Tom Zarek

Tom Zarek was a Sagittaron political activist and terrorist who escaped the Fall of the Twelve Colonies aboard the prison transport Astral Queen. Freed on the orders of President Laura Roslin, he achieved considerable political success, at one point serving as Vice President and then briefly as President of the United Colonies of Kobol. He was ultimately executed after supporting and co-leading a mutiny aboard the Galactica.

Activism and imprisonment#

Zarek's exact early political activities in the United Colonies of Kobol are unknown, but he made his name by triggering unrest against governments he considered corrupt, illegitimate or acting against the people. He was eventually incarcerated after a terrorist campaign that culminated in the bombing of a government building.

During his imprisonment he wrote a book intended to counter the negative publicity surrounding his actions, and it succeeded in casting him, in the eyes of many across the Colonies, as a victim of political corruption despite the bombing. His writings had to be smuggled out of a labor camp due to harsh regulations and were immediately banned by many institutions, including military academies, yet remained provocative enough that people risked obtaining copies.

Freedom aboard the Astral Queen#

Around the year 2000, Zarek was placed aboard the prison transport Astral Queen, bound for Caprica for a parole hearing alongside some 1,500 other prisoners. During transport the Cylons attacked the Colonies, and all non-military ships were ordered to remain stationary in their space-lanes, away from the fighting. The Astral Queen was rescued by military forces loyal to the newly inaugurated President Laura Roslin, and Zarek was spared an emergency airlocking when Captain Wilkens proposed executing the inmates for the good of the refugee fleet.

In the days that followed, Zarek began to radicalize his fellow inmates and some of the guards. Disgusted at an unelected President serving out the term of another with no Quorum, he planned a full-scale prison riot and the hijacking of the ship, intending to die as a martyr for democracy when Galactica's marines inevitably boarded. When representatives from Galactica requested laborers in exchange for "freedom points" rather than the promised parole hearings, Zarek initiated his riot, and the rioters took the others prisoner, including Galactica's CAG, Captain Lee Adama. The riot failed when Adama put a gun to Zarek's head but promised to push for the restoration of democracy and Zarek's freedom. Zarek subsequently avoided jail time for his role in a later plot on Kobol, where he had attached himself to Roslin's faction for political gain.

Rise to power#

After reuniting with the fleet, Zarek was approached by Lee Adama for information on his shady associates, who controlled a black market in essential goods. Zarek named a gangster called Phelan, later killed by Adama; though Zarek denied involvement in the black market, claiming to have broken with Phelan upon discovering his child prostitution ring, he was nonetheless seen associating with one of Phelan's former henchmen.

Zarek went on to become Gaius Baltar's campaign manager in his bid against Roslin, engineering a winning platform that called for the fleet to settle the newly discovered planet later dubbed New Caprica. When Baltar was elected President, Zarek became his Vice President.

Office and corruption#

Beginning possibly with the settlement of New Caprica, Zarek succumbed to the power of his office and grew corrupt, using his position for criminal ends. A year after the settlement, the Cylons discovered the colony and placed it under occupation, forcing Galactica and Pegasus to flee. Zarek was confined when he refused to collaborate with the Cylons after they compelled the surrender of the Baltar administration. He, along with Roslin and Cally Tyrol, was among 200 citizens sentenced to death by the Cylon-controlled Colonial government. Believing themselves doomed, Zarek elicited a confession from Roslin about the election fraud that had nearly denied Baltar the presidency, and conceded that settling New Caprica had been a mistake. The group was saved at the last moment by the human resistance.

After Galactica returned to rescue the survivors, Baltar was left behind with the Cylons. Zarek became President of the Colonies but chose to step down, believing he could not control the fleet without the military's support. Before resigning he appointed Roslin as his Vice President, and was visibly surprised when she in turn asked him to serve as her own Vice President.

Second Vice Presidency#

Before Roslin resumed the presidency, Zarek, in concert with Saul Tigh, secretly authorized "The Circle" to carry out death-squad executions of those who had collaborated with the Cylons on New Caprica. Roslin was horrified when she learned of it, but Zarek argued that the fleet needed swift justice to prevent chaos. The executions were halted when Roslin declared a general amnesty in her inaugural address.

When Baltar was later returned to the Colonials, Zarek repeatedly counseled against a public trial and urged Roslin to declare martial law, behavior at odds with his lifelong opposition to such measures. When Roslin was kidnapped by renegade Cylons, Zarek declared himself Acting President under the Colonial Constitution. Though the Quorum supported him, Lee Adama advised him to step down because the military would not back his administration. Zarek reluctantly invoked a provision allowing an Interim President in a time of crisis, and Lee Adama became Interim President until Roslin's return.

After the fleet found the first Earth to be a desolate, irradiated wasteland, Roslin withdrew from public life, leaving Zarek as the government's de facto leader. Tensions soon arose with Admiral William Adama over a plan to install advanced Cylon jump drives on all civilian ships. Zarek regarded it as an illegal military usurpation of civilian authority and a step toward an unwise permanent alliance with the rebel Cylons. He pushed the Quorum to forbid Cylon engineers from boarding any ship whose captain refused them and privately urged resistance. When the tylium ship Hitei Kan jumped away after contact with Zarek, Adama had him arrested. Confronted in the brig with documents purporting to prove his corruption, which turned out to be mere ship laundry slips, Zarek relented and gave Adama the coordinates the Hitei Kan had jumped to.

Mutiny and death#

Soon afterward, Felix Gaeta visited Zarek in the brig and proposed a mutiny and coup, to which Zarek agreed. Gaeta removed Zarek from the brig and escorted him to the hangar deck, where, after the deck was cleared on a pretext, a suspicious Crew Chief Laird was about to alert the LSO when Zarek struck him in the back of the head with a wrench, killing him. Racetrack then flew Zarek to Colonial One, where he falsely told Lee Adama that the Admiral had reconsidered his imprisonment. Zarek remained in contact with Gaeta throughout the mutiny.

After Gaeta seized control of Galactica, Zarek met with the Quorum. When it became clear the Quorum would not follow him as President, he ordered the entire Quorum executed. With the Cylon basestar under Roslin's control and broadcasting anti-mutiny messages, Zarek lost the confidence of much of the fleet, and he and Gaeta resolved instead to split the fleet and leave with the ships still loyal to them. When the FTL drives were shut down, the mutiny reached crisis; Zarek berated Gaeta and demanded Vipers be launched against the basestar, but Gaeta ordered a ceasefire, cutting Zarek off from military support. Marines loyal to Admiral Adama then stormed the CIC and detained the mutineers. Zarek was found guilty of treason and executed by firing squad alongside Gaeta.