Disclaimer: I don't own BSG or SG-1/SGA, nor do I make any money from this story whatsoever.
Sorry for the delay, school's been keeping me busy. If you want the background I'd advise you to read Under Siege and Battlestar group 16.
Please R&R
Thanks to Rudy Pena for the beta
Earth Orbit
1700 hours, January 20
In orbit over Earth, between the planet and its moon dozens of starships patrol the sky. Several hundred fighters are flying CAP's around the system. Some of the ships represent the might of the Aesir tribe of the Asgard, their mighty O'Neill class battleships forming the core of the patrols. Other smaller ships coming from the Colonials, Jaffa, Tok'ra and several other races have taken guard around the mighty O'Neill's. The Tau'ri's own battle cruisers -most of them still damaged from the recent battle- are doing everything they can to help the people on the planet itself. The planet was hit by large chunks of debris falling from the skies after two Wraith super hives were destroyed in orbit. One battle cruiser however is not aiding the planet but is surrounded by several Aesir Daniel Jackson class science ships. White beams reach out form the Jacksons to place or remove things from the Tau'ri Federation ship Ticonderoga. The Ticonderoga is the first ship to be renamed from USS Ticonderoga to TFS Ticonderoga, a new change in planetary politics. Inside one of the hanger bays massive modules are placed while the other hanger bay is receiving Colonial MK.8 Vipers and several Raptors. The Commander of the Ticonderoga was already waiting for the raptors. The first raptor was moved towards an empty spot on the crowded hanger bay. The hatch opened and the first person out was a short blonde female wearing the uniform of a Colonel in the Colonial Fleet, furthermore she wore numerous war medals and also a badge that indicated she could fly Raptors and Vipers as well as having command of a battlestar.
The blonde stepped forwards and brought her arm up for a sharp salute.
"Colonel Kara Thrace reporting as ordered sir."
"At ease colonel." Grant said as he returned the salute. "So you're going to be my new XO, I've heard quite a lot about you."
"Nothing of it is true." Thrace replied.
"Admiral Adama spoke very highly about you, said you were the best." Grant said. He gestured Thrace in the direction of the doors.
"In that case, it is all true." Thrace replied. "What happened to the original XO?"
"She received a small dose of radiation; the doctors won't clear her for the mission." Grant said.
"Lucky me, so when do we leave?"
"In about two hours, the Asgard are finishing up the repairs and upgrades to our systems and the last of the new crew will arrive soon."
"I heard the crew will be larger than the normal 200 something?"
"The barracks almost double the amount of people we can have on board, the total crew number is between 450 and 500. I hadn't had a decent chance to look at the personnel files just jet." Grant replied. "I did hear that some of the new soldiers are Colonial marines, they wanted access to our weapons."
"I hope those marines are Razors, they are the best we have." Thrace said. By now they had entered the bridge and Thrace looked around amazed.
The bridge of the Ticonderoga was changed a bit with all the new systems and races aboard. For instance, every screen had a button to translate to Asgard, Tok'ra/Goa'uld or English which was the default setting. Several new stations were added while the commander's chair now more represented an Ancient Chair. In front of the bridge a beautiful young woman stood, though something seemed odd about her.
While Thrace gave the woman a questioning look the women just returned it. When Grant noticed the two women staring at each other he explained. "Colonel Thrace, meet Ticonderoga, the ship's AI. Ticonderoga, meet Colonel Thrace of the Colonial Fleet, the new XO."
"What the Frak…" was all Thrace could say.
"Hi there, I am looking forward to working with you Colonel." Ticonderoga said.
"Colonel Thrace, you first task is to oversee the transport and installation of the ZPM which we will be receiving momentarily from the George Hammond." Grant said.
"Ye… yes sir." Thrace replied. She walked over to a lieutenant and whispered something in his ears. Not a minute later four marines walked in and the ZPM was beamed in from the Hammond. Thrace took the case with the ZPM and walked off towards the ZPM room with the four marines in tow.
Bridge, TFS Ticonderoga
1855 Hours
"Colonel Thrace, please give me a status report on all systems." Grant ordered.
"Hyperdrive stand-by, sublight on, shields active, weapons ready to power, ZPM is tied in and performing perfectly. All other systems ready to go." Thrace said.
"Alright, get me Atlantis." Grant waited for Thrace to open the feed to Atlantis and for O'Neill to show up. "General, we are ready to go, I request permission to leave orbit and set course for our targeted destination."
