Admiral Nagal looked over the fleet from the closed off section of Scorpia Shipyard. The usually calm space was filled with a thousand vessels of all sizes. A hundred battlestars has been assembled for this mission, with a dozen warstars in the mix on top of that. Escorting them where comparatively small cruisers and destroyers, even the largest overshadowed by the smallest battlestar the fleet had to offer. The collected fleet represented a full fifth of the Colonial Navy, and he could see the ones who were responsible for it all mixed in. There were only two in the whole fleet, but the twin battleships from forgotten colony where almost the size of a small battlestar. They didn't carry fighters, but the foreign ships had plasma batteries and energy shields that put everything the Colonials had so far developed to shame. Their shining silver appearance stood out from the rest of the fleet like a sore thumb though, so Nagal suspected that they would be the first targets of any resistance.
"So humanity shall finally be reunited." He said to himself.
"The gods did always say it was inevitable." Nagal didn't respond to his old war friend. Adama had always been a voice of reason in his mind, which made him wonder why he had elected to remain on the Colombia after repeated offers to join command. "Is this how they envisioned it though?"
"Perhaps not, but with the danger they pose we can't risk them discovering our location. You saw what they did to their world." They being their brothers from the forgotten colony, the fourteenth tribe which time had forgotten.
Nagal remembered it clearly. Five years earlier a patrol along the Armistice Line reported activity along the border. Five ships which were believed to be basestars had jumped off only a hundred kilometers from the line, right against the wall in cosmic terms. The Pegasus has been dispatched immediately for what many believed at the time would be a suicide mission to slow a Cylon assault while the rest of the fleet prepared the renewed war.
What they instead discovered was the debris of five basestars and a ship unlike any they had ever seen. The ship, later learned to be a battleship, made contact and it was then they learned of the lost tribe.
They called themselves the Aschen.
A people without a home, theirs was a civilization which had been broken by a weapon of unimagined power: a sustained artificial wormhole connecting their homeworld to a black hole. The footage was horrifying, orbital recordings showing whole continents being consumed by the inescapable power of hyper gravity. It was an odd means of attack, but effective, as it had been used by a civilization centuries behind another technologically to bring their enemies to their knees.
The people of the Colonies had been easy to sway. The Aschen had lost their homeworld in a first strike by an unknown power, and had been forced to flee as a result. They had been reduced from thirty billion to only twenty thousand, a small rag tag fleet of three battleships and a few dozen civilian ships. They needed a home, and the Colonials needed their technology to fight this new threat that was more than willing to commit genocide against their fellow man.
This was a righteous mission, one that had to be done if their people where to survive, lest the Earther menace learn the location of their system and do to them what they had already done to Aschen Prime.
And so that was why they were here, with the largest fleet ever assembled and a hundred mission soldiers from across the system ready to occupy the planet after the invasion. They had to do this to protect themselves. There was simply no other way.
"On this day, we, the people of the Colonies of Kobol, brothers and sisters born of a common ancestor, shall once again be united under a single banner. Mankind faced annihilation at our own hands millennium ago, and at the hands of the machine menace but a lifetime ago. Now we once again see our race faced with the monster of destruction by the hands of our own kind. The Earthers have already killed tens of billions of our lost kinsmen. For this they pose a threat to us all, to our way of life and our very existence. We cannot allow such a tyrannical world have its power go unchecked, it is for the good of all men that we bring them under our wing and bring liberation to its people to uplift us all towards the common good of prosperity."
Kara lost her ability to pay attention to the radio broadcast that seemed to just drone on and on as President Adar's speech continued. She tried to think of something to do, but the rest of the wing in the cabin where doing last minute inspections of their equipment, catching some sleep or playing card games that she was no longer welcome to. The crew of the Columbia had quickly learned that she was the last person one wanted to be betting their qubits against. Her fallback plan was to smoke, but checking her pockets she remembers having lost her matches.
"Any of you bastards got a light?"
"Maybe if you ask nicely I'll give you one." One of the other pilots stated, earning a laugh from a few others.
"You're mother's a whore" was Kara's response. That answer earned her a lighter thrown her way.
