One

Firestorm

As his Viper Mark VII hurtled out of its designated launch tube on the Battlestar Titan's port side, Richard Grayson thought briefly that the sensation must be similar to that of a bullet being fired out of a gun.

Except, of course, that a bullet had no control over its own flight path once it left the barrel. Seized by a sudden, impulsive need to remind either himself or the ship just who was in control here, he fired his reaction control thrusters for the tiniest fraction of a second, just enough for a controlled barrel roll.

Predictably, the CAG's voice immediately squawked in his ear. "Robin! Stay in formation, this is not an exercise!"

"Roger that, Batgirl," he answered back, "Just stretching my wings a little."

"Get your head in the game!" she snapped. "That goes for all of you! This is what you've trained for. I know that most of you are still in training, or recent graduates, but that doesn't matter now. This is the real thing. Intel makes our targets as most likely Cylon Raiders, numbering between ten and twenty, CBDR. None of us were expecting this when we woke up today, but this is what we all signed up for. Trust in your training, trust in your Vipers, and trust in your wingmen, and together, we'll make it through this."

Nice speech, Barbara, Dick thought to himself as he tried to focus his thoughts toward what was coming. Or, rather, empty his mind of unnecessary thought, so that his training and his reflexes would be free to take control when the moment came.

He wasn't worried about himself, or her. Although neither of them had ever seen any actual combat, they'd both been flying for years and were already top-rated pilots, even though they were barely out of their teens. In fact, their exploits in the civilian circuits were quite renowned, and even some of the experienced pilots in the Colonial Fleet had been heard to express admiration for their talents.

"The Commander ordered weapons free," one of the younger rooks said suddenly, reminding Dick – or Robin, as was his callsign when he was in the cockpit – to focus on the here and now. "Does that mean we can basically fire on sight?"

"That's an affirmative, Beast Boy," Lt. West answered smoothly. "If it's a Raider, or a Cylon, period, you are officially authorized to shoot it until it's dead."

"Roger that, Kid Flash," the ensign giggled nervously.

"Just remember to check your targets," Batgirl added, "And try not to hit anything friendly."

"You rooks had better stay clear of my line of fire, while you're at it," another voice threw in.

"That goes for you, too, Speedy," she told him.

"…Acknowledged, CAG," he answered after a brief silence, during which Robin suspected he'd probably cut his mic to keep Barbara from hearing what he'd really wanted to say to her. He smirked at the thought.

"Query … How are we to identify our targets as Cylon?" One of the other rooks, whose name Robin couldn't recall, asked. "After all, there have been no confirmed Cylon sightings for two decades."

Gods, Robin thought, but she had an odd way of speaking. So overly-formal. Where in Hades was she from?

"If they fire on us," Lt. Troy was answering her, "They're Cylons. If they take up a hostile posture or an offensive formation, they're Cylons. If they're not Colonials, they're Cylons. Is that simple enough, Ensign Anders?"

Anders, that was it.

"I … think so, Wonder Girl, thank you," she replied, but still sounded uncertain.

"The old Raiders looked kind of like bats," Robin added, "Or flying wings. They've had time to improve on their fighter designs, just like we have, but they'll probably be recognizably similar. Think of it this way – a Viper Mark VII is a totally different ship than a Mark II, but they still have a similar profile, right?"

"Agreed, that is helpful," she said, sounding a bit more confident now.

"Sorry to interrupt the history lesson, Blue Squadron," Raven's droning voice suddenly cut in, "But the targets should be showing up on your DRADIS within the next few seconds. ETC, four minutes. Also, please take note of the damaged Colonial mining vessel less than a klick from your intercept point, where a search-and-rescue op is currently underway. The miner is drifting dead in space, and may be venting tylium vapor, so you'll probably want to steer clear of it."

"Thanks for the heads-up, Raven," Batgirl told her. "Okay, Vipers, listen up. We're adjusting course to make a wide turn around the miner, then we'll form up on the other side between it and the enemy. Let's give our Raptors some breathing room, so they can finish up and bug out. Follow my lead."

