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President Roslin's eerie self-possession in the miniseries is finally explained through a series of flashbacks detailing the absolute heaps of horror that life chucked at her head before her political career even got started: this is a woman who is no stranger to tragedy, in more ways than we ever knew. The beginning of the romance between Caprica and Gaius Baltar is explored; her tenderness and affection for his insane father go a long way toward explaining his blindness to her agenda. And we get to see Sam Anders rambling pseudophilosophically (think "gelatinous orbs" and "prehensile paws," mark II) in the most delightfully sports-pro way, paralleling his new Hybridness.
We're treated to the first night the Twins ever met, and the total crazy that Kara engendered in Lee from minute one, and learn that Bill was even more upset about the decommissioning than he let on in the mini. It's pretty cool to get flashbacks not to the day of the attacks, but at least two years before them: Laura and Kara without a fear or pain in the world, Caprica and Gaius picking carefully through the minefield of their own defenses, and just how drunk Lee used to secretly get. There are also a walk in a marketplace fountain (beautifully mournful) and a fight with a pigeon (funny and foreboding and sad). Some really great images tying threads together across the whole of the series. It's soft, moving, and has a light touch indeed, which plays a good counterpoint to the plot-plot-plot that was to be expected.
Which we have, in abundance: In the now, it's pretty much nonstop entertainment: Cavil's 145s start "testing" Hera at the Colony, freaking Boomer out. Chief's in stir for getting Hera kidnapped in the first place, and pretty much hates Cylons more than anyone ever did, despite being one. Adama suffers a massive change of heart about the Hera situation, gets over his innate fear of Hybrids and nonsense, and eventually gets the Colony's coordinates out of the Anders-Thraces. (Oh, and it's pretty much openly stated that Bill's going to be flying the last Viper out of a launch tube at some point, which will be cool and probably heartbreaking in some way.)
Shit goes into overdrive as Bill draws a literal line in the sand for a final mission -- taking Galactica (or a strike force of Raptors if necessary) to the Colony for a final battle -- and Skulls and Racetrack (of course) learn that the Colony is parked outside a black hole. Because there's always going to be a black hole. Laura, the Five, and the Twins are obviously in, and Caprica, and the still-destroyed Agathons. Bill has to manually take Doc Cottle off the volunteer list, since he's the only doctor in the Fleet besides John Hodgeman. Other people I can see are Hoshi, Ishay, Dealino, that bald guy that's everywhere... The full list is a lot longer, obviously, but there's not so much of a focus on who's where as you might think.
All in all, not a whole lot happened, but what did happen was gorgeous. I'm iffy on whether the flashbacks will lend the story anything more than texture, given the circumstantial nature of any thematic elements this week. However, I happily would have taken an entire episode of them, meaningful or not, just because of the performances and getting to see our kids comparatively unbroken. It's my hope that the Caprica City flashbacks continue or expand week, but I can also see it being a conceit for this episode only. So much of this story has been about, and is now particularly about, the end of stories. What better way to close the loop than to show the tiny and mundane (or in Laura's case, unendingly brutal) apocalypses that came before?
Also loving the whole Remember the Alamo thing and crossing the red line, because that's where RDM's love of Cool Shit intersects with my own. Chief's complete self-hating dehumanizing of all Cylons was a welcome surprise, but not a shock. Seeing Adama tenderly remind Kara that she's his daughter, and welcome Laura to the final mission with a loving "Madame President," followed by Kara propping her dying ass up and softly holding her hand, were all pretty much worth the price of admission.
So if this mission is go, and it clearly is, then the cliff from which the episode hangs, basically, is what Gaius is going to do. On the one hand, Baltar's managed to amass a great deal of political capital in the last few months, to the point of making a nearly valid play for a seat on the Council. On the other, Lee hands him the same "you are still total bullshit" line as Caprica did last week and Laura awhile back. So does Gaius step across the line and leave his cult to get weirder in his absence, or stay safe and sucky forever? Guess we'll find out week: Two hours, hella fighting, and more than likely zero survivors. Not to mention whatever's planned for that damned black hole.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!The singularity is the point at the center of a black hole, in which the gravity of a collapsing star has grown so strong that not even light can escape; we don't know what happens then, or there. The singularity is the moment when robots awake to consciousness, and the world changes forever; we can't look and see what that will be like. The singularity is the location of change, of dying, of the end of everything; a door in the mind; the space between five stars. The singularity is the Maelstrom, that goes around and around. In fact, if the singularity does have infinite density, you can't even think near it: the singularity is a cloud of unknowing. Change feels like dying because it is: you can't know what's on the other side of the door until you walk through, and everything is burnt off. The singularity represents a location in spacetime in which general relativity is turned on its head, and spacetime stops meaning anything at all. All of these things are true.
None of these things are true. You can't imagine a black hole changing over time, because time doesn't mean what you think it means anymore. And neither does space. The breakdown of general relativity means that you've reached the edge of space, and time; the singularity becomes a place marker for where our physical universe ends, and can more easily be understood as an event, rather than an object. The singularity is a moment in time, and what we're really looking at are the processes occurring in the matter nearby.
Where the Hybrid lives, it's everyplace and noplace. eutopia. In the middle of the Maelstrom, you're everywhere and nevermind; we're all of us every age we're ever been, somewhere in there. You'd be surprised sometimes who gets the talking stick. In the singularity, time and space spread out like a chessboard and you can see it all happening, how it fits together, who painted the sky. The way the world ends; who its author may be.
"The title means exactly what the words say: naked lunch, a frozen moment when everyone sees what is on the end of every fork."
A galaxy. A bird flapping against the sky, caught behind glass. A planet, blue and white. Day breaking. The rush of rain, like tears. The surface, the oceans, the harbor of Caprica City, Before the Fall. It is beautiful. Irulan wasn't fucking around when she said beginnings are hard. I've never loved anything as much as I love this and I don't know how to do it, so I will begin like this, just so: William Adama is retiring his Battlestar.
