opportunity," said
Septimus, hovering over Bojay. The Viper pilot lay on the operating
table, as Cassie ran the last-centon safety checks and tests. The IL was
fixed to a modified hoverchair, as he as yet had no new legs of his own,
either.
     "Really?" said Bojay.
     "Oh yes. Ever since I was activated, all I have been allowed to do
is work in prosecuting the war against you Humans. After just over
two-hundred-ninety standard Colonial yahrens, it is actually refreshing
to be able to do something...I think the Human term is 'life-affirming'."
     "What changed your mind?" asked Cassie, as she adjusted the
neuro-transmitter sensors.
     "I saw that Humans were in actuality far more than what we were
always told. And far different, as well. I came to understand that you
did not wish to exterminate the Cylon race at all. That you merely wanted
to be left to live your lives in peace. Unmolested by anyone or
anything."
     "They told you this?" asked Bojay. "That we were actually trying to
wipe out all Cylons?"
     "It is part of our standard initial programming upload, yes. Every
one of us, regardless of Group or Series. Humans are seen as the
unremitting enemies of the Alliance. Bent on the extermination of our
kind. It is part of the whole Cylon ethos, Lieutenant."
     "But?"
     "But, I have learned. You did something that I must admit surprised
me greatly."
     "And that is?" asked Cassie, double-checking the oxygen system flow
sensors. 
     "You reactivated me. A destroyed enemy. Something you did not have
to do. And, you have sought out a way to co-exist in peace, with the crew
of Baltar's BaseShip. Imperial propaganda would never have conceived of,
nor admitted to, anything like this." 
     "Well, we don't actually like fighting," said Bojay. "We just did
what we had to do, to survive."
     "I understand. I suspect that were I Human, I would have acted in
much the same way."
     "Okay, all the instruments are ready to go," announced Cassiopeia. 
     "Before we start," said Bojay, stomach full of flutterons suddenly,
"Explain to me. How is it you can do this, when you never have before."
     "It is part of our nature that we instant adapt and assimilate to
whatever programming or data we upload, Lieutenant. Where a Human would
take many of your yahrens to become skilled at certain tasks, through the
gaining of experience, and the establishment of various neural pathways
in your brains, we can develop, and even initiate, new pathways almost
immediately, once the information in question is fully integrated into
our data files." The IL raised his flashing head, and a holographic image
unfolded in the air over Bojay. It showed a network of blood vessels, and
the nerves branching between and around them. "I have inputted every text
in your databanks on microvascular, as well as neural surgical research
and existing templates for minor repairs, into my memory. Combined with
the design of the interface we shall be using, it will be possible for
me, assisted by your Doctors Salik, Paye, and Cassiopeia, to attach the
artificial limbs with a high chance of success."
     "It will be good to walk again," admitted Bojay. 
     "We'll be doing just your arm, first," said Salik. "We need to be
able to watch how the healing and fusion progresses, as well as let you
recover your strength, for the next operation."
     "One at a time, huh?"
     "Yes. But don't worry. Within a centar, you should be on your feet
again," said Salik.
     "My feet," said Bojay, quietly. They wouldn't really be his feet, he
reflected. They would be the product of the fabrication facilities aboard
the Cylon ship, stripped down to the bare minimum, made to match the
interior of Human limbs. "And I'm not going to look like some holovid
fusion freak?"
     "We have the artificial skin overlay," said Paye. "As soon as
everything checks out and your healing is complete, you'll be given the
outer covering. It will look just like your own skin and muscle,
Lieutenant."
     "And, it will have the tactile senses of Human dermal tissue," said
Septimus. 
     "Plus, with some minor modifications to the inner circuits, there
will be warmth," said Paye. "It will feel, to anyone who touches it, like
genuine Human flesh." Bojay looked at the tray, next to he operating
table. The Cylon-made limb was there, it's polished surfaces shining
brightly. It looked like a metal skeletal arm, but with conduits and
micropumps and complex linkages inside clearly visible. And, soon, Lords
of Kobol willing, it would be part of him.
     "He swallowed. Hard. 
     "I hope so." 
     They heard the outer hatch chime, and Cassie checked the screen. It
was Gayla. She would be watching from behind the force field. 
     "Gayla is here," said Cassie.
     "Your consort, Lieutenant?" asked Septimus.
     "Well, we are going to get sealed, actually. We would have been by
now, if this hadn't happened."
     "I see. If I understand Human psychology correctly, this should be
an added incentive for you to be able to return to full function, as soon
as possible."
     "Yeah," said Bojay. He was still apprehensive. Hades Hole, he was
scared nearly mongless! Not merely a major operation, but one performed
by a Cylon! 
     "Well, shall we?" asked Septimus. With a nod, Cassie pressed the
first key, and the mix of medications making up his anesthetic began to
flow, as they slipped the life-ask over his face. Gradually, Bojay began
to feel the lethargy creep slowly through his ravaged body. He had
trouble focusing his gaze, and he tried to focus on the odd surgeon above
him, the IL's oscillating optical scanners somehow making the transition
to slumber easier.
     "Okay..." a voice seemed to say, then he heard another voice.
Another  voice, and a shout. A sharp cry...
     "Everyone stop! Now!"
     "Wha...." He tried to say, then blackness took him.


     "Commander!" said Athena, at her station on the bridge. He voice
sounded urgent, and he turned quickly.
     "Yes, Athena?"
     "We just got a call from LifeStation, Commander. It sounded like a
shout. Then, the channel went dead."
     "Play it for me."
     Athena did so. The screen showed MedTech Garcia, face close to the
screen, shouting.
     "Bridge, this is LifeStation! We have a host..." Then Garcia fell
away from the screen, and the image went dead.
     "Try and raise LifeStation," said Adama.
     "Isn't this the scheduled time for Bojay's surgery?" asked Colonel
Tigh, coming over to the Commander. 
     "Yes, Colonel, it is," replied Athena. "In fact..."
     A screen suddenly came to life, and Adama was looking at...who? On
her own, Athena sent the image to the personnel computer, for a facial
recognition scan.
     "Commander Adama!" said the man on the screen. Not a question or
query, more like a demand.
     "This is Commander Adama. Who is this, and what do you want?" He
looked down, as Athena gestured. The computer had come up with an
identity on the man.
     Hades Hole! How in...
     "This has to stop! Do you understand me? This has to stop, now!"
     "Identify yourself!" replied Adama.
     "Chakra. From the Celestra. I have taken over LifeStation.
This...obscenity has to stop. Do you understand me? It must stop now!"
     "What obscenity are you referring..."
     "Don't give me that! This monstrosity, mixing Human and Cylon
together! Either you stop it, now..." he was quiet a moment.
     "Yes?"
     "Or I kill everyone in LifeStation, now. Starting with Gayla!' The
camera moved back, and they could see that he had the woman in a firm
grip, a small weapon pressed against her head. "Do you understand me?"
     "Chakra, don't..."
     "DO YOU UNDERSTAND ME, COMMANDER?????" the con shouted, his whole
body shaking with rage, his voice unstable. Adama had no doubt that man
would, indeed, do what he promised, if he didn't get what he wanted.     
     "Yes. I understand you."
     "Good." 

