AN: Here it is after a bit of a wait, the second Draft of my Prologue, I finally managed to add some of the people who signed my Google Form as Promised but I still need more volunteers to get more of my fans in on this fic, after all I hate being vague on appearances now enjoy this re draft and criticize it I can't make improvements otherwise, but other than that Enjoy oh and since not everyone can find my Google Form.
Read my BS-106 Information Wiki and send me your characters through a Private Message, I'll be checking my PM's more regular now so hopefully you lot can have an easier time to add you to my story thanks a bunch you guys, and thank you for all the FAV's and Likes since this fic became official, this is going to be slow to write since I want to AVERAGE around 5000 words a chapter.
Battlestar LION BS-106, Somewhere Beyond the "Red Line"
72nd Reserve Battlegroup "Support Battlegroup Demeter"
80 Days since the Destruction of the Twelve Colonies
Commanders Quarters
Sitting upright in my bed my thumb and middle finger of my scarred right hand rubbed my temples, my bedside alarm blared away as I processed my thoughts, the nightmares never seceded ever since the fall of Humanity, beginning with 'my' report to 'my' superiors that had been outright dismissed in the opening hours of the second Cylon war, after they had believed that the all clear beacon aboard Armistice simply needed maintenance and repairs.
I realised now after eighty days of hellish survival I should've just reported directly to Admiral Nagala or Nash; even if it was against protocol. I removed my hand and smacked it on to the stop button atop of my bedside alarm, shifting free of my quilt I planted my feet on the cold steel plate deck, I pushed myself up and walked nude to my private ablutions where I immediately went through my routine, washing up in the shower my thoughts went back to my decisions as a Commander and acting Commodore of the 72nd Reserve Battlestar Group; the crews aboard all of the 72 R-BSG vessels were freshly rotated to give most of the veteran crewmen some much needed shore leave. Meaning I had crewmen that were either fresh out of boot or had only taken part in anti-pirate and colony disaster relief missions.
I spent hours contemplating my options, which had me mobilising the Battlegroup on my own authority, my gut feeling screaming at me that we were going to come under some form of Cylon attack, I had ordered all ships crews to use wartime protocol's to have the Demeter anchorage ferry supplies autonomously into all of the ships, whilst having the station's crewmen aboard Demeter evacuated into the vessels.
We had a good hour before shit hit the fan, an entire battlegroup of Cylon new type Basestars jumped right on top of Demeter, the Dradis picking up the mass launch of hundreds of Raiders and two dozen nukes the moment they cleared their FTL wakes, it had been lucky enough all of my fellow commanders and I had brainstormed a situation like this during a meeting years ago only we had thought Pirates would be the aggressors not the god's damned Cylon's, the drill had become a running gag of sorts, only this gag was about to save thousands of lives.
Standing beside the Lion's war-table I had my wireless in hand and ordered all ships through the secure channels to button up and egress to point Beta.
Now point Beta was a pre-plotted jump site no further than 100 kilometres away from Demeter, problem was we had only gotten about half of the total munitions stored aboard the anchorage, meaning the moment the ships jumped the Anchorage would detonate because of the munitions being ferried to the vessels were unsecured.
With moments to spare all vessels jumped simultaneously whilst still being docked, as predicted the jump had caused the unsecure munitions to detonate in a chain reaction, Demeter disappeared from the Dradis screens, with the Battlegroup clear I ordered all ships into formation, with the battlegroups support ships in the centre while the Cruisers and escorts took to forming a defensive bubble around them with the Lion taking its place directly above the centre most vessel.
The Cylon's caught flat footed by the manoeuvre had their entire fighter support clear of their position they had obviously expected a soft target which left their flanks exposed, giving the order I had all vessels with a line of sight on the Cylon battlegroup open fire against the Basestars, I ordered all guns to focus on targeting the central axis, which if design philosophies remained the same from the first war would cripple them.
All 160 mark two and three vipers in eight squadrons of twenty launched within two minutes in two waves of eighty from the Lion's flight pod's the most renowned being Lion's premier 'VOID' fighter squadron which made up half of Lion's 'GREY' fighter wing, the other three fighter wings were 'GOLD', 'RED' and 'BLUE' respectively.
