Chaos Theory – Re-keyed. Buffy the Vampire Slayer/Neon Genesis Evangelion/Stargate SG-1/Star Wars/Star Trek/Halo/Lord of the Rings Crossover...

Title: Chaos Theory: Re-keyed
Rating: PG - Language and Violence.
Genre: Crossover
Author: PitViper
Date (Part Thirteen): 2013-06-13

Chaos Theory: Re-Keyed

Part 13: "Forging the Sword"

"There are moments that come where no single mind can truly comprehend the entirety of that event. Yet, we still try – both to understand and to tell the story. Eventually comes the moment when we tell it to our children. If this story is good, it is told by our children to our grandchildren... so on and so forth. This is how truth becomes myth, and myth becomes legend... And when we are legend, does it really matter who we once were?"

Merlin of Avalon (Translated from his collected thoughts) – circa 982AD.

–

Jack looked out at the town that was rapidly changing. Buildings were both submerging and rising, as the magnetic lifts designed to protect the civilian facilities were tested. It had been two weeks since Halloween, and he didn't know if anything would ever be the same again. They had gone to another world via the Avalon gate – the home world of the Senghalli. They had seen the Goa'uld contract their borders, shying away from the area of space Earth occupied. As more and more Alterran systems were brought online, it became obvious that Sol had an amazing level of defenses. Ring after ring of stations, outposts, energy satellites, and weapons grids, starting from Jupiter orbit heading out into the Oort cloud, the Heliopause, and well past Alpha Centauri.

The city had been raised inch by inch, towards the dimensional weak-point below Sunnydale. The closer the Alterran facility came to the hole in space and time, the more power the city was generating. Transporters that had to rest every ten minutes after adding a half-inch of rock under the rising city now had the reserves to function almost continuously.

The dimensional weakness was now surrounded by a facility designed to contain anything that existed within. The chamber of proto-vampires was destroyed as one of the first acts of securing the portal. The city was now mere hours from connecting to the base of the construct, the various unstable tunnels and rifts in the earth formed by the unstable energies of the Hellmouth collapsed and recycled. Steel re-enforcements now lined the areas beneath the new sky-scrapers and buildings of Sunnydale. Tritanium composite re-enforced with Carbon nano-weave (graphine sheets and Carbon Nano-Tube re-enforcement) plates now acted as the GeoFront's first line of defense.

Once the city was docked, and the original gate in place, the city would then modify the subspace signature of the hellmouth – setting the dimensional weak-point to a previously recorded positive-entropy reality. Once that happened, Potentia production could resume at normal levels.

"They're almost ready in the command center, Colonel." Came a voice from just behind the Spartan.

Jack nodded casually and turned sharply, breaking himself forcefully from the random thoughts about what was happening. He looked out over the expanse of land in the distance, towards the hidden facility that was building the first of their capital ships – a small light-frigate.

Well... small was a relative term. It was still nearly four hundred meters long. But it only had a permanent crew of forty, ranking it in the light-frigate classification. Most of the ship was dedicated to what Jack would call, 'A Big Honking Space Gun'. Scotty called it a combination of a Planetary Phaser with an Alterran Weapon known as a 'Caseim Beam', loosely translated of course. Variants on the hull design would support a wing of fighters, a small hospital ship, missile boat, command and control, cargo freighter... you name it, this small ship frame could do it – so long as one removed the 'Big Honking Space Gun'. And it could be constructed very quickly – seeing as though it was simply a cubic-rectangular hull.

According to the various Star Trek guys, it was an ugly beast, and not suited to warp travel at all – as it would only be able to achieve and sustain about warp 7. Warp 8 if they pushed it for about 12 hours. For civilian use that's considered good... but for the military vessels in the Trek universe, that's sub-pedestrian.

Still, warp was something unknown to the Goa'uld. The concept was both simple and complex, and if they had not possessed the experience that came with Federation memories, then it would likely never have been officially pursued as Hyperspace travel trumped it in almost every aspect. However, the fact that none of the hostile powers had the technology gave the Federation technology an advantage.

Jack began walking with the man who had come to escort him, slowly moving towards the facility entrance. As he looked to his left at the border of the town, he could see the first segment of the giant ring that would surround Sunnydale taking form. Within a month, it would be complete. The city would be virtually impenetrable from the air, although ground based attack would be a threat, as the planetary phaser emplacements weren't designed to be able to target ground based vehicles.

He thought back to the question, as to why they weren't going to at least equip Sunnydale with surface to surface energy beams and the kid possessed by Scotty exclaimed, "Are ye daft? Do you know what a type twelve planetary phaser battery can do? Blast right through a mountain and drill through to the core in the time it takes you to blink! There's a reason they aren't mounted on starships, y'know?"

Jack had raised an eyebrow to this, pointing out that the frigates would have that kind of power.

Scotty just sighed, "Lad, tis never a good idea to have a planetary battery that can turn its own foundations into vaporized plasma if you aim a bit too close..."

