The Colonial Fleet
Survivor count: 5,697
The Massena II rose off the asteroid leaving the civilian fleet anchored to the ground. In the CIC Commander Boyle watched as the Heracles-class Gunship gained altitude slowly clearing the rim of the crater. In his hand he held the microphone "Captain Bolden, the Massena will not be gone long but until we return, you're in command. Captains Steele and Brand will aid you should any crisis crop up but I suggest you remain in the crater and powered down, stay out of the way." He said looking at the screens as the Massena crossed a kilometre in height. "I understand Captain, but we need to investigate this, we'll be back soon. Massena out." He said putting the phone back into the command table turning towards the jump officer. "Ken, jump the ship." He commanded the young officer nodded and moments later the Massena flashed out of position.
Orion-class Battlestar Seraph
Crew: 150
"Com'on where in the name of the Gods are you guys!" Commander Daniel Atler said as more capital missiles slammed into the Seraph rocking the ship. "Stealth systems?" He asked as the three Cylon Basestar continued to fire on them and their fighters began to swarm the Orion.
"Compromised" Lt Susan Barnes said from her console "defence batteries running hot" she reported looking at her screens as another two missiles hit the Seraph. "We can't stop them all" she said if that wasn't already apparent. "Jump signature!" She called out we've got a ship jumping in off the port side!" She called out.
"They're out of position!" Atler noted relieved that their back up had finally arrived. Suddenly a Heracles-class Gunship entered the space around them and immediately moved forwards quickly its dorsal mounted anti-ship weapons fired first with three shots going straight through one of the Basestar. The gunship continued to power forwards with the ventral mounted weapons now targeting the second Basestar. The weapons quickly ripped through the ship and the gunship continued on. "Who the frak are they?" Atler asked watching as several Viper Mk VII fighters joined the Seraph's remaining three Viper Mk IIIs in attacking the raiders. "Who cares, change course bring us in under them, try and raise them on Fleet Comm."
The gunship made short work on the third Basestar tearing it to pieces with concentrated fire the remaining two Cylon Basestars obviously thrown off by the appearance of the gunship, and their missiles now ineffective by the Heracles' flak barrage, had decided enough was enough and jumped out of the area to rethink their plans. "The Cylons are bugging out! More jump signatures!" Barnes called out as in space from behind the gunship two more ships began to jump into the area. Clear of Cylon threats and with additional ships behind them the pilot of the Gunship threw the ship into a turn with forward ventral thrusters and aft dorsal thrusters firing at the same time. The effect this had on the ship was to throw the nose of the ship directly upwards as it did other manoeuvring thrusters rolled the ship was it moved then forward dorsal thrusters and aft ventral thrusters also fired pushing the ship back down again. "Nice manoeuvre" Barnes commented watching her screens as the gunship rapidly began to break slowing its movements. The two ships that had jumped in had now completed their transition into the area both ships were Freja-class Battlestars and neither had begun to deploy Vipers DRADIS confirmed they were the Sirocco and the Tyraxes the ships he'd been expecting in the first place.
"Indeed" Atler noted watching his own screens "anything on fleet comm?" Matt Rowe looked up from the communications console and shook his head. "Who the frak are they, switch to standard communications!" He ordered it was a less secure form of communication but necessary in this case. Rowe nodded a few moments later and Atler keyed a panel above his head. "This is the Battlestar Seraph of the Colonial Fleet to unidentified gunship please identify."
"This is the Massena, confirm you are Colonial Fleet?"
"We are surviving elements of the fleet." Atler confirmed "I'm Commander Atler, may I ask who we are talking to."
"I'm the Commander of the Massena. Commander Atler, I'm willing to invite you onboard the Massena, otherwise we'll be leaving the area."
"You speak like a renegade, Commander, we are the fleet and we are here to defend the Colonies like you." Alter suggested though he couldn't think of a single active Heracles-class Gunship in the fleet the ship was ancient, studying the DRADIS information this one appeared to have been modified maybe it was an experimental model.
