Battlestar Galactica

Episode #102 - "Water"

This document is ©2005, John Larocque. All rights reserved.

The Cylons were created by man. They evolved. They look human. Some are programmed to think they are human. There are many copies. And they have a plan.

Synopsis

Lee is having flashbacks of the explosion of the Olympic Carrier and tells Adama he can't stop thinking about it. Adama replies, "That was three days ago. It's ancient history under these circumstances. Leave the second guessing to the historians." "Don't we have an obligation... to make sure the decisions that we make are the right decisions?" "We did what we had to do. A man takes responsibility for his actions, right or wrong. He accepts the consequences and lives with it. Every day."

Laura complains to Billy about the military protocol whenever she arrives at the Galactica. On this day she attends a ceremony where the Virgon Express is siphoning off some of Galactica's water. Adama tells her, "Galactica's water recycling system is close to 100% effective... There's not one drop of water that's wasted aboard. We have enough water for several years before replenishing. Many of the ships like the Virgon Express are not made for long term voyages. They'll have to tank off of ours periodically." Lee remarks to Laura that the Commander hates protocol and pomp. "He's making a gesture, trying to make you feel like the President."

Sharon informs Tyrol what's happened and that there are six missing G4 detonators. "Sharon, you can't screw around with stuff like this." "I'm not screwing around, okay? The only reason I didn't tell anybody is because they're gonna think I'm the one who took them." "You know what? It's not your fault. Somebody's obviously setting you up to take the fall for something, that's what it is. You wake up some morning you don't know or anything? You're drugged or manipulated or who knows what." "What am I going to do? 'Cause if I report what's happened they'll think I'm a Cylon agent... You've heard the rumors. Cylons who look like humans. Sleeper agents hiding in the fleet." The decompression alarm goes off on CIC, and there are ruptures in all four tanks on the port side, venting all the water directly into space.

In an emergency conference, Gaeta reports they lost 10 million JPs -- "almost 60% of the total portable water reserves" -- and that Galactica has about six days water supplies left. "One third of the other ships in the fleet were depending on us for replenishment. If we don't find new supplies, they'll run out of water in two days." Tigh warns, "There's gonna be riots on those ships. Civilians don't like hearing they can't take a bath, wash their clothes or drink more than thimble full a day." He also reveals that there are five planetary systems within jump range with the potential for finding water. Adama orders a Raptor search to scout each star system. Baltar lists off statistics on the weekly rate of consumption of the fleet's civilian population of 45,265 -- "at minimum, 82 tons of grain, 85 tons of meat, 119 tons of fruit, 304 tons of vegetables and 2.5 million JPs of water."

Tyrol reports back on his investigation team's findings to the inquiry. "So far we've found five discrete detonation points in the tank and we believe that there may be a sixth. I've suspected, due to the size of the residual scoring and the burn points, that we're dealing with a G4 type explosive. So I've requested a spot check of all inventory from the master at arms and she indicated to me that there are six detonators missing from a small arms locker in a port flight pod. So one detonator may still be unaccounted for... Due to spotty record keeping and lax security procedures since the attack, she believes that we may never know who took the detonators."

The conference now consists only of Commander Adama, Lee, Colnel Tigh, Laura Roslin and Dr. Baltar. Adama believes there is at least one Cylon aboard the Galactica. In answer to a question from Laura, Tigh states that only three Marines plus the five people in the room know the Cylons now look human. Laura tells Baltar, "You're supposed to be screening the Galactica for potential Cylon agents." Baltar equivocates on whether or not he has a Cylon detector, citing equipment, resources and problems with his Cylon detection method. Adama responds, "I'm going to assign Lt. Gaeta to aid you in anything that you might need."

Sharon's been assigned to the team to look for water, and before she lifts off, Lee tells her its a critical mission. "We already have fights breaking out on some ships over water rations. There's panic in the air." In his quarters, Laura tells Adama that "Colonel Tigh was right. Rioting broke out on a cruise ship when they reduced rations. We need to demonstrate an ability to maintain order. We need to do it now." Adama declines Laura's request to have the military act as a police force. "I'm not gonna be your policeman. There's a reason why you separate the military and the police. One fights the enemy of the state. The other serves and protects the people. When the military becomes both, the enemies of the state tend to become the people." "I appreciate the complexity of the issue and I won't let that happen." "I'll send troops to the cruise ship." "Commander, I won't let that happen."

