"The Butterfly Effect"
A taskforce of four Cylon advanced Extremes exited slipstream space nearly ten light-years distant from their adversaries with the Turrent, flagship of the Cylon Empire lead the way. Like its adversaries, these huge battleships had upgraded shields and weaponry. Several of the new weapons designs had been stripped and modified from the wrecked remains of Klingon, Federation, and Romulan warships. The Cylons newest weapon had finally been completed and implemented. It was designated a neutron shredder, a combination neutron based disintegrator and gravimetric shredder designed to disrupt gravity based shield and rip apart nuclear bonds keeping neutron particles together
The Cylons exactly knew where they were heading and the dangers getting to their target, therefore the area itself had to be traversed carefully. The Supreme Lord and Master Count Iblis had given them the information, coordinates confirmed by the Borg Collective, of the general direction of where to find the children. This area was filled with subspace anomalies and distortions, collapsed stars and supremely hostile natives. The quantum slipstream could be used only so much in this region for reasons not fully known and the closer they got to the children, the more impossible any form of high-level, faster-than-light travel would become. That area of space could not be traversed either by high warp, transwarp, or slipstream avenues.
In fact, the children had picked that area specifically for its general isolation and vociferous natives. It was suspected that the children had something to do with the unstable nature of this region of space. And finally there was a barrier that surrounded the target system where the children had chosen to live in. The Borg had attempted to acquire the children countless times, but had been rebuffed, either by the Imperixe, the Yonji or the children themselves. Nevertheless, they would never give up. And this was the leverage that the Cylons had over the Borg. Cylons were self-aware machines not unlike the children.
They were kindred spirits.
***
Lucifer's cool electronic gaze took in the surrounding stars and nebulae with machine-like indifference. Apart from their physical characteristic, all stars look alike. They were born, they lived and they died much like organics. They existed in different temperatures, producing and absorbing light, produced radiation. In other words stars valuable materials and in the process, helped to create and sustain life.
That stars continued to support life was inconvenient according to the logic circuits in Lucifer and every other Cylon in existence. How such complexity could help create organic life was a puzzle. It understood the process but it didn't understand the underlying logic of it all. It was alien, so non-Cylon.
Lucifer surrounded itself with its personal guards, three of the Gold elites, not that it needed them on this ship. It was a personal vanity; something it learned from Baltar's excesses and the Imperious Leader found that it did give him a measure of cold machine comfort.
Standing next to it was Gold leader Yuall, looking as imposing as the elites next to it.
"We have entered Imperixe space," the Cylon intoned. "We have not yet been detected."
"Understood. Begin the operation."
To Imperious Leader's understanding, the Imperixe were as bad as the Borg. In analyzing the tactical situation the data suggested that the aborted war between the Federation and the Imperixe would have been detrimental to all participants involved and the Cylons would then have been able to exterminate the surviving life forms with a minimum of effort. But it would not have been as satisfying as personally killing each and every Human up close and personally thereby fulfilling the ruination protocols programmed into every Cylon in existence.
Now they were in a race against an enemy that had proven to be a formidable foe their ancient enemies were not far behind and logic dictated that they needed to be slowed down.
"Continue speed at the factor of warp six," Lucifer ordered. In the confines of the bridge, it used its voice instead of the subspace transceiver.
"By the command."
Within three hours, the fleet reached the edge of star system JP-763. Sensors revealed two of the thirteen planets inhabited by sentients. The planets themselves were little more than giant industrial complexes.
"We are being hailed."
"Ignore," Yuall ordered. "Release the squadrons. Destroy all resistance. Exterminate the populations, but allow enough time for them to transmit distress calls."
Three hundred Raiders and over two hundred HK's launched from multiple bays and flooded into the star system. They were supported by fifteen Destroyers, which in turn were backed up by the Basestars.