"You think any of us will earn our wings with this?" One of the greens asked.
"Probably not. Lucky bastards in the forward attack wing might be lucky enough to, but we're in the midsection. There won't be any Earther flyboys left by the time we see action." Another answered.
Kara couldn't help but agree with the sentiment. As disappointing as it was, the most combat ready units in the expedition where placed first in the ranks to minimize casualties. Most of the rooks where barely flight worthy and a waste of a good Mark VII. She should have been in a forward placed battlestar or warstar, but her attitude problem and the disciplinary problems had made that impossible. She had been told to consider herself lucky old man Adama pulled strings to have her on the Columbia at all. Taking a look at her small bunk's wall, she saw a picture of her, Zack and Lee in front of a trainee Viper. Thinking about them, though she wouldn't admit it she was jealous of Lee's own posting.
Presidential Tower
Caprica City, Caprica
Adar rubbed his eyes as he looked over the information that was being looked over one last time. Four ministers, three members of the armed forces and a representative of the Aschen all sat around the conference table he was heading.
"So tell me are we ready for this operation or not?" Adar demanded. "You have all assured me that we were ready to begin mobilization months ago."
"I apologize sir, but you must remember that we have never committed an operation on this scale, there were bound to be complications." The minister of defence replied.
"Complications is an understatement. We're talking about occupying and integrating a world that has a billion more people than Canceron. We should count ourselves lucky we managed to reach the hundred and fifty million soldiers we need to deploy for this to work without the need for conscription." The General representing the Colonial Army stated. "Even then it'll take six months of constant streaming to get them all deployed."
"It's quite expensive, but to be expected." The Admiral representing the Colonial Navy countered. "This isn't the Cylon's we're talking about, the fleet can't win this on our own using glassing tactics. These are human beings we're talking about, we can't use the threat of annihilation and expect it to do anything but backfire. We certainly can't expect to actually go through with such actions either."
"We can do that though, but only as an absolute last resort." Adar clarified. "No one wants us to have to kill our brothers, but if there is no alternative better seven billion of them then thirty billion of us."
"That is correct." The Aschen representative added. "My world once housed thirty billion people, as many as you're twelve combined. Despite our outnumbering them over four to one and being centuries ahead of them technologically, they managed to drop a black hole bomb onto our world and push us to the edge of extinction. All they would need is a single such weapon being deployed anywhere in the system for the same to occur here."
"And that is why these past three years have been dedicated to economic mobilization." The Economy and Industry minister stated. "For three years we've been spending fifteen percent of our GDP on defence. Due to the economic mobilization plan we're now building six battlestars and one warstar each five day cycle throughout the system. With current rates of recruitment we're going to start to have a manpower shortage for the fleet between the next year and a half to two years. By that point we shall either need to slow down production, lower standards or implement conscription. Reducing levels of production are the least desirable option as it stands, as each colony save Aquaria has a significant level of economic dependence on the fleet yards in orbit."
"The more urgent problem will be the occupation" the Heritage minister spoke up. "If the data the Aschen have provided is accurate, the Earthers will be the only predominantly monotheistic world in the colonies. There's no way to say that this is only going to end badly if we attempt any form of intervention. We've had minor differences in belief between Sagittaron and Gemenon that let to centuries of conflict. I believe a blanket ban on missionaries should be set in effect indefinitely, until we know how they would react to their presence."
"There are too many unknowns that we're dealing with." The minister of the Interior stated. "Outside of the limited data the Aschen have provided, much of which is unverified due to it coming from the Earthers themselves, we should take better care in our actions."
"We've been sending stealth Vipers for the past year for just that" the Admiral representing the Marines stated. "From what intelligence we've gathered the information is accurate. We seem to have a distinct advantage over them. On top of the population and tech advantage we poses, we also have an industrial one. From what we've managed to observe Earth is an impoverished world. While some areas are close to Colonial standards of living, we estimate that on a per capita basis their GDP is between one seventh and one tenth of our own. So long as we can prevent them from deploying their secret weapon this should be a simple though expensive campaign."
