Author's Notes:
I want to thank Decoherer for not only beta reading Episode 1 but giving me plenty to think of about when writing this story. All your help has been greatly appreciated.
Disclaimer: This is a fan-work. I am not making money from it or producing it for monetary gain. I have none of the copyrights to any materials in the Battlestar Galactica series or related works including Razor, Caprica, or Blood and Chrome. If requested by the rights holders, this story will be taken down.
Episode 1 - The Last Day
Part 1 - SRRS
Today was turning into a more interesting day than Commander Terrence Noyes had been expecting. The printout of the wireless transmission in his hand was the latest addition to an already busy day. He finished reading it before looking up to the young male communications staffer that had handed it to him.
"Give me ship-wide and broadcast to our deployed crews," Noyes said to the staffer who promptly nodded, turning back to his station. Hawkish features under a shaved head observed the crew of the modestly sized CIC of the Arion already diverting their attention from their consoles. He subtly adjusted his dark grey uniform, smoothing out what felt like a wrinkle around the waist. Cut similar to a Fleet uniform, the attire had few adornments expect for the twin United Salvage and Repair Corporation "USRC" corporate logo patches just below the shoulders, a star-burst pin on the left breast indicating his status as Commander, and a patch with the name "Noyes" directly below it. His professional staff were dressed similarly while the operational crew wore a dark brown version.
Noyes picked up his wired phone from the small up-lit central console and waited for the ship-wide announcement notification tone to pass. "All hands, this is the Commander," his voice echoed out around him. "Colonial Fleet has requested the Arion investigate a loss of communications with the Armistice Station. All personnel not assisting Colonial Mover 13 with engine repairs are to report to Ready Alert stations for possible jump and SRRS operations." The sound of the phone being placed back down onto its rest was followed almost immediately by the medium volume Ready Alert warning tone echoing through the ship.
"First Fleet work in awhile," Noyes quietly commented to no one in particular. A small cluster of monitors descended from the ceiling coinciding with the primary dradis array going active. He scanned the images briefly before asking, "Deployed ship status?"
"Foreman Myers reports two of the three repair crew shuttles deployed to C.M. 13 will be finished and return in ten minutes," came the voice of the same young male communications staffer. "Shuttle Two is remaining behind for equipment support of Team Two while they re-fire the engines. We have two Raptors out on standard watch, Raptor C27 for us and C15 for C.M. 13."
"Tell C15 to stay with Shuttle Two until repairs are complete. They should then report to the nearest supply depot to pick up replacement parts and await rendezvous information," Noyes instructed while looking down to the shipping lane chart laid out on the up-lit table. "Tell Witch and Bulls-eye they are on scout duty and to jump to the Armistice Station coordinates immediately. Time to get eyes on the other side."
Sarah Coleus, call sign 'Witch', offered a silent prayer to the Lords that she was finally getting a break from the tedium of her day. She had been circling counterclockwise amidship of the Airon in Raptor C27 for several hours while her navigator Joshua Simus, call sign Bulls-eye, did whatever he usually did at the computer terminals in the rear.
"You'd better have that jump computer working back there, Bulls-eye," Sarah piped over the internal communications frequency in their helmets. While being in flight gear for extended periods of time was expected for pilots, the USRC policy of keeping your helmet on continuously when flying a basic watch pattern was more than slightly aggravating. "I'll have your teeth if the computers are down again. The Commander can have the leftovers."
Joshua looked up to the pilot chairs and responded in a mildly annoyed tone, "The jump computers are ready to go Witch. I was looking at the navigational subroutines this time."
After grumbling something quietly to herself, Sarah switched to the ship-to-ship comms. "Arion, this is Witch. Raptor C27 maneuvering for jump to Armistice Station to investigate loss of communications."
The sound of a young man came back over the wireless. "Arion acknowledges Witch. Send status over wireless after jump. Will be in voice range when you are on the other side. Good scouting out there."
