Chapter 7 The Unveiling
The city that never sleeps found itself in a strange state, for the first time since Hurricane Sandy almost eight years ago in 2012 there was US National Guard soldiers in the streets. Most had no idea why they found themselves standing with their rifles slung over their backs in New York City on a perfectly clear October morning however, the high-ranking officers did know. New York was not alone there was armed Humvees sitting on the Washington Mall and other major cities across the US had similar situation as the military went on alert. This event was not just limited to the US as Russian tanks moved into defensive positions around the red square in Moscow and British military police formed a defensive line in front of Parliament. With all thirty five-member nations of the IOA going on alert it caused a domino effect as those nations not on alert went on alert and within hours, all the nations of the world had their militaries on alert.
These events could not go unnoticed, as the world media tried to figure out what was going on however all they got was no comment or a historical announcement would take place on Liberty Island in New York Harbor. Schools across the world had been closed, all none emergency related work had been canceled, even the stock market had been closed and governments had demanded airtime starting at 10:30 am Eastern Coast time US. This caused people who would not normally be paying attention to the news to turn on their TV at the approached time.
When they did all they saw as a standard looking wooden stag with a long line of flags standing on poles filling the back of the stage. Behind that, they could see the Atlantic Ocean which had been cleared of all shipping by the US navy and when the camera spun around they could see either the VIP invites most of them diplomats or military members form the countries who flags where hanging. Looming over everything was one of the major symbol of America the Statue of Liberty. The only thing that really stood out as strange was the upside V with a circle on top symbol on the podium.
When the time came the President of the United States moved toward the podium as the other world leaders gathered in front of their home nation flags.
"Thank you all for joining us on a day which will remembered as long as humans walk across the surface of the world." started the President as he took a deep breath. "Now I am here to release some information to the public of the world which has been known only to the highest levels of the United States Government and military starting in 1997. Later it shared with every nation gathered on this stage this morning."
"In 1997 the United States Military learned that not only where we not alone in the universe but our own history isn't what we thought it was. Yes, humanity is not alone and we have made contact with people not from this world. We are not even the first race call the Earth home." stated the President as the scrolling news alert which appeared under him on all the news flashed that message. "Hundreds of thousands of years ago, when our ancestors where only just learning how to make fire our world was the home operation for a race we call the Ancients. Now the Ancients where a lot like us in fact we are considered by some other races in the galaxy to be the second evolution of their form. They explored this galaxy and nurtured life however their greatest achievement was the building of what we call the Stargate network."
The President paused for a moment as he let the people process the information.
"The Stargate is a transportation device which when active creates a stable wormhole between itself and another Stargate located in the network allowing almost instant transportation between any two points. This network basically acts like a roadway covers not only our galaxy but countless others but we have only really explored two." stated the President "With this the United States began exploring later joined by the other nations of the alliance here. While we were exploring we discovered countless trues about our own past which are too numerous to share here, but I will share the major points."
"Sometime we don't know when the date but it was sometime turning the time of the ancient Egypt a alien from a race we call the Goa'uld discovered Earth. The Goa'uld are snake like race that invades a body and takes it over the enslaves the victim. Soon others of their races came and posed as the gods of the ancient world." stated the President "He and other Goa'uld took people from Earth and seeded them across the stars to worship them as Gods and work as slaves. Some point the people of Earth rebelled and pushed them off our world and buried the Stargate where we found it before World War II."
People where having a hard time believing what they were hearing, however since it was coming from the United States President and since he was surrounded by other world leaders caused them to believe it.
"Once we began expoloring the Galaxy we came into contact with this still much more advanced race of aliens and a war began. A war, thanks to countless men and women we won. Not only are the Goa'uld defeated but countless worlds and the people who had lived on them as slaves are now free." stated the President "Now we didn't just go to war the gate has brought many wondrous achievements to our little piece of the galaxy. Cures for cancer, aids and heart dieses has all come from the gate, the new power grid which is producing clean energy came from the gate and all the technology we are using to fix the errors we have done to our own world came from the gate."
The roar of engines caused a few people to look up as the President mentally cursed; the military was a few seconds early.
