The marines were well trained. Maintaining their vigilance throughout their transit by foot, both Squads One and Two made it to their observation positions (just behind and below the lip of the crater). Thanks to the lack of atmosphere, making noise or dust clouds was not something they had to worry about, though they kept a wary eye out for the possibility of motion sensors that the Cylons may have planted. None were detected, which meant that the tinheads were either not expecting a surface reconnaissance, or that they hadn't gotten around to doing it yet.
When the squads reached their respective positions, several of the marines fanned out to form a defensive cordon while three others - the squad leader, the observer, and a sniper - set up the observation equipment.
Besides their gauss-rifles and the suit recharger unit, each squad carried a sophisticated monocular for close-in observation, a shielded signal lamp, and an extra long range sniper gauss-rifle. The sniper had his weapon at the ready while the monocular was being set up on it's telescoping tripod.
Slowly, the monocular was raised on the tripod until it peered over the lip of the crater. As the monocular was camouflaged to look like a piece of grey rock, the chances of it being seen was very low. That still did mot mean that the observer could afford to drop his guard. Despite the fact that all the marines were wearing similar camouflage coveralls over their pressure suits, everyone knew that movement can be a dead giveaway.
Keeping strict communicator silence, the observer tapped on the screen that was connected by cable to the monocular. Sergeant Haig nodded and looked at the screen.
The monocular was focused onto the opposite lip of the crater. Haig could see that the other squad was in position. He aimed his signal light - setting it on infra red - and flashed it quickly three times, signifying SQUAD IN POSITION. Through his helmet filter, he saw three return flashes, indicating that March's squad had acknowledged and were in position themselves. As there was a long tube attached to the front of the lamp, it meant that only those who were directly in line of the beam could see it. As Cylon visual systems could see light wavelengths beyond the visible spectrum, care had to maintained.
Haig motioned to Jones to join him. Haig wrote on a tablet START OBSERVATION AND RECORDING. Jones nodded and gave a thumbs up to the observer to start focusing the monocular on the complex. The sniper - ever vigilant - had already moved up to the lip of the crater. His helmet top and the rifle were also camouflaged.
While this was happening, Haig took the lamp and looked down the slope, where he could see the landram pull up with the heavy weapons squad. He aimed the lamp and flashed it quickly three times, letting Howe know that Squad one was in position.
"Good", Howe said to Corporal Marconi after he acknowledged the infra red signal light, "let's get the weapons squad loaded up and in position".
As Marconi went back to the other members of Squad three, Howe wondered if the observation squads were getting a good view of the tinheads. There were various light codes which would be used, depending upon the situation. Howe went back to the landram, where he helped both Taggart and the landram gunner spread a camouflage net over the vehicle. The last thing they needed was for a Cylon ship to fly over and see them...
"Squad Two have just flashed their IN POSITION code, Six", Taggart said, gesturing to the location where March had positioned his group. As Taggart had the similar helmet filter, Howe didn't have to look to confirm. He nodded for Taggart to acknowledge with the landram's signal lamp.
Marconi was now overseeing the squad loading up with their weapons: primarily mortars and shoulder fired missiles. These systems could either be aimed manually, or be tied in via laser link to the recon squads' monocular scopes, which in this event would automatically acquire the target. The latter depended upon being in unobstructed view of the squads, hence the position that the weapons squad was heading to. Also additional equipment for communications and scanning purposes was being taken along. It made for quite a load per person.
"Six", Marconi said to Howe after he had finished with the camouflaging of the landram and joined him, "even with the low gravity, this is a lot of hardware for us to carry. Don't you think we should do this in two trips?".
"The sooner we're set up and under cover, the better, Corporal", Howe replied. Marconi nodded. The longer that they were exposed increased their chances of being detected, and that tinhead flying fortress that looked like a freighter could always reappear at any time. Speed was of the essence.
"Taggart", Howe said to the driver, "you stay here with the ram and make sure that the communications relay stays operational. But be ready to move immediately when I give the word. If things go wrong, we're going to need to make a quick getaway". Taggart nodded. He hoped that wouldn't happen as the landram was not ideally suited for combat, plus would not be able to take all the platoon on board in one go. He hoped that the peregrine crew would immediately respond in order to give him support should it be needed. The single gauss-cannon on top of the ram would not provide much in the way of suppression fire.
