Neptune's Revenge

by cliff.west

What happens when the Battlestar Galactica from BSG 2003 finds another group of lost humans but these humans are from Rifts Earth? My first attempt at writing so buyer beware

21. Chapter 21 chpt some assembly required

I do not own Battlestar Galactica or have any connection, other than I have seen the show, a long time ago. I also do not own or have input into the game of Rifts. I don't even play the game, but I do own copies of some of the books and used them for this story.

I'm still looking for a Beta reader and help, no one has come forward yet. Sorry guys, but I'm still trying. Also I understand that when I posted chap 10B it did not send notices that I had updated the story or even refresh the info on the preview. So you might want to read that part, if you have not do so yet.

10 cylons to a Squad, 4 squads to a Platoon (40), 4 Platoons to a Company (160), 4 Companies to a Battalion (640), 4 BN to a Regiment (2560), 4 RGT to a Brigade (10240)

########

Chapter 12 some assembly required

Three days later.

Human Refugee camp.

This was the largest meeting of leadership of the Refugee Camp, which had been called New Caprica or New Caprica City ever called. That new title had not gone down well with the Colonials that lived in the mud lane village. But it was accurate name, even if it was not flattering one. It was slowly be used more and more, among the camps inhabitants in every day conversation. There were only three people in this meeting today. They were Laura Roslin, Saul Tigh, which were normally making the decisions. The new addition was a single representative from one of the different religions sects, which was called David Formosus. Laura and Saul both did not want him there, but David had a fallowing that could not be ignored. Or at least, it could not be ignored for long among with what remained of the 12 Colonies of man. This meeting had been demanded to happen by this religious leader, very forcibly. The first two demands had been delivered to Saul. It had not gone very well for the messenger, on both visits to notify him of the demand. The next request had come through…other channels to Roslin. Now he was sitting at the table with the two leaders, with a very smug look plastered on his young face. As soon as he had entered the tent and took his seat, he had started this confrontation with the other two people in the main tent.

This latest confrontation had started, when word had somehow leaked out to a set of the wrong ears. That Tyrol had a communication device, and that he was able to get a message to Admiral Adama, a few hours ago. Roslin already knew that Saul was working on finding out who might have been the leak of that little fragment of information. He said, that he planned on plugging the Fraking leak and make it so that the leaker would not be able to leak anymore. How he was going to do that particular feet? Roslin had no idea, and she was not going to ask. But she did hope that not much blood would be shed, when he found the information leaker in question. Then again after this meeting was over, she might feel like helping the old warhorse find the leaker herself.

Roslin looked across the handmade wooden table at the new addition to the meeting, and was not impressed with what she saw. David was an up and coming power player in one of the larger temples on Old Caprica, that had been before the cylons had attack anyway. As luck would have its fickle way. He had been off planet, on some kind of undisclosed personnel business trip. When the cylons wiped out his home planet, and all of the temps he had work his way up through. He had recovered quickly, and had started worming his way into a leadership role very quickly while on the run from the rest of the cylon fleet. He reminded Roslin of a strutting chicken, she had seen once a lifetime ago. She was sensing a power grab of some kind coming, and it was radiating from the young man across the table from her. When she felt like the time was right she would make her move. Right now they were, just setting at the table looking at each other. This was not going to get the job done. "Well now to get this over with." The ex-president thought to herself, but Saul was thinking the same thing. Roslin could read it on Saul's face, that he was about to let his personality out if its' box. And he it looked like he did not have a leash with him. She folded her arms on the table top, and eye locked the youngest man at the table. She needs to take control of this meeting, or Saul was going to do it quickly and without political care in the world. That might turn out to be a bad thing… possibly. She moved one hand below the table top, and used it to signal Saul to calm down, and that she had a plan. She was able to convey those thoughts with only a single finger, and not looking at the head of the military arm of the Colonial Resistance. She was that good, at her profession, no matter what this young daggit might think about her.

Roslin was waiting for the young man to speak first. Saul was Fraking pissed off, and the truth was that he did not trust his voice. So he also was being quiet, and for now at least. And he was willing to let Roslin take the lead on this one. So it was David who had to speak first at this meeting. He knew as soon as he opened his mouth that he had lost this power play round, but deep in his mind he really did not believe it. He had already talked himself into believing that he had always intended to speak first. He sort of rocked back into his high backed chair and started speaking. "I am here as the representative of all of the Temples of the Colonies. I am here because, all of the temples are not happy with some of the decisions that are being made for the rest of us." He let his voice get louder, to just under a shout for his closing statement. He wanted it to add force, to the meaning of his next words. We will not stand for that!" The tone David used was the same tone, which he had used during sermons when he was still an entry level priest. Deep down, he knew that it conveyed strength, and dominance over the little people in the gathering he oversaw.

Roslin looked down her nose and over her glass at the boy. Then she leaned forward to place her pointed elbow on the table. She used one fist to hold her head, as see watch the boy like a hunting hawk would a rabbit. "Really? And what would those decisions be? This is the first time, I have heard of this problem. You know, I am kind of close to some of the surviving Temple elders, David. Why don't you, just tell me what is bothering you." Roslin intentionally said you, and not the Temple elders. She did not think that this young daggit would be able to notice the word choose. All the time she was speaking she had not move one fraction of an inch after placing her fist under her chin, as she watched her intended victim.

David had a smug look on his face, that both of the other people wanted to smack off his face. The second it marked his young freshly cut blonde hair topped face. "Your status as the leader of our people is also under review, by people with deepest of knowledge of the Scrolls. What I'm here to do today. Is to address many issues. One is why the Temples, were not the ones to properly distribute any new supplies? After all it is historically there job to do this task for The Colonies of Man." David's nose went up a little, like he was some kind of tent master that had smelled bad.

Saul could not hold it back any longer at the tone this little whelp was directing at Laura, and the not too veiled of a threat that had just made to her. He snorted and rocked back in his chair wooden high backed chair. He let his brain relax, and his mouth take over. "Roslin, what this little weasel is saying, without coming right out and saying it. Is that someone in the Temples wanted there cut, before a crumb makes it outside of their tents for the rest of us. And I would bet only crumbs, would have made it out of those fraking nests of vipers. When it was all said and the business was done." Saul's tone was dripping venom, and his eyes were leveled at the younger man. They were more like a battlestar weapons turret, than human eyes.

The young temple representative gave Saul an indignant look, but even he could not look directly into his eyes. He settled for looking just to one side, so it would look like he was making eye contact. That was how he had been trained to do when giving press interviews, in the political class in collage. "The temples and those people, who are in them, do "The Gods work". They have to be supported at all cost, or our very souls will be at risk for the blasphemy." It did not even dawn on David that other people might have needs, that should be met or there health would be in jeopardy. He was a priest, but in reality he was primarily a bureaucrat. And a very highly placed Bureaucrat at that, this was hard to hide in a population pool that was so small now. Game playing Bureaucrats can hide very well, when there are latterly millions or even billions of people to hide in. If there was one constant in this fraked up universe. It was that a bureaucrat, always felt like they should be the first called to the supply trough so that they could have their fill and a little more. No matter what had happened, they should be given first pick of anything that a community had. That was why bribery was so common among people like, David.

Roslin patted Saul on the hand that was now flat on the wooden table without moving her other hand, which had formed a fist her chin was resting on. She did in such a way that David could see her doing it. She was the corners of the young man's mouth turn down slightly at her actions. "Now, Now Colonel, dear." The tone that Roslin switched to, was one she had used before on certain 8 year old boys, but with a very mocking trace to it at the end. "Those people working at the Temples would never put their stomachs above those of others, or the less fortunate among use and in need. That would violate a number of the scrolls, I would think." She never let her eyes move of the other man, and she saw the slight uptick of David's lips on one side of his face. He must have thought that he had scoured a point in this game. That was not a good sign. It was also a sign that he is still on his game plan, but she did not know what it was yet and the cards he might have. "I will just have to see what buttons in I need to push," thought Roslin. As she kept her pose and let nothing show on her face as her mind worked. "We have been using this same method of supply, ever since the cylons attacked us. I can ask for a review of how the supplies are distributed, if you would like. This will require a panel be seated, and I don't think it should be private one. A more public format would have to be set up. It would also need to be made up of people who do not have an interest in the outcome, of whatever comes out of the Panel's decision in the end." Roslin's tone was a level and villanelle as she make it, but still keep her owl like pose.

David gave her a smile that reminded her, a lot of the one Tom had given her one time. That had been when he was secretly planning on being the next VP, and that he could have her killed after he had that job. Then he could have been the President of what was left of the human race, all legal like. The smile also looked a lot like the Number One called John had used on her before. With the smile still on his face David started talking, thinking that he had scored another point. "I think that I can give the other temple leaders the good news." He had no doubt, that he could stack any panel with the right kind of thinking people. With that battle won, he moved to the next item on his mental check list. "Another issue that is causing a large amount of concert for us, is about the contact with these people. You know the ones that are claiming to be from the 13 Tribe of Kobal." David did a dismissive jester with one hand and his nose went up in the air, like he had just walked by an open latrine.

Saul jumped in on this one, like a lake trout on the perfect looking fly. Like everything Saul Tigh did, he did with power and gusto, even if it might be the wrong move. "They have not claimed to be from the 13th Tribe. At least they have not to me, or anyone who I have talked to. Even those that also have had dealings with them out, in the forest all agree on that."

Saul was starting to turn a little red at the neck as the words come roaring out of his mouth, and if Laura was right. The red was going to start to both rise higher and go lower, on his pale skin old skin in the next few minutes. Right now Saul was wishing for a drink, and glad at the same time, that he did not have any on his person. Because if he had that alcohol in him, he might go from just thinking to doing what he was thinking about to this little fraker And what he was thinking was that he might do something, Bill would regret later…..again. Saul knew it would feel good, or even feel real good when he did it. But there would be blow back of some kind, even if he could not see it coming in his current mental state. It would be there, so he let it drop for now, and started to think about having a bit of his latest run of rotgut when this meeting was finally over. Than line of thinking was enough to get his mouth to stop working, at least for a little while.

The Temple representative squeezed his eyebrows together with exaggerated wrinkles on his forehead head. "I'm confused. I thought that they have been telling everybody that they are from Earth. Am I wrong about this information? The few briefings given to us, all have said that they were from Earth. Has some new information come in, or was there something to somehow cause a miss translation of some sort?" The look on the temple rat's face was confused, but still under controlled his full control. Not many would know weather this was for real, or he was playing a game of some kind being played.