She fired her thrusters, boosting out ahead of the squadron and heading into the wide arc she'd described. Robin was right behind her, and the rest of the wing followed suit. As they drew near the derelict miner, he wondered for a moment if there'd been a note of subtle sarcasm in Raven's mentioning it – light from the nearest star was glaring brightly off the ship's profile side, making it difficult to miss, even with the naked eye. In fact, there was a moment during the pass where he had to use his free hand to shield his eyes from the glare, even through his Viper's tinted canopy. With no atmospheric filtering, it was almost like looking at a star, itself.

They came around and formed up as planned, in position above and beyond the miner. The star's bright glare did have one benefit – it allowed Robin's trained eyes to spot the incoming bogies with relative ease, even though they were still several klicks out. From this distance, they looked like tiny, sparkling bits of shiny tinsel … but moving with a purpose, and in a definite formation.

"Um… how come I'm getting these weird DRADIS readings?" Beast Boy asked.

Robin checked his own scopes. "I'm getting them, too. Whoever they are, they're throwing out one helluva lot of E/M jamming."

"Frak," he heard Batgirl mutter, before she caught herself and switched back to her 'command voice'. "Okay, team, listen up. With this kind of jamming, missile locks will be difficult if not impossible, and potentially hazardous to our own planes. All Vipers are therefore ordered to hold missiles, KEW fire only. I repeat, no missiles, guns only. Understood?"

Whatever groans of dismay this order may have prompted thankfully did not carry over the wireless net.

"But, dude … without DRADIS locks, how are we supposed to hit anything?" Beast Boy again, sounding shaky.

"Mark one eyeball, squirt," Speedy drawled.

"Your Vipers' visual tracking systems will help, too," Robin added, as he activated his own.

And the targets were now approaching close enough to see clearly. The profile was reminiscent of the old Cylon Raiders, in a sense, but also very different. The ships sported curving, forward-swept wings which ended in a sharp, decidedly predatory point. But the primary hulls were far too narrow to accommodate the traditional three-Cylon cockpits of their presumptive predecessors, and the forward section bore an eerie resemblance to the faceplate of a Cylon Centurion.

Robin counted a dozen targets. They hadn't adjusted their course, despite the fact that their present heading would take them right through the Vipers' defensive grid. They were still outside of weapons range, but closing fast, and as he watched, an unmistakable, glowing red light began sweeping back and forth along the bow of each ship, right where a Centurion's traditional 'eye' slit would be.

"Yyeeeah, I'd say they're Cylons," Kid Flash observed.

Suddenly, all of Robin's control panels flickered and winked out.

"Frak me…" he breathed, his eyes widening in horror.

Then it all came back, accompanied by startled exclamations from his wingmates, indicating they'd all experienced the same phenomena.

"—The frak was that?!" Speedy was yelling. "Those godsdamned knuckle-draggers, I'm gonna—"

"Weapons range!!" Batgirl interrupted him. The Cylons were still coming straight in! "All Vipers, fire at will! All Vipers, open fire!!!"

Robin didn't think. He picked a target, and opened up.

Everyone cut loose at once.

As it happened, half of them had picked the same target, that being the centermost Raider. Its hull completely riddled by Colonial bullets, the craft shuddered, pitched forward, and violently exploded.

Unfortunately, in zero gravity, once an object has acquired inertia, it tends to keep it, regardless of whether that object is in one piece, alive or dead. One of the greener rooks learned this the hard way as a large section of the destroyed Raider's fuselage continued on its established course, straight through his Viper's cockpit.

The kid didn't even have a chance to scream.

This all happened in the space of maybe two seconds, during which the surviving Raiders broke formation and peeled outward in every direction, narrowly avoiding the hail of Colonial projectiles aimed at them while Batgirl shouted, "Break! Break! Break!" His instincts taking over, Robin hit his afterburners briefly, then simultaneously fired his forward RCS and jammed his stick to the side; his Viper obediently performed a gut-wrenching (but flawlessly textbook) 180-degree turn and put him at a perfect angle to pursue and engage the nearest Raider. Which he did, of course, quickly closing on the enemy fighter before it could come around to target him.

