Authors's note: I do not own nor never will own neither nBSG nor SG and it's assorted franchise. I have no money, so no use in suing me.

This should never have happened

Chapter one: Don't tell me I told you so…

"This was not supposed to have happened, Gina." Admiral Helena Cain said to her lover over one of the infrequent meals that they had managed to squeeze in somehow. They were having an early lunch and enjoyed the peace and quiet that came with such an activity, though both knew that by tomorrow they both might be dead. They were aboard the Pegasus which was floating through the void of space with the rest of the force of two dozen battlestars as well as two Warstars, awesome behemoths that had been dragged out of retirement and upgraded to the standard of the Mercury class battlestars such as the Pegasus. Surrounded by over a hundred escort vessels, the impressive Colonial fleet protected a smaller secondary fleet of only eight battlestars and some forty assorted escort vessels that protected a force of over two hundred ships. These were troop transports, supply and repair vessels, and finally an assortment of a dozen newly commissioned carriers specially designed to hold hundreds of Vipers and Raptors as well as five dozen of the newest bombers for the ground assault. (Funnily enough, the Colonials had utilized the first Cylon war Raider design as they realized that their shape would let them carry a reasonably impressive payload of bombs). Over four hundred thousand troops with their accompanying vehicles would be deployed in the ground assault.

This gigantic fleet had only one purposeto destroy the heretics and conquer Earth.

"I mean, why couldn't they just accept it and become part of the Colonies of Kobol? But no, they just had to spit on everything that we hold dear and sacred and jump away after destroying two escorts and damaging several moreand now look at us. Many people are going to die, all because they wouldn't join the Colonies as it should have been, the Thirteen Tribes of Man once again reunited as one." Cain angrily exclaimed.

"Are you listening to yourself Helena? This is utter bullshit and you know it. You're an admiral of the fleet damn it. You got the uncensored files. Remember showing them to me? You know that they stumbled across us by accident. You know that they only wanted to talk and exchange tales of their culture and history. But no, once religion got involved it all went downhill. Helena, I believe in the gods, here her voice took on a much softer tone and she grasped her lover's hands in her own before continuing.

"But please, Helena no matter how devout you are, even you must agree that the Quorum was absolutely out of line. When the Gemenese started shouting things like "blasphemy" and "heresy", well, I think any chance of coming to a peaceful solution was pretty much gone, even more so when the idiotic morons in the Quorum started demanding their arrest. Arrest! They were people who had an accident and wished to make contact with us, and because they have different values and such they want to put them under arrest and charged with crimes! How moronic can you get?Gina's voice had risen and it was clear to Cain just HOW worked up she had gotten because of this.

Taking a deep breath to calm herself she continued, though she still spoke in a derisive voice.

"That is just begging for war. Even more so, as when they finally escape back to their ship, with the use of some kind of incredibly technology mind you, the president and the Quorum start screaming at the admiralty to open fire on them. Yes, I regret those deaths as well, but you've got to agree that they only fired on those ships that were in their way and who fired on them, so it was self defence. And now we are sent to subdue their world militarily...and this is supposed to be a "just" crusade? Now that's what I call a good joke! And anyway think of it like this. If they had truly joined the colonies as the Thirteenth Tribe, well let's just say goodbye culture, history and everything else that had defined them as people of Earth for the last few thousand years. They wouldn't have a chance. The Quorum could have imposed whatever they wanted on these people and they would have been powerless to stop them. Add to that the distance alone is far too great to make for an effective and fair government. It痴 taken over a month of continuous jumping to get she took a deep breath and continued in a bitter voice dripping with venom and sarcasm. 鉄o they get ruled by a group of planets who are over a month away and who want to effectively destroy all their cultural heritage and history. Add to that all of that is based on a religion that is not even practised by them, at least not any more. Granted, religion is an important part of the Colonies society and identity. But on Earth? Look at the report. Earth has many religions and they all are of varying importance as part of their culture. Most importantly though is, in my opinion at least, the simple fact that most of Earth's inhabitants see religion as something very personal, not something that should taint how one sees someone else! Such views are anathema to many in the Colonies. And as such it would have led to persecution and discrimination of the Thirteenth Tribe. Coupled with their isolated location you can be sure that they would have risen sooner or later and rebelled against the Colonies." After this second outburst by Gina the room was uncomfortably quiet. The only sound was the sound of knives and forks clattering. "I'm sorry, Helena. I shouldn't have said these things." Gina said into the silence. "Pass me the wine please, will you?"

