Chapter 3 Recon

Across the Conquest fleet the males which were not in hibernation in cold sleep where for the most part asleep themselves. They were following the standard day over their capital of Preffilo back on Home, therefor it was in the middle of the night and the bulk of the males who were out of cold sleep where asleep. The ships where as quiet as a tomb with the only real activity happening on the bridge and in the engine compartment where workers monitored the nuclear pile. It wasn't the middle of the night for the three Akula stealth ships which were approaching the fleet, in fact the entire crew of each ship were at the combat stations, the single Asgard beam weapon on each ship was ready to charge, the rail guns where maned and the missile crews where standing by to fire. Even so the most important members of the crew where the radar and sensor officers on each ship.

Each ship was moving in under cloak so they were invisible not only to the naked eye but to all standard sensors, to the enemy radar they were no there and if anyone was looking out a window they would have seen nothing. The Colonials had developed a way to detect a cloaked Akula class ship using their Dradis system to track any space junk which bounced off the side of the ship, however that was only useful near a planet where junk was around. There was no junk here and with their powerful sensors the Akulas began to get information about the unknown fleet.

"They are moving slow and are slowing down in fact." reported the radar operator on the first Akula. In truth it wasn't radar but advanced Asgard and Ancient sensors but the name stuck. "Judging from their path I think they are going to make a turn toward Earth."

"I see, how many ships estimates was 500 ships." inquired the Captain

"Close, 514 ships." said the radar man with a shake of the head. "Most of them are uniform in size, yes there are a few smaller ones but most are all around the same size. Anyone looking at the data should have known this wasn't a group of asteroids."

"The computer system, read them as asteroids because of their slow speed and in a standard long distance scan the computer likely only did a count of the contact not their actual size." Stated the second radar man, who was in fact a woman. "The real issue is that we didn't send someone out to check these out sooner or at least used a more detailed focused scan to get a better idea of the make up the asteroid group. Instead we saw that the computer read it as asteroids and we moved on."

"That is a concern for another day, have you learned anything else about them?" inquired the Captain.

"Judging from their flight path, they likely came from this star group here." said navigation as she pulled up a holographic map. "At the speed, they are going they must have been at it for a very long time, 35 years or so."

"Alright mark down the location and make sure it is sent to Earth, we will likely be paying them a visit, how long would it take us to reach there?" inquired the Captain.

"Around 7 hours at our standard speed if we pushed the engines we could cut that about in half." answered Navigation

"Any weapons?" inquired the Captain.

"I have a few missile launchers along some of the ships but overall no." answered tactical "I also am getting no shields of any kind or visible ways to protect a shield. Also no sign of beam technology in either weapons or transport kind. No sign of even of even artificial gravity."

"I see." stated the Captain as she ran her hand under her chin as some of the worry left her face. The threat was still there but they weren't dealing with something that couldn't be a huge threat to the Earth. With no shields, their slow speed and only a handful of missiles, the three Akulas under her command could destroy the entire fleet without much in the way of trouble. If they allowed them to get closer and within range of the defense stations and the rest of the 1st fleet it would be like shooting fish in a barrel.

"Any idea who they are and why they are here?" inquired the Captain.

"We are getting some of their radio broadcasts but…" said the communication officer as he flipped the switch on the control panel. At once a series of pops, hisses and what sounded like steam coming out of a tea pot came out of the speakers. "I am running it through the translator program but we could use some help. We don't really have a context for whatever they are saying."

"Solution?" inquired the Captain, she was a native of Lanagara but she was as much Tau'ri as everyone else and she was grateful that the soon to be vice president of the Tau'ri was from her world.

"Best solution is to get into their computer system, we can download everything and that would speed the whole process of translation up." Said the communication.

"Problem is they don't even have Wifi or anything like that on their ships. It is all hard-wired in." added tactical "Without that we can't remotely access their computer network with any real ease. So an actual hard interface would be needed."

"What are conditions like on the ships?" inquired the captain

"Hot, average temperature 28 degrees Celsius or 84 degrees Fahrenheit." reported the sensor officer, as the Captain took in both system of measurements. In the back of her mind she knew that was one of the issues still facing the Tau'ri most nations had used Celsius and the metric system for so long with only a handful of nations notably the US using Fahrenheit and their own measuring standard system. The Americans where still getting used to the new system and integrating everything takes time and would still be going on for a while into the future.

