ATHENA

Skyler…thank heavens you’re all right….

SKYLER

I’ve got to go back for Zac. It’s an ambush…they jammed our communicators. You tell Commander Adama there were no base ships. He’ll understand what I’m saying.

ATHENA

Skyler….

SKYLER

Athena, just listen and tell Adama that it’s more than just an attack. The Cylon base ships are missing. That means they’re up to something diabolical. Now I’ve got to go back for Zac. (he turns and starts to leave)

ATHENA

You don’t have to go back. (Skyler turns back. His tone is positive but his expression uncertain)

SKYLER

You mean he’s all right. One of the other ships picked him up! (tears begin running down Athena’s cheek)

ATHENA

No…. (Skyler stares at Athena emotionlessly, then turns away as she cries)

SKYLER

I guess I can give my report to Adama myself.

ATHENA

Your report…is that all you can say? Zac’s dead.

SKYLER

We’ll probably all be dead, soon.

What a cheerful guy! Richard Hatch has stated that when he was originally approached to play the Apollo role he refused because the character was inhuman. This script more than adequately corroborates his account.
The section dealing with the battle and escape from the Colonies is substantially like what was shot, though the plotline about Adama’s despair and threat to resign was a later development, and in the Council scene dealing with the decision to go to Carillon, Anton and Uri’s lines are all spoken by Anton and several of what became Apollo’s lines are given to Adama (dealt with elsewhere). An interesting lost Baltar scene follows this:

(two Cylon centurions enter Imperious Leader’s chamber with Baltar between them)

CENTURION

By your command.

IMPERIOUS LEADER

The people of Cylon wish to offer you an opportunity to serve, Baltar.

BALTAR

To serve…?

IL

It appears that a small band of refugee humans eluded the Alliance.

BALTAR

I tried to forewarn you…. (the centurions hurl him to the floor)

IL

I offer you life, and you question my judgment. Dangerous….

BALTAR

Kill me.

IL

Let him rise. (Baltar does so) I sense a bargain.

BALTAR

We bargained before and it left me a dead man. This time I will have my reward before I serve you.

IL

The entire Alliance serves me. Why do I need you?

BALTAR

Why do you spare me? Because you fear man. You do not understand him. When your forces had taken and put the entire nation of Tucana into slavery, man was there to break the chains. When you chose to dominate the people of Gaelon, man was there to make the Galics strong, to help them seek their own destiny. The Cylon is content to serve…man is born to lead. But I can succeed, where you have failed.

IL

What is your bargain?

BALTAR

When I find the survivors of the Colonies…they are mine.

IL

And how do you propose to protect this bargain?

BALTAR

There are those who will follow me. Away from your influence, away from your interests.

IL

All the stars interest me.

BALTAR

You can have no reign on tyranny…there is room for all.

IL

You appear as a man but you think like a Cylon.

BALTAR

The better to serve you, while serving myself.

Much more interesting, in my view, then the tacked-on “Imperious Leader changes his mind and spares Baltar because ABC won’t let us whack his head off” version we eventually ended up with. In this version of the premiere, Starbuck shoots Baltar dead in the casino.
The order of scenes is mixed in this version, compared to the one we’re used to; the decision has already been made to go to Carillon, but the above Baltar scene is followed by the (somewhat changed) Apollo-meets-Boxey scene. After that, we have this lost scene on board the livery ship as Apollo goes on a search for a daggit:

STARBUCK

I don’t think I can help you, Skyler. Other than fixing the landing servos on this livery machine, the only thing I know about livestock, which includes daggits, is that we’ve run out of food to feed them. Let me show you. (they enter a stall where there are two unicorns, one lying on its side)

SKYLER

How long has he been like that?

STARBUCK

He collapsed last night just after I was brought on board. You know unicorns are very monogamous. His lady’s in foal…they think he’s been letting her have his share of the food ration. If we could have stopped at Borallus…. (Skyler turns and storms away)

SKYLER

We couldn’t stop. The Cylons would have been there, waiting.

STARBUCK

Well, when these animals are gone, they’re gone. We’ll just have to accept the fact that generations will grow up without ever having seen a unicorn, or a tagon, or a….

SKYLER

There wouldn’t be any generations of anything if we’d stopped. I would have made the same decision as my father.

STARBUCK

OK, OK…it’s just rough to have to watch them slip away, one at a time….

SKYLER

I’ll tell you what’s rough. We’ve got a little boy in the same condition. Are you sure no one brought any daggits along someplace in this whole fleet?

STARBUCK

No, we’re both out of luck. I already checked.

SKYLER

Both out of luck? You checked for daggits? Why?

STARBUCK

Daggit racing.

SKYLER

What?!

STARBUCK

What’s one of the most awful things that can happen to people on a long voyage?

SKYLER

They die!

STARBUCK

Not that awful…I’m talking about things to do for excitement.

SKYLER

Fifty million Cylons chasing us all over the stars, our ships are falling apart, there’s nothing to eat, and you’re worried about excitement?!

STARBUCK

Well, when you put it like that…anyway, I got the idea before it began to look like we weren’t going to make it at all.

SKYLER

We are going to make it. The animals too.

STARBUCK

Tell him. (they’ve arrived at a droid whose front is open, exposing its workings. There are tools in front of the machine, suggesting that Starbuck has been working on it) How’s it going this morning, Zeus?

ZEUS

Not well…all species receiving inadequate food supplements to survive the voyage to the planet Carillon.

STARBUCK

You’re wrong, Zeus. Commander Adama has just decided to take a chance through the Nova of Madagon. That’ll cut two centons off the journey.

ZEUS

The Nova of Madagon is mined by the Alliance…the percentile risk of successfully traversing the strait makes it statistically impossible.

STARBUCK

Is that right.

ZEUS

Yes, that’s right.

STARBUCK

Thank you.

ZEUS

Thank you.

STARBUCK

Thank you.

ZEUS

Thank you. (Starbuck shakes his head)

STARBUCK

Idiot….

ZEUS

I beg your pardon? (Skyler reacts)

SKYLER

Starbuck…that’s the answer! You’ve saved a life.

STARBUCK

What?

SKYLER

Never mind…thanks. I owe you one. (he hustles out. Starbuck stares after him)

STARBUCK

Malnutrition…it’s getting to everyone.

That scene has such a wacky charm to it that it should have been retained; Starbuck the not-quite nature lover scouring the fleet for racing daggits is all too in character. We also learn here that if nothing else, Colonial robots would have been polite.
In spite of these lost scenes, the different order of others, and an entirely different Carillon sequence, it’s obvious that this early script—just two drafts removed from the first draft—is so similar in its overall outline to what ended up on film that Larson’s ideas were formed very early and in spite of George Lucas’ protestations really aren’t very much like Star Wars except for superficial details like the (later deleted) presence of Colonial droids. Sire Uri and Cassiopiea were added later; only in later scripts did Serina (still Lyra in this draft) become Boxey’s mother. Adama’s resignation and Serina’s sickness were also late developments. With those largely edited out of the final cut, what survives is very like this early, and so not quite lost version of the Battlestar Galactica premiere.

� 1992, 1999 by Susan J. Paxton