17 Years before cylon attack
William Adama age 48
Location: Aquaria Regional Space Extreme Range – Colonial Raptor 312
"Drone launched." William powered down the Raptor and released the straps that held him in the pilot's seat. He squeezed his way into the rear of the craft, bent down to pick up the gear that had been set aside for him, and pulled a combat vest on over his flight suit. The heavy weight of it on his shoulders brought on a sense of finality, succeed or fail, there would be no going back from the course he had chosen. He picked up an SA-80 assault rifle and gave the rest of his reassembled team a quick once over.
Danny sat in the back of the Raptor with his arms resting across his knees and he rolled his lucky cubit between his fingers. He was in full marine gear over his flight suit. William couldn't see his expression, but he knew it was as solemn as everyone else's.
Alexa had taken the ECO position. She was absorbed in the dradis screens in front of her so intensely that it looked like she was trying to will their target into existence. She had on the lightest combat vest that offered any protection, but the mobility she gained from the lighter gear would be negated by the full pack of G-4 at her feet.
Saul was the copilot for this mission and he was outfitted similarly to Danny. He didn't seem particularly anxious, which was expected, more importantly he was sober and that was all that really counted in his case.
"Now we wait," said William. Fully geared up and ready, he returned to the pilot's seat.
-x-
"To the Colonial Fleet." There was the clink of glasses and Saul bolted down his drink without delay. William only sipped at his and kept half of his attention on the other patrons of Morrigan's. The bar was the perfect place for what William had in mind and their table in the back corner was nice and secluded. The dull roar of everyone's voices would drown out any stray sound from their table. The low light and smoky atmosphere kept anyone from Spec Ops' Internal Security Division who might be watching from seeing too much.
"I'll admit," said Saul, "I never thought you'd do it. But look at us now, back in the Fleet, back in Vipers and posted to Atlantia, can't get much better than that." He reached for the whiskey bottle and poured himself another glass.
"Nope, can't get much better." Their assignment to Atlantia had been another of President Kearney's favors, but William didn't tell his friend that, nor had he mentioned specifically how he'd gotten enough pull to get Tigh reinstated in the first place. He had said only that a few people had owed him favors.
"Shame I'll be flying Raptors for the most part now," sighed William.
"Piss off Commander Rhyder that much did you?"
"Had a bad landing, busted myself up pretty good." William finished off his drink while Saul worked on his third. "Raptors were the only way for me to stay in the service and keep flying."
"Frak. I'm not taking orders from a CAG that flies Raptors," he said into his glass.
"You'll take orders from me and you'll frakking like it," replied William. A smile stretched across Saul's face that reached the corners of his eyes.
"Aye, sir."
They chuckled and downed another drink apiece, but William's good humor subsided quickly. When his friend went to pour himself yet another drink, William reached over and stopped him.
"Saul, I have to ask you for a favor." He hesitated and scanned the crowd; no one was paying any attention to them. "I want your help on a mission, off log. There's a rogue ship. I lost two of my pilots to it."
"And you wanna take the bastards out, is that it?"
"Yeah, I do."
"I'm in."
"It's gonna be dangerous."
"Always is, Bill." Saul pounded back another drink. "I'm in just the same."
-x-
William adjusted his position in his seat in an attempt to get comfortable. There was a flash of pain in his right leg that reminded him of the weeks he had spent relearning how to walk after the cast had come off. He shifted position again and felt the bottom of his combat vest press into his thigh. It momentarily brushed against the lighter in the pocket of his flight suit. Going to need all the luck we can get this time.
He absently tried to feel his wedding band through the glove of his left hand, but then he remembered that it wasn't there anymore.
-x-
When William looked at the clock last it had been 0330. Over the course of the night he had consulted the clock on the wall across from the couch probably a dozen times and every half hour or so he settled back into the leather cushions of the couch and closed his eyes, but the house was too quiet. There were no echoes of people passing by in corridors outside, no hum and vibration of ship's engines to distract and lull him to sleep. Alone, in the dark, he felt like he was falling. When he tried to shake the feeling off and rolled over onto his side a twinge of discomfort in his shoulder brought back the memory of the crash, the alarm, the roaring wind, hard dirt, and a suffocating shortness of breath—
William sat up. He ran his hand over the left side of his chest. He couldn't feel it through the fabric of his shirt, but he knew the thin scar on his shoulder was there, a reminder of confusion and pain and grief. "There is no victory without sacrifice."