"Flying over our heads right now is the primary space interceptor fighter the F-302 Eagle Interceptor. Each of them are capable of both atmosphere and space combat and we have hundreds in our current arsenal with more planned." Stated the President of the United States as a flight of thirty-five Eagles came from over the ocean and did a low swoop of the Liberty Island and the surrounding area. There was an Eagle from each of the member nations. As the Eagles patrolled the sky another flight of thirty five aircraft
"Now this is the close ground support aircraft the A-305 Osprey Attack Bombers." Stated the President as the Ospreys flew lower and slower than the Eagles since they were designed to do so. The Eagles and Ospreys kept circling for about a minute before forming up into six wings before leaving New York Airspace. Next came in a flight of Condor Bombers which flew higher than their the Ospreys or the Eagles, and they didn't circle instead they did a fly by as the President introduced them. The next bird to make an appearance was the S-306 Owls which flew overhead and two of which even hovered on the sides of the gathered crowd before coming in for a landing so that the press could get a better view of the ships.
All eyes were on the sky as dark shapes appeared on the horizon coming from the same direction that the aircraft had. However these ships where far bigger, everyone eyes widened and by now massive crowds had gathered on the shoreline and looking out of high rise office buildings.
"People of Earth I present to you four of sixty seven strong fleet of intergalactic vessels." stated the President "The Lead vessel is of the Daedalus class Battlecruiser and is the backbone of our fleet, behind it is the Galahad Destroyer, next comes the Archimedes class science vessel and finally the largest vessel is the Hadrian constructor ship."
The news media was having difficulty deciding what to focus on first as the camera zoomed in and out on the different ships. They were so focus on the ships hovering over the harbor that no one noticed the six larger ships coming from the same direction until the President spoke up.
"And now to introduce the six most powerful ships ever produced by human hands the five battleships and the first carrier which along with others which will be built in the near future will assure humanity place among the stars." stated the President as the cameras turned on the six massive ships which had entered the harbor. "These ships are under the command of one of the five full time members of the UN secrecy council with the United States having the only carrier."
The five battleships looked to at first glance to sword like in shape, they had a long body which lead to a slightly rounded point in the front while in the back it spread out a bit so that engines and relatively small hangers in comparison to the ship as a whole was located. Poking out of the ship where massive three barreled turrets similar to the ones that used to be on their ocean-going cousins only taken to the next level in size and range. Also located on the ship where small gun emplacements and multiple missile launchers. While not as impressive, looking as the guns each battleship also had eight standard Asgard beam weapons and two of the Ancient beam weapons, which was more power with a longer range but took more time to cool down. Also located onboard where multiple pods for full of Earths version of the ancient drone weapon system.
While having a different function it was clear that the same team which had designed the carried that had designed the Battleship. Like the battleship the carrier had a somewhat sword like appearance however while only the last ¼ of the battleship was larger over half of the carrier was larger than the central column. The Battleship only had two small hangers only about the size of those on the Daedalus class while the Carrier had four hangers each three times the size of those on the Daedalus class. Also located along the bottom of the carrier where small drop hangers where marines or soldiers could load up into assault ships for mass combat drops. The carrier lacked the large heavy guns but it did have missile tubes and four Asgard and a single ancient beam weapons.
"Before you are the Missouri class Battleships and the Yorktown class Carrier." Stated the President "Before you are the Battleship USS Missouri which is the namesake of the class, next to her is the HMS Britannia, the Kursk of the Russian Military, the FS Napoleon of the French navy and lastly is the Long Chun of the People Liberation Army Air force. The only current carrier at the moment is the USS Yorktown."
It was not hard for anyone to figure out which ship belonged to which nation since each one had the flag of their nation engraved on the haul of the ships.
"Over the next couple of days these ships and others in out fleet will be visiting different cities across the world and will be open for media and civilian tours." Explained the President before looking toward his right and three men and one woman dressed in the dress uniform of the United States Air Force, along with them where three men dressed in suits and two women who were also dressed for the occasion. "Allow me to personally introduce some people who were key players in saving Earth multiple times. General Jack O'Neill was the head of the main team called SG1 who went through the stargate to discover multiple worlds and saved Earth multiple times over. He is now the supreme commander of all off world forces."
With that Jack O'Neill stepped forward as the camera flashes where almost blinding him.
"Next is General Samantha Carter who was second in command of SG1 and was instrumental in countless situations and who is currently in command of Stargate Command here on Earth." Stated the President as Samantha stepped forward as she thanked God for the dark sunglasses which protected her eyes from the flashes.
"The civilian member of SG1 is Doctor Daniel Jackson who thanks to his knowledge in archeology and ancient languages has helped us unlock the mystery of the Ancients and other races across the galaxy." Stated the President "And beside him is a man who isn't even from Earth but has saved Earth multiple times, Teal'c was a warrior for our first enemy but turned his back on them so that he could gain freedom for his people, freedom which they now have."
