Chapter 7
Command Center, Base Ship 76
A group of six very unsettled humaniform cylons stood around the command table of their base ship, their hands submerged in the bioelectric gel that enabled them to interface with their ship and their own models. Each was lost in his or her own thoughts, the events of the last few days overwhelming them. A familiar voice interrupted their reverie.
"So you need me now do you?" A Three walked towards them with a predatory smile. Not just any Three, but the Three known as D'Anna Biers. She wore the white blazer and skirt combo that she usually favored. She was enjoying every minute of their discomfort and she was going to rub it in.
There was a long silence. Cavil cleared his throat. "ahem"
D'Anna looked at him for a long moment. "Did you say something brother?" she emphasized the word "brother". All the other cylons were watching their interplay with keen interest.
The Cavil models had been infused with a deep sense of pragmatism. Whether it was from the original cylons, or their god, they didn't know. But the Cavil and all other cylon models knew that pride was a human sin. So in effect, cylons like Cavil had no pride to swallow. Cavil knew it was better to work with D'Anna than against her.
"Actually, all our lines came to a consensus. That with a momentous decision such as this, we needed to bring you and your line out of cold storage. The whole cylon race could be affected by our decisions here today. You were boxed, and rightfully so, because you and your line continually defied the group consensus. But right now we need to put aside past differences and work together. Let bygones be bygones" he held his arms open, a smile on his face.
That only infuriated D'Anna more. She had been brought up to date on current events when she merged briefly with the hybrid. "I see" she hissed menacingly, "a couple of mistakes have been made since I was put in the freezer." She turned to a Six. "Caprica Six decides to take Hera and escape with the traitor" she glared at Boomer. "And a Cavil provokes and initiates an ill advised attack on these new humans" her eyes finally resting on Cavil. If looks could kill, the Cavil would have fallen over. "All mistakes" she continued, "worthy of boxing those lines" she concluded. "Am I correct?"
A Simon stepped forward. "Which is why it was decided to bring your line out of storage. We need to learn from our mistakes, otherwise we would be no better than the humans"
"And it took you all two days to decide this?" she said tightly.
A Leoben came to stand next to Simon. "Yes it did D'Anna. It's time you got over it. We're not asking for your forgiveness, although God blesses those who do forgive"
"Oh, I can forgive, but I won't ever forget" D'Anna said. Although her tone suggested otherwise. She had seen the faces of the final five models before she 'died' and she wasn't about to reveal their identities. Besides, she thought, I can't really be sure if it was a hallucination or not. I'll play that card when the time is right.
"We're receiving a transmission!" said a number five 'Doral'model.
"From where" asked Boomer, glad for the distraction. The argument with D'Anna was getting tiresome. She once again submerged her hands in the gel to access the transmission.
"It looks like it's from one of our operatives. Let's see….it looks like Baltar was actually acquitted after his trial…this Voyager and Captain Janeway claim to be from earth and are journeying there.." Simon informed the group.
"What's even more disturbing is that the colonials have requested asylum and Janeway has granted it" finished Aaron.
The group looked at each other, concern on their faces. These new events changed everything. Not only was this new ship technologically superior, the colonials were now under their protection. That meant they couldn't attack the colonials while they were under Voyager's protection.
"Well, let's look at the bright side, we can follow them to earth now, since this Janeway supposedly knows the way" said Boomer.
"With 'supposedly' being the operative word" countered D'Anna. "There's still no proof, and our operative has her own doubts."
"There's more" added Boomer as she accessed the message. "Earth is supposedly part of these United Federation of planets, in fact it's the capital" she paused. "This Federation is also composed of non human races"
"Aliens?" asked Six.
"That's what Janeway said during the press conference. Our operative also reported that these aliens were present during the initial visit by Janeway" said Boomer.
Cavil was incredulous. "Humans working with non humans? Impossible! We all know that humans can't even live and work with us humaniform cylons, much less aliens. Humans in general, are intolerant. All of them. New Caprica proved that."
For a long moment, no one said a word. Finally, a Simon spoke up "We have to remember that these humans aren't colonials. They didn't create us. It's possible that these Federation humans have learned to co-exist with non humans"
"Is that possible?" asked Six
"It does appear so" answered Doral.