There's some high stakes flirting between Baltar and Kara over a game of cards. Baltar wins ("full colors") and gives Kara a parting gift. It's a cigar, "hand-rolled from some of the finest fumarello leaf on Caprica. It's also one of the last left in the universe," and then he lights it for her. Sharon's Raptor is approaching a planet and we see that the sixth explosive device is on board and armed. Sharon tells Crashdown that she's got nothing even though the screen reads "H2O Multiple Contacts," and then asks Crashdown to run another sweep. She says she has trouble seeing it, and her fingers are touching the device. "I think I see... I have positive contacts!" She then sees the device is active, is scared and shuts it off. When they return to the Galactica, she instructs Tyrol to investigate a problem with her ejection pyros, and he finds the device.

On Caprica, it's Day 10, and the Cylons have found Helo's Raptor. Sharon #2 tells him that their plan is still to "get off the planet and get back to the ship." "Why did you come back for me? ... You disobeyed orders, flew back into this hellhole. I mean, not that I don't appreciate it but why?" "I just couldn't leave you behind. Let's leave it at that." Helo's radio hears a Colonial Fleets signal from within Caprica and they hug. According to Sharon, "Someone in the military is still somewhere live and kicking here in Caprica." "Now all we gotta do is find them."

On board Colonial One, Lee is still troubled by the Olympic Carrier incident and repeats what Adama told him. Laura gives her own advice. "You know, I remember, when President Adar sent the Marines into Aerilon, fifteen people died... He was sure of what he'd done, made the right choice, stayed the course. But he knew it was a mistake... He said that it was imperative for a leader to remember and learn from their mistakes, even if they can't admit to them publically." "Do you think we made a mistake?" "I don't know." Laura thanked Lee for the insight into Adama's military protocol from earlier and offers him the job of her military adviser. "I'm not looking for military advice, I'm looking for advice about the military... and you can keep your day job at the C.A.G." "So, who's going to tell my father?" "Well, I was thinking that would be your first assignment." "Somehow, I knew you were gonna say that."

Tyrol tells Sharon he found the detonator. "I gave it to the master at arms... I told her I found it during maintenance... That puts them on the same trail we're on, doesn't raise suspicion to you... Trust me on this, Sharon, I'm not going to let anything happen to you, OK?" Sharon walks back from the meeting in a robot-like manner.

Ron Moore's Commentary

1/13/2005 -- [On the pairing of Starbuck and Baltar] -- That's the kind of thing where you throw a moment in a script and wonder if it's going to go anywhere, and you watch dailies and see how the actors respond and what the chemistry is like between those two. And then you go, 'O.K., I want to keep playing this and we'll see where it goes.' (source: Now Playing)

1/27/2005 -- During the shoot of "Water" and shortly afterward, I was acutely aware of just how long the script was and how much material was going to have to be lost along the way. I was fairly upset with myself for writing something so bloated and large that it was killing us on the stage and would later require major surgery in the editing room to make our mandated runtime. The first cut of "Water" ran 10-12 minutes long -- essentially an entire act that had to go -- and for a long time when I watched the final locked picture I was always uncomfortably aware of the "cheats" involved. That is, the dropped scenes, the internal cuts made to scenes that made a hash of some of the logic I'd tried to lay out, the half-expressed thoughts, the missing emotional beats, etc.

However, when I saw the final aired episode, I was hard-pressed to even remember most of the cuts or why they had bothered me in the first place. (Although I still missed a nice bit with Baltar in the Wardroom, where he tossed off a theory of how six small charges could've blown open the water tank, as it was both helpful to the plot and an entertaining bit of grandstanding by the character.) Frankly, I used to think of "Water" as one of the weaker shows in the first season, but now it seems like a fairly coherent piece.

4/11/2005 -- "BSG-75" was something created during the production of the miniseries and it stands for Battlestar Group 75. This definition is now official because it can be seen on one of the charts in the Wardroom scene in "Water" where they are discussing the water tank explosion. I don't know who came up with the designation or what the initial thought was. I think we must assume that battlestars are more or less permanently associated with a particular battlestar group, and that there's some particular prestige associated with the various groups akin to the pride that a particular army unit takes in being part of a prestigous division.