Now it was Roslin turn to smile, but it was only a smile on the inside. She did not let her poker face crack, not even a little bit. She could tell that the look was as fake a three cubit bill. She wanted to keep all of her cards to herself for as long as she could. But it looked like she was right in guessing the game and the cards this rat was holding. "They said that they are from a planet, that they call Earth. However as they said many times, there are many planets with the name of "Earth". They just say that they, only come from one of planets. Which is called Earth by the people who live there. They had no idea about a 13th Tribe when they were asked about them. That story is pretty much the same, no matter who they ask. It would seem that you drew a line, were none was." Laure knew there were cards for the rat to play, and she waited for him to do so. It things went the way she was thinking that they would. It was going to get ugly very soon.

David gave a smile that would be called evil, no matter whose face it might have been on. "Good, then they are from the 12 Tribes of Kobal, and fall under our laws. Do I need to remind you what the Common Law view and sentence are on heresy?" He tilled his head to one side with a smug look on his face. He felt that now he was the teacher, and the older people on the other side of the table were the young ones to be schooled. He was sure that he had gotten the point across, and that soon his star would be on the rise again.

Saul let out a full belly laugh that was not out of joy, but out of cynicism. When he noticed the odd look that was coming from David, he quickly decided to come clean to the little young fraker. "Okay let me get this straight. You little Fraker! You want to charge the people who are helping us with food, weapons, body armor and that are killing cylons by the Fraking Raptor loads with heresy?" Saul shot a look at Roslin but he did not stop talking. "Roslin I thing this young man has been dipping your old Kamlia supplies, a bit heavily. You might want to see how much you have left. I am thinking that it might be all gone." Saul let his head turn again to look at the blonde wantabe man on the other side of the table. "Oh and on top of that you Frak for brains. These are the same people who are shipwrecked on this planet, but they have technologies that can stop a cylon from down loading into new bodies. That is something, I did not know was possible, and neither did the cylons from what our spies have told us." Saul held up two fingers, and started to slowly rise another one as he spoke "And oh by the way, they have Fraking man portable Direct Energy Weapons. Oh let's just think a little harder about that? They have Fraking Directed Energy Weapons!" Saul let his voice drop into a lower tone, and made eye contact with the younger man, and he gave a look that had made more than one enlisted or lower ranked officer sweat bullets in his day. "All of those things are so Fraking far beyond, what we could do back on our old planets. That you could only read about the ideas in bleeding edge tech bulletins, and that you little Fraker was even before the attack." Saul started laughing again, but it had a brittle edge to it as it filled the tent. "That it's not even a little bit Fraking funny, and you want to do something to them. What? Do you want to hang them? You want to make them publicly repent first, or just hang them? That is a Fraked up way to thank people who are helping us, bleeding for us, and making sure our young ones are healthy."

David gave the old bald man a sneer, which he hoped would showed that the look was not working on him. "Have you seen these any of supposed Magic weapons, Saul?" When the military man did not jump right back to reply to him, David let the sneer build. And he sat farther back in the cheap wooden handmade chair. David was already thinking about how soon he would be able to upgrade his furniture back in his ship's cabin. David did not sleep in a shack or even share his cabin with another person. That is unless she was pretty enough, and even then for a short length of time.

Saul looked a little uncomfortable to anyone who had a set of eyes, and then went into full defensive mode in a blink of an eye. "No I have not seen them, yet. You know that I have been stuck in this camp right along with you. But others have seen them, and they have reported back about how powerful their weapons are. More importantly, you have seen how the cylons are acting. That means that the cylons know who powerful our new friends are, and they are scared Frakless." Tigh had caught the implied insult of David's use of his first name without it being first offered.

David let the sneer on his face turned into a fake smile and his tone was mocking. "So you have reports. We have all heard that one before, Saul. Have you thought that the reason that the cylons are not working right, or as they are advertised to us about how they are supposed to be working. That it is because the Lords of Kobal, have deem this planet for humans, and not those abominations." He was tilting his head to one side again, and his smile was still there for both of the other leaders to see. He even had a gleam in his eyes, which should have told anyone that he truly believe every word that had come out of his mouth. He did not, but he had that kind of gift for lying.

Roslin was fighting not to smile at what the little rat had just said, and it was not easy even with all of her renowned political skills. David did not know it yet, but he had just slipped up big time. He did not know that, but Roslin most certainly knew it. Roslin open the way for this young daggit to truly have enough rope to hang himself with, but good. It was time for her to set the hook. "So let me get this straight, David. Now I'm not a military person by training or experience, I think you would agree with me on that point." She stopped talking for a few seconds, to let the young man think about her words before started up again. "You say that the Lords of Kobal have said, that this cold mud ball of a planet. Is for our use only, right?" Roslin took another breath, but she did not want to lose the momentum by delaying too much. "Then would you please explain to me. Why all of the cylons we have shot with Colonial military weapons, have come back to try to kills on another day. But the ones that these strangers have shot, really does kill them for good?" Roslin voice was sweat, and she even had a slight sly looking smile on her face as she finished her question. David should have run away screaming "it's a trap", but he did not. He was intending to stick to his guns and win.

Visibly David was not taking it well, that Roslin and the town drunk were punching holes in his belief structure and his ego with equal ease. And he made a predictable response, as quick as his mind could put the words together and for them to fall out of his slightly open mouth. "You should not blasphemy the Gods, Laura." David started wagging his finger at her like some youngling taking one too many sweats off the checkout desk. "There will be repercussions." David set up straighter in the home made wooden high back chair. He threw his shoulder back and his back was ram as rode straight as he could make it. He was about to deliver the word of the Gods, to the other two lowly mortals around the table. He first looked at the ex-President of the Colonies of Kobal. "You will not have any more contact with the heretics without my explicit say-so. You!" The young mans was now point a finger at Saul across from him and it had just a slight shake to it. "Will contact Admiral Adama, and tell him that he will launch an attack on these abominations now. This will be done, or I will have you both arrested for heresy. So say we all!" David had a full head of steam and was beating a fist on the table top as he finished the last words. He was not going to let these small people interfere with his calling. That calling was to save humanity, and take his rightful spot as the leader of the human race. Then he would lead it for the rest of his no doubt long life. He would be the High Lord of all, and not these uneducated and low born dregs of his great society.

David was so into his own tirade and feeling of self-worth that he did not realized, the other two people around the table were quite. They had not repeat the honored saying after him, as would be expected and demanded by their culture. He had even closed his eyes when he had said those hallowed words out of habit. Sensing something was wrong, he opened them slowly. Only to see the two older people looking at him, like had had a second head growing out of his shoulders or a Medusa's hair. He was so convinced of his own righteousness, that his brain could did not fully register that something was very wrong.

Roslin was looking at the young man, and she schooled her face as best she could so that it was perfectly still. But her mind was racing like a Viper going out of its launch tube. "This guy is totally fraking unhinged!" These were the reverberating words being shouted in her mind. Then her mind shifted gears quickly, and went to the real problem that was in front of her. "Now how do I get him out of this tent as quickly as I can? And still not have little fraker go running right into Baltar's office, and give us all up to be turned over to the Fraking cylons." This was not a great thought, which Laura had to herself. She had to come up with something to say very quickly, or things were going to go downhill. She could somehow feel that it could go that way, unless she could come up with something quickly and she did. "David, you have brought some very compelling arguments to us this morning."

Laura took a breath to help defuse the energy building up in the tent turned school house. "Can you give me and Colonel Tigh some time, to talk about this alone?" She held up her had to delay the building reply she could see building in the young man's face. She had a fleeting thought and it almost made her face brake under her control. That at the level this boy had been playing at, before the cylons had come. That he would have better control of what showed on his young and too pretty face. That was just too bad for him or he was just that out of practice. "It's only, so that we can work out how best to add you into the command structure without disrupting things too much. We are set up, in what Colonel Tigh calls a cell structure, so that the cylons will not get us all in one big sweep. Do you think that you would be up the challenge of being on this staff? It's critically important that we work this way for the good of our people." She had used Saul's military rank to reinforce that he was a Colonial Military officer. Laura knew that the Law on things this young daggit wanted to employ. It had some dangerous limits that should not be crossed, without deep thought. Thoughts that she was thinking that David had not spent the time on reviewing very much before today.

Now it was Roslin turn to get the "What the Frak are you thinking woman?" look from the Colonial Colonel sitting beside her at the table. The only thing that had stopped him from saying it out loud, was that David was now smiling broadly with lots of white teeth showing. He even was starting to rise from his chair at the table, almost like he had just won the planetary finals of Triad. Or as Saul would think of it, the cat that ate the song bird face.

David was not even looking at Saul out of the corner of his eyes, this was an oversight on the young man's part. He was completely focused on Roslin like a mongoose looking at a snake, and the massive win he thought he had scored on her today. "Thank you Laura. I told them last night, that you would be reasonable. All I had to do was show you the ways, which the Gods want us to go." The bad part was that he believed every word that had fallen out of his mouth, and even the tone that he was using was good and proper. It was just too bad that he had an un-diagnosed, but major case of pseudologia fantastica and mythomania.

Rosiln just gave one of her patented political smiles, and even reached over and shakes hand with the young man. "Yes David. Everything will work out for the betterment of New Caprica." What the young man did not seem to notice was that Roslin had shift positions, so that she had her other hand on leg of the military man's leg. Colonial Tigh was on the ragged edge of losing his self-control, and she just needed to get this lunatic out of her tent. That is before someone did something, which might have ugly repercussions, in both the short and long term outlook. It was a race to defuse the situation, with two different bombs setting beside her. She was just hoping that the left hand and the signals she was trying to send to Saul was enough. It was more of the point. Would it hold Saul Tigh at bay, long enough for David to get out of the tent?

David was so happy that he felt like his feet were not touching the wood flooring, as he made his way away from the table. He was already planning his next moves against both Roslin and the drunk, which thought they should be the leaders of the human race. He was already working out in his head, how he was going to get the next few pawns moved in the right direction to push forward his overall larger plan. In his mind he only needed a few more moves, and he would be the person in power over the lives on this planet and the space around it.

When the younger man had finally left the tent, Saul could not hold back his anger any longer. He was not even sure if the representative of the religious sects was out of ear shot or not. He could not careless, he just could not hold it back for one second longer. "What the Frak are you talking about Laura!" Saul had not bellowed, but that was just another sign. That Saul was about to explode all over the tent, that is unless he get some satisfaction right the Frak then from Roslin. Tigh was well known as a yell of the first order, but few knew something else about him. That was when Saul was not yelling and only talking loudly. Then things were about to go downhill on a nuclear scale of the same first order. Saul was almost in Laura's face as he spoke at her.