It was kill or be killed. Ship-to-ship combat in its purest form. He'd never actually experienced it firsthand before, but he'd effectively spent half his life preparing for it. Which was fortunate, considering that the remainder of it would now depend on those preparations.

These thoughts flickered through a segregated partition in the back of his mind. They had no bearing on his situational awareness or his actions, which at the moment were guided purely by instinct and reflexes, those things having been honed by years of training. It was purely mechanical, he noted with irony; the key to battling machines seemed to be in learning to function as a better machine, yourself. He ignored the chaotic wireless chatter from his wingmates, as they all scrambled to engage their targets, and focused his attention on his own.

The Raider he was chasing flipped around to bring its guns to bear against him, but he was ready for it. In the vacuum of space, he couldn't hear the roar of his Viper's wing-mounted guns so much as feel a steady vibration through his cockpit as they spat out forty 30mm rounds per second, Swiss-cheesing the enemy fighter during the brief instant the broad side of its profile was exposed to him. Once he'd successfully negotiated the debris field the exploding craft left behind, he spared a glance down at his DRADIS screen to get a sense of the larger battle.

They'd lost two more Vipers, from the look of things, but the Cylons were down three Raiders, and Batgirl and Speedy were moments away from adding two more kills to that tally. So they were doing reasonably well, especially considering that none of these pilots had ever seen real combat before … although the fight was far from over.

"Uh, can I get a hand, here?!" Beast Boy was in a tight spot; he was dodging and weaving but the Raider on his tail almost had him zeroed.

"Hang on, BB," Robin told him, firing his RCS to angle himself into position and then kicking in his thrusters, quickly matching his target's speed and sliding into position for his shot. A few quick trigger pulls later, the Raider was in pieces and BB's bacon was officially out of the fire.

Just as Robin was starting to think this was almost too easy, the missile lock warning lights on his display panels began flashing wildly. He must've missed one, as he'd focused on helping his wingmate…

"Frak," he muttered, as much to berate himself as anything, and executed another dizzying 180-degree flip, hoping to shoot the missile down before it was too late. But before he could draw a bead on it, it blew apart, having been raked by fire from another passing Viper.

"You can thank me later," Kid Flash told him nonchalantly.

"Titan, this is Raven," Raven announced over her wireless link to the ship, watching the displays on her DRADIS screen converge. "Blue Squadron has engaged the enemy."

"Understood, Raven," Commander Wayne's voice came back after a moment. "Continue to advise. Titan out."

"Yes, sir." She released the 'call' switch and went back to studying her monitors. A minute earlier, the SAR Raptor had reported that they were unable to pick up any life signs from the tanker, and were now on their way back to the Titan. The salvage crew was still evaluating the ship's damage and tylium payload. Due to the tanker's proximity to the battle, she was keeping a close eye on their DRADIS signature, in relation to the others'. Her own Raptor, meanwhile, was holding position roughly an equal distance from both the tanker and the Titan, and was well outside the combat zone.

"Hey, look at this," Tempest, her copilot and Electronic Countermeasures Officer, called from the ship's rear cabin, as he sent a DRADIS image from his station to her screens. "I think I finally found a marker, out at the very edge of extreme sensor range. It's too far away to tell for certain, but if we jumped out there, we might be able to find out how the fight back home is going."

"Has the wireless traffic dropped off?" she asked, her eyes darting back and forth from one DRADIS panel to another.

"Not completely, but…" His voice dropped a level, becoming noticeably more subdued. "…At this point, I am hearing more krypters and distress calls than anything."

"Right … I'll check it." Raven opened her wireless connection to the ship, again. "Titan, Raven. We've detected a possible Colonial marker, at the outer edge of our sensor range. If we jump to that position, we may be able to plot a recon mission back to Colonial space, and gather intel on the situation there. Please advise, over."

"Stand by, Raven," came Commander Wayne's response.

The pause lasted nearly a minute, during which she supposed he was probably discussing the plan with Colonel Gordon. Meanwhile, she continued to monitor the skirmish between their Vipers and the enemy fighters. They'd taken losses, but the battle seemed to be going in their favor, as more than half of the enemy ships had been destroyed.

"It's a nice day for a flight, after all."

She looked over her shoulder at Tempest. "What was that?"