Wordlessly Helena passed the wine to the woman facing her. As Gina poured herself another glass of the heavy red wine they were having with their meal, Helena reflected on what Gina had said mere moments before. As she thought about it and realised that what her lover had said was true, it suddenly occurred to her just why she was so much in love with Gina.

"No Gina. You are absolutely right. This "crusade" is a scam and everybody knows it. Well, everybody in the command structure. And though I know these people are innocent, the admiralty and the Quorum have made a good job of whipping up the religious fervour. Well, that's the cover story for the crew of the ships and the soldiers. The truth is though, that the admiralty has a completely different set of motives for this attack Gina, my love. I did show you the report of the meeting with the members of the Thirteenth Tribe, didn't I? But what you do not know, and Gina this is a secret that must be kept at all costs, is that this ship, the Prometheus was tiny. She was less than two hundred meters long. And yet she destroyed two escorts and damaged three more as well as one battlestar. The reason for that is that she is incredibly fast. She literally flew rings around our forces it was almost as though she were an oversized fighter in an atmosphere. Secondly, and this is her main secret, she possesses some sort of energy shielding. This shielding allowed her to take heavy fire from the main cannons and even let her shrug off at least two nuclear missiles without any visible damage. Though at the end of the fight, just before she jumped using whatever FTL they have, it seemed as though her shields had either failed or were on the verge of failing. You can be sure that just those shields as well as their propulsion systems are enough to make the admiralty痴 mouths water. Those are the real reasons why we are invading Earth. We are going to steal their technology and to gain more power by subjugating another planet. And I must say that it sickens me."

"Energy shielding? You've got to be kidding me? That sounds like something straight out of some bad science fiction movie." Gina exclaimed, her eyes wide and disbelieving.

"I know, I didn't believe it either when I first saw the report but after reviewing the gun camera footage of our Vipers and Raptors I started to believe."
"But the power requirements must be gigantic. Putting a generator capable of such a feat on such a small ship is only possible if..." Gina's voice trailed off as the implications hit her.

"I see you've understood. They must have a way to produce an enormous amount of power without resorting to the use of huge generators. Just think what that's mean for a ship the size of a battlestar. No wonder the admiralty eagerly supported the Quorum's decision to go to war with the Thirteenth Tribe. They want to get their hands on their technology."

"And for that selfish desire thousands of people may have to die." Gina concluded.

"Yes." Cain simply said.

They sat in silence, both thinking what the next day might bring and wondering how many brave men and women would have to have to fulfil the selfish desires of a few.

A little while later, they had finished eating and drinking and after some meaningless chatter they got up and put away the dishes before they turned in for the night.

"Will you stay Gina? I don't want to spend the night all alone knowing what tomorrow will bring. I doubt I'd be able to sleep without you by my side, at least not without a lot of trouble .Helena Cain said to her lover just as she was about to leave quarters. Hearing Helena ask her to stay brought a smile to Gina's face and she turned and said "Of course I'll stay. You only had to ask, silly!" Giggling a bit she leaned back and gave Helena a quick peck on her left cheek.

Later when they were lying in the bunk, Helena leant into her lover's arms and said a simple "Thank you."

They both fell asleep within moments, the exhaustion of the day catching up to them and the knowledge that they'd both need every last ounce of strength if they were to survive the coming storm. They slept deeply and peacefully and woke the next day feeling refreshed.

0837 hours (ship time) War room Warstar Zeus

In the war room of the Warstar Zeus, deep within the bowels of the giant, the Colonial Admiralty had gathered. Admirals Nagala, Cunningham, Cain, and Bass were there, still going over the last details of their planned attack on Earth.

"The latest reports of our stealth probes show that the Thirteenth Tribe possesses only two to four ships. It was admittedly hard to count them since they appear to be deployed in rotation throughout the system or some sort of extended mission especially the one called Daedalus which has only been sparsely seen, with only one or two ships typically maintaining orbit over Earth. Although, for some reason the latest probes show four ships gathered maintaining a close watch over Earth in something that is clearly a defensive position. This leads me to conclude that this is their combined fleet." Admiral Nagala said.