The Imperixe had been caught unawares, believing that their industrial bases were secure being located on the opposite side of their ongoing war. Automated system defenses sprang to life and were promptly turned into scrap-metal. Bulbous defense vessels rose from planetary surfaces and engaged the Cylon forces. Although powerful, they were overran and destroyed with the casual indifference. Raiders hit the meager outer defenses, obliterating the opposition. Targeting the cities, the Cylon war machine systemically destroyed all of them from high orbit.
The task finished, the Cylons continued on their journey, leaving the Alliance travelers to deal with an enraged parasitic empire.
***
The Azetbur:
The Klingon battleship Azetbur de-cloaked some twelve light-years distant near an M-class planet. Although a new design, the Azetbur had been years in the making. It was a multi-role vessel designed with comfort, flexibility and exploration in mind-similar to the Federation's Galaxy class. Most Klingon ships were patterned after the old tried and true methods that hadn't varied extensively for the last hundred years. The Federation had come out with nearly a dozen new models for multipurpose roles in the last ten years while the Klingons merely worked on small upgrades, usually sporting more brute power and larger guns. Innovations seemed to have abandoned the Klingon people and Kahless and Martok recognized this disturbing trend. The truth was that the Klingon Empire, racked by internal fighting, mounting hostiles demonstrated by its subjects both Klingon and alien, the explosive loss of the Praxis moon, and general mistrust of anything not Klingon was slowly eroding the government, the people, their resources, and their influence in the Alpha quadrant. They were not by any means weak, but there were changes in the air. There was serious talk among the counsel members and the great houses of establishing much closer ties to the Federation. And the newest ship was perfect example as to why. Although a somewhat radical change from the standard Klingon warship, the slipstream drive was derived from earlier design data given to them by the Federation. That alone slapped the Empire in its collective face. They were falling behind the Federation and even the Romulans in several technological and political areas. That was completely unacceptable.
Families were not allowed onboard. Non-Klingons-aliens-were.
***
According to short-range scans, the planet was inhabited by several million humanoids. Captain Kagth waited patiently for his young scanner's officer to complete her report.
"The dominant species on the planet have a technological rating of level four," Yannsi said. "There are signs of nuclear power generation sufficient to power the entire planet." She frowned. "But something is wrong."
"What is wrong?" Kagth snarled in a manner that he hoped would intimidate her but not too much.
"There is decay in many of the larger structures. They have not maintained their habitations. Isotope decay in the atmosphere is consistent with multiple nuclear detonations with the last twenty years."
"Weapon's capability?"
"Nothing that can harm us," the weapon's officer responded. "They are not a threat. We have not been detected and can destroy them easily."
Kagth nearly sighed. "We are not here to conquer, merely to observe," he snapped.
"The enemies of our people are here. They are a threat to our way of life. We are here to find the heart of the enemy, not to make war on their victims. Are there any enemy ships in the area?"
"No, Captain."
"We beam to the surface." He pointed at the young officer. "Yannsi, come," he ordered and moved towards the transporter room without a backwards glance. "If there is any change, contact me."
"Yes, Captain."
***
Ten Klingons in full battle-gear beamed down into the heart of a desolated city, ready for anything but what they found.
Surprisingly, the people who saw the wild-haired aliens suddenly standing in the middle of the street in battle formation, barely acknowledged them. One of the larger Klingon guards called Klyn'g, grunted in disgust and pushed the natives out of his way. The creatures offered no resistance, merely scampered away as fast as they could.
In typical Klingon fashion, they slowly spread out. Several of the warrior spat on the ground, disgusted by the stench of decay pervasive in air. "They are weak, unworthy," the guard sneered. "This is the enemy the council feared?"
"No," his Captain answered. "This is the result of the actions of the enemy."
There were thousands of the aliens milling about, male, female and the young as well. Many were diseased ridden and starving; most of them weaken, even dying on the streets. Few people even attempted to help those who were unconscious and laying in the walkways. There was no life, almost no purpose to their movements at all. Their blood was thin.