For a good hour Raiders, Vipers, Basestars and the 72nd Reserve duked it out, The Lion claiming three Basestar kills with her liberal use of Armour Piercing Anti-Capital rounds, the other warships of the 72nd Reserve claimed the other three kill's with a final clean-up operation killing off the last raiders to prevent the battlegroup being tracked when I ordered the battlegroup to jump clear to prevent an effective counter attack.
All in all we had killed the Cylon force in system with few to no casualties, several rookie Viper pilots had lost their lives in their first real combat situation, it felt like a kick in the balls but we had to get the frak out of dodge before reinforcements arrived, with all surviving birds back in the barn I had the battlegroup perform multiple jumps.
That's when my Communication's officer Julia Sato a fair woman who was of Asian descent from Caprica, reported that nearly two full thirds of the Colonial active fleet had been destroyed in the opening hours, reports though somewhat sketchy indicated that the entire CNP developed by Gaius Baltar had been breached and that vessels were simply shut down without firing a single shot.
The only ships going down with a fight either used the older networked IOS or simply didn't have it installed, nearly all of the reserves hadn't been modernised leaving them immune to cyber-attacks this however was countered by the fact all of the crews aboard those reserve vessels lacked the skills necessary to make any real difference.
Looking at the war table I contemplated our next destination, when it hit me in the face, the Sidonia Asteroid Belt, home to an asteroid base community named 'Pirate Bay' due to the populaces anti-government views, with that decided I relayed my orders to the rest of the commanders and we began our multi jump trip to our staging point for the foreseeable future.
I spent a good half a day with the governor of Pirate Bay, a brunette woman with the sharpest brown eyes with a wit to match; she had a scarred body and face though it did nothing to detract from her beauty, Sofiya Pavlovna had been a former Colonial Army Colonel during the first war who was gravely wounded during one of the campaigns to retake the colonies owned by the Cylon's, once she had recovered she had been medically discharged and given no further support leaving her to fend for herself.
Gaining her support had been a great boon, especially when reports came through that the Cylon's had begun a scorched earth policy, indiscriminately nuking Colonial population centres, Caprica City being the first to be hit and the hardest hit to boot.
By the time the first day was over with, Admiral Nagala had taken command of the fleet to begin a counter offensive above Virgon, which failed and the last official order came from no one other than William 'The Old Man' Adama himself, it was short and spoke volumes of how FUBAR the whole situation had become over the last 24 hours.
I AM TAKING COMMAND OF THE FLEET. REPORT TO RAGNAR FOR NEW COUNTER OFFENSIVE.
CMDR. WILLIAM ADAMA.
One thing was certain the Old Man himself was a Veteran as was the ship he Commanded, both he and the Galactica BS-12 were tough sons of bitches they would survive but not for long, not without her Battlegroup to support her, which had been posted over Virgon due to the Galactica's De-commissioning which occurred today of all days.
Everything was fracked, so I ordered two raptors to head to Ragnar only for them to report later that the Galactica was just clear of Ragnar's Ionic storm defending against two Basestars as over fifty civilian ships jumped clear, the Galactica's Comms officer had apparently picked up on the Raptor's Radio Sub Transponders (RST's) and sent a tight beam message directly to them it too was short and straight to the point.
JUMPING BEYOND RED LINE. CO-ORDINATES EMBEDDED. ENCRYPTION KEY YANKEE-GOLD. GODS SPEED.
LT. DEE
Adama was smart, a fracking tactical genius, if this was a war of extermination like my fellow commanders, Sofiya and I believed, what better way for the tin-jobs to lose, than by having humanity survive to fight another day.
On a hunch I had my Navigator plot a predicted course using Lt. Dee's given co-ordinates and lo and behold, the prediction put them somewhere on course for where Kobol, the birth place of humanity, was suspected to be, mind you that suspicion had over a thousand AU's variance but that was neither here nor there.
