Chapter 4
'Row, Row, Row Your Boat.'

Stargate Command

NORAD
24hrs since the loss of Achilles

"Any news Sergeant?"

General O'Neill stood towering Above Sgt Davis as the smaller man brought up the latest SATCOM information from upstairs. And from their off world facilities, a quick look showed the men that no report had come in from the USAF Achilles in the last few hours.

"No Sir, No response, the Achilles is now sixteen hours overdue for radio contact."

"Get me the Daedalus and contact the Tok'ra see if we can get anything out to their last coordinates."

"Aye, Sir."

"Looks like it's time for the Red phone again, now I know why Hammond used the thing so damned often."

"Aye, Sir." Davis responded.

"He's not happy," said Sgt Siler from the other side of the room.

"No he's not. He hates the loss of anyone to the Goa'uld especially now he's in command of the SGC."

"Amen to that."

Later that day:
DSR Command Station
DSR 4

"As far as I can tell they are fully human in all aspects. In some of them there are certain abnormalities in their blood, but those could be explained by viruses that they had never been vaccinated against. But everything else checks out," the station's doctor explained to the Commander of the station- Colonel Anastasia Travmakov.

"What's more is according to some of the recordings we have of the two of them, they have intimate knowledge of Earth and of certain 20th century 'Pop culture'. On a whim I asked about that Missing Episode the League want to know about."

"What, that soap episode?"

"Yes and they gave us the answer as well."

"You mean they know? Well, who did it then?"

"Colonel please this isn't the time or place," the doctor piped up.

"But…"

"Colonel, this is a serious security concern."

"All right, all right, Ill find out later. Is there anything about these two that could constitute a threat to EarthForce security while on the station?" she asked the Marine Major beside her.

"From what I can tell Sir, they have no idea what's going on or where they are. They are by all accounts harmless as far as we can tell, but a pair of guards at all times would not go amiss until such time as we get their stories straightened out. Oh and Sir, we were able to access they fighter we found these on their seats."

The Marine handed over a pair of items both wrapped up in what seemed to be a belt, unwrapping them she pulled out one of the metal objects. "Sir those are Beretta mk92s, they've not been manufactured in over two hundred years. What's more they are well used and completely intact, meaning they are functioning weapons."

"Early 21st century guns that still work and with ammunition, mentions of 20th century culture and a ship that couldn't have been built by anyone that wasn't human or at lest thought like a human."

"That's about the size of it, Sir."

"Doctor, can you tell me without a doubt that these people are human in every way, that this isn't some kind of trick?"

"I've been though every type of test I can think of; even through to a few I created myself, as far as I can tell those two people in there are human and in pretty good shape too."

"Thank you Doctor. Dismissed." With that the Doctor left to return to the Infirmary.

"I don't know about this Angus."

The Scottish Marine merely shrugged. "I don't know what to tell you Ana. Maybe we should listen to them at least let them have their say, then if necessary, contact EarthForce Command and have someone come and get them."

"Looks as if we have a hell of debrief to go through. Major."

"Yes Sir."

Cell 16
Security Bay
Same time

The two USAF crewmembers were facing each other across the table, the Commander of the Achilles had decided to lay her feet on the table while leaning against the wall. The Colonel was still deciding exactly what to tell these 'Earth alliance' yahoos, if it was true and they were from Earth somehow then anything they could tell them would be useless.

They knew that the 302 had been opened up and searched; they had left the canopy unlocked precisely so these people could see it. However the electronics and mechanics were in full lockdown, meaning that if anyone attempted to hack the systems or start her up, then the system would go into a five minute countdown to explode. Hopefully giving the Air Force officers enough time to get to them and reset the systems- this was a simple countdown system now in use on ALL SGC based ships to prevent theft by anyone not cleared for them.

"You know they won't believe us don't you?" The larger male pilot said as he lay upon the standard issue cot that made up the room's single bed, spread out and still in his white and black pilot's uniform he didn't look much like a pilot of a starfighter but more like a contestant on a reality TV show.

"About what exactly?" the colonel asked her subordinate.

"About pretty much anything, Colonel we're currently sitting in a massive space station surrounded by the biggest damned ships I've ever seen, those big battlewagons look as big as an Asgard cruiser. Now we arrive with a tiddly ship saying we're from Earth and we've just blown up a ship several dozen times our size- tell me you wouldn't find that a little hard to believe?"

"So what else do we say, we're from another planet from a galaxy far, far away that just looks a lot like Earth? This isn't Star Trek you know."

"You watch that dross, oh and you got the reference wrong that's Star Wars."

"Only every so often. What? You never wanted to see if any of these programs even got close? Never mind I know…but you get the point anyway."

"So what we just tell them we're from Earth hope they believe us and let us go home."

