Refugees.

The observation room was a cold stark design, bare silver metal walls and floors only broken by a few utilitarian control panels, one by the rooms single door and the other set in the wall next to the window. The figure standing statue still in the rooms centre made a vibrant contrast to its surroundings with its brightly coloured red and gold robes and flamboyant wide collar.

The only sounds were the quite double hum of two small red scanners cycling and the distant sound of the ship itself. Outside was in comparison a hive of activity. A single smaller ship was the focus of a dozen figures, all working feverishly. Flares of glaring light threw distorted shadows as welders blazed inside one of the holds. Its side cut open and racks for fighters installed, other workers jetted about on small manoeuvring thruster packs towing equipment on tethers to where it was needed to be installed. 400 metrons long (1) the irregular hull varied from the arrow shaped cabin/command module at the prow 30 metrons wide and 20 high to the three dome shaped storage holds that made up the bulk of the ships superstructure each 80 metrons wide and 80 metrons high at their thickest cross sections. It was a respectable sized ship poorly armed with its single light laser cannon turret but still capable of moving goods in impressive amounts, it was still dwarfed many times over by the cavernous empty hangar it was moored in.

Watching through the armoured window as the final preparations of the ship were made raised a certain level of apprehension in the watcher. They were nearly ready; soon within the time cycle (2), work would be finished and they'd be on their way. Everything riding on one final flip of the cards as an old friend had liked to say.

A hiss sounded as the door opened and the watcher turned its head slightly to see. Another robed figure, this one dressed in silver and black, entered. For a microcenton (3) the din of the frantic repairs shattered the quite, then the door slid shut cutting it off and returning the silence.

The silver and black figure paused studying its red and gold compatriot before moving silently to stand by its side. Walking with an elegant gliding motion that would've put a lot of professional dancers to shame.

"This course of action is almost sure to end in failure." Speaking with a smooth almost soothing voice the newcomer spared a quick glance at the work going on outside the focused on the main target.

"So you've said, unfortunately we seem to be as out of options as we are resources." Speaking in nearly the same tones but somehow while they first seemed to be trying to sooth this voice held a hint of humour that seemed mock without effort.

"More reason not to waste what little we have left on this fools mission of yours."

"And do what with it, sit here trying to repair this shattered wreck as we run out of power?"

"We will find usable deposits of Tylium or Solium soon. We have discovered numerous trace amounts of both here and in neighbouring systems. It is just a matter of time."

"Time we do not have. This is a risky plan, yes, but doing nothing and just hoping we find what we need is more so. This area is not secure, we have been attacked once already and the damage from that one small battle has nearly finished us off"

A slight rustle of material as the silver and black figure shrugged. "They caught us by surprise the portal itself did nearly as much damage as the fighting. When the scanners are repaired we will see them coming and they will not get off so easily."

" 'We' have been repairing the main sensors for the better part of a yahren (4) with little result I might remind you. Without new components or at least better tools and raw material to build those components with it could be another yahren before it's working at anything like exceptable levels. And the delicacy needed to monitor higher and lower dimensional spaces? The last time they reported to me the repair crew were talking about using salvaged wiring from lighting fixtures to cobble together simple radar for goodness sakes! We'll be lucky if we have real time readings at one light second when they're finished."

"The fighters.."

The gold and red robed being made a rude snorting noise, cutting the other off and turned back to face the window and the ship seen through it. "The patrols, even if they were not so under strength, can not compensate for the command ship's damaged systems and you know it. I wish you would stop bringing this up every time we have this conversation. If we are attacked again by a similar ship, which was by local standards a minor threat a converted freighter with out of date mostly incompatible weapons that were badly installed, we would die"

"That is a needlessly pessimistic view of the situation and 'you' know it. It was pure chance that they opened that portal so close and not something any sane ship commander would try to replicate. I think in any realistic battle scenario our fighters would knock back anything but an overwhelming attack. we seem to have a heavy technological advantage over most of the races populating this area of space."

"Yes and that might mean something if there were more than a few dozen of us left! An overwhelming attack wouldn't exactly need an armada, what do we have on patrol hmm? Eight fighters, eight! that's what!"

"It would be twelve if you weren't taking our best with you on this quest of yours! For that matter the resources used to outfit that freighter could have been used to bring some of the weapon systems back online. If we had the even the light pulsar guns operational we could have destroyed that Pirate ship with a single shot!"

"Most of what is going into the freighter is nothing more than metal, a frame, rebuilding one of the holds into a rough launch bay for the four fighters. Yes a few complex systems as well, but nothing that could have been of real use repairing this ship. Even if we scraped the freighter itself and pulled it apart for spares we couldn't fix a fraction of what needs fixing. Face it, without a huge influx of raw resources and some pretty sophisticated manufacturing machinery we are not getting this ship back in working order and as far as we can discover there is only one place where it might be possible for a group like us, with no credentials or backers to get it."

"But …. But, THEM! Why must we throw ourselves into their affairs again? Why they even exist here in a totally different universe, separated by so many variations that we don't recognise a single other race is a crime against nature and random chance, one that leaves me concerned about a mythical higher being that's out to get us! That's bad enough but to purposely seek them out? To go out of our way to mix in their insipid politics and pathological meddling again feels very much like purposely sticking my head down the projector of a mega pulsar and shouting FIRE! And that is not a good feeling!"

"You're being wildly over dramatic, yes their presence here was an unwelcome surprise, but it can also be an advantage if we are careful. We have dealt with them before after all. That experience can only help us, we can predict how they will respond to us to a certain extent, tailor our actions so to speak."

"There must be other options, the mind probe of the captured raiders who attacked us shows a complex system of allied or at least not out right warring civilisations. Surely one of those would do just as well."

"You studied the same reports I have, even if the various alien powers are not actively fighting each other, most are armed as if they expect to be at any moment and they take xenophobia to extremes. This diplomatic station is our best bet."

"The Mind Probe is notorious for some of the unreliable information it can produce on occasion and that was with a race we'd had hundreds of yahren to study. With these creatures, these Markab and Drazi they are total unknowns, we have no baseline for them at all. For all we know the data we retrieved could have been the most recent episode of their favorite entertainment drama!"

"Don't be ridiculous, the interrogation team know their duties. Everything was cross and double checked long before we saw a scrap of it. We captured over fifty of the things, they had plenty of material to work with."

"Babylon 5!" Despite the smooth modulation of the voice the distaste was evident. "If you feel the need to comment on the ridiculous Lucifer, perhaps a mention of the meaningless names the humans insists on hanging on their installations?

"oh, felgercarb! Specter your being needlessly argumentative, the others have agreed with the plan, hades! you have agreed with it. We will travel to this neutral station 'Babylon 5' we will open diplomatic relations with this universes powers, including the humans. And we will trade as little as we can get away with for the resources we need to repair this Basestar and get it's manufactory online."

The two IL series Cylon's glared at one another for one long moment before turning away. Even being blown through a wormhole, riding the disintegrating wreck of their Basestar into a alternate universe then scrapping together the handful of survivors to start to rebuild using up what little they had to work with only to be knocked down again by a gang of near primitive idiotic pirates that had opened a jumpgate right on top of their already abused ship. The trials hadn't really dampened the two commander's rivalry, much. Perhaps toning the constant bickering down just enough so that the other Cylon leaders, two Command Centurions and the three lower ranked ILs didn't mutiny and space the both of them.

Outside floating free from the ships artificial gravity, fuel hoses were being disconnected from the reconfigured Type 4 freighter.

(1) Metron = Meter
(2) Time Cycle = Day
(3) Microcenton = Second
(4) Yahren =Year.