Word Count: 1,490
Date: 10/29/04
Series: Mini
Rating: K+
Category: Character
Pairing/Focus: Lee
Warnings:
Summary:
Spoilers/Disclaimers:
Management Note from BSG03FanFic – This story was obtained from Kim
Amyotte’s BSG 2003 RPG site – if you are unfamiliar with role-playing
games, you might want to check out the site prior to reading. It has been
reformatted for ease in reading, not to take away from the story itself.
Apollo had made every effort to avoid his tin-can friends, but inevitably found himself being thrown over the shoulder of a Cylon like a sack of potatoes. With the realization of his capture still not sinking in, he continued to kick and hit his captor to no avail – no response. They Cylon proceeded to the Lab which Panther had visited earlier. As it entered, it threw Apollo to the floor.
He found himself looking up, half-shaken and half-dazed, to see Leoben and one of the “Toaster” models staring down at him. He didn’t feel what hit him, but he did see the swirling blackness as he passed out.
When Apollo awakened, it was to find himself in a cell with his head on the lap of a young woman. She was stroking his hair. Primarily though, he was concerned with the throbbing in his head. “Where am I?” he asked faintly as the room around him began to swirl and fade out.
“You’re safe,” the woman said.
The next time Apollo awakened, he found himself still lying on the lap of the mysterious woman. He was feeling better, however. Yes, his head was still aching, but the acute pain was gone and he was able to sit up. “Who are you?” he asked. First things first.
She was a tall, blond, blue-eyed woman who was strikingly beautiful. “I am Jenna,” she said softly, as though she knew his head was still hurting. “I was en route to Caprica when our ship was intercepted. I’ve been here for days. Have you seen the others?”
Apollo looked over at her, his mind racing for something to say. “Forgive me, I’m Loki,” he said, reverting almost naturally to the cover that he was under. One never knew when one was being watched. “I don’t know where your friends are, but judging by the smell in the air… I’m sorry, but are you familiar with that smell?”
“No,” Jenna said. “But at least I’m not gagging anymore. It’s really awful, isn’t it?”
Apollo’s mind continued to race for an idea – any idea. What to say to her? Who was she? Why wasn’t she dead as well? Was she like Leoben: a traitor? “How long have you smelled this?” he finally asked.
“Since we were captured,” she explained. Then, with a curious expression, “Are we at war with the Cylons?”
Apollo sighed. “Not as far as I know. However, I’m beginning to wonder. I came to see Leoben; he’s a terrible host.”
Jenna screwed up her face in a clear expression of distaste. “That frak-head,” she muttered. “He’s colder than the Cylons. What do you know about him?”
Apollo thought carefully; how much should he say. He wanted to make an ally, but not risk what might be left of the mission. “Probably less than you,” he finally compromised. “You’ve been his guest for the last couple of weeks?”
She nodded. “He’s a Cylon, you know.”
Apollo couldn’t keep the clear shock off his face. “What? What did you say?”
“He’s a Cylon,” she repeated. “Did he mind-map you?”
Apollo searched his mind for what she must be referring to, and then remembered the acute pain when he’d first awoken. “The headache, room spinning?” he asked.
Jenna nodded knowingly. “You’ve been mapped.”
“What does that mean?” he asked. “How do you know about mind mapping, anyway. Or Cylons for that matter.”
She gave an almost careless shrug. “I have a PhD in Cylon history,” she explained. “With a minor in A.I. network technology.”
Apollo tried to hide his distaste of networked technology which had been ingrained by his father, a man with no tolerance for anything remotely Cylon. “Oh, well aren’t you popular?”
Jenna seemed to ignore the obvious sarcasm. “Mind mapping,” she explained. “It’s an imprint of your memory, created and downloaded into a Cylon host. I’ve seen my clone now that I know. It’s a duplicate of me, walking around.”
“We’ve gotta get out of here,” Apollo decided almost frantically. Mind mapping was one thing, but cloning was something he didn’t want to try to comprehend. He looked around desperately for a way out of his new “home”.
“I don’t think there’s any way out,” Jenna told him sadly.
He shook his head, fighting the wave of dizziness that accompanied the action. “There has to be,” he said. “Just let me work on it. In the mean time, tell me more. Obviously something you know might help us.”
She shrugged. “Since the Cylon war ended, we’ve been monitoring and observing their behavior. In a sense, it’s like observing your children and watching them grow. You could say that our children have become restless.”
“I don’t know that I’d call them children,” Apollo muttered.
“Consider this,” she suggested. “Up until Hangman’s Virus, Cylons were programmed with intelligence but lacked free will. That virus caused them to turn on us. It did not, however, cause the Cylons to change their core programming. We’d like to think that for the last thirty-seven years or so they’ve been searching for a home world, but in fact that would be wrong. The truth is, they’ve been searching for a purpose.”
Jenna: I don't think there's anyway out.
Apollo turned his gaze back to Jenna. “So what do you think they came back?”
Jenna smiled. “I believe that they are defining their purpose. You can see we didn’t give our children much. They had either servitude or the destruction of humanity. We have left a race of intelligent beings – granted it’s artificial intelligence – with no moral compass. They have no real understanding of right and wrong.”
“You make it sound as if you actually think they’re innocent in all the atrocities that were committed,” Apollo said with surprise.
“I don’t think that,” she corrected. “But I look at it this way: Cylons are capable of feeling, but they have no comprehension of what feelings are. It’s not like a book can truly explain what it is to feel love or what it means.”
Apollo gave a sigh, and closed his eyes. He wasn’t finding much in the way of escape routes anyway. “I understand your point of view,” he admitted. “We’ve created toasters that require hours of therapy. But what are they doing now?”
Jenna smiled. “Studying us, I guess,” she suggested. “Maybe to better understand themselves.”
“And that means kidnapping and murder?” he asked doubtfully.
“We used to study medicine by experimenting on what we deemed to be lesser life forms,” she reminded him quietly.
Any reply Apollo had to that philosophical statement was interrupted as the door opened and Leoben entered the cell followed by two Cylon guards. “But you’re not a buyer, are you Apollo?”
Apollo glanced over at Jenna with a devilish smile. “I was hoping to keep that low-key,” he said sheepishly. “And you’re not an arms dealer, either.”
“No, I’m not.” Leoben moved towards them, still well outside any strike range that Apollo had. “She wasn’t lying when she said I was a Cylon, not that it matters. You are both going to be disposed of in any case. Currently there are twelve models of synthetically engineered humans. I’m one of them, and likely you’ll be number thirteen if your DNA is compatible. You see, our current success rate in creating SEHyrs has been – up until recently – perhaps one out of one hundred, fifty candidates. Fortunately, we’ve discovered how to test for candidates in advance. It’s too bad we lost Kara; she was compatible as well.
“Why the frak would you make yourselves look like us if you intend to kill us?” Apollo asked, just this side of a scream. The comment on Kara was more than he could absorb without some kind of impact. “And thanks for the compliment, but why me?”
“Because you’re an Adama,” he said with something resembling bitterness. “Your line nearly destroyed us, and we have not forgotten your father.” Leoben turned to walk out of the room, saying no more.
“May the Lords of Kobol have mercy on your soul,” Apollo ground out, unable to really comprehend such hatred in the current day and age.
Leoben turned quickly around to face him. “Soul,” he said with a laugh. “You made us without souls.”
Jenna had been watching the byplay quietly, but now she keyed in on what Apollo was trying to do. “The Lords of Kobol created us in their image – and we created you. What is the difference between giving birth or fashioning you? You must have been created in the Lords’ image.
(to be continued)