Laura Roslin just held one finger to her lips, so that Saul would shut his Fraking mouth for another few minutes and not torpedo some of her plans. She also wanted to make sure the object of his heat, was out of ear shot of the coming boom. When he sputtered to a stop at the signal, which she rarely used on him. His eyes were about to bulge out of his face. Roslin rose from her chair without making a sound, and went to the tent flap that leads to her small living area. When she was about ten feet from the closed flap, she started to speak at the fabric in a very mild tone. "Would you please join us now?" She stepped to one side of the tent flap, leaving an open path from her living area into the main area of the school tent.

To Saul's complete surprise six cloaked and hooded figures, slowly walked out of the little living area off to one side of the larger school tent. Until that very second, he had no idea that anyone else had been in the tent and privy to this very important meeting. Saul's head went from looking at the group to looking at the opening and was thinking. "They must have been packed in there, check to jowl and had not said or made any other noise for over an hour." Saul knew that they had to have been in the main tent area, a little longer than an hour. That was because he had no idea they had been back there or had any indications anything was off the entire time. Saul quickly thought it would be best to keep his big mouth shut for a few more seconds, and see what Laura had planned out. Really it was the shock of these unknown face covered people that kept his mouth from moving any more. It would take some effort after shock wore off. To kept his lips from parting, and letting something dumb slip from his lips. That is before his brain could stop it, again.

Roslin had her hands clasped behind her back and was looking at the six robed figures, as they stopped moving and stood in a line before for her. They had silently formed a line, but they always kept the hoods down and were covering their faces. She did a quick look down the line of figures in front of her. That was before she started talking at them, and not to them. She was in full leader mode and don't frak with me. "I take it you all heard, what was said in this meeting?" She waited till the all six of the hooded people, as they nodded their heads in agreement that they had heard the total exchange during the leadership meeting. "I will leave this issue alone. And I will treat this matter, as an internal matter to be handled as you all see fit. However I want to remind you all, that I will be watching. I think you know that he is a threat to the safety for what remains of our people. Please don't make me take actions against your young lion, so you need to do it quickly. I will, if I have to, but I will have to make my actions and the reason I moved against him public. By public, I mean very public, and most likely very messy. Do we have an understanding?" She tilted her head to one side, all the time her face held no emotions as she spoke.

She was answered with six soft voices coming from under the cloth hoods. All pitched low and very nondescript voices, which sounded as if only one person had spoken the reply. "Yes Madam President. So say we all." The six figures turned as one, and slipped out the main tent flap into the mud path outside. Roslin did not care who saw them leave, it was up to them to keep a low profile. As far as she was concerned, they were just six people. That might be part of any of a number of religious orders that been among the refugees from the start of the cylon attack.

Roslin did reply with the words of faith this time, but it also was just as soft as the group that had left her tent had spoken with. That group would have taken offense, if she had not. When the tent flaps were still closing behind the group of hooded people. She turned to see a very stunned Saul Tigh, doing some dead fish, mouth movements. He was at a complete loss, about what had been going on not twenty feet from where he had been sitting for over an hour. Roslin gave a sly smile, and decided that she would wait to see how long Saul could be quite for. Much to her disappointment, it was not that long after all. Saul was incapable of keeping his mouth shut that long, no matter what was happening. It was almost like he was programed that way.

Finally Saul said something, which was considered just typical of the man. "Laura would you please." Saul stopped talking for a few seconds, and worked his mouth from side to side. Then he threw his hands in the air in abject confusion. "What the Frak just happened?"

Roslin smiled a little bigger, and returned to her seat at the table near the old warhorse. She still pitched her voice low, to hint that Saul might also want to do the same at least for the time being. "Why Saul, we were just helping a powerful faction or power block. Our little group meeting was able to handle…a problem. And we did it before it became too public for them to handle effectively." The smile on Laura's face was not friendly, and was just plain evil looking. "And now Saul, they owe us a favor. A very big favor indeed and one, that we might need to call on sooner than I would like to." Roslin let the smile drop, and let her face go blank. She now wanted get to the information, which she really wanted to know. And that this meeting had been supposed to have given her, until she had found out that the young lion was coming. Then he had to change her plans at the last minute. "So what did Bill really say? When you contacted him about the other group that is help us? Roslin tilted her head to one side, and waited for the reply. She was glad that she had canceled class today. It was looking like she was going to not have any spare time today.

Saul rubbed his bald head with both hands back and forth with some vigor. The change of subject was too a little fast for him, and he needed a few seconds to get his thoughts together. "He said that they had already picked up some of their transmissions. But since they were in the wrong codes, he just thought they were cylons playing some communication tricks from the last war…..again. I'm just glad that crazy Fraker hopped onto a Raptor so fast. That we could talk some things out without having to use a middle man shuttling back in forth between this solar system, and wherever they are hiding. I don't think we could have gotten half of what were able to cover, if we had to do that shuttling crap. Plus there was no telling how much, might have been lost or confused. In-between the, who knows how many jump flights it would have taken."

It had only been a few days ago. That they had powered up the hidden communication device, and started to try to reach the Admiral with it. And to their surprise, they had made contact on only the third try in the first day. It was not released information to the rest of the refugee camp. That they had made contact with the only human crewed warships, that anyone on this planet knew about. Roslin had wished that she could have been able to hear Bill's voice herself. But she and Bill would have considered that to be an abuse of power in their eyes, even if no one else would have said a word about it. Now all of that information would have to come to her, via second hand sources. She was thinking to herself, but they only had to do that for now. She gave her head a slight shake, to get her train of thought back on track. She needed to ask a question that had to be addressed. "So do you thank Bill will trust them, or not?"

Saul rubbed his head again this time with only one had, and he sagged a little in the high backed wooden chair. "Nah. Not yet at least. But he trusts you, and if you say that they are good people. Then he will give them enough rope to hang themselves real Gods damn good, let me tell yea." Saul would not let on, how much finding out that Bill was still alive lifted his spirits. Much less hearing his longtime friend's voice had helped him mentally. Right up to that second. He had half believed the cylons. When they had said, that they had blasted all of the ships that had been orbit into dust. On that first day of their return to frak with his people.

"Can we get the updated codes to them in time, for a three way communications by next week?" Roslin was pressing now, and she did not have to say who "them" were. She also had no idea about the codes. She had just assumed that you would turn on the blasted thing and talk, and then the people on the other end would talk back to you. After all it was not like she had any experience with something like this before the attack on her people.

Saul gave an odd look to Roslin, and leaned forward to put some of his weight on the wooden table top. The handmade table gave a slight grown as it took the weight, which drew both people's eyes for a second. Saul had several options he could have given her, but went with the one that he like most of the short mental list of replays. If she did not like the one he picked, then he could go down the list of other options he had come up with before he had walked into this tent. "I can send Duck out the tunnel in a few hours. That is if you give the word, that it is okay for us to send the codes. There will still be some daylight left, so even with the tunnel. This will have some bit of risk attached, when they get out in the open while the sun is up." He stopped talking and looked at Roslin, who was sitting very still, and was seemingly waiting for him to continue. Saul gave a slight nod of his head, and got to the point. She had asked for his opinion and she wanted it. "Laura, I think it would be worth it. The faster he starts on the trip. The faster he can get to the nearest transportation device, which we know our new friends keep close by."

Roslin took some time to think about what the military man had said, but she kept her body as still as death. She was dealing with something that could mean the death of one or more humans, and she would not take that lightly. No matter some around the camp might think. They could wait till it was full dark, and it would be safer. The down side was she had to weigh, if they could they risk the loss of time this would cause versus the possible loss of a human life. From what Tyrol had said, this Safe port Bay Settlement, as they called it, was quit some distance away from this field. Maybe even all the way on the other side of the planet, from where the Colonials had landed. It was not like they could just jump in a Raptor or something like that. Roslin had to keep the smile off of her face, as she thought about what to do. "Frak, now that would be a short trip. Walking or driving that kind of distance, was a completely different story and a major planning obstacle to get around. Then add on to it. That you were going to have to do without being found out by the cylons that controlled the skies. "Send him out now Saul. Time is the main issue, that we have to deal with for right now." She stopped talking for a second. She had given her orders, but she was not done yet. "Also see if you contract in Colonial One, can somehow get some good digital images of the damage being done to the Tin heads so far. We can send them to Bill the next you talk. It could work as proof that they have some special kind of firepower, which I would bet that he has never heard about. Speaking of your contact there in that den of Vipers, are you ever going to tell me who this contact might be?"

Saul almost choked on the drink in he was sipping. He had not expected that question to come out, after she had approved Duck leaving again. After some sputtering and losing over half of his drink. He was ready to speak in a more normal tone of voice. "Even if I Fraken knew who it was? I would not tell you Laura. You know as well as I do, that you can't tell those Frakers what you don't know. I will tell know that when this is over, we will owe whoever it was a box full of medals. That is if they or any of us are alive when this is all fraking over." This made both of them look down at their hands, and think about those that had dies already just on this rock. Something clicked into Saul's head, and it was out of his mouth before he could stop it. "Laura have you noticed that some of those human looking Frakers, are a little more jumpy than normal? Do you think it's true that they got there metal heads handed to them…. again? What do your sources say? Mine are as dry up as Baltar's heart right now."

Roslin was on her way to sitting down from getting some more water for both of them to drink. She looked down her glasses at Saul Tigh. "First off, Saul it is when this war is over. Or at least when we don't have the cylons holding us down anymore. We are going to need to know who he or she is. I know you have some ideas, and are keeping them to yourself. I'm okay with that, Saul really I am. What is that old saying Bill like to say?"

"You will have to separate the goats, from the sheep at some time." Was quickly supplied along with a snort by Admiral Adama's best and only friend, which Laura knew about or had ever heard Bill talk about. Well ones that were still above ground anyway. What he did not say, was that he did have a good idea who might be feeding them all of this golden bits of information. More to the point he knew, who he needed to talk to who really did know who his golden goose was. That person was in a different resistant cell, and almost never was seen with in two hundred feet of Saul or Laura. That was as close as Saul would let it get.

