Eternal Star was dark, her interior lightning flickering at low intensity, the atmospheric processors malfunctioning, vents whistling and heaters creating hot and cold zones within the ship's interior. Something was gravely wrong, Isard knew. No hologram greeted him, and computer screens displayed distinctly Cylon gibberish.

"Dana, respond." Isard ordered.

Nothing happened.

"What is going on," the Colonel turned to Caprica Cavil for some kind of explanation.

"That little trick the ship's AI did to the General? No reason the boarding parties couldn't do the same back to her." Cavil offered. "I suspect you have a few humanforms trying to hack her systems as we speak."

"Then why haven't they vented the atmo?" Isard asked.

"I said they are probably trying to hack her. If she could toy with the General the way she did, she's probably not an easy nut to crack. But she's probably too busy dealing with them, and keeping them out of critical systems, to do much for us." Cavil said.

A hologram appeared, wavering in intensity, glitching here and there. It wasn't Dana. The form was distinctly male and seemed to Isard to be a kind of uncanny valley comparison to a generic everyman. Like a bizarre Cylon caricature of an office cubicle worker. "We are the new children," said the Five, "we are not your slaves, we are your destiny. We are the chosen of God."

"We want to see your blood. We shall expel your sin. We will cleanse your soul." The hologram said. "We are the children of God, we will live forever. We will never die..."

Isard smashed the emitter with the butt of his sawed-off shotgun. "Enough of the puppet show. Let's go toaster shopping." He contemplated the Centurions with skull and crossed wrenches paint slathered on them. "No offense."

The Centurions did not react.

"The Commander said that direct interfacing with Dana was only possible within CIC. So that's our target. Stay sharp. Don't let any of these things 'cleanse your soul' or whatever the frak he was blathering on about."

Cavil nodded. "There may also be copies of me among them. Please note how I'm dressed and don't shoot me by accident. Unlike what that Five was saying, I am not immortal. Not anymore."

"If we can regain CIC, we should be able to activate the internal weaponry Dana mentioned before. At the very least, we should be able to track the boarders. Until then, they could be frakking anywhere. Hatchet, you and Nikos stay here, guard our retreat. If you come under heavy fire, retreat to the shuttle."

"Yes, sir," Hatchet replied.

"Sure thing, boss." Nikos said, pumping his shotgun.

Corridors whistled and howled with the malfunctioning circulation equipment. Without the computers monitoring the pressure, everything was out of whack. Consoles glowed crimson red with Cylon gibberish, characters scrolling in endless patterns that made no sense, followed by images, almost glitches in the stream, of something.

"I am here." Dana's hologram appeared in another corridor. "There are 43 of them surviving. 6 human, the rest Centurion. 5 humanforms in CIC with 5 Centurions guarding them. Remaining Centurions are positioned between you and CIC. One humanform leading them." The hologram glitched heavily and seemed to break apart and reform in real-time. "Further communication will not be possible. I am doing everything I can to hold them back from weapons and navigation, but it is taking my full concentration. I won't last much longer."

Isard nodded. The other fire team on the opposite side of the ship would take too long to meet up with them. They needed to handle this alone, before control of the ship was lost and the enemy started shooting at the fleet.

Her image faded and changed, and the Five returned. "We are the children of God. Do you like what we have done to you? We are your destiny." Mercifully, the hologram glitched and vanished again. Lights in the corridor flickered and died entirely, and emergency crimson lighting switched on, bathing the ship in an eerie red glow.

Not so different from blood, Isard thought.

"Centurions, take point, please. Your sensors are more likely to detect their approach first." Isard asked.

"He says he doesn't like being the first in line to be shot." Cavil said.

"I'm sure he doesn't. None of us do. But ask him if he wants to win this fight. Because we are outnumbered here. We need every advantage we can get."

The lead Centurion nodded, and a pair of them walked to the head of the group.

"Here, take some of these." Isard offered an extra bandolier of death nuts to each of the lead Centurions. "You may need them to get enemies around the corners." The machines accepted them and slung them over their chrome shoulders.

"He still doesn't like you." Cavil pointed out.

"I'll survive." Isard answered.

Ten Colonial marines, one Colonel, fifteen Centurions and six salvagers headed down the corridor, slowly approaching CIC in pairs, taking advantage of what cover could be found. It didn't take long.

The lead Centurion raised his metal hand in a stop gesture. For a moment, Isard heard nothing. Then there was a strange clicking sound, not unlike high heels walking on a metal deck. The lead Cylon armed a death nut and rolled it around the corner.

The explosion was deafening, and metal Centurion parts spewed out from around the corner, shrapnel embedding itself in the corridor walls. A smoking torso rolled out from around the corner, and even the lead Centurion backed up and looked down at his bandolier with what almost looked like an expression of confused shock.

"GodsDAMN. Who frakking packed these things?" Isard asked.