Chapter Ten


     How in Hades Hole did a convicted murderer get off the Prison Barge,
and aboard the Galactica?" demanded Adama, anger simmering just below the
surface.
     "He was released this morning, Commander," said Omega, print-out in
hand. 
     "Released? By whom?" he snapped, loudly, taking the proffered
document from the other. "
     "It seems he was part of Siress Lydia's work-parole program, sir,"
said Omega. 
     "Siress...oh Lords of Kobol!" He turned to Athena. "Find Siress
Lydia, and have her report...no, order her to report to me on the bridge,
at once! Under escort, if necessary!"
     "Yes, Commander."
     "What's Siress Lydia doing with convicts?" asked Tigh, at Adama's
elbow. Unless she's trolling them for a new lover, he thought, but kept
to himself.
     "It's part of her work rehabilitation program, that she proposed to
the Council, a few sectons ago," Adama replied, visibly riled. "Convicts
with various skills could work off some portion of their sentences, earn
better rations and privileges, by volunteering to take part, under
supervision, in necessary tasks of labor, production, and maintenance
across the Fleet."
     "And she let a convicted killer loose?" Tigh vividly remembered the
Celestra incident, and the murder of Kronus. "That's insane."
     "No. Not insane, Tigh." Adama scowled, silent a moment. "No. Not
insane."
     "Comander," said Athena. "Security reports Siress Lydia is not in
her quarters aboard ship. They are tracking her down, now."
     "Tell them to hurry, Athena." He turned, as a scan of Chakra in
LifeStation came on another monitor. "Lives are at stake." He turned to
Omega. "Try and find out how a prisoner on work release was able to get
that far inside the ship, without clearance."
     "I may already have that answer, sir. He used Master Chief Varica's
security ID."
     "Master Chief...how did he get that?"
     "We just this centon got a report from Security, sir. Master Chief
Varica was found unconscious in a locker, down in Service Bay Four. He
appears to have been stunned, and his Security ducat is missing. And
according to computer logs, his code was used to access other areas of
the ship."
     "What areas?"
     "The lifts normally reserved for officers, and...and an ordnance
locker, in Theta Section."
     "Ordnance locker? Oh God! What did he take?"
     "Unknown as yet, Commander. Security is on the way."
     "Ordnance...Varica attacked...Damnation, where is Lydia?" 
     "Commander? Are you there?" demanded Chakra.
     "Yes, I am here, Chakra," said Adama, snapping back to the moment.
"What do you want?"
     "I told you what I want, Commander." He waited a beat. "Well? What
about my demands?"
     Slowly. Delay him. We need to buy time. Distract him.
     "What guarantee do we have that you'll let your hostages go, if we
comply with your demands?"
     "I guarantee you you'll be scraping what's left of them off the
bulkheads if you don't," replied Chakra. 
     Tigh touched his elbow, and handed him a printout. Aside from a
laser sidearm, there were dozen anti-personnel grenades, missing from the
locker. 
     "Let me see and talk to them," said Adama, trying to keep his anger,
and fear, in check. "I want to know they are still alive and well."
     "I'm okay, Commander," said Gayla, as the field of view widened
slightly. She was in the outer ward of LifeStation, he noticed. "But the
door to the inner ward is sealed, and he can't...uhhhh!" Chakra
backhanded her, and she stumbled backwards, into a table. She fell, and
was still.
     "Chakra!" shouted Adama. "If you hurt any..."
     "You'll do what, Adama? Sentence me to the Prison Barge?" He leaned
close to the pickup. "Look, this is how it is going to be. You stop
this...this abomination. Turn that Cylon, that... mechanical obscenity,
over to me, and I will let them all go. After it is destroyed, of
course."
     "You expect us to trust you? A convicted mutineer, as well as
murderer?"
     "If you don't do as I say," said Chakra, coldly, "I will blow
LifeStation to pieces, Commander." He held up a belt of grenades. "Do I
make myself clear?"
     "Chakra, I..."
     "DO I MAKE MYSELF CLEAR?"
     "You do," said Adama.
     "Good. Now, the abomination will cease all actions, and surrender
itself to me, or I will destroy LifeStation." He ran a thumb lightly over
the detonator of a grenade, smiling. "You have one centar, Commander."
And the screen went blank.

     "He'll never agree to it," said Cassie. She and the rest were behind
the force-field reinforced hatch. "Not the Commander."
     "Why does he hate his fellow Human so much?" asked Septimus. This
aspect oh Human behavior was quite new to him.
     "It's not that," said Cassie. "He just seems to hate the idea of
cooperation with Cylons."
     "Perhaps I should surrender myself to him," suggested Septimus.
"Perhaps..."
     "No," said Salik. "I doubt Chakra would keep his word, even if you
did."
     "Then what is to be done?"


     "What's the situation in LifeStation?" asked Tigh.
     "According to the computer, there are three patients in the recovery
ward, and one currently scheduled for physical therapy," replied Athena,
checking her screen. "I have contacted the Medtechs in those wards, and
updated them on the situation."
     "Good work," said Adama.
     "Father?" said a voice. Adama turned, to see Apollo enter, Starbuck
with him. "We just heard. What's going on?" Adama filled his son in.
     "Commander!" said Athena, turning to look at him, face tense. "We
just got an update on the people in LifeStation." She handed him the
hardcopy. One patient was Jolly, recovering from a bout of Saggitarian
flu. The second was Lycos, one of the civilian workers billeted aboard,
and the third...
     "Sheba?"
     "Yes, sir."
     "We had a mishap in our quarters," said Apollo. "A shelf she was
moving shifted, and she wrenched her left elbow badly. She was in for
some physical therapy this morning."
     "Lords..." seethed Adama. 
     "Commander?" said a voice, and he turned. It was Siress Lydia,
entering the bridge. "You needed to see me?"


     "We'll, we're going to have to do something, and soon," said Cassie,
eyes on the instruments. "Bojay is fully under. Either we proceed with
the surgery, or we'll have to reverse the anesthetic" She looked at the
other doctors, and then Septimus.  
     "It would be wrong, would it not, to let threats and...what is your
Human word...terrorism, decide someone's fate," said Septimus. "At least
that is what my reading of your Human philosophy and moral codes tells
me. I think we should continue with the procedure." He waited a beat. "It
is your decision, of course."
     "Doctor Salik?" asked Cassiopeia, eyes questioning. She had to admit
to feeling in a serious quandary. What if Chakra made good his threat,
only decided to up the timetable? If he found that they were proceeding
with the operation, mightn't he decide to just start killing, and to
Hades Hole with timetables? The Security force field was in place,
sealing him off for the moment, but that didn't help Gayla or Garcia
much. And if he chose to detonate those grenades...
     Salik was quiet a moment, looking at each of them, at the sealed
door, the bank of instruments, then back at the patient. He took a deep
breath, and straightened up. 
     "Let's go." 


     "You'll never get away with this," said MedTech Garcia, sitting up
against a bulkhead, on the floor. He had slowly recovered from the stun
blast, but Chakra had told him to remain where he was. 
     "That...!" he said, almost spitting the word, as he pointed towards
the surgical ward, "cannot be allowed to proceed!"
     "They're just trying to save a man's whole future!" said Garcia. He
heard a groan, and saw Gayla beginning to stir. "Save him from a life of
crippled dependency."
     "With parts from a Cylon?" snarled the murderer. "That's sick!
Fracking sick!"
     "Hey, we're Lords know how many light-yahrens from home, Chakra.
It's not like we can just turn around, and put in at a base hospital."
     "You would actually want...pieces from a fracking Cylon inside you?
Attached to your body?" He leaned close, his eyes filled with disgust.
"Ending up more Cylon than man?"
     "If it was the only chance I had to live something close to a..." He
stopped, as Gayla shook her head, and tried to sit up. "To as normal a
life as possible? Hades yeah. Damned right I would. I'd take it in a
Caprica City Centon." He snapped his fingers. 
     "What's happening?" asked Gayla, massaging her throbbing head.
Garcia filled her in.
     "You're sick!" shouted Chakra. "The both of you! To countenance
something that vile. To accept it for yourself! I ought to..." He
fingered the trigger on the pistol.
     "Hey, hey Chakra!" said Gayla. "Don't..."
     Something's wrong! Thought Garcia, studying Chakra as closely as he
dared to. It's like...is he drugged?
     "Oh don't worry. I told Adama you had a centar. I meant it." He
looked at the weapon, changed the setting from stun to kill, then back to
her. "But...after that..."   


     "Had I known, I would never have recommended him for this program,
Adama," said Lydia, still on the bridge. She was so convincing in her
tone, she almost believed herself. "This is as much a surprise to me, as
it is to you, believe me."
     "Why would you include Chakra?" asked Tigh. "After what he did?"
     "He is a highly trained technician, in several areas, Colonel. I
hardly need tell you how much the Fleet needs trained people to try and
keep up with the basic maintenance schedule. It's punishing enough on the
workers we have as it is. We need people."
     "How did he even know about this operation?" asked Apollo, pointing
at the screen. "Bojay's." 
     "You know as well as I do, Captain, that news travels faster than
BaseShips, in the Fleet. I think there was even a short piece on IFB
about it, last night."
     "I saw it," said Starbuck. "When I was having a meal with my father.
A short piece." He looked at Apollo, obviously worried sick for Sheba,
but refusing to show it. Hades Hole, he was as fearful for Cassie. 
     "How did he manage to get this far inside the ship?" asked Lydia, in
a truly award-winning performance. "As part of the work program, he would
not have had clearance, surely?"
     "He used a stolen ID ducat," said Tigh. "Master Chief Varica's."
     "He killed someone to get a security ducat?"
     "No, the Master Chief is still alive, but unconscious," said Adama.
"Hopefully, we'll be able to get some information out of him. If he
survives."
     The Commander turned away at that moment, as the monitor sprang to
life, and didn't notice Lydia turning white as sheet.
     But others did.


