A Disquiet Follows My Soul

"A Disquiet Follows My Soul" An episode of the Re-imagined Series
Episode No.	Season 4, Episode 12
Writer(s)	Ronald D. Moore
Story by
Director	Ronald D. Moore
Assistant Director
Special guest(s)
Production No.	414
Nielsen Rating	1,717,000
US airdate	January 23, 2009
CAN airdate	January 23, 2009
UK airdate	January 27, 2009
DVD release	28 July 2009
Population	39,644 survivors ( 6)
Additional Info
Episode Chronology
Previous		Next
Sometimes a Great Notion (Chronological: The Face of the Enemy)	A Disquiet Follows My Soul	The Oath
Related Information
Official Summary
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As the Fleet recovers from the disappointment of Earth and William Adama contemplates upgrading the civilian FTL drives with Cylon technology, Felix Gaeta and Vice President Tom Zarek takes steps to foment dissent, both legal and illegal.

The DVD for Season 4.5 includes the original broadcast cut and a Director's Cut of this episode. The Director's Cut contains eight minutes of additional footage and features a different commentary track from writer and director Ronald D. Moore.

Summary

Teaser

• Admiral William Adama struggles out of his bunk to begin yet another working day on Galactica. He had fallen asleep in his uniform and realizes that he's running late for his shift in CIC.
• In silence, he appears to conduct some semblance of decorum after the disappointment of Earth. He heads to CIC, picking up a piece of trash in the hallway on the way.

• In sickbay, Dr. Cottle is using a sonogram to show Caprica-Six and Saul Tigh their child in utero. Tigh can't see the image, when Cottle quips, "Try looking with your eyes...eye." Assistant Layne Ishay points out the elements of the sonogram when Tigh, overwhelmed a little at the sight, asks for a drink. Cottle offers a cigarette instead to Tigh as he lights one for himself, to Ishay's chagrin.
• Caprica-Six realizes that, with the ability to conceive children biologically, and with the ability to resurrect now gone, the Cylon race can survive by human-style reproduction. She notes that no Cylon pairing had conceived before--and that they have made many attempts to do so.
• Cottle orders Ishay to get a fetal monitor for the child. She passes Felix Gaeta, in to get his prosthetic leg cared for. Gaeta is annoyed at all the attention that the Cylons are getting.
• To add to the chaos, Galen Tyrol rushes in with his son, Nicholas Tyrol, screaming for attention--the child is "peeing blood."
• In response to Ishay's apologies, Gaeta answers sardonically, "Can't keep those toasters waiting."

• Aboard Colonial One, the admiral, with Lee Adama and Vice President Tom Zarek aside him, holds a media conference amidst a rather hostile Colonial Press corps. He refuses to answer questions about his XO or a possible alliance with the rebel Cylons. When Sekou Hamilton asks Zarek about his opinion about the alliance, his reply is a cold, "No comment."
• The admiral steps back as his son tries to end the press briefing. Playa Palacios asks about President Laura Roslin and her whereabouts. Lee answers that Roslin is resting aboard Galactica.
• Sekou Hamilton asks about the identity of the fifth Cylon. Lee indicates that they believe it to be dead, but flubs by revealing that "she died some time ago." The three end the conference as the reporters erupt in confusion.
• In the president's office, Zarek vehemently opposes an alliance with the Cylons, but the admiral instructs that the President will make the final call. When Zarek threatens the admiral, Adama warns him that it will be easy for Adama to finger Zarek as the instigator if anything occurs.