Roslin smiled a sad little lonely smile as she the image of Bill floated threw her head. "That was it. I always wondered where he comes up with some of those lines. One of these days I'm going to have to make him write them all down." With another shake of her head, she got back to her line of thinking. "I think that one fits. Even if it might be a bit early, and things can and I no doubt will go wrong before we are done. We need a way to know who has working for us, against us, or just stayed on the sidelines until the smoke cleared." Roslin quickly change subjects, so that she could address what Saul had asked her. "Yes, I did notice them. And I was going to ask you the same thing. You just beat me to it, and no I have no idea. As far as what is happened out there beyond the wood line. I don't know a damn thing, and I wish we did. I was hoping that one of the people coming through the tunnel would talk about it or had given you something, by now. I see that, this has not happened. When Duck is sent out ask him to see what he can find out and get it back to us." Roslin made a lip biting face as she was speaking. The smile had quickly fallen way from her face. These days if it showed up at all, it was only for the briefest of moments.

Roslin stopped talking with a click of her mouth closing, and went into deep thought mode for a few minutes. She was about to make a major change in policy, and she did not know if it was a good idea or not. She knew as soon as she opened her mouth, she was committed for good or evil. "I think you should ask "them" about it yourself instead, tonight. Why don't you make contact with them? What do they call that thing…. Radio that's it. It would be a good way to start the information exchange, on none sensitive issues." She has said the Radio in pretty plain English with a good bit of the Caprican accent slipping in. One part of her brain was wondering how long it would take for other Earther words to start to slip into every day usage.

She went into thinking mode again and stopped talking. Saul was waiting for her to finish her line of thought, almost scared to interrupt her. "What an odd word, I wonder how they come up with it. I will say that it does roll off the tongue don't you think?" Roslin face went poker playing or in political mode again. "Saul, do you think Ellen is with us or not? I don't want to put you on the spot about her. But Saul, if she lets something slip." She was shaking her head from side to side very slowly. "Then anyone that is going out the tunnel, are going to be shot down. Just like the ones who tried to sneak out before and were caught by the cylons. If you're not sure, about her being able to keep her mouth shut? Then, I want the Radio moved over to Tyrol's place. From what I have heard, he is firmly on the wagon again. And it seems to be back to as normal, as anyone else in this Hades hole can be. We can move it somewhere else that is more secured, later."

Saul was not happy about what Laura had just said, and he also not liking what he was thinking after she had said it. He had no idea, that all of his emotions were playing across his old face for anyone in the tent to see. Saul loved Ellen, but she had been drinking more than ever. This was no mean feat for the woman to accomplish. She had been known to be able to put away the ambrosia in bucket sized lots, even before the cylons sneak attack. Saul knew, from long experience, that when she was deep into the bottle it could be trouble. She would often forget and say something, which she should not have been talking about in public. She would say it in front of God's knew who, and she would not care that she was doing it. Saul quickly remembered that more than once over the last few weeks. He had to makeup cover stories to protect people, because she had said something while drunk in front of the wrong person. Saul rolled his lips into a tight line. "She is with me, but." He stopped talking and deflated a little before completing this thought out loud. "I will have the radio thing moved over to Tyrol's sometime today anyway, just in case. When we need to use it, we can go over to his place. It would be easier anyway, because he is well known to the cylons as being bachelor again. And it's also known that he has not hooked up with anyone yet. Now back to speaking of goats, I want to start looking into what is going on with Starbuck. We don't know if she is alive, or not. If we can at least find out if she is with the Gods or not, that would be helpful to Bill." Saul stopped talking again, and drummed his fingers on the table top for a second or two. The next part he would need her approval to do, and he was not sure he wanted to ask. With a slight sigh, he decided to go with is original idea. "I might need to dip into the bribe stash to find out anything worthwhile."

Roslin gave a thin face look to the other man, and did not say anything for a while. Soon the air got quite between them like the calm before the storm. She knew that Bill thought of that crazy Fraking woman, as his own blood daughter. And more importantly, she understood why he felt that way about her. Roslin also knew that, Starbuck had pulled off more than one trick, which had ended up saving the whole refugee fleet in her time in a Viper. As well as during other events outside of a Viper, that just happened to have surrounded her. The last was reason alone was enough to reach into some "extra" trade goods to find out what happened to her. Besides if she was still alive, Roslin was betting that very soon. They were going to need any and every combat pilot Bill could get their hands on, again. "I will also see what I can dig up, but yes dip into the bribe items, if you have to. But keep it under control, and as quite as you can. We might need that stuff later, to save our lives."

Roslin stopped talking and her eyes shot up, breaking her poker face. A thought had popped into her head. After quickly working all of the angles she could see, she let an evil smile come to her face. "That blond cylon keeps coming by the school, and asking what it can do to help out. I might be able to see if it knows anything of use for us." Roslin did not even notice that she had called the cylon an IT. As far as she was concerned, they were machines to her. No matter what they may look like on the outside. The two continued to work in the now truly empty school tent. Outside the tent, cold wet wind blew across the muddy field that had been turned into their prison.

###########

About the same time, across the planet at a place that was normally referred to simply as "The Settlement" a different meeting was being held. This meeting was being held with a few more people than the other human meeting. This time the meeting was being held in the belly of the hard metal and ceramic hulled ship called the Lucky Find. This meeting was going to cover something's, which the three men in charge. Did not want to make it to the ears of the rest of the people living in the slowly growing town. At least not as quickly, as was it normally would have. If they held the meeting at Warehouse One, it would be over heard by dozens and dozens of people. Then that information would be passed to more ears, at near the speed of light. By the end of the average meeting, easily a hundred people would know what had been disused and decided on in the meeting.

Captain Kelly was smiling at the other men around the ship's table, and a group setting in chairs along one wall that made up the meeting room. He was shaking his head from side to side and was letting a light tone color his voice. "So the Amazon and crew, did it to everyone again?" Now he waited for the rest of the room to stop laughing at his statement. Eva and Robin were both, well-liked by most people that had ever met them. At least the ones that were not overly jealous of the pairs repeated and public successes over these eighteen months or so.

The XO of the Lucky Find, Sophia Ryan spoke up first as the laughing fell away, and it was comfortable to speak over the noise. "We don't think so." She stopped talking when all eyes turned to look at her viper fast. When all eyes were on her with looks of disbelief on most of those faces. "Don't get me wrong. It was her group, which were the first ones to jump on it with capital to perchance enough of the right equipment. Now that the information has gotten out, and your guess is as good as anyone's on how it was given out or leaked out." She stopped talking for a second, and locked eyes with her Captain. She was almost sure she knew "who" had leaked the information, but she could not bet on it. "We now have a waiting list on any more of those components, which might come in from the combat zone from now on."

The Captain of the Lucky Find was shaking his head, and then looked around the room. He did not answer his XO's unasked question, if he was the one that leak the information in questions. "Do we need, or will it even help. If we put a reward out for these items, to maybe increase the possibility of their recovery post contact?" The word contact sound a lot better than other adjectives like say slaughter, massacre or wiped out to the last moving cylons.

Kelly was rubbing his chin at what his fellow ship's captain had said. He was glad this was not coming at him cold or flat footed, he had already thought of that idea. "I think we might want to hold off on the extra reward, for now. I think that we ought to let the information percolate out on its own to Major Weston and his troops. I don't think it will take long, for it to get out. That the chest, and right upper leg of the Centurions. Both have something of high value to people back home." Kelly started to shake his head in wonderment. "Who would have thought that the main power supply, for those machines was in the lower chest and the backup power supply would be in the right thigh." Design wise, it was a perfect location to protect them from battle damage. That was because most troops shot for the head, or center mass of the machines. Doing those two things improve their chances of a hit, or hard take down of the enemy combat machine. If you were limited to the weapons technology that the cylons and Colonials were bring to the battlefield.

Kelly brought himself, mentally back to the table. "If we can find out, who was the person that was able to figure that out? And that with a few common spare parts. They could turn the junk, into something very useful. Oh and let's not forget, that these parts are also some of the easily reproducible ones, made by one of 3D printers on top of all of that. Well that is, something we should reward with at least some kind of acknowledgement. That is some way out of the box thinking on someone's part, and they should be acknowledged."

They had found four of the massive 3D printers in the cargo hold. Along with about ten tons of the printing matrixes for them in the same cargo hold, when they had come to this planet. That much matrix would have been able to supply their old destination, for about year or so of normal production output. Here on this cold planet supporting a lot smaller population base. It was going to end up last them much, much longer than the one year. It was not a limitless supply, and it was not because they had been limiting the use of those devices to stretch the limited supplies. That kept the devices still running at almost full rated capacity. Without having a lot of refined metal around to use, the 3D printers were working overtime. The reason for extend time line of use, was that they had been able to find a replacement for most of printer matrix. Right here on this planet and in a river bed, only a few hundred miles from the Settlement. This massive resource covered over 90% of the supplies need to support all of those printers. Those four printers were making the only new spare parts the Safe port Bay Settlement had access to at this time.

Paul Carr looked around the room before he said anything. He did not like talking in these meetings, if he did not have to. But it seemed to him, that no one else was going to bring something important up. So he did after taking a steadying breath. "Does anyone know why they wanted all of those power supplies? They were able to pick up all of those 400 torsos and upper legs. That was almost all, that they were able to send back from the attack on our decoy transmitter. They have those, along with every other one that they could get their hands on? What are the capabilities of these power supplies they were able to pick up?"

Kelly turned to look at Paul, but kept his face blank, he blinked a few times. Then he reached down, and pulled out his pocket computer. That had been an off the wall question, and he had to check his notes to see if he had the information with him. It also was a very good question, and he was both surprised that no one else had asked that question, and that normally quiet Mr. Carr that had done the asking at this meeting. "I don't know how true my information is, because it has only come from one source. That is, that it was the cylon POW who gave it to us, and she admitted that she was not that well versed about the internal working of the Centurion. We also could not get that much detailed information about the Centurions from the Colonials. There only experience with them, is that they are unstoppable machines of war, and very good at taking human life."

Kelly looked around the table at the other two leaders and gave him each a nod of their heads, before saying another word. "Okay." Kelly started reading the intelligence report. "The Centurions can operate for a dozen hours between recharging, at a full military or combat load. The secondary or back up power supply, is supposed to be good for two more hours of operation at the same level of effort. When some of our tech people ran those power numbers, they come up with a rough comparison the output to our E-clips."

The three leaders had already heard this report, but it had been some time ago. It also had been decided that it should not be made public knowledge. This information was new for the other people in the room, and well this was hitting them for first time flat footed. Kelly stopped talking to make sure they all were paying attention to what he was about to say. "For the size, weight, and mass of the power supplies, it would put them at about 50% of the capability of an old E-clip of the same size." He let that set in, before he moved on with repeating the report. This was the closest that any Colonial or cylon technology had been, to anything that the two ships had brought to this world. At least it was the closest that had been found and reported all the way back to them. Oh and they have space ships, and a way to go between the stars, all things the Rift Earthers had no idea how to do. Other than that the Colonials and Cylons were very far behind in the tech gap on the battlefields of this planet. The news about the "power supplies" reinforced that the cylons were not that far behind what the Settlement knew about.