It was now the time to strategize, we needed a viable solution to a no win situation, for an entire week we had debated between ourselves as humanity dwindled in population, we had decided that we would spend the next three weeks saving whoever we could and whatever ships we could, before following the trail of the Galactica and her Refugee fleet, it was a daunting order but something we as fellow men and as officers of the Colonial Navy had to do, if not, Humanity would die not with a blaze of glory but with a meagre whimper.
Battlestar LION BS-106, Sidonia Asteroid Belt
72nd Reserve Battlegroup "Support Battlegroup Demeter"
28 Days since the Destruction of the Twelve Colonies
Three weeks had come and gone with nearly one hundred civilian ships hidden throughout the asteroid field had been saved, alongside some more than grateful Police operated corvettes and two police frigates, the Boadicea which was one of five dedicated civilian-military Hospital ship's with its signature asterisks adorned on its hull, over the last three weeks it had become home for those wounded enough not to be a strain on supplies and women refugees who were pregnant, expecting or who had just given birth.
The cradle had been working on overdrive stripping ships with no real use and building a single modular ship which while fracking ugly could house hundreds of colonists so far, it's whole purpose was to be constantly added to, sublight botanical cruisers had given up their bio-spheres, engines and reactors alongside any spare drives and power plants and had them installed onto dedicated sections of hull that could not be ejected unlike other modules unless damaged or breached.
An entire market had been built by those who knew how to operate a business all of the essentials were provided in each and every housing unit, schools, clinics and police stations were all set up and connected and while cramped, with little to no natural light the corridors, homes and market were lit up well with plant life that had been placed to act as natural carbon filters.
Towards the rear farms and industrial facilities to convert waste into a safe useable manure had been placed to help with fresh food stocks of the fleet and attached on her underbelly, a single pair of salvaged Mercury flight pods fully loaded with vipers and raptors which had a dedicated module nestled between them, from which the entire compliment of Colonial Navy officers, enlisted and Marines operated from when aboard the modular ship, the ship had various salvaged deck guns and anti-fighter batteries with their magazines installed in sections where only Colonial Navy and military personal were permitted to enter, the marines guarded any military zone with dedication and if any civilians wanted to volunteer for the Military or Navy they were directed to either the recruitment centre or call a dedicated wireless line which had been set up which connected to one of the Lion's Tertiary comms suites in the bowels of the ship.
In essence we were as prepared for the long haul as we could be with what time we had on hand, fewer and fewer safe zones were abundant and it wouldn't be long before the Cylon's spotted a fleet of around 100 strong being defended by a Support Battlestar Group and various other armed vessels dotted throughout.
Finally the entire Populace of Pirates Bay had made some space saving conversions on ships that were dedicated for seated passengers only, being an asteroid community had given them some serious skills in making the absolute best with what space they had, so they built racks of bunks which replaced most seats and small community areas were established where people could entertain themselves with TV, music, cards and provided a place to sit and eat, these conversions had been done and in record time and all it took was for the Cylon's to commit genocide for Humanity to band together and help their fellow man.
Turning off my shower and making my way to my basin with a towel around my waist I began shaving my face with an Ivory handled cut throat razor, a job which required a steady hand least you slice your throat open.
Pirate Bay had served well as a staging post for the last three weeks and was finally stripped of everything before Sofiya left a parting gift for any Cylon looking to board the station, all that was left to do was recognise the establishment of the Civilian Governing Council and the fact that all military matters of fleet security fell to myself as acting commodore, my fellow commanders and our executive officers, all civilian ship captains were under my military jurisdiction for both fleet security and fleet cohesion.
Every ship was stationed in such a way that every weapon system formed a protective bubble that overlapped another, this formation had to be maintained even if under attack from Cylon forces or else everything would collapse.
The Civilian Governing Council bitched at first, before I reminded them that their position was just a temporary one, until we established contact with the Galactica which just so happened to have Colonial One with the next in succession Laura Roslyn sworn in as President of the Colonies of Man, which was something of a fact we stumbled onto when we went through the communications manuscript which had been stored since the attack started.
