Chapter 25
Battlestar Galactica – Port Hangar Bay – Colonial Fleet
"Callie! What in Hades has gotten into you!?"
Specialist Giana O'Neill glared at her fellow deckhand. She was seriously annoyed that the girl had intruded upon her examination of the Thirteenth Tribe's massive shuttlecraft, something they called a dropship, according to Galen Tyrol. Although the large transport had aspects that reminded her of Colonial Vipers such as the clear cockpit canopy and the tail fin, there were other features that reminded her of the heavy cargo aircraft that her aerospace company had produced for the Caprican market. Of course, that had been during another life time, a time before the Cylons had destroyed Caprica—a time before she'd lost her husband only to discover he'd been one of the things that had ruthlessly annihilated the Twelve Colonies.
With her critical aeronautical engineer's eye, she had studied the Thirteenth Tribe's dropship. The massive thing had barely fit on the Galactica's elevator. Far larger than a Raptor, the craft reminded her of an old Patrolstar she'd seen once in a scrap yard. The Patrolstar had served as a picket ship during the Cylon War forty years ago and, at times, had to be serviced in the field by battlestars. That had been why the elevators were designed to handle craft like the Thirteenth Tribe's dropship.
She'd taken note of the large cargo ramp suspended under the ship by six elephantine hydraulic lifters. Obviously the craft had been designed to transport heavy equipment along with being able to hold its own during combat engagements. Under the plane's nose she had spied a rotary cannon enclosed in a turret. The design had suggested to her the craft was supposed to engage ground targets rather than be used in a dogfight with other aircraft since the gun was designed to fire downward in a variety of firing arcs.
However, all of her thoughts about the craft derailed spectacularly when Callie had grabbed her right arm and Giana had turned toward her young colleague and witnessed the wide-eyed look of sheer terror in the girl's eyes.
Knowing that Callie was essentially mute due to the injury the deckhand had sustained the other day after Galen had inadvertently attacked her, she didn't resist when the girl dragged her to the far corner of the pallet that contained the tons of supplies and thousands of gallons of water the Alliance people had just unloaded from their craft onto the hangar deck. From that vantage point, they could peer up into the dropship's cargo bay where, to Giana O'Neill's utter amazement, she saw a walking nightmare from ancient Caprica's past lurking in the compartment's shadows.
"Callie," she whispered, "do you see it, too?"
The girl nodded her head fervently in response.
"By the gods!" Giana exclaimed. "It's a razor cat!"
Now her face mirrored the frightened expression on Callie's face. A thousand years ago, razor cats had been an indigenous life form of Caprica. Based on exhibits she'd seen in Caprica City's Museum of Natural History before the holocaust, Giana knew that the ferocious creatures had preyed on the early colonists who'd left Gemenon to explore and settle on Caprica.
The animals had been stocky, muscular mammals with short legs, broad and rounded heads. Their mouths had contained vicious teeth that had ripped the flesh from their unfortunate victims. In addition to their sharp teeth, razor cats had possessed five-fingered paws armed with knife-like claws.
Fortunately for her ancestors, the creatures had never been that numerous. Apparently, they had tended to be solitary and territorial animals. Subsequently, they had been hunted down ruthlessly and driven into extinction by the ancient Capricans.
Just when she was about to scream out a warning to everyone on the hangar deck, a tall, bald-headed black man dressed in a Thirteenth Tribe uniform called out to them. "Ladies, may I help you?"
She blinked twice and struggled to rein in her distress. "There's a razor cat inside your ship!" she shouted.
He narrowed his eyes at her, apparently confused by her warning. "Excuse me, did you say a 'razor cat?' What exactly is that? "
"That!" she snapped and pointed to the creature in concert with an equally frightened Callie Henderson.
He turned to see where they were pointing. Then, when he finally saw the thing, he sighed heavily. "Please excuse me for a moment, ladies. I've got this," he said simply and marched toward the craft's ramp.
Afraid for the man, both women hesitantly crept forward, hoping he possessed a weapon to protect himself from the monster hiding in the dark.
As the man stalked into the cargo hold, they overheard him snap, "Imani! What in the hell am I supposed to do with you? Did I not tell you to keep your mangy hide out of sight, Gunny? You're just damned lucky one of these poor folks haven't decided to shoot your dumb ass."
An utterly gobsmacked Giana O'Neill was stunned when the creature actually spoke to the man. "I'm sorry, Captain. I couldn't help myself. I just wanted to take a little peek outside."