"We have a language in hisses and pops and a very warm climate." stated the Captain as she thought about it. "My bet is that we are dealing with some kind of reptilian race."

"Great, I hate lizards." said another one of her officers

"Either way, we need more information has the life sign detector to determine how many of them we are dealing with?" inquired the Captain.

"Not with any real detail, there are a few thousand for sure moving around the ship but judging from where all their power from their nuclear reactors are going they have a lot more in cryo-sleep." answered sensors.

"So we have gained some information but we need more." said tactical officer "We need to send in someone to get more information."

"Alright, send everything to Earth we will let them decide what we will do." stated the Captain as the three Akula class ships moved around and gathered information about the coming threat. The ships spread out, two to either side of the fleet with the third moving above the fleet. Using their engines, they were able to keep up with the fleet with some ease. All the while broadcasting their information back to Earth.

That information was sent straight into a large conference room under the Military command center, there an emergence meeting was underway. Multiple top-level military members, along with some scientist and researchers from other departments and members of the Tau'ri congress gathered for the meeting. If need be from here they had a direct link to home system command located deep underground outside of Istanbul and with the SGC located on the moon, from there more military and civilian advisors could be teleconferenced in. They also had links with the Presidential estate and other key locations however for the moment soon to be President Samantha Carter was sitting in the room with some of the highest ranking military personal in the world.

The room itself was rather simple with a large table, which was capable of projecting holograms which could be moved by hand. Multiple flat screen monitors some as large as a full-grown man covered the side walls allowing for either more displays to be put up or in this case teleconference with other high-ranking officers. All of them where currently dark since everyone who was really needed aside from the 1st fleet commander Admiral Harrison was already in the room. The fleet Admiral was onboard the flagship of the 1st fleet the battleship HMS Prince of Wales which was moving toward the Pluto defense line. Even so he could appear in the form of a hologram around the table.

"How could 500 plus ships moving so slow get so close to Earth?" inquired a member of the Senate

"The fact that they are moving so slow is why they were able to get so close." Said a Colonel in engineering. "The defense stations and long-range scanners are all designed to alert us to two main things, first ships traveling in hyperspace and other known forms of FTL and anything that is within a 50 thousand kilometers of the orbit of Pluto

"Still 500 ships?" inquired the Senator

"514." Corrected Intelligence

"Space is full of rocks and other natural bodies we can't track them all and if they aren't heading into the system or moving in an unnatural path the system doesn't alert the operator of them. It was only when these ships began to slow down that the system picked them up." Stated the Colonel

"How long until they enter our defense line range?" inquired Carter, she sat at the head of the table, with her soon to be Vice President Jonas Quinn beside her. She had been elected in a huge landside which wasn't even close, considering only a handful of other candidates ran against her none of them as famous as her. She won easy and now found herself in a position she didn't want but in a position where she would do the most good for the Tau'ri. "How they got so close can wait until we are clear of the threat."

"At the rate, they are going 3 days and it will take them another 45 days to Mars." stated the Colonel "They are moving very slowly by our standards."

"Recon?" inquired Carter as she turned toward a navy officer in the uniform which in the past would have marked him as being a submariner but now marked him as a member of the Akula stealth ships force.

"I have three Akula ships on the edge of their fleet, we are still gathering information but judging from what we have discovered so far, they are lightly armed at least on the outside and they are likely reptilian in nature." explained the Navy officer

"How do you know that?" inquired General Leong

"Judging from the temperature inside the ships which is very warm and the sound of hissing and pops on their radio broadcasts we believe that reptilian in nature is the most likely answer." answered the Navy officer, as General Leong nodded her head.

"Numbers of people we are dealing with?" inquired General Leong, the answer came from the head of the table.