"Huh?" He looked up from his instruments.

"Did you say something?" He shook his head.

Frowning, Raven turned back to her own monitors.

"Raven, this is Titan-Actual. We've been able to restore the ship's main wireless array, so we can now communicate with Blue Squadron on our own. You are therefore cleared for FTL recon. Our primary DRADIS functions are still unreliable, however, so hurry back. Over."

"Understood, Commander. Raven out." She glanced back at Tempest. "Spin up the FTL, let's get this over with."

"Nice shot, BB," Robin told the younger pilot as the Raider they'd been gunning for exploded. Maybe it was his imagination, but it seemed like the things were getting harder to hit the longer the fight dragged on. Like they were actually learning, in real time … he supposed it made as much sense as anything did.

Nevertheless, by this point the outcome was basically assured. Speedy and Batgirl each scrapped another Raider while Robin watched, which only left one more to deal with. And it was…

"Aw, frak, he's making a run for the miner," Kid Flash's voice echoed Robin's own thoughts. "Attention, salvage Raptor! You've got incoming!"

"I will stop him!" Ensign Anders announced, as she blasted off in pursuit.

Robin eased his own Viper into position, ready to kick in his afterburners and assist if it became necessary. That seemed unlikely, though, as the rookie already had a firing solution and was peppering the last surviving Raider with bullets. However…

"Too slow, nugget! He got a missile off!" Speedy snapped as the enemy ship broke apart, its deadly projectile rocketing toward the mining ship and the retreating Raptor. "Salvage crew, you've got an inbound missile! Get outta there!!"

"I will destroy it!" Anders exclaimed as she blew through the Raider's debris field, accelerating to catch up with the missile.

"Negative, Ensign!" Batgirl barked. "It's too close to the miner! The tylium—!"

As Robin realized what was going to happen, time seemed to slow down as his thoughts cascaded, but it was too late. All he could do was watch in horror.

Anders fired a burst at the missile, and managed to score a hit.

The missile exploded, well short of its intended target, and less than fifty meters from the derelict miner.

The tylium vapor, which the damaged vessel had been steadily bleeding into the surrounding area of space, ignited.

The resulting explosion was actually brighter than the nearby star, and left a searing afterimage on Robin's field of vision even after he'd shut his eyes against the sight.

The ensign's startled shriek was cut off abruptly as her Viper's wireless array burned out. Robin thought he glimpsed a particularly bright fireball streaking away from the violently exploding miner, before he looked away. He knew it was probably her.

The force of the explosion scattered the remaining Vipers, but they were far enough away to avoid being roasted alive in the blast. Once they'd managed to right themselves, they simply drifted there for a moment, in stunned silence.

As such, Robin nearly jumped when an unexpected voice suddenly sounded over the wireless channel.

"Titan to Blue Squadron, Titan calling Blue Squadron. This is Herald, requesting status report, over."

"This is Batgirl, Herald," the CAG answered quickly. "All enemy fighters have been neutralized, repeat, all enemy ships destroyed. We lost – um, six Vipers. And, the mining ship was destroyed, also. No further hostile presence detected, awaiting further instructions, over."

Had he not known her as well as he did, Dick doubted he would have ever noticed the nearly inaudible nervous tremor in Barbara's voice.

"Roger, Batgirl. We wondered what caused those chops. We've got wireless functions back up, but our primary DRADIS is still touch and go. If all hostiles have been neutralized, your Vipers are cleared to return to the ship. Be advised, however, we are continuing to maintain Condition One. Over."

"Understood, Titan. Batgirl out." Her tone shifted noticeably as she switched over to addressing the pilots. "You heard the man, Vipers! Mission accomplished, let's return to base!"

Speedy, Beast Boy and several of the other pilots let loose with full-blown cheers.

As for Robin, he released the breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding, and broke into a broad, unrestrained grin.

Raven released the breath she'd held during the Raptor's last jump, and opened her eyes.

"If my calculations were right," Tempest was saying from the rear compartment, "We should be in Tauron space."

"We are," she replied, her voice sounding hollow to her own ears.