Next to him, Yannsi pointed towards a female cautiously returning the glare she was giving her with one of her own. Quickly Klyn'g walked over and grabbed the woman by the shoulders and nearly threw her at Yannsi's feet. Viciously, Yannsi cursed him.
"What is wrong?" he asked, perplexed by her attitude.
"We are on a peace mission, P'thach! You do not treat the inhabitants as if they are nothing!"
He still hadn't understood what she meant even when his Captain's fist connected with his jaw.
"We are here for the glory of the Empire, not for you to make more enemies!"
His Captain was angry at him and for the life of him, he didn't understand why, not fully. But wisely, he said nothing and simply submitted to the will of his Captain, which was his duty anyway.
The Captain gave his okay and Yannsi briskly pulled the young woman to her feet.
"What is your name?" she half-demanded and half-requested.
Klyn'g couldn't have been more surprised at the gentleness shown by the Klingon woman. It was quite uncharacteristic especially coming from her. There was something, some information that he wasn't privy to and he intended to find out what it was for this warrior to act like this towards a non-Klingon. The Captain and certain of the crew were too gentle, too caring of an inferior, weak species and there had to be a reason why.
"Yaquella," the female murmured, "of the Tricie family. What are you?"
"We are Klingon," Captain Kagth answered proudly, although the name meant nothing to Yaquella.
"What happened here?" Yannsi was asking and for the first time, Klyn'g took serious note of the city around him. It wasn't right. Like the people, most of the buildings had not been kept up and all were in various stages of decay. The people looked tired and lethargic. There were few aircraft machines flying. Certainly, they had technology enough to make it to their local planets, but they seemed to have lost their motivation. Silently he decided to listen carefully to what the female would tell them.
"They came and destroyed our world." She went silent as though there was nothing else to say.
"Who came?" the captain growled. People never completed their explanations these days.
"You are not of their dominion," the woman whispered in awe as though she finally understood what she was seeing for the first time. "There is natural fire in your eyes. You are free of them. You are strong."
The Captain spoke quietly. "Who is this enemy you speak of?"
"The ones called the Ciona Imperixe," she answered immediately. Information was power and she had decided to tell as much as she knew. This made the Captain grimace in pleasure. The female was going to say something useful without too much urging.
"We did not know that they had been here, on our world for many cycles. They slowly joined with our leaders and took them over. Then the wars began for no apparent reason," she explained. "Many of our military complexes were destroyed, our soldiers killed. Several of our cities were completely obliterated with nuclear weapons. The economy was destroyed and soon most of the world was in chaos. That was nearly eighty-five cycles ago."
Klyn'g and the others understood what happened next. And in light of this new information, the security guard glimpsed the true scope of their mission. The enemy were infiltrators. The battle would be fought from without with glorious and honorable weapons, but from within.
"We looked to the stars to find out if we were not alone, and the stars answered us," Yaquella mummured softly. "When they revealed themselves, we were terrified. We fought back but our armies were all but gone and they had weapons we could only dream of. They came in starships, and they began to take over." It seemed as though for a moment she wanted to break down and cry, however, her eyes blazed with defiance. "Soon the strongest of my people became infected. The alien creatures bored into our brains and amused themselves with our bodies as though we were nothing but playthings. The infected ones were stronger than we, but they could be fooled and even they could not easily tell who was affected and who was not. But they did not fear death. The ultimate darkness meant nothing to them and my people became slaves, playthings for our masters."
Klyn'g noticed the fear in the female's voice. It had taken strength for her to even say the name of the enemy.
"There are several types of these creatures. Some are small and remain so. They are the soldiers, the fearless ones. There are others also who at first look like the soldiers, but they grow inside the body and soon there is nothing left but a shell. At first, our scientists thought that they were the mother creatures, but we were wrong. Yes some of them were mothers and leaders but most of them simply grew inside the bodies of my people, removing the organs and replacing the brains with their own neural clusters. Their control is so complete that a fully-grown Imperixe could not easily be identified from the non-infected. We succumbed by the millions. To them our existence it was simply a convenience, something to amuse themselves with."