3/26/2007 -- When I had Laura mention sending the Marines in to quell the rioting on Aerilon, it suggested to me a significant political moment in the recent history of the Colonies wherein the President essentially sent in "federal" troops for the first time on the soil of a sovereign Colony since the ratification of the Articles of Colonization. In my mind, this had set a tone for a strengthened federal role for the president of the Colonies, but at the same time had produced increased tension among the Colonies themselves, exacerbating the feeling that poorer worlds like Aerilon were treated one way which richer planets like Caprica were dealt with another way. This later fed into Baltar's manifesto and his observation of the class system emerging in the rag-tag fleet and how it mirrored the social structure of the pre-attack Colonies.

Commentary

Adama gave Laura a copy of "Dark Day" by Edward Prima. She told him she loves mysteries such as "Murder on Picon."

Adama's advice to Laura on police powers indicates he believes in keeping the military and civilian spheres separate, and that to do otherwise would invite a military dictatorship.

Laura questioned her decision to destroy the Olympic Carrier and thinks of it as a mistake. She has the name "Olympic Carrier" written on a piece of paper in her pocket as a reminder of the incident. She told Lee her predecessor kept the names of the fifteen dead Marines on Aerilon in his desk as a reminder of a mistake he could never admit publically.

Tyrol protected Sharon, even as evidence piles up that she was involved in the bombing of the fuel tanks. Before the tanks blew up, he said that someone was trying to set her up to take the fall for something. Tyrol's initial response to Cally was that the holes in the tanks could have come from rust. During the inquiry, he concluded that five G4 explosives were responsible for the tank explosion but left out any mention of his earlier meeting with Sharon, who had reported six of the devices missing. Even after he discovered the sixth device aboard the Raptor, he promised he wouldn't let anything happen to her.

This is the clearest evidence to date that Sharon is a sleeper agent. Subconsciously her Cylon programming led her to plant five explosive devices inside the water tanks, and to hold on to the sixth, which she later placed in her Raptor. On a conscious level, she's genuinely disturbed by the implications of her amnesia and the missing explosives, and went to the first person she could talk to in confidence, her lover Tyrol. Did Sharon's Cylon programming know that Tyrol would not likely betray what she had told him? Given her comments to Tyrol in her first meeting, on one level she already suspects she's a Cylon agent. In her Raptor, her humanity wins out over her Cylon side when she performs a second sweep, and forces herself to reveal to Crashdown that they found water.

Tigh states that only three Marines know that the Cylons look human. Crashdown's comment to Sharon in "33" indicates that at least one of them is responsible for leaking this information to others.

Lt. Gaeta has been assigned to aid Baltar in building his Cylon detector. According to Gaeta, "I actually studied genetics in college. In fact, I was planning on going for my graduate degree through the military extension program."

The earliest analysis referred to the nuclear attack from the miniseries. According to Gaeta, "The most likely explanation is that the tank was structurally weakened during the Cylon nuclear detonation during the first attack, and that caused it to buckle and rupture."

The flirting between Baltar and Kara is the first sign of his interest in her.

Crashdown christens the ice moon Kimiko, "after a lovely little lady in a lovely little city in a lovely little colony that I used to know."

Deleted Scenes

Sharon carries the duffel bag with her through the mess hall to her locker and places it there. She closes the door and jumps when she hears Boxey. "Hey Boomer." "Frak!" "Sorry about that. Are you OK?" "I had the mid watch, OK? I was on duty until 0400. A lot of people saw me. I was on mid watch, OK?" He shakes his head. "Whatever". She walks out the room and Boxey opens up her locker, unzips her bag, and looks at the red-stained towel. There is an announcement over the speaker. "Attention. Colonial One will arrive in five minutes, honor detail." The Sky One episode guide, which is based on the script, describes the scene this way. "Crewman BOXEY accuses Sharon of acting strangely and she gets defensive, further fuelling his suspicions. He picks her locker, searching through her belongings."

Inside the water tanks, Cally hands Tyrol a honeycomb-shaped debris. "Chief, take a look at this." "What have you got?" "Not sure." "Looks like burn marks, from an explosive." As Tyrol handles the object, he notices it has stained his gloves red. The Number Six theme plays.

In the ready room, Boomer arrives, and Boxey greets her, "Hey, way to go Boomer. Heard you saved the frakkin' world." Tyrol pushes him out the room. "Outside, watch the door." Inside, he gives Sharon a hug. Crashdown arrives and interrogates Boxey. "Is Boomer here?" "Nah, she went back to the ready room. Hey, wanna buy a bottle of ambrosia?" "Kid, where did you find ambrosia?" "Snipe, down in the engine room. Got three bottles of it. Vintage stuff."