"Which is why it is imperative that we keep the location of Cyrannus a guarded secret at all cost." His navy counterpart interrupted. "We cannot afford to allow the Earthers to discover our home system."
"Gentlemen we have discussed these matters countless times in the past three years" Adar stated with a sign. "What I want to know is if we need to postpone the expedition or not. Give me a clear answer. Yes or no."
"Sir, the problems we are facing with this operation are ones which will be just as problematic in a week, month or year. Delays will not change that." The Economic and Industry minister answered. "So no, we will not need to postpone the expedition."
"Good. Then as of this moment I'm authorising the expedition to leave in thirty six hours. All military operations are to be handled by Admiral Nagal and all civilian operations by Minister Johana." With that he signed the document before him that was the final official declaration for the mission. The Economic and Industry minister nodded his head, his selection as the civil administrator of the mission and the occupation to come had been done months ago, with the Minister of Education being chosen as his second in command. His own choice was for practical purposes, though his immediate subordinate had made him less then pleased due to her being posted for political reasons. Half of it was to avoid a possible scandal within the administration, with the other half being for propaganda image purposes. By having a teacher as the second highest civilian in the expedition and occupation, it gave a better image then they otherwise would have had. Johana suspected it wouldn't make much different to the Earthers, but that wasn't who they were trying to give a good image for so it didn't matter.
He just hoped she wouldn't get in his way.
New Aschen Station (formerly Ragnar Station)
Chief Administrator Borren watched over the control room as the area buzzed with more activity in the past few hours then it had in the past year. While many would call the Aschen stiff, emotionless and almost robotic, it was moments like that which reminded him how lacking in nuance the people of the wider galaxy where.Blinded by irrationalism born from their reliance of emotion, they could not see that there was much more to the Aschen people then what they appeared. It was the reason they had advanced further than any other race technologically they had stumbled upon. They were beings of reason, logic, of playing the long game instead of thinking in the short term.
And it was for that reason he knew they would win.
For now they would play ball with the Colonials, pretending to be a member of their little federation of planets. But once Earth was dealt with they would slowly go to them what they did to all others.
Every world had its story of Troy, of a city brought to its knees by brining within their impenetrably walls a gift which held the means of their destruction. The details varied from culture to culture, but the leader of the Aschen that the tactic worked just as well with one's allies as it did its enemies. The Confederation had been built upon that being the case.
The plan was deceptively simple. First they destroy Earth through the use of biological weapons, an act to be written off as an accident. It would cost one of their few prized battleships, but it would be a sacrifice for the greater good. Then when that was done they would uplift the Colonials technologically, bringing them more in line with a quality of technological development in line with the Confederation. Of course, that uplifting would be the horse to their Troy. While Borren would be an old man long past having the physical and mental abilities to be anything other than a lowly teacher, he should be able to live long enough to see the transformation of Colonial society into the proper new Confederation.
If the Colonials where correct about their gods being real, or the monotheistic minority was correct about the single one, whichever they were must have had a poor sense of humour, at least in mind of Borren. Twelve habitable planets in a single quaternary star system, with multiple moons that were also inhabitable, all of which save a single frozen moon and a tundra of a world where rich in resources and fertile land. Such abundance in the hands of those driven by irrationalism was almost cruel to behold. Aschen Prime had been a barren planet, few in resources and with little fertile land. It was because of that lack of resources that it had been abandoned centuries ago by the false gods, and it was because of that which her people had been forced to abandon their emotions and become the people they were today.
Borren had read a theory from Colonial academics that humanity thrived in all environments because it changed those environments to suit them. For his people it had been the other way around, they had been forced to change to survive. And because of it they had managed to thrive in a world unfit for proper habitation. And it was for that reason that they had earned their place as the leaders of the human race. Those they came across had been blessed with environments that a child could tame, but the Aschen had tamed that which would kill those of other human worlds. It was the simple law of nature that the strong survived and the weak where either to be led or left behind.
And it was because of that reason that the Colonials would be led and the Earth left behind into the annals of history.