WILLIAM ADAMA
Bill Adama is retiring his Battlestar. They're taking her away from him. Steady as it comes, cutting back and forth between Bill, in civilian dress, trying in his way to stave off the inevitable, listing his accomplishments and all the reasons this obsolescence should never have been planned. In the singularity there's no such thing as obsolescence but this is before the Fall. "It's one hour of your life. Look, sometimes there are things you just gotta do, all right?" Frank Porthos is saying.
And Slick is saying: "Listen, you may feel like hell. But sometimes, lost is where you need to be. Just because you don't know your direction doesn't mean you don't have one."
And Gaius is saying: "Music. Did you say music? You know, it's funny, it's a lot like that. It's like the distant chaos of an orchestra tuning up. And then somebody waves a magic wand, and all of those notes start to slide into place. A grotesque, screeching cacophony becomes a single melody."
GAIUS BALTAR
Across the city he's wearing all white, and the Six is wearing black. They joke, champagne wit, infatuation laughs, on their way across the city. Gaius likes having things done for him. She thinks it's laziness -- "I prefer not to rely on others as much as possible. Less chance of being let down that way" -- but that's not it. He's trying to impress her. He didn't always have money. Now, look at his limo driver: Gaius drinks, the driver drives, all the time Cuffle's Breath Wash getting smaller and smaller in the rear view mirror and no looking back.
("Looking back, I think I was rewarded. Pythia talks about a flood, wiped out most of humanity. Nobody blames the flood, the flood is a force of nature. Through the flood mankind is rejuvenated, born again. I was another flood, you see.")
She laughs at him, privately, the thousand brittle lies he tells to keep it locked down. In the end, we're all just human. Her hand works up his thigh; he doesn't take his eyes off her face. She calls him Doctor, he asks her to call him Gaius. He asks her name; she kisses him instead. She doesn't have one. The telephone rings, and he answers drowsily, lying back against the seat. He shoves her off and begs someone somewhere not to leave. She's piqued, but watching. Their date is put on hold, and the driver drives them home, already a little less glamorous than they were a moment before.
Zarek: "Gaius, you're a genius."
Gaius: "And?"
LAURA ROSLIN
Laura says goodbye to the last of the shower guests, and laughs delightedly. Her sisters stand in the apartment, grateful and happy. She looks back at them, joyful and proud. When their mother died, she stepped up.
Cottle: You are obviously an intelligent, well-educated young woman. Would you mind explaining to me why you waited five years in between breast exams?
Roslin: Yes, I would mind. It's none of your business. I was busy.
Cottle: And now here you are.
Roslin: Yes. Here we are.
Laura tries to clean up immediately, but the girls are still glowing with celebration. They know her natural inclination is to help, to clean. Mother to the Colonies. "No!" They shout, knowing the routine. "Laura, no cleaning!" She begs for just a little bit, just a little time to clean things up. Someone's got to do it.
And Roslin's saying, "I'm not suggesting anything, Doctor. If I want to throw a baby out an airlock, I'll do it."
And her sisters remind her of her promise: that they'd finish every bottle of champagne in the house. Sandra asks for a little bit, a little sip, and Laura giggles -- "Uh... no? Pregnant girls only get gifts!" -- but she begs, and Laura gives her just a little sip before heaving down onto the couch. The girls cuddle up beside her, and she gathers them into her arms. Since Sleeping Beauty there's always been one person at the party who brought gifts nobody wants. Laura laughs, the three of them convulsing and hilarious, gossiping about the woman Mrs. Anderson brought, the strange gifts: "You know, there's always one..."
LEE ADAMA
Kara's in the kitchen, attending to dinner, a candle burning and the recipe book open, when the doorbell rings. It's the first time she'll be meeting Zak's brother. When their father died, Lee stepped up. Alone in a house with a madwoman, fluttering against the sky like a bird trapped under glass. She opens the door, and there he is, just like in pictures. Something happens when their eyes meet; his smile falls for a moment. Something takes flight, slips the surly bonds of earth.
It's awkward, she invites him in. On the wall behind her as she's closing the door is a painting, a red and yellow and blue star; something she's been drawing since she was little. He brought flowers. She's unsure where to look, and just calls Zak's name again and again.
And Sam is saying, "It's about those moments when you can feel the perfection of creation. The beauty of physics. The wonder of mathematics. You know, the... Elation of action and reaction. And that is the kind of perfection that I want to be connected to."
And Apollo's telling Romo, "My grandfather, he would wave me over... And then he'd say, 'Lee, be a good boy. Just don't be too good.'"
Lee praises her beautiful apartment, and Kara laughs: "It's a rattrap, but the rent's cheap." As Zak comes downstairs she tells him he's a terrible liar; says they should play cards sometime. "I hold my own," he says. She grins. Zak appears. Three pilots.
(Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
of sun-split clouds, -- and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of -- wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there,
I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air....
Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue
I've topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace
Where never lark nor even eagle flew --
And, while with silent lifting mind I've trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.)
Lee embraces his brother, who jokes -- "This one's mine, keep your hands off" -- and the air changes, twists into something more awkward. Zak laughs that his brother's a really bad liar; it's a joke they've already made. Kara kisses him, to prove something, and sends him off to get the drinks.
Remember the red line? It's how far you can jump before you can ever come back. You're not supposed to cross it. Technically, you shouldn't be allowed to. The calculations for such a jump are so complex they are nonlinear. Be good, just don't be too good.
GAIUS BALTAR
Gaius apologizes to the nurse for his father's behavior. "Nothing in my contract about being stabbed with my steak knife!" she shouts, and he turns on the charm as Julius sits impotent in his chair, swearing that she's stealing from him. Aerilon fears; a farmer's life in the foodbasket of the Colonies. Even here in Caprica City he knows something's being taken from him. He brings those fears and nightmares into a clean place, into a place where all that pain and shame had been burnt off. At the edge of the singularity the gradations in gravity are so intense they could tear you apart: all the things you think you're leaving behind.