"When you say it that way…"

"Thought so. No prime directive here you know; well as far as I can tell anyway."

"Odds are they already know where we are from anyway, our tags, uniforms and the Berettas in the fighter will all point to who we are and where we're from. I just don't understand what could have happened..."

"Colonel!" The pilot spoke up nodding at the door behind her, turning in her seat she saw the door open and clammed up.

"Good Afternoon. I'm Colonel Anastasia Travmakov, Earth Force Commander of Deep Space Rendezvous Point Four. I apologize for the inconvenience but your arrival has turned a lot of things on their head. Colonel Taylor?"

The striking redhead stood up her medium size making her about the same height as the commander of the station.

"That would be me, Colonel Joanna Taylor USAF, Captain of the USAF Achilles. You are Russian, Colonel?"

"I am."

"I apologize for my wariness Colonel but any information I have is classified and possibly beyond your understanding."

"On the contrary colonel, it seems that we have quite a lot to talk about starting with your ships..."

"I would like to contact my ship first, they might be getting slightly worried about myself and Lt Silverston. We don't want to start an incident that could be construed as offensive."

"Agreed," Hitting her comlink she ordered a signal to be piped down into the security room they were sitting in. "We've managed to link a full visual and audio signal to your ship, the frequencies were difficult to match however it should work. You can go ahead."

The face of the Achilles' Executive Officer popped up on the small screen in the security room, his youthful looking face was pleased to see his commander looking well.

"Achilles this is Taylor."

"Colonel we were about to contact the station and ask for you, otherwise well we'd tell them to 'go somewhere'." Taylor knew that the Achilles had been about ready to attack the surrounding ships and base if they had been given a run around fortunately the EarthForce officers realised that the newcomers were inoffensive and therefore could easily be given Comm. Clearance.

"We're ok. XO, myself and the Lt will be staying a while. We'll contact you when we're ready to leave the station. We're not going anywhere until we find out what's going on."

"Aye Sir." The message had been understood by the Executive Officer, they knew that at this range the ship's main energy weapons didn't need a solid lock on the beam could just sweep across the station if it had too.

"Taylor out."

"Achilles out."

"Ok Colonel, It seems we have much to talk about," the Russian officer spoke up, this was looking to be a very strange debriefing indeed for the women of both United States and EarthForce commands.

Minbari Flagship Drala Fi

The Massive Shargotti warship, the Drala Fi or 'Black star' in Earther language, floated outside the system that had held the battle that had destroyed one of their Warrior caste brethren's mightiest warships. Slightly bigger than the Sharlin class War Cruisers that made up the bulk of their offensive power, the Shargotti ships were rare and massively expensive to produce in both manpower and resources. They were the first in the new classes of warship designed to defend against the rising powers of the galaxy.

Now however, the ship and its four escorts were searching for an enemy ship, a ship that by all accounts had annihilated a Minbari cruiser, attacking after the Minbari vessel had destroyed many of the Earther's ships in the system. The new vessel had destroyed the Shal'avi and had for all intents and purposes disappeared soon after the battle leaving nothing but a hulk behind.

"How could these primitive vessels have so completely destroyed one of our most powerful ships and leave little to no debris behind?"

"There was significant debris around the system Alyt Sharonn, some civilian shipping and some warships," the aide replied.

"But not enough to point to the number of ships the Earth needs to destroy a Sharlin Class Warcruiser. Only a small number of destroyed vessels were found in the system. The last time any Minbari ship was destroyed the debris field was much larger consisting of many more ships. With debris from their ships was mixed in with the debris of our own leading us to believe that they were rammed. However the recovery of our ship's remains did uncover this."

A display popped up above the heads of the warrior caste Minbari, a small section of an unknown mineral had been found by the Warcruisers that had retrieved the hulk of the Shal'avi.

"This piece of debris is obviously part of a ship possibly armor and hull fragments. Although the sample is metallic in composition most of the base materials in it's construction are unknown to either the Warriors or the Workers. No word has yet come from the religious archives but we doubt they have any idea what it is either. We do know that it is not from any of the Earth ships in the system and is not part of the hull of any known Centauri, Narn or League ship. So far, all attempts at analysis have yielded nothing by more questions."

Satai Coplann of the Grey council approached the meeting of warriors, quietly acknowledging the Warriors around him. Only the best and the bravest of Warriors were granted commissions on the mighty Shargotti Class Warship.

"So we have no idea what destroyed the ship."

"The dark ones?" A voice asked from the side and behind them.

"Entil'zah, It is agreeable to see you again," the ship's Captain responded

"As it is with you Satai, the destruction of the Shal'avi has become a stain on the honor of the Minbari Warrior caste. If these are the actions of allies of the Dark ones, the Rangers will take revenge on their servants."

