Ok, I've just spent two days watching the entire first season of the new look BSG on DVD (and you guys complain about my cliff hangers?) so I'm up to date on what's going on. I'm only going to include those bits from the show that fit with this AU, so don't expect it to be canon.
When two Tribes go to war...(Part 11)
Marcus Conners rubbed his eyes: he'd been a senior diplomat with the Mobius government for twenty years before transferring to the reformed Systems Commonwealth, but in all his years he had never encounters two sides so apposed to a peaceful solution.
The Cylons wanted nothing less than the complete extermination of the human race, including subspecies like Home-Aquarius and the Nietzscheans.
The Colonials wanted the complete extermination of the Cylon race, and any other sentient A.I.
The proceedings had moved to the Andromeda Ascendant, as it had better facilities to handle the peace talks. This had pleased nether sides, but they had reluctantly agreed, much to the relief of Captain Ryan.
"Order!" Conners hammered on his table with a hammer, "Can we please continue this without hurling insults?"
"This, machine, is unrepentant as to the destruction of the Twelve Colonies!" Tom Zarek, the senior Colonial representative glared at the Ambassador, "While I may not agree with Laura Roslin and all her actions as President, this is one thing we agree on: there can be no peace as long as they Cylons continue to hunt us."
"You expect us to believe that you would not seek reprisal for our pre-emptive strike?" The Number Six who was representing the Cylon Alliance asked, "We are humanities children, and we know our parents well; unless unarmed or exterminated, you will always be a threat."
"May I remind you that the Human race makes up a considerable percentage of the population of the Known Worlds? There is no way that you could expect to kill every last one." Conners placed his hands flat on the desk, "Yes, we are a violent race; it is our nature. But humans form communities, and communities defend themselves. At this time, you face only a small parentage of our population, but if you attempted to try and annihilate us, then you would face the combined wrath of an entire species. No single threat in recorded history has been able to unite us, but it would be possible. And our wrath would burn the very stars."
"Praise the Lords of Kobol!" Zarek smiled.
"The Systems Commonwealth is not interested in war with the Cylon Alliance, but we will not allow you to destroy the last remnants of Colonial society." Conners took a deep breath, "Nor will we be party to the extermination of another sentient race, even one that is artificial in origin. It is beyond a doubt that the Cylon people meet the requirements to be treated as sentient being according to Commonwealth Law."
"You let your fracking machines run your lives!" Zarek hissed.
"Mr Zarek, one more outburst like that and I will have no option but to remove you from these negations and request that your government assigns someone who is capable of holding a civil conversation." Conners looked at the Colonial council member, "Your people have requested asylum in Commonwealth space, and we are willing to grant such a request, but you will respect our laws and citizens, organic or synthetic." He looked at everyone in the room, "Now, shall we continue?"
"Madam President?" Billy stood as President Roslin started to come round again, "Can you here me?"
"Billy?" The Colonial leader blinked, "What happened? Last thing I remember was talking to Captain Ryan and Commander Adama."
"You passed out, a side effect of your medication."
"The cancer?"
"The Commonwealth doctors were able to remove all traces of the cancer from your system, but you had a minor reaction to some of the medication?"
"What sort of reaction?"
"You attacked two crewmembers, including Captain Ryan. He doesn't blame you, but he may wait until you're out of sickbay before he visits you again…"
"What did I do?"
"You through a bed-pan at his holographic form, and swore at him profusely. I've never seen you so worked up."
"Oh gods! Did Adama see?"
"He was the only one who could calm you down at all."
"He is never going to let me live this down, is he?"
"I'm sure the Commander would never do anything to embarrass the position of President…"
"Nice try Billy, but you can't bullshit a bullshiter: he'll remind me every chance he gets." Roslin looked at her aid, "Have you been here the entire time?"
"Yes…"
"You'd better get back: you stay any longer and that young wife of yours is going to start getting ideas!"
"Dee isn't the jealous kind. I'm sure she understands."
"What: that you've found an excuse to get out of dealing with a kids who's going through teething?" Roslin chuckled, "Go: I don't want to see you for 24-hours, and that's an order from your President!"
"She's what?" Dylan stood in the middle of the command deck as the Cylon fleet stopped its advance just outside of effective weapons range, "How?"
"I need to do more tests to determine her exact nature, but the human-type Cylons appear to be some form of advanced clone cyborg, maybe even bio-mechanoid." Trance stood in the doorway looking like a rabbit caught in headlights, "As the base DNA is human it is not unexpected that human-Cylon crossbreeding is possible."
"Have you run a DNA test to confirm the paternity?"
"Chief Tyrol is the farther, if that's what you're asking…"
"You know, it is times like this that I miss having Rev Bem around: this is defiantly his area." Dylan rubbed his forehead, "Ok, ask Chief Tyrol and Commander Adama to meet me in my office. But what ever you do, don't tell Lieutenant Valerii: there is no way of knowing how she would react."
"I can't believe you have betrayed your people!" Boomer paced backwards and forwards in her cell, "And to think that you always called me the weak one."
"Is love a weakness?" Six asked, her holographic form standing just outside the bars, "There is no way our people can defeat the Commonwealth. From what little Andromeda has allowed me to see of her systems and capabilities, they are more than millennia in advance of our own technology. I am merely trying to find common ground between us."
"You fell in love with that fool Baltar…"
"I only did as God wanted me to: I helped Gaius to understand his part in what is to come."