A few seconds later and he still couldn't quite breathe. The air felt heavy in his lungs. It was laden down with accusations and denials and tension from the argument he'd had with Carolanne earlier in the evening.
You miss everything she'd said. Ever since the Zopyros and the crash it was more than the day to day trivialities. It was her birthday. He had forgotten it. Then Lee's Pyramid tryouts. He had been at Morrigan's with Saul. Then it was their tenth anniversary. Rioting on Aerelon had called him back to Atlantia. He didn't make it back home in time. He couldn't remember the rest of the fight. It was all just a rehashing of everything they had argued over for the past ten years, nothing new. Nothing new except that this time when he demanded to know what she wanted from him she told him; I want a divorce.
Those words had hit him like a slap in the face. He had simply turned away and walked out, went outside for a walk and tried make sense of it. He couldn't. By the time he got back Carolanne had put the boys to bed and had gone to bed herself. He had resigned himself to the couch.
Carolanne's demand still echoed in his ears. "I want a divorce."
William stood up and then headed for the bedroom. He walked down the narrow hallway, past his sons' rooms and stopped outside the bedroom door. He eased the door open and slipped inside. Carolanne was asleep in the middle of the bed, cocooned in the blankets, oblivious to everything around her. At least these days he could navigate better.
He strode past the end of the bed to the closet. He packed his uniform and a few personal items away with quiet efficiency; anything he left behind could be dealt with later. With the duffel bag slung over his shoulder he headed for the door, but then, with his hand on the doorknob, William glanced back over his shoulder. He wanted to kiss her good bye. He wanted to tell her that he just didn't want to fight anymore. But he knew he couldn't do that. She would wake up. She would insist that she hadn't meant what she said, he would say he was sorry and in a couple of weeks, or a month, or six months, they'd do it all over again. If he didn't leave now, then he'd leave next year or the year after that.
Instead of kissing her good bye William took off his ring and left it on the corner of the night table. Then he left.
-x-
"Dradis contact! CBDR, bearing zero nine seven, carom two seven one." William straightened up in his seat and consulted his dradis readout. "Signatures match, it's Zopyros," confirmed Alexa.
William's hands hovered over the flight controls. Hopefully the decoy drone would keep the Zopyros from detecting the Raptor just long enough. He tore his eyes away from the screen as the stars outside the canopy were blotted out and the bow of the Zopyros' hull slid overhead. There was a flash from one of the ships' guns and the decoy was gone, but it didn't matter, their inside intel had been good, Zopyros had appeared as scheduled and she'd taken the bait.
William powered up just long enough to fire the RCS thrusters and executed a roll to line up with the lower port side of Zopyros' hull. He brought the Raptor in near one of the airlocks. Within seconds the small vehicle had latched onto the larger frigate like a parasite.
"We have soft seal," said William. "Break out the torch." Everyone that was strapped in unsecured themselves and double checked their gear while Danny unsealed the floor hatch and went to work.
-x-
"…Another month before we can all get leave, but we should be ready by then if the rest of the team comes through," said William. He scanned the crowd of the Morrigan's for a familiar face, but he couldn't see much of anything through the smoke of cheap Foliole cigars that hung in the air and erased anyone from view that wasn't within a few meters.
"That's a big if," Saul replied. He knocked back a glass of Caprican Silver and poured himself another.
"They'll come through," said Danny. He shuffled a deck of Triad cards in his hands. Then he reshuffled them and kept doing so while they waited.
William had to admit that the three of them being stationed on Atlantia carried a number of advantages, including coinciding leave that no one would think was particularly unusual. Barring major complications between now and another month or so, there was a chance that they could actually pull this mission off and no one in the Spec Ops division would know they were behind it. If complications did arise, if they were discovered to be conducting rogue operations, they'd be immediately stripped of their rank, anyone who knew them would be subject to interrogation, and if they weren't summarily executed they would be left to rot in a penal colony. Knowing our luck it would be some hole on Sagittaron and we'd be dead inside of a week anyway.