She knew that the planet which now filled the view from her cockpit was Tauron. Even though its geographic features and its normal atmosphere were completely obscured by mushroom clouds, from what must have been thousands of nuclear detonations. Even though the atmosphere was now irradiated to a point where it was triggering the Raptor's radiological alarms, even from this range. Even though there was no conceivable possibility that any form of life could survive, at all, in such conditions as this. Still, she knew it was Tauron.

After all, she'd grown up here.

The surrounding space was hardly empty, either. A major battle had clearly taken place here. The planet's orbital field was rife with debris from Colonial ships – several Battlestars floated in pieces, hundreds of Vipers and many civilian vessels all shared what had become a zero-G graveyard. One of the nearest Battlestar's hangar pods drifted close enough for her to read the lettering on it; it was the Battlestar Keystone.

Not only had she never before seen carnage on such a scale, she'd never even imagined a sight such as this.

"All that you know, burns away, into dust."

Slowly, she turned her head toward the voice.

There was a lanky figure lounging in the co-pilot's seat next to her, leaning back with his elbows propped on the armrests, fingers steepled in front of him. He was adorned in an outlandish costume consisting of an antiquated breastplate and gauntlets, the lower half of his face hidden from view by a dark scarf. Piercing, pale blue eyes and an arched eyebrow regarded her from beneath a cascading fountain of brilliant, pure white hair.

He was… he was dressed exactly like a character from one of her favorite fantasy novels. Malchior of Nol. No, it was more than that … he wasn't simply dressed like Malchior; he was Malchior, precisely the way she'd always imagined him. But that was impossible – how could he even exist, let alone be sitting in her Raptor?!

"So many lives," he continued, as she stared at him in disbelief.

"…So many innocent," she finished, still unsure of what was happening.

He chuckled. "Well, that might depend on who you asked."

She kept staring. Was she – was she losing her mind…?

"Let's call me a projection," He said, abruptly leaning forward, as if to answer her unspoken thought. "I've been sent to you as, well, a guide. I'm here to help you, Raven. To help you realize your destiny."

"No…" she whispered, disbelief warring with horror.

She could imagine, if not see, his charming smile beneath the scarf. "You've known this day was coming. You've known it all your life. And now … it has finally begun."

"The Cylons will pay for this…" Tempest growled, his voice choked with emotion.

"He can't see me, of course," Malchior added, nodding in the ECO's direction. "Since I'm not actually here, in the physical sense. But that doesn't mean I'm not real. You and I will be seeing a lot of each other from here on out, I think … my sweet Raven."

She blinked, and his seat was empty. She stared at the empty space for a long moment, even hesitantly reaching over to make sure it was really so.

"…Raven? Raven, are you okay?" Tempest's hand on her shoulder brought her back.

"Um … yeah … I think so, yeah. Sorry."

"Hang in there. We're gonna be okay." He squeezed her shoulder gently, in a gesture of reassurance.

It was such a small thing, so meaningless and unimportant. But she clung to it, with a desperation that surprised her.

"We've gotta get back to the ship, we've gotta tell them what's happened," he said, as he turned to return to his station in the rear compartment. "The spinner should still be hot, I just have to crunch the numbers, then we'll be on our way."

"Right," Raven answered, not really thinking about it.

As his ship rode the mag lift from the flight deck down into the main hangar below, Robin realized his heart was pounding much harder than it had seemed to be during the heat of battle.

He supposed it was only natural that the stress should be catching up to him now, after the most immediate danger had passed. That was the way adrenaline worked, after all. He knew this, had studied it, been told about it over and over in combat training. Still, reading about something in a book, or having some loud-mouthed, sideburn-wearing drill instructor from Aerelon lecture you about it, was a far cry from actually experiencing it firsthand.

Anyway, maybe his heart had always been beating like this, he'd just been too busy to notice it earlier.

The lift came to a halt, and one of the deck hands – a big, burly guy whose name Robin couldn't remember (his jumpsuit's nametag had been ripped loose) – popped his Viper's canopy, reached in and removed his flight helmet, then his flight collar. Free of these things, Robin pulled himself up and out of the cockpit, and was about to clamber down the boarding ladder when the entire deck crew erupted in cheers.