Chapter Eleven


     "What is keeping him?" muttered Chakra. He looked up at the chrono,
on the bulkhead, then back at his hostages. "He'd better not be planning
anything."
     "Just your funeral," said Gayla, with more bravado than she felt. 
     "And I'm sure Doctor Salik would be happy to provide a free
autopsy," added Garcia."
     "I'll help," said Gayla.
     "Shut up, bitch!" snarled Chakra, smacking her with one hand. "Keep
your tongue behind your teeth, or you'll lose both!" He started to pace.
"Disgusting, you wanting to be with him, after this! Not a man! A
glorified Cylon meat puppet!"
     "What do you care?" asked Garcia. "It's not like it has anything to
do with you. She's the one sealing with him."
     "If this works, it could open up a whole new future for the maimed
and crippled," said Galya. "We've been so limited, since fleeing the
Colonies. Now, we have a chance to.."
     "Chance? A chance to adulterate ourselves!" snarled Chakra. "To
overturn, no betray, everything that makes us Human! Everything we spent
the last thousand yahrens fighting to safeguard!" 
     "Lose your legs, Chakra. Lose them, and an arm, and face of life of
handicap, and crippled restrictions, and then tell me about what it means
to be Human, or betraying us for wanting to be able to stand again,"
Gayla retorted, trying to keep her anger in check. "To walk again? Lords
of Kobol, you'd crawl into the operating room, for that. Hades Hole,
you'd crawl over to the BaseShip, for a chance to be normal again. All
your platitudes about Humanity be damned."
     "I'm right, Gayla!" replied Chakra. "You'll see. I'm not the only
one in the Fleet who feels like this. You watch! You'll see!"
     

     Inside, behind the security field, Septimus was well into the
procedure. Already, the interface assembly had been attached, it's steel
fasteners clamped to the ends of the humerus. Now, as the osteofuser did
its work, fusing bone to metal, the incredibly delicate work of
connecting the remains of the nerves, both motor and sensory, to the
proper circuits, could begin.
     "I've never seen anything like this," Doctor Paye said, quietly, to
his CO. "And the precision."
     "If this keeps up," said Cassie, as the IL continued to work, "we
all may be out of a job."
     "Oh do not worry," said Septimus, never taking his optical sensors
off his patient. "I am sure there will continue to be enough to do that
you will not cease to be needed, My Good Doctors."
     "Sure hope so," said Salik, watching as the Cylon-cum-surgeon used a
microlaser to seal a connection. Feeling like he was a student again, the
Galactica's CMO just shook his head in silent amazement. 


     "So, what do we do?" asked Starbuck, in the Ward Room, off the
bridge. "If we try and rush him, he'll pop those charges, there goes
everyone. We've already pulled all the security people back, like he
demanded. If he sees a uniform..."
     "Sheba?" asked Adama, looking at the holo-images, floating in the
air before them. In front of him were scans from Chakra, the ward where
Sheba and the rest had been when it had all begun, and the surgical
theatre. 
     "He still doesn't seem to be aware that anyone is in here,
Commander," replied Sheba. "We can see him on the monitor."
     "What about using the Zykonian transport device?" ventured Apollo.
He looked to Engineer Twilly, arguably the one man in the Fleet, who
understood the machine better than anyone. Even Wilker. "Could we use it
to grab him, and transport him out of there?"
     "Yes we could..." he began.
     "Well, then let's do it!" said Apollo.
     "But there's a problem."
     "Oh God, isn't there always?" hissed Apollo, at the engineer.
     "Apollo, please!" said Adama, holding up a hand. "Go on, Engineer."
     "We could transport from one part of the ship to another, yes. It
has been done, as you recall. But, that area of the ship is alive with
circuits and high energy power conduits. To get Chakra, and get him out
of there, or even to grab the hostages, would require great precision.
All that stuff in the way could interfere with the transport lock, or
scramble the frequencies."
     "But..."
     "Plus," continued Twilly, "even if we got a perfect lock, there's
the noise."
     "The noise?" asked Colonel Tigh.
     "Yes. Once the cycle begins, the scan signal superheterodynes onto
the main signal. As a result, it makes a lot of noise. A Hades of a lot
of noise. If we are off, even a bit, and Chakra hears that, he could have
time to activate one of the charges he's carrying. What that might do,
partially enveloped in the transport field, we just have no idea."
     "Essentially, you can't guarantee he won't be able to detonate the
charges, before the beam takes hold of him," said Adama.
     "No, sir. We can't."
     "What about anesthetic gas?" asked Starbuck.
     "Yeah," said Sheba. "Could we just knock him out, that way?" They
all turned to Medtech Waheeb.
     "It is possible," said Waheeb. "But it would have to immobilize him
almost instantly. Once he feels the effect start, he could still shoot
one of the hostages, or trip one of the mines. Plus there are the air
vents." He motioned to Twilly, and a schematic of the area came up.
"There are connecting vents throughout LifeStation. But if we introduce
any sort of gas, it will filter in to the other compartments. Now there
is a danger, to Bojay. If any of the gas gets in there, with him already
being under anesthetic, it could pose a serious risk. Even be potentially
fatal, depending on how much he got."
     "It seems like there's no way to resolve this," said Apollo.
     "And," added Waheeb, "if Lieutenant Sheba were to inhale any, it
could react badly with her baby."
     "You mean..." began Sheba.
     "Yes. According to the medical literature, this kind of gas can
cause unpredictable side-effects. Sudden miscarriages are not unknown,
albeit only in laboratory animal tests. We have no Human data."
     "Mong!" snapped Apollo. He looked around the table, then at his
wife. 
     "Hey," said Starbuck, slowly, as an idea came to him. "Those charges
Chakra snagged?"
     "What about them?" asked Adama. He looked at Starbuck, who clearly
had one of his wild plans formulating in his head.
     "Which ones?" he looked at Adama, then at Twilly. "Which ones?"
     "Commander," came a voice over the intercom. Rigel's.
     "Yes, Rigel?"
     "There is a message here for you. One of the Earth refugees,
a...father Fisher, would like to speak with you, sir."
     "Can it wait?" asked Adama. "This situation..."
     "He says it has to do with the hostage situation, Commander. He says
he has a proposal to make." 


     "Adama!" bellowed Chakra, into the monitor. "You're time is running
out! You have only sixteen centons left! Sixty-one centons, or people are
going to start dying!"
     "I have not forgotten the time, Chakra," said Adama, a bit testily.
"I want to talk to the hostages again."
     "And why should I?"
     "Because if they have been harmed in any way, all bets are off, and
we'll take our chances."
     "You wouldn't dare!" said Chakra. He held up one of the bandoliers.
"One touch on a switch, and the whole LifeStation goes up. You know I'll
do it. I have nothing else to lose, Commander."
     "Except the murder of several of your fellow Human Beings," said
Lydia, coming out from behind Adama. For a moment, Chakra was silent,
staring at the Siress. He looked, Adama thought...confused? "Chakra,
wasn't the death of Commander Kronus enough?" She looked at him with an
expression of compassion. "I got you a spot in this program, so you could
make a positive contribution to your fellow Colonials. Show that there
was still some sort of Humanity left in you." She waited a beat. "Is this
how you repay me?"
     "What? You...you don't understand!" shouted Chakra. "I'm doing this
for Humanity! For the salvation of all of us!"
     "Now listen to me, Chakra," said Lydia, but with a wail of seeming
pain, Chakra cut the link.
     "Felcercarb!" said Apollo. "What is..."
     "How do you propose to resolve this, Adama?" asked the Siress. "This
is escalating dangerously."
     "I didn't release him," said the Commander, giving her a baleful
glare.
     "Even so, this is spiraling out of control. I trust you have some
sort of plan for such emergencies?"
     "Siress Lydia, that is precisely what we are trying to do." Adama
looked at her, and it was a glare that made even Lydia feel caution. "And
time is running out." He looked up, as the IC pinged. He took the
message, and excused himself. Lydia watched him go, face unreadable.
     "What is it, Father?" Adama asked, out in the corridor. The other
looked directly at him.
     "I have a plan, Commander. This hostage situation."
     "How did you learn of it?"
     "It is all over the Fleet. But I want to help."
     "What can you hope to do? Chakra is a convicted killer, with nothing
more to lose."
     "Well, as I said, I have a plan." Adama listened, considering, then
shaking his head.
     "No, I cannot countenance this."
     "But..."
     "The answer is no. Your courage speaks well of you, but I will risk
no more lives, father Fisher. It has to be no."