Gaius begs her not to leave, offers her more and more money, frustrated. Tears of anger in his eyes. Today was supposed to be a hot date, not a cold room with an old man; this life was supposed to be clean, and new. The Six appears in the doorway and Julius laughs crudely at her, banging his cane against the floor. "I thought I asked you to wait in the car," he snaps at her, hating her for seeing this. Julius laughs at him as he begs, voice soaring into ever-higher registers, begs the nurse not to leave, offering more and greater and better recompense. All he has is money, money and shame. Julius calls the Six a whore. She's been called worse; she's intrigued by Julius, the wildness and the neediness and the steadfast presence of him; how even lame and old and mad he still goes on demanding. This is what a parent is, she thinks. This is a father. Without this man's farmer genes, there could be no Gaius Baltar. There would be no entity that is Gaius. Gaius shouts at him: "Shut your filthy mouth. Stop being so disgusting!" But she wasn't insulted until now. "This is your father, Gaius."
"Gaius is ashamed of his family," Julius screams, and the Six can't imagine. "Even his accent. Stupid bastard actually changed his accent. Would you believe that?" Gaius shouts at him, a litany of abuses, the cost of care, the third nurse in a row that he's chased off just for this: for the moment when his son actually looks at him.
"How much it costs. That's all he cares about now. Not the way he was brought up, I can tell you." She listens carefully to Julius, considering him. Considering who this Gaius might really be. "But he don't like to think about that. No, he don't like to think about living on the farm and doing a day's hard..." And Gaius attacks. The smartest man in the Twelve Colonies beats at an old man with a newspaper, lamely, weakly, desperate to shut him up. Desperate to hear anything but this old refrain: that school isn't work, science and art aren't work, not like the farming men do, with their pints and fistfights. The voice he leapt into the sky to leave behind. Gaius begins to weep; the Six begins to weep.
"I'll break it down for you, Dad! You're an obnoxious, spiteful, cantankerous old git, and you're frakking lucky you're not living on the frakking street!" Julius laughs at him, triumphant. "Big man, cursing his father. Makes you feel important, does it?" Desperate to connect. The Six looks at him and sees only his need; she falls in love with the old man, just a little. "Gaius, maybe we should..." He lashes out at her too, and sends her away. "I'm sure that the driver can see you to your home," he says, calling on his money once again to draw the line of what's allowed and what can't happen. She goes, and at the door she turns and waves goodbye to Julius, touches Gaius's arm tenderly. The only thing worse than your father's strength is his weakness. You can't outrun it. Gaius closes the door behind her, hot tears in his eyes.
LAURA ROSLIN
She answers the doorbell in her robe and pajamas, smiling nervously. The officers outside are faceless in the bright morning sunlight. Their names are Stephanie, and Sean. Sean has a kind face, but you can't see it yet. She lets them in, after a long fearful silence, and looks at the window as they sit down. Stephanie is going to say "We're so sorry," she thinks. And another piece of the world will fall down.
"We're so sorry," Stephanie says, and Laura jumps a little bit. An accident, in the night. Both sisters and her father, killed by a drunk driver. Nameless and faceless all through the night, until the casualties could be named, identified. Their bodies lay in the morgue for hours, until their identities could be verified. Getting colder in a cold room. Niece, or nephew. Laura stands up, so still and so quiet. The other driver is in stable condition. She holds herself up, against a side table; the gravity's getting stronger. Sean stands up, suddenly, as though he can save her from this. He can't. He stands back awkwardly; she asks them to leave.
The birds sing, outside in the sun. She cleans up the boxes from the shower. Just a little bit. She feels herself join the orphans. Her family is gone.
Chapter Seven: "The raft was not as seaworthy as I'd hoped. The waves repeatedly threatened to swamp it. I wasn't afraid to die, I was afraid of the emptiness that I felt inside. I couldn't feel anything. And that's what scared me."
Without shoes, without closing the door, in her pajamas she walks out into the city. On a mission, in her robe and pajamas. At the edge of the fountain in a busy center square, looking out past the spray and the water and the families and the children, going on about their days as though nothing's happened. As though the world hasn't ended. They stare at her, staring, and she looks down into the calmness of the water. They are too loud.
In the center of the fountain is a large rock, as large as a car. It could cradle you. With the spray of the fountains, like water on the hull of a small yacht crossing a vast lake, splashing up against your face. The sound of it, and the smell, and the rock cradling, and the water falling down, like a curtain around grief. It makes sense to her, she thinks, it makes sense. She walks across the water toward it, toward the anchor and the curtain, and slowly they begin to watch.
She leans back against the rock, hands up in supplication. The water pours down. She holds her head in the shower of the blast, holding her arms straight out, letting everything go. Steady as it goes. Only here. Not in the house, with the boxes and the bottles of champagne. Not where you can still smell them, where you're surrounded by pictures of them. Only here, between the rock and the water. Day breaking. The rush of rain, like tears. She can weep.
The showers become an IV drip; Laura's unconscious for now. Resting peacefully. Cottle and Ishay go on about their day, adjusting her while she sleeps. As though the world isn't ending.
WILLIAM ADAMA
Lee administrates the breakdown, the razing of Galactica, all the requests for her parts and for her heart. Bill Adama is retiring his Battlestar. They're taking her away from him. Steady as it comes. Dealino distracts him a moment: they want to strip the launch tubes of their magnetic accelerators. They have a civilian use, Lee explains to him, but that's not the point: "A Battlestar's whole purpose is to launch Vipers..." Lee nods, seeing him for the first time. "I kind of know how you feel. Part of my heart's here too. Tell you what, make the accelerators the last thing your men take out. Then turn out the lights and let the old girl die in peace." He looks Dealino in the eye, like a good president. Dealino thanks him and leaves; Lee nearly cries.
Bill seals the boxes one by one, labeling them for delivery to his new quarters on the Rebel Basestar. Boxing everything, at the end of line. Lee, younger and as a man. His sons as children. He grits his teeth; she groans around him.
(Adama: "Is this my ten minutes or is this yours?"
Tigh: "Yours. I took ten last time."
Dualla: "...I believe it was your ten minutes, sir."
Tigh: "The old man's so tired he can't remember, then it's his turn.")