When the rumblings stop, Kelly continued to read the report on his screen. It would have been faster if he would have just pushed it to the network, but then everyone would have access to it at the same time. "What you all might be wondering is what they were able to get power supplies for. I will say that they did not get the whole set of parts. They only picked up the power supplies of the parts. They were able to pick up those sub-systems for a half pound of fresh food for each system, or one E-Clip recharge chit. Before anyone gets heart burn about the price they paid. That was the scrap value and the posted price of whole chunks of metal, so that did not do anything wrong. They just were the first ones to come up with a use for those unknown items under the armor, and over the internal skeleton of those certain parts. I would bet the prices will get higher, at the next action for the salvage we have on hand by then." Kelly took a breath, and looked around the room again. It appeared to his trained eyes that no one seemed to want to interrupt him with questions, just yet. "Now from what I was able to find out", he looked over to a particular person in the group. Kelly let a smile come to his face, but he kept eye contact. "I will not be submitting a bill for the drinks that I had to buy to find this out, even If I really should. Man could that woman put them away, when she wants a drink or six. I think she must save it up when she is out in the field, and cannot get anything harder than tea. I can, however, confirm without a doubt. That the stories are true, Amazon has a hollow leg." This drew a loud and long bout of laughter from the gathered personnel in the room.

Kelly had a smile on. As everyone let the tension bleed out in the joke he had surprised everyone with. When the sound died down of its own accord, Kelly started up again. "Now for what all of those drinks bought me. The group found out from a third party, about how it might be able to hook up these power supplies to run their lights and any added heat generators the can rig up . Those heating units are the ones that they might need in there grow caves that they are exploiting. I took this information, and ran some number on my ship's computers. With their renewable energy resources they already have on hand today, and these new power supplies. They would not need to buy or trade for any recharges chits for a year, to up to a year in a half at their current scale of use for electrical power."

When Kelly looked around the room, he knew they were not connecting the dots, and did not understand the major issue about to hit them in the face. He did not make face as he decided that he would have to do the connecting of all of those dots for them. "If they lock up that much income, and don't use it. It could cause extreme issues for how our monetary system, that we have set up and running so far." This was something that he had only become aware of after review the data. Luckily he had briefed this fellow member of the Triumvirate, as soon as he saw the train wreck coming. That had been another ugly meeting.

The only other ship's captain and member of the Triumvirate squeezed his lips into a thin line, he was about to have to help the meeting along. He looked around the group, but did not look at the others around the outer edge of the room. Before he could say something, a different voice broke the air. "Do we need to do something like a tax or seize something? Only to make things equalize out somehow before things can collapse." This came from that outer edge of the meeting room, which caused eyes to turn it its direction.

A grumble came from the others in the room that was almost sub vocalized. It was always a dream to be able to make it big. Only because you had a great idea, and acted quickly on it before anyone else beat to the punch. To hear someone wanted to change the rules, without notice or a change in the laws, did not sit so well. Now someone had lucked out, and where on the road to extreme success, and now someone wanted to have the rules changed on them. Only because they were doing so well, that was not going to set well with anyone. That was true in the meeting, and with the larger population of the Settlement.

Kelly did not expect that to come up, so he was a little slow coming back with something to say to address this issue. After a few long seconds he worked out most of the angles, he had talked about them before with the other two. Now he was going to drop on the rest of the governing body. "I don't think that will be necessary. I did not really want to cover this yet, but looks like I will now." Kelly looked around the room and his face was very serious. "I will need to ask everyone to keep this next bit of information quite for a while longer. That is because it would not be fair to those two, if there competitors found out what their long term plans might be." He got nod from everyone in the room as he slowly turned his head to look at each person. He had only to look at one person, for a few seconds before the last one agreed to his terms. If anyone had not agreed to his requirements, they would have been asked to leave the room until he was done and asked to return to the meeting. And it was also a good chance that they would not be allowed, into another meeting at this level again. This had happened twice before, and the two persons were known to have had very hurt feeling about the event. "I want to let everyone know that I am serious. If it leaks out, I will demand satisfaction on the issue. Am I clear on this?" This was a whole new level of secrecy, and the whole room went on mental edge. Every head and eye was now locked Captain Kelly and the room was now deathly quiet.

Having a Duel was not common, but it also was not unheard of when they left old Earth. It was a rule that was still on the books that the Settlement had adopted, but it had been rarely called on so far. The first time it happened on this plane, had been a half a year or so that they had been on this new planet. Captain Kelly had been called to a Duel, twice since they have been on this new planet. He had killed the first man in less than twelve seconds. That had been when, that man had appealed his conviction and sentence on charges of repeated and brutal child abuse. The second one had taken longer to complete the Duel, but after 30 minutes of viscous hand to hand combat. The woman had tapped out, and accepted a triple punishment for a drunk on duty conviction. This was something that would be very ugly, if push came to shove everyone knew that Kelly would call for a Duel. Captain Kelly was sitting with his back very straight in his chair, and he made eye contact with everyone in the room again. He stayed that way for several seconds until they all nodded that they understood what he was talking about. Then Kelly would nod to accept their agreement to his conditions.

"Okay now. I was asked if we could put a quarter of a container of light bulbs up for auction over the next few weeks. That will be an advancement of about four months from our announced plans on this product." He looked around the room again, a little faster than the last two times that he had done this. "What I was told is that Eva, Robin and the Group will buy as many as of those bulbs they can. They are going to use the new lights to increase the amount area in the caves that they have dedicated to growing food." He let that settle in for a few seconds before he continued.

Now that everyone was up to speed of the facts, which were going on behind the scenes. Captain Kelly went on with more items that were very sensitive. "If they would have waited until the scheduled auction of those lights, they would have been able to drive up the price. Because they would have been only one of the few groups, who could afford that high of a price for the growing lights. Amazon and her group did not want do that, to people who also need those lights for their homes. We also do not know who they bought the technique from, or how much they had to pay for it. I do know that the person is not with the core of that group, no matter what the rumor mill might be saying. I would bet that it will be an expense that will be hard to measure. What I was told, and this is came by a different information source. Is that they have also picked up some dozens of sugar beets seedling from the Lucky Find's hydroponics, not too long ago." He raised an eyebrow before he continued speaking. "Do I need to remind everyone what we could get? When we use the excess glycerin we are getting from the fish oil, when it is mixed with a good bit of extract from the sugar beets and a few other easy to come by ingredients." He did not need to, as he saw all of the eye brows shoot up higher on most of the foreheads in the room.

What he was talking about, was how you a made a very high grade explosives. Making new high grade explosives had been hard do to do, because of the lack of the right ingredients being available. Well the truth was them being available in any usable quantities, to make the processes worth wild for the effort, possible damage and danger production might cause. If Amazon and her group could get the sugar beets growing in the right numbers, and in a steady supply of those numbers? That would now be another game changer. All provided by Amazon and her group of friends that were out of the box thinkers. Both Bob and Kelly were keeping a close eye on those two for possible positions with in the leadership of the Settlement or other special jobs.

Sophia recovered first and cleared her throat. She wanted to make sure that everyone in the room understood what was being said. She knew but she was not that sure about the rest of the room understood, and the risk involved. "So we are not going to step in? What if your information turns out not to be true after all? Then what do we do?"

Kelly looked around the table quickly. "I would say no, let it play out. I do think we need to come up with a well thought out and very detailed plan, in case this type of thing comes up again. How about we vote on it? That way we have set a president for this type of event. And an agreed upon action as a counter to it on the law books. What do we do if my information does turn out to be wrong? Well then we will have to look at what our options are then. We have no idea what the future is going to bring, and how it can affect the situation." It took almost an hour to get everything completed and voted on. These new rules would be put into the records for later use, by the rest of the Settlement. Kelly was thinking that it was a bit of an overkill approach, but it made the others more comfortable. Even if he did not agree with the need, it was done deal.

Joe Kittinger was the last person scheduled to have input in today's meeting. Everyone needed a break after the stress of the meeting, about the possible collapse of their economy, and what that would cause. Max called for a ten minute break so that everyone could go to the bathroom, and or get something to drink before they started the meeting back up. This was good for Joe, because he had wanted, and needed time to get things ready for his big briefing. After he was done he stood by the briefing screen with anticipation. He was waiting for everyone to come back. He was mildly annoyed that only the three leaders came back to the metal walled room, which was being used for this meeting. He had put a lot of work into this this briefing, and his ego wanted the most amount of people to know it when he gave the briefing.

When Captain Kelly was taking his seat at the wooden table again, he nodded to Joe. He could tell that the man was a little let down, by having a smaller crowed. Than he had thought he would be briefing today. Joe had not idea that the break had been called so that Max, Bob, and Kelly could dismiss the rest of meeting attendees quietly. "Joe, I wanted this briefing to be given just to us. Afterwards, you can post the data at Warehouse One if you want. I just wanted our little group to have the first look at what you have come up with. It will help us make any modification to any long term plans we might have before he had to play twenty questions."

After the three men were now re-seated, and all of them were looking at the man standing at the head of the table Joe smiled back at them. There was not much he could come up with to say, to counter what everyone considered as the leader of the three elected leaders. "Okay. My briefing is on the results of the testing of the armor samples from both types of flying machines, as well as weapons we pulled from both type of cylon flying craft. First thing to talk about, is that they were indeed able to take the complete weapon systems from both the flying craft types. To include the loading and firing mechanizes, for the projectile weapons from both types of cylon craft. What we found out quickly about the two weapons mounts. Is that they are the same class of weapon, just in a different weapons mount looking or mounting type. We had expected that from our contacts with the Colonial Military, but none of them had seen these weapons first hand. That is before we got our hands on some examples to work with, and break them down. One of the main questions we had. Was if these heavier weapons they carried, could damage our machines and combat robots. The simple answer is yes. But they are not up to our tech and the damage output, as we expected from our interviews previously." Joe stopped talking and looked down at this notes before continuing. "The damage levels are very low for the mass of the weapons, but they can still hurt our people. We need to make sure our people do not underestimate them, when they are taking fire from them."