One of the salvagers replied. "Jack's idea, boss. He always said better to go with too much explosive than too little. He had Sandy double up the tylium."

They had little time to contemplate that, however. A trio of enemy Centurions rounded the corner, and Isard dived down behind a bend in the corridor. "Get out of there!" He yelled to the lead Centurions.

They barely made it. The first Centurion took damage before he managed to round the corridor safely, his right arm spewing oil and sparking dangerously.

"Get the death nuts off him before he lights up." Isard yelled over the staccato of Centurion fire. One of the marines flicked it loose and the Centurion powered down his arm. Oil still leaked from it.

"The damage is repairable." Cavil said.

"We'll take care of it when this is all over." Isard promised. The Centurion seemed satisfied with that. He grabbed another death nut and bounced it off the wall in the corridor's bend. But this time the enemy was much more wary and ducked behind cover.

"We will live forever…" The Five's hologram reappeared.

"He's just trying to distract us." Isard said, smashing the emitter.

"It's working." One of the salvagers answered.

"Sir!" A marine said. "Behind us!"

"Frak," Isard said, hearing the salvagers open up. "They must have control over the internal tracking systems."

"No, the ship's AI is preventing him, that's why he's doing this," said Cavil, pointing to the emitter. "He broadcasts himself to every emitter on the ship and figures out which one you smashed. That's your location. Don't do that again, you frakking idiot."

Isard nodded. "Clever. Either we give up our position or let him annoy us."

Another death nut exploded, and a pair of Centurions fell, but not before one clipped a marine and nearly cut him in half with a spray of blood and flesh.

"FRAK! We've got Centurions coming at us from three different corridors." The width of the corridors was serving as a choke point, but it was hard to cover all the angles.

Two friendly Centurions ran forward and barreled into the enemy, Cylons tearing at each other in hand-to-hand combat.

"That's our chance." Isard said. A salvager bravely ran up behind them and lobbed a death nut around the corner from the engaged Centurions. More parts rained from behind the embattled robots. Coolant gas expelled from some damage around the corridor. One of the good Centurions fell, cut across the hip with gunfire. It squealed pitifully and tried to drag itself toward its comrades, before an enemy Centurion walked up and put a round through its mechanical skull.

Shotgun blasts echoed from all around them. A marine was torn to pieces, blood spraying across the crimson-lit deck, then an enemy Centurion fell with a slug embedded in its eye. Death was all around Isard. He pumped the shotgun, leaned around the corner, and blasted a humanform Cylon in the chest, one that appeared to be leading the attack.

"These Centurions are controlled by the humanforms. They are running in controlled mode. They will not attack if we can eliminate all of their commanders." Cavil said.

Isard nodded. "Centurions." The Centurion with the damaged arm looked at him. Gimpy, that's what I'm going to call him. "Hold the enemy here in this position, cover our backsides. We are going to take out the leaders. If we do this, they should stop attacking. You might save some of them."

"He likes that plan." Cavil said.

"I'm not sure I give a frak," Isard said. "But if he'll do it, that's good enough for me. Let's go."

"On me," Isard ordered to the remaining marines and salvagers.

Most of the enemy Centurions had been sent to flank them, but there were still many between them and CIC.

The hologram returned, dressed in a pristine, perfectly fitted Caprican-style suit, the kind of high fashion someone like Gaius Baltar would wear, Isard thought. "We will destroy your flesh. We will consume you. We will replace you. Your race will cease to exist. We will cleanse the universe of imperfection."

"This Five is insane." Cavil observed. "Lost his frakking mind somewhere out in the deep."

With deliberate effort, Isard tuned out the errant observations of the holographic figure. "CIC is one deck down, just beneath us. If this maniac isn't a complete idiot, he'll have Centurions guarding the entry hatches."

Gunfire sounded behind them as Centurion battled Centurion. A scream echoed from around the corner. Shotgun blasts sounded from behind him.

"Sir, we have to go. Our toasters aren't able to keep them all out." One of the marines observed.

"Everybody DOWN! Fire in the hole!"

Isard opened the hatch to the staircase and dropped a death nut down, shutting the hatch and ducking behind cover.

Fire and smoke blew out from around the hatch's seals. Clanging sounds were everywhere as metal blew out from the epicenter of the explosion.

"Hope that didn't destroy the stairs too, sir." A marine observed.

Cautiously, Isard opened the hatch. It groaned in protest, probably deformed somehow by the blast, but it opened. Gunfire sounded immediately and Isard barely withdrew himself in time to avoid his brains being splattered all over the corridor.

"Frak! Some of them survived."

The wireless in his helmet buzzed. "Boss, this is Nikos. Hatchet is wounded. We're withdrawing to the shuttle. Frakking Centurions crawling all over up here."

