Chapter 7:
On the landing pad:
A couple of the survivors from Drop Ship 1 had rigged winches and were pulling the ship toward the edge, in an attempt to clear the pad for what was hoped would be a successful pickup by the other ships within the next half centar or so. DS3 was assisting with the effort, with its forward tow cable deployed and the ship's engines whining as the damaged ship made slow progress toward the edge. There, the wreck of DS1 would take one final, ever-so-brief flight as it plummeted off the edge and tumbled down the mountainside into the ravine below. A couple of explosive devices would make sure that there was no Colonial technology salvageable by the Cylons.
Due to the Cylon mines found under several more pieces of the alien equipment on the main floor of the ancient building, most of the Colonials had been forced to withdraw to the outer wall of the building. Most went back through the holes they'd originally entered, and were using the wall as their defense barrier. The remaining group on left side of the Colonial line followed the others a short time later when a Cylon hand mine came rolling into the area. They scampered back to safety through the wall just before the little bomb went off. Therefore, the Colonials completely controlled the pad, but left the Cylons in command of the main room of the building.
While the situation didn't look all that good for the Colonials, the Cylons had their own problems. They were also essentially pinned down behind the alien equipment which neither side seemed all that interested in destroying. In addition, since it was a small base and considering they'd taken heavy losses from Gronicus' turbolaser in the early part of the battle, they didn't have the overwhelming numbers on which they usually relied to rush in and overpower their foes. Instead, they were forced to rely on little used parts of their cybernetic brains, original programming rarely called upon during the thousand yahren war with the Colonials. Thus, the battle devolved into a sharpshooting contest where any extended exposure invited death; both sides continued suppression fire on a random basis while their snipers searched for a secure but covered position from which to fire on exposed members of the other side.
Outside, Lieutenants Xercleon and Demeter were having a heated discussion over the local comm about the correct course of action, while the Command channel was being restarted yet again. Demeter, who was slightly senior, gave the order that saving the alien equipment be dropped as a priority, but Xercleon pointed out that their mission orders were for them to avoid damage to it so it could be salvaged. "You have to follow the plan!" he almost shouted at Demeter.
Lieutenant Demeter, who was attempting to remain calm despite the junior officer's provocation, pointed at the destruction on the pad and said in the calmest voice he could muster, "Xercleon, before he was killed, Lieutenant Mionicles told us the plan was shot. Remember that? Good. Therefore, forget the fracking equipment. Getting our guys back is top priority, alien equipment be damned. When we go back in, we're going to blow every bit of that stuff if that's what's needed to get them back. Do you understand, Lieutenant?"
Xercleon realized what he'd been arguing, and said, "Sorry, Lieutenant. I'll get my squad ready. Let's go get our guys."
The Command channel finally crackled back to life about that time, but didn't sound very good when the comm officer on DS2 activated it and said, "Test, test, test. Respond."
Most of those in the field clicked acknowledgement, but a few were missing, so the test was repeated. It was then that Marchuk was able to call in on Command, "Sir, two guys from Squad 1, Urdea and Phideas—they broke through before we had to fall back! They made it into that corridor and went after our Warriors! They're still in there and about five Cylons took off for that corridor a couple of centons ago. Whoever's on turbolaser splattered one and we got another one, but the other three got through the doors. Urdea and Phideas have at least three tinheads sneaking up behind them!"
"Everyone, that corridor must be strictly off limits to any more Cylons. If our guys are going to have a chance to rescue the prisoners, we have to do whatever it takes to make sure that no more tinheads make it in there, and pray that they aren't surprised from behind," said Lieutenant Demeter. Silently he added, "Lords help them."
'***
In the sky above Delta 16:
The support Vipers had pulled back up above the moon's thin atmosphere in order to conserve fuel, as had DS4. They had all assumed an orbital pattern, but were expending just enough fuel to allow them to stay only a relatively sharp dive away from the ancient building and the battle zone. DS3, on finishing helping to pull the remains of DS1 off the edge of the platform, was on its way up to join the other ships, and DS2 was in the process of landing on the pad to deploy the LAMAV and support troops to help turn the tide of the battle.
"Hey Cap, are you getting anything funny on your scanner?" asked Ensign Leto. "I'm getting some ground clutter that appears to be moving. And moving pretty fast! Looks like it's going straight toward the building."
"Yeah, I'm getting it now, too, Leto. Good work. Guys, we've got bogeys incoming on an intercept course for our guys on the ground. They're pretty close together, but it looks like quite a few of them. Here's what we're going to do…."
'***
A single Cylon Raider, flying extremely low and moving very slowly, zigzagged its way through the craggy mountain valleys of the moon, carefully hugging the landscape and taking every precaution needed to avoid detection from all but the most careful observer who might be passing directly overhead. With the bait now being offered several hundred kilometrons ahead in the main group, the gold colored Cylon Centurion didn't feel there was too much risk of being observed, but on seeing what would normally be high precision flying but in this case might lead to discovery, the commander said to his pilot, "You must tighten your flight pattern. Do what it takes to avoid detection. When our forces at the mountain base allow the few surviving humans to withdraw, we must be in position to trail the survivors as they flee to their fleet."
The robot pilot, chastised but not offended in the least, returned to following the carefully preplotted flight plan to the letter and replied, "By your command."
The gold Centurion turned to the small viewscreen and once again said, "Intendant, report," but again, there was no response. Perhaps the intendant was performing testing on the small furbags again, but that was not an acceptable excuse during a military operation. Since he was in charge of the operation on the moon, he would require selective reprogramming for the intendant following the destruction of the human fleet.
'***
Hidden in the upper atmosphere of the blue gas giant, Delta:
The IL series robot, its cranium scintillating, entered the command room of the Base Fleet commander and approached the command podium. Speaking in its soft voice, it said, "Commander, the trajectory detected by our forces on the moon has been analyzed and it appears that the human fleet is most likely located on the back side of this gas giant. This matches the predicted plan we have from one of our spies within the human ranks. We have a Raider prepared to track the humans back to their fleet when they withdraw from their incursion into our bio-facility."
The Commander turned toward the speaker and said, "This is as expected." He hit a button on his console, which lit up a three dimensional model of the blue gas giant and the moon with the base between them, and continued, "Our base ships will emerge from the atmosphere now and set these courses, which will allow us to trap the human battlestar and its paltry fleet between us, about here. If the humans begin orbiting the giant, then the rendezvous point will change to somewhere in this area, but we will still have them between our forces and we will destroy them." As he spoke, the model illustrated each step in the carefully crafted plan.
"Commander, what if the humans do something...unexpected? It is, after all, somewhat inherent in their nature to adapt."
"They have no reason to do so since they do not know of our presence, but if they do," replied the Commander, "we will do as they do. We will adapt our plan and then we will destroy them."
'***
