Battlestar Galactica 11 - The Nightmare Machine

by Glen A. Larson

  "Surely you don't cling to your suspicions about the Cylons. They asked for this armistice. They want peace. For myself I look forward to our coming rendezvous with the Cylon representatives."

  Adama wanted to wipe his friend's smug confidence right off his face. Why hadn't he been more firm with him at the time? Why had he been hamstrung by a useless respect for the office? Old friend or not, Adar had been, with his shrewd political skills and need to be approved by others, a poor choice for the presidency of the Quorum. But had he really believed that at the time, or was he now only making the judgement out of hindsight?

  "Forgive me, Mr. President," the past Adama said, "but—but the Cylons hate humans deeply, with every fiber of their existence. In our love of freedom, of independence, our need to feel, to question, to affirm, to rebel against oppression—in all these ways we are different from them. To them we are the aliens and they'll never accept our ways, our ideas, our—"

  "But they have accepted. Through Baltar, they have sued for peace."

  Suddenly Adama had to speak. He knew he could not be heard but he had to speak, if only for the chance that somehow his words would pass through the barrier of future and past, and change this moment.

  "Don't capitulate," he yelled at his former self. "Tell him, tell Adar. Baltar can't be trusted. You know that. You can change things, you fool! Say something!"

  But, as he knew already, history could not be changed and so the past Adama would say nothing but:

  "Yes, of course you're right."

  Adama felt such shame at his capitulation. He turned away from his past self and Adar, and walked away, furious.

  "No, no, no!" he muttered. "That wasn't like me. Why did I say it? Could I have changed things if I'd pressed harder? Could I have altered Adar and the Quorum? Maybe I could have. Why didn't I?"

  Of course he could not answer his own questions. There were no answers. There were only the building guilts that, back on the Galactica, back in the present, Lucifer's device was implanting into his sick, writhing body.

  Apollo and Boomer gave up the documents simultaneously. Some time had passed and they both were weary of the task. Next to them, Starbuck listlessly turned pages. He had been doing that ever since Boomer had insisted he do something. However, Boomer had been forced to surreptitiously take such documents and check them out for himself when Starbuck was through with them.

  "Nothing," Apollo said, throwing his last sheaf of papers into a far corner. "No correspondences, no clues."

  "Maybe there's something we haven't seen," Boomer suggested.

  "Boomer, we've looked at all these printouts and records at least twice apiece. We haven't missed anything. The Galactica has been functioning normally. A bit sluggish in some respects, but normally."

  "Maybe that's the abnormality. How often are we functioning normally? Maybe the whole gloomy gus routine is brought on by normality."

  "I don't follow," Apollo said.

  "I don't care," Starbuck interjected.

  "Shut up, Starbuck," Boomer said. "Listen. What if we're so used to being under the tensions of Cylon pursuit and the everyday crises of running this ship that, when we finally go get everything going right for us for a change, we don't trust it and begin to feel down because of this uncertainty. Maybe it's simply happiness that's making us gloomy."

  "Ah, Boomer—" Starbuck said, disgustedly.

  "No, Starbuck," Apollo said, "he might have something. But I don't know how we could prove something like that, except to let everything run its course. And I don't think Tigh would buy that as our final report. Even if it is so, we have to keep looking."

  "Well, frack, it sounded good there for a micron. Perked me up, anyway."

  Starbuck yawned theatrically.

  "Can I go to my bunk?" he asked. "I'd like to grab some shut-eye."

  "You been sleeping like it's your hobby lately," Boomer said, sarcastically.

  "Get off my back!" Starbuck shouted, with a disgusted anger. "I'm just not . . . not up to par, that's all."

  "Starbuck—" Boomer began, but Apollo interrupted:

  "Wait! Maybe we've been tackling this problem from the wrong direction. Of the three of us, who's the worst hit?"

  Apollo and Boomer scrutinized the yawning Starbuck simultaneously. His yawn stopped at half-mast when he realized what they were thinking.

  "Fellas," he said, "I have no intention of being a guinea pig"

  "It's an order, lieutenant," Apollo said firmly. "As my father is so fond of saying, you have no other choice."

