13: The Line
by chaos_eternus

Twenty-Five

"How are we going to reinforce Earth defences?" Hammond asked quietly as Commodore Williams slipped into the room.

"With great difficulty," came the dry immediate reply, "Alpha Centauri has already been stripped down to fighters and patrol craft and not a lot of those. Lots of training squadrons but only one operational fighter squadron and one patrol craft squadron. Frankly, the Colonials are the backbone of the defence of the system at the moment, which they're going to love and I don't see that changing anytime soon. It may be worth transferring one of the ships the 1st captured to them to reinforce and reduce our own crewing issues. As far as the 'overseas' deployments are concerned I think we can forget it. Three ships helping against the Aschen, four against Anubis and four at Edonia… those are already minimum strength deployments but ones we're treaty bound to support."

"That doesn't help us a lot here and now,"

"No it doesn't, but right now crew are more the issue then ships. The 1st brought back six ships with them, four of which appear to be loyal and two we're not sure about. Getting them recrewed with trustworthy staff would have a major effect on offsetting our losses… but trustworthy crews are where we're going to have problems right now."

The General frowned then sighed, "Innocent until proven guilty Sarah. Unless there are specific concerns we have to assume everyone is innocent for the moment for the sake of morale if nothing else. Those ships need to be operational as soon as possible, get them crewed!"

"Well, the sheer number of Shunters that have been stood down will help there at least."

"Shunters?" came the sharp query.

" Thundersdawn had fifty of the damned things, along with her fighter, Airhead and Paladin squadrons. Far far more small craft then the station was ever designed to deal with, treble in fact but the Shunters could get away with stacking themselves onto the external airlocks and that's what they did but with Thundersdawn now out… well, the Shunters are the only craft which aren't atmospheric capable so they have to stay in space… some are still at Thundersdawn supporting the stabilisation of the structure, some have based themselves aboard the Admiral Peters and the Coalmine and Minehead stations have picked up a small number of the birds as well but there are now 30 of the craft abandoned in Mars orbit simply because we have no where to base them at the moment including the squadron that was doing most of the construction work for Gaia… "

Hammond visibly winced at that and Sarah had to sigh her agreement, "not to mention the Shunter training squadron. Frankly, as soon as things have calmed down I'm going to have to ask for logistical support to get them rebased on Ravenbright. Right now I'm organising minimal training out of the mining stations but they simply aren't setup to support that and as this is going to cause Gaia to slip behind… well, the sooner we get training shipped out to Ravenbright the sooner what little spare space there is as Coalmine and Minehead can be used for operational purposes."

"Commodore!" A phone was handed to her and she spoke for a few minutes before grimacing and closing the call.

"Right…" Sarah shook her head as she dropped the phone down into its cradle, glancing across the paper-strewn desk at the aging General, "that was a Group Captain Myers on the phone, apparently he flew out from RAF Digby to assume command at Manson. He's declaring the base unsafe and closed… says it's going to be two days at least before he can get a reasonably complete damage assessment out to us."

"Do we have any fighters left on the ground there?"

"Theoretically yes, a Lancer and a Striker squadron. God only knows if they're actually there right now… My sister should have a reasonably complete idea of where every unit is so I'll buzz her about that shortly… but with Manston out we've lost fighter coverage over Europe ."

Hammond sighed, rubbing his forehead wearily, "alternates?"

"St Athans would be the primary; they're battered but seem to have largely escaped this most recent incident. We may be able to divert two squadrons there but Manston also has a Paladin and an Airhead squadron to consider. After that, we're talking bases equipped for Air Breathers only which will impact maintenance."

"What strength on the Squadrons?"

She sighed, "the Lancers… well I caught a news report an hour or so ago which stated that a number of their craft were burning and this is a squadron which as far as I am aware was already understrength. I have no idea on the Strikers. "

With a grimace, Hammond reached for his coffee, "Signal that Myers to get whatever fighters he can out to St Athans and get a report as soon as possible to us and Joan on what's remaining at the station. The French slipyard, does that have a runway attached?"

Tapping for a few moments at the laptop on the desk, she smiled and then nodded, "Yes, you're thinking we should move the support squadrons there?"

"It's already a secured TSS facility," Hammond noted "and would have some repair capability. But the Paladins should take support staff and basic equipment with them as they leave."

Nodding she sent a sharp look at one of the staffers at the back of the room and with a nod, the man rose and began to leave the room. As he did, Sarah grabbed his arm, a thoughtful expression on her face, "If they still have the room, it may be worth moving some of the squadrons displaced from Thundersdawn there as well."

