Authors Notes: There'll be a couple of more chapters, and then we're going to do a jump forward in time a bit. The chapters will eventually have more BSG characters appearing in them, as we get close to the time when they'll 'meet'.

Next chapter has a REALLY good idea in it, which I thought of out of pure coincidence. Let's just say that I picked Chicago randomly as the city that the Cylons crash land in. Coincidently, Chicago is on the Great Lakes of America (don't know their actual name). Let's just say that there'll be a Manta or two involved. Next chapter should be up in a couple of days. Next chapter will also have some more of Dr. Wotresser and the Battlestars Pegasus, Cerebus and Rycon. I've come up with the ideas of how they survived, but I'm not going to give that away yet, but there may be a few hints in the next chapters. Lets just say, you'll probably all LOVE the story of the Cerebus.

Chapter 11 – Surprise!

Colonial Viper 'Blackbird'

As soon as Starbuck had judged that she was far enough away from the Raiders that had passed her, she ignited her engines, spun the ship around, and headed for the fleet as fast as she could. It took her a couple of hours to get back, drifting at maximum speed. The whole time she had spent looking out the front of her cockpit to see if she was going to catch up to the powered down Cylon Raiders.

When she got back to the fleet, she almost wished that she had been spotted by the Cylons on her way out. She could see missiles streaking towards all the ships of the fleet, and she could see that other ships were already heavily damaged. To her surprise, they weren't using nukes, just ordinary missiles.

"This is Starbuck to Galactica. What can I do to help?" she said into her radio.

"Starbuck, land in the port launch bay and get into a Viper asap," she heard Dee's voice reply to her over the wireless. It was then that Starbuck noticed that there were more Cylon Raiders attacking the fleet on the other side, and guessed that they must have used the same approach, but from an other direction. She engaged the engines and steered the craft at full speed towards the Galactica, hoping that a Raider wouldn't come after her as she was weapon-less.

Holding Cell - Earth Ship Triton

Flight Lieutenant Samuel Johnson, or rather, just plain old Samuel Johnson was sitting on the bench within his cell, wondering what all the commotion was about. He could see through the glass pane in the door to the holding cells that there were people running about everywhere outside. It was then that he heard the captain's voice over the ships speakers

"All hands, brace for impact," it said. He didn't know what was going on, but moments later he was knocked off of his bench as the entire ship rumbled and shook violently. He got up and waited for about five minutes before someone came and unlocked the door to his cell.

"Looks like you were right Sam. We've been ambushed from the moon. There's nukes heading towards Earth, and some towards us. We need every available pilot we can get," the person said to him, which Johnson recognised as his official liaison between the outside world and himself.

"I can only pilot Ospreys though," he commented.

"We know, and you're needed."

'Red Falcon Flight Wing' – Approaching the Moon from space between Mars and Earth.

Henry O'Connell was leading the 'Red' Wing into the battle after they received a mayday call via the new laser-point communications system. They were on their way out to the asteroid belt for targeting practice, but had swung their ships around as soon as they heard the call. Now, they were approaching the 'dark' side of the moon, where he could see the Triton orbiting around, firing down at the surface. He could see enemy fighters firing missiles which were streaking towards the Triton and impacting on it's hull, one of them nuclear.

"Red wing, stay clear of the Triton, over," O'Connell said into the radio to his wingmen, knowing that if they were anywhere near the Triton when a nuke impacted on it's shields, the radiation would kill them while they were in their ships. "Red Wing, cut all networked computer systems and engage weapons," O'Connell said as they were now approaching the battle.

"Red Wing, this is Green Wing. Requesting Assistance at coordinates 034, 121, 251. Have captured enemy hostile and need assistance for protection, over," Henry heard over the radio. He relayed his orders to the rest of the wing, and pulled the nose of his fighter up. In the distance, above the major plane of combat, he could barely see traces of a battle occurring. He checked his navigation computer, and he could see that he was on the right path to the coordinates given by Green Wing. As they approached, Henry used the small telescopic camera mounted underneath his fighter to zoom in on the hostile targets that had been 'captured'. He could see two of the enemy's heavy fighters just drifting in space, appearing to have no power. He could see Green Wing defending the two powered down fighters from other enemy fighters, which appeared to be trying to destroy the powered down fighters.

