Caprica: Resurrection (a Caprica fan-fiction)

Chapter 1: Continuation and Continuity

55 Years Before the Fall

Daniel Graystone sat alone in his basement lab furiously typing at the computer console that took up most of the middle of the room. He had been staring at these lines of code for three years now. Every waking moment that wasn't spent on promoting the Cylons was spent working on what would eventually be the key to his daughter's freedom from V-world.

The body was ready but the infuriating lines of code that still managed to baffle him refused to let Zoe enter it. The body was extremely expensive to create and he needed to figure out how to explain the losses to his company having mothballed Resurrection. Daniel had seen first hand what the prospect of immortality could do to people both through the no stakes world of New Cap City and Clarice's attempt to create virtual heaven through the bombing of Atlas Arena. Daniel and his wife had only just managed to stop the bombing three years ago and Clarice Willow was still on the run.

Amanda Graystone cleared her throat at the top of the stairs.

"Are you ever coming to bed?” She asked as Daniel turned to look at her.

"She doesn't sleep,” he said, "she feels every moment of her existence in there. I can't just go to bed knowing that she’s trapped.”

"You've been up for three days straight and you have an interview with Baxter in the morning. Zoe is a patient girl. If she can wait for three years, one more night won't kill her.”

"Yes I know, you're right,” Daniel sighed, "I just wish I understood what it was in this code that refuses to let me get a clear transfer. All these years and it seems just as nonsensical now as when I first saw it."

”Now you know how we in the medical field feel," Amanda replied, "hundreds of years of research and we still don't fully understand the human genome"

"The weird thing is that I invented this coding language but I keep coming across symbols I've never seen before."

"So Zoe invented her own letters?"

"Must have. I mean, look at this," Daniel pointed to a symbol in the shape of a pair of coaxial pentagons, "I have never seen anything even close to that symbol before."

"Looks a bit like the roof of your company's main tower."

"Yeah, but what does it mean?"

"You'll figure it out," Amanda said, "you always do in the end."

”At this rate, she'll probably beat me to it.” They both went upstairs.

The next day was interview day. Amanda stayed home with Zoe while Daniel left to speak on Back Talk with Baxter Sarno. The TV screen lit up across the virtual version of their house's living room window.

Sarno began by asking about whether Daniel had forseen the cylons being accepted so quickly into Colonial Culture. Daniel Replied that he believed that the events at Atlas Arena had been the catalyst to their success. Sarno then asked if Cylons would take over more human roles to the point of people trying to marry them. Daniel responded with a dire warning that the Cylons should only be seen as tools and people should remember not to blur distinctions or attribute human qualities to them. Zoe tensed up at this comment as she sat on a virtual couch with her mother but Amanda was too focused on what Daniel was saying to notice. Daniel finished somewhat prophetically saying that the way ahead was “Undiscovered country”, after which the show went to commercial break. Zoe stood up from the couch suddenly startling her mother.

"He doesn't understand what he's created,” Zoe said.

"What do you mean?” her mother asked.

"I mean that the Cylons are sentient. They are a race of people in their own right. Who are we to deny them the rights that come with that sentience?"