With Hera now likely in the hands of John Cavil, Admiral Adama sends out search teams to locate The Colony, the Cylon home world if you will, that Ellen Tigh says is the only place she imagines she could be. Adama reluctantly comes to the conclusion that the Galactica has reached the end of its days. He orders all repair activities halted and decides to strip the ship and share everything that is salvageable with the rest of the fleet. Starbuck meanwhile shares with Gaius Baltar what she found on the uninhabitable Earth.
Spoilers ahead. Coverage follows the scope labeled below.
Complete story — includes the ending
Boomer's Raptor escape damages Galactica when she jumps too close to the hull. Admiral Adama makes the crucial decision to abandon ship and puts Lee in charge of offloading equipment to the rest of the fleet. As Starbuck searches for the meaning behind the "Cylon song" (revealed to be a rearrangement of " All Along the Watchtower ", a real song from 1967), Baltar tries to expose her return from the dead as proof of life after death.