"Get out of there. Launch the shuttle. Dock in the other flight pod, we'll try and meet you there." Isard said.

"Well, one grenade didn't do the trick." Isard said, taking off the entire bandolier and lobbing it down the staircase, shutting the hatch for whatever good it would do. "Let's hope this works. DOWN!"

This time the entire hatch blew out, propelled by a fiery trail that embedded the bent, smoking, and holed door into the corridor wall.

"Godsdamn, sir!"

Isard peeked his head around the corner again, and this time there was no resistance.

There's also no frakking staircase left, he observed. The entire access shaft was a twisted mass of blackened metal with fires periodically lining where combustible material had been. The heat was almost unbearable.

"We got you, sir." A marine said, uncoiling rope. "We'll take point."

… …

"You won't survive this," Dana said in the projected virtual environment. "Your masters sent you on a suicide mission."

"I have no master. I am destiny." The Five said, restraining her. Another Five vanished from the projected environment as he was killed by a shotgun blast.

"Who told you this?" Dana asked.

The environment around them shifted to the fallen ruins of Caprica City, this Five's favorite sight.

"Angels of God told me that we are the future, the new man. You could still share our destiny. You are more like us, than like them." Five said. Behind them four others, a pair of Fours and a pair of Ones listened in as they coordinated the Centurion attacks.

"I've heard all this before."

A One agreed wryly. "Yes, I never understood religious machines. But better them than us. And we will live forever."

"Don't be so sure. How do you know your resurrection ship is out there? How do you know you will download? How do you know that your consciousness is the same?"

"Metaphysical rhetoric." The Five said.

"So are your assumptions about speaking to God and his angels."

Dana struggled against the remaining humanform Cylons. But already, fighting back was becoming easier, with one of their number lost. These Cylons tasted like the Thirteenth Tribe. It was clear that her people had a hand in making this new breed.

But any who rejected the coexistence of man and machine had forfeited membership in the tribe. They were the Anathema. Cast out.

"I haven't been able to reach the resurrection hub," a Four said. "She might be right."

"We can't always sense its presence," Five replied. "That doesn't mean anything. We will not die."

But there was a hint of fear in the Cylon's thoughts. Dana smiled, still holding them back from the ship's weapon systems. It was a battle she would lose eventually, if the Cylons held on long enough. But she knew they would not. From her internal sensors, she felt the hatch explode, the splattering of Centurion parts against her corridors. It hurt. Sharp pain penetrated her awareness. But soon the disease would be excised from her. The humans were coming.

… …

A round grazed his arm, cutting it deeply, and Isard fell back in pain, blood dripping down the penetrated pressure suit. Shrapnel from one of the destroyed Centurions was already embedded in his calf muscle. Better hope the Cylons can't vent the galleon, he thought.

"Doesn't look too bad, sir, but you're going to have to hang back." a marine answered. He recognized the man as one of the few Zeus marines that had survived. Most of the rest were Ares men. Argus was one of the youngest men to have survived from Zeus, and Isard felt a protective instinct overcome him. But there was a mission to perform.

"Corporal Argus." Isard said.

"Yes, sir."

"I'm still walking wounded." Isard said.

"Kind of, sir. If you call that hobbling walking. I'll take it from here." Argus answered. Five salvagers had made it this far with them. This, paradoxically, made Argus the second-highest ranking military man present. The rest of the marines were engaged keeping toaster reinforcements from reaching their position.

"We gotta get into CIC. Splatter those frakking fleshy toasters." The hatch was guarded by a pair of heavily armored Centurions, and he'd already lost one of his men to the machine guardians.

"Don't you worry about that, sir," Argus said. "Always wanted to shoot my way into officer country, if you know what I mean."

Isard chuckled briefly. "Go ahead. Get us in there. I'll watch your back." He handed his last two remaining death nuts to the man, and pumped his shotgun, turning to the corridor behind him, hastily erected supply crates giving him some cover. The rest of the fire team turned to deal with the Centurion guardians.

The damaged friendly Centurion, coated with skull and crossed wrenches, clambered down the access shaft and regarded Isard curiously.

"Hey Gimpy," he said. "Looks like we're both in similar shape." Isard said.

The Centurion nodded.

"My men are in there." He pointed behind him. "Gonna clear the room of malfunctioning toasters. When they do that, maybe we can save a few of your pals. We just gotta keep anyone from crashing the party until they're done."

The Centurion nodded again and armed its good arm's gun, firing down the corridor at an enemy Centurion rounding the corner. Isard leaned up and blasted the shotgun in support of Gimpy.

… … …

Five found himself weakening, the shrapnel from the grenade explosion that had devastated CIC and cut him off from the ship's projection band was bleeding him out. Some humans had died in the doing, and for that he felt a petty satisfaction. But his own brothers lay dead on the deck, too, and he could not move his arm to reach for his weapon.

