Battlestar Galactica: The Lions of Leonis

by Phoenix4416

Spinoff from Battlestar Galactica:New Beginnings covering the war on Leonis. Without a fleet to protect them, with a world torn apart by a nuclear bombardment and with their people forced to survive in vast underground bunkers, this story covers a deadly, harrowing war from the perspectives of its leaders and its soldiers and civilians. A war of Stalingrad proportions.

2. Chapter 2 The Three Beasts

First off I apologise for the bad grammar, my apostrophe and question mark keys don't work.

Battlestar Galactica: The Lions of Leonis

Chapter 2: The Three Beasts

The shape of things to come

"Scorpia…Tauron…Picon. They were hit the hardest".

"Caprica…The fleet must have learnt how to combat the Cylons".

"Gemenon, Libran, Sagittaron, Virgon, Aerilon, Canceron. The fleet must have been hit hard, most of the wrecks seem to indicate hit and run tactics".

"Leonis…The fleet must have made their final stand here".

"Find the fleet…protect them at all costs. They must survive".

"Commander…it's the Pegasus"

"…It may seem that all hope is lost and that the end has finally come, but…we will endure…" Field Marshal Montgomery, The Leonis Legions

Willow (Cylon Homeworld)

Named after the prophet, Sister Clarice Willow who had led them to freedom from the oppressive humans, the Cylon Homeworld was a hostile planet to humans. With an elliptical orbit, the planet was either too hot at its closest approach to the sun or too cold at its furthest from the sun. And then the seasons were unpredictable unless you carefully studied the planet. Millions of years ago its sole moon had cleared the planet and been pulled into the star where it added its mass to the stellar fire. The loss of this moon had meant that the planet had an unstable axis and so could go through what felt like 5 year summers and 2 year winters and vice versa. This meant that despite the abundance of a safe atmosphere for humans and H20 the planet had no true biosphere, instead it relied on a hardened ecosystem of algae and amoeba. Complex, intelligent life was almost impossible on this deadly planet. That was unless complex intelligent life migrated here and could withstand the extremes.

The Cylons had made it here and had built a number of vast cities on the surface which tapped into the many hydrothermal vents and volcanic regions dotting the massive equator. It was more of a manufacturing settlement than a city and had been one of the main sources of the Centurion manufacturing facilities.

In the exact centre of the city in a vast metallic domed room, seven Cylons were meeting. These seven Cylons were seen as the seconds in command of the Cylon population, the firsts being away chasing down the Colonial Fleet.

An argument was taking place over how the war had been run and how it was going to be run.

"We can't hold the Colonies with what we have left and still chase down Adama and his merry band of refugees. We have to totally destroy the Colonies" James Cavil shouted over the others, determined to hold his ground.

"You can't be serious" Sharon replied "Yes, destroy the colonists but we can't destroy the planets. We need the resources they can provide us not to mention the history kept there".

"We don't need anything of the sort. We are machines, all we need is power and we can gather the resources from other places", Cavil replied.

The argument kept going back and forth until finally Simon decided to act as the voice of reason. In a quiet voice he put forward "It will take us at least a year to start replacing our losses although I would like to suggest we add thicker armour to our Basestars. Until then I believe that the wisest choice would be to reactivate the mothballed ships and hold the colonies with those while we repair the rest of our Basestars and construct more".

"That's only half the problem…" Cavil butted in but was stopped, this time by Natalie.

"We can pull Centurions from our planets and installations for the invasion fleet. The Colonials don't know where our installations are and even if they did there is nothing that they can do about it. We invade Leonis with everything we can muster before the week is out and we send a smaller invasion fleet to Virgon. Meanwhile we move on a revised schedule with the rest of the Colonies".

"What about Adamas fleet".

"We let John chase after it although why he hasn't destroyed them yet is anyone's guess".

Leobon added "We do have one last problem. Some fleet ships have gone missing. These include the Battlestars Pegasus, Storm, Opus, Pythia, Enterprise, and Arion…"

"A second fleet" Deanna asked.

"Possibly" Sharon answered "Either way we have to find and destroy them".

"And the invasion of Leonis?" Doral asked.

"We do need to act soon" Natalie answered "The longer we wait the harder its going to be".

Nodding, Leobon said "Two days and we will have everything we need in place. In two days the Cylons will march".

Orbit of Leonis

First day

A mighty battle had been fought here. Tumbling hulks of scores of ships from both the Colonial Fleet and The Cylons drifted amongst each other and in between them thousands of torn apart Vipers, Raptors and Heavy Raiders dotted the battlefield. They were all dead, or so it would seem.

Despite the threat of a still orbiting Cylon Fleet and the occasional flights of Raiders passing through the wreckage conducting patrols, men and women still lived, still breathed, still fought. But the conditions of the fight had now changed. Drifting through the wreckage with barely a dot on a dradis screen and with so little power that a calculator would have more came a ghost. The Raptor, like the true ghost that it was slowly rotated as it passed into a vast landing bay scorched by multiple missile burns and twisted hull plates before it finally came to rest by an access hatch. The hatch to the Raptor opened up allowing two suited marines and a pilot to exit. A line was fired out towards the hull next to the Battlestars hatch with the electro-magnetic grapple on the end locking it in place. Attaching the other end to a hook just inside of the Raptor each of the team steadily pulled themselves along the line and towards the hatch.

Turning the leaver and then pulling on the locking mechanism the lead marine with all his might pushed the hatch open allowing them to then pull themselves against the zero gravity and into the airlock. Turning on their helmet lamps only when they were inside the last one through closed the hatch behind them while a marine went to the other end of the airlock and after checking a gauge began the manual pumping of air into the airlock. The cold white gas steadily started to fill the room and it wasn't long before a hiss was finally heard by the pilots as sound was finally able to carry. Banging three times on the inner hatch the pilot began to unscrew the lock while the two marines took up firing positions. Pushing it open the pilots and the marines were immediately blinded by a bright glaring light and the shouting of half a dozen marines telling them to lower their weapons.

Responding the two marines lowered their rifles but didn't drop them even if that were possible in the zero gee conditions. A female marine, obviously the one in charge called out "Relax, they're with us. They're ghosts".

This did nothing to stop a marine rushing forward and slamming the butt of his rifle into the face of one of the pilots knocking him out cold. The other marines shifted their aim to him as he lowered his rifle shouting "He's a fracking skinjob" true enough when they rolled him over the face of a Two was revealed.

7 minutes before Cylon attack on Colonies

28 Light-years from Helios Beta, Orson Patch

Experimental Battlestar Arion (Colonial Fleet R&D X-471-M21-Alpha under command of Rear Admiral Hudson)

There were few people in the fleet that had the most influence on the future designs of the colonial fleet than 48 year old Rear Admiral Hudson. He'd spent the last 20 years of his career since he was a CAG in the R&D fleet, was among the first pilots to test the Mk-6 and Mk-7 Viper and had tested out more than 40 different classes of warship and support ship. Ten Years into his career in the R&D he was granted his first commission as temporary commander of the Gorgon class Battlestar and under his and his officers advice had scrapped this class as being inadequate to serve as a line warship.

Over his years of command he had passed and failed many warships until he was granted the status of Rear Admiral and direct leader of the entire R&D wing of the fleet. The R&D fleet however was only a BSG size but a promotion was a promotion. He had another 2 years left before he was to be permanently assigned to line duty which would likely come with another promotion since the last 3 heads of the R&D fleet had become one of the leading five Admirals within only a couple of years of leaving the fleet. The reasoning was simple, to be in command of an experimental ship equipped with all the latest advances in Colonial tech meant that you had to be able to defend it from the many terrorist/pirate organisations in the colonies, the Cylons or even an inside job of a crewmember out to make a quick Cubit selling the tech on the black market. Hudson had beaten them all off even the tests of himself that the fleet resorted to.

As he walked to the CIC, Hudson swept his eyes over the fine lines of the corridors reflecting that this Battlestar was revealing itself to be a diamond of a vessel. She was beating the speed records of any ship of her size, she was one of the most agile Battlestars (outside of the pocket Battlestars like the Valkyrie class) and had one of the best armaments he had ever seen. Combine all that with one of the most powerful Dradis arrays he had seen outside of a space station or planet and four spate flightpods which added a third more Vipers than the Mercury Class and it would seem like this was definitely going to be passed and put into production but Hudson felt like something had to go wrong and already he had found one area which needed changing before the ship went into production.

Entering the CIC, Hudson was greeted by a number of officers saluting him. Returning the salute, Hudson approached the information table and his XO James Hendricks. "Are our pilots in"

"Yes sir. Jump in 3 minutes. Sassy has reported we have one Viper down. The Chief thinks there is a microfracture in the heat extraction fins slowing down the cooling but he's grounded the rest of the nines until he's had a chance to check the rest. If there are microfractures in all the fins then TMC is going to be going out of business".