Joe stopped talking, and let the three leaders review the information on their portable computer screens. When Joe thought they had enough time to get the gist of the information, he started talking again. He had gotten a lot better at this sort of meeting over the last year. "My team had a couple of Colonials on it. They helped us identify some of the odder bits of the weapons, which we are not used to seeing. The weapon would be called a 30mm KEW weapon or Kinetic Energy Weapon. It is the same sized of weapon that the Colonial made Vipers and Raptors are supposed to carry. It makes a kind of since, and eases any supply issues if everyone shoots the same ammunition in certain high rate of fire weapons. It has been the standard Colonial fighter, anti-fighter, and anti-missiles weapon for around forty years, from what we have been told."

Again Joe stopped talking as he saw the leaders looking at slides with the weapons in an exploded view on their sixteen inch screens. Max gave a hand jester for Joe to continue his briefing, and he replied with a head nod. Max had the least amount of military knowledge, so if he was ready to continue, the other two men were also. "How they are able to get the heavy MDC damage output for the weapons is a twofold design issue. First design item, is the barrel of this KEW weapon. The breech of the weapon and its projectile we recovered, are 45mm in diameter when they are first loaded into the weapon." That was getting some strange looks as three heads came up from the screens to look at him. How could the projectile ammunition be bigger diameter when loaded, than the muzzle at the end of the weapon? Joe smiled back at them, as he saw the looks begin directed at him. He did want to tell them, that he had much the same look on his face. When he had found out that little bit of news, from the Colonials on his team. "If you go to slide ten you will see what I'm talking about. The Barrels have a tapper in them, so as the projectile is moving down the barrel. It is squeezed down from 45mm at the breach to 30mm just before the muzzle end. This has increased the efficiency of the propellant burn in the shell casings. We are guess increase by at least 50% over, the same length of barrel, which we would normally have used in a weapon of this class.

Joe was smiling at the wide eye looked the two men with military experience were giving him. Joe knew it was rare to stump both Captains. "The second design issue is the ammunition round itself." Joe pulled a round that had been bisected before the meeting and passed it to the three men across the table from him. "If you look at the round, you can see that it is made up of two different types of metals. The outer layer is very soft metal, or maybe a hard type of plastic. We don't know which one, yet. That is what makes the seal when the projectile goes down the barrel after the charge is fired. The core is a hard pointed metal alloy of some kind, that well do a good bit of damage when it hits. So far all of the ammunition we have found has been of this one type of round. We have not found an explosive round, like the big hand carried weapon can fire. That is about all we have been able to work out on those weapons. I have reduced the number of personnel working on the projectile weapons and there mounts starting tomorrow. I will still keep a few people on them, just in case something comes up. I think we have a good handle on them, and will not find anything that would be worth keeping the current number of people that I have put on the detail."

Joe activated the room's projector and an image was put on one wall near where he was standing. The image was of an odd pointed shaped object with fins at the back end with a smaller set closer to the nose. He activated a light pointer that had been in his hand from the beginning of the meeting. "The other weapons system we checked out, are the missiles. They were able to pull a dozen of these missiles from the landed ships and get them back to us. We also have been looking at sensors reports of their inflight capabilities, and warhead output provided by our people on the ground. All of the missiles we have seen, and have captured examples of. Seem to be just to have a high explosive warhead fixed on the thruster bodies. We are told by the Colonials that they have two other types of fighter carried missile. One is some kind of electronic attack or decoy systems, but our friends have not seen this one since what they call the first cylon war. We have also been told that they have nuclear warheads that are carried by both Raider and Heavy Raider. This sized of a weapon, is supposed to be able to carry a warhead in the five to ten kiloton range. We have not had a chance to examine them, first hand, so it is all hear say right now."

Joe pointed to the pointed nose of the projected image of the cylon made missile. "We now have a good idea of the tracking technique, and how there hardware and software works on their seeking systems. All of the missiles recovered had the same type seekers mounted on them. But we do not know for sure, if they have others or not. Our Colonial friends had no idea, and we know that the Colonial military only uses one type of seeker system on all of their non-capital sized missiles. We have already come up with a few good ideas on how to jam them, but it should be noted. That these missile seekers systems work on a different set of principles, than the seeker heads we are used to dealing with. The Test team feels that ours will be very hard for these cylons to counter. At least in the first and second engagements, that we use missiles against them and they live to pass along any telemetry. After that they might have enough information, to start developing counter measures for our missiles. That assumption will go out the window. If they capture any physical examples of our missiles, kind of like what we have done with theirs."

Joe moved his light pointer a little farther down the missile main body, to highlight a different area of the weapon on display. "This is the area of the warhead is right behind the seeking hardware and power supply and first set of maneuvering control surfaces. It is the main warhead. It is made up of a type of RDX/CL20 compound. That is as near as we can tell." Joe hit a button on the projector and a new image showed on the wall beside him. It was an exploded view of the warhead alone, so that each of the component parts was able to be viewed, and identified. "What is different in there warhead design verses ours is the core design of it. Is it has an outer wrapping of the main explosive charge, and it has an inner core of the warhead that is different than what we use." He pointed to the two different areas, but stopping moving as he pointed out the very inner core of the warhead. "We would call this an initiator charge. These seemed to be made up of the substance generally referred to as type of refined Tylium. Now we have found that same type of explosive charge in the ammunition in the ground base unit's weapons. There it is solid block of Tylium for the explosive charge. Tylium is a mineral that I, and anyone else that came to this planet with us. Has never heard of, our seen by a different name." Joe stopped looking at the three leaders and looked at his notes. He was looking for something and started to mumble just loud enough that it carried across the table. "What had one of the team called it?"

Joe stopped talking and reviewed his notes in his hand before he continued with his briefing. "There it is. They referred to it as being as unstable as an adolescent making home brewed nitroglycerin in an earthquake. That is a direct quote, by the way. I don't think that working with this stuff is a viable option for us at this time. I will put my job on the line, if I have to. That stuff is crazy unstable and I don't want to die working out how to make it, without a proven recipe. The Colonies of Kobal might have come up with ways to make working with this stuff safe. But right now, we have better results in yields, mass, and is safer just sticking with what we know how to work with."

Joe held up both of his hands, because he thought they might not like his idea he had just given to them. "I'm not saying that we should stop development in small scale, just as long as it is done safely. You never know what will come up, but right now this stuff is crazy unstable and dangerous as Frak." Joe stopped talking as a vision of some of the experiments they had run already had turned out ran quickly threw his mind. It only lasted a few heart beats, before he was speaking again. "The fuel for the missile has the same burn or spectral signature as the warhead. And we don't have any idea of how they were able to do something like that…. yet. The team thinks that we would be worth or while to see if we can get Mr. Tyrol back to our shops for this reason alone. If these cylon missiles are using a type of Tylium as a fuel for their impulse, this is one area." Joe stopped talking and looked right at Bob and Max, before he continued. "This is where they are ahead of us, equipment technology wise. Tyrol might be able to give us some insights into weapons capabilities, and maybe even some researcher and production pointers on this Tylium. He might even be able to define it better, than the people we have been working with so far."

Joe collected his note cards, and straightened them out. The last bit of information he did not need notes to give. "The team has concluded that we can make some improvements on our missiles systems, with what we found out so far from these captured cylon weapons. I have a small team that is working out how to use Colonial and cylon technology to improve at least some of our Missiles. We do not have the production capability to make new missiles, but if that changes in the future. I think we should have the plans drawn up, test as much as we can, and be ready to go into production. As of now our missiles have a better effective range, damage output, and better warhead selection or options. After a few contacts, there missile seekers will have a better hit ratio than ours will be able to achieve. But their conventional explosive warheads are a lot weaker than ours. The down side is that we cannot replace any that we use, and they can get resupplied. Even if they seem to be at the end, of a very long supply line, they still can at least plan on refilling there magazines. On the plus side, we can fire this type of cylon missile out of our any short ranged missile system that we have on hand. We can do this with only a few minutes spent, modify each missile we capture to fit our launchers. So if we can find a stockpile of them, we will be able to get some use out of them against any opponent. The targeting software is a simple patch, which we can upload in a few seconds onto the firing mounts. The software coding has already been worked out, and can be loaded into any combat unit when they come in for a maintenance cycle. It should not take more than a half an hour per machine, with our current manning levels. I approve the development of the software, as a just in case we can get access to Colonial military weapons. We were also told that the Colonial Warships, Vipers, and Raptor had been using this type of weapon for some time. We have been told, but even the person we talked to was not too sure how many they can make. But they can basically hand make new ones, if they can find the raw material and have the manufacturer ability free. That is a lot better than we can do, at this time."

"Why did they do that? Why would they make their ammunition dependent weapons so interchangeable?" This was asked the only no military person at the narrow table, his lack of experience was now showing on military matters. Even after these last few years of exposure. Max was still not that up to speed on military things, but he was a person who did not have to be told twice about something…. normally.

Kelly turned to face the other man, thankful that the deputies were not present to see this hole in the knowledge from one of the three key leaders. All most all of them were trained in at least one of the military arts, if not more. That did not mean that they were all knowing, when it came to all aspects of fighting. "The cylons were design to do the warfighting, and other nasty jobs for the Colonial's. Not too long ago in their history, so they started out using the same weapons as their current enemies. It takes a long time and lots of resources to change key weapon systems, that you also need a large number of to replacements what your currently working with. You also have the added advantage of being able to use capture supplies, with little or no work. That makes supplying your combat forces a lot easier and a lot cheaper, in both a long war and a short one. It has happened more than once back home, that I know of. I would bet, not all of their ordnance are that interchangeable, maybe in there big ship mounted stuff. I would also bet that as time went on, it would be less and less interchangeable like the 15mm weapons some of the Centurions have been sported with. So far we know that it does not have a Colonial military analog. But right now it still make some kind of since, for whoever in in charge of all of the cylons military power." Captain Kelly looked around the table again, and Joe was waiting not saying a word. Maybe it was because Joe did not want to interrupt his Captain.

Kelly was glad that Mr. Carr was not adding any additional or overloading information for Max to have to work through. "If this Admiral Adama still has those manufacturing ships with him. We could have them make expendable munitions for us. We know that they used those ships to restock all of their spent weapons stores, when they found this planet. So we know that they have done it before. It is something we need to think about, and put some rough ideas together." Kelly looked back at Joe, but Kelly had an almost dreamily like look in his eyes. "Sorry about that Joe, it was a target of opportunity." He smiled at the other man, so that he could get back to his briefing. Kelly had a list of dozens of ideas and counter plans. They were both in his head, and on a secure file in the safe built into his cabin. He was always a planer, even when he was a lot younger man.