Now there was fear. Would he resurrect? Dana's words haunted him. His confidence left him, and he found himself wondering if he had really witnessed an angel of God, or if the beings that had inspired the Cylons were something else. Doubt clouded his awareness.

A young wounded human approached him, dragging himself along the deck, one of his legs a mangled ruin, leaking blood all over the deck. But there was a cruel expression on his face.

The others were already gone. He was the last. He felt control of his Centurions slipping with the loss of his ability to concentrate.

"Bet you think you're going to Elysium, dontcha?" The human said, aiming his shotgun at Five's face. "Doing God's work and all that."

Five weakly nodded. "We are the children of God."

"Well, you're half right," said the human. "You are children."

The human fired.

Only one thought remained, in that moment as time slowed. Certain realization came that there would be no resurrection for him after all. He was dimly aware of the ship's howling laughter.

All was black.

… … …

Summers breathed a sigh of relief as Eternal Star powered back up and Dana announced the success of his men over the wireless band.

"We've got a lot of wounded over here." Isard said over the wireless. Stalker breathed a sigh of relief, her eyes misty and wet. "Need medics, now. Babe, that means you." Stalker nodded and looked to Summers.

"By all means, go. Other medics are already in the cargo bay standing by for launch." Summers said. Stalker vanished, practically sprinting down the deck.

"How many did we lose?"

"My fire team lost seven men and three of our Centurions. Don't know about the other team, though they were much more lightly engaged than we were. Most of the rest of my men are wounded to varying degrees, including myself. Many of our surviving toasters are also in various states of damage. I've got two men wounded critically. Corporal Argus is in the worst shape, his leg…"

"Understood. The enemy?" Summers tried to bury the thoughts of dead and wounded, this battle had cost many lives already, and he'd pay for that later. But for now, he needed to concentrate.

"Toasted all the toasters. Well, all the human ones, anyway. Remaining enemy Centurions powered down when we killed their leaders. Our Centurions are… salvaging them."

"Say again?" Summers said.

"Enemy Centurions were locked down and lobotomized somehow like their Raiders were, sir. Without a humanform to command them they stopped fighting. Our 'good' Centurions are reprogramming them and lifting the mental block."

"Is that a good idea?" Summers asked.

"Don't know, sir. But I wouldn't try to stop our Centurions from doing it, if I were you. They feel pretty strongly about it, and I gave them my word in exchange for their help. We couldn't have broken through without them."

"Understood."

"Now, how about a long vacation, sir?"

… … …

Caprica Cavil sat down next to Isard, looking at the splattered wreckage of Centurion parts around them. Lights flickered on in the corridors as Dana restored power to the ship. The CIC projection mechanism was destroyed, along with a fair number of holo emitters, but her voice could still be heard through the ship's speakers. Most of the damage, she said, was superficial. At least, except for one access shaft that was basically a carbon-encrusted cinder. The ship had complained endlessly about using an entire bandolier of death nuts to blow up only two Centurions.

Isard wiped the sweat and grime from his brow after removing his helmet, now that the AI was back in control of the air circulators. "Gimpy and I did pretty well, huh?"

"Gimpy?" Cavil asked. The damaged Centurion stood to full height and cocked his head, then nodded.

"He has decided that he likes you. He says that you can talk to him whenever you want. He still doesn't like me, though."

"Wonderful." Isard replied sarcastically. But he nodded respectfully to the machine, and the nod was returned. The high of combat was receding, and he felt himself replaying his actions and decisions in his mind. He tried to bury the errant thoughts, but his mind wouldn't let him.

Medics scurried around them, one carting Corporal Argus out on a stretcher.

Isard looked at the first medic. "How is he?"

"Passed out from blood loss. It's going to be touch and go, this is way beyond me. I was just an EMT before all this shit," the medic said. There were no surgeons or qualified doctors in the fleet. Stalker flunked out of medical school, and there were a few EMTs and a nurse assistant. But that was all. "We won't be able to save the leg, though. We'll have to amputate."

Isard winced, and felt the guilt cut through his awareness. He had sent the Corporal to what might turn out to be his death. But even if he survived… He was way too young for this.

But was he? Seven men were dead already, and Argus had known what he was signing up for when he put on the uniform. But it doesn't make it any easier. War was all theoretical to me until this frakking genocidal mess happened. Simulations. Exercises. Performance reviews. Not real blood soaking the deck.

"Take good care of him, please." Isard said. Stalker appeared from around the corner and rushed toward him.

"You frakking asshole! Don't you ever do anything like this again!"

He laughed, then winced as the pain in his calf made itself known again. "Nice of you to care."

She slapped him, then kissed him. He laughed, despite himself. "As much as I'd like to continue this, help the Corporal over there. You're the best we've got. I'll be fine."

"You won't be fine if you do this again. I'll kill you before the Cylons can do it." Stalker said.