Act 1

• In Admiral Adama's quarters, Lee Adama, Saul Tigh, Galen Tyrol, Felix Gaeta and Karl Agathon meet. As the admiral takes some kind of medication and rolls his arm in some form of discomfort, Tyrol indicates that the rebel Cylons of the baseship in the Fleet would rather ally with Adama permanently than risk meeting up with the Cavils and their hostile Cylon forces alone.
• Adama redirects the discussion to a proposed upgrading of all Colonial jump drives in the Fleet. As Cylon FTL is three times more efficient, such an upgrade would be very useful tactically, with some hard work. Lee Adama reminds the others that the Quorum is needed to get the civilian ship's cooperation, especially if the Cylons are needed to do the work on each ship. Tyrol confirms that Cylon involvement will be a requirement.
• Lee considers the argument that upgrading before the Fleet's food and fuel run out before they find a new home should be a good argument. But Tyrol ups the ante with a price: that the Cylons become valid citizens of the Fleet, with their own representative on the Quorum and Adama's oath of protection. Gaeta objects strongly, but the admiral indicates he is weighing all options as he dismisses the group, realizing that President Roslin needs to weigh it as well.
• Nurse Ishay and Dr. Cottle inform Galen Tyrol that his son suffered early renal failure. Treatment should prevent a damaged kidney. The problems complicate when Tyrol reminds the medical team that his child is half-Cylon, but Ishay tries to tell Cottle to inform Tyrol of something important. Cottle dismisses Ishay and speaks with Tyrol privately.
• Tyrol realizes that his late wife, Cally Tyrol, hid a secret: little Nicky is not Galen's biological child. When Tyrol asks who the father is, Cottle angrily declines that request until he can tell the birth father.

• Lee and Admiral Adama complete their talk. Lee is concerned of Roslin's absence as well. The admiral tries to phone Roslin in her quarters somewhere on the ship.
• Roslin ignores the ringing phone as she spaces out a myriad of medications on a table. In quiet defiance, she finally dismisses taking any of pills, pushing them all into a trash can as she smiles softly to herself.

Act 2

• Admiral Adama tries to convince Roslin to help with the Cylon alliance question as she tries a few aerobics. But Roslin continually defers to get back in the political game, asking for "a little more time" to be alone as she pushes Adama out of her room.
• Picking up more trash, the admiral continues down a corridor and past the officer's rec room as Gaeta sits down next to Kara Thrace, who isn't in the mood to talk. Gaeta reminds her of her involvement to try him as a Cylon collaborator, and that two of the other judges turned out to be Cylons themselves, as did Thrace's own husband.
• Gaeta and Thrace exchange unpleasant words about Anders and his actual behavior on Caprica, and he insinuates that she could be a Cylon herself. Thrace replies that at least she's not a gimp, referring to Gaeta's lost leg.
• Gaeta threatens that there will come a "reckoning," but Thrace isn't fazed, warning that she won't hesitate to strike him (or anyone else in her way), despite his disability, as she leaves the room. Gaeta then tells the others in the rec room to close the hatch to the room, saying that they need to talk.
• On Colonial One, Vice President Zarek argues to the Quorum that Cylon collaboration with the Fleet requires explicit government permission and the consent of the people. Lee Adama argues that they need to find a solution everyone can agree on, but Zarek wins: the Quorum votes in favor of Zarek's recommendation that no Cylon or Cylon technology be allowed on any ship without the express permission of its captain and crew.

Act 3

• With energy never seen in her since her early days as President, Laura Roslin, in crew sweatclothes, is jogging through the corridors of the battlestar, to the curiosity and astonishment of the crew she passes by.
• Meanwhile, Admiral Adama awakens from dozing off at his desk, a bottle of alcohol and star maps at his desk. He's awakened by a phone call and apparently informed of Roslin's behavior. Taking more pills and cleaning himself up, he eventually enters the corridor to meet Roslin.
• Roslin's flushed with energy, but Adama tells her his observation without mirth. He tells Roslin that he knows of Dr. Cottle's opinion that Roslin's energy is due in part to her detoxication, having refused her recent series of doloxan treatments after Earth's discovery.
• When Adama pleads for Roslin to return to an active role in the government, worrying about Zarek's power plays, Roslin refuses.
• Despondent of her part in the Pythian prophecy, Roslin doesn't want to be president or the "dying leader." She wants to enjoy a bit of her life as an ordinary woman while she still has time.
• When Adama admits that she has earned some time to be simply Laura and not the president, Roslin tells him, "I have. And guess what? So have you," she says, giving him a kiss before telling him to get out of her way as she jogs ahead.

