Islands in the Sky

  Apollo and Serina a fast once-over when they entered the room. Apollo

  pulled Serina to a dark coner and kissed her. At first her response to

  the kiss was tentative, but, in a moment, she returned his kiss.

  "Now, about my proposal..." Apollo said.

  "Let's dispense with ritual. My room's next door.

  Mmmmmm...whatever's in that grog, I'm considering taking it with me when

  we leave this place."

  Arm in arm, they left Boxey's room. Muffit Two's head settled back

  on a pillow, it's eyes staying open, keeping a steady watch on the

  doorway.

  *****

  From the Adama Journals:

  I've tried many times to make entries in this journal about Baltar's

  treason, but somehow I can't deal with the subject without seeing the

  man's puffy egotistical face floating between me, ghostlike, and feeling

  excruciating waves of hatred go through my body. I become tense and

  can't think of words. Trying to put his treason into words would give it

  a set of perimeters whose very limitations would diminish the pure an

  unalterably selfish evil of the act. And I'm not about to rationalize a

  treason of such dimensions. The acts of aliens like the Cylons or

  Ubbo-Sathla are at least understandable to me as manifestations of ideas

  that belong to different, perhaps ultimately incomprehensible, cultures.

  With Baltar, I can understand the ideas he spouted, and I can even

  imagine the awesome selfishness that led him to sell out his own people

  for rewards that seem trivial in perspective---but that doesn't bring me

  any closer to a clear conception of the man himself. It's all I can do

  to make the ghost-face of him fade away. In his evil he is alien to me,

  more alien than any multi-limbed or multi-eyed creature from a different

  part of the universe.

  *****

  CHAPTER NINE: TRAPS AND SECRETS

  On the Cylon base ship, Imperious Leader contemplated the latest

  report from his centurion on Carillon's Lot. The plan was proceeding

  efficiently; more and more humans were falling prey to the lure of

  Ubbo-Sathla contentment. Nor had managed to doctor the food of several

  of the human leaders (except, unfortunately, for Adama) with a drug that

  helped her to sway their minds toward foolish decisions. "I have been

  successful," she'd said, "with planting the idea of unilateral

  disarmament into several buriticians' minds. Also, I have been

  successful in holding back on the shipments of Tylium to the fleet in the

  skies above my planet, supplying them enough of the liquid form of the

  fuel to lull any suspicions they may have developed." But the Leader

  wondered if the wily Adama could really be fooled so easily. All signs

  pointed to that conclusion, but one fact that had emerged in the Leader's

  many battles with Adama was trhe man's unpredictability. If a conclusion

  about him seemed obvious, then it must be questioned.

  Nevertheless, the time to act was now.

  He sent out the order that the Supreme Star Force stationed at

  Arrakis be immediately launched and set on a course for Carillon's Lot

  with the mission of annihilating human survivors and their spacecraft.

  This time Adama's foces would be rendered impotent, even if a few humans

  did manage one of their miraculous escapeds.

  Another message came to the Leader a few moments later. The rest of

  the human fleet, the ships left behind by Adama that were traveling

  toward Carillon's Lot at sublight speed, had been located. A malfunction

  in their camouflage had given their coordinates away. The Leader

  resisted an impulse to send out a force to destroy this group of wretched

  and battered remnants of the human fleet. The better strategy was,

  clearly, merely to maintain surveillance on these ships. They were

  powerless and indefensible, obviously low on Tylium and supploies. No,

  the logical move was to save their destruction for later. Adama was no

  doubt in contact with the ships he had left behind. Attacking them now

  might alert a rescue fleet, and that could not be allowed. Yes, the

  waiting game seemed best for now. It was a strategy he had learned from

  the humans.

  Cylon victory was certain, the Leader told himself. The Supreme

  Star Force's larger numbers would easily overwhelm the weakened human

  fleet, he told himself. The ships left behind could be toyed with and

  blasted to pieces, he told himself. He would have Adama's head as a war

  trophy, he told himself. Nevertheless, a certain uneasiness, an

  uncharacteristic tension, troubled his thoughts.

  *****

  On the bridge of the Galactica, Adama paced his usual path along the

  starflied. Frequently, he made a fist out of his right hand, pounded it

  into the palm of his left.

  "Fools!" he muttered once. "Give them something to eat and all

  judgment flies out of their minds. Is there any way I can stop this

  council meeting they're planning, Tigh?"

  "Nothing in the regs gives you any authority with the Council except

  in regard to military affairs. Only then can you countermand them."

  "They speak of universal disarmament. That's a military matter, is

  it not?"

  "Technically, no. Such decisions have always been in civilian

  hands, sir. Many believe this to be proper and logical."

  "I know, I know. I've a firm grasp on the theories behind the

  separation of military and civilan responsibility. I even approve of it.

  In theory at least. It's just that this group of muddleheads seem

  possessed, Tigh. I just want to go into the council room and knock

  heads."