A few simple adjustments of the controls had Raptor C27 pulling away from the Arion. Yawing around had the apparently shrinking Arion and the Coloninal Movers ship visible through her cockpit window. The orientation was entirely at her discretion and nostalgia had got the better of her. No matter how many times she saw the Arion's name placard, she had to remind herself it was not the Valkyrie. 'The assignment she had blown before it started,' a part of her mind bitterly reminded her. While the two ships were of the same make, both Mars-class Battlestars, the Arion was no longer an actual Battlestar. It had been fully decommissioned from the Fleet and retrofit as a private salvage and repair wrecker. Only someone with Fleet experience would notice the subtle differences, mostly missing capital turrets or sealed bulk plating where there should be Viper launch tube exits. The Arion had been her best option 'afterward.' The starkest reminder was the lack of Vipers flying patrol around the ship. Instead the broken Colonial Movers ship floated nearby. To her it was little more than a glorified cylinder covered in deep space shipping containers.
"We are well past safe minimum distance Witch," Bulls-eye said in the same mildly annoyed tone. "Initiating jump to coordinates in five."
"Well, here we go," Sarah said mostly to herself. Seconds later the familiar feeling of going 'down the hole' overtook them both and a brief flash of light displaced humans and machine to another place in space.
"Bulls-eye, what do we have on dradis?" was Sarah's first question on the other side of the jump. She was starting to orient the Raptor to approach the station when something came into her field of view far too close. She did not even have time to think, trained reactions took over her hands on the controls.
The Raptor lurched, all fifty tons of it pitching downward sharply to avoid the sofa-sized rotating metal fragment with bits of wire and conduit hanging out coming for the cockpit window. She had her spot light on a moment later and pointed forward just long enough to visually inspect her path before half-yelling through the internal comms, "FRACK! Josh, dradis! I'm dodging bits here."
"Dradis is showing a large number of small contacts," came Joshua's surprised and perplexed voice. "Come to bearing 53, carom 402. Have a clearing in that direction and some bigger pieces to inspect. Looking consistent with a debris field."
"Already figured that out," Witch said through clenched teeth. She had to roll and pitch her Raptor around a twisted bulkhead man-door on her course before finishing her thought. "Call the Arion and let them know. This is no wireless malfunction."
Chucks of twisted bulk plating, insulation, conduit, glass, and even the odd instrument panel had been more or less disassociated from each other, given some velocity, and sent outwards in various directions. Witch barely payed attention to the sound of Bulls-eye's voice calling the Arion on the wireless as she sent her Raptor snaking and twisting around the larger pieces of debris. She could not dodge all of the smaller pieces resulting in the dull sound of matter bouncing off the Raptor's metal skin and occasionally the cockpit window. All she noticed of the wireless conversation was a delay of several seconds between the end of Joshua's transmissions and the replies from the Arion. The sound of Commander Noyes' voice barely registered about the same time she was able to maneuver the Raptor into the clearing in the debris field. A sweep of her search light towards the station's expected position gave her all the information she would need for the next bit of conversation.
"Witch, Arion Actual. Report," came Noyes' order over the wireless. A hint of irritation in his voice indicated that was probably the second time he had given her that order. Under normal circumstances she might even be concerned about that.
"Arion, Witch," she replied being careful to keep her voice level and professional. "The Armistice Station appears to have suffered massive structural failure and is in numerous pieces. Most of the pieces are moving away from the Station's original position at velocity. A Fleet shuttle has also suffered MSF with half of the ship visibly missing. SRRS operations recommended with Raptors as debris may compromise the shuttles."
Sarah was surprised when she noticed Bulls-eye had moved up, standing next to her to look out the cockpit window. The man would normally never leave his seat in the back except when disembarking. Now he stood beside her with a morbidly curious look on his face visible through his helmet visor, eyes tracking the torn remains of a shuttle moving off to their starboard.
"Witch, Arion acknowledges," came the voice of the young communications staffer with a backdrop of alert tones being picked up on his microphone. "Arion will be jumping in at a range of 10,000 to avoid collisions. The Commander has ordered C27 to jump to the Hercules to request additional Raptors for search operations."
"Arion, C27 acknowledges," came her reply as Bulls-eye moved back to his console for the jump. "Will be jumping when clear of the field."
It took Witch far less time for her to worm her Raptor out of the debris field than she expected. Being able to pick a path with the least obstacles in it likely helped. The Arion was just jumping into dradis range as the sensation of her body being stretched out over took her. The last thought to go through her head before the flash of jump light was she was going to get to see the biggest ship of her life under the most dire of circumstances.