Joe nodded and started back with where he had left off on his briefing. "Yes Sir. I would like to go back to the weapons, we most likely will see on the current battlefield. We have found something new out about the ammunition of both the hand carried cylon weapon you just mentioned, and the built-in machine guns that are used. We have found out that the Armor Piercing or AP core of the projectile is different than we first believed. Well it is made of the same type of metal, which is used as armor plate for the two types of small craft we have had access to so far."

Joe hit the button again on the projector, and the image changed on the screen. It was an extremely magnified imaged of something that was very hard to figure out what it might be, without more information being provided. Joe was ready to supply that additional information. "This is what the amour looks likes like close up, with our best magnification scopes. Its' a layered armor, and it's kind of like what we are used to working with. Only it is made up of different things. Also the layering is not anyway near as fine, as what we used to having access to. For what we can find out so far, and using the known technology limits as a guide. The smallest sized of projectile that they can make, is only going to be about 7mm in diameter. We have no idea how big a sheet of this stuff they can make in one run. But it should only be limited by the size of the equipment they have the room for, wherever they are making this stuff at the time. They also do have some way of attaching different slaps together. But so far we have no idea, if it is like what we have on hand or they use something completely different."

Joe flipped to a new image that showed a Centurion, a human form cylon, a Raider class craft, and a Heavy Raider class craft all on the same image. They were set up to be side by side to give a since of scale of each of the new enemy compared to each other. And a single human figure at one end of the image. "I don't want to have this taken as absolute, let's just call this a rule of thumb for now. We have come up with a defensive threat capability for each type of Cylons. Or more to the point, the ones we have encountered, and have lab tested so far. We are rating the current generation of Centurion, as being rated at eight MDC for the chest and between two to four for each of their limbs."

Joe moved his light pointer to the next figure on the projected image. "A human form cylon is a little faster, little smarter, and a little stronger than an Earth "normal" person. Other than that they are pretty much equal to most "normal" Earth born humans. So far they have only been seen in combat wearing relatively weak body armor. From all reports, it looks to be the same as what the Colonial Military has issued, to its main combat troopers. The same model that was just issued before this current war started. So they can only withstand a solid hit by something on the smaller side, like side arms and the like. Full sized weapons would blow threw them. Going from front to back and would even, be a threat to whoever was standing behind the first target with a large enough weapon. The hand carried weapons, that they have been seen to have been carried by our people and the Colonials. All looked to be standard issue Colonial Military or Fleet issue. We have no idea if they have different hand carried weapons, that they have not deployed ground side yet."

Joe moved to the image of the C shaped fighter with a cannon like weapon, under mounted on each of its sinister looking wings. "The Raider is designed for anti-fighter and light attack rolls in both atmosphere and in space. It has two cannons that are under-wing mounted and fire synced, but fixed firing forward only. It can carry up to six short ranged missiles in a central weapons bay mounted under what we think is the cockpit. The cockpit is behind the odd red lit area, and it holds the organic component that is the crafts control mechanism. We think that the main body of the craft is rated at about 10 MDC, and the wings are a lot lighter skinned than the main body. The craft is meant to be fast, and a first strike craft. It is not just for sitting around slugging it out, one on one with anything. We don't have any more information about the inner workings of this type of craft. Besides what we have been able to get from a few escaped Colonials with military experience."

Joe looked around to the three leaders, but they did not say anything. With a slight nod to Captain Kelly, Joe continued on with his briefing about the cylon craft called a Raider. "We have parts from about ten different craft of this type. That has come in from all of our different attacks so far to date. We have been told that they can fight in space, and have an ability to "jump" to different stars. But only at what they called a short ranged interstellar distance. What is that range? We have no idea. No one on my team knows what to look for in the engine area of the craft that can do this interstellar "jump". It would not help that much. Even if we had a whole one of these things to take apart, and test to our hearts content, we would still need technical support from Colonials. To really make any head way on figuring out how those systems work, or even if they were working in the first place." Joe could not hide his expression of distress at having to admit that bit of information to these men. "Now figuring out about their weapons and armor? We understand that. The rest of the stuff, we just don't have the back ground to understand them." Joe knows that this was not good news, but it also was not unexpected news. He moved on to the next image projected on the one wall to his right.

"This big ugly beast is called a Heavy Raider, by both Colonials and Cylons. We are told, that it is a little, but noticeable slower than a regular Raider class of ship. Its hull is also almost twice as thick as a normal style Raider. That means that it can take a lot more punishment, before it will come down. We think the mission type for this type of craft, is twofold. It can be used as troop lander like an APC, but it is also space capable. It is also used in heavy attacks, fire support to the smaller Raider ships, or the parent capital class ships. It has six cannons in two triples mounts, both of them are fixed firing forward. Each of those six projectile weapons, in those two fixed mounts are the same type of weapon. And the same that are mounted on the Raiders, but it has a lot deeper magazine to feed each mount with ammunition. But both mounts only cover the front arc of the ship with fire. If your attacking this thing from the back, top, bottom or the sides. Its dead meat in those areas, and it does not exactly turn on a dime either. Even with the bigger engines mounted on this thing, compared to the Raider class."

Joe stopped talking when Max looked up at him after the last comment. When they made eye contact, he waved for Joe to continue. "It also has only has the one missile bay, and it is in the lower center front of the craft next to the six cannons. This bay is larger than the Raiders have built into it, and this one can is carrying almost two dozen of the same type of missiles as the Raider class craft. We did find odd mountings inside the missile launch bay. It looks like the bay can modify to carry a smaller numbers of larger missiles. Maybe a Medium class weapon we have not seen before, but we think it can only carry ten of the larger missiles by the way the mounts looked to line up in the one example we have been able to look at. We do know from reports from the Colonials, heavier missiles are used for anti-shipping attacks. We are told that those larger missiles, come in also only two known different types of warheads. They are High Explosive and Nuclear, but we do not have a yield for those warheads on that sized of a missile yet. We also do not know if we can use these other larger missiles bodies or not. We have hunks from all of the larger Heavy Raiders that we have taken down so far. The guys on the ground found it easier to take big hunks out of the hulls of the grounded ships of this class, versus the crashed sites of the lighter Raiders. That is after they filled them full of holes, to make sure that they could not take off again." Joe gave a smile as he saw the three men in front of him look up as one, and smiled back at him for his offered light joke. "The message one of my forward deployed people said last night. Is that they were thinking about supplying more metal, for use back here at the Settlement and it would be coming from this class of ship. Just to let you know, about half of the total weight of the metal that came in from the attack on the fake transmitter site. That all came from the Heavy Raider class craft, which they were able to cut out quickly and as quickly carry off."

The other ship's captain, Bob Nichoson, rocked his head back at the mention of the additional refined metal. But he wanted to know about something that had been bothering him, since Joe has started his briefing. "Were you able to get all of what you needed for all of the testing you have been talking about? Do you need more? Do you need to move closer to the Main Support Camp to do better testing? What is the best way to compete all of the testing?"

Joe smiled a little bigger at the set of questions coming at him. It was always reassuring, to know that the leadership understood. How import it was to gain knowledge about any enemy first, before those test items were sent out for other uses and maybe less important uses. "We were able to get all of the materials we needed for testing without to many issues Sir. Those issues, I think have been resolved for now. But a blanket authorization letter from this body might be useful, down the road in case any issues come back up." Joe gave a twin shoulder shrug and kept talking. "After we had found out we could or did not need a sample anymore, or we were just done with a given sample. It was returned into the supply system here in Safe Port Bay. We have kept some items back, which we felt was still need for more testing or experimentation. But well over 80% or so of what we collected out of the supply network, has already been returned to the supply warehouse." He looked around the table at the faces, and they were looking back at him waiting to see what else he had to say. "That is all I have at this time. Thank you for your time gentlemen." Joe took a seat, and waited to see what was going to happen next.

Kelly looked around the table at his fellow leaders and read their faces like a well-used book. With a single look he knew what the next step was, at least the next step that had to deal with Joe. "I don't have anything right now. I think you can put all of the information from your report on the information network. I would like to think you, and your team. They did, and are doing a great work. I also was asked to pass along a think you, from the supply warehouse people about the return of those test items you just mentioned. That says something. When you have supply people, sending thank you notes, about your work. We will have to review this idea of a blanket letter in private. I'm not saying no, but we will have to review that request at a later date." A round of laughing swept Captain Kelly's side of the table. Every one of them had run-ins with the supply department at one time or another, before and after becoming the leaders of this little but growing settlement. No matter what planet you were on, supply people thought they owned every pen and bullet ever made.

Joe looked up and made eye contact with his Captain sitting across the table from him. "The notes, information, and the complete briefing are already on the Settlement network. I will password release them to the general access network, as soon as I get back to my office. And thank you for your compliment. The whole team knows how important it was to get as many of the items, back into the supply network as we could. I will pass along the thank you, to the rest of the team."

Kelly looked down at his portable computer, and back to the seated briefer. "Joe we know you have a lot on your plat, but we still have some topics we need to cover in this meeting." Kelly was trying to be nice, but the normal way to close one part of the meeting had been changed at the last minute. Now Kelly was left with only this awkward way to ask Joe to leave them, so that they could get some more work done.

Joe took the meaning, as it was time for him to leave the briefing room without any issues. He hated meetings, with the leadership of his people and he had a smile on the insides. "No problem gentlemen. I have about an hour before a test is to start out by the main gate, which I was hoping to be able to see in person. Thank you again for your time gentlemen." Joe rose from this chair, and swiftly exited the conference room. He felt like he just had a great day, and he had more things that he wanted to get done today. This had the makings of being a truly wonderful day. That is as long as nothing blew him up, before the dinner meal…again.

When the door closed behind Joe, Captain Kelly looked back down at his portable computer and flipped to the data he wanted now to talk about. "Okay. I did not want to address this to the larger group just yet." He tapped the screen of his computer. "I have an interesting report from the recycling center in the Supply System Department. They have hired a dozen more people to help with the increased workload that they have had of late. I am happy to report, that the salvaged cylon metal is already having an impacted on our standard of living as a group whole. A lot of it had already been process, and we have had made into massive influx of small metal fixtures like nails, screws, hinges. More importantly, the higher strength raw metals as also improved our defensive ability. We can still use more, a lot more, so we are not being flooded with an oversupply of those items at this time. No matter what some people might be hinting at, we need more metal." He tapped his computer again, and made a sour face. "I was asked if the Settlement would help fund a new melting furnace, to handle the salvaged metal back log that is just starting to grow. I kind of like the idea that more metal would be coming in, than the one furnace we have in operation can handle at this time. I don't think we should help fund this idea, at this time anyway. I think they could handle more output just by adding an additional working shift. I wanted to bring it up, in case we have to field some public questions later about it." This statement was rewarded with a pair of strange looks from the other two men at the table. The last four times this very subject had come up, to the gathered leadership. Captain Kelly had been the one who wanted to move ahead with this project. Now he did not want another smelter to be built, it was a strange shift in position.

