AN: Hello everyone. I just wanted to thank everyone who has read, liked, and left reviews on this story. It really means a lot to me, and I thank you all for your kind words. I will be updating this story as often as I can, but at this point I cannot commit to any set schedule.

Colonial Fleet

1.5 years after the Fall of the Colonies.

Commander Willian Adama sighed as he read the logs of the Pegasus again. The appearance of another battlestar a month ago, one newer, larger, and more powerful than his own, had given him the first feeling of hope he'd had since he'd managed to get what survivors he could find out of the Colonies. He loved Galactica, truly, but even he realized that she had her limitations, and the appearance of the Pegasus at least meant that humanity had one more protector against their enemy.

At least, until they found out just what sort of baggage the Pegasus had brought with her.

For starters, instead of seeing Admiral Cain with her flagship, they had found out that the admiral had been in a medically induced coma since ordering her ship to execute a blind jump out of the Scorpio Fleet Yards. Secondly, after taking command, her executive officer had apparently shown cowardice under combat, which ended with him being shot and Colonel, now Commander, Jack Fisk taking command.

It was the actions of the latter that had Adama concerned.

According to his logs, since taking command, Fisk had run his battlestar with an iron fist, and that extended to any civilian ships Pegasus had managed to find. Any ship found by the Pegasus had seen themselves stripped of any and all valuable equipment and useful crewmen, and then left to the mercy of the worst part of it was, that under the Articles of War, he was well within his rights to do so.

Which is why he still is in command, he thought.

Fisk must have realized how his logs would have looked like under review by a superior, and he managed to get out in front of any punishment from Adama by going directly to the Quorum. With a series of trades and backroom deals that most politicians could only dream of making, Fisk had managed to amass enough supporters in high places that attempt by Adama to relive Fisk would result with President Roslin being forced to either countermand that order, or face a Vote of No Confidence. One that, at least for the moment, she probably wouldn't win.

As such, Fisk was untouchable to a degree. Adama was still the senior officer, and Fisk would follow his orders, but aside from that, any decisions regarding the operation of Pegasus herself were officially hands-off until Laura could amass enough political weight to match Fisk's camp.

In the meantime, Adama was left to his normal duties of keeping Galactica as combat ready as possible, hope that the potentially power mad officer in charge of the warship that out-massed and outgunned his by a factor of three didn't decide to take command for himself, oh, and keep the fleet from running out of fuel and being left at the mercy of genocidal killing machines.

All in a day's work.

Speaking of fuel..he thought, we're going to need to find a place where we can post up long enough for our refinery ship to refuel us.

Faced with a challenge that he could tackle that moment, he started to look through the reports made by the recon Raptors. They'd been sending them out further than usual, and Racetrack and Skulls had struck pay-dirt. An uninhabited planet, itself barren of resources, but with an asteroid belt teeming with tylium. At their current speed and distance, they'd reach it within three weeks. From the grade of the samples they had brought back, the Monarch and Majahual would only need about a week's worth of mining operations to get enough tylium to top off the fleet's tanks.

And that buys us another three months of running time, he thought.

He made a plan to call a staff meeting in the morning. They would arrive at the planet in about three weeks, and he didn't want to spend a moment more stationary than he had to, meaning that they had to plan their pause with exact detail. And such planning would have to include Fisk. It would be better to get that out of the way as soon as possible.

Colonial One

While Adama planned, Laura Roslin was on another ship of the Fleet trying to come up with her own way of dealing with their latest edition's commander. Preferably, one that wouldn't result in humanity's only two surviving warships trading punches with the rest of the Fleet caught in the crossfire. Fisk had played his cards well, swaying over the Virgon, Saggitaron, and Gemenon delegations with much needed supplies, supplies likely looted from the various civilian ships Pegasus had found after the them firmly on Fisk's side, and most of the rest of the Quorum weary of Pegasus's firepower being turned on them if they supported Roslin, she was effectively helpless.

At least, for the moment.

"The Adriatic still has a spare point-defense cannon. We could have Galactica's crew offer to build a mount on one of their ships." offered Tori.

"It's one left over from the First War." countered Tom Zarek. "Meanwhile, Fisk has top of line PDCs, and probably a dozen spares, at least. We need to give them something more."

The ex-terrorist's assistance had been a surprise to Roslin, but Zarek had brushed it off as merely a case of dealing with the devil he knew.

"Besides the Adriatic, do we have any other ships who can give supplies that Fisk's backers want?"

"What about giving their ship's complements first priority for passes to either the Rising Star or Cloud 9?" suggested Tori.

"Possible. I know that some of the Gemenon ships are starting to become worse for wear livability wise." mused Zarek. "Between that and the Adriatic's spare, we might just have enough to sway the Virgon and Gemonense delegates. It's my fellow Saggitaron's that will be the hardest to convince."

"What would be something that they would want?" asked Roslin.

"At this point, just about the only thing they'll take is almost full autonomy from the rest of the fleet," said Zarek evenly. "That, or a promise from you that when we eventually stop running for our lives long enough to host a presidential election, you won't run."

Roslin sighed, rubbing her forehead with her hands.

"Anything else?" she asked rhetorically.

The three brainstormed for a few more hours before calling it a night, satisfied that they had at least made progress in dealing with the Fisk problem.

Now, if their ships would stop teetering on the edge of breakdown, and the Cylon's decided to give up, they'd actually wouldn't be doing half bad.

AN: Thank you all for reading. The next chapter will just be a POV of both sides in transit, but the fourth chapter should have both sides meeting. Feel free to leave a comment if you like, and if anyone wants to suggest a name for the captured Ha'tak, feel free to share. Thank you.