"I have never understood your blind devotion to that religion of yours. It is totally illogical."
"Love is illogical, yet God is love."
"And tell me, what does your 'God' have planed?"
"Something wonderful…"
Rommie made her way through the seemingly endless maintenance corridors deep inside the Pegasus, Helo following behind somewhat reluctantly.
"I still can't believe that Sharon is a Cylon." The young pilot shook his head, "She came back to Caprica to find me, but we got separated. At first I hoped that she'd found a ship and had managed to get away, but when I was picked up by the Pegasus, they said that there was no sign of another Battlestar in known space."
"Then how did you end up following the Galatica?"
"Intercepted Cylon transmissions told us that some ships survived the holocaust and were being led away by the Galatica. They seem to think that they know where Earth is."
"No, they would have missed Earth by at lest 500 light-years."
"You know where Earth is?"
"I've been there, what's left of it: there was a war 300 years ago, and Earth didn't come out too well. It's one big slave camp now."
"But there are other humans, elsewhere?"
"A few trillion or so, yes."
"Thank the Lords of Kobol!"
"You know, one of these days I'm going to work out just who those Lords of Kobol where: your religion seem to be a mix of ancient Greek and Roman myths, mixed with a little Vedran for good measure."
"Vedran?"
"The one race that could explain everything, if they bother to show up again." Rommie stopped near a hatch, "Wait right here."
Chief Tyrol was sitting on the sofa in Dylan's office, his head between his knees. Commander Adama looked like he'd been punched in the gut.
"I can not even begin to understand how much of a shock this must be to you." Dylan sat behind his desk, "Would you like a drink?"
"Water, if you have it." Adama nodded.
"Anything a little stronger?" Tyrol asked.
"Certainly." Dylan got up and poured a glass of water, which he handed to Adama. He then poured a generous measure of whisky into a tumbler and handed it to Tyrol, "Be careful: that's very strong…"
Tyrol downed the drink in one gulp. Dylan wordlessly refilled the glass.
"So your medical officer thinks that there was once a real Sharon Valerii?" Adama asked, trying to gather his wits, "What happened to her?"
"We don't know, and neither does the Cylon who we pulled out of Dr Baltar's head." Dylan sat back down, "Our best guess is that she was used as the base-template for a cloning program used to create a bio-mechanoid, a living machine. It's something the old Commonwealth experimented on, but never got anywhere with."
"What about…what about the child?" Tyrol asked.
"It is difficult to tell, it is less than a month old, but it appears to be perfectly healthy." Dylan tried to find the right words, "We believe that Lieutenant Valerii will be able to carry it to term without any complications, but there are still questions to be answered."
"Captain, we need to keep these as secret as possible." Adama looked ashen, "As you can no doubt understand, there is considerable hatred of Cylons among my people. Add to this a growing religious up swelling…"
"If it became public that a Cylon agent was pregnant by a human, and there could be trouble." Dylan nodded, "We'll keep Lieutenant Valerii in isolation until we work something out…"
"I'm sorry to interrupt." Andromeda's holographic form appeared in the middle of the room, "Dylan, I've just received a transmission from Tyr: there is another Battlestar and two destroyers in system. They've captured Admiral Rhade and destroyed the Pillars of Hercules."
"Another Battlestar?" Adama looked as shocked as anyone, "Did they identify it?"
"The ship identified itself as the Battlestar Pegasus, under the command of Sheba Cain." Andromeda responded, "My Avatar has infiltrated the ship in an effort to recover the Admiral."
"You know this Cain?" Dylan asked.
"We where in the same squadron during the first Cylon war." Adama nodded, "We thought the Pegasus was lost with the rest of the fleet above Caprica."
"How could it have survived?" Andromeda asked.
"The Pegasus is the same base design as the Galatica: it wouldn't have been susceptible to the Cylon computer virus." Adama licked his lips, "Captain Hunt, there is something you should be aware of: there was talk in the fleet, just before the Cylon attack, that Sheba was going to be forced into retirement. Fleet command was growing worried about her mental state."
"Why didn't they just remove her from command?" Dylan asked.
"Sheba's father was a legend during the Cylon war, he commanded the Pegasus when our squadron was assigned to her." Adama explained, " Sheba spent most of her career trying to live up to it. Her crew are fanatically loyal to her, and would never have accepted another captain."
"So what you're telling me is we have an unstable officer out there in command of at lest three warships, and we have no way of knowing what she might do?" Dylan asked rhetorically, "Well that's just great!"
"Commander, there's message for you." The Pegasus' operations officer reported.
"Very well." Cain lifted a handset, "Hello?"
"Hello again Commander." Rommie's voice was smooth as honey, yet dripped sarcasm, "We never did finish our conversation…"
To Be Continued…
I shall now respond to reviews
Jumper Prime: Yeah, well Cain is a little crazy.
rankokun alpha: Everything comes to those who wait.
Agent-G: The involvement of the Genites will become clear later on.
WBH21C & firstknight: Thank you.
Reikson: Go read what I posted at the top of this chapter and see who's the wiseass.
TrekkifulRon: I don't email people when chapters are up, it would take too long. Your best bet would be to crate and account here and add me to the Authors Alert list, that way would email you when I add chapters/stories.
JoeB1451: Yeah, well I didn't see these two groups being best friends from the word go. There are just two many differences for that.