Hudson replied "It's their own fault, they know that we expect the best quality and yet they persist in giving us substandard parts. I mean this is the fourth time that this has happened with parts they have supplied. At least with Imperial we got what we asked for even if they were twice as expensive".

Reading through a number of reports, Hudson nodded at a crewman who brought him a cup of coffee just like clockwork. Time seemed to slip away as the time to jump came.

The navigation officer spoke up "Jumping in 10,9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2…" space seemed to stretch as the laws of physics were bent and space folded. For many the first few times were sickening but eventually you got used to it but you could never sleep through it.

The jump came in a blinding flash of light and the ship disappeared.

Reappearing twenty light-years away Arion encountered a total systems wide blackout.

"Report!" Hudson ordered his command crew as they were plunged into darkness.

Battlestar Therion, CIC

It didn't matter where you were on this floating wreck, there was no gravity, there were drifting clouds of smoke and there were dead bodies. The CIC was no different. Emergency lighting had been set up in what was seen as the brain of the Battlestar due to the fact that all the generators of this warship were nothing more than pieces of slag due to the hostile actions this Battlestar had been involved in. These lights were a glaring bright menace to those working to repair the CIC and other sections of the Battlestar but in this case they were a welcome menace because they allowed the crew to realise that they were still alive, against all the odds they had made it this far.

Commander Burkett "stood" with his left hand gripping the information table meaning he wasn't going anywhere and his right tightly clasping a rebreather to his face allowing him some cleaner breaths of air. He was angry at the Cylons, the government and most of all himself. It was his job to take care of his crew and protect the colonies and it seemed to him at least that he had failed in both regards. Admiral Adama had left hours ago with the last of the fleet and without any way of making contact with him without alerting the Cylons or performing an evacuation of his ship, Burkett had been forced to do nothing. But they were still alive which was more than could be said for most of the fleet.

"Colonel, any word from the engineers?"

Colonel Regis a recent addition from Virgon replied "Reports are still coming through…from what I can tell we might be able to cannibalise parts and get one up and running".

"One isn't enough, we need at least two".

At that moment the Captain Alexander Chen, the CAG of Ghost Squadron entered. His face was dripping with sweat and his face was bright red. Approaching Commander Burkett, he saluted and then spoke "Commander, I have some good news".

"About time, go ahead".

"More than half of Ghost Squadron has returned. I need to ground three of them for advanced radiation poisoning and the rest of us have varying degrees of radiation sickness".

"Are there any more pilots out there" the Colonel asked.

"Undoubtedly. The problem is that there is that much debris and radiation out there that were struggling to find any live pirates. We only survived this long due to the Mark nines superior hull".

"Nevertheless there will still be pilots out there. Dose up on radiation meds, get back out there and bring in whoever you find".

Turning to get to it Chen was pulled short by the Commander "I'm not finished yet. There must be a number of intact disaster pods out there, I know you don't really have the manpower but you need to check them out and evacuate any survivors and while you're at it take some engineers with you and salvage whatever we need".

"Yes sir. Anything else"

"Just, Im sorry about Dozil but we have solid intel. He is a definite Cylon".

"Makes you think, doesn't it".

Outer edge of Colonial Space

Battlestar Pegasus

Life aboard Pegasus had been easier during the attacks than a lot of other Battlestars, easier just not as deadly. Pegasus had been at the Scorpia Fleet Shipyards when the Cylons had attacked and had narrowly escaped certain destruction in the first wave when she had blind jumped. A blind jump is the most dangerous of all jumps mainly due to the fact that blind jumps tended to bring you out near objects with a large gravity based on your point of origin. Tended to at least just not in this case. Instead the Battlestar Pegasus came out in a deserted area of space just past the red line.

It had taken hours for them to get the Pegasus back up and running, she'd been hit by multiple nuclear missiles at the shipyards which had knocked out both the main and backup wireless systems. Still, despite all the hard work the DC teams had put into getting Pegasus back up and running they only seemed to be hitting the tip of the iceberg. Entering the CIC, Rear Admiral Cain was faced with just what a daunting task repairing the Mercury Class Battlestar would be before they even got back into the fight. A new transfer in the form of Lieutenant Kendra Shaw turned towards Cain after settling the faceplate back over the tactical console and getting confirmation that it was now operable "Sir, tactical's back up and running".

This news was a welcome relief to Helena, the tactical systems had been among the hardest hit and this news meant that Cain could finally start to get an idea of where the Pegasus would be needed. Despite getting long range communications up and running an hour ago and still having Raptors with their own wireless systems and jumpdrives they were still too far from the colonies to receive any contact more than a few days old (speed of light) and with the state the Pegasus was in and not knowing how far the Cylons had evolved technologically, regulations held that they couldn't risk revealing themselves to their own forces in case the Cylons were able to follow them back. But now that the last of the systems were up and running and had been stripped of their networks they at least stood a fighting chance despite the structural damage.

"Good job, lieutenant. How long have you been here"

Shrugging and rubbing her hand along the back of her neck, Kendra replied "I don't know sir. I guess I never left".

Cain was finally starting to get an idea of the officer she had just gained and as she summed her up she realised that with a few pointers she just might be someone she could come to rely on, a Razor. "Button yourself up Lieutenant".

Seeing what Cain meant she started buttoning up her tunic. As the Admiral was about to move onto other matters, Kendra spoke "Admiral, I wanted to apologise for my actions earlier. I…I froze…"

Looking back at her, Cain intoned "Make sure that it doesn't happen again. I need razors. If you freeze then you risk the lives of everyone on this ship…you risk the lives of the entire Colonies. We have to be Razors. Dismissed".

Battlestar Arion, 6 Hours later

"Sir, I think I've figured out why we lost power" Chief engineer Wright said as his face was illuminated by the yellow glow of an emergency chemical lamp. At a nod from Hudson, Wright said "We actually encountered the power failure within a few thousandths of a second before we jumped and residual carbon scoring on the port side of the hull seems to indicate we were hit by a pulsars beam, most likely it was the Serang binary only a dozen lightyears away although it was a powerful pulse to say the least. It was trillions to one odds really especially when you consider we were jumping at that exact moment".

"Why does that matter" Hudson asked.

"We only managed to catch a brief blow from the pulsar. Any longer and it likely would have meant hull breaches. However the excess of power was enough to throw off our jump. We think it's by as much as 70 light-years".

"70 light-years" Hudson asked with shock in his voice.

"Navigation is still working on an exact match using the optical gear but we've narrowed down our location to the Trimian Expanse" the XO added.

"How long until our systems are back online" Hudson asked.

Looking down at his clipboard, the Chief answered "12 hours at the least. We're severing the network since there is a chance we could be hit again combined with the fact were still having discharges in some systems so it's safer to isolate each one and purge them".

The Head Deck Chief added "Unfortunately our Raptors systems were also susceptible to the pulsar but we can get them all back up within 7 hours".

"Alright, get to work".

Battlestar Therion, Engineering

To stand here in this darkened section of Engineering for more than a few moments was to be attacked by a cacophony of loud, ringing bangs, the whirring whines of angle-grinders and power machinery and the echoing call of engineers and dc crews seemingly coming from a hundred directions at once. It was disorientating to the extreme and was enough to make Burkett feel sick to the stomach but that could have been because of the rancid stench of burnt flesh and oily black smoke still hanging in the air. A lot of good men and women had been killed in this section of the ship and now Burkett was forced to face the consequences of command.

Taking a handful of steps forward, a rebreather strapped to his face and holding a flashlight at shoulder height in his right hand, Burkett ducked underneath a fractured structural support beam and was forced to crawl on hands and knees for a few metres before he was eventually able to stand up again. Portable Extractor Fans (PEFs) had been set up next to where he stood and the acrid black smoke was clearing just enough for him to see the engineers at work in the vast room trying to reassemble two generators from the parts of half a dozen scavenged from throughout the fleet. The acting chief engineer, himself only a second class engineer a day ago took no notice of the Commander since he had so much work on his hands building an entirely new generator from the hundreds of parts around him. Another group of engineers were taking apart the salvaged yet damaged generators brought in from the other torn apart ships.

"Commander, can I help you" Engineer Gaynn asked as he dropped a coil of cabling on the floor next to himself. His face was so covered in black smoke mixed in with a dozen cuts and a blackened bandage covering his forehead that he was almost unrecognisable. As soon as the coil was dropped, Burkett took notice of the bandage running around the man's left hand as it seemed it was fractured yet testament to the man's willingness to survive he was doing heavy work even with the injury.

Removing his mask, Burkett replied having to shout over the din "I just wanted to see first-hand how far along you are with the generators".

Glancing over to the acting chief, Gaynn replied "Were working round the clock so it should only be 3 hours before we have the first one online and another hour before we get the second up and running although…I'm sorry sir I shouldn't say".

"No, go ahead".

"It's just Chief Jenkins doesn't really know what he's doing, he's making mistakes that are costing us time fixing. He's a drive specialist not a generator specialist and he's trying to micromanage everything" it was obvious that Gaynn didn't like having to say these things but the safety and security of this ship was at risk.