He kept an eye on the crowd and for a while there were only the usual patrons, freighter crewmembers at the tables playing Triad, Merchant Fleet deckhands whose faces were marred by perpetual masks of grime gathered around the tables, Tylium miners that spent their time at the bar coughing in between rounds of drinks. Then he saw her; Alexa, dressed in green fatigue pants and a black t-shirt with her dark hair in a short ponytail. She drifted toward the bar, just on the edge of their field of view.
Danny got up from his chair and headed toward her while she was in the middle of ordering a drink. When she saw him, Alexa smiled and hugged him and they chatted, all to give the impression that they were merely two friends who hadn't seen each other in years. William smiled as he watched them. It was a shame that she was only acting affable. William knew that Danny wasn't. The lieutenant had genuinely missed her. I suppose I do too.
After a few minutes, Danny led her to the table where William and Saul waited.
"Fancy running into you all here, sir," she said. She set down her glass of Virgon Vodka Red and took the vacant seat across from Saul. William smiled and nodded.
"Quite the coincidence," he replied. As soon as everyone had settled in William examined the room once more and they proceeded in their planning session.
"Our Shadow wasn't able to get us any security codes," Alexa began. "They change them every few days, but we have this…" Alexa retrieved a deck of Triad cards from her pocket and laid several of them out in the center of the table. She shifted a few of them around and then lined them up in a large octagon. Individually the color markings that traced the edges of the cards were all wrong, but together it amounted to a ship's schematic.
"Clever bastard," mumbled Tigh.
"Yeah," replied William. It helps to have an inside man.
William examined the layout while the rest of them posited strategies on how to destroy the ship. The CIC was in the center of the frigate as expected, access to the magazines and engine room would be near impossible. The ship's external defenses would make successful delivery of any ship-to-ship nuclear missile to the engines unlikely, even if they could get close enough without a radiological alarm going off. Zopyros had stood up to a battlestar-of-the-line and they couldn't get access to a nuke anyway, the most Adama would be able to muster off log would be a Raptor and some combat gear.
"Aux DC," interrupted William. "We can cut through, vent as much as we can, at least everything up to frame thirty seven. Once we have the core, it's all ours. I can get the equipment. We just need a contact point."
"I can relay a request," said Alexa.
"I hate to be the pessimist here," said Tigh, "but you're still talking about fighting through at least two, maybe three chokepoints, against a crew of a few hundred or more. You're pilots, not Marines."
"We can handle it," replied William. He took Danny's deck of cards from him and pulled out a pen. He marked the edges of several and altered a few of the symbols in the centers. It amounted to a request for mission status and a rendezvous point approximately a month from the present. He traded decks with Alexa. "We're going. First chance we get."
Alexa and Danny both nodded. Saul didn't seem as sure.
"What?" asked William.
"Bill, this isn't just dangerous, you're talking suicide mission—"
"Our captain says go, we go." Alexa glared at Saul. "He says this is the plan then we execute the plan."
"It's major now," corrected Danny. "But, in any case, we're in it to the end." Their shared expressions said it better than words ever could. They were prepared to follow William, wherever he led them, even if it was to their deaths. Alexa looked to him and he acknowledged her with a slight nod. No going back now. She got up from the table and within seconds she had disappeared into the smoke haze. I hope this isn't a mistake.
Saul raised an eyebrow and looked over at his friend.
"Just what is it about you that turns the people who follow you into suicidal maniacs?" he asked with a hint of a smile.
William poured himself a glass of Saul's rum and drank it down.
"Just lucky I guess."
-x-
Danny set aside his cutting torch and waited for the glowing metal to cool.
"We're through," he said. He pulled out a final section of hull plating and stepped aside.
"We don't stop moving, we get to our target, we take over and we get out of this alive," said Adama. He glanced over at Saul. "We all get out of this alive."
William climbed through the hole and the layers of hull plating. The freshest of the cut edges were still warm through his gloves. He tried to make as little sound as possible when he crawled out onto the deck. He brought up his rifle immediately and scanned both sides of the corridor. They were narrower than on a battlestar and not as well lit, most of the lights were broken or flickering, but it was clear of personnel. The rest of his team made it onto the ship within seconds.