     "Okay, Commander," said Starbuck, after Adama had returned. "We got
a good look at the solenite charges, and cross-checked them with the ones
from the locker. They are the Lance 450 anti-equipment hand mine. Similar
to the ones we used when we hit the depot on Gamoray."     
     "I see. You propose to use the remote circuit to deactivate them."
Adama nodded. "Not bad. But as I recall, the range is limited."
     "That's the rub, Commander," said Apollo. "We ran a couple sims,
with Twilly. We'd have to be close. With the force-fields in place, and
all the electrical impulses all over that section, we'd practically have
to be on top of him, to remotely deactivate them."
     "That's the drawback with the 450 model, Commander," said Twilly.
Adama nodded. The 450 was often used by Special Forces troops, rigging a
target for demolition, or gunning for an individual enemy. Once in place,
they could be detonated remotely, either individually, or all at one go,
They could also be deactivated the same way. With the right signal...
     "How close will you need to get?" asked the Commander.
     "To be certain," said the engineer, checking his figures on one
screen, "Within twenty-five metrons. Ten would be optimum."
     "But can you get that close?" asked Lydia. "Surely if he sees anyone
coming, he will just start killing." 
     "I don't think so," said Sheba, over the link. "He's obsessed with
destroying that Cylon. He won't just give up, if he knows it means he's
failed. He'll try and figure out what you are doing, and that will give
us a few moments of confusion."
     "She's right, Commander," said Jolly, right behind her. "This guy is
whacko. He's not going to give up on killing that Cylon."
     "How would you get close enough?' asked Tigh. "The air vents?"
     "I was thinking of the service crawlway, that runs right under
LifeStation," said Twilly, bringing up the schema on the holo. "At it's
closest, it will get within less than four metrons of where he is." 
     "Who?" asked Adama. 
     "Me, Commander," said Starbuck. They all looked at him. 
     Starbuck?
     Volunteering?     
     "Starbuck?" said Jolly.
     "Hey, it was my idea, remember. And, well, I am the most...svelt of
us. I can slip through the crawlways easier."
     "But I know where they go," said Twilly. "All those circuits."
     "But I'm trained for things like this," said Starbuck. "You aren't."
He looked to Adama. "Commander?"
     "Go." Adama looked at Twilly. "Get him the frequencies for the mines
from the computer, and the layout for that section of service crawlways."
     "Yes, sir."
     "Now, Starbuck," began Adama, when Lydia cried out.
     "What in...?"
     On one monitor, someone was approaching the main hatchway to
LifeStation. 
     "Isn't that Fisher, the Earth refugee?" asked Tigh.
     "What in Hades Hole..." said Apollo.


Chapter Twelve

     "He what?" said Starbuck, stopping in his tracks, as he and Twilly
made for the access hatches for the service crawlways. 
     "He offered himself in place of the hostages," replied the engineer.
"Yeah! He offered himself, if Chakra would release Galya. Can you believe
it?"
     "Well, he is supposed to be some sort of religious type, from Earth.
Piety and good works and all that, Twilly. Maybe this is normal there."
Starbuck had missed the initial offering from Fisher, as Adama had
ordered him to get going, and not wait a micron longer. Twilly had caught
up with him, equipment in hand, a centon later.
     "Do you think Chakra will go for it? He didn't sound too
accommodating to me." 
     "I don't know, Twilly," said Starbuck, as they reached the hatchway.
Twilly entered the access code, and the hatch slid open. It was about a
metron above the deck, and Starbuck would have to, literally, crawl
through it, to reach the spot in question. Twilly handed him the chip
reader, with the layout of the conduits clearly marked, and the rest of
his equipment. "Now, once you get there, the signal should penetrate far
enough to trip the relays in the grenades, and deactivate them."
     "What if Chakra realizes what's happened?"
     "He shouldn't. The circuits are very quiet."
     "But if?
     "Then crawl like Hades Hole to get out of there. Someone who knows
what they are doing can reset the detonators very quickly."
     "Well, Chakra was a washout from the Academy," replied Starbuck.
"But he lasted almost a full yahren. He would have been trained in this."
     "I just hope he doesn't expect us to try something like this," said
Twilly. "He may be crazy, but he isn't the dumbest thing in the Fleet,
either."
     "Thanks for mentioning it now," said Starbuck. "You are such a
confidence booster, Twilly. Remind me to invite you to my next hostage
crisis, huh?" He slid through the opening, and began to slither along.
"You know," he called back, "this is actually kind of ironic, when you
think about it."
     "What? Me, helping you to rescue the woman who divorced me?"
     "Yeah. Exactly."
     "Well, life's funny that way. Now get going!"
     "Yes, sir, Commander Twilly. Sir," Starbuck saluted, theatrically. 
     "Oh please!" said Twilly, and sealed the hatch behind him. 
     Starbuck was on his own, now.


     "How much longer?" asked Doctor Paye, as Commander Septimus
continued his work on Bojay. 
     "I estimate approximately thirty-one centons, until we are ready to
seal up, and begin the neural regenerative stage," replied the IL. The
speed and precision with which his robotic hands worked, never tiring,
never missing a motion, was unlike anything they had ever seen. Even the
most gifted of Human surgeons could not work this fast, but the accuracy
was flawless. If this worked out, Salik mused, this could open up an
entirely new chapter in Colonial medicine. 
     Lords, how many people could have been helped, through the
centi-yahrens, had the Cylons been our friends? How many in the Fleet
could we help, even now? My God!


     "Why should I?" snarled Chakra, as the offer was given him. "This is
some sort of trick, by Adama!"
     "No, I swear to you, Mister Chakra," replied the other, hands
raised, "I do not come from Commander Adama, nor with his approval. In
fact, he actually denied my request to make this offer. I am here
entirely on my own."
     "Your own? Then why in Hades Hole are you doing this? No one offers
himself up like a sacrificial agnon, you...whoever you are."
     "Just call me Fisher," said the other. "The code of my calling
enjoins upon me to practice compassion, and the seeking of peaceful
resolution, whenever the opportunity arises. I am in earnest, I assure
you. Release at least the woman, and I will act as substitute hostage. My
life, for hers."
     "I...I have to think about this," said Chakra. He turned to his
prisoners. "You know this guy?"
     "Never met him," said Gayla, and it was true. While she had caught
the IFB special on the Earth refugees, a few days ago, and seen some of
them touring the Agro Ship One, she had been too busy to actually meet
them personally, nor had she engaged in conversation with any of them.
Chakra grunted, and looked to Garcia. 
     "Me neither," he lied. He had been here, and assisted Salik, in the
physical exams of several of them, when they had first come aboard the
Galactica. He had met, and briefly spoken, with the Earthman, but it had
been just perfunctory, concerned with the details of the medical exam,
and nothing else.
     "Why don't I believe you?" the criminal said, eyes narrowing
slightly. He looked at the visitor through the transparent tylinium
window in the hatch, then leaped to that leading to the Operating
Theatre. He hammered on the door with a chair. It bounced back, repelled
by the force field.
     "Stop! Stop what you are doing right now!!!! I swear to you..."
     "Chakra," said a voice. It was Siress Lydia, on the monitor.
"Chakra, listen to me, Chakra. This is not helping anyone. You have to
stop, now. Listen to me, Chakra. You must do as I say."        
     "I...I have to do what I have to do!" he replied, after a long
moment. He looked from Gayla and Garcia, to the outer hatch. The
confusion in his mind was clear for all to see.
     "You must do as Commander Adama tells you."
     "Please, show your good faith, and accept my offer," said Fisher.
"If you do, then surely Commander Adama will have more reason to trust
your word, about not jumping your deadline."
     
     "Do it," said Sheba, quietly, watching it all on the monitor in the
other ward. "Come on, be a man, and let the lady go!"
     "Does he even have that much Human dignity left?" said Jolly. "After
all he's done, Sheba? He even tried to kill you all on the shuttle,
before. You can't expect a guy like that to suddenly be all noble."
     "Time will tell, Jolly," she said, half-turning to relply. "Time
will...
     "Look!" said Lycos, suddenly, and Sheba turned back to look. "He's
opening the hatch!"
     

     "Get in here!" snarled Chakra, pointing a pistol at the other, and
motioning him inside. The Earth cleric complied. He turned to spare a
quick glance at Gayla. "Go!"
     "But..."
     "Go!" both Chakra and Garcia said, at the same time. The murderer
grabbed her by the right arm, and pulled her towards the door. "Go!" he
hissed again, and shoved her into the corridor, then resealed the door,
and reactivated the force field. She felt something brush her hand as she
went past...
     "Thank you," said the newcomer, as Chakra began to search him, at
gunpoint. "That was actually quite...noble of you."
     "Okay, I've showed my good will, Commander!" snarled Chakra, looking
to the monitor. "I've let the woman go."
     "She has a name, Chakra," said Lydia, her voice almost sibilant as
she looked at him. 
     "Who cares?" he said, motioning the newcomer to move over, to sit
next to Garcia. "My demands remain the same. Turn the Cylon over to me.
Stop the operation, and I let everyone go. Defy me..."
     "You cannot do this," said Fisher. "This is wrong, Mister Chakra. It
is evil."


     "Can he really pull it off?" asked Jolly.
     "Lords know, Jolly," replied Sheba.  
     "Wish we did," said Lycos.
     