The man glared at the creature that stood as high as his chest for a moment before he chuckled warmly. "I get it, Gunny, I truly do. However, these folks haven't had the opportunity to meet other races until now, so we need to introduce them to the members of our Alliance slowly and carefully. We don't want to do anything to spook them. Unfortunately," he noted with a sigh, "it seems we've managed to do exactly that. Tell me, do you see those two women standing outside the ramp?"
"Do you mean the two human females in the funny yellow coverings with orange stripes?"
"Yep. Well, Imani, they happened to catch a glimpse of you and you nearly scared the living daylights out of them."
The creature's head drooped down to its barrel chest. "I am truly sorrowful for my actions, Captain. I never intended to cause anyone any distress."
In the meantime, while the man and the creature had been talking, Giana, with Callie cowering behind her, approached the pair cautiously. "You…you both work together?"
The man regarded her with a hint of mild bemusement on his face yet he spoke to her with a gentleness that made her want to trust him. "Yes, ma'am, we do. This Marine," he indicated with a warm clasp of the creature's shoulder, "is Gunnery Sergeant Imani, my crew chief. He's a Khalian. As for me, my name is Nathaniel Walden. I'm a Marine aviator and this Apache dropship is my bird."
When she shot a glance at Callie, she spied the same crimson blush on the girl's face that she had felt creep into her own. I am such an idiot, she thought. It had only been several hours earlier when the female commander from the Thirteenth Tribe had briefed them on the Khalians and now Callie and she had almost created a diplomatic frak up with the very people who'd come to their rescue! "Captain, I know I speak on behalf of both Callie and myself in saying we're terribly sorry for making such a fuss over Gunnery Sergeant Imani's presence aboard your ship."
He smiled brilliantly at her. "No harm done, ladies. I'm happy we were able to work this out before things got out of hand."
At that moment, she felt something tugging on her sleeve. She turned to find a very contrite Callie standing there with a sorrowful look on the girl's face. Then the girl regarded the captain, the gunnery sergeant and her before Callie grunted through clinched teeth, "I'm sorry," right before she whirled and scurried from the dropship's cargo bay out onto the hangar deck.
"Will your friend be all right?" Walden asked.
She nodded. "She'll be fine. Gunnery Sergeant Imani," she said as she turned to face the Khalian, "I want to apologize for this misunderstanding. Can you find it in your heart to forgive us?"
Imani made a sound that reminded her of a human's sneeze. Moments later, she realized the Khalian was laughing.
Soon, he regained his composure and said, "Dear human female, there is nothing to forgive. It has been a long time since humans feared my people. I must say, I find the experience to be…interesting. Now if you'll excuse me, I shall return to my station."
After the Khalian had gone through a bulkhead in the forward portion of the bay, she turned to Walden and said, "Captain Walden, thank you for your understanding and kindness."
"You're welcome," he said. "However, I didn't catch your name, ma'am."
"My name is Giana…Giana O'Neill. And Captain, please stop calling me 'ma'am.' You make me feel like an old lady!"
"Well, we certainly wouldn't want that, Giana. Let me tell you, I don't see an old lady when I look at you."
She smiled warmly at his compliment. "Well then do you see an aeronautical engineer when you look at me, Captain?"
"Please call me Nat. All my friends do."
She pouted coyly and cocked a well-groomed eyebrow at him. "That's unfortunate," she said, "because I believe I would prefer to call you Nathaniel. I think your given name sounds quite…distinguished."
His smile broadened. "I think I can live with that, Giana. So you're an aeronautical engineer, eh? Well, I'm one, too. I got my Master's Degree in aeronautical engineering before I earned my pilot's wings."
"Really?" she purred. "Then I wonder if you can clear up something for me that I noticed about your bird."
"Sure."
"How come your tailplanes are at, what, a twenty degree or more anhedral?"
"Actually, they're set at twenty-five degrees. The designers did that to account for the ship's smaller fin height due to the space considerations inside Fleet carrier hangars."
"Don't they also affect the ship's directional stability?"
His eyes twinkled in glee at her question. "You do know your stuff, Giana! When they set the anhedral at that angle, it virtually provides the craft with additional keel area which keeps the plane from drifting while hovering during atmospheric flight." He paused for a moment before he asked, "Would you like to walk around the perimeter of my bird with me? I can point out a few more of her features to you."
"I'd love to...Nathaniel," she answered with a saucy smile.
#
Cylon Raider – In an Unexplored Stellar System – Gamma Quadrant
An emerald gas giant reigned over a cluster of moons at the outer reaches of a stellar system where a lone Cylon Raider drifted in orbit above one of the immense planet's rocky satellites.