"You have a go, good luck and bring her back in one piece if you can." O'Neill said.
"Colonel Thrace, break orbit and power the hyperdrive, once we are clear you may proceed to activate the hyperdrive."
"Yes sir."
The Ticonderoga quickly moved away from the planet and its moon, they passed other ships and also wreckage from the battle. When the ship was far away from anything else it engaged its hyperdrive for the day's long journey to the planet only known as p34-927. The ship's new crew started to practice, get used to the aliens on board and their procedures. Colonial marines worked together with US Marines, SAS and Spetznas soldiers, mainstreaming tactics and codes. Colonial engineers got their first looks at a working ZPM while earth and Jaffa ground crew worked with the colonial ground crews maintaining the vipers and raptors. The bridge officers ran simulation after simulation in order to get everything running smoothly. The entire crew worked hard to get into fighting condition and resemble something of a professional crew.
0548 hours, January 25
Colonel Grant walked with Colonel Thrace through the corridors of the Ticonderoga. Even though both were called Colonel, Grant was a full bird colonel which could be compared to a Colonial battlestar commander while Thrace was a Colonial Colonel performing the tasks of a Tau'ri Major. The two officers were looking to see how well everyone was settling in and to find the new security officer, Major Kendra Shaw of the Colonial Marines. Throughout the ship, crewmembers walked quickly with tablet PC's, after asking, one of them told Grant where they could find Shaw. Arriving in the gym they found it packed with people, colonial and US marines, SAS, Spetznas and Jaffa soldiers. Even though the regular Jaffa warrior isn't worth a thing these were, trained by Tau'ri Special Forces, they were the best the Jaffa had. After they had found themselves a way through the crowd, they found Major Shaw fighting it out with a Jaffa Soldier. By the looks of it the Jaffa had used a lot of its staff tricks but now Shaw had taken his staff. Without the staff the Jaffa had a hard time defending against the fierce major who kept attacking. In a few quick strikes she brought the Jaffa to the ground and held a dummy knife at his throat. Then Shaw relaxed and stood up. When she was standing again, she helped the embarrassed Jaffa up and gave the dummy knife to another Colonial marine while another Jaffa picked up the staff. Shaw, having noticed the two colonels walked over to them.
"What'cha doing Major?" Thrace asked.
"Oh, just showing the Jaffa that their staff tricks mean nothing and also showing them how to fight."
"Very good major, how's the integrating of the different forces going?" Grant asked.
"Well, the Colonials and Tau'ri are doing great; it's the Jaffa whom I'm worried about. The Jaffa warriors are immensely proud of their history, and they should. But their attitude it going to get them and us killed in the field. I know they had training of Earth instructors but it just isn't enough. Besides, they need to get over their feeling towards woman in combat, I've got the feeling that half these guys would jump up and drag any female marine out of the combat zone even if it means their death. On the other side, they don't trust a female to have their back."
"Better not let the Jaffa aboard a battlestar, I doubt they can handle the co-ed bunks and showers." Thrace chuckled.
Shaw snorted shortly before regaining her composure. "Sir, when do we reach our target?"
Grant consulted his watch before answering. "About three hours before we arrive, why?"
"I've been up for eighteen hours, beaten twelve Jaffa and two of those Spetznas guys, I think I'm gonna catch some rack time before we arrive."
"Just make sure you're on the bridge when we arrive." Grant said.
"Yes sir." Shaw said before she walked away to the bachelor officer's quarters.
Thrace and Grant watched for several more minutes how soldiers sparred before returning to the bridge.
Arriving in her quarters, Major Shaw set her alarm at 8.15, giving her enough time to get a shower and some food before reporting to the bridge.
8:15
Bachelor officer's quarters
Shaw woke up to the annoying tone of her alarm, several other officers told her to quit the damned thing else they'd shoot it. Quickly complying she turned off the alarm and got out of bed. She walked over to a large closet near the showers. She grabbed a towel from the large stack and walked into the shower room. She removed the few pieces of clothing she wore and stepped under the showers. After a few minutes the ship started to tremble, before she could do anything a giant shock threw her to a nearby wall. Soon the ship was rocked with impacts and the lights flickered. She struggled to get to where she had put her towel but before she could reach artificial gravity stopped working. Shaw having picked up quite some speed flew into the bunk room giving off a loud Frak, completely naked.