"Maybe it's possible for us to make peace with these Federation humans" asked a hopeful Six.
D'Anna had been wanting to get back into the conversation. "Yeah, right. After the colonials give their version of history to Voyager, I doubt that Janeway will even want to talk to us. And what do you propose to say to them? 'Gee, we destroyed the civilization of your cousins, the colonials, now we want to make peace with you. Could you show us the way to Earth?" she said sarcastically.
Picking up D'Anna's train of thought, Doral added "That brings up another problem. What if Janeway gives advanced defensive and weapons tech to the colonials? The colonials could come back to seek revenge against us. It's in their nature. They could destroy in in the future."
"Then it's even more imperative that we seek peace with this Federation" Simon said. He looked around. Six and Boomer were nodding their heads. Leoben and Doral had a neutral expression on their faces. Cavil and D'Anna looked doubtful.
"Let's hold on a minute" injected Cavil. It's still too early to make a decision, and might I remined you all that none of this information is confirmed yet. All we have is the report of one of our operatives"
Leoben spoke up "Let's go over what we do know, assuming the report is accurate. This Captain Janeway of Voyager claims to be from Earth and is journeying there, and this Voyager appears to be all alone"
"Correct" said Boomer. "If Voyager is alone, that might mean that Earth is close by"
"That might or might not be the case" said Doral. "We have seen that Voyager possesses superior defensive technology, some kind of defensive shield"
"But we haven't seen any weapons" answered Cavil.
"That's true. It's obvious Voyager posseses advanced defensive technology, logically, we have to assume that Voyager also posseses superior weapons technology" said Simon.
"I get the gist of what you're saying" said Boomer. If the Federation possesses these advanced defensive and weapons technologies, then they must have equally advanced enemies"
Leoben continued "We also know that the Colonials have requested and received asylum from Voyager. So that means we can't attack the Colonials without getting Voyager involved"
"We have to halt our aggressive patrols for now then" concluded Six.
"I have to agree" said Simon. "And if we make an enemy of this Federation, we can't realize our destiny. And our destiny is to reach Earth. We may have to make peace with them."
This was almost too much for Cavil to swallow. He was sure this wasn't the way. It wasn't right. Every fiber of his being resisted the very idea. Humans were an inferior species. They were a flawed creation. God demanded that the cylons take humanity's place. That's why it was God's plan that the humans create the cylons, to get rid of them. But he couldn't deny that these Federation humans had superior technology.
"I don't think this is the right path" he said. He was sure that D'Anna agreed with him. She had no love for the humans. That was for sure.
"Well, I vote we make peace with the Federation humans" said Boomer. As much as she hated the other Sharon who took her happiness, she still held that tiny spark of humanity in her, despite what she said to the other Sharon. Far in the back of her mind, she was hoping to see Galen again.
All around the table, Six, Leoben, Doral, and Simon voted yes.
D'Anna surprised them all, including Cavil. "I also vote yes to peace" She turned to Cavil, a predatory smile on her face "Are you going to DEFY the group, Cavil?"
Cavil, seeing that they all looked at him, realized that he was in a no-win situation. Visibly deflated, he answered "No, of course not"
"Then it's settled. We make peace with the Federation" D'Anna said grandly.
"Not just yet" Doral answered. "We still have to verify our operative's report. I say we wait a few weeks and see what happens. It doesn't look like they'll be leaving the nebula yet"
"What about food?" asked Boomer. "They still need food. And from the previous report, they're running low on tylium. Tyrol even led a labor strike on the tylium refinery ship"
"Then we wait for a follow up report from our operative" said Six.
"Then we wait" said Simon. That was something they all could agree on. Unfortunately for the cylons, they weren't going to have much of a chance.
Two days later….
Boomer was on her way to the command center when she was thrown off her feet. An explosion rocked the ship. She got up and ran the rest of the way to the command center passing various injured humaniform cylon along the way. When she reached the command center, everything was in disarray. The centurions however, looked non the worse for wear.
"What's happening?" she yelled.
"We're under attack" Cavil answered.
"I can see that! By whom? Voyager? The Colonials?" she asked.
"See for yourself" said D'Anna.