GAIUS BALTAR
Gaius lights a cigarette, walking with Paulla through the ship: after this latest catastrophe, and the funerals, their movement is even more popular. "Everyone else's numbers are down, which gives us solid majorities on over half the civilian ships in the Fleet," she says. The cold equations, where faith meets power. "I mean, no one else comes even close to having that kind of political power. Our time is here, Gaius." Chip Six appears, back in red, and nods. "She's right, Gaius. The end times are approaching. Humanity's final chapter's about to be written, and you... You will be its author." He stares. He's gone, somewhere else. That house, under a blue sky. That wonderful house.
(And Gaeta's screaming with a gun in his hand. "I believed in you!" And Caprica is swearing that they all did, in Gaius and in the dream of New Caprica, but she's the last one he wants to hear talking. "No, not him, he believed in the dream of Gaius Baltar. The good life. Booze, pills, hot and cold running interns. You led us to the Apocalypse!")
"Are you, um, are you thirsty, before...?" The woman watches; something's changing. Something's changed: he looks over and sees the Six, sitting in a club chair, holding a glass of ambrosia and waiting for him to come home. History keeps getting smaller all the time. All that pain, and shame. She's back again. She pretends it doesn't hurt as he demands to know what she's doing there. The woman offers to leave, and he bites at her and kisses her and sends her upstairs to get ready.
The Six looks at her glass; Gaius calls her an intruder. That is what she is. She saw his shame; she can't be allowed to exist. She goes outside the red line, outside the line of salt between what's allowed and what isn't. She doesn't speak, as he whines at her: just stands up. He backs away, nervous, afraid of confrontation, and calls the police. She's concerned; when he reaches someone on the line she finally speaks up. Her innocent, lovely smile, trying to help: "I found your father a new place to live." Gaius is brought up short, and stares.
"The Regency, down by the wharf. Very tony address." She picks up a brochure: "Full-time care, social activities, medical staff. And the best part? They encourage residents to garden and grow their own food. Julius will be a farmer again."
He searches her face. This is how they get you: on the other side of the pain of being known is the joy of being known. Imagine the eyes of someone infinitely loving, who can love you enough that it goes past here, and now, and money, past crude Julius and the shame of slapping your own father in front of a beautiful woman: this is how they get you. She has enough in her for all of them.
"His things are being moved this very moment by the staff." Resolve failing in the pain of being known, he goes to the door. "They'll be set up in his new room exactly how he had them in the apartment. He loves it." Gaius stops short: "Loves?" She is proud; she's reached past the red line, past what's allowed and what's not, and solved the problem herself. He likes having things done for him.
"Once I showed him around the facility. Your father's a very complicated man, Gaius, but there are a few simple things that make him very happy." She shoves the brochure in his chest: she's the same way, and Gaius will never understand it. The simplicity of joy, God's love. "The last time I saw him he seemed happy," she says, and nods, and leaves. He stares after her. And just like this, just so, Gaius Baltar falls in love. It's a force of nature. It's like a flood.
WILLIAM ADAMA
Kara taps her pen against the papers, connections and patterns, doing math on the notes, turning them into math and the math into something else. Thinking, and thinking, and tapping. She looks down at Sam, sleeping, and goes back to it. Day breaking. Hoshi spills coffee on the board and wipes it up slowly, chastened by Saul.
"As I was saying, the old man intends to fly the last Viper off-ship himself. Tell the deck gang to leave one launch tube intact, set to remote pilot launch." We'll send the old man off in style. Hoshi keeps wiping, the mess keeps getting bigger; Saul's eye twinkles. "You'll never make Admiral like that."
And they're revealing a Viper Mark II to the Commander, for the decommissioning, tail number A894FG, "HUSKER" stenciled on the sides. The breath is catching in Bill's throat as Chief waves the other deckhands away, and he's smiling to see Adama so moved. Prosna hands over a wrapped package: a photograph of Bill himself, standing on the wing of this Viper. She was rusting away in a salvage yard outside Caprica City when they found her. "The honor is mine," Bill is saying, almost unable to speak at all.
GALEN TYROL
Karl stares through the brig bars at his friend, eyes full of pain and care. Chief swears they're all the same: it's how he ended up here.
Karl swears they're different. It's how he ended up here.
"How you felt about Boomer, that was different. That's why you did what you did." Chief laughs, the laugh he always laughed: it was because he's a frakking idiot. "A two thousand-year-old idiot who cannot learn the simplest lesson: Machines are not people, they're just machines." All of these things are true.
None of these things are true. Karl shakes his head, trying to bring Chief back. If Cylons are nothing, if their feelings mean nothing, then Thorne died for nothing and Chief is nothing. If Cylons mean nothing, then Chief didn't hurt anyone but himself. "My wife. Athena? Is a person." Chief swears she's a blow-up doll. It doesn't even hurt, anymore, to hear him say it: he has no other options. Nothing else works.
"Athena, Sharon, Boomer... Call them what you will, they're all the same. They're all the same because we made them the same." Helo weeps, silently. "Don't blame yourself, but you can't trust them. You can't trust any of them." Helo hangs up, so sad and hurt for his wife, his friend, himself. He leaves, and Chief hangs up. Nothing else works. He's a machine. He's a man: a frightened one.
On the Colony, Hera's writing a symphony, a galaxy of notes. "Dots," Cavil snorts. "Lots and lots and lots of dots. She's clearly very gifted." Simon notes she hasn't eaten in days; she'll need an IV before the testing starts. "She wants her mother," Boomer explains, and Cavil laughs at her. "She can't have her mother now, can she?" Boomer jerks. "Oh, I'm sorry, I forgot to sound all soppy and soft when speaking of the child."
"She is a child: a frightened one." Cavil redefines it for her; this is the way we do it now. This is the perfect machine: "She's a half-human, half-machine object of curiosity that holds the key to our continued existence somewhere in her genetic code." Simon puts on his gloves; Doral leaves the room. Boomer watches Simon pick up the needle. It's sharp as a razor.