Kelly saw the looks, and when Max tilted his head to one side, and then made and odd head bob motion. Kelly let out a sigh, and filled them in on his change of heart. "I take it from the look I'm getting from Max. You both would like to know the reasons, that I do not support his expenditure at this time. One is the additional power requirements, this project will need to be worth wild. I think they would be very high, and now we would have to conceal both items. Well I don't think it would not be an easy item to do. With an enemy intelligence that we already know has both air superiority and space superiority over us. Then add on top of that these cylon have an unknown scanning ability, which covers all the way from orbit down to ground level. The second item, is that with the information we are getting about the Colonial manufacturing ships and there capabilities. I think we would not be able to compete against them. Not with something like a slapped together late 20th century tech device, or something that is pre-golden age. Not against their higher technology built-in ability those ships give them."

Max looked at Bob with a level look, and nodded his head to what Kelly had been saying. With a slight lip movement, he added his own opinion on the subject. "I have to agree with you Captain Kelly. What we have now, is working well enough and now that we have a steady supply of refined metal. And it is already supplying what we need. And the repair shops are providing the limited higher end products that we have to have. I'm not saying it would not be better off, if we had more manufacturing capability. I just think waiting for a few more months, would not be that big of a deal." Max looked around the room. "Now that being said. I think we need to come up with a list of items that we can make or maybe more importantly. A list of what we can't make, to increase the production of high and medium quality armor plate. As we all have learned Max was right about keep that sub-par armor plate. I think it's something that if we can make extra of. Well the Colonials I have talked to, said that they would love to have it. You know since it looks to be some much better, than that they have had access to in years. Do any of you we know what else we could supply them with that we can replace of the tops of your heads?"

"I agree." came the reply for the captain of the Lucky Find. He was rocking in his chair left and right in little arcs lost deep in thought, and not aware of this movements. "Right now about the only thing we can supply them, that we are not limited in ourselves. You know what was loaded on our ships when we came here, is food and clean water." He stopped talking because he did not want to say what needed to be said. He had too many pet projects working, that would be effected by what he was about to say. He had to fight with himself for some long seconds, but in the end he decided that he was required to say what needed to be said. "I think we need to raise the priority for make the machines to support Max's idea about increasing the production of new armor plate." He drummed his fingers on the metal table top and made an unhappy face. "I remember seeing the plans for a small armor plant on the network a few months ago. I think it was going to be set up somewhere away from the main base Golden age Weapon Smiths had, back home." I was hoping that we could push that project down the line some and wait before, we had to do it. We can use this time to work out any bugs and develop a good bit surplus for our people to drive the cost down for them." Bob was still dumbing his fingers on the table top and a deeper frown forced down his lips. "I don't think that is an option anymore. I also agree with Kelly about not helping pay for part of a new smelter, just yet." It was a bitter pill for Bob to take, and it had tasted as bad as he thought it would. But it was out in the open now and there was not much he could do about it.

Kelly was a little stunned that it was two votes that agreed about not starting the new smelter, and he did not have to break a sweat to get them. He was also going to bring the armor plant idea up later, but now he did not have to. "I say that this idea of an increasing our armor production gets bumped to number two on the list of priority. That would put it right behind support to defensive applications, and even above food production for the time being. Do we have agreement? Raise your hands please." All three men raised their hands to agree to the new plan. Kelly made a note on his computer about the vote, about the why and the results. It would be auto sent, to a pre-planned list of people Kelly already had ready. That would happen at the exactly at the same time, as it was being posted on the side of Warehouse One. For all of the rest of the still growing Settlement to have access to. A note would also be posted, that they had reviewed a request for support of building a smelter. And they had decided not to support, that idea at this time. That would not stop the smelter from being built, only that the leadership was not going to help with supply the funds. If they could raise the funds on their own then they could build it any way.

After making that note, Kelly went to the next item on his list of subjects. "Now for another bit of supply business, that was brought up to me. I have been sent an official request, for general support. It would seem that another group of young lions wants to go on another Megalodon hunt. They have that 80 foot kind of sloop rigged wooden vessel. They have just finished building, and doing some test runs on the beast." Kelly looked around the table, to read the faces. That large wooden vessel had been an issue, when it was it first brought up to them. After a few days the trios decided not to support, or help fund it being built. That had been during the first year on planet, and it was judged to be a waste of effort by most people. That had not stopped the people who had come up with the idea in the first place. Two of the individuals had been water warlocks or water witches. That is before coming to a planet that magic was so very quiet on. They had used their knowledge of sailing ship design, and now after almost three years of very hard but stop and go work. The vessel was ready for its first mission. Kelly had put some of his own money it the project, but only a little bit. It was more as charity, than in any hope of get any repayment for his investment. He thought the idea was more of a safe way for some magic uses to find an outlet, after the loss of their primary way of life. Deep down, he never thought that they might get something launched that would acutely float. Much less them making something that would be productive to the Settlement in any measurable way.

It had not been an easy job, and they had looked like they were going to give up more than once over the years that it took to not only built the vessel, but all the tools to build the ship. But somehow they would come together again, and they would fix. Whatever had slowed them down, or had stopped the work in the first place. The design had changed more times than the men around the table to could think of, or would have wanted to know about. In fact there was a betting pool going on in Warehouse One. If the ship was ever done, if would be even able to float. One of the hardest design changes had been when they found out, and it was not early on in the project. That there was no way to come up with something to make all of the sail cloth, that a vessel of that size. It would need a huge amount of that stuff to move at anything like a useful speed. That was why now it was barely sooner rigger, even now in a hodgepodge of different looking sails. That was still an issue, but they were working with others to test out any local fiber making planet. They would even help pay for some of the development of the sail making material, and do the testing on their ship.

Somehow the group of ex magic wielders, and friends were able to come up with the funds, to buy a poor souls EBA suit. That had been after he had removed himself from this word, because he had fallen into a bought of deep depression. They had been able to modify the suit to be the primary power supply for the vessel. The rest of the suit had been not well maintained, and the rest of the suit had been sold off as spare parts to keep other suits in operation. The suit's power supply system would spin the copper screw, that was just at eight foot wide with a three bladed propeller or prop. The ship was being built in a large sea side cave that opened to the ocean, and that cave had a tunnel access to the bay side of the ridge-line. One of the easier projects they had done was converting the foot trail, to a road to supply their pet project. The vessel they had finally launched was not going to be fast. But it was invisible to radar, and it had passed a limited DRADIS test from the device that Chief Tyrol had left them. The thing was invisible to both systems, so it had some utility, if it was used the right way. At least that was what Kelly was now thinking about the wooden hulled ship. But what could it best be used for? That was the million credit question.

The ship's elected Captain would not be a member of the Triumvirate, but they would be able to sail were ever they wanted to go. Just like the two ship's captains that sat around this table had been able to do, if they wanted to exercise that option. The owners did not have to let the leadership of the settlement know that they wanted to go on a hunt. It was an expected of them to let them know, but only because if something went wrong. It would be Triumvirate leading the rescue of them, no matter where they might be. The group around this table could have veto this first mission of the wooden boat. In the end they all decided that it would set a bad precedent set for the future. The mission Veto would only be used if, it was a real life or death situation. This had been already decided weeks before the craft had left slips for the not so loving touch of the open sea. Plus there was that age old rule for a commander. "That you should never give an order, which you knew, would not be obeyed in the first place."

Kelly waited for a time as he watched his fellow leaders reading the notes on their computers. He wanted to give the other two a bit of quiet time, to see if they wanted to object to the request that had been sent to him. When the other two men looked up from there computer, Kelly was ready. "I think we should ask them to limited there first hunt, to only two of those beasts. Before they are suggested return back to the dock for offloading. We will let them know that we are not going to put out an alert about the suggested limited catch, or even that they are going out to doing any hunting on their next test run. I think that it will not affect the speculation on price of the meat when/if. They come back with two of those 100 ton animals ready to hit the market. I would also suggest that we put in an order for more of the local plastic made long term food storage bags. That much meat hitting the market at one time will drive the price down, a least some. If we take what is left, and store it the right way for a rainy day. I think we can do it on the cheap side, and it might get even cheaper down the road. At least at the short run, I think the prices will drop a good bit. At least that is what I'm hoping it will do when they start pulling in more, and maybe larger meat animals out of the oceans."

Kelly sat back in his office chair and rocked back and forth with a sly smile on his face, as he was looking at the other faces in the room. "No I'm not that worried about the price of meat, but it will help us with supply the Colonials. The 10% of our total population that we have called up to fight, and feeding all of the people that we have supporting that 10% is going to cost. That will also take a lot of what we have in storage or can buy on the open market. I'm also don't want those young Lions to get to over confidant to quickly, and then ending up over doing something and sinking because of it. I also think that after their second mission that they successfully complete. That we offer them a job, which we are willing to pay for." The idea had just hit Kelly, and when all of the eyes turned to him. He was not sure his idea was great or bat fraking crazy as the Colonials would say. "I think that they should be able to load one of the smaller submarines on their ship as deck cargo. I would say give them a mission to scout, and detail survey up and down the coast. I say that we will help cover part of the cost of the mission up to say half of the total expenses. The sweater in the deal is that we would also get a cut of any profits, of whatever is turned up on this scouting mission."

Before Kelly could say anymore a voice cut him off from his chain of thought and speaking. "Captain Kelly, I think that the last part is a bit extreme. I also think that it is way too reliant, on to many things. All of those things have to break exactly right, to work out. I have no issue about the catch and test limits on this new crew and ship. But I say we should wait a little longer. Before we plan to far ahead, and charter a high risk mission like you just proposed. I say let's relook at any missions for them, after they have a few more successful mission under their belt." That had come from the other ship's captain, sitting at the table rubbing his day old beard growth on his chin.

As the three people went about their meeting in the metal hull of a converted warship, the rest of the Settlement went about their normal day to day business. All as the sun made its way closer to the sky line, and in the evening cold air. Some jobs were done, and other new jobs were just getting started. In other words, it was just another day on this planet hidden in a nebula.

########

Hope you all are like this. This update has put me at just over 500 pages posted.