Chapter 10
Galactica's CIC
"What the hell happened?" The CIC of the Galactica was in disarray, one of the Colonial ships had been lost. Adama wanted to know what was going on, had they been attacked? Had the ship been sabotaged?
Dualla was quick to respond. "Sir, there were no weapons fired from what I can see, the ship just exploded…"
"I told you Bill! You wouldn't listen!"
"Shut up Saul! There's an explanation. There has to be." Adama turned back to Dualla. "Get me that alien ship now. I want to talk to the President."
Atlantis
The Atlantis embarkation room was in a similar state. "One of the ships… It lost structural integrity and just… exploded…" Chuck the technician informed the room, and Colonel Sheppard and Dr. Jackson, of what had happened.
"For god sakes we just got back!" McKay couldn't believe how quickly things had gone to bad once again. "How many people were on that ship?"
Chuck turned to Rodney to answer the man's question and to break the bad news to the others. "Well, when the ship first dropped out of hyperspace it had 398 people onboard. The number began to drop rapidly soon after, I think Thor must have realised what was happening and started beaming…"
The technician was cut off by McKay. "Yes I got that, how many people when it blew up?"
There was a short silence before Chuck answered, a solemn look on his face. "76."
Samantha Carter
"322?" Roslin asked, wanting the small alien to reiterate what he had just said.
"Yes." replied Thor. "I was able to save 322 of your people."
Roslin turned and slowly began walking back towards the window, staring at the planet below, the wreckage of the vessel burning up in the atmosphere. "If I'm right… There were nearly 400 people on that ship…
Sam walked up behind Roslin and placed a hand on her shoulder. "I'm sorry…"
All of a sudden, the voice of Bill Adama filled the room. "This is Admiral Adama of the Galactica. I want to talk to the president right now."
Atlantis
Sheppard had called a meeting as soon as the full extent of the incident was known. Sitting at the conference room table were himself, Dr. McKay, Dr. Jackson, Ronon and Teyla. "This is not good. Something tells me the Colonials aren't going to be very happy."
"Tell me about it." replied Daniel. "They trusted us with the lives of their people and we've let them down. More precautions should have been taken before we attempted this, we should've known their ships were in no fit state…"
"And imagine how much damage will befall the Galactica." Teyla said, bringing up another problem. "They are going to have to make multiple trips back and forth; I doubt they will be able to make it in one piece."
"We can't let them do it." Ronan was the next to speak. "They're idiots if they think they can survive that many trips. They need to let us handle things."
"Something tells me it isn't going to be that simple." Daniel stated what everybody was thinking, but didn't want to say, and McKay agreed.
"There's no way they'll just sit here and let us go back and forth. I doubt they'll trust us now."
Sheppard sighed. "The Admiral seems to be a good man, and I genuinely think he trusts us. I need to get him down here and we need to figure this out."
Samantha Carter
Laura Roslin had managed to calm down after she began speaking with the Admiral, but she couldn't help but think about the people that had been lost, the most in a long time. "I believe them Bill. I'm not inclined to think this was there fault, at least not totally. I don't think they did anything on purpose."
Adama agreed with her. "I feel the same. I don't see why they would do it on purpose either. If they wanted to kill our people they could do it here and now."
Roslin sighed. "So what do you think we should do now? Colonel Carter has had an idea but I really don't know if we could get it to fly with the Quorum."
"What's her idea?" The Admiral was intrigued.
"She's suggesting moving the civilians onto this ship while theirs are being towed. If there are anymore accidents, then no one will be harmed, and Thor should be able to move more ships with each journey. It should speed up the process."
"That sounds good to me." Bill knew it would be hard to get the Quorum to agree to it, but they didn't really have to know. At times like this the president and Admiral were allowed to make decisions that they believe will be the best for the fleet.
SGC
Jack sat at the table next to George Hammond. After the two men greeted each other, they turned to face the IOA representatives, one from Russia, one from China, one from Britain and another from France.
"Hello ladies and gentlemen, hope you've been enjoying your stay at the SGC. I'm here to ask…"
"We know exactly what you are here to ask General." Shen Xiaoyi, the Chinese representative for the IOA, cut Jack off before he could finish his sentence. "You are here to ask if we will give our permission to allow the Colonials to take haven in Atlantis."
O'Neill paused for a moment. "Took the words right out of my mouth."
"The answer…" Shen looked over her fellow representatives, before turning back to O'Neill and Hammond. "…is yes."
"Uhm… OK. That isn't what I expected." Jack was shocked. He never thought it would be that simple.
Hammond leaned forward and looked at Shen. "If you don't mind me asking…"
"Not at all."
"…If you've all already agreed to let the Colonials to take refuge in Atlantis, why was it so important that myself and General O'Neill attended this meeting? Couldn't you have just sent the message through the Stargate? That would have been considerably easier."
"Yes, we could have." Mr. Chapman, the British representative, was next to speak. "But we also wanted to know what you intend to do about the Wraith fleet heading for Atlantis."
"The Dauntless is coming online, we won't be defenceless here on Earth, and we understand that." Shen spoke once again. "However, sending all of our BC-304s to the Pegasus Galaxy all at once means we will likely come out of this with a considerably smaller fleet than the one we started with. Is it imperative that they all go?"
"Yes." O'Neill replied. "If we're going to have any hope of stopping them it is."
"Just how many Wraith Hive ships does this fleet consist of?" asked Mr. LaPierre, the French representative.
Hammond and O'Neill looked at each other, before looking back at their guests. They were surprised that these people hadn't been told yet. Jack was the one to break the news. "About 50. Give or take."