"Two members of SG1 who couldn't be with us today is Colonel Cameron Mitchell and Vala Mal Doran who are currently on assignment." stated the President "The next group which needs to be addressed is the counterpart to SG1 in our operations which take place in the Pegasus Galaxy in the Ancient's city Atlantis called SGA."
"The team was led by General John Sheppard who before his promotion to commander of all forces in Pegasus Galaxy was the leader of the team who explored a whole new galaxy and helped us push an enemy called the Wraith back." Stated the President of John Sheppard stepped up. "Beside him is his wife Teyla Emmagan who like Teal'c is native to a whole different world then Earth has done bare work to protect Earth and her own home galaxy."
"Lastly is Doctor Rodney McKay and Ronon Dex who have done amazing work putting their special skills to use to deal series blows to the Wraith. Doctor McKay has used his brain and his years of formal education in Canada to help unlock the new technology which will shape the future." explained the President "And Ronon is a harden warrior who has put his skills at our serves and has proven to be a loyal and valuable member of our off world forces."
"In time the actions of these brave people and others like them will come to light and future generations will look on their actions with pride." Stated the President as he turned toward the group and started clapping. At once the other world leaders and others began clapping once it stopped the President turned back to the cameras. "This is a day that the world will never forget and it will mark a turning point in human history."
An hour and a half later, the world was still trying to wrap its mind around what they had just learned while the high ranking delegates where enjoying a private lunch in the UN building. All around the leaders of thirty-five nations and their families where talking about the events of the day while members of SG1 and SGA1 meet and talked. News members moved through the crowed trying to get interviews and representatives from governments who are not currently part of the alliance of the Gate where trying to gather information as well.
"So why didn't Michael and Vala come?" inquired Shepard to General Carter as the two of them got in line for the long buffet. It had almost every kind of upscale food anyone could imagine and all the very best of that.
"Well Michael is holding down the Fort at the SGC and Vala…" started Carter as she tried to find words.
"Could you imagine what she would have done with the press of the world in front of her?" answered Daniel who got in line behind Shepard both of them waiting for the smoked pork to be cut by a chief.
"Well we told her that we needed two members of the SG1 at the SGC just in case." explained Carter "But yes what Daniel said is the real reason."
"I can understand that?" stated Shepard as he looked around at all the news people taking photos as if the end of the world was coming at any moment.
"I wonder when people will get used to the idea of all this?" inquired Daniel as he looked up at the floating spaceships.
"Maybe in a few months it is a lot to dump on people all at once. We had years to absorb it all." admitted Carter "We haven't even told them about the Replicators, the ORI, Ascension or all the times Earth was almost destroyed."
"True." stated Daniel
"Well I don't know about you all but I am recording all the news networks just so that I can see what they all say." laughed Shepard as he kept on eating.
Almost half away across the galaxy away from the party the Odyssey left subspace and entered normal space in a flood of blue light and instantly the ancient cloak activated as the ship disappeared from all known types of detection system. The mission of the Odyssey was as simple as it was important, to recon the likely home system of these colonials. They had scouted the area of the battle only to see fifteen of these colonial ships in the area taking part in a massive recover operation of their destroyed ships. Once the system was confirmed to be colonial, the next step was to find out what sort of trouble they had gotten themselves into and why the colonials had attacked them in the first place.
"Colonel Lorne we have reached our destination and we are cloaked." Reported the second officer a major as the former second in command of Atlantis Military force now turned commander of arguable the most valuable ship in the growing fleet looked out the window at the void of space. However it wasn't a void there was a glow from a rather large star directly in front of the ship. "We are just out of target system and ready to begin the operation."
"Good, let's go see what we can see." ordered Colonel Lorne as the Odyssey moved toward the target system "Show me a map of the system."
Instantly a map of the system appeared on a small holographic table located behind the command chair. Colonel Lorne looked down at the map, there was seven planets in the system with a large asteroid belt separating the inner five from the outer two. The thing that stuck out to him was the fact that two of the planets each as large as Earth were orbiting around each other just as much as they were the sun. One of the outer planets seemed to be a gas giant and the other seemed to be slightly larger than Pluto. The inner planets is what was interesting to him four out of the five where in the habitual range and could support life.
In fact they did and seconds after he got the map of the system, he Odyssey began picking up the ships and there was a lot of them. They were traveling mostly between the four habitual planets with the heaviest traffic between the two binary planets.
"Sir, I am getting multiple ship classes," stated the radar operator "Attempting to ID the general class so we can figure out what they are."
"Are we getting radio transmissions?" inquired Lorne
"We are getting TV transmissions." corrected his second officer "Judging from these I can confirm this is a colonial system."