Boomer submerged her hands in the gel, interfacing with the ship's sensors. A DRADIS display immediate formed in her mind. There was nothing on it except their own ships. She switched to optical sensors. It was then she noticed seven small ships. And they were firing on them with some kind of beam weapon.
"Have the resurrection ship jump at once" ordered Doral.
"30 seconds before they can jump" answered Simon.
"We need to buy them some time" answered Boomer. She had taken stock of the situation. Seven small ships were firing, taking out missile batteries. These new enemies were methodically taking out their weapons. The whole group's raiders had been launched and were headed toward the enemy.
"Launch everything we have, including the nukes" said D'Anna.
"Launching now" confirmed Cavil.
The five base ships launched every nuclear missile they had. Boomer watched transfixed as the missiles sped away towards the enemy ships. A moment later, she was dissappointed as she watched the enemy ships fire their beam weapons, destroying every single missile launched at them. None of the missiles were even close to their targets as they were destroyed one by one. However, since the enemy was so intent on intercepting their nukes, the resurrection ship jumped away in a flash of light.
"The resurrection ship has jumped to the emergency coordinates" Leoben confirmed.
Boomer returned her attention to the battle. Their raiders were almost there.
"Try the logic bomb" ordered Cavil.
"I'm having the lead raiders transmit…now!" answered Leoben.
On the lead raiders, the logic bomb was being transmitted to these unknown aliens who dared attack them. Moments later, the lights went dark on those ships and they started drifting. Sensing victory, the raiders began launching their own missiles. A few of the closer ones began their strafing runs.
Boomer looked on in dismay as the raiders' missiles seemed to have no effect. The rounds from the raiders' canons seemed to merely bounce off the ships. Some type of armor! she thought.
"Now that we've disabled them, we could've used those nukes right about now" said Doral.
"We don't know if those would have worked either. It appears that standard anti ship missiles are ineffective against their armor" said Simon.
They continued to watch as their raiders launched missiles and continued firing on the enemy ships. Explosions racked the enemy ships, but as the explosions cleared, they could see that the enemy ships were undamaged. How long the enemy ships would be disabled was anyone's guess. The base ships added their own firepower to their raiders. The base ships launched their heavier missiles from whatever missile batteries they had left. Their heavier rail guns adding to the tons of metal flying towards the enemy.
The enemy ships continued to absorb whatever the cylons could throw at them. And still, they appeared intact. Slowly, one by one, to the cylon's horror, the lights came back on in the enemy ships. The ships started firing on their raiders. Whenever a beam touched a raider, it exploded in a spectacular ball of flame. Eventually, over fifteen hundred raiders ceased to exist.
They're toying with us! Boomer thought.
"How long before we can jump?" she yelled.
"Two minutes to jump" answered Cavil.
"We're not going to last 30 seconds against those ships" retorted Boomer. Unfortunately for her, who ever was aboard those ships believed in taking time with their enemy.
"We're receiving a transmission!" said Six.
"We are the Hirogen, and you are our prey" was all the gruff, slightly muffled voice said. Boomer couldn't tell if the voice was human or not. But she could tell that the voice was confident, the voice of command.
"Hirogen? Just who in hades are the Hirogen?" asked D'Anna.
"I don't know, but they're ignoring our transmissions" reported Doral.
The Hirogen ships now turned their attention back to the base ships, firing their devastating beam weapons at the cylon missile turrets and rail guns. Soon, the output from the base ships slackened, then went down to nothing. The were now defenseless. One Hirogen ship fired it's beam weapon, the beam spearing the closest base ship in the middle and emerging out the other side.
"The hybrid of base ship 57 reports that their FTL drive is down! They're unable to jump!" yelled Doral.
On base ship 57, two large humanoids appeared in the command center in a sparkle of light. These humanoids were large, wearing blue black jagged armor. They wore face masks that obscured their faces, leaving only their eyes visible. One had two red marks on his helmet, as if they were hand painted on, while the other had two white marks. They carried huge silver rifles, which they immediately began using on the humaniform cylons. Screams echoed out of the command center as humaniform cylons were gunned down one by one, each with huge holes in their chest or back. Within seconds, every single humaniform cylon in the command center was dead. The hybrid, in her chamber two decks down, summoned a score of centurions to the command center.
