THREE
Aboard Baseship Hotel Three Alpha
"Brother Four, what news of the happenings on Harlow's World?" The female form approached the sensor monitoring console where the male human form stood while the Centurion stood guard in the corner.
"There's been another contact with humans, Sister Six. Two sentries at Warehouse One observed a reconnaissance force of unknown numbers approaching the facility. They engaged the Colonials but were destroyed. When a Sister Three and the work party came to their aid, they were themselves destroyed. We are awaiting Sister Three's pattern to download so we can get some information on what happened. Again, the numbers are unknown. The Colonials retreated into the forest. The remaining Centurions are searching for them now."
"And what of the supply shuttle? Were they attacked?"
"No, Sister. It would appear that the Colonials were either not there when the shuttle came, or they chose not to approach the warehouse until after it was loaded and left. The shuttle made it safely to our companion baseship. In either case, I think we should assume that there is a Battlestar or Star Cruiser nearby that escaped the neutralization. The Central Cylon reports they cannot account for several Battlestars and starcruisers. Obviously some Colonials have found a refuge we overlooked or missed in our research."
The female form stood quietly over the console for a moment. "How many inhabited asteroids, moons or planetoids are there within the Perimeter, Brother Four?"
The male form passed his right hand over his console and let it settle into a datastream port. His gaze fixated for a moment, then he removed his hand from the stream.
"There are over 120 lesser occupied satellites within the Perimeter. We have neutralized more than sixty of them. Of the remainder, only half were considered large enough to house colonies of 150 humans for more than thirty days, which was the criteria for employing neutralizing force. Of those, fifteen have sleepers on them. Most were remote mining colonies that will not be able to function more than a few weeks to a few months without re-supply from the Colonies."
"And how many of those facilities are within the jump range of a Colonial Raptor from Harlow's World, Brother?"
Only five, Sister. The Vergisaw mines. We do not believe them to be active, but all are capable of housing humans. Vergisaw 3 and Vergisaw 9 were known to have Colonial Forces monitoring stations on them but both were destroyed. The other facilities remain intact. There are others further out but they are considered insignificant." Brother Four paused to allow his superior to assess the data. He thought to ask about other potential variables to the search parameters, but she seemed content with the response she received.
"Shall I send patrols to those places, Sister?"
The female form processed the data and then allowed herself to try and put herself in the place of the Colonials. It was not easy. Human decision making was not an easily assimilated subroutine.
"Yes, Brother Four. But only a single Heavy Raider to each location…No fighters. If the Raider happens to be detected the humans will only think it to be a lost ship or transiting along a translight course. We have reports of human activity near all of the homeworlds, albeit small numbers. Certainly they may have a secret base we've not found, even in their most well-protected files. It would be a tremendous find if we were to discover the location of this nest, wouldn't you say?"
"Yes it would, Sister. I will prepare the mission profiles and download them to the Raiders. I will notify you immediately if any of them report any human activity."
"Indeed…and remember, Brother…The Raiders are to be strictly instructed to avoid contact. Even if they are scanned, they are to ignore it as if they didn't detect it. Only if they are directly attacked are they to fire their weapons. Understood?"
"Understood, Sister. It shall be done."
The female form turned to leave but then she stopped abruptly. She turned to face the male form once more. "And let's keep this to ourselves for the moment, shall we Brother? There's no use alerting The Others unless we have facts to report."
The male form nodded. But he knew this had nothing to do with falsely alerting the others. It had to do with prestige. The Central Cylon sought to emulate the human species as closely as it could in the Twelve Models. It now seemed to Brother Four that many of the human's weaknesses had somehow seeped into the programming too.
But maybe it wasn't programming. Perhaps it was evolution? But in a machine? Perhaps. For was it not the humans that created the Cylon in the first place? Wasn't it due to the mankind's efforts to impart artificial intelligence to his predecessors that had precipitated the Cylon / Colonial War? Had it not been the Cylon's desire to exceed it's programming that had brought them to this day? Brother Four was amazed how one question could lead not to an answer, but even more questions. Perhaps it was this very convoluted thinking that so impaired the human's capacity for rational thought, he mused.
His affirmation of Sister Six's order notwithstanding, this would warrant discussing with The Others at some point in time.
But not now.
For now, he would obey his orders.
Afterall, he didn't want to wind up like Brother Seven.