His heart strained against the inside of his chest. The only thing he could hear in the confines of his helmet was his rapid breathing and that of his team. They followed him down the corridor toward the aft section of the Zopyros. In the flickering light he thought he saw movement at one of the corridor junctions. William motioned for them to pick up the pace. No sooner had they crossed the junction than the ship-wide alarm sounded.
"Time to run," snapped Adama. They gave up all attempts at stealth and pressed forward. From that point on everything was a blur. He swept his rifle across his line of sight with every change of cover, every junction passed, every stretch of corridor that they made it through. Another ten meters and they encountered the first signs of resistance.
The crew was unprotected, just dressed in green fatigues and carrying sidearms. William sighted one of them and his finger squeezed the trigger before the crewman could bring his sidearm to bear. There was a flash and a burst of sound from his rifle. Training took over then and his responses were as quick as his reflexes allowed.
Use support beams for partial cover.
Aim for the chest.
Fire in bursts.
Advance.
Suppressive fire.
Cover the left flank.
Never stop moving.
Advance.
Establish crossfire.
Shoot to kill.
Cover the rear.
Advance.
A sealed hatch stalled them. Alexa scrambled to set a G-4 charge set while the rest of them defended the position. Marine units had finally responded. They were wasting bullets to keep them at bay.
"Hurry it up godsdammit!"
"They're gonna pin us down! Come on!"
William felt a sharp pain on the left side of his torso. His combat vest had stopped a bullet from tearing through him. He glanced over to Saul's position beside him in the corridor. He'd been hit twice already, both shots to the center of his vest. They had to be more careful, one hole in their suits and they'd never make it through the vented corridors when the time came.
"Fire in the hole!"
Danny was the first one through the hatch. The rest peeled off and followed. Saul was the last one through. He had tossed a grenade behind him to disrupt pursuit and closed the hatch.
They pressed forward. Up one deck. Straight toward the auxiliary Damage Control station.
Three more hatches. Three more fire fights. Dozens killed, but Adama and his team were still intact when they made it to DC station.
Alexa and Danny got inside and went about venting as many compartments as they could.
William and Saul defended the perimeter.
They were in a bad position, defending a junction from three directions and ammo was finally getting scarce. Saul covered the left flank while William stepped out of cover and took down two more in the center corridor.
"Watch right!" shouted Saul.
William turned to confront another of the crew, but when he squeezed the trigger of his rifle nothing happened. No ammo. Frak. Three rounds hit him square in the chest. His vest stopped them all, but he still dropped to one knee in pain. Saul gunned the Marine down before the officer could readjust his aim.
William pulled out his sidearm and advanced far enough to retrieve the fallen Marine's rifle. By the time he had returned to his position Danny had moved up to defend the junction. Alexa had reappeared as well.
"We're clear!" snapped Tigh. "Let's move!"
They progressed to the port side and reached the vented compartments.
"Suit check," called Adama. "Pressure green."
"Green," they confirmed one by one.
William nodded to Alexa and she blew the hatch lock. They went forward, frame by frame, without resistance other than the occasional zero-pressure sealed hatch. When they moved starboard, back into the pressurized interior, they found that there was nothing in their way to CIC. The shipboard alarm had been silenced, the corridors were empty, the hatches left open. They pressed together in a consolidated three hundred sixty degree formation and moved through the final stretch slowly.
William blinked sweat out of his eyes and kept scanning the area ahead, but there was no one, no surprise ambush. Every step forward was done so with care, but nothing untoward happened. He heard nothing except his own breathing and the movements of his fellow team members.
They stopped outside the hatch to CIC. Everything was quiet. They shifted positions with Danny covering the rear while William and Alexa took point. Saul wrapped a gloved hand around the hatch handle and waited for the okay to move.
"Let's do this," whispered Adama. He nodded toward Saul. Tigh wrenched the hatch open and they piled through.
CIC was empty, except for two of the crew in the center of the room. One of them wore a Colonial uniform, dyed black with gold piping. He bore no other signs of insignia or rank. His graying hair was cropped neatly and his deep set blue eyes focused immediately on William. In his right hand he held a standard issue Colonial pistol and his left arm was slung across the neck of the other crewman, Adama's inside man: Xander.