CASE-ORANGE DECLARED. ALL SECRETARIES OF STATE ARE TO REPLY ON THIS CHANNEL.
ONE RESPONSE FOUND
SECRETARY OF EDUCATION: LAURA ROSLYN.
AUTHORISED TO COMMENCE SUCCESSION OF THE FORMER PRESIDENT
UNDER THE ARTICLES OF MAN THIS DECLARATION GRANTS: LAURA ROSLYN: THE POWERS, DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES OF THE OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT ONCE SWORN INTO POWER.
STATUS: COMPLETE: LAURA ROSLYN: SWORN IN AS PRESIDENT
CASE-ORANGE CLOSED. MAY THE LORDS OF KOBOL PROTECT. SO SAY WE ALL.
All of this had been confirmed by every vessel which had received the transmission, which was near enough all of them, so right now with just over 120 vessels civilian and military alike we began our journey to join with the Galactica's Refugee fleet with an additional 132,876 survivors from all twelve colonies, we were thirty days behind and we had the audacious task of manoeuvring the second refugee fleet past the mapped out Cylon Battlegroup patrols and established sensor nets, before jumping clear beyond the Red Line, a jump only one other navigator successfully plotted, no small feat accomplished.
From there onwards it was follow the bread crumbs scattered raider and viper remains in systems, a ransacked Cylon Tylium Refinery, it took us fifty days but we reached it Kobol, two old type Cylon scythe destroyers sat in orbit, two raptor deployed nukes sorted that out and I figured we had about half a day to find out what the Galactica and her fleet had before toaster re-enforcements arrived.
Battlestar LION BS-106, Orbiting Kobol
72nd Reserve Battlegroup "Support Battlegroup Demeter"
80 Days since the Destruction of the Twelve Colonies
Commanders Quarters
Stepping back into my quarters I dressed myself into my duty uniform, hopefully by now my military and civilian ground team had found out what in the Gods names we were looking for, opening my hatch the two posted marines outside gave me a salute, one I returned allowing the men to stand easy. "Corporal Winter Private Vallo, anything from the rumour mill?" I asked the female male pair standing either side of my quarters door. "No sir, nothing's down the grapevine yet, though a few of the new bloods are wondering when they'll get some groundside action." Spoke Corporal Winter, as she re-adjusted her combat harness. "Hopefully no time soon, because if we're fighting on the ground, the fleets good as dead." Spoke Private Vallo most of the marines I knew personally would've heard those words and would've thought Vallo was a coward, on the contrary he was smart, scarily so, especially when you consider his knowledge in first Cylon war strategies. "Good man, mobility is key here, so those teams groundside better have found out what we're after or else we'll be flying blind."
Closing my quarters door behind me I walked with measured paces throughout the hexagonally shaped corridors, the entire interior was built around superstructure honeycomb's which provided the Lion with unprecedented durability supplemented with cross bracing and other supplemental structural support the Lion could take one hell of a licking and she'd just keep ticking.
I saluted various officers and enlisted as I made my way to the Lion's CIC once there the marines opened the hatch and saluted, which I returned passing through the threshold one of the CIC junior enlisted officers barked out. "Commander on the deck!" all of the CIC came to attention, for fifty odd days this had been the routine, a routine the crew kept, because it kept them sane breaking that routine now would send everyone out of whack and the Fleet and I didn't need that.
Walking down the steps into what was called the pit, I stood beside the war-table that sat dead centre of the CIC much like the Galactica own CIC with just as a rugged and reliable setup monitors hung above my head giving of the hum as the DRADIS made its sweeps. "I want duty officer reports in thirty minutes, and communications tell the groundside teams they have exactly an hour to get their arses back on the ship, or Fleet is leaving them behind."
"Aye Sir." Was the replies from all of the officers I had addressed. "Alright then, carry on the lot of you." With that the CIC broke out into a controlled whirlwind of activity, thirty minutes or so later I had a stack of reports resting on my war-table with a cup of white tea in hand.