• Elsewhere, Gaius Baltar speaks rather dispassionately to his flock, arguing whether they disappointed God with some kind of discretion because of the lost Earth, or demand that God come down to them to ask his angered people for their forgiveness.
• As the crowd's energy rises to a loud shouting rage, Galen Tyrol is there, staring across the room at Viper pilot Brendan Costanza. Tyrol steps over to Costanza as he tries to apologize for his time with Tyrol's wife. Tyrol appears to nod in agreement before cold-cocking the pilot, fist-fighting as Baltar looks on without concern and the crowd cheers.

• As Saul Tigh and the admiral make their way to CIC, Tigh tells that the news of the Cylon FTL upgrade is not being taken well at all throughout the Fleet. Several of the civilian ships are refusing to accept the Cylon jump drive upgrade. Others won't even communicate with Galactica. Gaeta points out that the crews of those ships are merely exercising their right to deny Cylons access. Adama tells him that jump drive upgrades is a military matter outside the civilian government's jurisdiction. Totally ignoring military subordination, Gaeta questions Adama's right to make the ships comply with the upgrade.
• Their argument is interrupted with news that the Fleet's tylium refinery ship, the Hitei Kan has mutinied. Its crew has killed a Cylon and two marine guards. Adama orders a mardet alert team and a Raptor to intercede.
• The Hitei Kan is not communicating with Galactica but sends a wireless transmission to Colonial One. Hoshi intercepts it: Tom Zarek is directing the refinery ship not to cooperate with Galactica.
• Just as the Mardet team arrives, the Vipers firing warning shots across the ship's bow as Athena tries to guide the Raptor to dock on the civilian ship, the Hitei Kan jumps.
• Adama's mood is sour. "You know, there are days that I really hate this job," he says.

Act 4

• Incensed at Zarek's power plays, the admiral orders Athena and her team to board Colonial One and arrest Zarek, authorizing them to use deadly force if necessary.

• Back in sickbay, Tyrol instructs Costanza on the basics of being a father. He leaves him to tend to his son. When Costanza asks how long he must sit at Nicky's bedside, Tyrol answers, "Until I get back. That'll be after I sober up."

• In the brig, Admiral Adama drops a thick pile of documents in front of Tom Zarek, noting how the documents record many of Zarek's criminal activities. While Adama knows that Zarek would happily go to the gallows or rot in jail as a martyr, but to be condemned as a political criminal--the very people Zarek had fought against for most of his life--would be an embarrassment too much for Zarek to handle.
• Zarek doesn't believe that the Fleet would handle yet another protracted trial, as was the trial against former president Baltar. But Adama disagrees. Without the Hitei Kan and her tylium, the Fleet can't move about. "At least they won't be bored," Adama says, noting that Zarek would have no friends in such a situation.
• Adama believes Zarek knows where the tylium ship is, and leaves Zarek to read the documents. But Zarek relents. He scribbles the coordinates of the ship.
• Adama takes both the note and the pile of documents. As the admiral leaves, Colonel Tigh is there to greet him. "Shall I send in a medic?" Tigh quips, wondering if Adama appealed to Zarek's "intellect" via his fists.
• Tigh looks at Adama, telling him how unwell the admiral looks. Adama hands off the pile of documents to Tigh as he leaves. Tigh leafs through the pile. "Laundry reports," Tigh says with a smirk, realizing the admiral had bluffed Zarek.
• Later, Felix Gaeta meets with Zarek, still in his cell. They agree to an alliance against Adama's alliance with the Cylons. Gaeta promises that he has others in the Fleet ready to aid in a coup against the admiral.

• The day ends as the Hitei Kan jumps back to its place in the Fleet.
• The admiral hears the news on the phone from Colonel Tigh, asking him to handle the situation as a female hand comes up to take the phone away to its place on the receiver.
• The hand is Laura Roslin's, also in bed with Adama, nude and comfortable, a smile on her face.
• "They found the tylium ship," Adama says as he kisses Roslin's shoulder. "Um-hmm," is all that Roslin says. "Do you care?" he asks. Roslin hums in the negative. With a smile, Adama says, "Neither do I."