Tyrol unlocks the room and leaves, and Boxey makes smooching noises. "You know, Boxey, this is a really big ship, and there's lots of really bad things that can happen to little kids." He mocks Tyrol. "I'm scared." Boxey is holding the red-stained towel that he used to wrap the ambrosia bottles, and Sharon sees him. Tyrol makes an immediate connection. He revisits bits of conversation from Sharon from earlier ("The towel?" "I took one detonator from the duffle, I woke up soaking wet.") "Where'd you get that?" "I dunno." "Well, there's lots of towels lying around. You could find stuff like that anywhere. You know, it doesn't mean anything, right?" Boxey has a puzzled look on his face. "Yeah, whatever." The Number Six theme plays. The Sky One episode guide, which is based on the original script, describes it this way. "Tyrol walks in on Boxey holding Sharon's red-stained towel. Boxey tells Tyrol he doesn't know where he got the towel, but Tyrol knows it's Sharon's towel." The Space Channel episode guide (also based on the script) describes what happened after this scene. Tyrol "knows there's a connection between Boomer's towel and the explosion, but he slips it into a laundry bag ... protecting her, for now."

"It was a hand towel that [Boomer] found in her bag and there was residue from the water tanks on it. We are not sure if she used it or it was placed there. Boxey finds her and the towel, she leaves, he grabs it and Tyrol finds him. Tyrol asks him where he got it and Boxey says he found it and leaves. That is the scene if I remember it correctly." -- Aaron Douglas (Chief Tyrol), in October 2004

Col. Tigh struggles with his dress grays (#2 on the SciFi site) -- Tigh and Adama are walking in a hallway and he's complaining about his dress uniform. "She doesn't expect us to do this every time comes on board, does she?" "This was my idea." "You? You hate this kind of thing." "We start treating her like a President, she may start feeling like one. The better she feels, the easier it will be on us." "Oh well, look who's becomin' a politician in his old age?" "Who's talking about being old?"

The Galactica crew welcomes President Roslin (#3 on the SciFi site) -- Adama's crew welcomes the President aboard the Galactica with an honor guard.

Baltar's lecture to the tribunal (#1 on the SciFi site) -- Moore describes this scene in his blog from 1/27/2005.
Adama: "A G4 is a very little explosive to rip through the hull plating, don't ya agree, Chief?"
Tyrol: "Yes sir, I'm surprised that something so small could have done such enormous damage."
Baltar: "Yes, well obviously something so small didn't, not directly at least. You set off a charge this small on the exterior of a water tank, no one's going to get their feet wet. The charge was placed on the inside of the tank."
Tyorl: "Yes it was."
Baltar: "Fluid accretion dynamics. Water, as you may already have gleaned, is an incompressible medium. You set off an explosion under water, and a shock wave forms. In this case the shock waves frm multiple simultaneous explosions, combined and focuses in such a way as to amplify their individual effects. Now fluid accretion dynamics suggest that under these pressures, water has a tendency for outer propulsion, and if we factor into the equation the structural damage sustained to the hull during the last nuclear explosion. That's the science. On a more practical level..."
Lee: "Are we saying someone got inside the reserve tank? When it was full of water? Is that possible?"
Tyrol: "No sir. It's not, um... No human being could survive the pressures inside the tank, no."

After Adama agrees to send troops to the cruise ship, Laura asks him a question.
Laura: "Where are we going?"
Adama: "I take it that is not a rhetorical question."
Laura: "No it isn't. By the way, I get asked that question almost every day. People all over the fleet say, 'Where is this Earth, and how do we get there?'"
He asks her if she wants some water, and she says yes. He hands her a glass and starts filling it.
Adama: "Would you tell them we are keeping it a secret for security reasons?"
Laura: "I know what to tell them. What do you have to tell me?"
Adama: "At this time, the focus is on finding supplies and resources. That'll dictate the movement, at least for the immediate future."
Laura: "So there's no plan. You're hoping to get away from the Cylons. You're hoping to find water. You're hoping to find food and fuel and a hundred other things we so desperately need. And you're hoping to eventually stumble upon a place we can call home. That's a lot of hope."
Adama: "I'm an optimist."
Laura: "Who knew?"
Adama: "Keep the faith. If there's water out there, my pilots will find it."

In the hallway, Number Six tells Baltar, "She's not your type, Gaius." "What you fail to understand, my dear, is that they're all my type."