"Indeed, that is IF these dark ones are in reality even thinking about returning. One thousand years have passed old friend with no mention indeed no sign of the ancients. It is my opinion that the creatures that destroyed our great ship are not servants of the Dark ones."

"I disagree." A single soft voice came from the rear of the room, a small slight figure appeared dressed in a thick grey robe denoting her position.

"Satai Delenn, I was not aware you had decided to join us in our deliberations."

"Satai Coplann, the Council as you know is in recess I have chosen to see the front lines for myself and not through reports by the warrior caste. I was recently brought aboard by one of our ships."

"This is not a place for members of the religious caste Delenn." Coplann admonished the younger woman.

"Nonetheless here is where I choose to be. Knowledge of the destruction of the Shal'avi has become public knowledge across the federation. We know that no power bar our own can so easily destroy one of our ships. We know that many of the First Ones could also do such damage, but we have not seen anything of them either. It is possible that a servant race of the Shadows have attacked our ships and if that is so we need to find out who and why."

"Delenn the readings taken of the remnants of the hulk indicate the use of some very high yield atomic based explosives. Only the Narn and the Earthers use these weapons in any kind of quantities, however the radiation signature has left behind a strange reading of an unknown element one that could indicate how the ship was destroyed.."

"No earth ship can get that close and not be destroyed. Your own reports indicate that no Earth ships were in the area and no Earther debris was mixed in with the Shal'avi, so what did destroy them?"

"The ancients do not use these types of weapons nor do any of their known servants from the last war." The Anla'shok commander piped up "It is possible that a new race has appeared somewhere and are working with the Earthers or with the Shadows. Analysis of the hull fragment found with the Shal'avi should inform us about this new threat."

"Agreed. For now we should inform all front line ships to be cautious and to inform us about anything that could point to this abomination, and who was behind this coward's attack."

"Indeed- any threat ship capable of destroying our most powerful cruisers will need to be found and destroyed before any more of our ships are destroyed by these unknown vermin."

"The fleet will be informed before the end of the day, those on the front lines are already looking for any information about those that caused the destruction of the Shal'avi, However as of now the majority of our units are concentrating on finding the location of the Earther home systems and something we have found recently may help in that regards."

Once again the main viewer of the room changed its shape and became that of a grid based plan of a star system, one that was obviously inhabited by some race or another.

"After the destruction of the EarthForce third fleet two days ago, one of our stealth scout ships managed to follow the survivors of the fleet to what seems to be their command base in the Romius system."

The new information had come up in the same area that had come up when the information about the unknown debris had been shown to the Satai and the warriors in council inside the control room. The new view was clearer than the last, that of a Human outpost in an otherwise empty system a few dozen light years from their position deep in the occupied areas that had once belonged to the Earth Alliance. The tactical view was that of a spin habitat that was the basis of all Earther defense stations, small defense satellites and a sizable but ineffectual Fleet of warships patrolled insystem. In all, the base and its denizens were targets and nothing more, only a few ships would be needed to destroy this outpost.

"This is the next target for the Blood of Dukhat taskforce, the loss of one of their ships to a ramming attack one standard week ago has led to their demand for retribution. This target has been chosen for them." Coplann said.

"Do we know much about the base or its defenses?" asked the Enti'zah

"It is known to the local warship fleets as a Deep Space Rendezvous Base, it is heavily defended by use of large scale plasma defenses, atomic based minefields, fighter squadrons and a full task force of warships, other warships may be in system that escaped the destruction of fleets and the eradication of those colonies we had already found and sterilized. The five ships of the Blood of Dukhat may be an exaggeration of power but the Council members of the Warrior Caste have agreed to destroy this out of the way post to show the Earther's none of their people are above our retribution."

The view changed to a closer scan of the system. The actual ships were now obviously in guard positions while others were out in the outer reaches of the actual system itself, tugs and repair ships 'tenders' as the humans call them were all assisting the large warships with necessary repairs.

"As you can see these bases are also repair stations for use by damaged vessels. The loss of these stations and the fleet will not only hamper their operations, but will also mean that repairs for their ships will be all but impossible in the surrounding sectors forcing their ships to retreat to other bases. The ships of the task force and their fighters will be more than enough."

"Destroy them," said Delenn

"As you wish, Satai."

The advanced tachyon based communications of the Minbari flagship informed their brethren many light years away that they were authorized to destroy the base immediately. But they were ordered to leave at least on ship alive to relay the loss of their defense post to their leader. Psychological warfare is sometimes a much more efficient tool to their ends that simple destruction of their ships and colonies just doesn't quite reach into their souls as much as this would.

In the silence of the darkness of space the five ships, two capital ships and their three escorts, slipped silently into the miasma that is hyperspace and headed towards the next of their targets, a Deep Space Rendezvous Point.