For fifty days the fleet had chased the scent of the Galactica, but she and her fleet bailed likely due to superior Cylon forces occupying Kobol's orbit, the teams had discovered several wrecks of raptors that were stationed on Galactica so we knew they had to have been looking for something.
"Sir ground teams are RTB right now sir it seems like someone left us a care package with a CONI beacon attached." Spoke up my Executive Officer, as they placed down the wireless back onto its base, that gave me a moment of pause, CONI were some of the most sly frackers I knew but for someone to have left us a beacon only another CONI operative could've found out about it, probably found the fracking beacon the moment they got planet side, but to retain his or her cover acted as if they'd stumbled onto it. "Have the care package delivered to CIC, our own CONI planted operative has without a matter of doubt already verified it's not an IED, bug or a tracker, whatever it is it must be important.
A good ten minutes passed as a video played on one of the CIC monitors, the Old Man, the president and various other people were in a chamber in one of the ruins, before them displayed a map. "By the God's their going to try and find the thirteenth Colony…. They're heading for Earth." My XO muttered under their breath. "That CONI operative must've planted that on the off chance we'd follow them…. Clever very clever, alright navigation I want you to jump the fleet clear of Kobol twice before you make your assessment on our direction the Galactica is thirty days in front of us, CAG have raptors launched to the systems following our second jump, find me a mineral rich asteroid field I have a job for the Cradle that her crew is going to love.
I smirked to myself thinking about the crew of the cradle, for the Last fifty odd days they had continued to build upon the modular ship doubling her original size, the Modular ship which had been named Athena's Vengeance which just so happened to be the amalgamation of the names of the Mercury flight pods we had salvaged for the vessel the port pod being salvaged from the Battlestar Athena BS-217 and the starboard pod from the Battlestar Vengeance BS-299.
The following four months was spent in various asteroid fields as the Cradle completed her next project CONI operated out of stealth corvettes and frigates able to mask themselves into the background radiation when going ultra-silent, with the addition of texture buffers and super chilled coolant reduced all infrared signatures and their electronic warfare and countermeasure suites made them perfect for not only deep recon, but also electronic subterfuge and as a bonus mine laying vehicle, though this did come at a cost they were lightly armed and armoured meaning one well-placed anti capital round or missile it was game over before it begun.
These ships would be operated by a select crew of twenty apiece as the cradle had built six of these prowlers in four months, each prowler had a single raptor for relaying messages to the fleet and each ship was spread out in 3 AU increments with overlapping fields for greater stellar cartography readings, hopefully before long one of the Prowlers would find either the Galactica or the Mercury that rescued her, the destroyed Basestars and whatever that other ship was had clear impacts from the spinal battery from a Mercury.
And if it just so happened to be the Battlestar Pegasus all the better, her CO Admiral Cain deserved nothing less than life in the brig for what she did, after all killing her through a firing squad was too quick and clean ditto from spacing her via airlock, plus there was no point wasting good air.
Right now however that was neither here or there, we had a second refugee fleet eager to hook up with the first and we still had a ways to go to get there.
Battlestar LION BS-106, Orbiting Kobol
72nd Reserve Battlegroup "Support Battlegroup Demeter"
770 Days since the Destruction of the Twelve Colonies
CIC
We had overshot it was the only explanation the trail of breadcrumbs had simply vanished, for just over half a year we had not found head or hair of our fellow colonial fleet it just vanished so we doubled back in a zig-zag pattern, only two things would have stopped the old man, either the complete and utter annihilation of the first refugee fleet, of which there was no evidence of happening at all, or the old man found a habitable planet in one of the local clusters, chances were we'd overshoot the fleet a second time but it's a risk all people agreed we'd have to take, that's when one of the Prowler Raptors, broadcast a message clear on the military only channel's.
The first fleet had found a habitable planet hidden in a nebula just off the beaten path, our outermost prowlers missed their positon a year ago by one AU, just one, but right now the Galactica was in some dire straits, outnumbered, out gunned she was attempting to rescue colonials on the Cylon occupied planet, thinking through situation I had one solution, jump in the Lion, hammer the chrome jobs in their unguarded flank with APACHE and have vipers tactically nuke the Basestars while their fighter wings focused solely on the Galactica.