"I'm not a renegade nor are my crew" the man replied he didn't sound like he was a military officer "we're not officially active Colonial Fleet but we've been doing all we can." He confirmed that he was not a serving member of the fleet, what was left of it, but it still didn't explain where the gunship had come from. "Again, I'll invite you onboard Massena II or we'll be leaving and you can take the assistance on credit." The ship's commander responded he obviously did not want to get off his ship with three other ships in the area.
"I'll come onboard Massena Commander, my ship cannot presently jump, while my crew conduct repairs we can talk?" Atler suggested he didn't like the idea of remaining somewhere the Cylons knew they were but what choice did they have. With the Sirocco and the Tyraxes here they'd have support if they needed it.
Massena II, Heracles-class Gunship
Atler had transferred to the Massena II via Raptor docking with the ship in its small launch bay at the rear of the ship Atler noticed the Vipers and Raptor fitted neatly into the bay under the gunship's huge engines. Despite the crew claiming not to be military and few of them wearing anything like military uniforms the ship appeared to be being run efficiently. He was led through the ship to a meeting room again few of the crew he encountered wore military uniforms instead they wore uniform more like those seen on civilians' ships. At the meeting room he met with two men one younger who wore a civilian outfit made up of utility trousers and a red jacket with a dark utility vest underneath something he'd expect an engineer to wear adding to Atler's theory that this was an experimental test ship. The other man was older and he clearly belonged to the Colonial military with a duty military uniform which carried the rank insignia of a Major. "I am Commander Daniel Atler, the Captain of the Seraph."
"Commander Matthew Boyle, commander of the Massena II, and this is Major Patrick Sinclair, originally of 432nd Training Division based off Aerilon." He said introducing the older man who immediately saluted Atler. The Seraph's Commander returned the salute he noticed the Boyle didn't flinch as the two of them exchanged this ritual of respect shared by military officers.
"Aerilon is a distance from here" Atler said speaking to Sinclair seeing him as the ranking officer onboard the Massena Boyle might be acting as a commander of the ship due to his expertise and knowledge of the ship but the military officer was the true power on the ship and now another military officer was here Atler expected the Major to exert control. Matthew had expected this and allowed Sinclair to speak.
"Yes, sir, my unit evacuated onboard a Ranger-class transport following the Cylon assault. We were ambushed in space and Commander Boyle's ship rescued us. Sir, myself and my remaining marines owe Commander Boyle our lives and our loyalty." He explained Atler nodded his understanding perhaps there was more to this young man than he'd first thought.
"Understood" Atler said turning towards the younger man who had crossed his arms confidently he was dressed like any trader, or smuggler, that Atler had ever come across and he'd seen plenty. The Seraph was one of only a few active Orion-class ships in the Colonial arsenal and before the fall it had specifically been used against those people who would break the laws and threaten the Colonies. "Interesting ship for a trader" he said glancing around knowing fine that no civilian should have this ship "and you just happened across Major Sinclair?"
"We happened across nothing" Boyle said rebuking his comment refusing to bow down to the Colonial military that had failed them all. "I was under orders from Commander William Adama of the Battlestar Galactica to remain in the Colonies and find survivors while he and the Galactica led civilian fleet to safety out of the combat zone. My ship began with the Major and his people and continued to serve the survivors of the Colonies until we lost her over Picon. We rescued fleet survivors there and salvaged the Massena II from a dry-dock facility on the planet's surface."
"You engaged the Cylons on Picon's surface?" Atler asked surprised at what these people had done and surprised that the Galactica, of all the fleet's Battlestars, had survived and was leading a civilian fleet away from the Colonies but he was also very glad to hear that there were additional survivors.
"Briefly" Boyle admitted "we lost good people doing it but we were able to net ourselves a ship that could defend our people and take the fight to the Cylons when we needed to."
"And defend people it has done." Atler remarked remembering what it had done to the three Baseships. "Commander, I know you are not Colonial Fleet but you and your ship are welcome to accompany us back to our staging area and meet our command."
