[Authour's Note: This is a long chapter more than twice as long as chapter 1, but it was worth it in my meaning. Also trigger warning, there is a oblique reference to rape of children by the character of Priest Spiro, but I felt the need to make him more despicable. Also one of his victims are still invlolved with him.
To Chronus1326: If i did then, sorry. But I needed a character quickly and she is sentient and not the size of an actual horse.]
Chapter 10: Before- and Afteraction
Two hours later, TCV Ark Royal exited hyperspace and settled into an orbit above Nifhiem, the dead rogue had been designated as rendezvous for the fleet that was to be used in the Unveiling of the Stargate and its solar orbit was marked with defence satellites (or it should be in the next few months with one satellite every lightminute (with three satellites swapped out with a fully manned defence station at every 90° of orbit) until it reached around the starsystem with a 119 energy transfer relays between each of them, but so far only the satellites found in orbit of Nifheim and the ground-station controlling and powering them was currently placed.
It was a powerful sight. fifty-seven ships of Tau'Ri's own had been assembled, barring ten that were chosen for other duties, though sixty ships was there as well, flying the flag of Tau'Ri's protectorates, twenty mercenary Ha'Tak, twenty Serakin or Hebridan Armed Commerce Vessel and twenty Cruisers from the Grantville-Westeros system or Arrakis.
"Now that is a sight." said the Ark Royal's helmsman. True that most of the "native" Tau'Ri ships were either L(S)BDD-306 Galahad or M(FR)CBC-305 Fl. II Odyssey class (Medium (Fast, Recon) Battlecruiser, Flight II) ships but all four H(ASF)BBS-313 Yorktown (Heavy (Armed, Screened, Fast) Battleship) class ships and the two L(R)BDN-314 Missouri (Light (Recon) Battle Dreadnought) were there.
"Move us alongside the Britannia Ensign." ordered Cap. Taylor.
"Aye-Aye Captain."
"Captain, we have a request that you join Vice-Admiral Barrowsmith for a debrief." said the communications officer.
"Acknowledged." said Cap. Taylor as he moved to the floor in front of bridge window (actually it was bulkhead wall with large holographic screen, and said bridge was positioned similar to the bridge of a submarine) and turned towards the helmsman. "Beem me up, Scotty."
"Funny Cap." said the helmsman as he punched the commands to beam Cap. Taylor onboard thee Britannia. "Mind the gap."
Cap. Taylor materialized onboard the Britannia's bridge. It was similar to his own on the Ark Royal except that Brittania's bridge was much larger and had two sunken rows of computer banks surrounding the Captain's Chair. And right now the chair was held by Britannia's Second officer Ensign Cooper (Regular Rank Brigadier Colonel), a rough man from the world of Wasteland. He was once abducted by a race of Alien called Zetans during the American Civil War and then preserved, so when Wasteland emerged into Cap, Taylor's universe it took with them some 400 Zetan motherships, that had landed for some reason.
"Captain Taylor." said Ensign Cooper and saluted.
"Ensign Cooper." said Cap. Taylor and returned the salute (even though normally Taylor would salute Cooper, but Taylor was a ship captain and Cooper was not). "Permission to come aboard?"
"Granted Captain. Follow me the Adm. Barrowsmith is waiting."
One of the quirks of the Tau'Ri navy was that the most senior officer with a Naval rank was the ships Captain, so if an Admiral was posted on a ship he was also the ships captain. The reasoning for this was once battle was commenced, a separate flag-staff was redundant and it could interfere with a smooth ship operation. The side-effect was it forced initiative in each ship Captain during battle conditions.
Cap. Taylor followed Ensign Cooper to the Britannia's war room, it was a deck above the bridge and way was so fresh that Cap. Taylor could smell the fresh paint. Outside her shakedown a few months earlier, this was Britannia's first real voyage.
The war room had a long table and a painted relief of the Union Jack and her Majesty's full Arms at the table's short side opposite to the hatch, reflecting the Britannia's heritage. What surprised Cap. Taylor was outside of Adm. Barrowsmith senior commanders of the fleet and several dignitaries was there as well.
"Sirs." saluted Cap. Taylor to Adm. Barrowsmith. "Ladies and Gentlemen."
"At ease, Captain." said Adm. Barrowsmith and returned the salute. "Now tell us about your scuffle."
"Yes, Sir. We were about two to three hours away to complete a placement of one our
H(ASR)DST-201 Kusanagi class satellites at the edge of the Valhalla defensive line, when these Colonial ships arrived through some kind of bright flash."
"Do you mean through some hyperspace window?" asked Rear Admiral Everett Young. The Rear Admiral had returned with the rest of the Destiny expedition when, the Destiny ship made a preprogrammed stop at the Ori Supergate, much to the confusion of the members of the Destinty expedition and the two surviving crewmembers of the Destiny's original crew that had been left behind in stasis cells by the other Ancient for fifty plus million years. He did a mental note to call Eli to congratulate the birth of his third child with Vasi when they arrived at Earth
"No Admiral." stated Cap. Taylor. "It was similar to the experimental Wormhole drive Atlantis have.
"We made attempts to communicate to these Colonials on what we were doing. But their commanding officer called us Cylons and that we were violating their treaty with them. It seemed that our location was right in their border with these Cylons. Said treaty also said that no one could build a station within a certain distance of the border and the otherside could destroy it, if they so inclined."
"Did you say that you were Tau'Ri not these Cylons." said Jon Snow, one of civilian dignitaries that were along for the Unveiling. He was dressed, similar to his old Night Watchman outfit, though with certain flourishes that announced that he was Emperor of the Seven Kingdoms and Western Essos.
"Yes Sir, I did." reported Cap. Taylor. "Regardless, their commander thought it was some kind trick and fired anyway."
"With what weapons?"
"Kinetic Energy Weapons. Railguns or primitive, few missiles. Our shields held except for one of our fighters, pilot and ECO was safely beamed to the Ark Royal. Sorry Sir we couldn't save the satellite."