As Taggart settled back into the driver's cab and activated the passive sensors, he watched the weapons squad plod along to their set up position. One way or another, things would be getting exciting pretty soon, he thought. He set his attention on watching the sensor screens while listening to any incoming transmission on his headset.
Back on board the PEGASUS, Voight was giving a final briefing to his squadron commanders over the command commlink (all were in their vipers awaiting clearance to launch). Voight knew that the Cylons would be better able to put reinforcements into battle should they get wind of their presence. That would mean that Black Knight Wing would have to cover the PEGASUS while the marines and Silver Spar Wing tried to return to the battlestar.
Monitoring the conversation up in Core Command was Sanders. Apart from Cain and Tolen, only he and two other CIC officers had unrestricted access to the command frequencies. He nodded to himself in satisfaction that Voight was making sure that his squadrons knew what to do. Hopefully, they wouldn't be needed, but this mission was a risky one and the suppression batteries on the PEGASUS may not be enough to hold off any Cylon strike force alone.
"Everything in order, Comms?", Tolen asked as he walked up to Sanders. Sanders nodded.
"Black Knight Wing are ready to go, Silver Spar and Fulcrum are in position, and the infiltration team are in position. We should be getting some information soon. What they find will determine what happens next. Still, the ANVIL op plan gives us several options", Sanders said.
"What troubles me is that the tinheads may do something not anticipated in Captain Masters' book of plans", Tolen replied, "Still, at this moment, we have done all that we can. Keep us informed if anything happens".
Nodding, Sanders put down his headset and headed over to the DRADIS console. Any telemetry from Fulcrum or Nebula Force would be displayed there first. It was now a waiting game...
Waiting was now what the pilots of Silver Spar wing were doing. All had positioned their vipers behind various clumps of floating boulders that made up the sprawling asteroid field, and now the vipers' systems had been powered down - with the exception of the communicator. All would be able to power up and go into action the instant that Syke gave the word.
Syke's viper was powered down as well, except for the telemetry receiver from the disguised probe, and the direct comm-line to the PEGASUS. Syke hoped that the PEGASUS would soon let him know that the marines were successful and that they could head back to base. But, if that 'freighter' should suddenly show up, then they would have to take it out.
Syke looked out to where the raptor was parked. He could clearly see the modification made which enabled it to be able to do the job as envisioned in the ANVIL op plan, but the timing would have to be good. Too many things could go wrong. He decided to check in with Gorde over the secure laser link.
"Fulcrum, this is Bojay. How goes it?", he communicated.
"Boring", was Gorde's response, "but at least Snoopy and myself have room to stretch our legs. You and your wing don't have that luxury".
Syke nodded ruefully. The viper cockpits were not exactly roomy.
"Just be ready to move if and when we need to, Newguy", Syke said.
"Will do, Bojay. Hang on in there. Hopefully, the ground pounders will handle things okay", Gorde replied.
Syke hoped that the marines would be able to do the job. Waiting was really the hard part...
Down on the asteroid, the weapons squad had reached their desired location just behind the lip of the crater where the Cylon mine complex was located. They were in clear view of both recon positions, so that the laser link would be unobstructed. In turn, his position was in clear view of the landram so that any intelligence could be quickly relayed back.
From this moment, there would be no talking on the suit communicators this close to the bad guys. As Marconi supervised the setting up of the mortars and portable missile batteries, Howe was getting the first relayed images from both of the recon squad monoculars on his portable screens.
The images first showed a series of terraces, like what one would expect from an open area mine. There were a number of first generation Cylon centurions around the area, but Howe noticed immediately that there were far too few of them to account for the effort to mine such a sprawling site. It could have been because the freighter which made the last visit had picked up others who had worked on it, but other things did not match.
"No excavation equipment operating, no ongoing collection of ore", Howe noted to himself. He was starting to agree with Cain's feelings about this place. He saw a close up image from March's monocular sowing a centurion carrying what looked to be clumps of heavy metal, but it was not taking them to the central complex - where a refining operation would be expected to be going on. Instead, Howe watched the centurion take it's load over to a remote area of the mine and simply deposit the ore there. It then headed back to the complex. Howe quickly looked at an image of the complex from Jones' monocular and noticed that by the landing pad was a huge pile of what looked like semi refined metal, but the centurions were not putting it there for pickup. Instead, the centurions were moving the ore from the landing pad to various areas of the mine.