This caused many of the assembled officers to smirk, Admiral Bass even letting out a full bodied boisterous laugh.

"Four ships? That's all? I'll give them that they are better than several of ours, but still, four ships? And we should be afraid of those? This is going to be a piece of cake!" Admiral Bass laughed. Both Admiral Nagala and Admiral Cunningham were smiling and laughing too, their derision for the fleet that the Thirteenth Tribe possessed clearly visible. However, Cain was not laughing. As she went through the newly acquired data the frown on her face was getting ever more pronounced. "If you are finished behaving like children then maybe you could have a look at this data, because should what I see here is true then we may be in for more than we bargained. Here, look at this!" With that she showed the other Admirals, who had stopped laughing and had turned serious again upon hearing Cain's cutting remark, several pieces of data.

"First of all, I cannot see the Prometheus in this group of ships. In fact the Prometheus has not been seen for over one and a half years. Secondly I cannot see other ships of the same class as the Prometheus, only four ships of a considerably larger class. If the data is accurate, then I'd put this new class at more than 300m length and generally being bigger. This class is also a clear descendant of the Prometheus though her design is more streamlined. We have to assume that this new class is more heavily armed and most importantly more heavily shielded than the Prometheus. The absence of any other Prometheus- class vessels also suggests that the Prometheus was one of a kind, an earlier class phased out of service or even a prototype and a test bed for new technologies, as it would have been easier to create a larger fleet of smaller ships than a small fleet of somewhat larger ships. So we might expect a harder fight on our hands than expected." When Cain was finished taking the other assembled Admirals down a peg with her snarl, the others looked rather grim and also a little bit abashed.

"She is right you know." Frank Cunningham said. "I suspect that we will take quite a few losses, maybe even a few battlestars. We have only one advantage and that is numbers and even then we cannot take too many losses if our fleet is not to be crippled. They, on the other hand, are technically superior and far more agile. This means, if we want to minimize our losses we have to take at least one advantage of theirs away, while using our own advantage to win the battle. I propose a simple pincer attack with Helena and me leading a pincer each. Bass you are to take the middle with the Warstar Hera and the majority of our battlestar forces, say ten or so. Admiral Nagala and the Warstar Zeus will hold the rear with a small division of four battlestars. We enter the system somewhere around their moon but still from then to get their attention and then jump in right beside the enemy fleet, taking them by surprise. This should put them in a flak crossfire nd crossfire of broadsides and allow us to utilize our nuclear weaponry to quickly bring down their shields and force them to either surrender or be annihilated. Most importantly though, we will be acting directing the battle and putting us in an advantegeous psychological position!"

Seeing the agreement on the faces of the others, Admiral Nagala took up the thread and continued with the laying out of the campaign. 鄭 few minutes after our initial jump into the system the invasion fleet jumps to the other side of the planet and begins landing operations, using tactical nuclear strikes to take out any military facility of importance that can be discovered. The bombers will destroy targets too small to warrant a nuclear strike or orbital bombardment." Hearing the suggestion, the other admirals nodded. It was a good plan, and although they'd probably pay a price in blood, with no other apparent defensive structures Earth would have to bow down for fear of orbital bombardment in the form of nuclear missiles. Still there were some items that still needed to be addressed. 典he probe data shows that Earth generates an insane amount of Radio traffic. Certainly far more than any comparable planet in the twelve colonies, though of course with apparently some six point five billion people living on the planet that was to be expected. What we did not expect though with such a population it might have been expected, is the fact that we can pick up eight times the traffic that is generated by both Picon AND Caprica combined! These people have an insane amount of information to deal with. Still we were able to ascertain some facts. Number one: Earth is not a unified planet but fractured into many smaller countries. One of the most influential of these is a United States of America. Incidentally, if I may remind you, is the same country that the Prometheus actually hailed from. This means that if we take out of these United States then we will probably already be able to accomplish our objective and retrieve the technology we want. Apparently their capital is somewhere on their east coast. This means we will be landing somewhere here."