One Hirogen was busy decapitating a number eight to collect as a relic when the centurions rushed into the command center. The centurions mobbed the two Hirogen. At first the Hirogen held off the centurions with their rifles as the centurions tried to blast them with their hand guns, creating a deadly wall of lead. But the Hirogen returned fire, blowing away centurions left and right. Seeing that the aliens were unaffected by their guns, the centurions went to their next pre-programmed course of action, and began forming their battle claws. The Hirogen smiled beneath their masks and pulled out their blades. Hand to hand combat is what they lived for! They roared at the centurions, eagerly anticipating the battle to come.
The centurions charged, their claws bared and ready rend and rip the intruders to pieces. Using their numbers, they piled onto the Hirogen, claws desperately trying to gouge at the Hirogen. Unfortunately for the centurions, Hirogen armor was far stronger than centurion steel by an order of magnitude. First one centurion, then another, then another was thrown against the far wall. The Hirogen were using their vibro blades, cutting through centurion amor with ease. The two Hirogen cut down the centurions in a matter of seconds, physically ripping apart any damaged centurion. Soon there were no more centurions left.
The hybrid watched the scene in horror through her optical sensors in the command center, transmitting the images to the command base ship. The hybrid, through her connection, realized the same thing was happening on the other base ships and she sank into despair. It was futile to send more centurions to the command center. They would be cut to pieces. It was time to die. She activated the self destruct sequence…
The Hirogen in the command center received a transmission from the lead ship telling them the ship was going to self destruct. The alpha ordered that as many humaniform cylons possible be beamed away. These humans were resilient prey! he thought as he was transported back to his ship. The hunt was going well. The humans in a surprise move had temporarily disabled their ships with a computer virus, something no other prey had attempted to do. It took a cold restart of their computer systems to get rid of the virus. They would not make the same mistake again. The human computer virus would be analyzed and a defense would be formulated against that.
Back on base ship 76, the cylons were in a panic. They had watched the scene on base ship 57 in undisguised horror, with almost the same exact scene being repeated on the other base ships. Their own base ship was slightly damaged, but they were lucky, their FTL drive was intact because another base ship was in the line of fire and had taken the brunt of the hit instead of them.
Boomer was determined that they learn from the scenes on the other base ships. She ordered two scores of centurions into the command center, their claws retracted, guns out, their sweeping red sensors looking for signs that the enemy might appear. "Time to jump?" she screamed.
"Five seconds" answered Cavil
As he said that, two columns of light appeared in the command center, the same type of large aliens that had appeared on the other base ships took shape.
"Open fire! Aim for their eyes!" she screamed to the centurions while ducking for cover behind the command console.
The centurions began firing at the Hirogen even as they finished materializing. The Hirogen started returning fire, blasting centurions and humaniform cylons alike. D'Anna and Cavil weren't quick enough and were flung to the other side of the room huge gaping holes in their chests.
"We're jumping now!" screamed Doral, he was lying next to her behind the command console. His face was contorted in pain, his left arm and leg burned off by a Hirogen weapon.
The hybrid of base ship 76 completed the jump to the emergency coordinates, leaving the battle behind, knowing that the hybrids of othe other baseships would trigger the self destruct mechanisms for their own ships. She wept at the loss of her sisters while laughing at the same time, knowing that they would be reborn into new bodies. Like all hybrids, she processed so much information from all her sensors and operating most functions of the ship, that she was literally unbalanced.
Back in the command center, the battle raged. Bullets ricocheted off of walls, beam weapons left scorch marks or gaping holes in humaniform cylons and centurions alike. Then one of the centurions got off a lucky shot as it was blasted into oblivion. The round entered the beta's eyeball socket and exited the back of his head. The Hirogen went down even as his alpha continued to fire at the centurions. When the alpha saw his beta go down, he went into a rage. He pulled off his mask and threw it across the room. He threw down his rifle while pulling out his blade. He was going to rip these humans and their robots apart for daring to kill his beta. He roared with rage and pounced on the centurions, slicing them apart. The centurions vainly tried to fight back, but their claws simply couldn't penetrate Hirogen armor. Soon there were no centurions left standing. Looking around at the blood spattered walls, human body parts and mangled centurions lay everywhere. He stooped to take the head of a blonde human female. Then the alpha pressed a button on his chest that would activate the recall signal and transport him back to his ship. Nothing happened. He pressed it again. Still nothing happened. It was then that he saw Boomer on the other side of the command table, trying to crawl. The alpha jumped on top of her, pinning her down.