He froze at the unexpected commotion, then took a look around.

The deck gang was cheering them – the pilots. All of whom, like Robin, were in the process of disembarking from their Vipers, and were each reacting to this in their own way. To his left, Beast Boy ran a gloved hand through his spiky, punk-green dye job, grinning nervously. On his right, Kid Flash, having noticed Robin's own reaction, spread his arms wide and started laughing. Behind him, Speedy was standing on the nose of his Viper, pumping his arms and shouting victoriously back at the deck hands, a wild look in his eyes.

Across the deck, Batgirl caught Robin's eye and smiled broadly, and the only thing he could do in response was to smile back, despite himself.

It always did that to him. She had such a beautiful smile.

"Aw-right!!" Chief Petty Officer Stone, the deck gang's senior NCO, bellowed. The man rarely used a megaphone on deck; he didn't need one. "Heard you really took it to 'em, out there, Lieutenant!"

It took Robin a second to realize that he was the one being addressed. "Uh … just doin' our job," he said with a grin as he climbed down the ladder, trying to sound modest. Or at least modest compared to Speedy, which wasn't exactly aiming for the stars. Why was he so nervous? The fighting was over, but he felt like he was still waiting for something else to happen.

A strobe light began flashing across the room, indicating there was another ship coming down the lift.

Stone raised his eyebrows. "Thought you said you lost six birds, L-T?" This was directed at Barbara, as they began walking toward the descending lift. Robin fell in behind them, for lack of anything else to do.

"We did," she replied, looking slightly confused. "Maybe it's Tempest and Raven, back from their recon flight?"

"That looks like a Viper … well, it used to," the Chief corrected himself as the smoldering ship came into view. "Fire units! Let's get this thing hosed down, quick!!"

It was a Viper, all right – or, at least, it had been a Viper. The ship literally looked like it had gone through a deep fryer. The outer skin, which had been burned and blackened almost beyond recognition, was still smoking and continued to burn even as the crew sprayed it down with their handheld extinguishers. The tail numbers had been completely obliterated and couldn't be read. Without the Titan's auto-landing system, it would have been impossible for any pilot to have landed this plane – even the canopy was thoroughly blackened, and partially melted into the fuselage. Chief Stone had to break it open with a fire ax.

Once this was done, and after they'd pulled the pilot free, there was still one more surprise in store.

"I am undamaged!" Ensign Anders announced as they removed her helmet, allowing an impossibly voluminous cascade of brilliant crimson hair to tumble free.

Watching it happen, Robin honestly felt like he was watching a movie. It just didn't seem real. Nobody could survive what he'd just watched happen, let alone fit that much hair inside a standard flight helmet. It just wasn't possible. There was no way.

Then Anders noticed the condition of her Viper, apparently for the first time, and she looked … well, frankly, she looked far more embarrassed than frightened.

"Oops … er, that is, mostly undamaged?" And she giggled.

It was too much. Dick looked at Barbara. She looked back at him.

They simultaneously broke down laughing.

One of the deck hands, Specialist Weathers, produced a mysterious bottle from somewhere and before Robin knew it, it was spraying everywhere, and people were toasting from it, and Beast Boy and Anders and Chief Stone started singing, and he laughed until his sides hurt and he could hardly see.

The last time he'd laughed this hard had been weeks earlier, on Caprica, after the party Bruce had thrown when he and Barbara had made Lieutenant. It was after the guests had all left, and the three of them – Dick, Barbara and Alfred, had been sitting together in the kitchen. And Alfred was telling one of his famous stories, about…

Alfred might be dead, now.

The thought hit Dick so suddenly and so unexpectedly, and it did something to his stomach that no G-forces ever had, in or out of the cockpit.

He sat down abruptly, right there on the deck.

Alfred might be dead. Caprica might be gone. Everyone he'd grown up with, everyone he'd ever known … they might all be ash. Like the outside of Anders' Viper, but all the way through.

"Whoa! You okay, there, Sir?" Chief Stone was looming over him, offering him a hand to help him up. Barbara stood beside him, looking concerned.

"It's … yeah, I'm okay. I'm good." Dick waved the hand away.

"Just … just give me a minute."