"How can you be sure?" inquired Lorne as his second command tapped a small interactive screen on the table.
"Welcome back to the Colonial News Network and we are going to go over the top news about battle between the Colonial Navy and the unknown ship which claimed to be from Earth." stated an anchor woman, before Lorne's second in command muted the screen.
"How do they know about Earth?" inquired Lorne
"Unknown sir, we are still gathering information judging from the different civilian news channels we are getting I can name the four habitual planets." Stated the second officer as the names of the worlds appeared over the inner planets.
"So we have Caprica, Gemenon, Picon and Tauron." stated Lorne "Interesting names but where are the other colonies, there are supposed to be 12 colonies of this Kobol?"
"There are three other star systems within a quarter of a light year," reported the long range radar operator "Best guess they are there."
"Sir I got the ship count and you are not going to believe this but I have over 900 ships moving back and forth between these planets and almost a quarter of them are warships. I am not even counting what fighter patrols, manned satellites or mining ships working the asteroid belt," stated the Operator as the two higher officers blinked. "And they have some massive suckers when it comes to ships and orbital stations some of them as large as our battleships."
"Damn." Cursed Colonel Lorne as the map updated to show all the ships moving back and forth. A few seconds after that the thousands of smaller stations and satellites appeared on the sensors as well, in the end it was the most crowed system the Tau'ri had ever seen. "Have they spotted us?"
"No sign of it sir, I have access to what seems to be their civilian radio traffic but their military is encrypted it will take some time." Reported Communications as the holographic table activated and a map of the nearest world appeared.
"Look at all those ships." Stated the second officer "And all of this within 200 light years of Valhalla. That is so close, how could we have missed this?"
"Worry about that later, I am more interested in this." Stated Colonel Lorne as he pointed four long lines of large stations which sat in high orbit around the planet. "This has to be some kind of defense line and we need to get inside it to get a better scan of the planet but if they detect us then it could be over."
"Sir I was wrong those aren't defense stations they are warships." reported an officer as he looked out the window at the massive ship which sat dead in the water a few hundred yards away from him. "But why are they just sitting there, the life sign detector says there are only fifty people on board."
"I see, very clever." stated Colonel Lorne as his XO blinked "These must be older model ships, kind of like how we mothball our old ocean going warships on Earth however instead of having them sitting around waiting to be scrapped or called back into active duty they make them their defense line. Put a small crew onboard, just enough to man the guns and some other systems and boom you have an instant defense line but one that could be called upon to be a warship again."
"Maybe sir we should report this?" offered up the communication officer
"Not yet, I don't want to risk them picking up any of our broadcasts." explained Colonel Lorne "Besides we need more information we only have good data on this planet here and if their own name is anything to go by there are 12 worlds. We need to find them and gain more information, I want as much information as we can get but keep a path for hyperspace open so that we can run."
"Yes, sir." confirmed the XO
As the Odyssey was heading into the 12 colonies of Kobol scanning everything it could a meeting was taking place far away from the worlds. The wall of the room was made out of chrome and a large table sat in the middle of the room. The table had twelve seats however only seven of them had people sitting at them. If a colonial or even a Tau'ri had entered the room they would have only seen seven normal looking people sitting down at the table, three of them where women and four where men. These people where in fact not human these where the humanoid Cylons which ran the Cylon empire.
"I thought Earth was a myth?" stated one of the two blonde women, this one wore a red cocktail dress and was the sixth humanoid Cylon model "D'Anna could this be a fake?"
"Possible." Admitted the second blonde, she was third model and was more modest then the sexual sixth model. "However one of my copies was filming the battle and she heard it herself. This could really be Earth."
"If this Earth then we have to handle this fast," stated the clean shaven man who wore a simple blue button down shirt and pants, he was the fifth model of the humanoid Cylons "We should launch our attack now."
"Five, I am with you that the humans need to be destroyed but we haven't gained access to the colonial defense network yet. In all the computer programs of the war we lose 48% of those and that isn't even taking into account the new level of alert the military will be on now yet alone Earth." stated D'Anna "No it isn't the time, we need more information and more time."
"Then what do you recommend?" inquired the dark skinned man who was the fourth cylon model as he rested his chin on top of his knuckles "The arrival of Earth changes everything, we have a whole new colony to deal with. Judging from what just one of their ships did we can't take them lightly, they may be an even greater threat then the Colonials."
"Colonies." corrected D'Anna "This Ark Royal Captain said they were setting up a defense station for a new colony. Earth has been separated from the colonies for four thousand years they could have dozens of worlds under their control and we haven't even talked about their weapons, if the colonials get those we don't stand a chance?"
