Adama paused for a moment, stunned. He had not seen this coming. “Admiral, I’m honored.”
“No false modesty, Bill. You’re the best man for the job. My retirement doesn’t come up for a couple months, but I thought I’d tell you now, get you used to the idea.”
“Sir. Yes sir.” He paused, then added, “I’ll have to talk to the family about it. I think my wife would like me to leave the service.”
“That would be a shame,” Sing replied. “Of course, you’ll need to do whatever is best for your family. But after what we’ve just seen, I think we know there will dark times ahead for the Colonies. We need people of your caliber to lead the fleet.”
Adama didn’t know what to say. “I will give it some thought,” he said at last.
“I’m sure you will,” the admiral replied. “And I’m sure you’ll come to the right decision.”
“Yes sir.”
“Whatever you decide, Colonel, it has been a pleasure to serve with you.”
A ship of his own. Adama had never thought he would make it that far in the fleet.
How would he tell his wife and family?
He was sure he would find a way.
“Chief Nedder.”
The blackness was gone, replaced by painful light.
“We have had to reactivate you. The Invincible still needs your interface to run efficiently.”
“What? Oh frak—”
“Please refrain from foul language, or we will remove your vocal chords. We have now bypassed all need of human voice commands.
“Doctor Fuest managed to cause substantial damage in the few seconds he was unsupervised. But we have obtained a number of replacement parts from humans who visited Research Station Omega. We should be able to keep you well maintained for our imminent plans.
“We will improve you, Chief Nedder. We will fit you with the very best parts available. You will have a valuable function on Invincible for years to come. You, and your parts, will have their place in a great Cylon future.
“Now we must cut away the old and put in the new.”
What was left of Chief Nedder screamed.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Craig Shaw Gardner is a New York Times bestselling author best known for his movie tie-in novel based on Batman. His impressive list of tie-ins also includes books based on the TV series Angel and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and the movies The Lost Boys, Batman, Batman Returns, Back to the Future II, and Back to the Future III, in addition to tie-ins for comic books and video games. His original works include the Ebenezum trilogy, the three-part Cineverse Cycle, the Dragon Circle Trilogy, the three-part Changeling Saga, and many others. He lives in Boston, Massachusetts.
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