Notes

Ron sitting in the director's chair.

• This episode was the directorial debut of Ronald D. Moore.
• This episode takes place immediately after the "The Face of the Enemy" webisodes, where in the final webisode Saul Tigh invites Felix Gaeta to the meeting at the beginning of this episode. Gaeta also demonstrates a hostility to Cylons not seen in "Sometimes a Great Notion," and in the first nine Webisodes. Not until the last minute of the 10th webisode, when he pointedly states that he wants to talk directly to William Adama as Tigh is a Cylon, does he displays the hostility shown in "A Disquiet Follows My Soul".
• A throwaway scene from "A Day In The Life" in which Brendan "Hot Dog" Costanza complains about a sexually contracted skin disease seems less innocuous in light of the events of this episode. Although the scene takes place late in the third season, long after Nicky's birth and Costanza's retroactively established affair with Cally, it does set up the notion of Costanza as a hapless womanizer.
• The poem Adama reads and recites at the beginning of the episode is "There is a Languor of the Life" by Emily Dickinson.
• As Gaeta's mutiny begins to disintegrate, he later repeats to himself what William Adama told the mutineers about being a "day of reckoning" and apparently applying this statement to himself. It is after this event that Gaeta stands down before Adama and his loyalists storm CIC.
• Nicholas Tyrol is revealed to be a fully human child, reinstating Hera as the only known Cylon-Human hybrid.

Analysis

• Ron Moore, who took the reins of directorship for the first time in his own series, made it a point to note several serious character views in this episode. The most significant may not be Laura Roslin's near-abdication of the presidency, but the physical malaise that seems to plague Bill Adama. The malaise isn't only within him but in Gaius Baltar, who has made his followers challenge what seems to be a dispassionate and uncaring God, and in Felix Gaeta, whose bitterness threatens to lead him into betraying his own people. The last scene, standing on his mechanical leg with Tom Zarek, appears to be an allusion to Gaeta's loss of humanity, as he slowly becomes more like the Cylons he now despises.
• Fans of the Roslin/Adama relationship were likely well satisfied with the scene at the episode's conclusion. In the past, their lives as leaders of the Fleet made them hesitate to become closer, although in a couple of instances, they "let their hair down" a little ("Resurrection Ship," "Unfinished Business," "The Hub"). Now, at Roslin's insistence that she and Adama try to be just ordinary people, if only briefly, the plights of the Fleet were put aside for a time. However, it stands to reason that their romance, if anything in the Pythian prophecy is true, may not last.
• Inconsistently, the woman now identified as the Tauron Delegate, in "Sine Qua Non" replaced Reza Chronides in the Quorum (with Speaking Delegate #2 present), while in "A Disquiet Follows My Soul" she replaced Speaking Delegate #2 (with Chronides present), apparently representing two different colonies on two different occasions. (This is not the first time such strange Quorum shifts have happened.)
• The episode reinforces information demonstrated in the latter season 1 and 2 episodes "Kobol's Last Gleaming, Part I" and "Lay Down Your Burdens, Part I": Cylon FTL technology, both in mechanism and in navigation, is three times more accurate than Colonial FTL.
• The survivor count shows a loss of a six people during and since "The Face of the Enemy" webisodes. Based on Karl Agathon's, Saul Tigh's and Felix Gaeta's comments, some of these were suicides, like that of Anastasia Dualla previous to the webisodes. Three of the deaths are those of Esrin, Finnegan and Brooks, murdered by a Number Eight in "The Face of the Enemy".
• Gaeta's incident with Thrace in this episode is similar to a previous confrontation in "Collaborators" except this time it is Gaeta who initiates hostilities.
• Adama has accepted Tigh back as his friend and second in command. Tigh, despite being outed as a Cylon, maintains his rank and privileges. Adama also, unlike the previous episode, speaks to Tigh in a more familiar manner here.
• Col. Tigh still has much authority with the crew of Galactica as XO even though he has been revealed to be a Cylon. At near the end of "Sometimes a Great Notion" just before he speaks with D'Anna Biers for the last time, he is clearly shouting orders at the landing personnel on Earth to get their gear for departure in 15 minutes in his familiar barking way. No one objected (not that anyone actually wanted to stay on the planet). Thus far only Felix Gaeta has shown overt objections.
• The amnesty offered to the Final Four Cylons, along with presumably Admiral Adama's consent, has resulted in them being allowed to remain aboard Galactica and presumably (given Tigh is still the XO) to keep their posts. It remains unclear in this episode how well the rest of the Fleet accepts this or to what extent it is understood that the Final Four are different from the other seven and are not sleeper agents, but it is a sign of how far the two races have come that there can be such intermingling. This would have been unthinkable in the first two seasons. Nevertheless later episodes do show that dissent and hostility are brewing over the rushed blanket amnesty and the fact that the revealed Cylons remain free and serving ^{(TRS: "The Oath")}.
• Here we have another example of how confusing and improvised the matters of Colonial law have become. Despite not being Colonial citizens, Athena, Tigh, and Anders are serving as Colonial officers, and Athena and Anders are married to humans.
• Galen Tyrol refers to the Eights and Twos as "Sharons" and "Leobens," but the Sixes as "Sixes". His former relationship with Sharon Valerii and service alongside Sharon "Athena" Agathon explain his inclination to refer to the Eights with a human name, but his choice to address the Twos in equally familiar terms is difficult to explain from an in-universe perspective. In fact, the Number Two model designation was only established in "Six of One". Presumably Tyrol refers to the model as "Leoben" to avoid audience confusion.
  • It is possible that this is due to the fact that the Twos and Eights all go by the same name (Leoben and Sharon respectively), whereas most Sixes are referred to simply as Six, the ones that have had human names have all chosen different ones.
• Galen Tyrol is struggling with his group identity during the conference with Councilman Adama, Admiral Adama, Colonel Tigh and Lieutenant Gaeta. He stumbles with the plural pronouns, 'we', 'you', and 'they' when speaking of humans and Cylons. Out of habit, he initially refers to the rebel Cylons in the third person before correcting himself to use the first person, and likewise speaks of the colonists in the first person with an immediate amendment to the second person.
• A ship executing an FTL jump disrupts the space immediately surrounding it to a sufficient extent to send small ships such as Raptors or Vipers tumbling. This spatial distortion phenomenon will be explored later as having a significant strain on the hulls of ships jumping- or those in very close proximity to the jump effect "Someone To Watch Over Me".