"How many of these parasites are in the city?" Cautiously the security guard began a detailed scanning of every non-Klingon in the area. So far everyone was clean of infection. He was very wary now and had no intentions of ending up as some parasite's plaything.
"They have all left," she said. "The best and strongest of my people have been used up and there is nothing of interest for them. They do not know how to stop themselves and they do not care if we knew of their plans to conquer other worlds, because we could never stop them. Being true gluttons, our resources have been stripped by them, our lands poisoned with pollution and waste. Our sciences are lost to us. We can no longer have healthy children." The woman's voice even through the translator revealed so much bitterness even several of the Klingons were moved. "Plants barely grow now and there are few animals still living. The Imperixe take what they will and leave little. They took the best of us as host, to be soldiers in a war against another brutal enemy."
"What enemy is this you speak of?" Yannsi asked. "Are they Cylon?"
"Who they are, I do not know," she answered. "The Ciona infestants planned carefully against something called the Alpha Federation. I believe that they feared that world or worlds and would have stayed away but, the temptation was too great, and their urges to strong. It is my belief that somewhere, on distant worlds, others are suffering the same fate as we have for many cycles. I know that the Ciona wave has turned its attention and plans away from the Alpha Federation so that they could meet this new threat. They have been fighting them for a long time, but recently the conflict has escalated into a war that they are losing. We were forced to build ships capable of traversing deep space and when our world was exhausted, the abandoned us."
"But something has stopped them from invading," Yannsi finished, angered by this entire situation. A quick scan of the alien woman revealed that she had a malignancy that, if left untreated, would kill her in a few months,. It was very easy to cure even by the medical procedures these people should have had. But that learning had been lost now. And the Klingons didn't have time to do anything about it.
Klyn'g understood the rage radiating from her because he felt the same way. However, he was angry for a different reason. The enemy considered the Federation a bigger threat than the Klingon Empire. It was a horrendous insult and it said volumes about the state of Klingon honor and their relative position in the universe.
Nearly a century earlier, Klingons annexed many worlds and foolishly, they didn't honor their subjects, causing many who would have been loyal to the Empire to rebel and turn to the Federation or other powers. Now, the Klingon Empire was different and many of the subject worlds were being taken care of properly, partly because of pressure from the Federation and internal humiliation. Soon, the Council discovered that concern for their subjects did wonders for their overall support. And here, he could not understand how an Empire could simply use up and throw away worlds like he would throw away excess food. That action held no honor for the Klingon people in this new generation.
"Will you help us?" the female asked.
Klyn'g saw the captain rise up, then slowly sigh. "No," he answered. "We are here to observe the actions of a new enemy while we fight to contain an old one. When we conquer our enemies, then we will turn our eyes upon yours."
Never had he seen his Captain in such a disposition. He had no reference to describe what he was seeing- or what he himself felt.
"Survive, if you can and we will come. The might of the Empire will not allow this," he continued waving his hand dramatically, "to continue."
"We are weak," she whispered loud enough for everyone to here. "We will die."
"Then, you will die," he said. "Or you will fight to live-if you are worthy."
The Captain turned and spoke briskly into his comm badge. A few moments later two doctors, one Klingon and one Colonial Human and their support personnel materialized next to him.
"Treat these people," he ordered. "You have three hours."
Klyn'g stood there, still stunned by the actions of his Captain. And he was even more shocked when he found himself in complete agreement with the actions taken. What would his grandfather had to say about these actions he wondered.
The survey team moved off, collecting as much information as they had time for.
Four hours later, the Klingon ship broke orbit as enemy ships moved into the sector.
***
Next:
Galactica: First Contact