13: The Line
by chaos_eternus
"I don't like this," Murielle commented quietly, her expression dark as she gazed through the binoculars at the encampment below.
"They're preparing to mobilise,"
"Oh, I agree," she noted, "and you were right to buzz me. But we've had Jaffa doing raids, Jaffa surrendering, Jaffa trying to blend in and make a life for themselves… but this lot. They've set up here since Disclosure and not moved… they've even farmed for supplies for fucks sake and now they choose to mobilise?"
"They don't have strength enough for any major moves,"
"That," Murielle noted darkly, "would depend on what the rest of us are up to at the time."
This was considered for a moment by her companion, then "shit."
"I think its time we brought this bunch in for questioning,"
"They may have just been told to prepare to move, they might not have their mission orders yet."
Murielle gazed across the small encampment and shook her head, "no, the way they're moving… I think they know exactly where they're headed."
"Well, they're not the real problem. The bastards we don't know about…"
She nodded, "I think we need to issue a stage 2 alert right now."
"Undocking now,"
The voice was quiet over the borrowed radio but he winced anyway, hoping the small group of Jaffa around the corner hadn't heard.
The clumping stopped and then reversed and he knew his prayer wasn't to be answered. A pity; still…
He shot Shoketa a look and gestured for a grenade. With a nod, the small globe of a Goa'uld shock grenade was pulled from the soldiers webbing and a quick three count later, tossed swiftly forwards, bouncing off the far wall and around the corner.
He felt the distinctive brief moment of disorientation that signalled a shock grenade going off nearby but not near enough to disable. That was his signal and in that moment, was already slipping his head and his left arm around the corner, Zat in hand and firing.
He felt a tap on his back and dropped to his knees, a few moments later he could see the brilliant actinic glare of Zat fire volleying form above his head as well.
A staff weapon opened and eyes widened, he took a swift step back, bumping into a set of legs. The corner of the corridor flared brilliantly orange for a moment and a few splatters of molten metal filled the air.
He took a step forward, head and arm around the corner once more, looking for the Jaffa that had fired but he was already dropping to the ground, his armour sparkling slightly for a moment with the afterglow of a Zat burst.
Two more shots; carefully choosing his targets, then it was over.
He signalled a pause and listened for a moment, wondering if another group of Jaffa had heard and were closing in. He heard nothing and signalled Thompson to go down the corridor, beyond the fallen Jaffa and guard, Piers he signalled as the rear-guard and then stepped out into the corridor, noting with glee that several of the Jaffa had manacles on their belts.
Either they were expecting to take prisoners or… or what he didn't know. What he did know is that it would allow him to eke out their own supply a little longer. There were a lot of Jaffa on this ship and whilst some were dead or dying, a lot weren't and their Free Jaffa allies did insist were possible that captured Jaffa should have the chance to renounce their False Gods.
Didn't bother him to much, killing prisoners however did. He would leave the treatment of those who failed to make the safe choice to the Jaffa .
Right now, he had to make this quick though and get this lot to the main cargo bay. They still had a lot of decks to search, he just hoped the Free Jaffa were up to the job of commanding this ship in battle, it wasn't as if any of them had had the opportunity before after all.
"I can see where Sarah is coming from," Billingsgate noted, "hell, I'll back her up in this, the quality of some of the greenies I'm getting just isn't up to par, they simply don't have the flight hours and my squadron commanders are all burning valuable flight time on training missions because of this. I just don't see how we're going to manage it."
"The funding…"
"Is an issue of course, but we have five fighter squadrons either forming or reforming at the moment plus two support squadrons. There are orders in the queue for ten more squadrons of support craft… ten!"
Peters whistled, "Hell… I knew it was bad but…"
"I know, I've had a meeting with WingCo Reynolds about this yesterday, passed your message onto him too. He's definitely supportive but… well; you know that old saw about the bureaucracy expanding to meet the needs of the expanding bureaucracy?"
"Yes?"
"Well, we may have that problem… but we're also seeing the numbers of support craft growing to support the growing numbers of support craft."
She laughed wryly at that, "Well, getting some serious shipping going between Sol and Alpha will help."
"Of course it will… but the merchants will need support ships of their own and sooner or later we'll have to boast our rescue capabilities to cover them as well."
"I know Colonel," Peters shook her head, "our expansion is a little more break-neck then I would like at the moment in every area except actual combatants."
"And that's going to pick up like a bat out of hell once Gaia goes online, assuming funding."
"We have funding for three more ships right now; I would have two of them on the stocks except it would mean no slips empty should we need to do some repairs."
The American nodded, conceding the point, "still… it will just get worse when the final design for the Starlifter is selected but Reynolds informs me that all the designs which have made it to the final stage do have a far greater capacity them the Airheads so hopefully we'll need fewer of them."
"Not the way we're expanding we won't," Peters noted, "and its looking like more then one of the designs may get selected."
"Oh, Ray's gonna love that."
"I know," shrugging, she gestured towards her small kitchenette as she rose from her desk, "but there are two stand-out designs and they both have their advantages. The Airheads aren't going to go away either, as much as it might screw your aerodynamics over, there are some cargos that are just better lifted externally."
"Are we looking at any new countries coming in to help fund all this?"
"A few," Peters replied, refusing to say any more.
"I see…" he raised an eyebrow, then shrugged, "still, I don't want us to get to the point we're we're robbing Peter to pay Paul here."
"Little late for that," came the reply, "our budget already exceeds the total income of certain western nations I could mention and still… Finance is actually considering issuing war bonds again… war bonds for God's sake!"
"Is that even legal nowadays?" Billingsgate noted, "I mean the financial laws aren't what they were during the Second World War."
"Apparently so," she shrugged, "the cash injection would be nice but I don't see this war being finished in my lifetime. Frankly, having to start paying back the bonds whilst we're still involved in the fighting might cause issues. Not really my call that one though…"
He snorted, "Glad its not mine either… but Sarah isn't the only one pushing for more Squadrons."
"How many?"
"Frankly?" Billingsgate shrugged, "between Earth, Alpha Centauri, Edonia our deployments 'overseas' and having availability for offensive operations… between us and the Colonials we have twenty-six combat squadrons of which only fifteen are fully operational. Not only would I like to see that doubled…"
Peters winced but he hadn't finished, "but I would like to at least four of those Squadrons based in Earth orbit, not the surface. The surface to orbit time is murderous."
"Good luck getting that in a hurry," she replied dryly, "Oh, don't misunderstand me, I certainly want fighters in orbit, the difference that will make to the reaction times… well, it wasn't that long ago we had one of the Ha'taks being used as a fighter base in orbit and that certainly made the point."
"I may just push for that again, at least until we get something more permanent," he noted, nodding gratefully at the steaming mug he was handed.
" Lancers and Vipers take up the least deck space," Peters noted, "but the Lancers are being phased out and we don't have any spare Vipers. It would have to be F-302's."
"Same basic profile as a glider," Billinsgate noted.
"But only one operational squadron in this system," she replied shaking her head, "and that's based here."
"I know," he replied, sighing, "this is a large part of my problem. We have no fighter reserves at all. Well, except for the Darts and they are a last resort."
"We need more of everything," came the swift reply, "but we're not going to get it. Right now, we should consider ourselves lucky…"
She stopped abruptly as the tannoy sounded and the lights flicker to a new colour. Her cup dropped, bouncing across the sink as she dived out of her offices and into the bridge, the Colonel following swiftly behind.
"Why are we at Yellow alert?"
"We just got word from Manston," came the grim reply, "the outer perimeter just got breeched by Jaffa ."