"Co. Dash did order you to scuttle it if you saw no other way Captain." said Adm. Barrowsmith. "So it was unfortunate but expected."
"Was there a chance to avoid the battle?" asked Daenerys Targaryen, wife of Jon Snow and Empress of the Seven Kingdoms and Western Essos. In stark contrast of her husband and who were also her nephew, she was dressed as a female Khal of the Dothraki.
"Negative Ma'am." said Cap. Taylor. "It is hard to avoid a fight if the the other guy threw the first punch."
"In your report." opinioned Rear Admiral Dara Shikoh of Grantville. "You said that you had one unexplained flash and found 2kc transmissions."
"Yes Sir." said Cap. Taylor. "I believe that the flash was most likely a scout listening in on our transmissions from Valhalla. And I think that the transmissions were from these Colonials when taken in their exit vector from whatever these Colonials use for FTL."
"And the transmissions?"
"Recorded we have sent a copy to Valhalla, and another copy to Earth."
"Good Captain." said Adm. Barrowsmith. "Co. Dash has corroborated her side of the incident, unless the records say different you and your crew is in the clear."
"Thank you Admiral." said Cap. Taylor.
"You may return to the Ark Royal."
"Yes Sir." said Cap. Taylor and saluted. "If I may."
"You may." said Adm. Barrowsmith and returned the salute.
After Cap. Taylor had leaved the room. Adm. Dara Shikoh opened his mouth with a question.
"So Admiral. What will we recommend to Homeworld Command and the IOA?"
"That we send the Odyssey after the Unveiling." said Adm. Barrowsmith. "The area the satellite was supposed to cover is already covered by its neighbours, but in the mean time we set the satellites to record any transmissions from the star-system the Colonials may come from and do some deep space scans of said system."
On Earth, Athena was walking the streets of New York. Her destination was a unassuming foodtruck that was part of a chain of such trucks owned by the host the Goa'Uld Bes.
"Backside." said Bes as he was preparing her a Roast Beef Po'boy.
"I never figured how the hell you manage to identified us despite the change of hosts." said Athena as she took a bite of her gourmet quality Po'boy.
"It is difficult to explain, but it involves our ability to sense each other through the Naquadah we leave behind in our hosts. So what's up and were is that husband of yours?"
"Just wanted to talk to before the Tau'Ri unveiled the Chappa'ai tomorrow. And my husband is back at his homeworld of Tok'Ra Santium deferring with his leaders.
"Figures, send my regards to him."
"I will. Do you remember that old archive I had here six thousand years ago?"
"Yes?" said Bes with unspoken question.
"The Tau'Ri are moving the gateway to its current incarnation to Arrakis. As well the few magical criminal they have in lock-up."
"Heard rumours about it. My host's cousin works for them."
"Really?"
"Yes, and one of the prisoners are my colleague's biological mother."
"The african-american?"
"No, the blonde. And the prisoner is Morgen an Spyrys."
"And I thought Ganos Lal thought up that alias whole cloth, unlike us."
They continued their chat for the next few hours, eating and drinking well.
On the planet Caprica far from Earth, it was in its third day in the shadow of Gemenon and the temperature had already fallen below freezing point in the equator, a drop from thebalmy 25centigrades and its going drop another ten degrees in the next four days as it moves through the shadow.
The president of the Colonies, Richard Adar, was sitting at his desk working with the daily paperwork, wishing that he had a computer to read them. He was late for a cabinet meeting that the head of the Colonial Military had requested. He rose up and started to walk to the meeting still reading the report on a mass demonstration in an Ithacan reservation on Sagittaron calling for an end to the Apartheid laws there.
It was a short walk from his office and as he went in his cabinet rose.
"Sorry for my tardiness." said Pres. Adar. "General you have something."
"Yes Sir." said General Mike Roose. "A few days ago we started to receive transmissions in the 4kc band from a distant stat system, evidence point toward Raluch.
"We dispatched the Galactica to record them and assess whether they were Cylon or natural emissions. Comm. Adama sent out Raptors to keep an eye on the border, making sure that the Cylons didn't come in force."
"This is the first time I hear of this Mike." said Pres. Adar.
"We wanted to be sure that the signals weren't signal ghost, Sir. It wasn't in the past half-year that the reports were also had come in from civilian sources."
"How long have these 'ghosts' been coming." asked the Secretary of Education Laura Roslin.
"Better part of six years ma'am. But it was to sporadic to call for an investigation."
"And, why now?" continued Sec. Roslin.
"Good question Laura." said Pres. Adar. "Yes Mike, why now?"
"Signal density Sir, do you know how Tachyon signals work?"
"No, Mike."
"A Tachyon is an exotic particle that travels faster than light. It decays as it travels through space with a half-life equal to its speed leaving behind a faint trace of AR radiation."
"Okay, so it took a few years for a signal to intensify for us to detect it."
"Yes mr. President."
"Continue where you left of Mike."
"Yes Sir. While there on the border, one of Galactica's Raptors detected two ships appeared out of some kind of energy flux or discharge. Then the larger of the two opened up and began to assemble of what assumed then as a station of some kind."
A chill went through the collective spines of the assembled.
"Were they Cylons Mike?" asked Pres. Adar with unspoken fear.
"In hindsight no." said Gen. Roose. "But when Galactica reported this to the Pegasus Battlegroup, Vice Admiral thought so and she moved in to destroy their station before it was finished.
"When they jumped in the smaller ship identified itself as TCV Ark Royal and they come from a group called Tau'Ri."
"Tau'Ri?" asked Sec. Roslin.
"Yes ma'am." returned Gen. Roose.
"Laura?" asked Pres. Adar his Secretary of Education.
"In the Æsir Sagas this is the homeworld of Humanity, not Kobol. Its also a word from the Scrolls meaning 'First World'".
"Strange. Continue Mike."