  "Yes, I have. I can go to sleep."

  "Starbuck!"

  "Okay, okay. But I'll remember how you pulled rank on me, Captain."

  "So what? Now look, I want you to think about when you started feeling this way."

  "Feeling what way?"

  "Morose, gloomy, guilty . . ."

  "Oh, that way."

  Starbuck scowled as he sincerely considered the question.

  Baltar agitatedly paced along his usual route, a wide circle around an open area of the command chamber. He was worried about many things. About the success or failure of Lucifer's guilt device, about his plan to attack and destroy the Galactica, and especially about the coming of the Imperious Leader's liaison ship with its messenger and who knew who else?

  Lucifer rolled into the room. Baltar, seeing him, stopped his pacing and asked anxiously:

  "Has the delegation arrived?"

  "No delegation. Just one representative."

  "Just one? Only one?"

  This news depressed Baltar even more. Perhaps he was being slighted by the Leader, or even removed from duty. He wasn't sure which would be worse.

  "One," Lucifer said, "but not the one I would have chosen."

  If Lucifer hadn't deliberately programmed certain inflections out of his voice when he'd become Baltar's second-in-command, this remark would have been heavy with sarcasm.

  "What do you mean?" Baltar asked, confused.

  "You will see. Now, in fact."

  Baltar's attention was directed toward the command chamber entranceway, a wide arched portal. Standing at the center, beneath the arch's zenith, was another ambulatory cybernetic sentience, looking something like Lucifer but recognizably from a different series. Whoever it was, there was something vaguely familiar about him. Baltar felt he had met this one before. But when?

  Lucifer could not look toward the portal. He felt such revulsion for the social-climbing, rank-pulling, hoarding, degenerate figure standing there that he hoped it would go away. It was not normal for Lucifer to feel disgust, but it was an ancillary part of his emotional programming.

  The newcomer slid into the room with the same kind of smooth motion that propelled Lucifer, although it was not quite as graceful and made an irritating squeaky noise on the floor of the chamber.

  "Count Baltar," the newcomer said, "I have been looking forward to meeting you for ever so long."

  Baltar, unaccustomed to hearing one of these creations speak with warmth, was nevertheless bemused by the newcomer's familiarity. The figure stopped, his blue robe continuing to whirl around him for a moment, and said gently:

  "I was commander on the planet Antila. We communicated regularly when I captured the Galactican pilot Starbuck . . ."

  The memory of that incident returned to Baltar, as did the realization of the newcomer's identity. And this was Imperious Leader's representative? Baltar now felt he had nothing to worry about.

  "Ah, yes," he said, "Spectre, isn't it?"

  Spectre, pleased at Baltar's recognition, continued his path toward the commander.

  "Yes," he said, "Spectre, at your service."

  Lucifer thought he'd rather short-circuit than stay in the room and watch these two oil each other. Yet, he observed, there was something fitting in this meeting, something perhaps even destined.

  "Good to see you," Baltar said gleefully and threw his arm around Spectre's shoulders. Lucifer realized Baltar had never touched him that way.
He didn't know whether he was glad or sorry. Still, the easy familiarity of the gesture worried him.

  "I was impressed," Baltar said to Spectre, as they began to walk together, "by the way you handled yourself during that Antila operation, even in a losing cause."

  "Yes, it was unfortunate that the pilot escaped. I was so close to breaking him."

  Spectre easily readopted the line he had promoted at the time of the adventure. In reality, he had never seen the pilot, who had been in custody for no more than a few microns.

  "We all have to endure failure from time to time, Spectre."

  If Lucifer had had blood, his face would have been drained of it with that remark. Baltar had quite a history of failure, especially in his several failed schemes to capture or destroy the human fleet.

  Lucifer was appalled at the mutual admiration society that continued in front of his glowing red eyes. He was certain Spectre was a fraud who had covered up his own failures on Antila. And he knew how fraudulent Baltar was. They deserved each other, he concluded.