"You must be responsible for this!" he roared. With his left hand, he grabbed the small human's throating, intending to squeeze the life out of her. With his right hand, he reached for his blade, intending to take her head as a relic. Bringing his face centimeters from hers, he growled "You pathetic human, I'm going to enjoy terminating you". Boomer gagged from his foul breath.
Boomer spotted a gun, partially covered by Cavil's body. She slowly reaching for it with her right hand, while her left vainly tried to pry the Hirogen's hand from around her throat. She couldn't breathe, as the Hirogen had begun to squeeze her throat, trying to throttle her. As she was about to lose conciousness, a shot rang out.
The Hirogen turned around, wondering who had the temerity to shoot him in the back.
Leoben stood there, the gun still smoking in his quaking hands. A look of absolute fear on his face. The Hirogen smiled. Oh frack was Leoben's last thought as the Hirogen deftly turned around and with one deft swipe of his blade, Leoben's head went flying, landing on the pile of humaniform cylons and centurions.
The distraction allowed Boomer to retrieve the gun. When the Hirogen turned back to her, she snarled "You're terminated fracker!" and pulled the trigger.
The alpha's brain barely had time to register his surprise when the bullet entered his mouth and exited the back of his head, blowing off his helmet. Blood and brain matter dripped down his back as his suddenly slack body collapsed on top of Boomer.
Not again she thought as she blacked out..
USS Voyager
Janeway threw herself on her bed, utterly exhausted. Her tour of Voyager for the Quorum had exhausted her. For the thousandth time she was thankful that Chakotay had been at her side, helping her answer questions from the Quorum and their little bevy of reporters. She'd gone into excrutiating detail about the Federation government, its policies and how it applied to them. There were a few of them who had interesting questions to be sure.
The hard ones were the questions about religion coming from the Sagittaron and Gemonese council members. They had asked why Earth, the 13th tribe, no longer worshipped the Lords of Kobol. Chakotay, being the anthropologist, had answered them that the knowledge of Kobol must have been lost over the centuries. While the knowledge of Kobol had been lost, he explained that Earth still retained some knowledge. They had gone to astrometrics, and Chakotay had brought up the twelve signs of the zodiac and they had been amazed. Roslin had commented that the zodiac had retained the ancient names of the colonies. Chakotay had said the zodiac played an important part in astrology, and that each sign of the zodiac covered part of the Earth year. Doing a little mental arithmetic, Janeway had proclaimed to Sarah Porter, the Sagitarron council woman, that she was born on May 20, which made her a Taurus. The Quorum, including Roslin, had been intrigued at that.
She was relieved that the anticipated controntation with Tom Zarek hadn't come about. He had greeted her with a toothy grin and politely introduced himself, other than that, he seemed content to stay in the backround. But he seemed to be keenly observing everything. He asked relatively few questions, mainly questions about human rights and democracy in the Federation. She didn't believe his insincere smile for a minute and was sure he had to be planning something. What it was, she wasn't sure. Probably something for Roslin to worry about, not her.
She had taken them to the holodeck and called up historical programs of Earth and the Federation. They had literally sat in the Federation Council chamber seats and watched as the legendary Captain Jonathan Archer gave his famous speech commemorating the signing of the Coalition of Planets Charter, which would lead to the founding the the United Federation of Planets. She had brought up a holographic representation of a map of the galaxy, showing where they were and where Earth was located, showing just how far they had to go. They came away with an appreciation of the length of the journey ahead of them.