     Starbuck decided that he was lucky he was not claustrophobic. Some
parts of the crawlway were as roomy as a Viper cockpit, only with no
outside vision. As he came to a junction, he checked the schema on his
small screen. Yes, he needed to turn left, here. He passed under a blower
fan, circulating air to cool the high-voltage equipment, and squirmed his
way into the next section. He listened on his tiny earpiece, to the
relayed conversation from the drama in LifeStation. It sounded like this
new wrinkle had really put the felixes among the peristons. 
     "I hope this Earth guy knows what he's doing," he muttered, already
turning over various ways to try and turn the situation to their
advantage. Snorting slightly, he moved on.


     "Very soon, now," said Septimus, as the surgery drew on. "Is the
injection ready?"
     "Yes," said Cassie.
     "On my mark, then, Doctor," said the Cylon. Cassie could feel the
sweat build up on her brow, as the microns ticked on. Then, with a final
turn of his instrument, and a soft beep, Septimus declared it was done.
He set the instrument back on it's tray, and Cassie connected the
hypospray to Bojay's intravenous, sending regenerative medications into
his bloodstream. Between that, the regen unit that would be placed around
the site of the surgery, the flesh would heal, knitting and bonding with
the artificial attachment far faster than would happen if left to nature
alone. As soon as the drugs were in, she snapped her eyes to the
monitors, gauging the results, as well as minor changes in Bojay's vital
signs. 
     "Here," said Paye, and Septimus firmly but gently swept the beam
emitter of the built-in unit over the entire area, bathing it in healing
energies. After a few contons, he gently but firmly clamped the portable
regen unit around the area, locking it into position, and activating it.
It softly began to hum.
     "There," said the IL. "We are, for the moment, done, my good
Doctors." He looked up from Bojay, at all of them. "I must say, it has
been quite a strange, as well as stimulating experience, to be able to
assist you in restoring your man to full function. And, I believe the
Human term is, 'an honor', as well."
     "The honor is ours, Commander Septimus," said Salik. 


     "You don't understand?" said Chakra, looking at the newcomer, as if
he'd lost his mind. "You really don't understand?"
     "Remember, we are not from your Colonies. My people never met these
Cylons," said the other. "No, I don't understand. A lot of things, it
looks like."
     "Murdering machines!" spat Chakra, and launched into a diatribe,
recounting, in a disjointed and confused way, the history of the
Colonies' Thousand Yahren War against the implacable forces of the Cylon
Alliance, and it's obsession to destroy all organic sentient life.
Especially Humans.
     "But this Cylon," replied the other, when Chakra finally stopped for
a breath, "is offering to help your man regain his health. To aid him,
not to kill him."
     "Humans and Cylons are different! To mix the two is an abomination!"
Chakra almost screamed.
     Careful. Do not work him up too much. He is already closer to the
edge than you thought.
     "How does your man feel about it?" asked Fisher. "While I can
understand an animus towards an enemy, certainly after a long and
exhausting war, Bojay seems to have been agreeable to the whole idea.
Have you not stopped to consider how he might feel about what you are
doing? Do you think he would approve of this course of action you are
taking, here?"
     "He wasn't. Not to begin with! No, he refused it, like a true, loyal
Colonial should. But they turned him. Brainwashed him into going for it."
     "They?"
     "Yeah. Baltar. The Commander. That bitchy whore Bojay's took up
with." He shook with anger, drawing in deep breaths. "They turned him!
They all have to die!"
     "No one needs to die, Mister Chakra," said the other. "Those Cylons
out there are at peace with us...you, now. The fruits of rational
dialogue..."
     "Dialogue! To Hades Hole with dialogue! There can be no dialogue
with the enemy!" Chakra looked from him, to Garcia. "Maybe Mattoon was
right!" he exclaimed, referring to the lamentable Flight Sergeant
Mattoon, a highly decorated Warrior, who had, finally, after all the
losses he had suffered, snapped mentally at last, and tried to destroy
the d‚tente, with the Cylons of Baltar's BaseShip, and re-ignite the war.
Only quick action by Apollo and Starbuck had prevented the Sergeant from
bringing down utter oblivion upon them all.   
     "Mattoon was psychotic!" said Garcia, with some heat, who had helped
perform the medical and brain scans on the insensate Mattoon after he was
taken down. "He tried to blow up the whole ship! He's still in
loony-land, thank the Lords."
     "Shut up," said Chakra. "Shut up!" He backhanded Garcia across the
face with his pistol. "Next time, it won't be on stun!" he snarled,
pointing the business end of the weapon at the MedTech. "Understand me?" 
     He is utterly insane! And yet...
     "Well," said Chakra, looking at the chrono on the bulkhead. He
activated the link to the bridge. 


     How in Hades Hole do they do this? Crawling through all this? Get
lost so easily! Starbuck checked his position on the scanner. He was
getting closer, but all these pipes and conduits were confusing. Only an
engineer could possibly love this tangled menagerie of circuits and
relays and Lords knew what else, that lined the bulkheads, and the
ceiling above him. Slowing at a junction, he slithered left, and after
passing rows of clacking relays, he came to the inner side of an access
hatch. 
     "Okay," he said to himself. "Here I am." According to the schematic,
he was under the floor of LifeStation, somewhere between Storage Locker
Four, and the main Recovery Room. He double-checked his scanner. Yes, he
was picking up the charges. Chakra had indeed activated them, and they
were armed. He would need to get a bit closer, to insure a strong signal.
Suddenly, something stuck into his exposed neck, and there was a crackle,
like...
     "Oh great! A Zykonian candy wrapper! Slobs!" He rechecked his unit.
Yes, it was all as it should be. He traced out several lines, from a set
of flashing relays, and selected the one he wanted. Taking the tools from
the kit Twilly had given him, he clipped into one line. Then, as quietly
as possible, he opened the hatch. He put his hand to the latch, and...
     "Holy Felcercarb!!!"


Chapter Thirteen

     "What will you do, if he tries to break through?" asked Septimus.
     "Hope the force field on the door holds," said Salik.
     "If I recall the specifications of the Cylon equivalent to the
charges he is carrying, the detonation of three or more, simultaneously,
will be sufficient to breach the door, even if it is reinforced."
     "Well, it's all we have, right now," said Cassie. "They never built
these things to withstand a grenade attack from the inside. The field was
meant only for internal security lockdowns. Quarantine, and keeping
potentially violent patients in check. But this..." She gestured towards
the hatch. She watched as the IL cocked his head to one side, a mannerism
the IL's neural net processor assembly had unconsciously picked up from
contact with Humans. "What is it?"
     "I have an idea, Doctor." He turned to look at Salik. "Might I be
allowed to see the controls for the force field unit?"


     "Septimus wants what?" asked Adama, on the bridge.
     "Access to the engineering schematics for the force field controls
in Life Station, sir," said Omega. "The one sealing off the inner
surgical area."
     "Does he say why?"
     "He said there is no time, but that it is vitally important,
Commander."
     "How is Bojay?"
     "Cassiopeia reports he is fine, sir."
     "Commander?" asked Tigh.
     "You have four centons left, Adama! Do you hear me?"
     "Give it to him!" said Adama. "Septimus. Give it to him, now."


     "Sheba, you scared the fickerfracking mong out of me!" hissed
Starbuck, as he recognized the person above him.
     "That's why they give us brown trousers," she quipped back, lowering
the steel cane she wielded. "What the Hades Hole are you doing here?"
Starbuck explained the plan. Sheba had seen the latch moving, just as
Starbuck got right under her. 
     "Things still the same?" he asked, looking from one to the other. 
     "Yeah," said Jolly. "He's been screaming and spouting his diatribe,
like before, but he hasn't tried to jump the deadline."
     "Yet," said Sheba.
     "That's a plus."
     "You think this will actually work, sir?" asked Lycos, behind
Jolly's bulky form. "If anyone is a micron off..." 
     "Only one way to find out," said Starbuck. He crept quietly to the
port, and dared a peek in. Chakra was still there, back to him, screaming
at Adama over the monitor. This would have to be timed so close.
     "Sir?" asked Lycos.
     "Get ready," he said, passing out pistols to each. "This is going to
be dicier than dating two women at once."
     "Ha!" snorted Jolly. "Then we are in safe hands." Lycos snorted.
     "Funny." He looked at his chrono. "Okay...on my mark. Twenty.
Nineteen."


     "Will it work?" asked Doctor Paye.
     "It has before," said Septimus, peering into the open control panel
next to the door. "Of course..."
     "Of course what?" asked Cassie.
     "That was using Cylon-manufactured equipment, and tools, not
Colonial." He probed the inner circuits with one of the surgical
instruments so recently used on Bojay. "Some of your engineering values
are not...ah!" 
     "Ah?" asked Doctor Salik.
     "Yes. Stand by." Septimus adjusted the probe. "And perhaps you might
indulge in a particular Human action. It has no meaning to a Cylon, of
course, but it seems to, for your species."
     "What's that?" asked Paye.
     "Hope."  