"Thank you, I'll deal with it" as Gaynn went back to work, Burkett realised that maybe the worst thing he could do would be to interfere directly and talk to the acting chief, instead he went over to the wall mounted sound powered phone and was patched through to the CIC "Burkett here, Sam I need you to get ghost squadron to do a priority search for any surviving chief engineers or engineers with three or more years experience".

"Aye, sir. Ghost leader is just returning with one of Atlantia's Raptors I'll have the marines notify them as soon as they dock". Burkett placed the phone back in the socket and moved on to the rest of the engineering sections checking on how work was going, in the back of his mind however was that if they didn't find a suitable replacement for Jenkins within the hour then he would have to properly intervene.

Leonis Battlefield wreckage, Drifting Raptor (Designation unknown)

He'd spent hour upon hour drifting in space in this damaged Raptor watching the end of the worlds come about. He spent his entire military career as a marine on board the Battlestar Atlantia, but all he could seem to remember of that life were the rapid-fire explosions of the Cylon boarding parties tearing through his squad mates along with any crew they could find. It was…it was hell. The screams stayed with him more than the sights, the echoing call of the Centurions boots as they covered the distance between their targets in rapid succession.

The marines had fought, and they had fought hard. IEDs were created and packed with thermite but there was only so much thermite held on the Battlestar and there were far too many Centurions. What was even far more vivid were the faces of marines who were killed by their own IEDs when the Cylons shot at the devices when the marines weren't ready, their screams seemed to torture his very soul as their skin dripped from their faces. He couldn't bear to see his friends in such agonising pain, an extended death really, he remembered raising his rifle as his tortured friends shuddered on the floor as their screams ran through them, he remembered squeezing the trigger and the shots bursting their foreheads apart putting them out of their misery but not those around them who had to witness it.

The rest was an agonising chaotic mess of memories as they had struggled to even stall the Cylon advance with everything they had right up to point defence and antiship ammunition. In the end they had been forced to evacuate when the Kraken (Cylon Colony) had jumped in and started to tear apart the remaining fleet ships. His commanding officer Marine Sergeant Munroe had literally thrown him into a waiting Raptor along with over a dozen other crew and marines. The lifts to the flightdeck were unpowered so an assault laden Raptor which was ahead of them had to blow through the lift to clear them an exit, luckily the airlock was working and bulkheads could cut off the rest of the hanger so the bay didn't depressurize straight away. They'd torn away as fast as they could to the waiting Valkyrie but it was no use, a nuclear missile had struck the hull of the Atlantia and the subsequent EMP was enough to overpower the military hardened electronics and knock out the Raptors systems.

From their vantage point they had drifted, watching the world around them turn into a minefield of drifting bodies and collapsed ships. Wherever the Cylons came they destroyed without mercy, the lights of the explosions dimming all hope within those few survivors left and in the Raptor a smell was building as a medic struggled to staunch the escaping blood of a screaming petty officer. It felt like days but was only minutes before the petty officer died of blood loss and they were left with his cold body and his blood floating about the cabin. Then the Cylons seemed to leave them alone as no one fired back at them.

A deckhand had managed to repair the life-support somehow but all that was doing was delaying their deaths. Some just couldn't take their fellow survivors wailing at the deaths of their families and friends, another had to be shot because he was fighting to escape the claustrophobia and get out of the hatch. Eventually the suicides came. After the first, a gun against the chin, no one really paid much attention, so lost was their humanity, they were all now disjointed personalities trapped in the shells of their bodies and the Raptor. All hope was lost, they were all going to die here, and they knew that, it was a certainty they just had to come to terms with. Blood drifted in the zero gravity coating the crew and consoles alike.

With only five remaining alive in the raptor, the marine had made his peace with the Gods that he had rejected all of his life and lifted his sidearm to his head and closed his eyes before a flicker broke through his eyelids. Opening them he saw a Viper in front of the Raptor flashing a light in the cockpit. Struggling up and trying to control himself in the zero gravity, he made his way to the cockpit and took his flashlight from his harness. Clicking it a few times, the Raptor responded with three flashes of its own before it fired an electromagnetic harpoon at the hull of the Raptor. Two clunks reverberated through the hull before the viper turned around and slowly accelerated pulling the Raptor behind it. It was five minutes of flight before they made it to their destination, the port flightpod of the Therion. As soon as they passed the entrance, the trap caught the Raptor and its electromagnetic energies steadily increased as it passed further through slowing it down before it eventually scraped across the deck to a halt.

A tube was extended to the raptor, snaking around the ship before making contact with the hatch, atmosphere built up within until it was equal to the Raptors before a group of fully suited Marines opened the hatch, shining their torches and rifles into the cabin asking for names and checking their faces. When it came to him, the Marine replied "Corporal Seth Hudson, Atlantia".

Battlestar Arion, 14 Hours later

"Beginning full systems power up" the Chief Engineer announced over the wireless before his words were followed by the CIC lighting powering up along with the numerous consoles. "The jump drives still have enough residual charge that we will be able to make our first jump within ten minutes, however I would advise against it, Admiral until we have fully restored all of our systems".

Turning to his XO, Hudson ordered "Start plotting our jumps back to Colonial space and get me a full assessment".

Leonis Gunstar Hound Debris Field

The not so stealth Raptor S silently manoeuvred through the debris field surrounding the Gunstars position. The dradis was only set to passive scan so as to reduce the Cylons abilities to detect them. All that seemingly remained of the Gunstar seemed to be a dense cloud of debris which had been compacted into this cluster by opposing explosions to the debris velocity. It seemed like the Raptor was flying through a rainstorm and every once in a while it felt like the Raptor was hit by a tree trunk. For those inside it was a grating journey as if they were being attacked every step of the way into the deep dark depths of the labyrinth of Tartarus. Red light shone on the helmet covered faces of the packed in pilots and marines, a cold sweat seeping down their faces and dripping into their eyes and their stomachs churning just as much as the debris field threatening to blow their contents into the helmets and their bowels feeling like they had just eaten a bad kebab.

But all that would never stop them from completing their mission. Already the passive dradis scans had revealed the presence of at least two disaster pods within the debris field with another couple of larger contacts which may hold more disaster pods. There were two commonly known types of disaster pods in existence and one of them was technically wrong. The wrong one was actually a disaster crate which held emergency food, medical supplies, water and a generator and was only called a disaster pod because it sounded better than a disaster crate. The other type, the one that they were after was in fact a section of a warship which was designed to survive the best chance of surviving the ship being destroyed. The disaster pod had an armoured coating just like the outer armour of a Battlestar although it was thinner to a certain degree, it had its own power source and separate basic systems like air and water and a small amount of basic, long life rations. Due to the increased cost of them they were only located in certain areas of a warship, the CIC, Med Bay, one near engineering and depending on the type of ship up to 5 more were spread throughout it. It wasn't certain if the disaster pod would survive the destruction of its ship, it all depended on a variety of factors chiefly the force of the explosion but if it did survive and depending on how many people were in the disaster pod then it was possible for those inside to survive for up to four days, supposedly long enough for pickup in a normal war.

More and more debris collided against the Raptor forcing the Pilot to take the drastic action of using the manoeuvring thrusters to pull the nose up so that they were continuing forward belly first since the armour there was a lot thicker than the cockpit window. Suddenly just as the debris reached a crescendo that threatened to collapse the hull and made a marine piss himself in its intensity, the debris suddenly stopped and silence reigned supreme with only the occasional bang against the hull. Reorienting the Raptor, the Pilot announced "Looks like were in the eye, the debris must have gotten this far before something stopped it. Setting course for closest contact".

The Raptor engines fired a short burst of thrust pushing it towards the drifting disaster pod. Behind them another two normal Raptors which had followed their exact course through the debris field broke off their pursuit and set course for the other contacts.

The stealth Raptor slowed as it came close to the spinning disaster pod and the pilot waited a moment as she carefully watched the spin all the while counting down under her breath trying to work out the speed and shape of the spin without risking their position by turning on more computers. When she felt ready she tapped in some numbers and started to steadily match the spin while getting them in position to access the hatch. It took three minutes of careful manoeuvring before the spin was matched and she moved the Raptor towards the hatch belly first. A faded stencilled name came into view throughout their positioning revealing this as "D-POD 3 ENGINEERING GS HOUND. 15582b76" meaning that this was the third disaster pod located in the Gunstar Hounds Engineering section, the rest was the serial number. Also located around this disaster pod were a series of "Xs" and lines with numbers designed to allow a Raptor to be fully aware of where the hatch was located if they came in belly first.

A heavy thump ran through the Raptor as the shuttle hit the disaster pod and quickly before the disaster pod could fly away from them the electromagnetic grapples were powered securing the Raptor to the Disaster pod and the highly resistant seal descended around the hatch before filling with an equal atmosphere. The pilot called out "Were docked, seals check out. Cutting engines".