Questions

• Based on the many instances in the episode where Admiral Adama is shown not to feel very well (and is "popping pills"), that the Fleet has still not found a home, and that Laura Roslin has relinquished (for now) her role as leader, is William Adama, in fact, the dying leader of the Pythian prophecy? (Answer)
• Will Tyrol continue to maintain custody of Nicky?
• Will people in the Fleet mistakenly suspect Kara Thrace of being the Final Cylon, now that Lee Adama has publicly let slip that the Fifth Cylon is a woman?
• Besides Tigh, Admiral Adama, and Lee Adama, who else in the Fleet knows that Ellen Tigh is the Final Cylon? (Answer)
• How many others on Galactica have sided with Gaeta and Zarek? (Answer)
• Which model Cylon was killed on the Tylium ship?
• Has Zarek actually been involved in any corrupt activities during his time as vice president, and if so, to what extent?
• What is Tyrol's status in the Colonial Fleet? In this episode, he was seen wearing only civilian clothing and was advocating for the Cylons. Has Tyrol resigned from the Colonial Fleet? Has he chosen to live amongst the Cylons in the fleet permanently?
• Will Zarek attempt to align with both Baltar and his followers in the pending rebellion? Will Baltar exploit the coming rebellion to regain power over the fleet? (Answer)
• Is Baltar still functioning as scientific adviser as he was in Sometimes a Great Notion?
• Is Gaeta not aware that Anders' Cylon nature was not known to either the Significant Seven or Anders himself at the time of the attack on the Colonies, or does he simply not believe it? Or does he simply not care?
• Gaeta's and Thrace's argument bandied about the figure of 50 billion humans killed. Tigh's pronouncement on New Caprica was 20 billion. Which is correct?