WILLIAM ADAMA
Hotdog's carrying Nicky in one arm and a bundle of photos with the other; obviously, this is too complicated for old Hotdog, and he drops the photos, cursing under his breath, distractedly apologizing to his child as Adama approaches and helps him gather them again: "These are...?" Pictures of pilots, from the Hall of Remembrance. "We wanted to take them with us. You know? So we wouldn't leave them behind with the others." The others?
"Lot of photos still down there. Nobody knows who they are anymore. Probably friends or relatives, of people on Galactica who died somewhere along the way." Nicky cries out, pointing at something, and Adama lets Hotdog go. The wall is almost empty. All that's left are the nameless and the faceless. The relatives of people on Galactica, who died somewhere along the way. The fathers and sons; the mothers and daughters. There's a photograph of Hera, still crumpled and stuck to the wall where her mother pinned it. Athena is bending to kiss her daughter's face.
And Dualla is saying that the problem isn't betrayal, it's helplessness. "You were injured, you couldn't do anything. And when you finally had a chance to do something you let us down. You let us down. You made a promise, to all of us... To find us a home. Together." And Dualla is saying: "Every day that we remain apart is a day that you've broken your promise. It's time to heal the wounds. People have been divided. Children have been separated from their parents."
And when Apollo asks what Adama would do, if he were missing, Bill doesn't skip a beat: if it were Lee, if it were his son? They'd never leave.
He walks away down a corridor, and stops at the junction. In a halo of light he stops. For just a moment, he stops, and something changes. Another wall falls down. He turns and stares at the photograph, on the wall down the hall, and his back goes straight again. He pulls down the photograph, and holds it in his hands.
She's given up. He can't have that.
And Tigh is looking out across CIC in the hours after the attacks, begging them to stay awake. "Yes, we're tired. Yes, there's no relief..."
Gaius hounds Lee through the hangar deck, wondering when Lee's going to listen to his proposal, spurred on by Paulla and Six. "I'm not even saying it would necessarily be me," he says. Heavy was the head of the President, once upon a time. (Laura: "Because I don't like politics to begin with and a national campaign is just so...") Lee takes the pen out of his mouth and finally looks at Gaius, wondering what on earth he's thinking of this time. "My people deserve a voice in the government. Now, I'm literally talking about the lives and wellbeing of thousands of people in the Fleet."
Lee asks if "wellbeing" was really the point when he was outing Starbuck's secret. Gaius could never explain to him the ways in which it was; the ways he's trying to rebuild religion in a way that makes sense, updating mystery cults and resurrection for a new world, a new way of thinking. "Does everything have to be reduced to your personal feelings about Kara Thrace?" Gaius grabs him as he turns, and begs him to listen. "Lee. I'm asking to have a genuine conversation. Please." Lee's tired, but curious to see what Gaius having a genuine conversation could possibly look like. He heads away to give him five minutes; Gaius waves off Paulla and promises to be back in five.
Bill holds Kara's notes in his hands, searching them for an answer; below them, Sam sleeps. "I don't know, I'm just groping mostly. Looking for patterns. Trying to see what comes to me. I thought that if I assigned numbers to the notes..." He looks at her and she shrugs. "I don't know."
Bill puts down the notes and looks at her; forces the words out. "What Baltar said the other day. Is it the truth?"
And Lee's laughing: "No pain no gain, no cliché left unturned, as Kara Thrace returns to the world of the walking. Can she do it, or will she fall on her ass?"
Kara doesn't look, but she answers pretty quickly. "Yeah. I found my body..." She looks him in the eye. "And I burned it, on Earth. I don't know what I am." He looks at her, past her truth. She's calmer now, for having said it. For having said it to him. He looks down at her husband. "I have to ask him a question, do you know how to plug him in?" Kara, after a beat, comes around him to do so. Bill grabs her arm, tenderly. "Hey. I know what you are." He puts his hand on her back. "You're my daughter. Don't forget it." She won't.
And Doc Cottle's saying, "It's gonna hurt like hell. But it's supposed to."
SAMUEL T. ANDERS
Sam sits in the living waters of resurrection, the soul in the machine. He blinks and the world responds. Focused on getting stronger, connecting sky to earth again. Helping out the team any way he can; speaking the best he can through the oracular language of God.
Aaron Doral's leading a group through the ship, on the day she becomes a museum: "Form follows function."
Sam sits in a hot tub at the sports fitness center, recovering. The reporter's trying not to look at him, the beauty, the perfection of him. She's asking him, if he doesn't get to hold the Cup before he's done, will his career feel incomplete? Is there a point where he would even accept retirement?
"Right now I'm just focused on getting stronger, and helping out the team any way I can. Um, I..." He looks away. She's asking him who he is: the beautiful mind of science, that musician's heart, beating away in a secret place Cavil won't let him remember.
(And Leoben's bleeding. "What is the most basic article of faith? That This is not all that we are. ...C-Bucks rule." Sam jumps. "What did you just say?" Forward guard, right? Sam were good. But even in the middle of it, the celebrity and acclaim, what is he? Just another face selling magazines, another piece of scoreboard trivia. He knows there's something more. "You were just waiting for your singular moment of clarity," Leoben's telling him: A singularity; another in a series of endings that are no endings at all; another in the ongoing list of every beautiful, terrible apocalypse. apokalyptein means only to uncover, to reveal. To clarify toward a better truth. The end of something, if time existed. It doesn't anymore.)
They come fast and strong, all the time. You have to watch out for them. Steady as it comes. "Look, you want to know the truth? I don't really care about the status, or the Cup or the trophy or anything like that. Um..." He looks around, guilty for saying it, for thinking it: "In fact, even the games aren't that important to me. Not really."
Sam's running across a killing field on Caprica, one step ahead of the bullets. Leading his team to one more victory, unsure when the game will finally end.
"What matters to me is the perfect throw, okay, making the perfect catch. The perfect step and block. It's perfection, that's what it's about. It's about those moments when you... When you can feel the perfection of creation. The beauty of physics. The wonder of mathematics, you know, the... Elation, of action and reaction. And that is the kind of perfection that I want to be connected to."