The small craft patiently waited while its scanner searched for any signs of tylium ore. The barely sentient biochene, its intelligence practically on par with a Terran chimpanzee, wasn't smart enough to be bored by the dreary nature of its task. Designed as a spaceborne bird of prey, its mental capacity was solely focused on a series of programmed tactical responses and learning from the losses it had suffered at the hands of the human Viper pilots. After resurrection, it would harness its experience from its defeats and challenge the humans again, secure in the knowledge that sooner or later it would succeed and destroy its prey in the end.
Practically egoless, the fighter craft simply carried out its assigned mission, content to follow the directions given to it by the humaniform Cylons.
Before long, the scanner located substantial deposits of tylium ore in the moon's crust. Its mission completed, the sleek fighter recalled the jump coordinates of its mother ship, spooled up its jump drive and flashed out of the system.
Unbeknownst to the Raider, a hyperspace emergence wake congealed in the vicinity of the gas giant at the moment the Cylon craft had jumped for home.
#
Colonial One – Office of the President – Colonial Fleet
"Excuse me, Madame President."
Laura slowly opened her eyes after having savored a sip of the exquisite tea that had been provided to her thanks to the generosity of the Thirteenth Tribe. Bill had sent her several boxes with his compliments from the supplies delivered to his battlestar on the Alliance's first cargo run to his ship.
After months of reusing her teabags until every bit of flavor had been wrung from them, drinking a cup of good tea was a supremely sublime experience.
Unfortunately, she had to face reality and start her busy day. "Yes, Tory?"
"Council members Zarek, Porter and Bagot are here to see you."
"Thank you, Tory. Please show them in."
"Yes, ma'am," her personal assistant said.
Moments later, Tory guided the trio into Laura's office. Painting on a welcoming smile, Laura said, "Good morning!"
She suspected Zarek's smile was just as insincere as the one she showed them. "Good morning, Madame President. Thank you for agreeing to see us so early in the morning."
"I'm happy to do so," she lied.
"Madame President," Bagot said, "it's our understanding that you accompanied Admiral Adama when he traveled to the Hermes last night."
"That's right, she confirmed.
"Did you have the opportunity to begin laying the groundwork for the process of integrating their tribe into our government?"
She peered at him over the upper part of the frames of her glasses as if he was a hopelessly stupid pupil. "Marshall, don't you think it's extremely premature to broach this subject with the military of the Thirteenth Tribe? They aren't authorized to negotiate regarding changes to their governmental structure. I believe that's something only their civilian leadership can do."
Her response seemed to take the wind out of the man's sails. "I suppose you're right about that, Madame President," the Virgon native admitted.
"What about their faith?" Sarah Porter asked. 'Do they follow the teachings of the Sacred Scrolls?"
Laura struggled mightily to avoid rolling her eyes at the other woman's inane question. Although she was religious compared to most Capricans, even she knew that opening that can of worms this soon in the relationship with the other tribe was foolish in the extreme. "Actually, Sarah," she answered, "the subject never came up. Last night's meeting was a very short affair, completely unofficial. The Admiral and I simply wanted to break the ice with them and approve the relief shipments that are being transferred to our fleet as we speak. The only subject of substance we discussed with them was to advise them on the serious nature of the Cylon menace."
"Madame President, don't you think it's important for us to know where they stand on such a defining issue for our people?"
"Actually, Sarah, I would caution against pressing them on much of anything right now," Zarek said. "Let's face it; at the moment we have no leverage with them. Based on the wireless transmissions they've shown us, their warships and aerospace fighters are far more advanced and powerful than ours. The smartest play we have available to us is to avoid doing anything that would seriously offend them and make them believe we're more trouble than we're worth."
Amazing, Laura mused to herself. I'm actually shocked to find that I stand on common ground with Tom Zarek for the first time in our lives!
"Tom's right," she said. "While they work with the Galactica and Pegasus to protect the fleet, they'll also assist in uncovering the remaining Cylon infiltrators hidden among us. After we accomplish that task and our SAR to Caprica has returned to the fleet, the Alliance task force will lead us to the heavy defenses of Xanadu where we can begin to negotiate with their government in earnest. I'm certain we'll hear from them later in the day. But for now, we must wait until they make the first move."
"The pyramid ball is in their court now."
#
Author's note: I must give a shout out to Clavina for the razor cat idea. In her story, The Phoenix and the Wolverine (here on fanfiction), a razor cat was a wolverine. Also, if you would be so kind, please submit a review. Your reviews have done a fabulous job of helping me improve the story and to keep it on track. They...as well as you...are greatly appreciated!