"XO inform the Civilian Governing Council, the Lion is performing a solo military action to provide assistance to the Battlestar Galactica, tell them to break out their finest Ambrosia and the red carpet, we found them." My XO nodded as they picked up their wireless handset to relay the message, whilst I picked up my own wireless patching myself through to the Phoenix class Support ship SPIRIT OF MOTHERWILL. "Charles its Liam you're in command of the fleet, don't do anything I wouldn't do."
"Copy that Commodore, and good hunting."
Battlestar GALACTICA BS-12, Orbiting New Caprica
75th Battlestar-Group
770 Days since the Destruction of the Twelve Colonies
CIC
"God's Damn it Lee…. Thank you." Admiral William "Old Man" Adama watched as the Battlestar Pegasus engaged three of the Cylon Basestars that surrounded the Galactica. "Admiral the PEGASUS hasn't launched any vipers!" The Admiral took only a scant few seconds looking at the DRADIS to realise the same. "Lee left everything behind to defend the Fleet." Suddenly the Radiological alarm blared throughout the CIC. "Radiological alarm nukes have been launched!" Two nuclear missiles headed towards the GALACTICA before Veering sharply impacting with two the Basestars flanking the Galactica.
"What the Frak! New DRADIS contact!" Karl "Helo" Agathon barked out while one of the CIC monitors switched to a live gun cam feed on the dorsal hull, a fully armoured and armed first war Columbia class Battlestar ploughed clear of the DRADIS interfering nebula with all batteries blazing the two already damaged Basestars were citadeled in their central axis where the two nukes had caused breeches, that's when the Old Man's brain caught up with his eyes. "It's not a Columbia, that's a frakking Lion class Battlestar! Dee are you receiving Colonial Codes?"
"Aye Admiral it's Identified as the Battlestar LION serial BS-106, attached to the 72nd R-BSG!" Adama couldn't stop himself no matter how much he tried to hold his composure, he laughed hard so hard his eyes watered. "Sir the Lion has launched vipers I count eighty…. What the frak?... Scratch that last I count 160 vipers!" Helo said with his mouth agape.
"Patch me through to the Lion Dee, I need to speak with their commanding officer patch it through the PA."
"Aye Sir!" Dee deftly ran her hands over her console before nodding to Adama. "This is Galactica Actual Admiral Adama speaking, Lion Actual by the gods you're a sight for sore eyes." A young sounding male's booming laugh came through the CIC's speakers. "This is Lion Actual, Acting Commodore Spruce speaking, we were in the neighbourhood thought you could use a hand "Old Man"…. I got to say Sir that promotion of yours was long overdue…. I digress we'll have to catch up later over a bottle of my finest but let us handle these toaster fraks!"
"Copy that Lion it's damn fine to have you with us." Adama replied, a weight somewhat lifted off of his shoulders. "So say we all Admiral, so say we all." For the next half an hour the fighting was intense with the addition of the Lion the Basestars were out flanked and their fighter wings were way too far out of position to be of any help allowing vipers to close in and fire missiles into hull breaches, whilst providing missile interception duties for the two other Battlestar's whilst the Galactica, Pegasus and Lion could focus fire on two ships a piece which resulted in the Cylon Basestars with working FTL drives to retreat, not to say everything went completely in the Colonials favour both the Galactica and Pegasus took some serious frakking body blows, Battleplate warped, breaches dotting both vessels, alongside loosing viper pilots and their birds SAR raptors had found those pilots who ejected in time but never the less the loss of life had come as a blow especially to those in the first refugee fleet, the loss of life on New Caprica was in the mid thousands somewhere between two to four.
Laura Roslyn had retaken her position as President of the Colonies after Gaius Baltar had gone "missing" not that anyone would miss the bastard in the first place, Adama hoped beyond hope that the traitor was dead or dying in a ditch somewhere.