Warstar Hades
CIC
Admiral Nagal had made more than his share of grand speeches to the men and women of the expeditionary force. The nightmare of handling the operation until that point was already taking its toll on him, and he knew that the moment the campaign was over and a stable regime was set up on Earth he'd be ending his service.
Taking the ship's communication system, he addressed the entire expedition.
"All ships, all ships. This is Admiral Nagal ordering all ships jump ready. Repeat all ships jump ready." He put the comm. down and watched as the CIC crew scrambled into action, preparing the massive ship, pride of the Colonial Fleet, to jump.
"Sir, all ships are ready for jump" a comm. officer informed him about a minute after his order had been given.
"Tell all ships to jump in T-minus thirty on my mark… mark."
"Ship preparing to jump in twenty five seconds" the helm officer declared.
"All systems as minimum load, computer core prepared for ionization" the head technician stated.
"Jump in fifteen seconds" the helm officer said, continuing his countdown.
"Heatsink coolant at the ready for post jump wash down" another technician added.
"Jump in five, four, three, two, one, jump!"
In a brilliant flash of light, the large Warstar made its way into hyperspace for its instantaneous jump between two points, her thousand sisters doing the same within moments of her disappearance.
One Week Later
Space Observation Command Center (SOCC)
Atlantis, central Pacific
The SOCC was a post many considered a punishment. Outside of the rare moments every few days where one of the few Earth controlled Goa'uld built ships was entering or leaving the system, or an ally was doing the same, there wasn't much for them to do. 304s where rare in their visits to Earth itself as they were more often than not on a mission somewhere in the galaxy, or the next one over. That just meant that the only things they could see was two small dots representing the USS Phoenix and the HMS Neptune, the two newest 304s on picket duty, as well as a larger dot behind the moon that represented the ancient ship Destiny.
The work was typically long and boring, with the crew rotating every fifteen minutes to prevent a loss of focus.
That focus had no risk of being lost as alarms sounded throughout the facility. In an instant a thousand dots of all sizes appeared beyond the moon, grabbing the attention of the crew in its entirety.
"What's happening, what am I looking at?" The officer responsible for the watch asked with a panic. "Is this a system error or an invasion?"
"Confirming it now. It'll take a few moments to get visual confirmation on the targets." One of his subordinates replied. "Visual confirmation attained. This is an invasion. No recognition of the ship types."
"Understood." The officer on watch took the rarely touched red phone on his desk. "This is SOCC, we've got a Code Two Seven in progress. A thousand by the looks of it…. Yes sir, relaying data to all agencies…. I see, understood."
Hanging up the phone, the officer sighed. "A thousand, how are we supposed to repel a thousand?"
Department of Homeworld Defence Strategic Command
Stargate Command Centre
"What are we dealing with here?" General Jack O'Neill asked moments after being beamed into the room.
"We don't know, they just appeared out of nowhere." Walter informed him.
"Phoenix and Neptune are taking defensive positions against their current orbital entry vector. Destiny is moving out of lunar orbit to join them. All 302s on the ground are being prepared for orbital combat as we speak and all DHD member nations are mobilizing their armed forces." One of the staff informed him.
"Good. What are the odds looking like?"
"Not good sir, they outnumber us over three hundred ships to one. Suggest we prepare Fallback as a precaution" Walter stated.
"Do it. I want as many critical people on the index beamed to Atlantis for evac or running through the gate to the Alpha site." Jack ordered. He then looked at the readout on display across the room for him. "This isn't good."
Bridge of the USS Phoenix
Camron Mitchell was by no means pleased with the situation at hand. He was still braking his crew into his new ship, trial runs hadn't even finished and they found themselves in the unenviable position of combat with unknown hostiles.
The Phoenix had launched its complement of a dozen 302s, as has her British sister ship, and they had another four hundred reinforcements coming from Earth. But the enemy had already launched ten thousand from what he could tell, and more kept on launching with each passing second.
A call for reinforcements had been sent, but the closest ship wouldn't arrive for forty minutes, with the next one over two hours away after that. Half the fleet couldn't realistically arrive no matter how the fighting would go due to the sheer distance they were from Earth.