Bill stares as Sam connects himself, spreading mind throughout the ship, loving the singular entity that is Kara, standing before him, trying desperately to speak clearly.
"Spins and turns angles and curves the shape of dreams half-remembered slip the surly bonds of Earth and touch the face of perfection a perfect face perfect lace find a perfect world for the end of Kara Thrace end of line."
Kara shrugs. "He says a lot of things. Go ahead, ask your question." Bill's nervous. Not this C-Buck boy, not the guerilla soldier, not the forward guard, not the man coughing out his life on a planet far below. Something new. A new world, a new way of thinking. All these things are true.
(None of these things are true. Anders is paralyzed in the hangar deck, shivering, afraid to mount his Viper and fly the CAP. "What if I get up there and another switch flips in my head and turns me against my own?" And the Chief is shaking his head: "It's like the Colonel said, okay? Just think of that. Be the man you want till the day you die. You're Samuel T. Anders. That's all you've got to remember. Samuel T. Anders.")
Bill shivers as they stare down at Sam, lights flashing. "You ask him." Kara nods.
GAIUS BALTAR
"Let's forget for one moment that you're the son of the Admiral..." Gaius begins, and Lee flaps his hands, exhausted: "Shut the frak up. Get to the frakking point. You got five minutes, speak." And Gaius does.
"Galactica has been more than our guardian. She's literally a vessel into which we have poured all of our hopes and dreams. And when she's gone, when we can no longer derive the security from looking out a window and seeing her massive bulk gliding by, then this life will be over and a new life will have begun. A new life: that requires a new way of thinking."
(And the President stands before the phoenix, the Blackbird Laura, addressing the crew. She doesn't know it's named the Laura, yet. The honor is all hers, and she doesn't even know it yet. But listen to what she's saying, what she has to believe: "Today is a new beginning for all of us. We share a unique destiny, but our future is ours to shape, and our past cannot be forgotten. A new day requires new thinking.")
Gaius puts his hand on his heart and tries, tries desperately to be genuine.
"Now, I am willing to do anything, anything I can, to make this new life a good one. All I am asking is that my people have a voice in the government. I represent thousands of people, they deserve to be enfranchised just as much as anyone else. I'm not talking about myself. This is not for me personally. Come on, Lee. It makes sense. You know it's the right thing to do." He holds out hand; Lee stares at it.
"What I know is that in all the years that I've known you, I've never seen you make one truly selfless act." Gaius turns away. "Never seen you do something that didn't on some level serve the greater needs of Gaius Frakking Baltar. So no, I won't take your hand. And I won't bring you, or any representative from your movement, into the government."
So that's what it boils down to, Gaius says, getting frustrated, getting arrogant. These are his people. His people. "My people can't get representation, because I personally haven't passed Lee Adama's Selfless Altruism Test. I haven't been a goody-goody, and won a badge of honor..." Lee shakes his head, and says the question on the head of every pin, everything thought, every tear and every demand. "I don't think you've passed Gaius Baltar's test."
And a Six is leaning down, past the pictures of the Armistice agent's children, past the paperwork, past the dust of forty years of futility. "Are you alive?" she asks. And "Prove it," she says. And destroys twelve worlds, with a kiss. Are you alive? Prove it.
"Go ahead, look me in the eye and tell me about the time that you made a truly heroic act of conscience which helped you not even in the slightest. Tell me!" he shouts, suddenly shot through with passion he didn't know was there, almost begging: "I'll even believe you." Just tell me I didn't save you a thousand times in vain.
(And Gaius is holding his hands against a child's hot head, casting eyes up to God, watching his lies become truth as he says them. "After all I've done... Really, if you want someone to suffer, take me. We both know I deserve it. Selfish and weak. I have failed so many people. And I have killed. I'm not asking for your forgiveness. I'm just asking that you spare the life of this innocent child. Don't take him, take me. Take me, please." Did he mean it, Six asked him. Are you alive?)
Gaius looks at Lee's face, unable to solve this equation. To say it is to trumpet it. Matt. 6 says you don't pray in public and you don't wear your good works aloud. "When thou doest alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth." He nods, sadly. You can't call yourself selfless, or you stop being selfless. Your redemption flies away, like a bird. "You're right," he says sadly. "I wouldn't trust me either." He turns and leaves; he almost looks at Lee. And Lee stares after him, still wanting to believe.
And Six stands in her red dress, choking on rage and shame and sadness, looking down at the filthy woman, at the way she crawls, like a beast, waiting to die. The tears well up in his eyes, and he leans down.
"My name is Gaius Baltar, and I am here to help you."
LEE ADAMA
After dinner and too much wine, the girlfriend-stealer comes home drunk and laughing. Her face is like a bird, fluttering madly against the glass.
And Lee is asking Romo: "Think your sins are so special?"
And Joseph is waving his grandson over, where his father and brother can't hear him, Joseph is saying, "Lee, be a good boy. Just don't be too good."
There's a model Viper on his table; they are pilots. The three of them, pilots. Just like Dad, with Carolanne in the rearview mirror, getting smaller all the time. Outside it's impossibly bright; he's still wearing the clothes he wore last night. Day break.
"Holy frak," he mumbles. "I dare you," he says quietly to himself, laughing. "I double-dog-dare you." He laughs, and drops his keys on the floor.
(And on Galactica he's drunk and flailing; his wedding ring goes skittering off across the deck behind crates; he bends down to find it, knocking his skull against the bulkhead. They watch, but they don't help. He begins to weep.)
The sound startles a pigeon awake, on the floor of his apartment; it begins to walk and he blunders toward it, begging it to leave. He grabs a broom as it soars into the rafters, terrified. A bird in the house means death is coming; his brother has something he wants. He'll be dead soon. And Lee will feel so much guiltier about it than he knows, because this morning her face is a bird, fluttering against the glass.
He swings wildly and knocks something else off a table; he begins to curse the bird. She's caught, against the sky; she fights something she can't see because she is afraid. She fights because she doesn't know how to do anything else. Lee Adama loves Kara Thrace.