As one the marines in the back stated moving. Corporal Seth Hudson opening the belly hatch before pushing himself into the hole. Looking at a sensor attached to the door, Hudson called out "O2 Sensor is damaged. Can't make a thing...wait…" Seth was sure he had felt something below his feet. Dropping down onto his haunches he placed his hand against the hatch and there it was. Bang, Bang, Bang and a very faint "Help" being conducted through the hull.

Looking up to the two other marines he called out "We've got survivors, opening hatch". He got a grip on the wheel and started to try to turn it, struggling with all of his might it just wouldn't budge "The hatch is sealed tight, the wheels probably warped. Pass the burner". A marine passed down a portable welding torch and just before he activated the flame he shouted at the top of his lungs with both hands on the hatch "STAND BACK WE NEED TO BURN THROUGH!" Moving the flame forward he spent a minute burning through the multiple locking bolts on the hatch before he turned it off and passed it back up to a waiting marine. Bracing himself by grapping tight hold of the Raptors floor, he through his lower body in this small amount of zero gravity (space between both ship and pod) at the hatch. It took another two attempts before it gave way and opened.

A series of flashlights beamed up into the Raptor temporarily blinding the man before his eyes adjusted and when they did it felt like he was laying down compared to those inside the Pod. Pushing himself away from the Raptor and into the pod his feet suddenly dropped towards the disaster pods floor as they entered the gravitated field before he stood up and pulled his rifle out from behind his back and activated the attached flashlight.

One of the engineers aboard came forward saying "Thank the Gods you're here, we thought we would die alone out here…"

Seth interrupted "I'm sorry I have to cut this short, we don't have much time. Are you in charge here".

"Yeah. Chief Engineer Kale, Gunstar Hound. I have 23 survivors in here including five injured".

"Frak. Can they be moved in the one go. We need every engineer we can get on the Therion".

"The Battlestar Therion made it. What about the others".

"The remaining fleet under Admiral Adama was routed and the Therion didn't really make it. She's in a hell of a state right now and we've been doing a priority search for engineers. Now can we move everyone at once. We have a Raptor S".

The Chief seemed to think for a moment before saying "We have no choice, it'll have to be standing room only but we can't stay here anymore".

"Alright get your people moving, we leave within five minutes", Seth moved off to start helping survivors onto the Raptor S.

Leonis

Luminaire, Central Business District, Destiny Plaza

Wiping the grimy sweat out of her eyes, Major Natalie Ford looked over the burning corpses. The bodies were those unfortunate colonials who had been struck down by the immense radiation of the thermonuclear missiles the Cylons had detonated in the atmosphere. Hundreds of bodies, bodies which Major Ford and her unit had to drag together in order to be sure they cremated them properly. The cremations were necessary due to the fact that they couldn't risk any diseases popping up due to the decomposing bodies but still, Natalie could barely stick the smell, that smell which seems to act as a subconscious warning. A warning to humans that death lies here.

Turning to look behind her, Natalie saw the truth of war. Large swathes of the central business district known as the Isle of Wolves acted as a torn mausoleum. Few buildings stood here in contrast to the rest of the city due to the fact that here the defences had broken down during the bombardment which allowed the Cylons nuclear missiles to hit at ground level. Thankfully the winds were heading away from Natalie but if they turned then the fallout from those missiles would reach her within only a couple of minutes at the most. Working here was a risk, her Geiger counter was already halfway to the danger zone but so long as there were survivors here and defences to ready then they would stay.

"You all right, sir" Sam asked as he moved to stand next to her, pulling a bandana away from his face so that he could breathe properly.

Without even turning to look at him, Natalie replied "I was wondering if my husband managed to get out of there alive. I haven't heard anything yet". James, her husband worked as an accountant for a shipping company with his office based on the Isle of Wolves. Things had been difficult for them in the past few months mainly due to him wanting her out of the Legion and she suspecting he was cheating on her. But still, she would have liked to know he was safe.

"He will be fine. ARC 32 is below the Wolves and word is that they're at capacity…"

Looking at him, Natalie replied "There were over a million people working in the CBD and 32 only holds a few hundred thousand". 32 was one of the largest ARCs constructed at 350,000 capacity mainly due to its location but what they did not know which Command did was that part of that ARC had collapsed due to the direct hit from a nuke.

Sam just replied "He's safe. He knows that you'll kick his arse if he dies. Come on, Pauli needs some help setting up the safe house and we need to be out of here in ten".

As they walked back to a nearby restaurant which looked like it was a solid stone building built in the enlightenment style, Natalie said "I'm sorry. Have you heard anything about your daughter".

Smiling, Sam nodded "Her school was one of the first places evacuate to 19. She's currently being moved back to 16" before he pulled the bandana back over his mouth saying "Rains are coming" nodding at the sky.

"We had better get moving then. We have to hide a tank in half an hour".

Sam looked at her before he burst out laughing "The end of the worlds and we can still find something to laugh at. Come on". Little did they know that the invasion would begin tomorrow.

Battlestar Pegasus, 4 hours later

Cain had rested as many of her crew as possible while the repair efforts were ongoing in the belief that they would likely be thrust back into the action as soon as they returned to the Colonies. Having a tired crew would be as useful as having a stoned crew if it came to fighting their way through to the Colonial Fleet. Chances were, she thought as she readied herself for the coming jump that they wouldn't be a priority for a position in a dock. After all, if the rest of the Colonies had been hit as hard as Scorpia's shipyards then there were going to be a lot of damaged ships in worse condition than Pegasus. But, she reasoned, there is no way that I am going in blind.

The jump had been planned to bring them out 28 light hours from Caprica so that she could get an assessment of the enemy strength and where the Colonial Fleet was holding.

"Dradis Contact!" Shaw called out. "Reading one contact, its Ranger".

"Confirmed…" Hoshi followed "…incoming message".

Through the loudspeakers the voice of Ranger spoke "Pegasus Actual Ranger. One contact jumped in at the edge of our dradis range…the contact registered as the Battlestar Arion".

"Shaw, is it in the database" Cain hadn't heard of the Battlestar Arion before but it was possible that Corman had been producing ships in secret.

Looking up from her console, Shaw answered "The Battlestar Arion is an experimental class in the R&D fleet. Fleet registry states it is under command of Rear Admiral Hudson and was undergoing long range tests. We don't have a flight plan logged".

Recognising Hudson and the R&D fleet, it all made sense to Cain. The flight plans of the research fleet were only ever logged at the highest of levels of the fleet and the only reason that they knew any of the data the computers brought up is because they had to search for the name of the ship. "XO, get that Raptor back on board and get us ready for jump. Load all Vipers".

Battlestar Arion, 12 Hours later

Despite the ftl drives still having residual charge, it took a further 10 hours before Hudson received the all clear from his Chief Engineer. They decided to take it cautiously on the jumps back to the Colonies with a maximum of one jump every forty minutes in case there was something that they had missed. On the upside, Hudson thought at least we now have proof of what a Gamma Ray Burster can do to even a hardened ship, it would give the techs and gearheads plenty to think about and could possibly lead to new breakthroughs in military tech.

They performed one more jump which brought them out on the edge of Colonial Space, just 29 light hours out from Caprica when all hell broke loose.

"Admiral…" the wireless operator called out "…you're going to want to hear this". This far out from the colonies wireless signals were in the past. In essence they were hearing the past.

Walking over to him, Hudson picked up two headsets and handed one to his XO. Putting his own on, Hudson listened to the wireless messages that the operator had highlighted "Corman and Rand are lost. This is Admiral Nagala taking command of Atlantia. All available ships are to regroup at present position for counter-attack" a printout came out with Virgon highlighted as the location.

Looking up at the wireless operator, Hudson asked "Is this some kind of joke".

"No sir. It was sent in the clear and the airwaves are flooded with more messages just like that. The colonies, they're under attack by the Cylons, sir".

"XO, set condition one throughout the shi…"

"Dradis Contact!" the tactical officer called out, "Reading one contact, at the edge of our range. Scratch that its launching fighters…" The XO ordered Condition One and Vipers were pushed into their tubes while the tactical officer continued "Getting Colonial IFF…it's the Battlestar Pegasus, sir".

"Confirm" Hudson ordered the wireless operator.

A moment passed until he answered "Confirmed. I have Pegasus Actual on the line sir".

Battlestar Pegasus

"Alert Vipers are launching, the rest are holding in the tubes and all stations stand ready" Pegasus XO called out.

He was soon followed by Lieutenant Shaw "The Battlestar Arion is at extreme DRADIS range on 160 Karom 228. They appear to be flying a CAP, I'm reading three Vipers and a Raptor".

Cain knew that they had to be cautious and should never accept the Battlestar Arion as a friendly until she had confirmation. "Mr Hoshi, open a channel and request authorisation codes".

Hoshi got to work straight away and after passing the codes onto Kendra who ran them through her own console he nodded "They're authentic, sir".