"Sir, getting confirmation on two energy signatures."
"What?" Mitchell asked, unsure what his subordinate meant.
"Two ships in the fleet have energy signature consistent with a ship in our data base. Aschen harvesters." As he spoke an image of the two ships in question were put on display.
"Sure don't look like any farming ship to me."
"Perhaps, but we've got a ninety three percent match, too much to be coincidence."
Mitchell thought about what that meant. The Aschen had been a people they hadn't had much contact with, he only remembered a single report regarding them, maybe two depending on how one looks at things. One of the reports mentioned a message from the future warning of great danger, and they'd broken off contact after learning the Aschen had been that danger. Was this what that warning had been about? Had they failed to prepare themselves for what was to come? "What about the other ships?"
"Only an eight percent match, sir. Engine power output is significantly lower and shield systems are incredibly weak."
"How weak?" Mitchel asked.
"Weak enough that our ballistics would penetrate in the first volley" was his answer. "The only thing it seems to be strong enough to defect is micro meteors and transporter signals."
"I see. Send them the signal, and tell Atlantis that priority goes to the two Aschen ships."
Warstar Hades
CIC
"Admiral, we're receiving a broadband transmission from Earther ships across the fleet." The comm. officer informed Nagal.
"What are they saying?"
"Aschen translation matrix working on it now." The officer replied. A few moments later he read out the message. "Attention interlopers, you are violating Terran space and sovereignty. If you do not respond or do not leave in five minutes, we will have no choice but you view your actions as hostile and consider our peoples in a state of war."
"Straight to the point." Nagal quietly said to himself. "Target the two enemy vessels, all ships prepare for combat. All ships remain at full alert, this could easily be a trap."
With that the fleet began to fly towards Earth, closing the distance between them and their enemies.
"I want Wing Three and Wing Four ready for micro-jump. If this is a trap I want to close in on those enemy ships at point blank." Nagal ordered. Something felt very off about this.
Ancient Chair
Atlantis
John Shepard was nervous to say the least. Combat with the city was rare enough on its own, and he had never seen a fleet anywhere near the size of the one breathing down on them. Each moment that past saw the swarm of enemy ships grow closer. He knew which two where his targets, but he also knew that this was not going to end well. They simply didn't have anywhere near enough drones to take them all out, not even by half. Nonetheless as the enemy ships that he had prioritized for targeting crossed the engagement line, he waited for the word.
It didn't take more than a few moments of waiting for his radio to give him the message.
"Shepard, you are clear to engage."
Viper BSP-1837
Blue Squad Leader
Lee 'Apollo' Adama was nervous. He had never seen real combat, and even with the expedition having overwhelming numbers these people where ones he knew had done war before. He tried to not allow that to distract him, as he had a squad to lead from his new posting on the Pegasus.
That calm he was attempting to force upon himself was ripped away as he saw something he never expected. He expected combat to begin with conventional munitions or perhaps plasma beam weapons. Instead he saw a blinding light as hundreds, perhaps thousands of white and yellow objects flew towards the fleet.
Some of them where detonated by vipers which had not managed to evade them, but the stream split in two and struck the twin Aschen battleships. Their shields held out for a moment, but almost as soon as the impact began their systems became overwhelmed and after only three seconds of assault drones where already traveling through them, cutting them up like cheese.
When the two ships were destroyed the remaining drones moved to strike the closest Battlestars and Warstars. The second, third and fifth wings where decimated by the assault.
Looking back ahead towards the enemy, Lee noticed enemy fighters starting to appear on his Dradis.
"Blue Squad, weapons free and prepare for combat."
Warstar Hades
CIC
"Report!" Nagal demanded as dozens of whips disappeared from the ship's Dradis.
"Unknown weapon system has destroyed both battleships, seventeen Battlestars, three Warstars and forty two frigates. Another five Battlestars are reporting major damage to outer hulls."
Nagal did not like that answer. Such a weapon system couldn't be allowed to fire again, not if he wanted to win this. This had been a trap all along. "Wing three and four surviving ships, jump to point blank and engage enemy ships. All remaining ships ahead full towards low orbit and prepare for space-to-surface bombardment of weapon emplacements."