  Watching Spectre flatter and cajole Baltar, Lucifer wondered how this transparently false creation could have risen so skillfully in the Cylon hierarchy so that he was now a special messenger and personal representative from Imperious Leader. How could an ambulatory cybernetic sentience in his own series become a slick scheming bureaucrat? What kind of expediencies had formed Spectre's personality since he came out of the factory? And why should such a fraud rise in Imperious Leader's regard, while Lucifer, obviously of a superior series, and certainly a more evolved intelligence, was trapped on this base-star with an incompetent like Baltar. It irked Lucifer that an inferior being should have the Leader's ear, while Baltar would rarely listen to him.

  "And what is your business with us, Spectre?"

  Baltar's voice was so affable and sly, you could have knit spider webs with it.

  "Imperious Leader has sent me to prepare the way for him," Spectre announced. "He is coming to your base-star on a visit."

  "Oh, is he?"

  Baltar's voice, not so delighted now, dropped half an octave. Was this a visit, he wondered, or an inspection, perhaps an inspection leading to his removal. If it was merely a visit, a royal one at that, it was the perfect opportunity to aggrandize himself in the Leader's eyes. If he played his cards right, he could take credit for Lucifer's guilt device, and then top that with the final defeat of the Galactica. There were many dangers, many risks in the scheme, but he thought he could pull it off. And then he would be in the catbird seat within the Cylon hierarchy.

  On the other hand, the Leader might be coming to put him on the spot. He might intend to dress him down, or even make another attempt to lop off his head. Well, he had to take that chance. Anything went wrong, and he could go around smiling from the neck. But, with Lucifer's machine and the Galactica's shipment to the scrap heap, the Leader wouldn't dare do anything to him. He would be a hero, even in the Leader's many eyes.

  It was a delicate situation. But Baltar felt he could handle it.

  "What is to be the purpose of the Leader's visit?" Lucifer asked Spectre.

  Spectre whirled smoothly around and faced his fellow being, knowing Lucifer was the one individual in the command chamber to be wary of.

  "He wishes to buoy up the spirits of his troops and of the command leadership," Spectre managed to bow his head obsequiously to both Baltar and Lucifer, "with his approving presence, and to encourage you all in your present worthy endeavors in the pursuit of the Galactica and the loathsome human fleet."

  "He's coming all the way here for that?" Lucifer asked, incredulous.

  "As I said, honored Lucifer."

  "Interesting."

  "Why do you say interesting, Lucifer?" Baltar asked, wondering just what Lucifer was up to.

  "Oh, nothing," Lucifer said. "My interest is just . . . piqued, that's all."

  Baltar smiled sneeringly.

  "Come on, Lucifer," he said. "Out with it. You know I demand openness in my command chamber."

  Lucifer nearly exposed this patent lie, but decided to let Baltar let out his own string until somebody scissored it.

  "I am merely puzzled," Lucifer said.

  "Puzzled at what," said Baltar.

  "Imperious Leaders do not conduct routine inspection tours. They are assigned to lower echelon personnel. Imperious Leaders do not send cybernetic advisers as advance personnel for their visits. Imperious Leaders do not—"

  "Perhaps this one does," Baltar commented.

  "I assure you—" Spectre began.

  "I am properly corrected, Baltar," Lucifer said. "Indeed, perhaps this one does."

  Baltar knew there was sarcasm somewhere in Lucifer's statement. Perhaps Spectre could perceive it. He didn't want that, so he said to Lucifer:

  "Leave us. I wish to consult with our Leader's personal representative in private."

  Lucifer hesitated.

  "About Imperious Leader's coming visit, of course."

  Lucifer, not at all certain that all Baltar planned was a routine discussion with his visitor, glided out of the command chamber, knowing he would have to watch the both of them, Baltar and Spectre, from now on.

  Baltar did not say a word until he was certain Lucifer was out of hearing distance. He was uneasy about the implications Lucifer had suggested. Was there something more to this visit of Spectre's, and did Lucifer see what it was? Baltar knew he must be cautious, wary.

  The best way to start, he thought, was to butter up his visitor.

  "Spectre!" he bellowed heartily. The bellow was quite unnecessary, since Spectre was practically next to him.

  "By your command, Count Baltar, liege."

  Damn, but he liked this Spectre's style, especially the liege addendum.