"Must be important," he muttered to himself. They had received the full briefing over a burst in the laser-point communications system about how they had stumbled upon a hidden enemy base in the moon, and Henry couldn't believe that so many enemy fighters had been hidden right under their noses. He flinched as he saw another bright flash out of the corner of his eye, signalling that a nuke had been detonated. He knew that that area was somewhere around where the Triton now was, and he was hoping that it was one of their own nukes which had detonated.

Twenty Minutes later, and it was all over. The Triton had launched all of it's missiles towards the moon base, and the enemy defences weren't enough to stop all of them. A total of about six nuclear warheads detonated in succession over the area, obliterating anything living that would have been in the area, as there was no such way that any armour was capable of absorbing that much radiation. One of the transports that O'Connell was guarding had been destroyed in the fight, but they had managed to save the other one. Little did they know that the transport that they had managed to keep was a decoy, meant to lure them away from the three or so enemy transports which had departed the area not too long before the Triton had launched her barrage onto the surface of Earth's Moon.

Colonial Battlestar Galactica

Starbuck almost jumped out of the cockpit of the 'Blackbird' as soon as she could and went marching towards where her Viper was meant to be. Instead, she was looking at an empty bay, with nothing in it. Immediately, she turned around to go and find Chief Tyrol, but he was standing directly behind her.

"Where's my Viper?" She demanded to him.

"Out," he replied.

"Get me another one then," she demanded. He looked at her, putting his hands up towards her to try to calm her down. She was frustrated that there hadn't been anything for her to do to warn the fleet about the incoming Cylon Raiders, and from what she had seen upon her return in the 'Blackbird', there had been more of them approaching from different directions than the one that she had been travelling in.

"Calm down. Calm down," Tyrol said. "There's none left, they've all been deployed." Without saying another word, Starbuck spun on her heel and headed towards the CIC of the Galactica. If she couldn't fly a Viper, at least she wanted to know what was going on. She made her way through the various crew members who were running about the ship, doing their various jobs now that 'Action Stations' had been called.

She reached the CIC and walked in to see Admiral Adama looking at the DRADIS screen. She briefly glanced up at it, and saw that there were a rather large number of red markings on it, signifying enemy ships.

"What happened?" she asked the Admiral.

"Three Squadrons of Cylon Raiders ambushed us, drifted in on no power, from three sides. The first thing they did was target the FTL drives of the civilian ships. We're sitting ducks," Colonel Tigh answered in response.

"Not if there's anything we can do about it," Admiral Adama replied. Starbuck watched as he turned and faced Lt. Gaeta.

"Lieutenant Gaeta," he simply said with a nod in his direction. Gaeta left his post and turned to leave the CIC. He was gone only moments before he returned, with four marines, and a very familiar looking woman with him. Starbuck recognised the woman as Gina, a Cylon model which they had acquisitioned from the Pegasus when they had rendezvoused beforehand. She was made to kneel down on the ground. Admiral Adama pulled out a sidearm and placed it right at her forehead.

"We know that you have the ability to shut down those Raiders out there," he said calmly and coldly to her, while gesturing towards the DRADIS screen with his other hand. He was met with a cold look and no reply. "You will do this, or you will be destroyed," Adama said to her.

"Go ahead. Do it!" she said through almost clenched teeth towards the Admiral. Starbuck watched as he saw Adama more firmly push the pistol into her forehead. She watched as he looked up towards Gaeta, and gave a small nod. Gaeta, again, left the CIC, but he was gone for a longer time this time. It was probably a good three minutes or so before he returned, with more marines and another figure in tow.

Gaius Baltar was placed beside Gina, kneeling before Adama with his hands and feet restrained after he had been requisitioned from Galactica's brig. Starbuck watched as Adama pointed the pistol towards Baltar, never taking his eyes off of the Cylon.

"You will do this for us, or he will be killed," Adama firmly said.

"Do it, he's a good for nothing slimy weasel," Colonel Tigh commented.

"You wouldn't," Gina replied to Adama.

"And why not? He was the main reason that you were able to get past our defences. He betrayed us all, for a Cylon model which was identical to you. Why would I even hesitate," Adama replied. He was handed a fibre-optic cable by Dee, and he moved it towards Gina. He pushed the pistol in his hand towards Baltar more, reassuring Gina that he was ready to pull the trigger. Starbuck saw Gina bow her head, and take the line into her hand. She was made to use her own fingernails to make an incision into the skin on the underside of her wrist. "If there are ANY unwanted side effects, he dies," Adama said right before Gina started to thread the cable up her own vein.