USS Phoenix
Mitchell was disappointed inside as the drones had not managed to take out even a quarter of the enemy fleet before being depleted. The numbers where simply too much to handle and already 302s engaged in combat where falling like flies. Having done the math in his head, the enemy had three times as many fighters as Earth had space and surface based ones.
As it stood he couldn't worry about that for the moment, instead continuing the charge towards the enemy lines. That charge was stopped as a dozen enemy ships suddenly surrounded his own. Four Battlestars and a dozen smaller ships surrounded the Phoenix from all sides, firing on the smaller ship with kinetic batteries of all sizes.
Sparks flew as the shields became overwhelmed not from the sheer volume of the bombardment and the area of the shield's surface being sieged.
HMS Neptune was in a much worst situation. Unlike the Phoenix one of the Battlestars engaging it in battle had jumped directly in its path. The light shields in place on the Battlestar didn't stop things for a moment, but when the Neptune's shields made contact with the other, larger ship's hull the entire system became destabilized.
With a massive power drain in the form of ramming an enemy ship and the barrage of large numbers of kinetic batteries at close range, including point blank, the shields could not handle the strain and collapsed.
The fight was one doomed from the start for the smaller vessel. Powerful though its weapons where, twin Asgard beams melting through the Battlestar it had rammed and cutting the large ship in two, her armour was less than capable of protecting its offensive systems from the onslaught. The nature of the ships design left its weapons exposed, unprotected by a significant amount of trinium. This was a result of the design philosophy behind the ship design holding its shields, speed and maneuverability as the important factor, with the surface armour housing weapons instead of protecting them. The theory was that the ship simply wouldn't allow itself to be hit directly, avoiding the enemy and letting the powerful shields absorb the attack when it couldn't.
This situation the Neptune found itself in removed the advantages the ship was built to use. Shields down, engines damaged from impacts, and weapons one by one being disabled from direct fire, the ship's crew didn't have to wait long for the inevitable order to abandon the vessel to come.
While the Neptune's crew transported themselves down to their ship's undergrown home port, the bridge crew remained behind doing their best to set in a collision course with the nearest Warstar. Their efforts would be in vein as under a sudden missile barrage on top of the constant stream from kinetic batteries the Neptune's armour could no longer take the weight being placed on it.
The small 304 was torn apart.
Atlantis Gate Room
Richard Woolsey watched over his subordinates as the city continued to report on the hundreds of thousands of people being transported into its towers and countless tons of supplies being moved to her bays. He was responsible for the city, and as it stood the city was to house three hundred thousand of the best, brightest and most capable the nations of the wider Stargate Command structure had to offer.
As he did so he'd occasionally turn his attention to the ongoing battle. He wasn't responsible for that but he held out hope that he wouldn't get the call he was expecting.
Despite his silent prayers for that to be the case, the call came in after the Neptune reported an abandon ship order. The call came directly from the president, ordering the immediate takeoff of Atlantis for the Alpha Site.
With a feeling of remorse Woolsey did as he was told, ordering the city's cloak to be deactivated, shields and engines brought online and the Alpha Site to be left for as soon as humanly possible.
Stargate Command
Gate room
"Sir, you have to leave." Jack heard as he watched a stream of people and supplies entering the gate. With Fallback Protocol in effect the facility would continue to beam people and personnel from around the world as long as possible until the enemy began to siege the facility. Different world leaders had already gone through, but Jack wasn't waiting out of a form of not wanting to stay behind. He was waiting for visual confirmation of the highest priority objects to be brought threw.
"There they are" he stated as he saw his targets. The objects in question where two of the three Asgard Cores Earth had in its arsenal. One was aboard the Daedalus, one had been in Area 51 and the last had been at another research facility.
As the two object where transported through the gate, Jack entered the stream of people making their way through, carrying a small crate of supplies as he did so. Everyone had to do their part.
USS Phoenix bridge
"Sir we can't just leave, who knows what these damned people will do to our planet." Mitchell was not taking the order to retreat lightly. His ship was still in the fight, he didn't care that the Neptune was gone.