Smiles went around the CIC and Helena placed her headset on "Patch me through", a second later a crackle on the headset answered her. "This is Pegasus Actual to Arion Actual…"

There was a brief pause before a male voice answered "This is Arion Actual. Admiral what's going on"

Trying to decide how to put it, but in the end deciding on the blunt option, Helena replied "Were at war. Just over 28 Hours ago the Cylons launched an unprovoked attack on the Scorpian shipyards and likely the surface of Scorpia. We were forced to commit to a blind jump and are currently working our way back to the colonies".

Admiral Hudson it seemed had more information than she did as he replied "The wireless messages were receiving Sir seem to indicate that Picon was also hit. Admiral Nagala has taken command of the fleet at Virgon".

"Then it's worse than I believe. Are you combat effective Admiral".

"Yes, sir. We've had to sever our networks due to overloads caused by a Gamma Ray Burster but we are armed, have a full crew and damage was minimal and has been mostly repaired. Arion is However untested in combat. We were scheduled for combat trials in two weeks but I believe she will be able to hold her own".

"Be glad you severed it, the Cylons employed a Virus in a backdoor built into the CNP. Also I may need you to transfer some crew over. Were currently at two thirds strength".

"Give me a list of the personnel you need and I'll see what I can do Admiral and I'll have my chiefs remove the networks from the Vipers".

"I'll get that list sent over and we'll be jumping in 30 minutes. Until then I'm moving Pegasus into a flanking position and I suggest you get your personnel working on finding out what happened".

"Already on it, Sir. Ill also send over some of the newest equipment spares that we have including DRADIS updates, none of them require a network, Sir but I suggest you upload the new DRADIS software since it will almost double the range available".

"How long will it take to update".

"Twenty minutes, for those twenty minutes you will be blind but we can use our own DRADIS and you can deploy more Raptors"

It was a gamble to install the new software this close to danger but, Helena reasoned we could do with having an increased DRADIS range, it would give us longer to deploy our squadrons and gather Intel without being discovered. "Okay, send the disks over. Fisk, deploy another half squadron of Raptors 20 klicks out and surrounding the Pegasus".

The overweight, usually jolly man replied "Yes, sir. Raptors will be away in two minutes".

"And Fisk, once the software has been updated I want Raptors sent out to scout all the twelve colonies".

"Yes, sir. But what about the mining and civilian outposts"

"Concentrate on the Colonies".

Virgon Orbit

Raptor 117Pegasus

In a burst of white light, the scout raptor sent by Pegasus appeared over Virgon with the majority of its systems on standby in order to reduce their DRADIS signature as much as possible. The ECO Ensign James "Clanker" Treiss looking at his dradis board quickly shouted "EVASIVE MANEOUVERS MULTIPLE DRADIS CONTACTS 400 METRES STARBOARD AND CLOSING…JUMP THE SHIP".

The Pilot "Lieutenant Yvette "Thorn" Samber fought at the controls aiming to pull them starboard and accelerate the ship away from the rapidly approaching Raiders trying to put them into an evasive course just long enough for the jumpdrive to recharge but with the Cylons being right on top of them there was little chance of it recharging in time. "Input the coordinates!" she shouted as she flicked the controls to pull the Raptor up.

"Missile lock…incoming missiles. Dropping the decoys". A hammer blow ran through the Raptor as the three drones it held on its undercarriage were dropped.

"Our best chance is going through them we cant outrun them" Thorn shouted back before she had to struggle with the Raptor careering out of control as a missile detonated against a decoy which was within twenty metre of the ship. The three Raptors took all the advantage of this as they could when they accelerated forward with their guns tearing into the boxy spacecrafts fuselage. When the pass was done all that was left of the Raptor and its crew was a tumbling, venting, dead wreck. The news that Virgon was only controlled by thousands of Raiders patrolling its space and one damaged Basestar would never reach Pegasus.

Leonis

Luminaire

ARC-16

Pushing a gurney away from the convoy of vehicles, Queen Alexandria along with the rest of the medical staff from the Sacred Paeon Hospital were directed to a large entrance surrounded by barricades and machine gun nests. Rushing past dozens of auxiliaries still preparing the defences, Alexandria bypassed the 4 foot thick doors and entered into a killing ground with the corridor opening up into a conical shape with the thinnest part being where the Queen was. Continuing to rush forward while her aide told her that the design was likely so that if the entrance came under assault by centurions a much stronger defence could be put up because of the choke point, it took almost five minutes before she could get to the elevator. Designed to allow a full century plus their gear to get to the entrance, the lift was large to say the least and allowed up to half of the patients and medical staff in this wave to descend to the second checkpoint.

The Queen and the medical staff passed through a further three chokepoints before they managed to get to the main areas of the ARC. As the Queen passed round a corner in a corridor and bypassed another chokepoint fitted with some of the deadliest machine guns and small artillery she had ever seen, her jaw seemed to drop and hang there in space as she looked down upon the ARC. Before her was a vast cavernous like room with a curved ceiling which seemed to be constructed from the same type of material as a Battlestars armour. Solar lamps, ten foot in diameter hung from the apex of this ceiling every 50 feet and judging by how many she saw the vast room must have been five to six hundred foot long. Running along the length were thousands of crates and vast areas set aside for triage.

Seeing her look of surprise at the enormity of it all, the auxiliary who had been leading them through the ARC said "This is only the tip of the iceberg, your majesty".

"Its…how" for the first time in her life the Queen was lost for words at the enormity of it all.

"I don't really know the full details but while this may seem like a waste of space its perfect for a defence of the ARC. If you look up and to your right you will be able to see a number of balconies running the length of the boulevard, snipers and gunners will take up position there and we'll be able to have launchers towards the back of the boulevard".

"But isn't there a danger that the Cylons could overrun the defences here and use it as a beachhead".

"There is always a danger but all we have to do is delay the Cylons to allow the civilians to escape. We already know that if the Cylons do manage to get into the ARC the best we could ever hope to do is delay them. If you will follow me". The Corporal led them through the boulevard and onto a waiting lift which let them continue down to the hospital.

Before getting to the hospital the Queen asked "Corporal, tell me where did you put all the soil and rock from the construction of the ARC"

Looking at her and tapping his nose the Corporal replied "State secret ma'am".

The hospital was packed with civilians and soldiers when they entered with primarily corpsmen treating the wounded, seeing all of this the Queen realised just how much they would have their hands full.

Battlestar Pegasus, 1 Hour Later

"Admiral, our Raptors are starting to return" Shaw called out from her post, Admiral Hudson had recommended to his superior (Both are rear admirals and unless orders state otherwise the person with the earliest commission date is the head of the two) that the scout Raptors all return at the same time to maximise the Battlestars chances of escape in case the Raptors were followed by an overwhelming amount of enemy Basestars. "Admiral, we are missing two Raptors…they were sent to Leonis and Virgon".

Standing ramrod straight at her position at the information table, Admiral Cain ordered "XO Get those Raptors aboard right now, move the Arion and Pegasus 100km starward and have gunnery crews ready to fire. Well give the ten minutes. Any longer and we leave them".

Time seemed to slip away as they waited but no word came from the two Raptors until eventually they were forced to jump to their emergency coordinates orbiting the Gas Giant of Ragnar.

"Lieutenant Hoshi, open up a conference call to Arion Actual and Fisk, get me a new set of emergency jump coordinates".

The speakers crackled for a moment as the connection established before Hudson spoke "Arion Actual".

"Admiral, I suggest we start reviewing the Intel". Cain had Hoshi transfer over a copy of the gathered Intel ad she started to look through the files gathered.

Hudson exclaimed "Frak me" at the immensity of the situation, every Colony visited had been attacked and in some the battered husks of the Colonial fleet drifted in debris fields. Cain however didn't say anything as she looked through the images, her mind ordering the attack by what she was seeing.

Cain started to speak "Scorpia…Tauron…Picon. They were hit the hardest". It was obvious due to the fact that so many Colonial wrecks littered the space ways compared to how few Basestars there were, although these Basestars seemed to be of a newer design but the overall shape was at least similar to those in the first war. Each planets atmosphere was a thunderous, roiling ball of fire and highly irradiated dust. Nothing it seemed could survive the nuclear fires which waged across them.

"It's likely that these planets were hit by an overwhelming force, hundreds of ships at least combined with that backdoor virus. But…" Hudson was carefully analysing the data but the facts didn't lie "…it was an inside job Admiral. There's no other way that the Cylons could have implanted that backdoor into our systems".

"I would agree, but who would betray their own people like that". Cain continued "Caprica…" this was different Cain had to admit and then it started to make sense "The fleet must have learnt how to combat the Cylons. The Cylons must have kept a fleet in reserve behind their lines while the Caprican fleet was forced to attack the main force".

"Look at the Viper groupings near Caprica…" Cain saw what he meant even as Hudson continued "…the Fleet must have found the backdoor and were attempting to close it or were just ripping out the networks. Compare these images to Picon and you can see that only a few hundred Vipers were left drifting here compared to every one of them at Picon. The others were able to fight but were overwhelmed then look at the Battlestars and supporting ships dotting the planet. The Virus should have knocked them out but they were able to find some way around it and to continue to fight. Their positions also indicate that the Cylons must have attempted to surround the planet in order to bombard it which forced the fleet to break off into wolf packs in order to hit as many Basestars as possible".