WILLIAM ADAMA
Gaius watches Lee pass by him again, and Lee watches his father go by. The old Quorum members are there, too, as everybody gathers to leave and say goodbye to the old girl. Everyone stands still. Something is happening. Something new.
There are random jumps, and there are jumps that aren't so random. Sometimes it takes a great notion to lead you places you wouldn't ever have looked.
Bill hands Kara the red ribbon of tape and proceeds down the middle of the hangar deck, laying it down, right down the middle like a line of salt. She joins him at the end of line, when they are done.
Remember the red line? It's how far you can jump before you can ever come back. You're not supposed to cross it -- technically, you shouldn't be allowed to -- but they're crossed it this time. The calculations for such a jump are so complex they are nonlinear; home is an itch you can't scratch.
"Can I have your attention, please? I'm sure you're all aware that a child was abducted from this ship recently. I thought that a rescue mission was impractical." Gaius stares at him now. "Well, I was wrong." Something happened, something changed. He knows more than he did before.
In the racks Hotdog relates what he saw. He'll never know that he was the one, who spurred the Admiral on. "Starbuck was there, so I bet he talked to Anders," Hotdog says, and shivers.
Laura listens to Ishay relating the story to Cottle. "He thought that a rescue mission was impractical because he didn't know where she was being held. But that's changed now, I guess, because he does know where she's being held."
Hera, and Bill. The President stands between the darkness and her people, all through the night. But she loves. When her mother died, she stepped up. Now she is mother to Thirteen Nations, and just one, and this is her family: Hera, the Twins, and Bill Adama.
Ellen walks with Tory, continuing the news. "Of course, knowing where the Colony is, is not nearly the same thing as being able to actually get her out." Tory shivers: this is insane. She loved that little girl until it broke her heart. She's never been the same. The Final Five theme soars, up against the light; it becomes something grander. "What I know is that Hera has some meaning that transcends the here and now," Ellen says. "She's meant to fulfill a role, just as we were."
And Ellen is looking Bill right in the eye. "You don't wanna frak with me, Bill. Try to remember that." And Bill is calm, and full of rage. "Don't frak with me either, Ellen." She doesn't know how else to do things.
And Laura is snorting lovingly at Lee. "You actually think that woman is a Cylon?" And he's shrugging, with a smile. "Well, if she's not, then we're all in a lot of trouble."
"So we're going," she says, in that motherly way. "The Five of us." Tory snits about it, but she doesn't really have much fight left in her at this point. "Oh, you're making decisions for all of us now?" she says, but it's just obligatory. She already knows Ellen's right. She puts her arm around her, this forgotten, amnesiac sister, this girl with a list, this girl who murdered to keep her forgotten family safe, and Ellen grins. "You'll go, Tory. Truth is, you never could be alone."
They pass by Lee on the phone, and the tracking shot lingers: they're setting the mutineers free, for a strictly volunteer mission. He's surprised at his father; he's incapable at this point of being surprised by his father.
And down in CIC, Tigh's telling them it's time to go to the hangar deck. "Set in-port watch until you get back. Watch Keepers report to the Admiral's Quarters to declare yourselves in person. Move!" As they walk, he asks Hoshi what he's going to do; Hoshi's not sure. He loved a Keeper of the Watch, once. "Well, take your time," Saul grits affectionately. "Takes approximately four minutes to get down there."
Helo's bouncing in excitement, in the Agathon quarters. "It's really happening! We're going after her!" Athena's still crying. "Or what's left of her. Cavil's probably had her sliced and diced and cut up into a thousand specimens..." Karl begs his wife to stop, stop thinking it, stop saying it. Come back to him. But she put the photograph on the wall herself. "Just stop it, okay? She's still alive, and she's still out there. And we're gonna get her. And everything's gonna be all right." This is why she loves him. It's not enough. "You're wrong," he says, backing away from her. She lies crumpled on the rack; this is her prison now.
And Athena's asking, "How do you know? I mean, how do you really know that you can trust me?"
And Bill's saying, "I don't." That's what trust is.
LAURA ROSLIN
Laura lies, awake again in sickbay, watching her monitors.
And Laura sits in her apartment, eating sushi three months after the accident. Between apocalypses. "I do too go out, I do. I do." She doesn't.
"No I'm not joining Adar's presidential campaign. I don't care. Because I don't like politics to begin with and a national campaign is just so... Bleh."
The woman on the phone changes tack; anything to bring her back to life. Laura's hands flutter, like a bird against the glass, frustrated and grateful for this love. "I'll make you a deal. I'll go on the date ... if you'll stop bugging me about this campaign." She laughs, scandalized. "How young is he?" The answer makes her jump in her chair and she protests, but she made a deal. Fairness first and always. "What's Mr. Perfect's name? Oh, Sean, I like that name. Sean what? Sean Ellison? Sounds familiar..." She laughs at herself and puts down the phone, and thinks about her date.
When when he comes to the door, his eyes will be kind. A police officer. She will join the campaign, and fall in love with a married man instead.
Laura settles the wig on her head, a pretty girl for a lovely day; the last day as she breaks all around them. She sits on the sickbay bed, tests her legs. And stands.
Adama: Politics. As exciting as war. Definitely as dangerous.
Roslin: Though in war, you only get killed once. In politics it can happen over and over.
Adama: You're still standing.
Roslin: So are you.
GAIUS BALTAR
Center on Helo; pilots stand to the right and the Final Five to the right. Behind Karl stand Dealino, and the Marines. He looks at his wife, who stands on the side. Far enough away from his hope and joy that it won't tear her apart.
"No one should feel obligated to join this mission in any way," Bill reiterates, standing on a lifter. He looks so strong. "This is a decision I have made for myself. If it turns out that there are not enough personnel to crew Galactica, I will lead a Raptor assault, with anyone who is willing to join me." Karl watches, and Gaius, and Hoshi. Looking up at the Admiral.
"Let there be no illusions! This is likely to be a one-way trip. So don't volunteer out of sentiment or emotion." He looks out at them. Remember the red line? "There is a line running down this deck." They obligingly spread out, to either side, revealing it, all the way down. "Volunteers, move to the starboard side! Everyone else to the port." He steps down, off the pedestal, and looks at them directly, breathing. Kara is proud. They stare across the lines at each other; Caprica looks across at Gaius, with his women. "Make your choice."