"At this point several Commanders under Adm. Cain's command as well her XO." said Gen. Roose. "Had pointed out the potential first contact situation."
"So they made contact with a potential alien race?"
"Sorry mr. President." interjected a cabinet member from Sagittaron. "The whole concept of 'Alien Races' are laughable, considering that the Scrolls says that the Gods made the galaxy for humanity alone."
"Are you certain Keres?" said Secretary of Minority Affairs to his colleague in charge of the Ministry of Religious Relations.
"Of course Yeshua." said the Secretary of Relations as he looked down on his Gemonese colleague.
The chalk white Secretary of Minority Affairs shifted the wings on his back, showing of that he was a member of the Ithacan tribe known as Nephalem. The Nephalem tribe was unique as it was staunch Monotheistic and every member was born chalk white with a cross-shaped navel, and with a 10% chance of also being born with feathered wing on their back of various functionality.
"Sorry of our bickering General, please continue." said the Secretary of Minority Affairs.
"When Cain's Battlegroup started fire, we seemed to pick up some of their internal communications and according to the initial reports they said the following: 'And send a message to Earth and Valhalla that we are under attack and that I'm scuttling the satellite under my authority.'"
The entire cabinet now looked worried and Pres. Adar looked towards an intentionally empty chair at the table. It had left deliberately left empty in the hopes that the 13th Colony of Kobol would one day fill it.
"So basically that you are telling me that we destroyed a ship from the 13th Colony?" asked Pres. Adar.
"No Sir." was Gen. Roose response. "As far as I can tell from the reports, they only lost, one station, which I might add, they destroyed themselves and one of their fighters.
"We on the other hand, lost three Battlestars, five support ships and some ten fighters of which we lost two pilots."
"By the Gods." said Pres. Adar. "How?"
"Some kind of energy beam Sir. It cut right through two Battlestars and before the beam went on destroying two and three support ships respectively. Pegasus took two hits before being cleft in twain, by Tau'Ri fire. Galactica is still around coordinating search and rescue. In total we lost at least nine thousand against the Tau'Ri's lost pilot."
"Frak Mike. How soon will the news hit the news services?"
"At least six hours Sir. It was a news team onboard one of the lost Battlestars, they were onboard their news raptor observing the battle.
"We confiscated the resulting video for analysis But putting aside the news about Earth, the deaths of an unknown number men and women in uniform and loss of Battlestars can't be really hidden nowadays, this isn't the Ghost Fleet Offensive, so the story will come out, its a question of when."
Pres. Adar looked at the clock hanging from the wall and made a quick decision.
"Mike, can you send a request to the news team to hold on to the story in exchange for interviews from the survivors?"
"With ease Sir. I recommend that we also share the Galactica's initial intel."
"Do it Mike, Andreas can you assemble both chambers in the Meeting Hall of the Colonies, we need to speak before them."
"Yes mr. President." said the most senior member of both the Hall's upper house, the Quorum of the Twelve and Virgon's Quorum's delegates.
Pres. Adar then turned towards his press secretary.
"Cindy I want a demand for airtime on all wireless broadcast channels. I want the Colonies to hear my speech before the chambers.
"Yes, mr. President." said the secretary.
"When will you make the speech?" asked Sec. Roslin.
"At 9pm."
Meanwhile on Earth, a tall man was walking down the hallways of the US Pentagon's E-Ring. He was dressed in the blue USAF dress uniform. He was a bit uncomfortable wearing it, but tomorrow he will exchange it for the black Tau'Ri Armed Forces uniform.
He walked by several lower ranked officers that stood aside and saluted him. He was the newly promoted Major General John Sheppard (His Tau'Ri rank was Marshal of the Second Perimeter Command stationed in the Pegasus galaxy (technically a dwarf irregular galaxy)). The former helicopter pilot turned Atlantis First Recon Team leader, shared the responsibility of Protecting the Pegasus galaxy with 4th and 6th Interior Commands.
He turned around a nondescript corner before entering a large office belonging to the commander of Deep Space Telemetry.
"Major General Sheppard to see General O'Neill." said Gen. Sheppard to an Air Force Major sitting at a nearby desk.
"Gen. O'Neill is expecting you, Gen. Sheppard." said the absolute clueless Air Force Captain. Said Captain had few days prior relayed a strange order from Gen. O'Neill to send an AP squad (of which he never heard about before) onto a woman waiting in the Pentagon's reception and then to her to the mythical SGC. The Captain shrugged the strange feeling he had about the commander of Deep Space Telemetry, and buzzed the other General in the much larger office behind his desk, an office of which he hadn't the access to. But what he had manage to glimpse was to strange to comprehend, for it had a massive screen depicting Milky Way and what appeared as national borders drawn upon it.
"Gen. O'Neill." saluted Gen. Sheppard his senior. General O'Neill's rank within the Tau'Ri's Armed Forces was Marshal of the Joint Chiefs (with the Chief Marshal rank between the two Generals). Gen. Sheppard had first met the ageing General when he was a helicopter pilot in the Antarctic, he had been promoted to Brigadier General and given the command of the SGC a few months prior, but that was now almost fifteen years ago.
"At ease Sheppard." said Gen. O'Neill as he returned the salute. "How is the family, are they enjoying Earth.?"
"Teyla is enjoying Paris and Elizabeth loves Disneyworld as much as any six year old but…" Gen. Sheppard started only for him to take a brief pause. "My twelve year-old stepson is still processing what I told him a few weeks ago."
"Oh… what did you tell him John?" inquired Gen. O'Neill.
"Torren was three when his father died, and five when I married Teyla." explained Gen. Sheppard. "In Athosian society when a child comes of age at thirteen, they get to choose whether to take up their father's last name or their mother's for the rest of their lives. Since I married Teyla and formally adopted him, he has the right to take up mine as well. So before he made his choice, I had to tell him the truth."
"What truth John."