"They failed…they were overwhelmed" Cain let out before adding as another piece of the battlefield caught her attention "Look at the Cylons reserve fleet. Nagala must have dispatched a BSG to strike at them".

"Three at least judging by the amount of destroyed Basestars".

"No just the one. They jumped in here…" Cain highlighted an area near the back of the scattered formation with a laser pen, this action highlighting the area in Hudson's data. "…and dived into the centre of the Cylons formation…hang on" Cain zoomed in onto a piece of wreckage which was spinning across the Battlefield "Kestrel".

"I didn't catch that Admiral" Hudson said over the wireless.

Powerful thoughts and emotions tore through Cain as she recognised the name of the Missilestar Kestrel. Her fists clenched, her knuckles white.

Her XO stood across from her saw what was happening and looking down on the highlighted wreckage knew what was happening but in front of everyone he could do nothing except look into her eyes and put across as much help as he could as he said "One missilestar, 113 Vipers. They made it away".

Looking at him, Cain nodded before she spoke "The missilestar Kestrel was destroyed here, however there isn't any other significant wreckage of another Colonial ship which means that Battlestar Group Sixteen managed to fight their way through and jump out. At the same time look at the flanks of the Cylon Fleet. These Basestars were hit by a nuclear and conventional salvo fired from their Raptors. You can still see some of the drifting missiles".

Moving on while hoping for the best for her son Cain continued "Gemenon, Libran, Sagittaron, Virgon, Aerilon, Canceron, Aquaria. The fleet must have been hit hard, most of the wrecks seem to indicate hit and run tactics".

"If I was Nagala with the fleet that was left I admit I would have been consolidating my forces and attempting to clear the backdoor as much as possible while sending out wolf packs to delay the Cylons as much as possible. But we have a question"

"Where is the rest of the fleet" Cain asked, "Admiral prepare for a jump to Leonis then one to Virgon. XO do the same".

Battlestar Therion, CIC

After almost two sleepless days of work it finally seemed like they just might get out of this mess alive they just needed more time. True, the majority of the systems were still offline due to damage sustained but they at least had three working generators with a fourth due to be complete within the next hour, the point defences were now 36% operational if they activated them, life-support was working in the inner sections of the ship, the ftl drives were spooled and while they were damaged they could still make maximum jumps of eighteen light-years and it was believed they could increase that to thirty light-years within the next couple of days and the antiship weapons which hadn't been destroyed were now operational but powered down so as to reduce their dradis signature. All in all their chances were a lot better now than they had been two days ago and with time they should be able to survive long enough to get to safety.

The ship was fine, but the crew weren't. The vast majority of the crew aboard the Battlestar Therion were in fact refugees from other destroyed ships drifting in the debris field. And of those hundreds of pilots rescued in the first twelve hours of the SAR missions, 82% of them were currently undergoing treatment for radiation sickness and it was expected that less than 40% would survive. Those rescued after the twelve hour mark had been lucky that they had packed emergency supplies of oxygen and unlucky in that they only had a few percent chance of survival since they had been exposed to the radiation plaguing the battleground for longer. Commander Burkett hated to even consider going down to the sick and dying lining the central hallways near CIC just yet, he'd heard the stories from his XO and he'd seen the images on the security cams and that was bad enough but to actually be there…he couldn't stomach it just yet, he was having to psych himself up to do it.

The alarm started beeping and the tactical officer shouted out "Multiple Dradis contacts. Its…" the tactical officer could barely speak for a moment before he looked at Burkett and said "…It's the Battlestars Pegasus and Arion".

"Arion" Burkett questioned, he'd never heard of such a Battlestar and he prided himself on knowing every current and past ship of the line.

"She's listed as being an experimental Battlestar out of the R&D wing commanded by Rear Admiral Hudson" the tactical officer said as he read the report that came up.

The XO said "Cylon Basestars are moving to engage them. They're outnumbered and won't last long".

The wireless operator spoke up saying "Commander I've got communication between Pegasus and Leonis…"

Burkett ignored the wireless operator as the tactical officer announced, multiple Raiders on approach to Pegasus starboard flank, radiological alarm! They're armed with nukes".

As all the information came at him, Burkett ordered "Battlestations set condition 1 throughout the ship and power up the whole damn thing. Hold on IFF" as soon as he uttered the orders more consoles started to light up as power was channelled into them. "Set intercept course to bring us in between Pegasus and those Raiders, then roll us and fire as soon as you have a targeting solution".

The severely damaged Battlestar stopped playing dead and manoeuvring thrusters activated stopping her spin while the engines pushed her forward and literally through the debris field. Her armour was still damaged in multiple places and there were still hull breaches but this wolf was going to war. Ramming her way through the debris she finally registered on the Colonial and Cylon DRADIS as an unknown powered vessel since Burkett had ordered the IFF to remain deactivated. It was obvious that the Cylons believed her to be a damaged Basestar simply because it looked like she was attacking the Pegasus rather than setting a course for the Cylon Basestars and so the Raiders maintained their course to the Pegasus. Unfortunately the Pegasus looked like she was turning herself to show her broadside to the Therion ready to fire her guns.

Burkett maintained course until they were just 4 seconds from effective firing range of Pegasus guns when he ordered "Activate IFF" the IFF powered up and revealed the ship as the Battlestar Therion to the Pegasus but Burkett knew that Cain would likely still shoot without confirmation and ordered "Open a channel to Pegasus Actual", before the channel even opened to remaining point defences on the Therion started firing at the oncoming Cylon Raiders and combining with the Pegasus Point defences to take them out.

"Therion Actual this is Pegasus Actual. Is that you Burkett" Admiral Cain said over the wireless and through the loudspeaker.

Burkett smiled and said "That it is Admiral. You don't know how glad we are to see you. Admiral, we are barely holding together over here, we won't be able to hold the Cylons off for long and we have multiple survivors from the fleet on board". Despite the Cylon Raiders having launched what nukes and missiles they still had left at the ships, the combined point defences of both the Therion and the Pegasus seemed to be taking them out faster than they could be fired. But now the Cylon Basestars were coming into firing positions around the three ships.

"Understood Commander. I want you to move the Therion between Pegasus and Arion, well provide you with whatever covering fire we can. Leonis Command, say again…" Cain continued as she was conducting two conversations at once.

Burkett looked at the navigator and ordered "You heard her, get us into position".

Leonis

Luminaire

ARC-16, CIC

For two days they had sent men and women out into the cities searching for survivors. For two days they had prepared their defences and now the Cylons were upon them. "DRADIS CONTACTS! Multiple Cylon Basestars detected in orbit. They're first war Baseships".

As soon as Montgomery saw the Basestars on the dradis he noted how they were holding position over 10000km away from the floating debris of Nagala's last stand, likely due to the ever present danger of missiles and ammunition exploding at random and the fact that even Montgomery's dradis had to be recalibrated in order to make sense of the debris field and so a lot of smaller debris was going unseen. The chances were that it was the same for the Cylons, especially with them using the original Basestars whose dradis arrays if they hadn't been upgraded would be even worse than the planet side dradis arrays of Leonis.

Turning to the colonel at the tactical console Montgomery ordered "Notify me as soon as they launch raiders and transports and have all fixed positions ready to combat any raiders launched as soon as they are in range". The Colonel acknowledged the order and proceeded to monitor the situation.

General Marx, second in command of ARC-16 approached Montgomery, a Tac-pad in his hands "Queen Alexandria's here. She currently at the Pilgrims hospital".

"Good, we might be able to deal with wounded still coming in" realising just how callous that sounded, Montgomery continued "And it's good that she survived, God knows the people are going to need her. Any word on Parliament"

"The PM is currently in 24, we've transferred the Deputy PM to 36 and split up the rest of Parliament likewise", Marx brought up the list detailing each MPs location and handed the Tac-pad to Montgomery. More than half of the MPs were listed as missing.

Montgomery had another look at the data coming in before saying "It might be best if I went to see her and let her know just what has happened" before he turned to leave.

"MULTIPLE DRADIS CONTACTS!" the DRADIS operator shouted out as he read the data coming in from the portable DRADIS arrays that had been set up on the planet's surface. These DRADIS arrays were powerful to say the least and were of a similar design to those on Nemea, this did however mean that they required more power, but it was ultimately worth it.

As Montgomery returned to the information table to look at the new DRADIS sightings he saw something that surprised him and was confirmed by the DRADIS operator "Two new contacts registering as the Battlestars Pegasus and the prototype Battlestar Arion 100 klicks from the outer edge of the battlefield".

Montgomery could hardly believe that these two Battlestars had survived the Cylon onslaught and for a minute he believed that it was because they were a Cylon trap. That was until one of his analysts brought him two files which had been quickly printed off. Inside was a brief report on each Battlestar and their commanding officers and it made sense to Monty that their commanders made it through. "Open a channel" he ordered as he put on a headset.