On the bridge Grant struggled to remain in his chair. Two nearby airmen had found out the hard way that remaining seated during heavy turbulence was recommended. Consoles sparked and a fire had started somewhere to the back of the bridge. Alarms were all blaring and the ship kept being rocked with impacts. When the artificial gravity gave out Grant quickly fastened the seatbelt installed in his chair. Most other personnel were not so fortunate to have a seatbelt and slowly drifted away from their stations. As sudden as the rocking and shaking started it ended. From all over the ship reports of damage came in, several decks were breached and people were asking for orders. Then out of nowhere the ship's AI activated.
"Tico, what the hell is going on?!" Grant asked using the quick name for the AI.
"Some sort of Ion Storm, it destroys anything that draws huge amounts of power."
"Crap." Was all Grant could say. "Tico shut down all systems except for basic systems like life support."
"Already on it sir." The AI said. And within seconds all active systems ceased their activity except for the basic systems. For all intents and purposes the Ticonderoga was dead in the water.
"Damage report!" Grant ordered.
Thrace tried to reach her station but Tico beat her to it. "Asgard weapons systems destroyed, hyperdrive destroyed, sublight seriously damaged, long range sensors destroyed, artificial gravity off-line, Asgard core off-line, ZPM power levels low, Shields seriously damaged and off-line." The list kept on going for a little while.
"How the hell is all that possible?" Thrace asked.
"We were pulled out of hyperspace by some unknown way. Because of the unplanned exit of hyperspace, the ship automatically raised its shields and powered weapons. Both actions drew huge amounts of power leading the ion storm into hitting those systems. When Asgard weaponry and the shields were disabled an automated distress call was sent by long range subspace communications, again drawing large amounts of power leading to its destruction. As per exit of hyperspace, the sub-light engines kick in to slow us down to reasonable speeds again requiring large amounts of power. Several other systems were damaged just because they were either close to an energy-hungry system or in the way of ion strikes. We have multiple hull breaches and the transporters are off-line. So far 465 crewmembers have been accounted for by the internal sensors meaning we have 32 missing. The sickbay is inaccessible and the hospital in the hanger bay is being overrun with wounded." Ticonderoga replied.
So we're crippled even if we get out of this ion storm?" Grant asked. When the AI nodded its head he muttered "great." Grant quickly looked around the bridge and saw most screens either black or showing errors. "Any idea when this ion storm will be over?"
"It will never end. But because our engines were not completely able to slow us down we do have a reasonable speed and with what our short range sensors indicate we will make it out of the storm in about six hours." Ticonderoga said.
Right at that point Shaw floated in, only wearing shorts and a tank top while holding a Colonial assault rifle. She was followed by four other marines.
"Well, if it was at any other moment I'd take a picture of you major but this isn't the time." Grant said while looking at her.
"Sorry sir, I was taking a shower when the gravity went down, I grabbed a rifle and made it over here as quickly as possible. What's going on?"
"For some reason we exited hyperspace right in the middle of an ion storm, it took down most of our systems, we will need to wait until we exit the storm before we power up our systems." Grant said. "Major, now that you're up could you spread the word to the rest of the ship? The com. System went down with most other systems, hand out portable radios, hopefully they'll work in here."
"Yes sir."
The ship continued to drift to the edge of the storm. The ship's hull showed scorch marks all over and in some cases hull breaches. The little wings to the side of the long neck of the ship that housed 4 out of six Asgard Plasma Weapon systems were almost completely blown off. The other two turrets, one on each hanger bay were also destroyed; fortunately the inner hull wasn't breached. The long range com. Array, only a dozen meters away from the bridge was completely blown up. Other antennas' just hung broken, through cracks in the hull air was escaping, fortunately exposed areas were already being closed off by damage control teams.
Eight hours later, the ship exited the ion storm, it took longer than expected. One by one the lights started to come on-line again and the few remaining systems were turned back on. Meanwhile a decent headcount had been performed. 49 dead and 122 wounded of which 65 seriously leaving 383 crewmen capable of carrying out their task.
One of the first things done was making a sensor sweep of the immediate area. The sweep revealed several planets close by in two systems. One of the systems had dozens if not hundreds of contacts while the other only had a bunch of satellites and one or two space craft. After some deliberation it was decided to move in the direction of the less active system.
Please R&R
the second chapter is already finished and will be posted soon. beyond that i have no idea how long it will take me to write the third chapter