"If they are moving that slow, they would need a cryo-sleep system to keep a large population alive, that would make it hard to figure out how many are actual there." advised Carter, she wasn't a true Politician. She had spent a lifetime in the military where she had become a hero to the people. When the people of the Tau'ri decided to have a true president elected by the people only two real options for the 1st president was possible, General O'Neill and General Carter. General O'Neill was up in age and had decided to retire from public life and was currently spend his days fishing and drinking beer outside his cabin. That left General Carter who didn't want the job but had taken up the role anyhow. "So this is likely one of three things, either it is a colonization fleet, a refugee fleet or a conquest fleet from a civilization that hasn't developed faster than light travel and don't have the Startgate. What weapons have we detected on the ships?"

"No shields, no energy weapons of any kind have been detected not even artificial gravity. The power source as far as we can tell comes from nuclear reactors and aside from some missile tubes we have spotted no clear sign of weapons." explained the Akula officer "However a nuclear tipped missile can still cause enough damage. We need more information is to get into their computer system and the only way to do that is to get on their ships."

"Can you do it without getting detected?" inquired soon to be Vice President Jonas Quinn "They are getting rather close to our system but I would rather not lose the element of surprise."

"We believe so, they haven't seam to detect our forces yet but we are moving ships into position to respond to any movement and with your permission madam president we will send alert orders to our other fleets and put our forces on Alert condition 4, with our outer defense stations on Alert condition 3. We also believe we know where they came from, a system about 7 hours away from us."

"What does the Asgard data core say about the system?" inquired another advisor

"Not much, only a general outline of the system. There was no stargate there either so we are almost totally blind about that system." explained the Navy officer.

"That will need to change, send an Akula class ship there to see what it is like. We have assumed that since the Asgard and Ancient data cores didn't mention a threat that there was none. We can't assume that anymore." stated Sam let out a breath and looked toward General Loeng. "I want plans drawn up to start a mapping operation of every system within our territory, We can't defend ourselves without us knowing what is out there. I also want official guidelines drawn up on how to make contact with space born civilization who have not developed faster than light travel or the Stargate."

"At once." Said a policy maker

"That may stress our fleet thin." Stated the Navy Admiral "But we can do it, how soon do you want it?"

"This is a long-term operation, we can't map every star system in 20% of the galaxy in a couple of days." explained Carter "No, start with the systems around Earth, Vahalla and Lanagara and work our way out from there. In fact why don't we see about talking with some of the other powers in the galaxy to see if they will allow us to map out their territory as well."

"Provided we give them the maps as well, most are likely to accept that." stated a high level diplomatic advisor.

"Alright, we will worry about that later." Said Carter "First we need more information on whatever is heading our way. General Leong, you are go on board the ship, no contact until we know what we are really dealing with."

"Yes, Ma'am." said General Leong

Far away from Earth, unaware of the situation going on back there, Colonel Jack O'Neill Jr, the Asgard clone of now retired General Jack O'Neill moved down a street with his rifle cradled in his hands. He moved around the crowed market street with his eyes scanning the crowds for any sign of danger, he wasn't expecting any but he kept an eye out. The street themselves where as wide as any streets on fully colonized world under Tau'ri control, however this wasn't a fully colonized world. The official name of the world in Tau'ri records was TOP-1349 which didn't roll of the tongue, any better than the old name PX-1349.

Aside from the Tau'ri military base and a handful of civilian contractors the world wasn't officially colonized either. Each day traders from multiple worlds which were under Tau'ri space control but not actual control came to trade with each other in a neutral world. These planets where primitive by the Tau'ri standards with most of them at the level of medieval Europe or Asia but they all knew about the stargate. So instead of traders going to multiple different worlds trying to find a single market they came here along with the customers for their goods. Here they would buy, sell and trade in almost everything aside from a handful of items like slavery and other banned items. For the most part, everything was peaceful and people seamed grateful for the Tau'ri protection.

"Excuses me!" yelled a kid about 8 or 9 years old as he ran down the street. Jack studied the kid for a moment, thinking it could possibly be a thief but he quickly pushed that idea out of this mind. The kid wore something that looked like he belonged in a renaissance festival but he carried a bright neon blue backpack. Jack stepped aside as the kid ran down the street, as the school bell went off in the distance. The Tau'ri had set up a free school where children from every world could come and learn.

