I don't own Babylon 5, sadly enough. I just make do with Fanfiction.
Enjoy, and please let me know what you think.
The Beginning of the Age of the Raiders.
Operation Exodus began in earnest. For such a complicated plan, the Earth Alliance organised it as quickly and as efficiently as they could. The plan had been shifted slightly, with orders sent directly to each planetary colony and outpost close to Earth to prepare for the evacuation. The timing was everything even though they only had three brief weeks, but they quickly got into the plan. Squadrons from the third, fourth and the fifth fleets were sent to the entrances of the Underspace with a number of passenger liners and other craft which were considered large enough to support and house many people.
None of the officers who knew of the finer details of Operation Exodus was even remotely surprised by the inclusion of the liners, but their presence raised some eyebrows on the ships. Although the crews were surprised by their presence, the ships moved nearer and nearer towards the edge of the solar system When they arrived at the entrances to the corridors, the crews baffled since they all knew the Earth Alliance would not send squadrons of three fleets to corners of their home system for nothing, but that was before the Earth Alliance warships entered the Underspace and headed out to the colonies which hadn't fallen yet, following the star maps gathered hastily by Interplanetary Expeditions to guide them on their way.
The crews of the ships had been stunned when they had headed into the Underspace corridors which were on the outer edges of the solar system rather than heading for the local system jump gate, but when they entered the corridors they either let out exclamations of shock or something else. Only the captains and first officers of the vessels were briefed on the existence of the corridors which, up until now had been a classified secret until the ships entered them. The moment Earth Force command had discovered the existence of the corridors thanks to Sinclair and Ivanova's accidental stumbling over them, they had classified the existence of the corridors in order to prevent their existence getting out and falling into the hands of the Narns, the Centauri, and the Minbari.
It was a logical thing for them to do.
The corridors incredible properties enabled faster than hyperspace travel, cutting down travel times to only a few hours or days, but at the same time, they allowed rapid transit to different solar systems without any of the same issues which were inherently a problem for hyperspace travel. The corridors were stable, they didn't seem to shift or change according to IPX's studies although there was still so much they didn't know about the corridor network.
Anyone discovering the corridors would have no trouble using them to explore space, visiting other solar systems, but at the same time, their strategic importance was quickly realised. The corridors couldn't be detected by ordinary sensors, and it seemed they only became noticed when a ship or a probe flew into one of the mouths. If they were used in a war, then one side could quickly decimate the enemy because they even realised what was happening, ending the war because there was too much destruction suffered by one side or causing too much devastation to planets and industrial bases to cripple the war effort.
Such a tactical advantage would be highly prized by any species. If the Narn Regime discovered the existence of the corridors, they would be able to conduct lightning-fast attacks and raids against the Centauri Republic, maybe even going for Centauri Prime itself and perhaps even conquering the planet and teaching the Centauri what the peacock haired aliens had done to them.
On the bridge of one of the ships, Elizabeth Lochley sat in her command chair, listening to the sounds of surprise coming from her crew.
"It's okay, everyone," she said calmly to reassure them. "Don't panic. Everything is gonna be okay. Navigation, there's a program set into your computer. Execute it."
"Captain," one of the crew asked while the navigational officer found the relevant program and executed it - Lochley didn't know the name of the officer, but since several members of her crew had been killed off by the Centauri in one of the recent skirmishes, that made sense. "What was that?"
Lochley smiled. "That, Lieutenant, was the entrance to the Underspace; a network of corridors looping through the galaxy, and maybe even further beyond. We discovered it fairly recently," she went on although she had no intention of going into the full explanation of the circumstances behind their discovery, "We are going to use them to save our race from extinction at the hands of the Minbari."
"How?" One of the crew showed less restraint, excitement filling his voice. "Are we heading to the Minbari solar system, and blow it all up?"
"Is that our mission?"
"No, it can't be," one of the more experienced members of the crew countered. "We don't have any heavy-duty weapons."
"I'm afraid not," Lochley spoke over everyone on the bridge; she knew she shouldn't have let the whole bridge crew get out of control like this, but she had known they would ask the logical questions, were they going to be using the Underspace to launch attacks on the unsuspecting Minbari. "We are going to use them to evacuate our colonies. The discovery of the Underspace has come a little bit too late for us to launch attacks on our enemies."
"But why, if they cross the entire galaxy-."
"It's because of the size of the network," the navigation officer interrupted while he sat studying his screens. "I've got only three charts programmed into the computer, but I haven't got anything more than that, and as we're travelling through the corridors I haven't got anything on the routes as they branch off."
"IPX haven't got the resources to properly map them out," Lochley divulged, "the war with the Minbari has pushed all of our scientific and industrial resources into trying to break the Minbari stealth, and all of Earth's exploration and merchant organisations have been forced to give up their ships in order to help us evacuate colonies and the Minbari have been shooting them down quickly before we can even build them. As a result, we don't have enough ships to spare for exploring them, and all our resources have been pushed into the war. Thanks to the Centauri and the Narns, they're stretched to breaking point, and we only have a few ships to map out the Underspace."
"So…what are we going to do?"
Lochley was silent for a moment as she wondered to herself how her crew would take the news. Like everyone else who'd attended the conference discussing Operation Exodus, Elizabeth hadn't really liked the thought of just turning around and running away. But she was a realist. The Minbari were gaining ground every day despite EarthForce's best efforts to slow them down, but with the Narns and the Centauri joining the Minbari for their own selfish reasons, Earth would be hard-pressed to stop it. The Narn Regime was closer to them in terms of technology, but they were warriors hardened by years of slavery at the hands of the Centauri, but they were beatable. It would have been hard fighting against the Narns on their own, and it was debatable from her point of view of who would win in the end, although it was hopeful there would be a strong enough draw to stop the Earth Alliance being conquered by the Narn Regime.