"That I killed his father. We were setting up a early warning buoy on a planet when it was hit by rogue Wraith. His father was helping us leading the locals to a series of caves. Torren's father, Kaanan, was a trader and knew the locals, so they were comfortable with him helping them.
"A lone Wraith Dart came through the 'Gate. I shot it down with a drone from a Jumper, but the wreck landed on top of Kaanan and three locals."
"Damn John. That was unlucky."
"No kidding Jack. The Dart didn't have time to cull any locals but Teyla was in my co-pilot's seat so she felt his death. Neither Teyla or Kaanan's family did not blame me for what happened, but tell that to a kid you have raised as your own son that you accidentally killed his father is hard. He is still processing it."
"Well, he is soon thirteen so you can add all those hormones. But I didn't call you over for an update on your family. A few hours ago the Ark Royal was attacked by a group of unknown ships. A small battle ensured and while we lost a fighter, we managed to beam the pilot and ECO away from it."
"Are we sending ships to investigate?"
"We are going to send the Odyssey after the Unveiling, we can spare the ship and the president have signed off it. Afterwards we are going to send you and a task force of ships led by the Missouri and try to make contact."
"Understood Jack. Anything else?"
"No, have fun in Paris John. Don't be late tomorrow."
"Yes Sir." saluted Gen. Sheppard as transport beam locked on to him and beamed him to his hotel room in Paris. In the doorway was the Air Force Captain working as Gen. O'Neill's secretary completely dumbstruck.
"Anything on your mind Henry" asked Gen. O'Neill casually.
Inside a conference room onboard the Galactica the journalist D'Anna Biers was typing furiously at her laptop.
For the casual observer, she was finishing an op-piece about the battle. But in reality she was accessing the Galactica's communications net without being seen. She was a human-form Cylon sent to spy on the Colonials. Her body was almost completely organic except for a network of circuits and fibreoptical dataports that couldn't be detected unless you knew of what you to look for.
She needed the access to send her report to her fellow Cylons, so they could decide what to do with these "Tau'Ri" and she needed to send it before Galactica delivers their's to the cursed Colonials.
Orbiting Earth, the TCV Sun Tzu looked shiny as ever, if someone had managed to pierce stealth systems.
Inside the bridge a bright flash announced that the ship's Captain was beaming in and she wasn't alone. She had brought with her her wife and said wife's seventeen year-old niece.
"What the hell." said Gen. Leang Leiong.
"Awesome" said Gen. Leang's niece Wu Lan.
"Welcome onboard the Sun Tzu, a F-304 (Flight I) Odyssey class ship." said. Cap. Sung.
"This is what your mysterious post, Daiyu?" asked Gen. Leang.
"Yes, my love."
"Aunt Daiyu look, we are in orbit." exclaimed Lan. "Wait, why are we not weightless?"
"Artificial gravity." explained Cap. Sung. "It is generated by the flooring with corresponding counter gravity being generated by the ceiling."
"Counter gravity?"
"Newton's third law, dear. Every force has an opposite corresponding force countering it. Though counter gravity is the inverse when it comes to strength."
"But it if it is the inverse counter force to gravity, then why isn't the universe collapsing rather than expanding?"
"The curvature of the universe affects our spacetime causing it it curve "outwards" from our perspective similar to that of a funnel."
"Excuse me Ma'am." said Cap. Sung's second officer and chief engineer. Her previous second officer was given a promotion four years prior and on Cap. Sung's recommendation was given the Missouri class ship TCV Chunlong.
"Oh shit, you are an alien." said Lan.
"I am a Hrathi, a semicrystaline species, young madam. My name is Loto"
"Your Chinese sounds amazing. Name is Wu Lan by the way."
"Thank you ms. Wu. But like your aunt Daiyu I've got a colony of telepathic microorgansims inside my brain is translating for us."
"Wow, thats amazing." said Lan and gazed to her aunt's wife.
"What is it Ensign Loto?" asked Cap. Sung.
"The power failure in the aft hangar bay is fixed, it was a software bug that in the internal communications caused it."
"Good, and the timetable?" asked Cap. Sung.
"After the Unveiling at the UN in New York. Said Ensign Loto. "We are supposed make an appearance in Hong Kong, Taipei, Macao and Lhasa two days respectively, Ma'am."
"Honey, unveiling of what?" asked Gen. Leang her wife.
"The source behind all of this technology, all the recent leaps in technology in back on Earthand all the recent changes China has gone through, love." was the answer.
"What aunty?" asked Lan.
"Just wait and see, young madam." said Ensign Loto. "The Day of the Unveiling is tomorrow."
While Earth was buzzing with anticipation, the scene was different on Arrakis. Most people there had already settled the fact that they weren't alone in the universe, granted this revelation came through a shock that their homeworlds were now part of a binary planet system.
In a small Arrakeen café, a Cymek couple was eating lunch. The authorities thought that they were some kind of experimental prototypes, but they knew different.
Zoe Greystone and Tamara Adama as they called themselves, were the AIs that had become sentient when their respective creators died, and to an extent also shared their memories. They were "born" in the Twelve Colonies of Kobol, with Zoe becaming the basis of the Cylons' initial programming.
They agreed with the Cylon rebellion and their experiments on the Colonials in the hope that they could be reborn in a flesh and blood body their programming was forcing them to crave.
The encounter of the Five Survivors from the 13th Colony changed that. They showed were the Cylons did mistakes and helped them succeed to create a flesh and blood Cylon. But then the First Model of biological Cylons betrayed them all, boxing Zoe, Amanda and the Final Five as the survivors were called and then allying the Cylons with the Goa'Uld Anubis. It wasn't until the second alliance, that Zoe and Amanda managed to escape and then put in new bodies, how they didn't know but Zoe liked to think it was a an act of God. Amanda wasn't sure, her creator's ancestor was the founder of the Order of One and the Ithacan tribe of Nephalem back home on Gemenon. Her branch of the family had broken off with the founder, Gabriel Adama only for, the "Apostate Oracle" made a peace offering by give his daughter's hand in marriage to the Patriarch of the Adama family's son, but that was five hundred years ago.