"I am late, I am late for a very important date." Laughed Jack to himself as he kept moving down the street. As he did he heard street venders call out to him wanting him to sell different things ranging from little gifts to strange food. Jack simply smiled at them and occasional stopped and talked with a shop owner to see if anything was wrong but other than that he kept moving on his patrol. He checked his watched and stopped in at a food vender and picked up something which was a cross between a Mexican and Chinese food. He paid with Tau'ri tender which was happily accepted here and carried on his patrol. Overall the Galaxy had become a very peaceful place at least for the Tau'ri, the Galaxy had seen what the Tau'ri had done to the Colonials and the other powers didn't really want to mess with them because of it.

They had gotten through the normal checkpoints with no issues, the guards watching over the checkpoints had checked their IDs and tickets to make sure they were who they said they were and that they had business at the space port. With that done they moved into the port and headed toward the actual space part of the space port. The air/space port was set up in a Y shape, with one side hosting the normal airliners for travel on Libran itself. While the other side contained the larger ships capable of traveling between the stars.

"This is so cool." Said a young boy who was almost 5 years younger than his older sister who was sitting by the window waiting for the craft to be ready to take them on. The ship was painted blue and white and sat in a long narrow bay with multiple restraints holding it in place. The 15-year-old boy had been far too young to take part in the war outside of viewing it on TV and this his first trip off world and his excitement was showing.

"Yes, Nikias." said Acacia to her baby brother, their parents were sitting away from the window each of them engrossed in work. Her mother, Dr. Korina Drivas was working on another one of her Psychology book while her father, Professor Paulos Drivas was busy editing lessons for his Cylon War class at the university both worked at. Acacia rolled her eyes slightly, her parents where both professors and would work until the vacation started when they arrived at Aqauria.

Her best friend Medea was leaning against a nearby pole looking out at the port as well, however unlike the younger of the Drivas siblings they both noticed that there was a lot of empty spaces in the bay. They knew why as well, the Tau'ri had blown most of the colonial ships out of the sky or where they sat on land because the military had impressed all of them into military duty. Only a handful where not destroyed and they made up the backbone of the colonial civilian and cargo fleet, it wasn't a lot. The colonials where hard at work making more but the shipyards had been even a harder hit than Colonial Cargo fleet.

"Look at that." Said Nikias in wonder as he pointed toward a large black shape which was descending from the sky toward the runway. It was massive about the size of a battlestar but it floated through the sky with great ease before coming in for a landing in the nearby cargo area of the space port. From their vantage point they were able to watch as massive doors opened up on the top and bottom of the ship as large shipping containers marked with different colonial company logos where unloaded. There was a handful of Tau'ri companies as well but for the most part they were Colonial companies.

"That is a Hadrian class transport." answered Acacia as she recalled what Robert had said about them. "They are named after some ancient Tau'ri emperor."

"The Tau'ri are so cool." stated Nikias with a smile, Acacia smiled to herself. She had seen how after the war, most Colonials aside from Sagittaron and Gememon had accepted their current position in the galaxy. They were a backwater area deep inside Tau'ri space and the other powers didn't look favorable on them because of the attempted murder of a Nox diplomat and the claim that they had a right to rule over the entire galaxy. That meant that the colonials had no friends and none of the other powers had even contacted them. They were on their own, with the Cylons nearby and the Tau'ri over them. Luckily the Tau'ri seamed strangely willing to offer a helping hand up to the enemy they had just beaten senseless then anyone had expected when peace finally happened even so anger and bitterness remained.

"And without them now, most of us would be either starving or paying out of our ears for basic needs." stated her father Paulos as he turned his green eyes on his two children. "The Tau'ri did a number on us in the war, but I shouldn't have to tell you that. You and Medea both saw what they did on Tauron and we all saw what they did everywhere else. They may not be occupying us in the traditional sense but it is clear that they are the real power and our freedom is only really allowed under their approval."

Acacia raised an eyebrow at the comment but let it go, she had more important things to worry about.