  Tigh smiled slyly and said:

  "May I remind you, sir, in all due respect, that if you had not

  resigned as president of the Council you would have the privilege of

  going into that council room and knocking heads."

  "I am all too aware of that, Colonel. All too painfully aware."

  In the meeting room, the buriticians eyed Adama's entrance with

  apprehensive caution. To Adama, they looked curious, as if they had been

  physically transformed into total strangers.

  Before taking his seat, which had been placed to one side to denote

  his present lack of status on the Council, Adama said, "What, may I ask,

  is the purpose of this special council?

  Gant, the new president, gestured at the chair and replied.

  "Adama, please respect the order of business until called upon by

  this chair."

  Adama sat, his anger growing. Even Gant, who'd once been his ally,

  seemed odd now. The emaciated old buritician called the meeting to

  order.

  "It is the growing consensus of every man, woman, and child in this

  body that to set forth into uncharted space is utter madness," Gant said.

  "Hear, hear," said the rest of the buriticians, almost in unison.

  The mutere agreement sound like a chant, orchestrated, of course, by Sire

  Zalto.

  "The question is," Gant continued," what do we do about the Cylons.

  Obviously to remain here is to run the risk of discovery
. Sire Zalto has

  a measure to propose. Zalto?"

  Zalto rose to his feet, surveyed the council with a smile that

  displayed his smugness for all.

  "Brothers, brothers, lend me all your ears," he said unctuously. "A

  hasty attempt to outrun the Cylons spawned in the nighttime of

  desperation seems foolish in broad daylight."

  Nighttime of desperation, indeed! Adama thought. How quickly these

  oily buritricians could reduce the circumstances of tragedy to a cliché.

  Did Zalto not remember the suffering, the panic, the Cylon fighters

  killing our people and reducing our cities to rubble? Did he not even

  remember the joy, however momentary, he must've felt when, safe in the

  plush compartments of his own luxury liner, he knew he was still alive,

  one of the few survivors? Or were men like Zalto empty of all feeling,

  alive only to satisfy some instinctual greed or lust that moved them

  through their shabby existences like microprocessor chips inside a droid?

  Perhaps, Adama thought, he was just seeking rational excuses for what was

  in reality madness.

  "I propose," Zalto continued, with a significant glance toward

  Adama, "that, instead of rushing off on a doomed mythical quest, we now

  attempt to appeal for justice and mercy."

  Adama could hold back his rage no longer. He rose to his feet,

  shouting:

  "Justice from the Cylons? Mercy? Did you actually say that?"

  "Easy, Adama, easy," Zalto said. His voice had dropped almost to a

  whisper. What really bothered Adama was that the other councilors had

  appeared annoyed with him when he spoke and then had nodded at Zalto's

  soothing imprecation. "I know you're unhappy with us, Commander, and I

  understand how you feel. But you're a man of war, in case you've

  forgotten, and to people like you gestures toward peace almost always

  appear senseless. And that's my point. The spoils of enslaving us so

  far from their base of power hardly seems worth the effort for the

  Cylons."

  "Enslaving? Base of power?" Adama, still unable to control the

  anger in his voice, shouted, "Gentlemen, it's you who do you not

  understand! The kind of reason you're trying to employ might be sensible

  if we were dealing with other humans, with any species whose system of

  values was parallel to our own. But these are the Cylons, gentlemen!

  They said they would not stop until every human had been exterminated.

  Not enslaved, mind you---exterminated! We have not even had the

  priviledge of dealing with their leaders openly. All we know of them is

  by interference and observation. Why should they change their own

  methods? For that matter, why should they believe we are now willing to

  accept that which we always found unacceptable? To live under Cylon

  rule? We have always been just as adamant about that as they have been

  in their avowed desire to exterminate us."

  Many of ther brows around the council table gradually began to

  frown. Perhaps, Adama thought, he was getting through the muddle.

  "Commander," Zalto said, with an obvious sense of theatrical timing,

  "the Ubbo-Sathla queen Nor has observed the Cylons up close, and in much

  more peaceable circumstances. Her race has been at peace with the Cylons

  for a millennium, and she assures me that victory is the Cylons' only

  goal. It's a matter of satisfying their codes of order. If any

  individual enemy or group of enemies still roam the universe, then they

  feel it's their duty to exterminate them---to wipe out the flaw in their

  sense of order, I suppose. But we can remove that flaw."

  "How?" Adama asked, even though part of him didn't really want to

  know.

  "By destroying our arms to proved we're willing to live in peace."

  "Destroy our only means of defense!"

  "Or attack. As you recall, brothers, we were once at peace with the

  Cylons. We didn't have conflict with them until we intervened in their

  relations with other nations."

  Adama struggled to keep from coming to blows with Zalto. He

  wondered briefly whether, if Adama sprung upon him suddenly, the man

  would refuse to fight back.