Battlestar Galactica
"You're actually agreeing with this woman?" Asked Zarek, furious that the President and Admiral had already given the go ahead to Carter's new plan without consulting either himself or the Quorum. "I'm the Vice President; you should have told me before you made this decision!" Roslin had beamed over to the Galactica with Colonel Carter soon after the incident, and she had not been looking forward to dealing with him.
"We didn't have time to consult you Mr. Zarek, I'm afraid the decision had to be taken quickly. The Wraith could attack the fleet at any time and quite frankly I can't be bothered to negotiate while
"There is always time. We are supposed to have a system; you can't just bypass it any time you want to." The vice president wasn't having any of it. "And where the hell is Apollo? Don't tell me he's still on that damn alien ship."
Sam stepped forward. "He agreed to stay behind and co-ordinate the efforts on the other side with Thor when we get back to the fleet…"
"I was talking to the President, if you don't mind Colonel." Roslin was gob smacked by Zarek's audacity, so much so that she was left open mouthed. That rarely happened to her. Tom began to walk towards the door, as if he hadn't said anything to Sam. "I'll be consulting with the Quorum about this; you'll here from them very soon. Oh, and good to see you're well, Laura." With that, Zarek left the room, leaving the two women alone. Tom wasn't angry at Sam. He wasn't angry at the humans at all really. He did, on the other hand, recognise this as an opportunity to hold something over them. They had come in, all high and mighty, and they held all the chips. Not anymore.
Laura turned to Sam as soon as he had left. "I'm sorry about that. But you have to understand that the original joy my people felt when we made contact has been… dampened quite a lot by recent events."
"I understand." Sam replied. "But if your people aren't going to trust us, then the process of helping them is going to be a hell of a lot harder then I'd hoped."
Laura sighed. "Exactly, we don't need this. I'm going to talk with Admiral Adama now to see how preparations for our return are coming along, ad I think Gaius Baltar wanted to talk to you about ways of upgrading the ships of the fleet once they are back to Atlantis, so they have a better chance against the Wraith."
"I'm not sure I can do that until official negotiations get underway on Atlantis…"
"One of our ships was destroyed and we lost a lot of good people, because of your plan. I think you can understand why we would want ship upgrades if being around you comes with such risks."
Sam looked at Roslin. "…Are you trying to blackmail me Madam President? After we saved your life?"
"Now Colonel, you know that I'm very grateful for what Commander Thor did for me, but all that you and your people have done so far is left us with a load of debris and dead bodies."
"We saved you when the Wraith attacked your fleet… And we are giving you haven in Atlantis." Carter was quite shocked by the way the President was acting, putting it down to anger over the loss of one of her ships.
"Unless I'm mistaken, you didn't lose dozens of people in the process, and there is no guarantee that we will be given sanctuary in Atlantis yet."
The two women stared each other down for a short time, before Sam spoke. "I'll go and see Gaius Baltar."
"Good." Laura smiled as she spoke. "His lab is close by, I'm sure if you ask someone they'll show you where it is."
"Fine." Sam said as she turned and began to walk towards the door. As she left, she mumbled quietly to herself. "Don't expect much though…"
Unknown Wraith Facility
The Wraith branded 'Todd' by John Sheppard stood on a small balcony at the top of one of the biggest Wraith facilities under his control. He stared out over the landscape before him, amazing reds and oranges illuminating the desert, the massive sun sitting on the horizon. He looked down, seeing hundreds of thousands of clone soldiers marching towards their designated Hive Ships, ships which were in the process of being brought online. There was already a fleet in orbit, Todd felt confident that his new armada wouldn't be susceptible to a sneak attack.
He turned and walked back into his private quarters, thinking about how he got to this point. How hard it had been to take power without a Queen, and then how easy it had been to unite the remainder of the Wraith once he had achieved his status. He hadn't wanted it to come to this. He had tried to work with the expedition to find a substitute food source, but it wasn't to be. His species were unwilling to take Michael's advanced retrovirus, or anything like it. For Todd, it was either the majority of the Wraith changed, or none of them did. His people had spoken. And now, the only way to clench their hunger was to take Earth. He had resigned himself to that fact… and he had decided that he was going to enjoy himself doing it.
Battlestar Galactica
Carter had been looking for Baltar's lab for a few minutes, but was having trouble finding it. She had asked a few people, but their reactions had been… strange. She got the feeling that there were quite a few people on the ship that weren't keen on Baltar. The people had seemed keen to talk to her until they found out where she was going.
She'd found herself in quite a quiet part of the deck, there was no one else around. Finally, she bumped into a Colonial soldier. "Thank god. I need help. I'm looking for Gaius Baltar's lab; Laura Roslin said it was…"
"You from Earth?" The soldier asked, cutting her off.
Sam wasn't sure where this was going. "Yes… I am. Can you help me?"
Without warning, the soldier pulled his gun on Sam, and pointed it at her chest. "You know, my family were on that ship." He stalked towards her, causing her to step back. "My wife… My kid. They won't tell me if they're alive or not…"
"Please, put down the gun." Sam tried to reason with him. She held her hands in the air either side of her and tried to calm the soldier down, but it wasn't working.
"It's weird, because they're telling everyone else if there relatives are alive… So… Why won't they tell me?" The man prepared to shoot, and Carter asked him calmly once again to put the gun down. He still refused to listen, and spoke over Carter before she could finish talking. "They won't tell me, because they're dead."
With that, the soldier pulled the trigger, sending a bullet into Carter's chest at close range. She fell backwards, clutching at her chest and breathing heavily. The soldier stood over her, and aimed the gun directly at her head. Tears streaked down her face as the pain flowed over her; she felt both agony and numbness as she stared down the barrel of the broken man's firearm. "I want you to remember my face…" With that, another shot rang out.