"Colonial Heavy 798, from Kingstown Libran to Queenstown Aquaria will now begin boarding." Announced a voice over the load speaker as the Drivas family plus Medea who was family in all but name got in line and boarded the spaceship that would take them to Aquaria. Once in their seats, with Nikias having one of the window seats the ship took off with a roar, it lifted off the ground using its powerful engines to go almost vertical for a moment before moving into a path that would lead it up into space. They moved up and up through the clouds as Nikias looked out the window as the darkness of space replaced the blue of Libran.

"Alright ladies and Gentlemen, we are looking at a two-hour flight to Aquaria with two jumps we will alert you when they come until then we will be coming around to get drink orders." Said the pilot from the cockpit, Acacia and almost everyone else knew that the FTL onboard would be spinning up right now and because this was a civilian ship it lacked the range of a military FTL. Luckily Aquaria was in just the neighboring system, if they were heading to Virgon the time would be almost three times as long because of the distance between the two solar systems.

"Sis, Medea can I ask you two a few questions?" inquired Nikias

"Alright, what do you want us to pick up for you on our trip? We are going to Vahalla, that is Tau'ri" laughed Acacia as her brother's fifteen-year-old eyes grinned a bit. In the row behind them, her father glared a little at his daughter calling Kobol by the Tau'ri name of Vahalla instead of the Colonial one.

"I'll think about that, however my teacher assigned us some vacation homework and we have to interview three people about what they did during the war for our history class." explained Nikias as he pulled out a notebook from his bookbag. "Can I interview you two? That would mean I only have to find one more person."

"Sure, I don't see why not." Said Medea with a laugh. "We have some time to kill, which teacher?"

"Mrs. Frinzer." answered Nikias as both older woman nodded their heads.

"Oh, I remember all the fun I had with her." said Acacia before looking at Medea "I think you feel asleep in the middle of her lecture on the articles of Colonization and began drooling all over the desk."

"I think so." answered Medea with a laugh, it would take 33 minutes for their FTL to charge so they had to wait. "So go on, Nikias ask away."

It was a perfect day on Vantic 5, the weather couldn't have been better for the members of the Race who now called the world home. It would have been a perfect spring day, with just enough coolness to make a male or female relax a bit but still warm enough to take in the heat. The race had ruled Vantic 5 for 74 local rotation or 148 years of the race. The colonization fleet had only been on the planet for about half as long only 74 years of the race. Like the race, the natives of Vantic had long lives, in fact a large population of the Vantic people where either teenagers or young adults when the fleet arrived where only now having children or their own. In the span of their lifetime everything had changed, they had gone from being masters of their own planet to subjects. They had to stand by and watch as their historic buildings where torn down by monstrous machines only to be replaced by large cube buildings which where uniformed in almost every way.

The sound of gunfire caused the males and females of the race in the shopping center parking lot to turn their eye turrets away from what they were doing and toward the direction the shot came from.

"Those foolish Vantic are at it again, don't they see we are improving their lives?" said a male as a Vantic moved behind him pushing shopping carts, his green insect like head lowered in shame.

"Is something wrong? Do you disagree with me, shopping center worker?" inquired the male as he turned an eye turret on the Vantic. The Vantic wore the simple body paint of a worker and like every member of the race he wore nothing else but body paint.

"No superior sir." said the Vantic, in the hissing pops of the language of the race. It was the only thing he could say. He had once been a blacksmith working at his forge but he had lost his forge, and his home above the shop he and his family had run for generations. He couldn't lose this job, he needed to provide for his family, something which confused their overlords who had no idea what family was or why it was important. To them friendship was everything and aside from the Emperor bloodlines and ancestors meant nothing. So he had swallowed his pride, took off his cloths and put on body paint which is what the race wanted and worked here pushing carts around for just enough to feed his family, the paid only enough for a single person to live on and since he was a Vantic not even the same that would have gone to a member of the Race.

He had to also change to fit into the role the Race wanted for him, wearing traditional clothing and practicing their faith was becoming harder and harder to do as the Race cracked down on it, they wanted everyone to be like them and worship their emperors past. What was worrisome was that some of the younger generation was slowly falling in line. He looked across the wide road where a temple had once stood to honor the God of the Fields and Harvest, now a motorized vehicle store sat.