Howe knew that something really stank about the place. He moved over to one of the packs that had been carried by one of the members of the weapons squad and took out a mineral analyzer. He quickly scanned the local area around him. The analyzer only picked up trace amounts of various exotic elements.
Howe then very slowly moved up the slope so that he was looking over the lip of the crater and down onto the complex. There were no indications that he had been seen, so he slowly ran the analyzer over a part of the complex where there was no centurions present that could pick up the narrow beam from the device.
The analyzer immediately picked up large amounts of high purity minerals in those deposited clumps of ore. Titanium, lithium, beryllium, platinum, cobalt, aluminum. Howe turned off the analyzer and slowly moved back down to join the weapons squad, who had now fully set up their equipment and were tying it into the telemetry coming from the recon squads.
He motioned Marconi over. As Marconi came up, Howe picked up a writing tablet and wrote on it: THIS MINE IS BOGUS. LOOKS LIKE A TRAP IS BEING PREPARED. STAND BY WHILE I INFORM HOME PLATE. Marconi nodded and headed back to join the others.
Howe went to another field pack and pulled out a portable laser communicator. He powered it up and aimed it at the relay antenna back down at the landram.
Due to the small size of the asteroid, the landram looked like a speck on the horizon, but that just an optical illusion.
As the communicator light turned green signifying that the relay link was established Howe tapped out a brief message on his keypad.
The signal was received by the landram's relay antenna, which re-transmitted it to the FLEET AVENGER by means of a small sub satellite that had been deployed by the peregrine before the initial landing. It was disguised as a piece of asteroidal debris so as not to attract attention. The sub-satellite then relayed the signal to the FLEET AVENGER. Sims was at his console, monitoring the receiver when the signal came in.
"Hondo, I've got a signal from Nebula Six", Sims called, "Relaying it to your screen".
"So the old Man was right", Hunter replied after reading the terse note.
"Better let the PEGASUS know, Coffin", Hunter directed. Sims activated his transmitter array and sent out a message.
"We've got a signal from the peregrine, Captain", the Comscan operator said to Sanders. After it was printed out, Sanders quickly read the message, then went over to Cain. Sanders handed the message form to Cain.
NEBULA SIX REPORTS THAT CYLON MINE COMPLEX IS DEFINITELY A TRAP THAT IS IN THE PROCESS OF BEING SET UP. HIGH GRADE ORE BEING PLANTED NOT EXCAVATED. ESTIMATE SIXTY PLUS FIRST GENERATION CYLON CENTURIONS IN SITE PLANTING ORE. NO INDICATIONS SO FAR OF DEFENSIVE ARMAMENTS IN PLACE. NEBULA SIX AWAITING ORDERS.
Cain looked at Sanders, then Tolen.
"Well, Gentlemen?", Cain asked, "what do you think?".
"It's definitely something designed to attract attention, Commander", Tolen answered, "sensors from a patrol ship would definitely pick up those minerals on sensors - minerals which are just the type that are needed to keep a ship functioning - then after seeing an apparently under manned open air mine operation, would relay back to base that such large amounts of necessary ore is ripe for the taking".
"The tinheads are using good bait, I agree", Sanders added, "but to what end? According to this message, Howe hasn't picked up any indications of defensive armaments or anything else designed to take out any potential attacker".
"It could be that they haven't set up the armaments yet", Tolen ventured, "after all, we're a lot further out than what would be expected".
"That does not make sense", Cain said, "You got to think like a Cylon. It's logical to set the trap before baiting it, not after. So there must be something there. Comms, inform Lieutenant Howe to continue recon probe and to search for any hidden weapons".
Just then, a technician from Core Command called, "Fulcrum reports that the Cylon 'freighter' has been detected".
"Orders for Fulcrum and Silver Spar?", Sanders asked.
"Let them know what's been found so far by Howe, but let the 'freighter' continue to the 'mine' unless discovered. Perhaps it's arrival might give Howe the information we need. Let Howe know to expect it's arrival. Inform Syke that Silver Spar are to engage it only on it's return".