2670.262 New Kobol system jump-point: As the Ares passed through the jump-point, Commander Julius was standing next to Major Xenia his XO on the bridge.
"No matter how many times I see it sir, I'm still amazed."
"I know what you mean Xenia, I still can't believe that we're finally going home."
Xenia looked at the deck, she was obviously thinking about something.
"What's wrong?"
"Well Julius, for the last 25 yahre… uh years, I've been more worried about keeping our people alive. Now that we're here, what's next for us?"
Julius looked at her, "Only the fates know Xenia, but at least we'll be with our own people."
"Your right Julius."
The comm. tech spoke up, "Sir, we have Captain Taylor of the TCS Icarus on line sir."
They walked over to the comm. station and saw a woman on the monitor. "Welcome to your new home Commander."
"Thank you Captain Taylor, and again thank your crew for helping us get here."
"Disconnecting all Nav-links, your on your own Commander, Good luck to all of you."
The Icarus then took up a flanking position to the Ares.
The comm. tech spoke again, "Sir, I have an incoming message for you from the President of the Quorum of 12, and his senior military officer."
"I'll take it at my chair." and the commander went to his command chair. When the monitor came on, Julius was surprised to see a familiar face, his uncle.
"Uncle Tigh?"
"Julius?"
The two men looked at each other for a few seconds, then Commander Julius corrected himself. "I'm sorry Mr. President, I uh …"
Tigh was laughing, "Don't worry about it Julius, I'm just as surprised as you are."
Julius now relaxed, "So Commander, do we have permission to come aboard?"
"Of course sir, when can we expect you?"
"In about 30 minutes, we have a lot to talk about."
"Yes sir." The trans ended, and Julius looked at Xenia,
"Major, you have the Con, I have to change. Oh, get an honor guard to the landing deck now." and he then rushed off the bridge. Smiling, Major Xenia called for all Viper pilots to be on the flight deck in full dress in 20 minutes.
When the colonial shuttle landed, the honor guard was in place. As the door of the shuttle opened, President Tigh stepped out, followed by Commanders Apollo and Athena.
The three of them walked down the honor guard and stopped in front of Commander Julius.
He saluted, "Mr. President, Commanders, Welcome to the Ares."
The three of them saluted back, and then Tigh hugged him, "By the lords Julius it's good to see you."
Apollo could swear he saw a little moisture in Tigh's eyes. "We have a lot to talk about Julius, but first, the people of the Kobol system have a welcome home gift for you and your crew. 20 cases of New Caprican ambrosia."
Julius was speechless, but one of the Viper pilots who had overheard him spoke up. "Three cheers for the President." all of the honor guard cheered, along with all of the flight deck personnel.
Julius looked at him, "Captain Bellow, see to it that the Ambrosia is taken to the officers mess, and inform Major Xenia that any personnel not on duty may have a drink or two of the ambrosia. And save a case or two for the crew on duty Captain."
"Yes sir" he said while smiling. The four officers then proceed to his office/quarters.
As they made their way to his office, the three of them could tell that it hadn't been an easy trek for them. There were obvious signs that the destroyer was in need of a major overhaul. The most obvious was the jury-rigged wiring on some of the comm. panels, and the slight smell in the air. In his office, he offered them a drink, "It's not ambrosia, but it does pack a punch."
"No thank you Commander, what we want to know is how did you survive?"
"Well uncle, that's a long story."
"We've got the time Julius."
"OK then."
"Our destroyer group had been on patrol of the cylon border, when the peace summit attack had occurred. We didn't receive any signals from the summit, and our Commander was worried. When we received the broadcasts from the colonies, and saw them getting attacked, the Commander ordered the group to make for the colonies. When 3 cylon destroyers and a Base-ship jumped us. They jumped us from out of an asteroid field, and we were completely defensive. We were flying next to the Agamemnon when 3 Cap-ship missiles hit it. When it blew, the Ares took a lot of damage, and we were sent spinning off toward the asteroid field. Our main energizer was about to go critical, and our chief engineer ejected it. I think that when it blew, the cylons believed that it was the Ares blowing up."
"Xenia and I were in auxiliary control, and it took us almost 10 centons to stop our spinning. When we were finally stopped, we were in the asteroid field. The radiation from the explosions and the materials in the asteroid field helped to hide us from the cylons scanners. When we did a damage assessment, I found that the senior staff was dead, along with half of the crew. Our energizer was gone and our fusion generators were damaged and off line. We were on emergency battery power, and we knew that it wouldn't last to long."
Tigh looked at him, "So what did you do for power?"
"My chief engineer came up with a wacky but brilliant idea. We hooked up 2 vipers to the power grid and used their energizers to augment the batteries. It was a full secton before we were able to repair one of the fusion generators, so we had the majority of our people doing, 'clean up'."
"While we were doing repairs, I had 2 vipers check the area for cylons, and then check the battle area for other survivors. There were no survivors, but there was a lot of usable wreckage. I had one of our engineering shifts working on salvaging what ever they could from the battle area. It took us another 3 sectons, but we were able to get the Ares systems back to 90 percent. Then we headed for the colonies."
They could see that look of despair on his face, when he told them of what they found.
"The tin-heads butchered any survivors, and poisoned or irradiated all of the colonies. But we were able to find a few survivors that were missed. A group of scientists on one of the moons of Leon, which had been doing research on cylon code breaking. From them, we first heard about the Galactica and your course out of the system. So we set our course, and followed the direction that you went off on."
Tigh looked at Julius, and listened as he told them of their trek across the stars. He was truly saddened that their home worlds were now totally destroyed. Then there was a knock at the door.
"Enter."
When the door opened, Major Xenia was standing there. "Mr. President, Commanders. We are coming up on New Caprica, and are pulling alongside the Pegasus."
Julius stood up, and introduced everyone to his XO. "Uncle Tigh, I would like you to meet my XO Major Xenia, and my wife."
Tigh stood up and looked at her for a moment. "I may be a little late in saying this Xenia, but welcome to the family." And then he hugged her.
Xenia was smiling now, "You don't know how long I've wanted to hear someone from Julius's family say that."
They all looked at her strangely, except for Julius. "Xenia was orphaned on Caprica during the war. Until we were sealed, she said that she didn't have any family."
The three of them smiled, and soon everyone was smiling.
Tigh looked at her, "Major, you have no idea how big a family you have now." then he proceeded to tell her of his godchildren, their children and grandchildren.
After the familial moment, the five of them began discussing the upgrading of the Ares, and using it as a prime model for the New Kobol destroyer class. Their meeting went on for hours, until Tigh invited them to come down to the planet.
"Of course you know that there is going to be a celebration in your honor."
The next several days were very hectic indeed. There was a daylong celebration, and then the arrival of the Confed personnel and ships. In less than a week, the Galactica was virtually stripped down to her framework, and the colonial and confed crews began the job of rebuilding her. Many of the Ares crew found that they had relatives from the home worlds that were still alive, and were spending time with them President Tigh also got to meet his grand nephews, Tigh and Adama, and he was acting just like a grandfather with them