"Good." said the male as the Vantic went back to pushing carts, he entered the shop to find some more of his kind at the register. He walked up behind on and whispered into his hearing hole in their own native language.

"The fight goes on." he whispered.

"The fight goes on." answered the cashier in their own language.

"Who is speaking that barbaric language!" yelled one of the nearby managers but like all the other Vantic workers no one spoke up and in a sign of strength. "Very well, I will dock all your pay by two tenth of an hour, unless one of you speaks up."

"It was I superior sir." said the former blacksmith, as he bent down in a sign of weakness even though he wanted to spring on the tiny scale covered invader and rip his head off. "I was reporting about the gunshot outside and I didn't want to scare any customer."

"I see…" said the manager, considering the lie. "Very well, I will let it go this time but next time I will write you up."

"Thank you, superior sir." said the former Blacksmith as the male moved off and the Vantic went back to the break room to have his lunch and cursed out his boss and all the occupiers in his native language.

Responding to the call of gunfire was not the police force of the Race but armed and ready combat males. In almost every point in the history of the race aside from when they went out on conquest the Race had no soldiers, even their police for the most part went unarmed aside from a baton with maybe a handgun for emergency response teams. Here even the police where armed which was worry some to the average males and females but it was clear that it still needed.

A female of the race was down with a large caliber wound, one of the Vantic's primitives guns had hit her in the shoulder. While the weapon was primitive by comparison to the weapon in the claws of small unit commander Wuppah or the other males under his command. He poked an eye turret around the bulldozer he was using as cover and looked at where the shot had come from. A large group of native Vantic homes which were supposed to be torn down today to make way for the clean crisp organized streets and buildings of any city within the empire. Another shot rang out as the bullet slammed into the dirt only a few body lengths away from him. He had seen where the shot had come from. He spun into the open and fired his assault rifle into the window where the shot had come from. Only to have a second shooter open on him from a different window.

"We got a terrorist cell on our claws." hissed Wuppah before getting on his radio, all around him the males under his command where taking cover. In a perfect world, he would order the advance however he needed to protect the male and female construction workers who were under attack from the terrorist in the homes they were supposed to be bulldozed. The native Vantic's who were also working as unskilled labor where also under his protection but his main goal was to protect the Race not them. In fact he kept an eye turret on them in case they were terrorist themselves.

"Foolish primitives, don't they know that the Emperor in all his wisdom will provide them new homes better then what they have now." said a male under his command, quickly casting his eye down at the name of his distance sovereign. Wuppah didn't have time to respond as the sound of a flight of three attack helicopters crossed his hearing difram. The three flying death machines formed a straight line toward the group of houses where the terrorist was located. Then they began to spit fire into the buildings, both machine gun bullets and rocket fire turned the homes and shops into wreckage and any terrorist inside it as well. Then to make even more wreckage a pair of jet powered killer craft came over and dropped a couple of guided missiles from high above turning the entire area into a mass of twisted stone and dried mud. Pots, pans and other household items including the cloth wrappings wore by the natives could be seen in the mess along with a few natives themselves lying dead in what had once been their homes.

"That is what you get for protecting terrorists. Move forward, clear out anyone who doesn't walk on two legs." stated Wuppah as his males moved forward leaving the job of watching over the civilians to the police officer. A medical transport quickly arrived to get the wounded female to a hospital and treatment it was once again a victory for the Race and a defeat to the Vantic freedom terrorists.

Unaware of any of the issues going on outside of Pluto, former Colonel in the Colonial Navy and actual humanoid Cylons turned prisoner in all but name of the Tau'ri Saul Tigh, sat at a beach side bar on the large island of Hawaii. He could look out over the pure white sandy beach with all the women walking around in skimpy swimsuits all day long while drinking anything he wanted from the bars. All his expresses where being picked up by the Tau'ri, it was a golden prison but he was still a prisoner. He was followed everywhere he went by a team of Tau'ri watchers and they had embedded a tracking device into the back of his neck. He knew why they had done such a thing, they had promised the humanoid Cylons that they would keep him and the other originally humanoid Cylons called the final five Galen Tyrol here on Earth and away from the Colonies. Saul was more than happy to stay in his cage, overall the Tau'ri where not bad and they weren't trying to get any information out of him and they could have sent him and Galen to some place a lot worse.