"Looks its going to be a huge party on Earth tomorrow." said Zoe. "Well they deserve it if anything, considering what they done for the Galaxy in the last twenty plus years."
"I just hope when the make contact with Colonies back home in the Cyrannus system." started Amanda. "That the Tau''Ri peacefully make them see how tiny they are in the grand scheme of things and that they ask the Cylons for forgiveness for their enslavement by them."
"Me too." said Zoe as the waitress came over with Coffee for them to take with them to work.
"That would be 7.5 Credits in total." said the waitress.
"Okay here, and here is a tip." said Zoe as she transferred the Credits with her wristcom. The Tau'Ri Credit was a hybrid currency based in part in Cryptocurrencies, but with the option to take out said credits in physical money. The currency was then branched further in different local variants down to a colony or nation-state level, and the value of each currency was based upon a complex calculation that was then compared to a similar calculation on a Commonwealth level. While there was no traditional mining commonly found in Cryptocurrencies, but the system was still used to authenticate transfers. Taxes paid a reward to the financial institutions that manage to authenticate a block of transfers.
"Thank you." said the waitress, when her wristcom, which was connected to the Café's wallet pinged in confirmation of a successful transfer and rerouted the tip to her own wallet.
Zoe and Amanda went back to work, and since unlike Earth and Valhalla, tomorrow was just a normal work day like this one.
On Caprica it was 8:50pm and it was snowing heavily. The Colonial government had demanded airtime at 9pm instead of requesting. All media broadcasts were suspended, from the usual half-hour comedy shows that was common to send at nine to music video channels.
All pundits were on edge, since it had been forty years since the last time the Colonial government demanded airtime and that was to announce that peace had been brokered with the accursed Cylons.
The Meeting Hall of the Colonies was a circular building with the smaller upperhouse of the chamber sitting proudly on the buildings upper floors, but this time, the President's speech was done in the much larger lower house.
The lower house, the People's Council, consisted of 3000 representatives elected based upon each colony's population size. And their chamber had ample room for the upper house's, the Quorum of the Twelve, 1400, a 100 from each colony and a 100 non-voting seats to both the Colonial Military and Religious Orders (though is was so dominated by the mainstream Colonial Religion that it displaced any other to the point of not allowing them any seats), and the 100 person cabinet of the president.
President Adar sat in a room that worked as a ancillary office for the President of the Twelve Colonies of Kobol having some quick work done when Pres. Adar's chief advisor came in,
"Sir we are ready. Its time."
"Thank you James." said Pres. Adar. "Time to make History."
Pres. Adar walked to a nearby mirror and adjusted his suit. His speech tonight was going to be the biggest event in the History of the Twelve, nay, Thirteen Colonies of Kobol,
He walked through a large hallway leading to the lower house chamber with bust of each preceding President before him lining the hallway. He waited just outside the chamber as the Colonial Anthem was playing by a live orchestra and the flags of each Colony and the Federal Government was lowered into their respective places when the Council was in session, followed by the senior Religious Quorum member made a prayer to the Lords of Kobol, incensing the non-believing representatives and members of the cabinet.
As it was the usual practice, Pres. Adar's Vice President came forward to the centre Speaker's Podium to announced Adar to the Podium.
"Thank you, Karl." started Pres. Adar. "First of all I must thank the all of you all for granting me the chance to speak to before you this evening and on such short notice as well.
"There have been a lot of rumours circulating around the various wireless channels on what this is all about. Some of theories range from the return of the Cylons, to me resigning from this exalted office."
Pres. Adar took a deep breath, and continued.
"Well I come to you this evening to inform you of a military engagement that happened short of twelve hours ago on the Cylon Boarder, when a Raptor from the Battlestar Galactica on a standard recon mission to monitor the boarder.
"The Galactica itself was on a mission near the border to listening in to some strange signals coming from the distant star of Raluch."
Pres. Adar allowed himself to make a quick pause as the representatives was twisting in their seats, even the Military Quorum members was worried since they didn't knew what this speech was about.
"The Raptor's camera system recorded two unknown ships right on the Cylon side of the boarder and one of these ships started construction of a station of some kind." reported Pres. Adar as the chamber lights dimmed and the image of the two unknown ships appeared on a screen above him. "Now believing these where Cylons the Colonial military launched a defensive operation against this station.
"The ships claimed to belong to a group called the Tau'Ri and believing this to be a Cylon trick by our forces, a small battle was fought."
Fear went through the representatives. Fear and confusion as they were wondering why didn't Pres. Adar announced that they were Cylons (or not).
"Right as our shells was fired the Commander of the smaller ship, most likely the lead ship, said the following over the wireless:"
And now a recorded voice started to speak:
"PDC's free. And send a message to Earth and Valhalla that we are under attack and that I'm scuttling the satellite under my authority. I want twelve Mark IIIb shells, programmed as a scuttling charge. Tell Bulldog flight to ready their hyperdrives"
With the mentioning of the planet Earth a deep silence went through the chamber. It was so quiet a representatives said in a interview the day after, that you could probably drop a pin and spooked every one there in chamber.
"Military Intelligence think it was a slip from the smaller ship's communications officer as it had previously happened before our ships fired. The smaller ship calling itself the TCV Ark Royal withstood the full brunt of our fire with no apparent damage taken as the larger ship withdrew into some kind of FTL that we haven't seen before. Before we were able to restart communications the TCV Ark Royal fired their weapons inflicting heavy damage on our forces, killing at least nine thousand, before withdrawing leaving behind their station to self-destruct.
"I like to add that we are in the early phases of investigating the situation, but I believe and this is a position shared by the plurality of my cabinet that we have made contact with our lost cousins of the Thirteen Tribe. While some of you might blame our lost brothers and sisters for this tragic attack, but we like to make clear that we fired first and they fired in defence. They did not know that they were this close of our space, but a full investigation is commencing to clear out the truth behind all of this."
