Episode Report Card Jacob Clifton: A | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT With Honors
By Jacob Clifton | Season 3 | Episode 10 | Aired on 12.07.2006
In the officer's lounge on Galactica, a horrible thing is happening. Kat's staring in the mirror at herself, and slowly pulling out her hair. Like that dream with your teeth. Hair, and hair, great gouts of hair, coming out in her hands. Her cells revolting. She pulls out her rad badge and stares at it. It's black as night. And she hears a voice, and the voice is Starbuck's, and the voice is saying, "Accept who you are." And Kat grabs her rad badge, sucks it up, goes out and finds Enzo, and remembers Sasha. She says goodbye to that girl, in bed with Enzo, and then says goodbye to Enzo. She remembers who she is, and accepts it, and knows that she'll leave Sasha out between the stars. And she touches her Raptor, and she goes to Helo's locker and trades out rad badges with him, because he's the best and she knows it; she accepts it. The drums of war follow her into the flock, onto the hangar bay floor, among her fellow pilots, and up onto the wing, Helo's rad badge in her hand. Remember who you are; accept the grace in that: you're Kat. Not Sasha. It's always easier on this show to blame yourself. Nobody wants the embarrassment of absolution.
Outbound trip five, black-badged Kat loses the Faru Sadin, and curses herself again. In the CIC the damage reports are escalating across Galactica, and Tigh reports that the jump spot's gone unstable and they've gotta get out. Engineering reports a cascade of pressure failures. Bill hoshis to Apollo for a group jump, and Kat hisses at herself: "I'm not losing another one." And somewhere between the stars there's a ship called Faru Sadin. The shipherds jump, along with their flock. Outside the cluster, guilty-faced Starbuck and wincing-assed Apollo search frantically for visual on Kat and the Faru Sadin, and can't come up with her. In CIC, bunch-browed Gaeta watches the screens grimly; T'Pol-haired Hoshi reports that a Raptor and the Faru Sadin are missing. "It's Kat. She must've missed the order." Bill gets scared. In the cluster, Kat calls again and again for the Faru Sadin, looking down at her badge whenever she's brave enough. The whole CIC stares at the dradis. Kat flies around the cluster, blind, begging, starting to lose consciousness. Tigh begs her, quietly and under his breath, to come home.
Bill and Gaeta stare, worried. Kat's fading fast. It goes on a long, long time. It stretches out and seems longer than it is. I imagine Kara Thrace has a lot of things to think about during this time.