Xander's expression was distorted in pain, and he had one hand pressed tightly against his side. There was a dark stain on his fatigues beneath his hand; blood.
Alexa and Danny tried to get past their leader, but Saul caught them both by the back of their combat vests and kept them from interfering.
William crept forward until he was within a few meters of the man who he assumed to be the Captain of the Zopyros.
"Tread carefully Major Adama," said the Captain in a measured baritone. William froze. "Yes, I know exactly who you are. It's an advantage of knowing your destiny, and accepting it. You and your team got this far because I let you. You've had your bloodletting now, there's no one left, so let us talk like reasonable men. Do you believe in destiny Major?"
"No," he replied and raised his rifle to line up with the Captain's head. "Why don't you let him go before I put a bullet through your skull?"
"You can't fight destiny, Adama," he began. "It catches up with you, no matter what you do." He adjusted his grip on Xander and moved the former pilot into Adama's line of sight. "I'll offer you a piece of advice," he continued, "when you finally have a battlestar of your own, know the name of every man and woman who serves with you. Know who they really are. Because if you don't, you will never stop the soldier that will be standing in your CIC one day, with a gun to your head."
Xander coughed and struggled. His knees had buckled and he was starting to suffocate. The Captain glanced down at him a moment and then released him. Xander collapsed to floor, gasping for breath.
"You have been accused of piracy, unlawful engagement of a Colonial Fleet vessel and murder of two pilots of the Fleet, among other crimes," said William. He stepped closer despite the fact that now the Captain's sidearm was trained on him. "Under the articles of Colonization the punishment for these crimes is death. As duly authorized by the President of the Colonies I can carry out that sentence right, frakking, now."
The Captain smiled and straightened his uniform with his free hand.
"You have not seen the size of the beast that will devour us all in order to stop you," he said. "Take your revenge. Sooner or later the day will come when I will have mine." He turned and set his gun down on the command table behind him, then turned back to face Adama.
William took the opening and fired. Three rounds went into the Captain's chest. The man's back hit the edge of the command table before he slid to the floor, dead.
Alexa rushed forward to help Xander.
William set his rifle on the table and collected the Captain's discarded sidearm. Something about this whole thing just wasn't right. The sidearm in his hand looked familiar enough, it was just like the one he had in the holster at his belt, but it was, off, somehow. It was too light. He released the magazine and checked the clip. It was empty. "You and your team got this far because I let you." But why? "It's an advantage of knowing your destiny, and accepting—"
"Orders sir?" asked Danny.
"Bill." William looked up to where Saul stood across the table from him. "What do you want us to do now?" This wasn't right. It didn't add up. But William knew well enough that he was out of his depth. "I don't want it just captured, I want it torn to pieces Major and I want her captain's head." The only thing he knew for certain was that he had a mission to complete and that it had already cost him as much as it was going to cost, he might as well finish it. I'm a good soldier who does as he's told.
"I— Uh, Danny, Alexa, take the rest of the G-four," he said. He set down the empty side arm and shouldered his rifle. "Get to the port maintenance access, set a stage one charge to detonate the primary oxygen lines, stage two on the fuel lines, rendezvous at the Raptor. Saul, help me get Xander up."
"Yes, sir," they said.
Alexa and Danny moved out at a jog to complete their task. William trusted that they would manage without too much trouble.
"All right Xander, let's get you outta here," said Adama. He bent down and helped to lift Xander up. Saul and William carried him between them and moved as quickly they could out of CIC and down a deck to the pressurized corridors that led straight back to the Raptor.
The corridors were clear the whole way back, but Xander's condition had worsened. His breath came in shallow bursts or bouts of coughing and it was strained, like he couldn't get enough air. He was pale and sweating and he had slipped in and out of consciousness twice by the time they got him into the Raptor.
Alexa and Danny weren't back yet.
Saul and William lowered Xander onto the floor in the tail end of the Raptor. Saul dragged the medkit over and opened it, then he went up front to prep for launch and their jump back to Aquaria's controlled space.
William knelt down beside Xander and examined him. The bullet had entered through his left side, just under his ribs and had probably traveled inward far enough to puncture a lung or clip a vein, it didn't really matter, there wasn't much that William could do other than try to seal the wound with gauze and tape.
"You just hang in there," said William. "I'll have you patched up in no time."