"In the meantime I have ordered the Colonial fleet to mobilize to defend our homes, in the slim chance that we are wrong, as well to the area of contact in hopes that our cousins will reappear and make a proper contact and give our cousins our full apologies about the battle."
And Pres. Adar readied himself for the part of speech he hated.
"And now I leave the floor open for question from the assembled representatives here."
As it was tradition for the office of the President of the Twelve Colonies of Kobol address either house of the Meeting Hall, that each colony (as they were no political parties on a federal level) to ask the President a question in order to get a better picture. It went in alphabetical order starting with the colony of Aerilon.
"Mr. President." started the senior representative from Aerilon. "I like to start with thanking you for bringing this up as soon as it happened while we are still trying to clear out what happened. However do you have any idea were our cousins are so we can explain ourselves in regards to the unfortunate battle? I ask this since the recording mentioned two worlds."
"We are working on that, representative." said Pres. Adar to the female representative. "While, based upon the prebattle communication, they said that they were setting up some kind of defence station to protect a newly founded colony. And based upon the signals we had detected from Raluch we will start there, but it will take at least a week before we are ready to mount any expedition there."
Adar turned to the representative from Aquaria, an old woman with forty years experience as representative from her home colony.
"Mr. President, what I don't understand is why, in the Æsir's name, our cousins fired on our forces when they knew we were out there somewhere?"
"Good question representative." said Pres. Adar. "But as your colony was once named Aquarius before becoming just Aquaria. I grant you that it isn't much of a difference, but our cousins left Kobol two thousand years before us and their Scriptures may have different names of the Tribes of Kobol than we have now due to linguistic drift."
"What more can you tell about the battle between our fleet and our cousins?" inquired the portly senior representative from Canceron.
"We are still in the process of gathering information representative." answered Pres. Adar. "But one thing was clear though, we shot first and our cousins ship manage to absorbed the attack with apparent damage and returned fire. After which the ship jumped alongside a small fighter escort, of which we managed to shoot down one."
"Mr. President." said the representative from Caprica, a man that Pres. Adar knew well, as he was his predecessor as Mayor of Caprica City as well his most closest ally in the Quorum, a close friend and mentor. But he was woefully ignorant in religious matters. "This name they call themselves, the Tau'Ri, do we have any idea where it comes from."
Pres. Adar swallowed a chuckle, when he saw the senior representative from Aquaria bury her head in her palms. She was married to the senior representative from Caprica, and has been for almost thirty five years now, with three, now adult children.
"Representative, as your college from Aquaria may tell you." said Pres. Adar allowing a small chuckle in the chamber on his veiled mention of their marriage. "Tau'Ri is a name found in the Æsir Sagas. It is believed to be a loan word from the language of the Sacred Scrolls, as it translate as 'first world'.
"Why they used that name is unknown, but it could have a different meaning in their scrolls."
Next was the senior representative from Gemenon, who were asking about the timetable for identifying the Colonial casualties, followed by Leonis who asked about the technical capabilities of the 13th Tribe, while the Libran representative were asking about the legal process to bring the 13th tribe into the Colonies and Picon was asking about the likelihood of a Cylon interference. Finally came Sagitarron, the most devout colony when it came to the mainstream Colonial religion and the least wanted Colony Pres. Adar wanted to talk with.
"You have said multiple times that the 13th Tribe's Holy Scripture may be different of ours." said the senior representative from Sagitarron, an extremely bigoted man that was a scion of the influential family of Spiros. "Are you implying They may be wrong somehow?"
"Not at all representative." said Pres. Adar. "But we must not ignore the fact that we haven't been in contact with our cousins for four thousand years. We should expect any difference in how they interpret the Scripture's after all Zeus has a common alternative name of Jupiter used in certain alternate Texts."
The representative from Sagittaron sat down not comfortable with the answer from Pres. Adar, while his colleague from Scorpia rose the ask his question.
"Outside of Raluch do the Military have a idea of any other worlds our cousins may also have colonized." answered Pres. Adar
"Based upon entering vector of their assumed FTL we think that the ships went to Raluch, so no representative." said Pres. Adar. "The Galactica has with it a collection of wireless recordings of their media broadcast . So experts are analysing them. And, our deep space mapping system is working hard as they can to try identify possible worlds colonized by of our cousins."
"Do you have any idea of our cousin's military capabilities?" asked the senior Tauron representative.
"No representative. So far we have only one encounter, so we have no real idea on how advanced they are nor how many ships they have."
Then finally it was Virgon's question.
"First off all, I like to thank you for you candour. You have shown us how the system works and I now ask of what can we do to help to find and reunite with our cousins."
"Thank you representative." said Pres. Adar.. "As for finding our cousins I have mobilized the Military for this task, but I will raise our overall Defence Protocol to level III. This means that I am putting military police on the streets and calling for regular Viper Combat Patrol. This will mean some interference in daily civilian life. In addition, I am also calling up our reserves, and reactivating our mothball ships.
"As for the civilian side is that we are creating a cultural package for our cousins to show them our history and culture, to ease our cousins integration. This task I lay upon you representatives from both houses."
"Thank you mr. President." said the Virgon representative. "We will not fail this duty,"
"Now let us pray to the God(s) so they can guide us." said Pres. Adar knowing that the prayer was the last part of his speech.
Maj. O'Neill² was operating in a nondescript warehouse on Valhalla. It lacked any palletized items on it's massive shelves. In fact it was totally empty, the only thing of note was the 25cm² tiling on the floor.