     "Time's up!" said Chakra. He hefted his pistol, and unshouldered one
bandolier of charges. "Adama! You haven't done as you were told! Now, you
shall pay the consequences!" He shook the string of explosives at the
monitor, then moved towards the hatchway. "All of you shall!"
     "You set all those charges off in a room this size, and there won't
be a LifeStation left!" said Garcia. "They'll take out a huge chunk of
the deck!"
     "Don't seek to put blame on me!" said Chakra. "Adama was told what
needed to be done, and he has not complied. Now, he will bear the
responsibility for what happens next." He moved to the door, and lifted a
charge.

     "Okay, here goes," said Starbuck, and pressed a switch. A moment
later, he pressed another.
     "Holy..." said Jolly.


     "...frack!" said Chakra, as the lights in the ward went out, after
flaring up to intense brightness. "Ah...what the..." He pressed the
detonator on one charge. Nothing happened. "What in...no!"


     "Now!" said Septimus, tripping a relay inside the circuit box. There
was a soft buzzing sound, then a pop.


     "Ahhh!" cried out Chakra, suddenly dropping his explosive, and being
hurled back from the door. He flew with great force into the darkness,
and then felt hands take hold of him. Strange, frightening hands.
     "Chakra!" said a voice. "Stop resistance now!"
     "Let me..."
     Chakra screamed, as two doors flew open, one from the recovery ward,
the other from the surgical suite. There were the sounds of struggling in
the darkness, as various bodies thrashed about. Chakra screamed again, as
something crashed into his face, then the sound of a laser filled the
room. Then, the emergency lights popped on, and they could take stock.
     "Starbuck?" said Garcia. 
     "Yeah. Everybody okay?"
     "I think so, yeah." As he spoke, Chakra lay on the floor, Fisher
standing over him, looking down at the unconscious man. Sheba and her
"troops" were there, on Starbuck's left, and Septimus and Doctors Paye
and Salik took up the rest of the space.
     "Everyone else?" asked Garcia. They all nodded in the affirmative. 
     "Excellent work, Lieutenant," said Septimus, hovering over the
insensate terrorist. "You're timing was perfect."
     "Thanks, Septimus," replied Starbuck. "I do my best. Where's
Cassie?" he asked. 
     "With her patient, of course," Paye replied, nodding his head
towards the operating room. "Bojay's unconscious still.  He can't be left
unmonitored."
     "Right." Starbuck moved towards the operating room, putting his mind
at ease when he saw Cassie at her bank of instruments, working to guide
Bojay out of the anesthesia. Her eyes flickered over to him, and she
smiled behind her mask.
     "How's Bojay?" Starbuck asked.
     "He's doing well." Outside, she could hear the hatch open, and the
Security people entering, but right now she was in total doctor mode.
Slowly, Bojay's vitals told her what she wanted to see. 
     "How is he?" asked Septimus.
     "Cassie?" asked Salik, checking the data as well.
     "Looking good," she said as she extubated her patient As she
adjusted the controls, and kept her fingers crossed, she couldn't help
but smile. This was going to work. Bojay was going to make it. Who in the
Colonies would ever have believed... "Dr. Paye did a nerve block, so he
should be completely comfortable at the prosthetic site when he awakens."
     "How is he?" asked Adama, poking his head into the room. Behind him,
Apollo had his arm around Sheba.
     "Your man appears to be doing quite well, Commander Adama," said
Septimus. There was a soft groan, and Bojay's eyes began to flutter.
After a centon or so, they slowly opened, and he looked blearily up at
them.
     "How are you feeling?' asked Cassie and Salik at once.
     "I..." he began, voice raspy. 
     "I trust you are feeling improved, Lieutenant," said the
IL-cum-surgeon.
     "I...I don't know yet," he replied. "I don't feel much of anything."
He looked from one to the other, then saw Adama, with his son and
daughter-in-law behind him, anxious faces all. The Commander was here?
What...?
     "Did I miss something?" 


Chapter Fourteen
	
     "Now just hold still," said Doctor Salik, two days later, in
LifeStation. Bojay was sitting up in the biobed, and looking very
anxious, as he was given a straw by MedTech Tone, and told to drink the
mix of electrolytes. A fake-fruit flavor, it was about as appealing as
Viper landing gear lubricant, but it was just what he needed. They said.
Cassie had his upper arm in her hands, and was making a last-centon check
of the interface fitting. She nodded to her CO. 
     "Doc?" asked Bojay, trying not to grimace at the taste in his mouth.
Old Viper landing gear lubricant.
     "Here we go," said Salik, and Cassie handed him the prosthetic arm.
Slowly, she brought it to the fitting, then slid it into place. With a
slight twist, and a click, it was in place. Inside, visible through the
steel "bones" of the endo-skeletal structure, lights flashed as circuits
were activated, some drawing energy from the internal power supply, some
from Bojay's own nervous system. "Looks good," said the CMO.
     "All circuits read as nominal," said Septimus, reading out the
instrument data. "Try to move, Lieutenant."
     Bojay looked at the metal hand, and tried to comply. For a moment,
nothing happened. Then, gradually, the fingers began to open. He opened
his new hand all the way, slowly turning the wrist. 
     "Excellent. Your own nerves appear to have fused to the synthetic
ganglia relays as planned.  What about tactile sensation?" asked the IL.
Cassie touched each finger in turn, with a fine needle. After a few
microns, Bojay exclaimed "ow!", and the metal fingers snapped away.
Faintly, they could hear the various solenoids and linkages inside
responding, functioning as desired.
     "I sure felt that," he said.
     "Neural responses are within two percent of textbook norms," said
Salik. "Reflex arc responding as expected. How does it feel, Lieutenant?"
     "It feels..." Bojay rubbed the artificial fingers together, then
reached out for Cassie's hand. "It feels real, Doc. It's...it's weird. I
can feel her skin, and the warmth, too."
     "The neural interface has synchronized entirely with your brain's
sensory and motor regions," said Septimus. "It will feel like your own
hand and arm, from here on in."
     Was there a trace of...pride? in the IL's voice? Pride?
     In a Cylon?
     "What about skin?" asked Bojay, turning the Cylon construct back and
forth. "I don't want to look like this forever."
     "We are preparing the syntho-epidermal covering, now," said Salik.
"We need another day or two, to make sure the metal has fused to the
bone, as it should. So far, the Cylon alloys have not triggered any sort
of auto-immune response, Lieutenant."
     "Uh, what?"
     "Your body is not rejecting the grafting, Bojay," explained Cassie.
"With the tissue regen therapy, plus the surprising inertness of the
Cylon alloys, we don't foresee any problems in that area."
     "Well, that's good," he replied. He flexed and unflexed his hand,
touching his thumb to each finger. Running it along the fabric of his
coverlet, he let himself experience the various gradations of sensation,
as he "felt" what his new fingers touched. "Wow, I can't get over it. It
feels like the real thing."
     "No residual pain?" asked Septimus.
     "A little, still. Some dull aching, where the thing attaches. But
that'll fade, right?"
     "Yes," said Salik.
     "And when the skin is on?"
     "It will both look and feel like your own," said Salik. "Cast from
your own cells, as a matter of fact. There will not only be sensation,
but it will feel like the real thing. Warm, and there will even be a
pulse at your wrist."
     "Lords of Kobol," said Bojay, shaking his head. "What a dumb astrum
I was to..."
     "Bojay!" said a voice, and he turned. It was Gayla. Bojay didn't
think he had ever seen her face so happy. She ran towards him, and she
took his hand. "Bojay, I..."
     "Gay," he said, "I was so stupid. I acted like a spoiled brat."
     "Oh don't say that," she responded. "I was..."
     "Perhaps," said Septimus, softly, "this is the time for a discreet
exit."