But this was not ideal. Not only was the Earth Alliance shrinking every day thanks to the Minbari war and the strain they were causing on EarthForce thanks to Jankowski's mad arrogance during the disastrous First Contact with them, but they had the Centauri's sudden shift from neutral to actually helping the Minbari conquer the EA and the Narn Regime following suit; unlike the Minbari, both races would be content enslaving the unfortunate humans left there.
Even now Lochley wondered what in the name of God the senate were thinking, just letting those colonists stay on those planets where they'd wait for the slaughter to begin, and she wondered why none of the colonists had thought to just leave in the first place, but for some, it was just too late. While Lochley was a trained, professional EarthForce officer who followed her orders to the best of her ability, she was not some kind of soulless robot. She did inwardly question some of her orders, and the decisions of her superiors.
She had had questions in her mind ever since this whole mess had started; why the hell had they allowed someone who was completely deranged to be sent to the borders of a race they'd heard of? Why the hell had none of the colonies been evacuated when it became clear the Minbari wanted to exterminate them all? What was going through the minds now? Would Operation Exodus work in the long term?
Lochley sighed. "We are going to evacuate our final colonies," she began. "This ship and several others will supervise the evacuation, but others are going to be mining hyperspace with fusion bombs."
"You mean cause enough intensity in hyperspace to knock the Minbari and the others off balance?" One of the crew asked.
"And use this Underspace to get the colonists to safety?" Another asked.
"Precisely," Lochley nodded, knowing there was a flaw to that idea.
And unfortunately one of the crew saw it instantly. "But Captain, what if there are refugees struggling to return to Earth? We can't detonate the mines in hyperspace; the shockwaves will knock any ship off course."
Lochley bit her lip. "Believe me, I hope that isn't true," she said, "and all this has been given to Earth Dome. Their orders stand. They claim the number of colonists we save is more important."
She said the words slowly as if she were afraid that if she didn't then everyone on the bridge would see her lose her cool. But at the same time, they could all tell she didn't like any of this any more than they did, only she wasn't in any position to do anything about it.
Elizabeth looked around the bridge, hoping against hope there wouldn't be a mutiny on her hands (she forced down the thought instantly in case she jinxed it, but hopefully they would see anything as extreme as that would do nothing in the long run; hyperspace was still going to be mined, the colonists would still be evacuated and everyone they could save would be saved and taken to safety; even if there was a mutiny on any of the ships, what would they do? The Minbari, the Centauri, and the Narns would still be gunning for them), and she sighed, hating that the four-way war was making her paranoid about her own crew.
"I don't like this any more than you do," she said softly, but in total understanding about everything that was happening around them and what they were likely thinking about their new orders, "I don't either. Nothing would make me happier than to go off into the galaxy and see if there are any of our people out there, trying to escape from the Minbari. I want nothing more than to find them, bringing them back to Earth, but we can't. There are millions of us still close to Earth, women and children. We must save them first. We might not be able to help the rest of our people out there in the galaxy, but we can give those children a chance to live!"
Elizabeth finished as emphatically as she could, hoping it would make them see the sense in her words. The crew didn't like it, she could see it clearly, could see them struggling to accept the reality of her orders and the orders from higher up the chain of command. Finally, one by one, they all turned in their chairs and focused on their duties. Elizabeth sighed, seeing for herself none of them was truly happy with the orders and decisions being made. However, at the same time, she was gradually aware of how everyone became focused on their duties.
XXX
The journey through the Underspace lasted approximately ten more minutes before the fleet emerged out of the corridors and back into real-space. As her ship emerged from the corridors, Lochley could not help but wonder about the corridors, whose travelling time seemed smoother than ordinary hyperspace travel. If Earth had known about them long ago, then they would have been free of the boundaries of hyperspace travel. Now, for them, a trip through hyperspace could take days, depending on the hyperspace tides, gravitational inclines, or competing and conflicting navigational beacons. But now they had a stable means of travelling faster than light, something far faster, Lochley wondered what the future held for the human race.
Their existence was hanging by threads, and while she could understand the military and strategic value of their worth, she agreed that for now, they needed to save as many people as they could. And yet as they left the corridors, Lochley hoped word of the corridors did not reach the Minbari, the Centauri, or the Narns. If they discovered them, then humanity may as well kiss goodbye to its own existence.
As the fleet appeared in orbit above one of the few colonies they had left, Lochley listened as the fleet commander communicated with the planetary government, ordering the evacuation while a small number of ships veered away, heading straight for the local jump gate. As the gate generated the energy to punch the necessary hole from real-space into hyperspace, Lochley watched as the small detachment of ships she knew were minelayers she felt the plan might just work.
"Captain?" The communication officer drew her attention back. "Fleet commander is requesting all available shuttles to assist with the evacuation."
"Acknowledge the order," Lochley ordered before she turned to her first officer. "Get all available pilots down to the launch bay, but keep at least one or two shuttles on emergency standby; if something goes wrong, I want a rapid response."
"Yes, Captain."
As she watched the small number of shuttles leaving her ship and joining with their sister ships before they entered the planet's atmosphere, Lochley hoped that Operation Exodus didn't go wrong.