'Hard to argue with that,' Jack thought as he entered the building. Of course, the Trek guys were completely oblivious to the fact that a ground facing weapon didn't have to be the most powerful thing they could mount. Boom is a great thing, but only when it happens to the bad guys.

Overall, Jack was rather surprised with the attitude of the star fleet officers from Halloween. They were a peaceful bunch, who tended to over-engineer a lot, pack as much potential as possible into whatever system they design, and then come up with insane regulations to keep them from using what they built. It was, well... frustrating. They believed in Overkill, just minus the 'kill'.

Well... Most of them did. Jim wasn't one of them. He didn't ascribe to 'Peace at any Price'. He was like a 22nd century version of a wild-west 19th century Federal Marshal. Get its attention, if it doesn't shoot back, talk, if it does, shoot it and keep on shooting it until it talks or dies. Out of the original 12 Constitution Class vessels, only the Enterprise survived with ship and crews intact – or relatively so. Kirk was a big, big part of that. He shot when he needed to shoot. He talked when he needed to talk. And sometimes, he just did what he had to do, consequences be damned.

–

The first of a dozen probes launched into the expanse between stars was returning its data. So far, it didn't look good at all. Jack walked in, looking at the massive main screen – and seeing what was undoubtedly an asteroid field. "Rocks?" He queried.

"Tellar Prime," Xander grunted. It was grim, as this world was one of the ones that they wanted to use to see how much of their universe was like the Trek Universe that they had so much data on.

Jim looked on darkly, watching Leonard from the corner of his eye. "Recent or..."

"Planetary instability caused during formation, Jim." Leonard noted calmly, "No signs of simple or complex organisms, no technology signatures, no destructive energy signatures. The planet survived maybe 3 to 5 million years after the final coalesce. High concentrations of Dilithium and Naqueda."

Jim nodded – making note of the system as a potential future resource. "Luck of the draw."

Xander looked back with questioning eyes at Jim.

Jim nodded, "Dilithium magnifies energy. Worlds with high Dilithium content have extreme seismic activity. Naquada not only is a superconductor but is also an energy generator. Put the two together with Tellar's orbit near the inner lifezone..."

"The planet tore itself apart." Xander finished.

There would be no Tellarians in this universe.

"We have another six days before the probe reaches Andor Prime." Xander noted quietly. "Another three days after that until the probe destined for Vulcan reaches that system."

Leonard spoke up at this, "Its safe to say that Vulcan is not space-faring at this time. Their patrol vessels would have noted the probes by now. While they are stealth-ed, their initial warp-energy signatures would have been detected to within a few light years, even if they couldn't track them. Alterran sensors and the three lunar arrays we've placed have a range of ten light-years at high resolution, and we can detect vessel signatures out to one hundred light years, no Vulcan vessels have been detected."

"No Andorian vessels for that matter either, although we are picking up Andorian life-signs from the system. There are no warp signatures." Tim said, looking at his console.

"Depending on their state of development, and their condition, Andor may be a valuable ally."

"Perhaps. Of course, there was one detection of a warp capable ship." Leonard said hesitantly.

Jim frowned, "Leonard..."

Meanwhile Jack looked back at the Vulcan hybrid, "Really?"

Leonard nodded, "Sensors from the probe heading towards the Klingon territory detected a flight of 5 C-9 Predator Class vessels."

Jim looked down, "The direct predecessors of the Klingon B'rel and Raptor class vessels. Early mark photon torpedoes, multiple light-disruptors mounted on the wings. Sustained warp of 3.5, maximum warp of 5.4 for two weeks. They have subspace shields and deflectors, equivalent to the Vulcans of the era. And they are hunting."

That made Xander's eyebrows rise, "Hunting what?"

Leonard frowned a bit, "They are following a predefined course, but not one that a warp capable ship would normally plot." He quickly tapped out a sequence on his console showing the trajectory in relation to the galactic map. "Their course takes them near several gate worlds, possibly ending with a destination somewhere in Goa'uld held territory. However the course is not warp-efficient, they're tracking something."

Xander looked at the path the ships were following and frowned, as he accessed the information he'd learned from Merlin. "The Taonas corridor."

Leonard and Jim looked a bit confused, but just then Merlin's avatar appeared.

"Indeed, look..." Merlin adjusted the display and overlaid the corridor's coordinates. "Its a match."

Xander put a finger to his lip, "Merlin, do we still have any active sensors on the Proclarosh Taonas Corridor?"

"A few," the hologram responded, "And they're in range."

Suddenly three red blips began to show on the screen. The text first appeared in Alterran then switched to English.

"One Cheops and two Ha'tak class vessels, the Klingons are pacing them." Leonard said, raising an eyebrow. "A flight of Predators would be a match to their firepower."

Xander looked up at the team, but Jim decided to nip it in the bud, so to speak.

"We only know that they look very much like Predators, it may very well be that these are not Klingons. And if they are, at our current developmental state, we're more potential victim than potential ally." He noted. "Yes, I am aware that Kirk's experiences are probably clouding my judgement on this, but we simply don't have the material or manpower to intervene in this particular action. The Klingons respect strength and courage above all else. Unless we can commit to a full on assault with them as allies, they will see us as a potential protectorate at best and a dangerous future enemy at worst."