     "That was brilliant," said Adama, in his quarters, looking at
Septimus. It was a bizarre sight, to be sure. Never, in all the history
of the Colonies, had a Cylon stood, facing the Commander of a warship, in
his own quarters. "What made you think of it?"
     "I have extensive data files on many aspects of engineering and
military equipment," said the IL, now standing up. In the aftermath of
the whole crisis, Doctor Wilker and Technician Hummer had worked with
speed, to reattach Septimus' legs. The IL had to admit he was grateful
for the restoration of mobility. "Part of the defense arrangements of
many Cylon outposts is the use of force fields, not merely to deflect
weapons fire, but to repel actual physical contact. By making certain
adjustments to the field emitters in your LifeStation, I reversed the
field polarity. When Chakra touched the door, it violently repelled him
backwards. I thought the shock and surprise would give one of your people
the extra time needed to disarm him."
     "What if the shock had set the charges off?" asked Apollo.
     "I calculated a less than thirty-four percent chance of that
happening, Captain," replied the IL. "Thirty-three point zero six eight
percent, to be precise. Given the situation, an acceptable risk."
     "But if it had?" asked Cassie.
     "The results would have been no different than if Chakra had done as
he threatened, Doctor. The door would have been destroyed, and doubtless
all of us killed."
     ""That was quite a wager. You have obviously been hanging around
Starbuck too much," said Sheba, with a grin. 
     "But a successful one, Lieutenant," replied the IL.
     "Well, it worked, whatever you call it," said Starbuck. "Good job,
Septimus."
     "As you Humans put it, you did not do so badly yourself, Lieutenant.
Your cutting of power to the lights was something I suspect Chakra did
not anticipate."
     "Nor your disarming the charges remotely," said Apollo, next to
Sheba on the couch. 
     "Well, we couldn't have someone blowing up LifeStation," said
Starbuck. 
     "Right," said Apollo. "Where would you go to get over your
hangovers?"
     "Funny," said Starbuck. "And remind me to be nice to Twilly,
sometime." He looked from Apollo to Adama. "What about Chakra?"
     "He's in a security cell in LifeStation. The charge from the force
field nearly stopped his heart."
     "How tragic," quipped Sheba. 
     "Well, we need him alive," said Tigh. She looked at him, a question
in her eyes. "Chakra didn't get from the service bays up to the
LifeStation without help. He had a stolen security ducat." The XO looked
to Adama, and then spared a glance at the IL. Adama nodded. "Master Chief
Varica was attacked, and his ducat stolen."
     "Well, Varica can testify to that, can't he?" asked Sheba. "Chakra
attacked him, and stole his ducat."
     "Yes, only it wasn't Chakra that attacked him," said Adama. "It was
someone else."
     "Then Chakra had help," said Sheba. "Who?"
     "He doesn't know. Someone in a cloak with a hood. He went over to
Chakra, then he was shot. Doctor Wilker has analyzed his uniform. The
weapon used was not Colonial. And from the energy signatures on the
clothing and skin, it looks as if it might have been Zykonian."
     "Zykonian?" said Starbuck. 
     "Picked up at Brylon Station," said Sheba. "I see."
     "And it also appears that the weapon either was set wrong, or
malfunctioned. As near as Wilker can determine, it was supposed to be a
lethal blast. For whatever reason, it failed to kill the Master Chief."
     "So this whole thing was a plot," said Starbuck. "Made to look like
a lone nutcase run amok."
     "Yes," said Adama. "Chakra was a pawn."
     "How can you be certain?" asked Septimus. 
     "After he was taken into custody, he was given a full examination,"
said Adama. "There were traces of a drug cocktail in his system." He
looked down at a report on his desk. "Some kind of psychoactive compound.
But it does not match anything, in either our, or the Cylon, databases."
     "You mean he was programmed," said Apollo. "Drugged and programmed
to take over LifeStation. He wasn't acting as a lone, deranged, killer,
but as someone's puppet."
     "And, no doubt, not intended to survive," said Tigh. "If he had
succeeded in detonating his charges, it would have shut his mouth
permanently."
     "And he has not yet regained consciousness," said Cassie. "He's a
complete blank."
     The room fell ominously quiet. Septimus' oscillations seemed to fill
the room.
     "Okay, who then?" asked Sheba, at last. Who?" 


Chapter Fifteen

     "Well?" asked Gayla, sharing a late repast with Bojay, in
LifeStation.
     "It feels great," said the Viper pilot. "And when I get the
synthetic skin on, it will be perfect." He held up his new arm, looking
somewhat frightening still, with just the bare endoskeleton.
     "Can't wait to try that out," said Gayla, with a suggestive twinkle
in her eye. 
     "Quite a leap," said Bojay.
     "Oh, and speaking of leaping, what about your legs? When do they go
on?"
     "Doctor Salik says in about a secton, or so. I need to rest up, and
let my body regain some strength, after all I've been through."
     "And you've been through a lot," she said, with emphasis. "More than
anyone should have to go through. First the crash on that lousy planet,
then this."
     "Yeah. But, first one leg, then the other. Soon, I'll be back on my
feet, and I can have a real life, again."
     "Well, as real as it gets these days," replied Gayla, crunching down
on a mushie. "Stuck here in the Fleet, the way we are. Not exactly what
I'd call normal."
     "You have me there, Gay."
     "I usually do," she replied.
     "Heaven knows, it could have gone down in flames. This whole thing."
     "Heaven?" She shook her head. "Why do you always have to invoke
religion, Bo? Things happened the way they happened, and that's that."
     "Gay, I was..."
     "Going all religious on me. Again. I don't mean the usual 'Lords of
Kobol' stuff. Every Colonial says that. But it doesn't mean anything. Not
really."
     "Well, I guess I'm in the other camp, Gay. Just me."
     "Yeah, I know. You see the hand of God in everything" She shook her
head. "Drive me nuts sometimes! Religious people!"
     "Just because someone is a person of faith doesn't make them bad,
Gay. Look at Commander Adama."
     "Yeah, well, he's the Commander. He has to be a tower of strength
for everyone. It's his job." She took another bite. "Doesn't make it
real," she said, around a mouthful.
     "But don't judge someone just because they see the universe
differently than you do, Gay.  
     "We shall continue to agree to disagree, My Dearest Bojay. Am I
understood?"
     "Oh you are, My Dearest Gayla," he smiled back. He was silent a
moment stabbing at the remaining contents of his bowl with the fork. He
looked over the edge of the bowl, and there was the barest hint of a
smile. "You know, it was really something that Earth refugee, Father
Fisher, did for you. Trading places. I mean, you could have been killed
by that maniac."
     "Yeah. Yeah, I guess it was."
     "A religious guy. And not even from our own Colonies, risking
himself like that. And for a complete stranger, too."
     "I get it."
     "And not a Book of the Word to be seen waving in the air..." he
grinned.
     "Alll-right! I get the point, Bo." She looked daggers at him.
     "Just saying..."
     "Yeah, well..."
     "No, admit it." He was all seriousness, now. "Something more than
just luck got us through this whole mess, Gayla. I mean, it was you who
convinced me to see a different path, and go for the surgery. I was being
a complete equinius's astrum, and playing the self-appointed martyr."
     "Which you do very well," she quipped.
     "It's a gift. And not just that, but letting them use Cylon
technology. And a Cylon to do the surgery? And that we would even have a
Cylon, out of all the Cylons on that BaseShip,  that could do it? What
are the chances that I would fall for the very person who did more to
save me than anyone else?" He reached up and touched her face, with his
new hand. "Then, you're saved by a cleric, of all people. I tell you, the
more I see of this crazy thing we call life, the less I believe in
coincidence, Gay." He put his bowl down, and turned to look directly at
her. "I don't think I could have gone on, if you'd been lost to that
snitrad, Gayla. I'd be in pieces, in more ways than one. Maybe...?"
     "Yeah," said Gayla, softly, looking down into her own bowl. She let
out a long sigh. "Maybe."