"RAAF Darwin ?"

Shrugging, she tapped at her console, "small scale ground fight, destruction of a munitions dump… they're cleaning up debris from that plus replacing a lot of windows. Three fighters took minor damage; last report says they expect those to be operational again tomorrow, for all practical purposes the base is online."

"Area 51?"

Sarah grimaced, "thoroughly VSF'ed for the moment. Small numbers of personnel who appear to have escaped the purge have turned up… but we've also caught a few of the traitors trying to pretend to be survivors as well so for the moment we cant trust any of them. Physically the base is relatively undamaged, its underground all concrete construction reduced fuel sources for the fires that were set. Main damage is actually smoke which can be dealt with… but where the fire took hold, it took hold. Some sections of the base may have to be rebuilt… don't have an exact read-out yet, this is just the initial impressions of the engineers who have gone in. Frankly, the recovery of bodies has only just begun; I wouldn't expect anything other then quick off the cuff reports for at least a week, possibly a fortnight."

"I see," the General leaned back in his chair for a moment, gazing away from Sarah before quietly commenting, "It's the loss of trained personnel that is going to cause us problems."

"More then anything yes," she frowned, "and it will be up to my department to do what we can about that but it's not going to be easy and it is going to take time."

"I know," he shook his head, " Cape Canaveral ?"

"Fighting still ongoing within the perimeter… and unless there's been any new reports in the last fifteen minutes or so…" she glanced up catching the eye of a tech on the perimeter of the room who shook his head silently, "great, then beyond 'contested' we have nothing in the way of status. We're not even sure which of the two groups fighting within the base is actually on our side as both are claiming loyalty and both have advised when the order to stand down came they did and the other group didn't and that they took losses accordingly."

Pursing his lips, Hammond shook his head disgruntled, "I see. Status on El Toro now?"

"Battered but operational… lost some support facilities, mainly 32 Squadrons Headquarters which got hit with a series of thousand pounders. Main loss is in personnel and birds and that'll take time to fix. They've got fourteen F-302 Starfighters on the ground that no longer have any crews."

"Consider that a priority, we need those birds back in the air," came the sharp reply.

"Agreed, but it isn't going to be easy. Right now we probably have some Lancer pilots spare who can convert but that will take time, time I'm not convinced we have. With dropping numbers of Lancers could probably close down 767 squadron for the moment, free up enough birds to bring 633 at El Toro and 194 at Manston up to strength which will help the security situation but if we lose pilots, that will make replacing them quite difficult not to mention reforming the squadron for the Mark 3 when it starts to roll off the production lines."

"Training will have to be done in squadron as necessary then, if those were still production fighters…" Hammond shrugged.

"I know, but we're still talking 3 to 4 days to get the training birds reconfigured then shipped back here under normal circumstances… given the current chaos in the supply lines, call it a week minimum."

"What about the Darts? "

"There's an operational squadron at Peterson and there was one forming at the Cape , no idea what their status is now but whilst we can divert them temporarily to defence duties that will have a major impact on training. I have already placed a stop on transfers out for the instructors… if our pilots get poached out to operational units that may give us an immediate boast but in the medium to long term we'll regret it."

"I can see your point Sarah, but surely one or two…"

"Those Dart squadrons you're talking about are relatively recent formations. Most of the staff are still being chivvied along by the one or two who really know what they are doing and those are the pilots that would be taken. No, I would have to insist on the training squadrons, such as they are, being left alone."

"Very well," with a grimace, the General continued, "but this doesn't move us forward. We need more ships."

"The prizes the 1st Battlegroup brought back will help with that but the issue still remains, what the fuck just happened? I don't think about… what, one eighth of our forces decided to turn traitor just for the hell of it!"

"Agreed," Hammond shook his head wearily, a deep pained frown marring his face, "but it is still under investigation… but given the suspicious actions of the Invincible …"

He paused at a snort from Commodore Williams and nodded, acknowledging the point, "…the especially suspicious actions of the Invincible and the manner in which they left does suggest an external influence."

"Which frankly scares me," Sarah sighed, "our internal security was supposed to have been greatly improved against infiltration and the like since the Cylons and their human-forms appeared on the scene but for an event like this to still be possible… what other kinds of trouble do we have hiding in our ranks at the moment?"

"I don't know," came the tired response, "but we had best find out."