Official Statements

• A Chicago Tribune interview with Ron Moore about the episode:
  • Adama is in pain lately, but this is not a sign of something deeper.
  • Only the "upper echelon," i.e. the Adamas and Roslin, have been told about Ellen's true identity.
  • Cally did not cheat on Galen. The intention is that she slept with Hotdog before she and Galen started getting together, and Galen popped the question relatively fast. So while she did she lie about the child's paternity, she did not commit adultery.
• In his podcast for this episode, Moore states that at the end of Season 3 he wanted to reestablish that Hera was the only Cylon-Human hybrid, so the decision was made to have Nicky fathered by another man. Moore also states that Cally and Galen Tyrol got married during the missing year on New Caprica (14:00).
  • Moore briefly considered Anthony Figurski as the actual father of Nicky Tyrol, but "cooler heads prevailed" (16:39).
  • Felix Gaeta saying to Kara Thrace as she left the mess hall "So I guess a pity frak is out of the question then?" was an adlibed line by Alessandro Juliani who plays Gaeta (Note: Moore misquotes the line saying "mercy" instead of "pity" and leaving out "then") (20:35).
  • Moore prefers to believe that that was the very first time William Adama and Laura Roslin made love at the end of the episode. However, Edward James Olmos and Mary McDonnell believe that Adama and Roslin had been making love periodically starting on and since New Caprica (42:06).

Noteworthy Dialogue

• Admiral Adama after hearing that the Hitei Kan has just jumped:

"You know, there are days that I really hate this job."

• Helo, Galen Tyrol, and Saul Tigh on upgrading the Fleet's jump drives with Cylon technology:

Helo: "Athena tells me the upgrades should...triple the Fleet's jump capacity."

Tyrol: "Absolutely. And that's conservative. Their technology—our technology, is way ahead of ours. Yours."

Tigh: "Maybe you'd like a chart to keep it all straight?"

Guest Stars

• Donnelly Rhodes as Doctor Cottle
• Bodie Olmos as Lieutenant Brendan "Hot Dog" Costanza
• Kerry Norton as Layne Ishay
• Brad Dryborough as Lieutenant Louis Hoshi
• Christina Schild as Playa Palacios
• Biski Gugushe as Sekou Hamilton
• Keegan Connor Tracy as Jeanne
• Lara Gilchrist as Paulla Schaffer
• Finn R. Devitt as Nicholas Tyrol
• Andrew McIlroy as Jacob Cantrell
• Marilyn Norry as Reza Chronides
• Judith Maxie as Picon Delegate
• Donna Soares as Gemenon Delegate (credited as "Speaking Delegate #1)
• Veena Sood as Tauron Delegate (credited as "Quorum Delegate")
• Hector Johnson as Marine Lieutenant (uncredited)
• Leo Li Chiang as the tattooed pilot (uncredited)
• Unknown as Zarek's Marine guard (uncredited)
• Unknown as a female cultist (uncredited)

Re-imagined Series definition: nerve center or "bridge" of a battlestar, see: Combat Information Center

Re-imagined Series definition: Executive Officer, e.g. Saul Tigh

Re-imagined Series definition: in military parlance, directive to continue the attack; otherwise used to refer to journalists ^{(TRS: "Maelstrom")}

Re-imagined Series definition: technology enabling travel across distances faster than the speed of light would permit, see: FTL

Galactica 1980 definition: Troy attempts to use a phone booth near a gas station prior to their first run-in with Jamie Hamilton ^{(1980: "Galactica Discovers Earth, Part I")}.

Re-imagined Series definition: the process of using the FTL engines to make an near-instantaneous apparent faster-than-light transport of a ship from one point in space to another

Re-imagined Series definition: mineral that can be refined to a powerful fuel, see: tylium

Original Series definition: a highly combustible fuel (see: tylium) ^{(TOS: "Fire in Space")}

Re-imagined Series definition: all-purpose vulgarism; Colonial version of "fuck" (see: frak)