Admiral Bass, who was the one speaking, pointed down on their provisional map (Incidentally his fingers touched down on the ancient battlefield of Gettysburg). "It isn't far from their main town and will let us easily bombard enemy positions or even the city itself. Once we have taken the capital we should have decapitated their government, letting us firmly entrench ourselves so that the second and third waves from the supply stations can land and strengthen our position. We may have to subjugate every single country which might prove bloody and costly, but nonetheless we should be victorious." "What about nuclear weapons?" Admiral Cunningham asked. "You are authorised to use nuclear weapons on ANY target that seems worthy to you. A major base or a city makes no difference. Those are the orders from the Quorum. To them the people of Earth are blasphemers and heretics and must be brought into line using all any means necessary." Admiral Nagala uneasily said.

Looking into the aghast faces of the other admirals, Cain was the first to speak out. "I think that I speak for everyone here. Use nukes in the space battle? Yes. Using them against civilian targets with possibly millions of dead. No! If we do this then you can be sure that they'll fight to the last especially considering a possibly lengthy ground war with us far from home. Most importantly I personally will NOT authorise the use of nuclear ordinance against anything other than a military target, even then it has to warrant such a use as nukes have a large area of effect. Neither will any of the battlestar commanders under my command authorize such a move. Have I made myself clear?" Murmurs of agreement were heard, the other admirals nodding, all knowing what the consequences of utilizing nukes on the planet might be, especially once they got home. This truly was an order not thought through, the minds clouded by religious fervour. Cain continued, her voice aggressive and full of venom showing her displeasure clearly. "The Quorum can go and frack itself. They are safe in the Colonies, and not here. And if by some cruel twist of fate we lose and are forced to retreat then those that cannot retreat will have to surrender and I do not want the men and women having to surrender right after they have just massacred millions of civilians, of that you can be sure." "Still, we've got our orders and you know that there are some especially within the Invasion Fleet that possess the same mindset as the Quorum, consequences and fallout be damned. Try and conveniently forget those concerning the use of nukes on civilian targets if you like, but if that is what we need to resort to in order to force a surrender, then so be it. And may the gods have mercy on us." With these words by Admiral Nagala the meeting broke up and the admirals headed back to their ships.

1030 hours just outside the solar system

The commanders had been briefed and the fleet had formed up according to the plan. They were ready to bring back the Thirteenth Tribe into the fold by any means necessary. Just minutes ago Fleet Admiral Nagala had given a rousing speech to all men and women serving aboard the fleet, whipping up the religious fervour once more and explaining in detail why this crusade was just and ordained by the gods, yet conveniently leaving out the orders to nuke the planet into oblivion should it be necessary, so as not to sow any doubts within the people crewing the fleet's ships . On the Pegasus many inhabitants of the CIC saw the grimace on their Admiral's face, especially when Nagala was speaking about the justification of this crusade. It was apparent to all of the members of the Pegasuscrew that their Admiral was deeply uncomfortable about something, and that this was directly related to the crusade. Still, when Helena Cain turned and called the crew to attention, her face was an unreadable mask and her crew immediately focused intensely on their stations and their job in the battle to come, professionalism taking over.

The Order was given and the fleet jumped.

Only they weren't the only ones there.

Ok, cliffy. Depending on how many hits and reviews I get, I'll update faster or not so fast. I will continue with at least a few more chapters though. Still this is my first posted story here on and any criticism as long as it's constructive is welcome. I strive to get better.

Anyway, everybody who guesses correctly will receive a cookie and maybe something else.

Now before any of you start bitching about OOC-ness (especially Helena Cain). Let me tell you this. I loved the character of Helena Cain and always wondered what had happened to her. Finally Razor gave me some answers. And I believe that Cain must have been a lot like Adama, but without his moral compass (which is canon as Adama says so himself). The Cylon genocide and the betrayal by Gina (who I always got the impression really loved Cain and who was loved her back) effectively broke her, and turned her into a wild animal intent on lashing out and hurting everybody who would not comply. The terrible decisions she made are also helped turning her into the proverbial razor. Here she is more humane (though she will not be sappy, she simply still possesses her moral code) and might play an important role.

This is also obviously a crossover with Stargate- SG1 and takes part after the Ark of Truth (so no Asgard, even though the little grey guys are really cool). Also don't worry the next chapters will have plenty of action.

Any other questions that pop up during the review will be answered next chapter (as long as it does not concern the plot- too much).

Otherwise have fun and enjoy!

And review!