Lee Adama was more than a little uneasy about this patrol. On one hand, the fleet was in desperate need of water, oxygen, food, edible plants they could grow, soil, raw material and, well, basically everything. And this system had an apparently inhabitable planet. On the other hand they still had no idea where the Cylons were, his squadron of ancient Vipers were almost falling to pieces as it was, the fuel was as limited as everything else, and there had been those strange sensor ghosts the probe report had sent back that they couldn't identify at the time.
And that wretched Doctor Baltar had been about as much help as a wet haddock. Less, actually; a wet haddock could have gone on the dinner menu and improved the quality of the squadron's food remarkably.
He frowned, enjoying the view of space as he always did but not being seduced by it. He had read proposals for new, improved fighters shortly before the Second Cylon War, ones with no clear cockpits, just control panels, and he had hoped he would never be called upon to fly one. Still, there was something about the Big Empty.
"Got a contact," Starbuck's voice rang out over the intercom. "Looks like one of the long-range surveillance vessels entering the system."
"It's Cylon," Lieutenant Anderson confirmed seconds later; his Viper still had an upgraded sensor system. "They're coming in on almost a complete opposite vector from us. We're still screened by the comet head, they won't have seen us. Maybe they'll pass on by."
Lee glanced up reflexively at the comet head of ice and rock they had found in a convenient spot and hitched a ride behind. The fleet had also gobbled up what chunks of the ice they could catch and purify.
He put that thought aside. "Federia, power down as best you can. Make yourselves inconspicuous."
The captain of the Federia snorted. "Yeah, like a cargo freighter comes with stealth systems." They did what they could, and the entire squadron waited with bated breath for Anderson to pronounce whether they had to fight, run or just wait.
"I don't think they've seen us," he said. "They're heading straight for the third planet... oh, frak. It's altering course."
"Towards us?"
Lee braced himself for a fight. "Can we run for it? Or get past them, maybe."
"We might be able to get past them," Anderson allowed dubiously, "If we stay where we are, in the comet's shadow, and jump off at exactly the right moment. They're not heading in our direction."
Lee paused, doing the course computations. This comet wasn't a regular visitor to the system, it would pass through once and once only, at high speed. "Great," he said. "How do we get out again if they decide to hang around?"