Colonial Guided-Missile Strikestar Andrasta (SSG-104)
Cylon attack minus thirty minutes
"CO/ComnNet," the clipped, perfectly-enunciated tones of Petty Officer James Travis's Caprican accent rang though Andrasta's cramped CIC, breaking the listless quiet that had taken hold. "Incoming flash-traffic on fleetwide."
Commander Jennifer Pendergast barely glanced up from the piles of charts spilling over the CIC plotting table. Her inky-brown eyes made only the briefest of eye-contacts—and though the haze of her graying blonde hair at that-before flitting back to the course she was trying to plot. "They know we're in the middle of an exercise?" she mused.
"Sir... it's flagged urgent," said Travis, his lips going tight as he glanced over at the printer spitting out the incoming message line-by-line.
"Probably some butter-dart whining about your cheating," came the smokey contralto of her TAO, Captain Sarah Fawkes.
"It's not cheating," said Pendergast, glancing up with a withering stare. "It's ingenuity. They expect anything less from aggressors?" She pushed her glasses up her nose, pointedly ignoring the lopsided smirk on Fawkes's face as she turned to the communications/networking officer. "Talk to me chief."
"Sir..." Travis's voice was a shaky, quiet whisper as he stared at the printout in his hands. "I-" he look up, his face a wreck of confusion and fear as he tried to coax another word out. Even Fawkes had traded her smirk for a stoney-faced worry.
"Travis?" Forgetting her charts, Pendergast made her way to the petty officer's station, the wrinkles on her brow deepening with each step. "What do you have?"
"You... should read this yourself, sir," said Travis, his hands shaking as he handed the printout over.
"Oh my gods," breathed Pendergast, her voice barely above a whisper as she read the blocky mono-space letters spelling out an impossible truth. "TAO-" she forced her voice into a commanding bark, "Sound action stations and go to RADCON condition secure. Now, people!"
For a split-second, the CIC was quiet as death, then it exploded in a fury of alert sirens and orders barked by confused, worried sailors.
"Sir, what-" Fawkes started to speak before Pendergast cut her off, slapping the printout against the younger woman's uniform blouse.
"Armistice station is gone," said the Commander, "Shuttle crew barely made it out."
"Holy frak."
Pendergast nodded. "As soon as we make condition one, start plotting an FTL jump above the ecliptic."
"Aye, sir," said Fawkes, her nose crinkling in clear confusion as she started booting the FTL navicomputer.
"By hand," said Pendergast, her hands balling into fists against the painted-steel console. "Shuttle's computers were compromised, we're not sure how. Until we do..." she glanced at the rack of dradis monitors hanging from the ceiling, "Assume all avionics are compromised."
"Sir, I've never plotted a jump by hand before," said Fawkes, her eyes not quite meeting Pendergast's as she powered down the computer.
"Grab anyone you need, just get it done," said Pendergast, already moving to the next duty-station. "And someone get my frakking XO," she snapped.
"S-sir," Fawkes dipped her head in a vague approximation of a salute. "Plot an FTL jump by hand..." she muttered to herself, pulling out a slide-rule and several inch-thick charting books from the corner of her console she'd thought she'd never visit. "How hard could it be?"
- - -
The shrill, electronic whine of Andrasta's shipwide alert klaxon jolted Colonel Mike Jackson from the paperwork-induced stupor of filling out the daily Operational Readiness Reports.
Action stations, and not just another simulated attack run. Even if he somehow missed the repeated "This is not a drill" announcement, the tension in Pendergast's voice was palpable. Something was wrong... very very wrong for her to be that tense. Paperwork forgotten, he bolted out the hatch, his boots pounding a nervous cantor against the anti-skid deck plating.
"Colonel!" A marine corporal nearly slammed into him in the hallway, "Sir, CO wants you on the CIC asap."
"No shit," Jackson waved for the man to lead the way, "What's the situation?"
"Don't know, sir," said the Marine, almost throwing himself though each pressure-tight door, "She got a message on fleet-wide... spooked her."
Jackson grimaced. Whatever happened was bad, otherwise Andrasta wouldn't be sitting at condition one. And if she hadn't told the crew... that meant it was so bad she didn't know how to tell them. The list of possibilities was vanishingly small, and every one of them more horrible than the last.
"XO on deck!" someone barked as Jackson stepped into the CIC. Not that anyone saluted. Every watch officer was busy with their consoles, with Commander Pendergast storming angrily from one to the other, snapping orders off where she could.
"Mike," she said, giving him an emotionless glance as she handed a crumped fleetwide printout over. "Colonies are under attack."
"Motherfrakker," Jackson glanced over the message, absorbing what precious little information it contained before glancing at the dradis tower to get his bearings, only to be met by a blank screen and a pulsing "Dradis offline" message. Andrasta was in RADCON secure. No radiation emissions meant no wireless, no thrusting, and no dradis. If the message wasn't exaggerating-and he had a sinking feeling it wasn't-going dark and quiet was the safest call. He still couldn't help feeling blind.
"Colonel," Fawkes mumbled, a slide-rule in her mouth garbling her words before she hurriedly spit it out. "Uh, XO... I have a jump plotted, but I need another check of the math."
"You do it by hand?" said Jackson, spinning the scribble-covered clipboard towards himself.
"My orders," said Pendergast, fuming as she bounced from station to station, giving the blank dradis tower a frustrated look every few seconds.
Jackson couldn't fault her on that, not after reading the message. "TAO, spin up the drive, I'll take this," he said, tapping his knuckle against the clipboard.
"Aye, sir."
Pendergast gave him a glance out of the corner of her eye.
"We'll make it," said Jackson, running though Fawkes's work line-by-line. Or we're frakked.