Leonis orbit (same time)

Battlestars Pegasus and Arion

Appearing over Leonis in an orbit over the Capital City Luminaire, Cain was momentarily shocked by what she saw. "Leonis…The fleet must have made their final stand here" she all but whispered as the external cameras revealed the drifting hulks of hundreds of warships, both Cylon and Colonial. What surprised Cain the most was the sheer number of destroyed Basestars compared to the amount of Colonial wrecks. Somehow the Colonial Fleet was able to hold off such overwhelming odds before they eventually succumbed to the Cylons numbers.

"MULTIPLE DRADIS CONTACTS!" Shaw called out "I'm reading 28 of the new Basestars and 32 of the first war variety on 182 Karom 227 the wreckage was blocking them Admiral".

"Set condition one and…"

"Incoming wireless…" Hoshi called out "Its…" Hoshi could barely believe what he was hearing "Its Leonis Command, Field Marshall Montgomery".

Cain could barely believe that the military had survived but she had to speak to them and find out what happened and to do that she needed time "Launch all Vipers and have Hudson do the same. Have Hudson take temporary battle command but tell him to delay action as much as possible, we can't hold off that many Basestars at once". Picking up her headset, Cain nodded to Hoshi to patch her through.

"Admiral Cain, is that you" the voice of Field Marshal Montgomery asked. The wireless was crackling a lot due to the nuclear fallout, something that Hoshi was attempting to compensate for by increasing the power to the wireless.

"It's me, General. What happened here".

"I'm sending you everything we have but you have to get out of here. The Colonies have fallen and if you stay you will surely fall. Listen carefully, the Cylons have the ability to look human now, it's how they were able to infiltrate our defences. We can hold out against the war to come and we believe we may be able to help the survivors on Virgon but our ultimate survival depends upon the fleet…"

"Admiral I have Therion Actual on the line" Hoshi called out.

"I've got them, they're coming out of the debris field on an intercept course" Kendra replied.

"Therion Actual this is Pegasus Actual. Is that you Burkett" Admiral Cain said over the wireless surprised that any ship had managed to survive the battle.

Burkett smiled and said "That it is Admiral. You don't know how glad we are to see you. Admiral, we are barely holding together over here, we won't be able to hold the Cylons off for long and we have multiple survivors from the fleet on board". Cain smiled at the welcome news, it appeared that Burkett had been wise enough to search out for survivors while pretending to be just a drifting wreck.

"Understood Commander. I want you to move the Therion between Pegasus and Arion, well provide you with whatever covering fire we can. Leonis Command, say again…" the idea was to have the weakened Battlestar Therion protected from both sides by the superior firepower of the Pegasus and Arion, one of the only possible moves to save the ship, Cain knew that Hudson would be giving Therion the new jump coordinates.

Montgomery continued "Nagala placed Admiral Adama in command of the BSG16 and the remaining warships with orders to flee the colonies and protect a significant Civilian Fleet. You need to find them and you need to protect them at all costs. If we fall then they will be the only ones left to continue our civilisation. As ranking officer I am ordering you to protect them at all costs. Only when they are safe are you to come back and only if you have a game changer. Now go, get out of here now".

As the deck vibrated from the hundreds of guns firing their shells into the oncoming raider horde, Cain was caught between carrying out her orders and ramming every missile she had down the Cylons throats. But in the back of her mind was the possibility of her son still being alive with Battlestar group sixteen, she had to know he was safe. "Is there anything we can do to help you".

"Yes…" Montgomery replied "…by getting your arses out of here".

Montgomery stayed on the line as Cain ordered, "Recall all squadrons and prepare for immediate jump". Time slipped by as the point defences increased the pace of their fire and the Vipers and Raptors performed combat landings. Still, missiles continued to hit the fleet's ships in increasing numbers but eventually all the squadrons were in and Montgomery wished "Gods speed Admiral".

Cain answered "We will come back" before she ordered "Jump the fleet". A few seconds later and they winked out of existence.

Battlestar Arion, same time

As soon as Cain handed over command to him, Hudson was prepared and started dishing out orders "XO, launch half our vipers and have them take position between Pegasus and Therion. They are to hug the hulls and stay hidden until I give the order. Pegasus, I need you to launch your Vipers, engage the Cylons and pull back when I give the order. Helm raise us 200 metres and tactical prepare for long range cluster fire on the Cylon Raiders. Therion, use your point defences to take out anything that gets through. Im also sending you our emergency jump coordinates". The orders were quickly followed.

Battlestar Arion, Port flightpod Alpha (upper flightpod)

Accelerating down the tube, Colonel Lucy Sassy Hudson felt the thrill of battle descend over her. As senior CAG aboard Therion she had the job of coordinating the four squadrons being launched. Performing a 180 degree turn as soon as she exited the tube, she quickly adjusted her course and accelerated over the Arion while keeping to within 30 feet of the hull and then passing through the couple of kilometres of space between the Arion and Therion before covering the last four kilometres to bring her into the head of a large formation of Vipers and Raptors taking position within a hundred feet of Pegasus Hull.

There she waited as the rest of her pilots took position. It seemed like a lifetime passed before she understood what her brother was planning which was confirmed when Hudson came on the line "Sassy, Arion Actual. On my order split the squadrons up and down over the Pegasus and envelop the raiders".

"Roger that, Actual. Before she changed to squadron chatter and ordered " Crazy, Nat Sue take Yukon and Harrier squadron on my orders under Pegasus. Thorn and Knife squadrons are to follow me over".

A moment passed before Hudson ordered "All Squadrons now, now, now".

At that call Sassy accelerated upwards with her squadrons and Yukon and Harrier went down. Skimming over Pegasus which had cut its guns for this approach, Sassy saw the close in shapes of the retreating Pegasus Vipers being chased down by over four hundred sickle shaped Raiders. Raiders who were now outflanked in a pincer formation. Diving down into the formation the guns of every Viper Sassy had at her disposal tore into the tightly manoeuvring Raiders while Pegasus Vipers broke into two ranks which went left and right in order to further flank the Raiders. This was when Pegasus point defences had their moment tearing into the stalled Raider formation before the guns were again cut and repositioned as the Vipers were now mixing in with the Raiders. The battle lasted brief seconds before the last of the Raiders were cut down and Admiral Hudson was forced to give the return to home order long before the Basestars could get close enough to harm them.

Leonis, ARC 16, Pilgrims Hospital

1 hour later

Entering the hospital, Montgomery was momentarily shocked at the amount of wounded but this was something he had prepared himself for. What he hadn't prepared himself for were the stony, stoic faces of the wounded. They had all lost someone, the life that they had once known was gone and they were all now forced to face their own mortality head on as their lives became measured by surviving each day. Walking through the ward, he was forced to endure the sight of those volunteers who had stayed manning the defences even as the Nuclear Fires raced towards them. Few of those volunteers had survived and of those who survived they would be forever scarred by the memories of those they had lost. Tears were piercing his eyes as he passed them all. Rubbing them away he turned a corner of the ward and saw the person he had come to see, Queen Alexandria.

Despite her red rimmed eyes due to lack of sleep and her dishevelled and bloody appearance due to the aid she was providing to those under her care, she still struck Montgomery as one of the most beautiful and graceful people he had ever met, the last time being at a forces gala. Approaching her and bowing his head, Montgomery uttered "My Queen".

Turning towards him, a look of shock swept over Alexandria to quickly be replaced by happiness at seeing Montgomery alive and well "Field Marshal, you can dispense with the pleasantries. But it is good to see you".

Looking up at her, Montgomery quickly apologised "I'm sorry, I just thought that…you are still our Queen" before she could raise any argument, Montgomery rallied ahead "I actually came here to inform you of a couple of developments. You do of course know about the battle which took place in orbit"

"I do, my guard was able to set me up with a secure link".

Nodding, Montgomery continued "An hour ago, two more Battlestars jumped into orbit".

"Who How did they survive" Alexandria asked, clearly surprised that there were more surviving warships.

"The Battlestar Pegasus commanded by Rear Admiral Cain and a prototype Battlestar of the R&D fleet called the Arion and commanded by Rear Admiral Hudson. I don't know how they survived but fleet records state that the Battlestar Pegasus had been docked at the Scorpia Shipyards when the Cylons attacked. Cain must have performed a jump in order to get out in time. I'm not too sure about the Arion. They were undergoing a long range test and its possible however unlikely that the Cylons missed them. Either way they managed to get here". Montgomery could see the delight on her face as he continued "I successfully made contact with them and gave them all the Intel the fleet had gathered on the Cylons. You may also be happy to know that the Battlestar Therion which was part of Nagala's fleet and was believed to have been destroyed managed to join up with Admiral Cain. I overheard that they have been conducting search and rescue operations in the wreckage so hopefully they will have gotten as many as could be saved out of there. However despite having three Battlestars if they stayed here then they would have been overwhelmed so I ordered them to go after Adamas refugee fleet and protect them at all costs. I'm sorry but I had to, honour demanded it".