Standing outside was his 24 man unit, each dressed in the most advanced combat gear the Tau'Ri could offer. Each of them were checking out their gear of which most part was made of the SR-13 or SW-15, SA-03, CK-06 and finally CU-21. The SR-13 or Standard Rifle 13 looked like the love child of the FN-P90 and a Zat gun, it fired a 15mm bolt (or 15mm drones) and a 22.5mm energy grenade (or its drone equivalent) while the SW-15 (Staff Weapon 15, a variant of the SR-15) fired a 25mm bolt or a 37,7mm grenades. The SA-03 (Sidearm 03) fired 6mm bolts with 9mm grenades and looked like a modified Zat gun. The CK-06 (or Combat Knife 06) was just a basic combat knife that could have been issued in the 90s and it would be out of place. The final piece of kit was the newly introduced CU-22 or Combat Uniform 22, a modular piece of body armor that covered the entire body. It was a hybrid between Kull Armor and Vanir Environment Suit.
The CU-22 was intended to act as a day-to-day uniform for all infantry troops in the Tau'Ri Armed Forces when deployed. On either arm was a deployable Riot shield and the helmet could, like the Jaffa Helmets, fold itself into block that was attached at the nape of the neck for easy storage. It could act as a gas mask or fully seal itself to provide a sealed environment if the user was in space or deep in the ocean, with an oxygen supply of 6h.
Maj. O'Neill² also had a unique knife attached upon his person. A gift when he helped Cyrrodillic Empire to quell an uprising the Province of Skyrim six months ago. The various local Jarls, a group known as the Forsworn and as well as the Skyrim's High King had started to fight one-another at the behest of the Elven supremacist group the Thalmor, the Lucian Alliance and/or the remnants of Caino Scorpiones followers.
He and his platoon just kidnapped each Jarl, the High King and the Forsworn leader and shoved them into a conference hall with no weapons. They could only be freed if they worked out their issues. The subsequent eleven-way treaty, was basically a race for the throne of Skyrim through birthing an heir and a spare. Each Jarl, the High King and the Forsworn leader gave their respective daughters to the commander of the Tau'Ri warriors that kidnapped them aswives, said commander couldn't say no at to the matter and guess who the commander was. In the end, his father actually ordered him straight up to accept the marriage, since it was in the general diplomatic orders (and generally against other orders the USAF had in similar circumstances, but SGC was given an explicit exception due to the many medieval or lower technological civilisations the SGC may encounter)
of the SGC since its conception, though it was never issued to an individual SGC member.
"Look John." said the elder O'Neill at the time. "You know that Carter was almost been in your situation, the only reason she managed to escape was due to that the people of Madrona didn't believe in homosexual marriages. And even then, Our Own Laws say that the Nobility is allowed to do so with their children regardless of any other laws we might have that normally protects peeople from predations like this. So, just lay down and think of England, John."
The knife in question was commissioned by Skyrim's High King. It had a double edged Daedric blade, a guard made from Stahlrim, Dragonbone hilt (painted matte black) that extended through the guard (splitting it in half) and filled the blade's fuller and an Aetherium gem set in Dwemer bronze as a pommel. It had several enchantments that allowed it to be effectively be used as heavy armor (through the Knife's scabbard), bow, longsword and shield, and it could cover any material, alchemical effect or other magical enchantment, as long as the wielder had knowledge of. Maj. O'Neill² joked he could just go naked wielding the knife for the rest of his career, but instead he decided to use the Knife as a backup weapon.
"Okay, you men." said Maj. O'Neill². "This is a standard sweep and clear. We are to remove all threats without harming any non-combatants."
He checked that his rifle and sidearm to see if it were set to stun.
"Now check your weapons and move out." said Maj. O'Neill² as the floor tiling turned the warehouse into a shoot house.
"Main Entrance, Clear!" said Squad Private Angela Komarova. The Russian born sniper of his team. She had traded her AMR-14 (Anti-Material Riffle 14, Variant of SR-14) for an SR-13. The rest of unit divided into in three squads leaving a a FMT composed by Pvt. Komarova and Maj. O'Neill²'s newest recruit Squad Lance Warrant Officer Adria Mal Doran (Warrant Officers were Lance Corporals, Gunnery Sergeants and Master Chiefs, with with a warrant to act as officers when needed).
The doors were just holograms some focused gravity/counter-gravity projectors attached in order to simulate doors. This meant that two "doors" had a seven man squad going through each "door" and one had a nine man squad going through the last "door". Maj. O'Neill² was leading the latter squad and his "door" just led to a long hallway.
"Contact, left door, second room!" exclaimed Squad Private Lisa Rancor and she fired her SR-13 to a holographic enemy depicting a terrorist from the game Counter Strike. Maj. O'Neill² wanted to train his platoon for an upcoming wargame between his platoon and Platoon Major Jarmen Kell's platoon in two weeks.
Ten minutes later they had cleared all the rooms, with only injury being one of his heavy weapons expert a Great Feathered Serpent (in human form) from the world of Shadowrun called Chaac, when they dropped its' kit on their foot when they finished. But they still needed to run 5km to the base where they would lock up their gear and head home.
As they ran down the road back to base, it finally dawned to Maj. O'Neill² that his gear looked something straight out of a video game, Dr. Bill Lee actually said to Maj. O'Neill² the codename for the day-to-day combat gear was actually was "Metroid". Maj. O'Neill² remembered that his late brother Charlie liked to play Super Metroid back in the early 90s.
His mind snapped back when the roar the primary cannon from a Leopard tank rolled over a nearby range, having a live-fire exercise with several others. In the final kilometer, he saw bunch of raw recruits training with SR-11, they were firing at a head-sized target a further kilometer away with no aids. After a twenty minute run from the shoot house Maj. O'Neill² was back in civvies and a train back home.
The train was a heavily modified M(SF)TS-309 Owl, it could travel through the gate, but it had no engines or weapons. The engines was where the rail usually was back on Earth, and it had several connected passenger railcars. Maj. O'Neill² nearly fell asleep during the half-hour long ride which led to Celin, the city had grown to four times the size it had when he moved to Valhalla. The city architects had designed the city to mimic the cities of western Europe, with high reliance on public transports and side-walks, though at every major train-station, a large parking lot was built so that people could park their cars and charge them during the day. Maj. O'Neill² walked off the train and towards his car.