Xander convulsed in agony at the slightest touch so William gave him a shot of morpha to ease the pain and tried his best to seal off most of the hole, but one look into the young man's eyes told him that Xander already knew what Adama was unwilling to accept.
"I—I never—" Xander was wracked by another bout of coughing and blood started to come up. It covered his mouth in a red froth. "Never, told Nia—that I—"
William stopped him with a gentle pat on the shoulder and tried to muster a smile.
"Don't you go getting all talkative on me," he said. "You can talk all you want fifteen years from now when I'm the one who's—" He swallowed the last word. Dying. William pried off one of his gloves and took Xander's hand in his own. Xander's skin was clammy and his grip was feather light, but William held onto him anyway. "I'm sure Nia knew how much you cared about her. You don't have to worry about that. I'm sure she knew."
"Sir, it's been—an honor, t-to—"
"The honor's mine. You did good. Don't worry," he said around the tightness in his throat and chest. "You did really good." William looked up and glanced at the open floor hatch behind him. Godsdammit where are Alexa and Danny? We have to go.
Xander was overcome by another series of coughs. This time the blood spilled over onto his chin and when his head rolled sideways it ran down the corner of his mouth in a thin river of crimson.
There was no way to get him to a doctor in time and there was no point in letting him suffer. William grabbed with his free hand for the second shot of morpha and fumbled to get a third one out of the second medkit. He did his best to distract Xander while he injected him.
"Everything's gonna be okay now," he said. William gave Xander the third shot. Xander's breathing was finally unhindered by pain and started to slow. "We're gonna take you—we're gonna take you home. You just rest." In another few seconds Xander had stopped breathing altogether. William bent down farther and listened to Xander's chest to be sure. No heartbeat. No sound at all. William reached up and gently closed the young man's eyes. He was gone. "Frak." Frak.
The sound of movement and people clambering through a small space kept William from focusing too long on Xander. Alexa and Danny had come back, both in one piece.
"He okay?" asked Danny toward Xander. Alexa, it seemed, had already figured it out.
"He's dead," she said. There was a brief expression of grief on her face, but then she swallowed and buried it down. "Seal the hatch. We have to get out of here."
Danny hesitated, his eyes still on Xander's corpse.
"Danny! Seal the frakking hatch!"
He finally did as she ordered. No one said anything after that. Alexa discarded her empty backpack and her rifle onto the floor and went up to the cockpit where she strapped into the pilot's seat. William moved to sit with his back against the rear of the vehicle. Saul had been sitting quietly up front, but he motioned for Danny to take his spot in the copilot's chair and joined William in the back of the Raptor.
The soft seal on the Zopyros was broken and they burned at full thrust to get as far away from the ship as possible. The FTL drive was spun up and ready, and the jump was plotted, but they stayed to be sure that the job was done.
Alexa changed their orientation so that the Zopyros was visible through the canopy. Moments later there was a brilliant white flash and one of the frigate's main engines exploded in a short-lived burst of orange fire. The rest of the tail section detonated and the Zopyros was torn apart. It was over.
Saul reached over and put a hand on William's shoulder. It was precious little comfort.
"I'm sorry, Bill," said Saul. He looked up front toward Alexa and Danny. "At least most of us came back. We both know it could have been a lot worse."
William sighed and closed his eyes.
"No," he replied. "This is bad enough."
That ship had cost him three of his pilots. He had gotten embroiled in something that he didn't understand. He knew in that rational part of his mind that revenge couldn't bring Tobias, or Nia, or Xander back. It couldn't fix the mistakes he'd made with his marriage, or his lapses in judgment, or his feelings of having been manipulated. But that knowledge hadn't stopped him in the past, and it didn't stop him the present, it probably wouldn't even stop him in the future, only now he was beginning to realize that the cost wasn't only to himself. I can't afford to keep making these mistakes.
"Let's go home," he said.
"Yes, sir," replied Alexa.
They jumped away.
AN: This part was a very long time in coming for lots of reasons, but it's finally here. Apologies for the delay, thanks for your patience (and thanks in advance for reviewing). Next update won't be until after December because November is National Novel Writing Month and I have a deadline to meet for that :) Hope to see you all on the other side of the jump.