  ""Yes," Adama said, "you are right. We didn't come into conflict

  with the Cylons until we defended our neighbors whom the Cylons wished to

  enslave. And, until we helped the Sobrams get back their nation, which

  was taken by force by the Cylons."

  "That's right," Zalto said. "Which only serves to prove my point.

  All we have to do is mind our own business, and the Cylons'll leave us

  alone. It's just that simple."

  Again the other buriticians, satisfied with Zalto's rhetorical

  flourish, murmured approval. Adama could see there was no point in

  trying to get through to them with anything resembling logic. He had

  made his contingency plans. It ws now time to put them into effect. He

  addressed the council in a quiet but tense voice.

  "Gentlemen, if we have come to this table to turn our backs on the

  principles of hluman reason and compassion, the principles of our fathers

  and the Lords of Kobol, from whom our Twelve Colonies evolved, we do so

  with my utter contempt!"

  He turned and strode quickly from the room. After he had left, many

  of the buriticians squirmed in their seats. Zalto turned to them and

  spoke.

  "These warriors! They're always the last to recognize the

  inevitability of change. The Commander's always been fond of telling us

  we don't have a choic, which always means to endorse his ideas slavishly.

  Fortunately, we've got a choice: life or death."

  "I supbmit that an issue this grave should be decided by the

  people," Sire Zelar said.

  "The military will be difficult to convince," Gant said. "How do

  you propose we present so delicate a matter?"

  After an uneasy pause, Zalto said:

  "How about we do so at a celebration? People are always easier to

  deal with at a celebration. Let's hold a celebration to decorate those

  three brave youngsters who, at the risk of their lives, opened the

  Carillon's Lot minefield for us. Without them, we'd still be on the

  other side, starving. One of the pilots was Adama's son, Captain Apollo,

  that right?"

  Some members of the council cheered their support of Zalto, happy

  that some solution had been found. Others applauded, impressed by

  Zalto's clever stratagem of including Apollo in the celebration.

  "That's a brilliant suggestion, Zalto," Gant said. "Why, that's

  just the tonic our people need at this moment---some old-fashioned,

  honest-to-goodness heroes!"

  "You took the words right out of my mouth," Zalto said, his smile a

  bit more malicioius than usual.

  *****

  Starbuck had spent a great deal of time trying to convince the lead

  singer of the Caladana group that he could hurl them from this dinky

  little engagement in an outworld chancery into a full-fledged big-time

  career. The singer had not responded to Starbuck's pleadings. She had br />
  merely sat nervously, a fat fumarello in her lower mouth, looking around

  the chancery as if she expected to see spies everywhere. Starbuck had

  gone as far as to offer them a seventy-thirty split, with him picking up

  transportation costs. But the singer had merely said she didn't think it

  would work out, and that she couldn't talk about it anyway. When he had

  tried to press her on the subject, she had only become more nervous.

  Leaving her dressing room, he noticed that her apparent fear of spies was

  justified. An Ubbo-Sathla jumped behind a nearby stage curtain.

  The next day, as Starbuck sprawled in his room in the guest

  quarters, his head throbbing with a hangover, Boomer rushed into the room

  and sat on the bed so heavily that the bounce sent waves of pain through

  Starbuck's head.

  "Out of the bunk, Starbuck. Captain Apollo's sent out a muster

  call, and he asked especially for you."

  "Boomer, I've been lying her thinking, about what you said last

  night. I'm beginning to agree with you. Something's going on around

  her. Something----bad."

  "Well, whatever it is'll have to wait. We're going to have to go

  back to the Galactica."

  "What for?"

  "Our dress uniforms."

  "Dress uniforms? Look, Boomer, I hate dress uniforms and I've got a

  head that won't go through one of those tight collars. I'll pass, thank

  you very much."

  "Starbuck, one does not accept our people's highest honor, the

  Golden Cluster, in battle dress."

  Boomer's information made Starbuck sit up. Too soon, as it

  happened, for his head seemed to explode. No matter. He was too amazed.

  "A star cluster? You're kidding!"

  "You got it. For that matter, me too. All three of us who went

  into that minefield blind. Apollo, too."

  Starbuck smiled.

  "Hey," he said, "that's all right. Doesn't some kind of pay raise

  go with that?"

  Boomer laughed, while shaking his head in disbelief.

  "You're hopeless," he muttered, "absolutely hopeless."

  *****

  Serina walked Apollo to the shuttle that was to take him back to the

  Galactica to get ready for the awarding of the star cluster and to

  respond to a request from his father for a meeting. Boxey and Muffit Two

  trailed along behind them.

  "It was a wonderful night," she whispered to Apollo.

  "For me, too," he said. "And thanks for letting me get all of that

  stuff out of my system about Zac. I feel better. It'll take a while for

  the guilt to evaporate, as you suggest, but at least I feel better about

  myself."

  "You should. You're very valuable, Captain Apollo. A walking lode