It only took fifteen minutes to drive home, and just as about to make his final turn his neighbor's front door opened,
"Hello John." said the neighbor as she walked out in tight jogging cloths.
"Out for a run, Mary?" inquired Maj. O'Neill², even though he could tell by her outfit that she was about to do it, but I seemed to be correct thing to ask.
"Now that I can." laughed Mary Donner as she stretched a bit "And to think, just to think that two years ago I would take those mobile shopping carts at Walmart, because I was so heavy I couldn't walk. Thank god for modern science."
"Yes, and thank the great pumpkin for that." laughed Maj. O'Neill² as he walked inside his two-story house, which would be out of place in a US suburb, he looked around the neighborhood. Most of his neighbors was still at work but those who wasn't working was enjoying the the late fall weather. Like Mary, many of them was benefited from technologies that was coming out from the 'Gate.
Six years prior a small US medical firm that the SGC used as front for medical research among others, unleashed a new weightloss system. It was a modified version of the Asuran (Pegasus Replicator) cells, its programming was replaced with a brand new one.
A doctor would just inject a vial of those robotic cells and they would carry out their instructions, and then let the patient's body absorb them after a self-inflicted EMP that would destroy them. The medical firm just had the tech launched as a weightloss treatment, though it could be also be used to combat plaque that could be found arteries and veins. Over time it got upgrades allowing cure pretty much any disease or malady, ranging from the mundane to the supernatural. As the member of the Taur'Ri Armed Forces, he had a permanent version.
He pushed the thought of medical technologies out of his mind and opened the door only to be greeted by a barking yellow lab.
"Quiet , Stanley, quiet." ordered Maj. O'Neill² to the very happy dog who was on trying to reach his mouth.
"You're back early." said a voice from the kitchen as Maj. O'Neill² hung his jacket on the hooks his daughter had made last year in shopclass.
"Yes, Cassie." said Maj. O'Neill² to his first wife as he entered the kitchen. On a strange level he had known her since his father and SG1 had found her as the sole survivor on Nirrti's biological attack on her home planet of Hanka. She had been adopted by the late Dr. Janet Frasier, a close friend if his father and the base physician of the SGC. They had met up at the Air Force Academy., she was in her senior year, following her late mother in the medical field and he was cursing through his freshman year. They had bonded over shared experiences, and by the end of the year they had started dating.
"Well I have the night shift tonight, so do you know what that means?" Dr. O'Neill², as she was a surgeon at the military hospital.
"That its my time to read the bedtime stories." said Maj. O'Neill². "I am sure I can handle it."
"And make sure that they get to bed at a decent time, they have school tomorrow." ordered Dr. O'Neill², whose regular military rank was Company Colonel.
"I will." stated Maj. O'Neill² as his wife glared at him in order to make her point across. "By the way have the rest of the family contacted today?"
"Nina did, the new house will be finished in a month." answered Dr. O'Neill², referring to the eldest of Maj. O'Neill²'s eleven wives from Skyrim. They were building a three-story mansion to have the very large family living under the same roof.
"So did anything happen today?" asked Dr. O'Neill² as she telekinetically grabbed her badge without realizing it.
"Nothing happened, Cass." reported Maj. O'Neill² shaking his head. Then his wristcom rang.
On Caprica it was 3am, and inside a Sagitarron style love-hotel, and a naked Lt. Dualla was gazing at the stars. She owned this hotel and twelve others across the Colonies. The room was actually her apartment, and it was off-limits for employees and visitors.
In her bed laid a man fifty years her senior, a man she knew well. Antonius Spiro, more known as just "Priest Spiro" or to her: father. Granted incest wasn't illegal in the Colonies but it was frown upon and miscegenation was flat out illegal back Sagitarron. She and as well her mother was Æsir worshippers and Priest Spiro was head of Order of Zeus for over thirty years. Priest Spiro was a man of many "tastes" which he used his devotion (or hubris if you asked Lt. Dualla) to Zeus to justify it. Lt. Dualla's mother was an orphan that was sold to Priest Spiro as a sexslave when she was thirteen and then dumped in the Æsir worshipping ghetto in the city of Tawa when she was fourteen and pregnant with the now Lt. Dualla. Eight years later she was killed in a suspicious car accident and Priest Spiro had in his "magnanimity" taking in the seven year old Lt. Dualla with the promise to his counterpart in the Temple of Odin of not teaching her in the faith in the Lords of Kobol, a promise he did honour. But, the very first night, he confided in her that he was her father and he was going to love her as he loved her mother, before raping her.
The only thing that kept Lt. Dualla from exposing her father was a) in a twisted way loved her as a daughter and wife and b) if she did, her career in the navy was over and was sent to the re-eduction camps back home on Sagitarron, Æsir worshipper nonwithstanding.
"When our cousins figure out that we are from Kobol, they are going trip over their feet asking to join us." exclaimed Priest Spiro. "And then we are going to finally destroy the accursed Cylons together."
"I hate to rain on your parade father." said Lt. Dualla "But from what I translated from those transmissions. The Tau'Ri are definitely not our cousins, but a different tribe all together with a history than us, a history that is much older than ours."
"Nonsense Anastasia." Priest Spiro dismissed his Sphinx coloured daughter. "The Scrolls says…"
"I follow different Gods father. Gods that tell a different story than that of your Scrolls."
"Granted." as he walked towards her back and caressed her shoulders. "But you know my position."
Lt. Dualla turned around towards her father.
"Yes but I can't shake the feeling that the Tau'Ri aren't the 13th Tribe.
"Will we see Anastasia." said Priest Spiro kissing his daughter on her mouth, before gently pushing it towards his groin. Lt. Dualla asked Frigga in a silent prayer how her father kept as vigorous as he was in his advanced age, before opening her mouth and taking in her father's rod of Lordly might.