"There are more of you?" Sinclair asked surprised already they had seen three operational Battlestars even if all three were the Massena's size or smaller.
"Most of our people were part of the 32nd Recon Group, tasked with exploring the regions around the Colonies in search for habitable worlds and worlds with resources we could use. The Seraph was picked up by them just after the fall of the Colonies, my ship was alone after the fall and wouldn't have lasted without them." Atler explained remembering the first few hours after the Cylon attack wondering how a Scout Battlestar would survive without support. "We have safe harbour for your ship, and for its crew Commander."
"About that…" Boyle said pulling the chair out from under the table, beside him Sinclair did the same and suddenly Atler got the message that this was going to be a longer conversation than he had expected. Over the next hour Boyle and Sinclair explained what the ship and its crew had done over the last several weeks how they'd kept moving keeping the Cylons in check where they could and running for their lives when they couldn't. They also explained that the Massena II was not their only ship though they did not mention where the others were currently hiding. And finally, they showed Atler their Cylon prisoner Doral Aditya who was still in the Massena's brig and the other humanoid Cylon models that they had identified during the Massena's voyage.
"As you can understand, Commander, I am reluctant to reveal where my other ships are until you can check your own population for these infiltrators and for further Cylon bugs like those that Doral suggested were fitted to the Viper Mk VIIs. The 32nd would be the perfect target for such technology." Boyle finished
"That's a lot to take in" Atler admitted "we've known about the humanoid Cylons for a short period of time, this one" he said pointing the blonde female wearing a red dress "was encountered leading Centurions on Caprica along with one that looks very similar to Doral." He said "but we were not aware that there were so many… not that there were multiples of each model. And this one could be a problem" he said picking up a picture of a female in her late thirties with light brown hair "this is Colonel D'Anna Sousa, the executive officer of our flagship. She said she was the twin of news reporter D'Anna Biers and she took her wife's name she's at our staging area and onboard a ship that could take all of ours put together."
"Well, Commander, I have five thousand-and-seven hundred reasons to help you solve this problem." He said mentioning the members of his fleet rising from his chair Atler did the same as Boyle extended his hand to meet Atler's for a handshake "let's get to work."
Seraph, Orion-class Battlestar
It took several hours to outfit the Seraph and repair the damage done from engaging the Cylons. During that time Atler, Boyle and Sinclair had discussed their options with the other two Battlestar commanders while checks for Cylon infiltrators had been carried out onboard the two ships fortunately no more infiltrators had been found. They had collectively agreed that the easiest option to avoid a major fire fight was that the Seraph returned to the staging ground alone to make its report to the fleet leaving the Massena and the other two Battlestars behind to put the rest of the fleet. They'd explain that the two other Battlestars had taken damage fighting off the Cylons who had chased the Seraph, the ship was still damaged enough to show it had been in a fight.
Onboard the Seraph they'd carry enough of the Massena's marines to form a security cordon around Boyle and Atler while they made their way onboard the flagship and headed for the CIC to make their report. They'd keep their weapons down as much as possible but when they got to the flagship's CIC they might need the marine's firepower. It was a risk if anyone onboard thought they were a threat they'd get nowhere and the Seraph didn't have the firepower to get them out, this could go badly wrong but they needed to eliminate the Cylon threat. Time was their greatest threat.
When they were all onboard the Seraph made its jump out of the colonies making a longer jump than the Massena had ever made during its run through the colonies. "Jump complete" the jump officer said in the cramped CIC of the Seraph "there she is." He said glancing at DRADIS.
"Our flagship" Atler said showing Boyle the information on the screen as the Minerva-class Battlestar Rycon moved through space. Nearby there was another Freja-class Battlestar like the two they'd left with the Massena II and several civilian ships. "Rowe, send them a text message tell them our voice transceiver is damaged and that we'll be over with our report shortly." He ordered "ready?" He asked Matthew Boyle.
"We're doing this for my people and for your people Commander, I'm ready when you are let's go."