     "And what about Fisher?" asked Apollo. He looked at his father, who
looked back, with intensity. Then the Commander looked to Tigh, then the
rest, all the while remaining silent. Then, he took a sharp breath, and
leaning back in his seat intoned:
     "All of this is classified." He waited a beat. "Is everyone clear?"
     "Commander?" asked Sheba, casting a glance at the IL. 
     "Perhaps I should go," said Septimus. "This is a matter for Humans,
I deem."
     "No," said Adama. "I think you should remain, Septimus.
     "By your com....I mean, as you wish, Commander Adama."
     "Commander?" asked Tigh, his face questioning. 
     "I think the situation calls for it, Tigh. Nothing of what we say
here is to go beyond this room, without my express authorization. All
clear?" The all nodded, even the IL. "Good. Now, to answer your question,
Apollo."
     "Yes. What part did he play in all this? He's some kind of religious
cleric, isn't he?"
     "Yes, and he and I have had many stimulating conversations on that
topic. However, the man we all saw on the monitors was not, in fact,
Father Fisher."
     "Not..." began Cassie. "I don't understand. I saw him. We all saw
him, after Chakra let Gayla go."
     "Yes, he took her place," said Sheba.
     "I have checked. Father Fisher was actually on the Prison Barge at
the time."
     "The Prison Barge?" said Apollo.
     "Yes. He was giving a lecture to some of the prisoners, on
spirituality and penal issues. Counseling and prayer. That sort of thing.
He seems to have been involved in similar social endeavors, back on
Earth. But, he was not even aboard the Galactica."
     "But..." began Starbuck. Then it clicked. "A shape..."
     "Yes. The person we saw on the scans from LifeStation was not Father
Fisher, but in fact the person we know as Academician Sarah."
     "What?" said Cassie. "Academician Sarah? I'm missing something,
here."
     "Academician Sarah, as we call her, is not, in actuality, at all
what she seems to be," said Adama. After a silent moment, he explained.
     "A Ziklagoio? Here in the Fleet?" asked Apollo. "One of those..." 
     "Allow me to explain," said Adama, and he launched into an
abbreviated version of the story, of how "Sarah" was in fact Nizaka, a
political refugee and escaped slave, from the planet Ziklag, and how she
had come to be a member of the refugee fleet. Heads started shaking.
     "She came to me, in the form of Father Fisher, and broached her plan
to exchange places with Gayla. Her idea was to insert herself into the
situation, with Chakra of course having no idea what he was now facing. I
of course refused, until she showed me that it was in fact her, and not
Fisher."
     "And you agreed?" asked Apollo.
     "Not at first, but time was counting down, and we had few other
options. Nizaka was to go there, and exchange places, if possible. When
Starbuck cut power to the lights, and deactivated the charges, she would
shift, overpower him, then shift back before power could be restored." He
looked up at Starbuck. "I'm sorry there was no time to fill you in,
Starbuck. And I felt it was best not to say too much, just then."
     "Say too much? Where is Sarah, by the way? Shouldn't she be here?"
     "She is laying low for a while, at my order," said Adama.
     "You...you know who was behind all this, don't you, Commander?" said
Sheba.
     "I believe so, though proving it may more of a problem that I had
hoped."
     "Commander?" said Apollo, obviously thinking deeply. "Who found
Varica?"
     "Security Officer Halberd." He looked at his son. "Yes."
     "And if he was stuffed in a locker..." began Cassie.
     "Who called it in? It was an anonymous call to Security," said
Adama. "In fact, it was..."
     "Nizaka," said Apollo. "And she was following Siress Lydia!"
     "Precisely," said Adama. "But not for reasons of Lydia's misdeeds.
She is compiling information for the Council, an academic study of how
the various social and legal problems we have fit into the overall
Colonial Charter of Governance. She wished to speak to Lydia, and by
chance saw her, heading down to the maintenance bays. She followed."
     "I remember now," said Apollo. "When we heard that Chakra had used
Varica's security ducat to access restricted parts of the ship, she
said...'he killed  to get a security ducat?' "
     "Oh my Lords!" said Cassie. "Why would she assume someone was dead,
unless..."
     "Unless she was the one that tried to kill him, and thought that he
was dead," finished Starbuck. "She slipped up. I wondered why she
suddenly looked so surprised when we heard Varica was alive. Nothing was
said about Varica's condition, but she reacted with shock. She thought he
was dead, because she's the one who shot him!" 
     "Yes," said Adama, and set a small weapon on his desk. It was at
once recognizeable as Zykonian in design, small and concealable. "In the
darkness, Nizaka took on the form of Lydia briefly. At least her voice.
That seems to have sent Chakra over the edge, mentally. They were shocked
when Chakra was thrown back from the inner hatch, as you can imagine, but
she managed to relieve him of the weapon she had seen Lydia give him.
Then, to everyone's surprise, Starbuck entered with the rest, and she
shifted back in time not to be seen, before the lights were restored." He
put the weapon back in his desk. "But Nizaka happened to see what Lydia
did, below decks. Unfortunately, she was in her Sarah persona, and Lydia
may have seen her. It's not certain. She is in seclusion for her own
safety, for the present."
     "What do you plan to do?" asked Tigh. "She should be arrested. This
skirts close to treason."
     "We need to find out how deep this goes, first, Tigh. No doubt,
knowing Lydia, there may well be plots within plots, here. Others
involved. We need more than we currently have."
     "But why, if I may ask?" said Septimus. "What purpose is served by
this entire episode? Terminating one's fellow Humans? What does this
woman hope to achieve?" He looked to Adama. 
     "I think she wants to undercut him," said Apollo. "Make him look
weak, as if he is losing control. Call his leadership into question."
     "How so?" asked the IL.
     "Letting a Cylon come aboard to operate on a Human. Allowing
security to become so lax that a convict could do what he did."
     "I see," said Septimus. "And with Chakra, and the rest of us all
conveniently dead, she could twist the facts to support her assertions.
Make a move for power." His optical sensors sped up a bit. "How...how
almost Cylon of her."  
     "Indeed."
     "Commander, might I ask why I was included in this?" asked the IL.
"After all, I play no part in your fleet command structure. My presence
seems superfluous."
     "As I said, this meeting is classified. I have not recorded it in
the usual way, and electronic jamming is in operation. However, your data
banks, Septimus, have stored everything. If I recorded it in the usual
way, even with encryption, Lydia might find a way to access it, if she
suspects. She is quite resourceful, after all."
     "But locked up inside Septimus, in Cylon code..." began Starbuck. 
     "Where Lydia would never think to look," finished Adama. "Yes."
     "What about proof, though?" asked Sheba. "Solid proof we could take
to Solon, Commander."
     "Could we search her quarters?" asked Apollo.
     "Not quite enough for a warrant," said Adama. "However...and it is
distasteful to me, but I intend to have her billet searched,
surreptitiously. If this goes deeper, rather than a one-time act on her
part, we have to know. But if there are others, perhaps, others
programmed and set to carry out some act of terror, like Chakra was, we
don't want to alarm her into unleashing them, before we have enough to
move on her."
     "I see," nodded Apollo. "Yet either way, we risk a lot."
     "It's maddening," said Sheba. "We have so much, yet...
     "Right now, all we have is pieces, Sheba," said Adama, sighing with
a trace of disgust. "All we have is pieces."

Fleeing from the Cylon tyranny, the last Battlestar, Galactica, leads a
rag-tag fugitive fleet, on a lonely quest. A shining planet, known as
Earth.


Addendum

     "Damn! Damn and frack!!!!!!!" screamed Lydia in her private
quarters, throwing her glass across the room. It shattered on the far
wall, sending both glass and liquor flying. She swore again and again, as
her rage flowed. Rage, and veins full of alcohol. Of all the
thrice-damned ill luck! Master Chief Varica had survived the shot that
was meant to kill him. Not only had he survived, but he'd given a full
deposition to Security! Mong!
     But, he had not seen who it was that had shot him, not seen that it
was her, or he would have named her, surely, and Adama would have been
breaking down her door by now. That gave her some breathing space, at
least. Space to try and cover things up, as best she could. To at least
try and salvage whatever could be salvaged out of this mess.
     Her neck, being foremost on that list.
     Chakra was in custody. Nothing could alter that fact, nor the fact
that her visiting him, certainly so soon afterwards, would arouse
suspicion in Adama. Well, given the shape Chakra's brain must be in by
now, or what was left of it, she had time, on that score. And, in a small
outbreak of luck, Sire Shanbour had called for a Council meeting,
tomorrow, to discuss the matter. That, of course, had been inevitable.
Even part of her original plan, but she was certain she would be able to
turn it to her advantage. After all, as Commander and President, Adama
had allowed a Cylon virtual free reign of the ship! What sort of
leadership was that? The fact that the Cylon in question was still able
to talk, rather than a shredded pile of spare parts, did complicate
matters a good deal, but Lydia was nothing, if not a survivor. There were
few circumstances she had not been able to spin to her advantage, over
the yahrens, as Antipas had discovered to his cost. Or at least
minimalize the potential penalties. This one would be no different.
     But she would have to tread oh so carefully. She looked at herself
in a mirror.
     "Don't I always?" She smiled, calming herself, then picked up the
telecom. 
     "Yes, Siress?" 
     "Yes, love. It is me. I may be needing you, soon."
     "Of course, Siress," the anxious voice of her personal shuttle pilot
Jarvik replied. 
     Lydia grinned the grin of triumph. The man had loyally served her
for the better part of just over a deca-yahren, and, on rare occasions,
Lydia had allowed him to become more than just her pilot. That had always
been the key to maintaining Jarvik's loyalty, since he'd long ago
reasoned that being an occasional lover of the elegant and beautiful
Siress, was more than ample compensation for doing her bidding. Even if
Lydia went as much as a yahren or two without obliging him, it didn't
matter. Lydia never stopped offering the tantalizing prospect of hope.
And the fact that she'd used a term of endearment already indicated to
him that maybe now his patience was going to be rewarded.
     "I may be needing you......soon," she repeated, drawing out the
words, so the tantalizing tease was at its fullest. "Can you.....make
yourself available in the next.....centar or two?"
     "Absolutely!" Her pilot could feel his heart pounding with
anticipation. "I am here for you always, My Siress!"
     "Mmmm. I do so appreciate that, Love. I'll be.....waiting for you."
     She put the telecom down and smiled, slowly, and wickedly, with evil
contentment. She would miss the...talents of the unfortunate Chakra, but
one session with her obedient and devoted pilot was going to be more than
enough to get her confidence back.....for the future. She looked up, and
regarded herself in the mirror.
     And laughed.

The End