"Do we know this colony is?" inquired the five, unlike the Colonials the Cylons had journey beyond the Cylon Colonial DMZ and knew of worlds that the colonials didn't . Even then, most of the worlds they had taken as factory worlds where clear on the other side of Colonial space from where the battle happened.
"From the video it appears that they use a different form of FTL then the colonials, their ships enter some kind of energy vortex and then pick up a lot of speed before disappearing into it." Explained D'Anna as the video played "Assuming that they have to go in a straight line we believe that the planet they are on may be Kobol itself."
"Kobol." spat the five as he made the word a curse "We should have nuked it when we found it all those years ago, turn it into a radioactive waste just to spit in the face of the colonials so called Gods."
"Now, this may prove to be of a great befit to us." stated the first humanoid cylon ever made, an older man with a simple black shirt and a hat on. "We know where they are we can launch an attack and end them once and for all."
"That is foolish, Cavil." countered the six "You have seen their weapons why go after them?"
"Because they are humans or did you forget what they did to us!" snapped the five as he slammed his hand on the table "They enslaved us."
"Yes the humans of the 12 colonies of Kobol did, not Earth they have done nothing to us so why commit the sin of murder before the eyes of God when it isn't justified." countered Six as she crossed her legs "Besides this may be a blessing."
"How so?" inquired D'Anna interested by the six's tone of voice.
"Sister, do you remember your history of the 3rd and 4th Tauron World War?" inquired the Six as D'Anna smiled.
"Well that is an idea." said D'Anna with a grin "Yes, that could work."
"Will someone fill the rest of us in?" inquired Cavil as the first model threw his hands up in frustration.
"The 3rd and 4th Tauron World War was won by the weakest nation on Tauron." noted the six "And do you know how?"
"Do we care?" snapped the Five
"Because they got the other nations to destroy each other and once they had used up all their strength they came in and defeated them all." noted D'Anna "That is why we care, we should take a page out of their own book."
"Yes…" said Cavil with a smile as he got what the six was putting on the table "Why should we fight Earth and the Colonies, we should have them fight each other."
"But how?" inquired the Five
"We could use the belief in their false Gods against them." offered Cavil "The main reason they never went searching for Kobol was because they believed it to be a sin against their false Gods, if their cousins have taken Kobol we can use that to drive them to war."
"This could work but it could bring them together, a reunion on Kobol could be played as a sign by their gods." stated the Five
"They have had no contact between each other in 4,000 years there has to be something we can do to force a wedge between them. We just need to find out how and then set the stage for that to happen." stated the Six "We will need to drop a few more copies into areas where they would be the most useful, most of all the deep space telescope program the colonials have."
"One of my copies is head of the program already," stated the Fourth "That is how we have been able to hide our ships from their deep space telescopes."
"Still there is going to be a massive effort to find Earth now, you will need help to stay on top of everything." stated Cavil as he thought about which copy could be sent as backup. Eight and three where out, Eight was in the military force which had made contact with Earth and could be brought in as an eyewitness. Three was a well known newswoman to have a copy show up suddenly couldn't be explain, same was true for the five who was part of the secretary of education staff and known to government officials. He himself was too old to play the part which meant it was down to either a two or a six. Both could play the part easy enough but what would get the most bang for his money.
"Six, has your copy talked to this Baltar about her family?" inquired Cavil
"I don't think so, last we heard he was more interested in the thing between our legs then anything else." Stated the six "Our spy believes she could have total access to the military network in two to three weeks or so, it is all about trust and we can't rush it. Then again this was before the arrival of Earth.'"
"What about the one in colonial fleet shipyard?" added Cavil
"Basically the same only switch Baltar with Vice Admiral Cain." Reported the six
"Make sure about what they have told their loves and if they know nothing then your spy just got another identical sisters who is a top researcher and another who works at the shipyard, they may run into each other now." stated Cavil as he looked to the four.
"Sure, I can fudge the data make her a fresh out of grad school research assistant who did some field work somewhere isolated for some time." Confirmed the four
"Good and who knows maybe having three sixes around will cut down the time we need to get into Doctor Baltar's files and gain another advantage over our enemies." Confirmed Cavil as the six grinned a bit at the idea.
Well I hope you liked this chapter and how I did the unveiling of the Stargate program to the world. As for the numbers of ships the colonials have I will be going into that in a later chapter but for a general rule I took how many warships the United States, UK, Russia and China have in the real world and times it by 12 so the number will be very high. Now until next time please keep reading, thanks Wilkins75.