With a slumped head, Alexandria replied "No, you did the right thing. If they can survive with the fleet then they deserve that chance. But can we hold out alone".

"We have no choice. If your question is do we have the resources to do so then the answer would be that we can last at least ten years with what we have and hopefully longer if things are done right. However this plays out at least ten ARCs should be safe. They're off the grid, their locations known to only a handful of people, myself included and they are to take no part in this war if at all possible. If we fail to win and are destroyed then hopefully they will endure".

Snorting, Alexandria replied "We will endure. Let's make sure we do Field Marshal. I do however have one more question a Corporal I met earlier couldn't answer. How did you build the ARCs without anybody noticing the mined waste"

Smiling, Montgomery replied "Only the bravest of pilots. You went through a vast Atrium at the top of the ARC" it was a statement not a question so Monty continued "…we had pilots jumping freighters into and out of there filled with the mined rubbish. I'll tell you more later. For now…I just wanted to thank you for helping out here".

Looking him dead set in the eyes, Alexandria replied "They are my people, I am their Queen. I would be no place else when they need my help".

Montgomery nodded and saluted saying "Yes you are" before he turned and strode away and back to his work preparing for an imminent invasion.

Leonis

Luminaire

ARC-16

Sector 8 Alpha

As they were elevator doors opened the group of civilians were led down a passageway until they reached a conical part of the hallway with the thinnest part being where the lift entrance was. Essentially a killing zone. The Private leading them looked down at the folder in his hands before opening a door on his right and turning to them saying "This area is Sector 8 Alpha. You will each be granted a bunk in a dormitory similar to this one. 10 people to a dorm and space is at a premium. In the dorm you will find a set of lockers, one each containing a survival kit in case we have to evacuate. As soon as the legions and auxiliaries are back you will all be trained and a member of the legion or the auxiliaries will be bunking with you. If you will follow me".

As the civilians followed him down the hall, each one undergoing a culture shock as they looked in on the dorms and really saw that space was at a premium compared to the lives they had lived just 24 hours before they came to another set of doors distinctive in the lime green paint on them. "The bathrooms or heads as you might become accustomed to calling them, the one on the left for women, the one on the right for men. You will each take two showers a day lasting five minutes each. We are living in confined condition, we cant risk illnesses spreading. Every month you will each be given soap, toothpaste and a toothbrush. You need to make it last because you will only get one each. If you lose it we will not give you a replacement. We will also be providing you with a bathroom rota".

Turning the Private continued further down the hall before stopping again at what appeared to be a large communal area. Filled with seated booths like at a café and TV monitors on the walls with directional speakers above the tables. In the back of the room was a shuttered area with a stainless steel finish. "This is a combined communal area and mess. Three rationed meals a day will be provided. Those with special dietary requirements for medical reasons only will be separated over the coming week so as to be placed with those like them. Your rations will eventually be supplemented with fresh food that you grow in the troughs that run down the sides of the corridors behind you. The lighting has UV properties to both help with the growing of food and help with your own health. If your crops fail then you are on basic rations. You will also see the TV monitors. Each booth has one and a directional speaker above it, move away from the booth and the you will not hear the TV. 20 Television Channels will be starting up over the coming month. They will be showing pre recorded programs and movies as well as news about how the war is progressing and will each cater to a different person. A library service is also available, details are in folders in your lockers. At the back of this room is a hatch. This hatch is an emergency exit which will bring you out into an access corridor into a security checkpoint in another part of the facility. This door is monitored at all times and if you attempt to use it without authorisation then you will be punished. It is only to be used in case of evacuation. If we have to evacuate then you will travel through this corridor with your survival packs and will be given weapons and emergency supplies and led out of the ARC to the nearest safe zone.

"You will all be given a job, children will go to schools, a government will still run, an economy will develop and we will attempt to keep families together. We have three punishments depending on the crime committed. The first and lightest punishment is reduced rations and use of facilities. The second is hard labour, solitary confinement or you will be placed on the front lines for no longer than one year. These two punishments can be lessened, the last cannot. The third punishment is execution. Murderers, rapists and traitors will be executed as soon as a guilty verdict has been received. This entire section of the ARC is covered with security cameras which are there for your safety. Even the bathrooms are covered although these cameras will be monitored by a sexually appropriate person. You wont like it but it is entirely for your safety and the continued survival of our people. You will also undergo bi-monthly check-ups with a doctor so that we can stamp out on diseases.

"I wont lie to you. For the next month or so the psychologists who helped to design the ARCs predict that you will feel like a prisoner but that will pass. Eventually this place will feel like a home to you, eventually you will come to understand why your freedoms are being restricted now. It is so that in the future when we win this war, you will be alive to see those freedoms restored in full. The government, the military…I swore an oath to protect the people of Leonis from all enemies. I swear to you now that with your help we will protect you but only if we work together".

ARC16

Sector 8 Control Room

While the technology and software in the ARCs were dated and could be seen as basic compared with modern technologies mainly for their resilience and low maintenance costs, some technology and software was so dated that it was created before the first war at a time when Colonial technological development exceeded modern day technology. Part of that software was running right now. While a controller, basically an auxiliary from the intelligence arm of the armed forces watched the security images of Sector 8 this software was doing its own monitoring of the video footage and cross referencing it with the latest intel. Most of this intel came from the ARCs copies of the colonial mainframe while the rest came from the Colonial fleet and the assets across Leonis including other ARCs sent through hardline connections.

This software was highly illegal because of how easily it could be hacked when it was part of a network which it needed to be in order to do its job, but this software had been brought out of secure storage and was set to work because of what the Colonial Fleet had learnt. Cylons now had the ability to look human.

This software was facial recognition software and was carefully cross referencing each face it came across with the intel it had available. This software would be the one thing that ensured the Leonosians could level the playing field and right now it had set an alarm beeping. It had found something.

Moving towards the computer as soon as the beeping started, the auxiliary quickly checked the face of the elderly man currently in Sector 8 Alpha with the images on file, images captured in ARCs 17 and 32. Grabbing the phone from the desk he dialled 2 and his superior in the CIC answered "CIC intel".

"Private Connor, Sector 8 security. We have a breach. 1 elderly male likely a Cylon infiltrator in Sector 8 Alpha also spotted in ARCS 17 and 32. Sending file now". Clicking a few buttons on the keyboard the file was immediately forwarded to the head of the intelligence wing who looked it over before saying "Good work. Security is on its way now and I will make sure you get double rations for this".

"Thankyou, sir but it was the software which found him" before he heard the click of his superior putting the phone down.

Moving back to his seat monitoring the monitors his guard came back into the room from the adjoining toilet asking "Whats happening"

Smiling, the analyst replied "Watch 8 Alpha". On the monitors displaying that area 10 fully armed legionaries exited the elevator and walked down towards the communal eating area and the civilians gathered there. The soldiers only had one target. As they neared, the lead legionary raised a rifle which seemed old fashioned and quickly fired a dart into the neck of the elderly man while the rest rushed the last ten feet and slammed the disorientated man into the floor. The civilians were ordered by the last two soldiers to step back and line up at the far side of the room under threat of being shot, needless to say they quickly complied while the now unconscious elderly man was cuffed and placed on a stretcher before being taken away for questioning. One legionary remained behind once the others had taken the unconscious man away in order to tell the civilians that they had captured a suspected Cylon infiltrator based on verified intel and that they were now safe and could return to orientation before he too left.

By the end of the day across all the ARCS, 141 Cylon infiltrators of seven distinct models were sedated and captured without killing them. This software, despite being illegal had proven its worth. If only they could contact the Colonial Fleet with this intel, just how many lives could be saved.

Hope you liked this chapter and my introductions of the three beasts which will have their own story from now on covering their chase after the fleet and their employment of guerrilla tactics. Rear Admirals Hudson and Cain share the same rank but in this case Cain is the superior because she was commissioned first.

The Battlestar Therion and Ghost Squadron are taken from the BSG ghosts comic series and Id like to thank Just a Crazy Man for introducing them to me.

The Battlestar Arion and its attendant crew and family is an idea that reviewerdwj has been bouncing with me. Arion also escaped the Cylons search for it because they jumped to the wrong place.

The exploits of these three Battlestars will be seen soon in a new story called The Three Beasts.

I wanted to show that sometimes old technology is better especially with the pre Cylon tech that the ARCs employ in small numbers with the photo recognition software and while it may seem too advanced you have to remember in Caprica 58 years before the fall, Colonial technology was about ten years ahead of what we can do and 10 years behind in other areas.

The next chapter will see the start of the invasion and will be called Raging Thunder.

Well I hope you liked the chapter and reviews are appreciated and I also apologise once again if my grammar is lacking with a lack of question marks and apostrophes since those buttons have stopped working on my laptop and I've had to copy and paste the ones that are there.