The most amazing thing to the Quorum was the demonstration of the replicators and the transporters. One council member, had asked why Voyager couldn't simply upgrade all their ships. Janeway had explained that while Voyager had the ability to replicate food and supplies, it took a large amount of power to do so. Once they left the nebula, they would have to search for food an fuel when supplies ran low. And she had said, that Voyager was only a light cruiser, a short range science cruiser with a crew of 132. Voyager simply didn't have the personnel or resources to do everything. Adama had commented that while Voyager was short handed, the colonials were not. He had said Galactica could help with any personnel resources she might require. Galactica was also carrying the crew complement of Pegasus. Many Pegasus crew members had gone down to New Caprica to settle, and Pegasus had been left with a skeleton crew when the cylons arrived. After the battle of New Caprica, many former Pegasus crew members had been rescued and integrated into Galactica's crew, but Galactica was way overcrowded. Janeway had thought about that. She had been thinking of beefing up Voyager's Hazard Team. A large, completely outfitted and trained Hazard Team could give them an edge in some hostile encounters. She would talk to Tuvok and Ensign Munro about recruiting new Hazard Team members from Galactica's colonial marines and start training them.
She had taken them on a tour of the Starfleet Academy grounds and they ate at the same Starfleet Command banquet hall, this time though, she had programmed it for daylight, with a view of the golden gate bridge in the backround. Janeway had enjoyed giving them the news that Voyager would be able to replicate food and supplies. Chakotay explained how the process would work, and that they would be able to begin transporting food supplies to the colonials. The colonials had stood up and applauded at that. But Janeway explained, they would need to use the transporters, since transporting food supplies to all the ships in the fleet using shuttles and raptors would be just too time consuming. Most of the colonials had seemed squeamish at the idea, and the Sagittaron and Gemonese council members seemed downright adamant that they could not abide by this method of transportation.
That's when Galen and Cally Tyrol had volunteered to be the first colonials to be transported. Tyrol had looked a little nervous at first but he bravely stepped on the transporter pad. Janeway had told the transporter chief to transport Tyrol to Galactica's CIC. After he dematerialized, she wished she could have seen the looks on the faces of Galactica's CIC crew when Tyrol had materialized there. After a minute, she had Tyrol beamed back. He had been all smiles and excitedly told them all that he hadn't felt a thing, and that one moment he was on Voyager, and the next moment he was in CIC. He said Colonel Tigh had been rendered speechless. Adama laughed at that. Seeing her husband was safe, Cally Tyrol requested to be beamed to the maintenance deck and back. After beaming back to Voyager, she had stepped off the transporter pad with a grin from ear to ear. Janeway had explained to them that they would have to get used to the transporter since this was the main method in the Federation for traveling from ship to ship, or ship to planetside. After that demonstration, and repeated assurances from Janeway and Chakotay that the transporter was entirely safe, most of the council members and reporters, including Adama and Roslin, had agreed to be transported. The Sagittaron and Gemonese council members still balked. They would ride back in the shuttles they said.
Doctor Cottle had been requested by the doctor to remain on Voyager for the night so that the doctor could start train him in the use of starfleet medical instruments, to which Cottle had quickly agreed. Which brought up an interesting point she thought. Thankfully, there were no questions about the doctor, or even a single question about why the doctor didn't have a name. They had been too distracted by starfleet technology she surmized. But that wouldn't last long. It's time the doctor chose a name for himself, that would help deflect any questions about his origins. Right now, the colonials assumed he was merely another human from earth.
After the colonials had departed, Janeway had a long talk with Chakotay, Tuvok, and Ensign Munro about expanding Hazard Team, and formulating a plan to best make use of the colonial's personnel resources. Munro had said that he would go to Galactica in the morning and work with Tigh on recruiting potential candidates for Hazard Team. They had to be the best of the best he had said. Chakotay had joked that the holodeck was also going to be used extensively for a while as Hazard Team members were trained. He also mentioned that they would also have to train the Galactica CIC crew on how to make use of the phasers and deflector shields. Tuvok said he would start programming tactical scenarios for Adama and company. Having deflector shields and phaser banks would be useless if Adama and his crew didn't know how to use them or make optimal use of them.
She had just started to doze off when Harry's voice came over the intercom. "Bridge to the Captain" Harry reported. Janeway blearily looked at her chronometer. 2335 hrs. "This had better be good Harry" she warned.
"It is Captain!" Harry's excited voice said. "We're receiving a transmission from Starfleet on the hypersubspace transceiver array.
She jumped up. "I'm on my way"
