A copy of this letter, written by McQueen to Cidra, was passed on to Cidra after the original was confiscated by Intelligence and Security. It was delivered by Sawyer Averies back to the ship on the April 20, 2042, in a plain white envelope with imperfect handwriting in black ink, labelled "Toast." The handwriting inside is white and unlined. It is a bit erratic at times and not quite straight.
Toast,
Cidra. I don't think I ever called you that.
I'm wondering if you're just going to use this thing as a damned rolling paper, or even read the bloody thing at all. Even if so, I've wasted my time in the past on far less /worthy/ endeavors, wouldn't you say?
By now, you've heard enough of the truth, or made some guesses, both probably being somewhat accurate. Let's get the hard shit out of the way first:
I am a Cylon.
I always knew I was a Cylon too, I was never some kind of cracked-out, reprogrammed Sleeper Agent (they made those, I'm not going to lie). I knew what I was from the moment I was inserted into human Society, joined the Fleet, went to the Academy, and learned to fight and fly with the best of them. Salt too, although that stone-faced bastard, God and all Gods have mercy on him, he had a different path.
There are Twelve Cylon models. Each of us created to represent humanity, or the Cylon peoples' link to it. We were originally designed to be a link between the two peoples, but it never really worked out that way, did it? It feels odd talking about Cylons as "my people" because they don't really feel like that anymore. More on that in a bit.
Anyway, well, the damn joke here is that you call the Cylons abominations, but we are Abominations by action, not nature. What we /did/ defined what we are, not the other way around. In the same way, I hear Fives, a model I can't bloody adbide, spew all manner of High Holy Shit about "God's Judgement blah blah blah" on humans when in reality I've seen unspeakable acts of beauty and genius wrought by human hands, just as I've seen base, profane, and horrible acts (File under one Rudy Kepner, I hope you guys dusted him good, yeah?). Anyway, the Fives talk to God but really they're only communing with their own rectal spasms as their heads are shoved so far up their own asses they haven't seen the light of day in years. But enough about that.
The problem with humanity is that the Cylons don't understand messy individuality - the very thing that makes you special. I, however, in my time alongside you, came to. But by the time things came to a head, it was too late. Or at least, that's what I told myself, and the Twos were resigned to agreeing with something they didn't really like because they were convinced it was God's plan. How could God be wrong?
We didn't understand God. God - Gods, there's no difference, divinity is a vast, hard-to-quantify, all-encompassing force whose light shines on every atom of the universe. Even the ugly ones. It just manifests as the Gods to humanity, and in a similar fashion, the Cylons sprung from a singular union and saw one God. The differences are semantic, but the point is, they're all real. Just as you are.
I was inserted at Picon Anchorage as a saboteur with very little work to be performed - just oversee the coup-de-grace on any Colonial vessels that survived the initial assault. Salt could not just stand by and let that happen after he got to know you, and let me tell you, a Twelve showing any speck of decency or consience is a frakking cosmic event. No wonder they boxed him for being "Defective." He was the only one that was ever made right. Anyway, Salt could not. I /would/ not. It was then that I realized everything. Only three ships - The Praetorian, the Corsair, and of course, the /Cerberus/. There you have it. The Tenth Sparrow, and all those bloody dreams I had made sense. The rest you more or less know, and now, well, I couldn't fly a Viper against those bastard Evocati after I got my leg ripped up and I just /happened/ to repurpose some mutineer's Raptor. At that point, I took those two good people along for the ride (and no, I didn't say "I AM A CYLON").
Since the other Twos and Elevens have made their revelation, I figured we could at least talk to them without shooting, and they're trustworthy sorts. But they don't yet know what I know, although they are trying. Which is why I didn't come back - we have a lot of work to do down on Gemenon. In return, they're delaying my inevitable death sentence. Kepner was right about one thing - I think our supposed immortality is a mistake.
You'll probably never forgive me for this, but every action I took was of my own free will, and I tried my best to be guided by the hands of the Gods. God. The Divine. Oh, and about what I said before I left. If you hadn't heard it, that shit is real. It's not 'programming,' yeah? Unfortunately we are saddled with all the 'faults' of humanity, and that includes emotions (jury is out on the 12s) like love. So there you go. I'll leave you with this, Toast. You always talked about others having visions. Like you felt deprived of them, somehow. I think that's not the case. Why? The Gods aren't going to bother sending explicit revelations to someone who's already on the right path.
We'll meet again before the end. I've forseen that, yeah?
Fight, fly, but never die until your time,
-Trevor Cairn McQueen.