"This is not up for debate Colonel, orders are directly from the president. All ships are to make their way to the Alpha Site to consolidate our forces. Destiny has already begun to prepare for hyperspace jump and Atlantis is already in the air. You are to defend the city until it had entered hyperspace and then make way to the Alpha Site. Is that understood?"
"Yes sir." Mitchell was furious, but his anger came in part from knowing that the move was the right one. He hated every part of this. "Helm take us towards Atlantis and prepare for hyperspace. Target destination is the Alpha Site."
United Nations Headquarters
New York City
The Secretary General of the United Nations let out a sigh as he looked over Manhattan. This was his last day in his position, possibly his last day alive. He knew that things were about to change for the worst as the news came in. He had intentionally made himself removed from the list of candidates to be transported out to Atlantis or evacuated through the gate due to his role being one that would hold no use should the need for Fallback arise. That day was today, and with a glass of brandy in hand he allowed himself a moment of indulgence with the luxury he suspected was about to become much more hard to come by. He hadn't finished his glass by the time the city's long dormant air raid and nuclear attack sirens began to awaken, as did countless ones around the world. He hadn't finished his bottle by the time he could see countless alien fighters in the skies fighting those of his world, people in the streets panicking in confusion at what was happening.
When he saw a downed F-35 crash into the MetLife building he allowed his moment of indulgence to come to an end, leaving the bottle behind as he left to assist his coworkers with the destruction of files to keep them out of enemy hands.
The war had been lost as quickly as it had begun.
Low Earth Orbit
The retreat of Earth's space forces had not signaled an end to combat. While the number of Earth's fighters were outnumbered three to one globally compared to the Colonials, and the Colonials gaining space supremacy, around all corners of the small blue globe the militaries of different nations did their best to stop the Expedition. The plan was simple but desperate: all air forces and navies would fight to buy time for the armies of the world to disperse and go into hiding. Guerrilla warfare was the plan for now, though with the enemy clearly in for the long haul everyone knew things would become much worse before they got better.
That was the plan, and it didn't take into account an unforeseen factor. The remains of the Battlestar the Neptune had destroyed where in low orbit. One half was traveling in a vector which would allow it to bounce off the Earth's atmosphere and continue into space forever. The other half was not so lucky, and instead was on a direct course with Earth. Though slow moving, the sheer mass of the remains of the forward half of the ship was enough to be devastating as it landed on the island of Jakarta, unleashing energy equivalent to the infamous Tsar Bomba, sending thousands of tons of soil into the atmosphere. Before a single Colonial soldier had set foot on Earth, ten million civilians had already perished and many times that number had been injured.
The occupation of Earth had begun.
"My fellow Americans, and the people of Earth. It is my unfortunate duty to inform you that today is a day in which we are about to begin a trial. A trial to see if we can survive alien occupation. We do not at present know who these aliens are, but hope is not lost. We have allies in the stars, allies who will assist us in these trying times. Do not despair, do not stop fighting, do not stop resisting in any way you can. And above all, do not lose hope. People of Earth, we shall return, and we shall prevail." –Presidential address from the Alpha Site, broadcast moments before the self-destruction of the Cheyenne Mountain Complex.
Author's Notes
Hey guys, if you're waiting for an update on Brother's Betrayal, here's the story. My laptop's fan died and took 2 weeks to get fixed, and by the time it was I was in the middle of crunch time working on 5 papers. As it stands now I still have 3 papers due, however one is in the final editing proses and the other two are due in a week and two weeks respectively, with no more classes left that's left me with enough free time to start writing again while I go through cooldown from working on papers. As it stands I plan on posting 3 chapters for Brother's Betrayal by the end of May.
For the rest of you, this story one I've made by popular demand. A pure Stargate/Battlestar crossover where the Aschen are the puppet masters behind the conflict. I'll bet few of you were expecting the Colonials to win that fight, but this isn't a story about war in space, this is a story about occupation and how each side deals with the reality of Earth being under the thumb of Twelve Colonies who are terrified of our people.
Stay tuned for more updates