  "I'm delighted to see you again," Baltar said, "this time in the . . . in the . . . in the—"

  "You may say flesh," Spectre said. "I appreciate human metaphor. And irony. I adore irony."

  Baltar, impressed, smiled broadly.

  "You're quite impressive, Spectre. I wonder . . . do you think someone like you is wasted in rear echelon duty? I mean, even with the Leader? I mean, wouldn't you like to see some real frontline action, use your considerable talents for the excitement and stimulation of real battles?"

  "Are you saying I could be useful on your staff here, Count Baltar, sir?"

  "I'm saying exactly that."

  Spectre paused for a scant moment, a fraction of a micron. He was employing his own logic circuits to see the possibilities of Baltar's offer.

  "It is definitely worth considering," he announced.

  Baltar was delighted by Spectre's response. It had been worded with the kind of care that Baltar liked to employ.

  "You could be just the ticket for me, Spectre. I'm sure I could create an opening for you."

  Both of them looked toward the portal through which Lucifer had just exited. A link that both felt seemed to be forging itself between them.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  "I think he's nearly in coma now," Salik said, "and getting closer all the time."

  Tigh's blood seemed to stop in his veins and freeze as he listened to the doctor's pronouncement. For a moment he had to look away from Adama, who was tossing and turning, getting the bedclothes in a tight mummylike wrap around his body.

  "Can you do anything?" Tigh asked the doctor.

  "Just what you're doing. Watch. Pray. Any levels hit critical points, we ship him to Life Center and I do what I can. How long since he was last awake?"

  "Just before you came in. It was odd. He sat up suddenly and stared at me as if he knew me. Then he said, 'That was my son, Mister President.' "

  "That mean anything to you?" the doctor asked, puzzled.

  "Unfortunately, yes. That's what he said just after his son was killed. He was speaking to Adar, the last president of the Quorum. It was right before the Cylons attacked."

  Salik shook his head and shrugged.

  "Kobol only knows I'm not a special
ist in things of the mind, but it sounds to me like the commander's mind has gone out the launch tube."

  As he often did, Tigh felt distaste for the doctor's brusque, sometimes inconsiderate way of expressing himself. But the man was doing his best for the commander, so Tigh kept his criticism to himself. He was too distressed to care about Salik's thoughtless way with words.

  Salik put away his instruments and went to the door, saying:

  "Let me know immediately if there's any change."

  "Right, doc."

  Salik left and, shortly thereafter, Athena entered the bedchamber.

  "Any change?" she asked Tigh.

  "Nothing good. How are you?"

  "Hanging in there. I'm—"

  Adama twisted around and half-leaned off his bed. As Athena rushed to help him, he said softly:

  "Prepare my shuttlecraft. I'm going down to the surface of Caprica, Tigh."

  Athena righted her father, and he settled his head back onto his pillow. Athena questioned Tigh with her eyes. He shrugged.

  "He's been saying things like that."

  "It's what he said to you just before he went down and . . . and found mother had been killed in the invasion."

  "I remember. Perhaps he'd be less restive if we left him alone for a while."

  They left the bedroom. Tigh suggested Athena sit down, but she said she was too nervous to sit. After walking to her father's desk and toying with a Caprican bluestone paperweight (a long-ago birthday present from Ila to Adama), Athena turned to Tigh and said:

  "Somehow he's reliving in his mind the time of the Cylon ambush."

  "Yes," Tigh said and ambled toward the viewport. He looked out at the vast starscape and did not speak for a while. When he did, it was in a quiet voice. "He seems to have the guilt disease—that's what I've come to call it. But he has it the worst of anybody. God knows, there're always reasons for all of us to feel twinges of guilt or get mired in long moody periods of remorse, but I can't figure why it should hit the commander worse than others. Of all of us, he's the most courageous, the most noble, the most—"

  "Well, that's just it, don't you see?" Athena took a position just behind Tigh and said sadly: "A noble individual is more liable to feel the consequences of his acts, to worry at length about the rights and wrongs. You've seen father do that thousands of times. And you don't see Sire Uri steeped in the depths of gloom, do you?"