Xander nodded, "Is there anything we can do to make their job a bit easier?"

Jim looked around the table, "These are not long range vessels. Another three our four days of this, and they will be past the point of no-return. Odds are two or three of the vessels will break off and return home, while the others commit to a suicide attack against the Goa'uld borders. Its obvious that the Goa'uld don't maintain many systems along the outer range of these vessels. Its probably why this particular route is relatively clear of traffic."

"Merlin, are any of the disruptor stations along the course operational?" Xander looked at the hologram.

"Several." Merlin replied, "I could use one of them to drop the Goa'uld out without these Klingons detecting the station, although they may identify the disruption."

Xander thought for a moment, "Do it. How much time will the klingon's have to intercept?"

"Twenty, maybe thirty minutes, depending on the kinds and types of spares the Goa'uld ships carry. The interdiction pulse will destroy their hyperspace control crystals." Merlin responded. "Disrupting in three... two... one..."

The red dots blinked on the screen, their status showing that they had dropped from hyperspace.

"The Klingons have accelerated. Detecting communications between the vessels. High Klingon Battle Language." Leonard responded.

Xander grinned, "Lets hear it."

Static filled the room's audio systems for a moment, before the sounds of the comms came through.

"What Happened?" came the short burst of translated klingon battle language.

"I'Glinthor, unknown. Disruption, natural, possibly artificial. They are in Normal space!"

The screen changed as the computers decided that the I'Glinthor was the name of the vessel asking what happened.

The I'Glinthor responded, "Today we dine on Gods!" A moment later: "Success! For the Empire!"

The other vessels responded, "Success! For we are Klingon!"

Radio silence consumed the last few seconds before battle.

The dots met each other, the tactical screen zooming in to the maximum sensor resolution available.

Still, they were false-image projections based on known information for the classes. Little better than outlines, as a radar operator would see.

Leonard intoned, "They have engaged."

The battle raged, although little was apparent from their perspective. The smaller Klingon vessels darted around the much larger Goa'uld ships. The icons would pulsate for a moment showing energy discharges from each ship, and that energy's interaction with the target's shields.

One of the klingon vessels showed multiple hits, and began to slow. Jim closed his eyes for a second, "Their shields are gone."

A static filled response came across the line, "Success, Remember US!"

The I'Glinthor responded, "Today is a good day to die! Success! A'mar!"

The computer flagged the unmarked and damaged ship as the A'mar and the blip suddenly accelerated at the Cheops. Waves of energy discharge were shown from the Cheops as the Klingon ship ceased to exist. Moments later, the Cheops also vanished from the screen.

The other four vessels focused on the two remaining Ha'tak. Multiple strike and fade hits took their toll, and both Ha'tak succumbed after a few minutes of this relentless barrage. One exploded, its icon fading. The other drifted, its power gone.

"They have disabled the vessel."

"I hope there's nobody innocent on that Ha'tak." Jim muttered. Three of the four Predators circled the wounded vessel, while the I'Glinthor approached. "They're going to board."

After several hours, each of the Klingon vessels had boarded the ship. Now each were setting their course for the Klingon's borders. After a few moments, the Ha'tak ceased to exist, most likely due to an anti-matter warhead.

As the klingon ships disappeared, Jim wondered, "Well, we've just fired the first human shot in a very long and brutal war, gentle beings."

Xander looked up, "More Klingons were able to go home at the cost of the lives of Goa'uld and their slaves. There's going to be a lot more engagements like this, and a lot more dead Goa'uld vessels. And a lot of them are going to be at our hands. But first, we need to get our house straight. Defenses and permitter weapons systems need to be confirmed. We'll be a lot safer once the Solarius Net is fully active again. Then once we secure our solar system fully, we turn our attention to the full Atlantis defense net."

Leonard raised an eyebrow, as Merlin explained - "The Solarius Network is a series of bases and defense systems located throughout the debris field known as the Oort Cloud. There are twenty-eight redundant master control stations out there, any one of which can be used to control the network. Currently the system is offline – it will require a trip to one of the control stations to re-establish the network. However, once reactivated, the Solarius net will prevent any hyperspace intrusion into the star-system. In addition, once the stations are manned properly, we will be able to field and control large numbers of drone spacecraft and drone missile systems.

"The extended Atlantis defense network includes a second line of interdiction satellites at the heliopause, and sixteen drone bases. A third level of defense englobes Terra Atlantis at a radius of five light-years but there are no command centers, and a fourth level encompasses a radius of ten light years with auxiliary command centers within each star system contained within the sphere. All of these bases have the capacity to hold tens of thousands of troops and supplies. Although during the long years of war that followed the fall, none have been restocked."

"It's the bare minimum we need established before we can even think about openly engaging the Goa'uld. And the Goa'uld need to be rendered moot before we can focus on preparing the repel the Xa'nel.