"This is CNN breaking news." said the TV over the bar which had become one of Saul's personal favorites. "The Nox have just handed down the sentences for Vice President of the 12 colonies Spiro and his brother Priest Spiro for their actions during the Tau'ri Colonial War. For taking part in the order to prepare a biological warfare strike on Valhalla Vice President Spiro has been sentenced to 75 years to life in a prison on Mars. His brother Priest Spiro was sentenced to 50 years to life for crimes against intelligent life for his tortured of none believers in the faith of the Lords of Kobol on Sagittarian. He will be sent to a prison on Lanagara to serve his term. No official comment yet from the President of the 12 colonies of Kobol."

"They would have sent them to Kobol but that is what they would have wanted." laughed Saul into his whiskey. "Not that it will matter both Spiro brothers are older than me, well older then this body of mine. They will die before they even reach their 1st chance of patrol."

"As our viewers may know former President Richard Adar of the 12 colonies of Kobol took a plea deal and is currently severing 50 to 75 years for his dual roles in the ordering the fleet to Valhalla which started the war and his attempted biological warfare. Part of the agreement was that he would serve in a middle level prison and after 35 years be transferred to a prison within the 12 colonies to serve the rest of his term."

Saul was about to turn back to his drink when the news changed once again to show images coming out of the 12 colonies. They showed Tau'ri soldiers on Sagittaron pulling forcing some children into their version of a Raptor transport. He shook his head at the image, Sagittaron was going to be a pain in the fraken ass for the Tau'ri. Then again it was a pain for all the other colonies as well, the only real good thing he could tell from the news about what the Tau'ri where doing in the 12 colonies was that aside from Sagittaron they weren't really enforcing their will on anyone. The other worlds seemed to have accepted that they lost and they had to follow the Tau'ri rules about freedom of religion even if they didn't care for it all that much. For their part, the Tau'ri didn't do anything to really offend the rest of the colonies.

"Imagine what could have been if we had just agreed that the Tau'ri where their own power and we didn't go after Kobol." Complained Saul as the image changed to show Vice President Baltar and a beautiful blonde hair woman. He knew that the woman wasn't Dr. Jenny Oldstone, no she was in fact a humanoid Cylon model six and she was on path to become wife to the Vice President of the Colonies and a major political power player on her own. "I wonder if Baltar knows who he is sleeping with or is just enjoying the sex."

"Another round Saul?" inquired the bartender

"Of course, Walter." Said Saul as the bartender poured him yet another drink. He lifted the glass up. "To golden prisons."

It appeared in a tiny flash of bright light which was even brighter in the darkness of the huge cargo hold in the heart of one of the large ships in the unknown fleet. When the light faded darkness returned to cargo hold only there was something else in the hold, it wasn't an actual person it was instead a small drone. It was the size of a small kid's dinner plate and shaped with four small rotating blades for movement in the air. Since it was flying in a zero-gravity field it was allowed it to be highly mobile. It was loaded with multiple high-tech sensors and intelligence gathering tools. The images that it broadcast where sent straight back to the Akula class ship which had launched the drone.

"I don't think this is a refugee fleet." said one of the drone operators as the images of row after row of tanks sitting in cargo holds, other weapons were also clearly visible.

"Or it is the most heavily refugees I have ever heard of." Added another operator as the drone took off through the darkness. With its highly advanced sensors it saw in the darkness just as well as in the day, it scanned the tanks sitting in their bays and began to get early tactical information as it passed over them. They flew over APCs as well and large cargo areas that must store other needed supplies for the vehicles but where currently stored away. Finally, the drone reached the end of the cargo area and found the door, that is where it found its target a computer terminal built into one of the walls. It dropped down from the ceiling toward the sleeping computer terminal and scanned it to find an access port.