Lee steps forward; Ellen proceeds across the line like a queen, on Saul's arm. Hotdog presents himself. Ishay and Cottle step forward , and Bill puts his hands on Cottle's shoulders. "Doc, we can't afford to lose a doctor. Go on back, Sherman. And thank you." He obeys, crusty as ever; Caprica moves across the line, and locks eyes with Admiral. Gaius stares. Chief snorts at Tory -- "Like you've got something better to do" -- and guides her across. In another life, they were to be married.
Gaius watches as Caprica takes her place beside Ishay, and they watch him as he wavers. The truth of the Opera House demands that he join Caprica. The truth of Gaius Baltar demands that he stay put.
And Lida Six is frustrated, watching his twist in the bed beside her. "But I want to make you feel better!" she tries to explain, and he breathes out sadly.
"Cut off my legs."
LAURA ROSLIN
More trading, as the volunteers cross with the survivors. And the maidens shall rejoice at the dance. They finally come to rest, toes against the line, looking across at their brothers and sisters. A small, frail woman makes her way through the crowd, sweetly asking their pardon as she pushes past, shaking, into the space between them. She makes her way to him, her home. Steady as it comes.
And on Caprica the report looks down at Sam, trying not to take it in, the perfection and the beauty of him. Form follows function. "But you still haven't won a championship, and now the C-Bucks are in a rebuilding year. If you don't get to hoist the Cup before you retire, will you consider your career to be incomplete?"
Bill walks to Laura, supporting her. "You didn't think you were gonna take off without me, Admiral. Did you?" He grins, proud and in love. "Never crossed my mind, Madam President."
Bill walks her to the head of the line, to stand with their family. Past Caprica, who loves her silently, past Saul and Ellen. She stands close to Kara, who reaches across the space between them and puts her arm around the President, holding her up. Laura reaches gratefully for her hands, and Kara takes it easily. The world is silent.
And Adama looks up from the page, ready to keep going, past the red line, a random jump into the unknown, into the thing he fears the most:
"I must warn you that I'm getting into the part I haven't read yet."
And Roslin laughs, nudging him with a grin. "Oh dear! Are you going to be able to continue?"
FORGIVEN
Raptor 279 jumps in on the coordinates Sam gave them: right into turbulence, asteroids. It's a hell of space and rocks. This has all happened before, and this is happening again now: Racetrack and Skulls, earning Tauron toothpaste one salvation at a time. "Frak!" Racetrack yells. "Plot us a way the hell back out of here!" Skulls is already on it. "Figures that a brain-damaged Cylon would send us hunting in the middle of an asteroid field," she bitches nervously, and Skulls laughs. "The more things change, the more they stay the same. You got a recon mission where someone needs to hang their ass over the edge and wait for a bite? Send Racetrack and Skulls." It beats sitting in a cell.
Skulls sees something, a ghost of a something on the long-range dradis. "Holy frak, we're right on top of a singularity." You always have been. They're already sliding toward it. Skulls spins up the FTL, to escape, but before he does he notices something else.
Lee's wearing his Major's uniform, but no insignia or wings. This is a special occasion. The most special, the final occasion. He's standing in the wardroom with the Final Five, and his family. Kara points to the Colony's location, and the Twins explain the singularity, trading lines and explanations as the rest of them watch. "It's within our jump range, but there's a sizable catch: It's located within an accretion disk of a naked singularity." The Colony's bound within the gravity well of the black hole, but maintains a stable orbit." (Quibble the terminology or don't, you know I don't have time for that stuff.)
There's no way to navigate the current, Kara explains: the "tidal stresses," meaning the gravity variances and weird radiation, make that impossible. The areas closer to the singularity rush forward faster than the parts of the ship that can't, and she's torn apart. There's one safe spot, however, that they've found. Lee points it out: while Racetrack and Skulls were taking pictures, they got to see two Baseships jump in and out. Saul points out that it is crazy close, and Lee nods. Less than a klick. He agrees with Saul on its tactical advantages: it's a bottleneck; it's going to be wildly, violently defended.
"All right," Bill says firmly. "Let's get to work."
And Three's looking at it all. Takes a host of moments -- fear, guilt, longing, secrets, love, hate -- and edits it down, combines them all into one living, beautiful thing. A memory of greatness, a ray of hope about the future.
"I came to Galactica to tell a story. In all honesty I thought I knew what that story was before I ever set foot there: how an arrogant military let their egos get in the way of doing their jobs, safeguarding the lives of the civilian population.
"But I found out that the truth was more complex than that. These people aren't Cylons, they're not robots blindly following orders and polishing their boots. They're people. Deeply flawed, yes, but deeply human too, and maybe that's saying the same thing.
"What struck me most is that despite it all -- the hardships, the stress, the ever-present danger of being killed, despite all that -- they never give up. They never lie down in the road and let the truck run them over. They wake up in the morning, put on their uniforms and do their jobs. Every day. No pay, no rest, no hope of ever laying down the burden or letting someone else do the job. There are no relief troops coming, no Colonial Fleet training new recruits every day. The people on Galactica are it. They are the thin line of blue that separates us from the Cylons.
"Lt. Gaeta told me a remarkable statistic: not a single member of Galactica's crew has asked to resign. Not one. Think about that. If you wore the uniform wouldn't you want to quit? To step aside and say, Enough! Let someone else protect the fleet! I know I would, but then, I don't wear a uniform. Most of us don't. Most of us never will.
"The story of Galactica isn't that people make bad decisions under pressure, it's that those mistakes are the exception. Most of the time the men and women serving under Commander Adama get it right. The proof is that our Fleet survives. And with Galactica at our side, we will endure."
And Gaius throws himself on his knees, bleeding before God. "And when we know what we are, then we can find the truth out about others. See what they are: the truth about them. And you know, what the truth is. The truth about them. About you, about me. Do you?"
Steady as it comes. Steady, as she goes.