But right now after a single tenuous jump both the Galactica and Pegasus re-joined their fleet alongside their new addition the Lion class Battlestar LION one of four that had been built and the only one that had possibly survived the destruction of the Twelve Colonies, even so with the addition of one more Battlestar the refugee fleet was all the more secure than it ever had been before, it had been debated that both he and Commodore Spruce would meet aboard Colonial One in two hours' time allowing Roslyn to reorganise her office after Baltar had made an absolute sty of the place.
Two hours were quick to pass with Adama being the first to step aboard the president's own ship being escorted by secret service into Roslyn's office, Laura was dressed to impress in her formal wear as was Adama who donned his dress uniform the navy blue uniform with gold trims and sash donning his campaign ribbons and awarded medals from his long line of service. "Bill what can you tell me about the LION, how does she compare with the GALACTICA and PEGASUS?"
"The LION is old testament Laura, in fact she's a Columbia Battlestar Sub-Class, she was designed to improve upon the failings of the Columbia's after several were critically damaged when their spines broke under sustained Basestar fire, she's built to survive, the only difference in fire power realistically comes from her fifty "three gun" batteries in essence giving her one and a half times more firepower than the Galactica in her prime…. But you're wondering if she's a realistic threat like the Pegasus was when just the Galactica was defending the fleet…. to be blunt Laura yes she is but she's reserve so her crew will be filled with less experienced personal, which hopefully would give both the Pegasus and Galactica a slight edge.
Ten minutes later another male entered Laura's office donning the dress grey uniform issued to all Reservists in the Colonial Fleet, sash also donned with various "Deployment Ribbons" while not as revered as Campaign Ribbons given to the Regulars who served, the amount of them and his awarded medals gave Adama a brief pause, a good few of those ribbons Adama recognised, Anti-Piracy deployment ribbons, several Colony Relief Deployment Ribbons as well as a single one Adama himself donned a Black Ops Deployment Ribbon, the medals were varied and less numerous he did however don a medal of Valour and one Colonial Cross another thing Adama and the acting Commodore had in common.
Both he and Spruce Snapped crisp salutes no doubtedly out of utmost respect having both received the Colonial Navies highest honour. "Acting Commodore Liam Spruce reporting for my debrief sir, madam President." Laura Roslyn took a few moments examining the officer before her he held himself with dignity and had a polite yet strict military attitude, but it was the way Adama tensed up and saluted with a crispness she saw seldom from the Admiral that made her assessment of the young looking officer a few notches higher than even Admiral Cain before she had found out what that woman had done. "Please Commodore be seated."
Taking that as his cue the brown haired officer with a moustache much like Adama's dropped his salute and took one of the two seats before the president's desk, both Admiral and Commodore shook hands before breaking the silence. "Madame President it's an honour to meet you, as well as seeing you again "Old Man" you probably won't remember but I was Commander Variks plus one during the Commissioning of the Warstar Atlantia five years ago." Adama's eye's widened a little at remembering seeing the reservist officer vaguely remembering the uniforms shoulder patch. "That was you back then, got to say you made quite the impression when you spoke against Adar's Administration to cut back on the Regular Fleet." The young officer broke a smile. "Indeed his plans to rely upon the reserves was sheer stupidity at the time, most of the reserves had been reduced to mothball sites, not a single one of those ships at those sites were suitable flying under their own power, the only ones taken care of, even if reluctantly were the reserve stations deployed along the Armistice Line."
"What happened during the opening hours, why wasn't the fact the Cylon's were attacking been passed up the chain of command?" The commodore rubbed the bridge of his nose. "It was Admiral, I was the first to report it, I even thought about subverting the chain of command and report directly to Nagala and Nash, but we had a battlegroup of Basestars and what we believed to be a command ship of some kind bearing down on our anchorage, the entirety of the 72nd R-BSG jumped in system outflanking the toaster frakkers, routing the lot of them, after that we jumped to Pirate Bay and performed inter-colony rescue operations before trailing your fleet 30 days after you left."
"This sounds like it's going to be a long story…." Pressing a button on her intercom Roslyn spoke into it. "Tory bring me three black coffees we're going to need them."
"Of course Madam President I'll be right up."
To Be Continued….