"You have got to be kidding me, it has interface ports only a CD drive slot." stated the operator as he cursed to himself. It was going to be much harder, as the drone lowered itself down from the screen height which was much too low for anyone over the age of 13 to use with ease to the base of the terminal. There was an access cover that led into the heart of the computer, with a few quick movements two tinny thing robotic arms extended from the base of the drone and went to work. Within moments the bolt covers where off exposing the wires and other hardware inside the terminal. Using the same hands, the drone physically attached itself to the computer.

"Alright." Said the operator as the interface with the computer system began to take hold.

"I have something on life detector heading our way." said the second operator.

"You have got to be kidding me." cursed the first, instead of detaching and flying away the drone flew into the free space inside the computer and using its second arm lifted the access port back up and into position holding it from the inside. With that done the drone turned off its blades to hide any noise but as it did it armed a stun round. It was hard to see what came into the cargo area through the ventilation slits in the access port but the camera did pick up some things. The lights in the cargo ships turned on bathing everything in bright harsh light.

It was covered with scales and had claws on its feet, wore no shoes of any kind and while the drone couldn't see anything above the waist line it didn't appear to have any cloths on at all. A short tail was visible as well but the drone wasn't getting enough information. The sound of hissing and pops filled the air as the creature spoke. ,

"Hold on, I'll send in another drone." said the second officer as another as a second drone appeared in the far corner of the cargo room, since the lights where on the bright light wasn't noticeable. The second drone didn't fly inside it attached itself to the ceiling, using photo sensors it's surface covered blended into the ceiling color making it almost totally invisible to the naked eye but it was in position to see almost the entire room.

With the second drone the Tau'ri got their first good view of the alien which had moved away from the computer terminal and toward the first in the line of tanks. It was short much shorter than a full-grown human, the height of the creature was only a hair above 5 foot or 1.51 meters. It was covered with scales and had turreted eyes one of which was looking down at a clip board while the other eye was looking over the tank. It floated around the tank before checking off something on the clipboard, multiple colored stripes where visible on the alien.

"He really does look like a lizard." said the drone operator. "Maybe it is a woman for all we know."

"Who really knows for sure." said the second officer as they waited for the alien to move down the line of vehicles before the 1st drone went back to work, the computer screen never turned on but it did make a slight noise as the hard drive began to spin. With that the download began and the Tau'ri gained access to the computer network. Using the drones own broadcaster it began to send the data dump to the Akulas who in return sent it to the Earth.

The first thing the Tau'ri officer did was run a translator program. The drones themselves would wait until the alien was at the far end of the cargo bay before the 2nd one flew down and sealed the 1st one inside the that done the second drone went back to the ceiling and monitoring the bay while the 1st keep up with the task of downloading the information.

It came up on two separate computer screens, one in the language of the Alien race the other in German. When the Tau'ri formed it became law that all school age children had to learn at least 2 of the 5-official language of the Tau'ri with military personal having to know 3, it was now common for most schools to offer all 5 plus their native country language and some nations like Japan had made it a requirement to graduate school to know 3 of the 5 plus Japanese. Those language where, English, German, Spanish, Mandarin Chinese and Arabic.

"What do you have?" inquired the officer in command

"Sir, if I am reading this right this is a Conquest fleet." reported the operator

"As we feared when we saw the tanks." Stated the commanding officer.

"Sir, this is the strange thing they have recon photos of their target Earth or Tosev 3 as they call it." Said the operator as he pulled up the image of what looked to be a crusader knight in full armor. "This is the most up to date information they have on Earth."

"You have got to be kidding me." said the intelligence officer as he looked at the line of images, he was looking at clearly photos of life on Earth almost 900 years ago. "This is their latest information they have on us?"

"Yes." Said the technical "Even our current radio broadcasts are too advanced for them to understand, they think it is some kind of solar activity."

"Didn't they pick up our broadcasts from before we introduced the stargate?" inquired the officer

"Sir, looks like they had most of their sensors off while they traveled and they had a radio lock on this world here." said the analyst "I would imagine that is their home world. They didn't pick ours up and they passed them by without notice, same goes for all our broadcasts."

"Alright, I'll send this all to high command but we need to get as much data as possible." ordered the Officer "Keep up the work."

"Will do sir." Confirmed the officer.

It took only an hour but the first reports began to reach the large meeting of military and political leaders in the heart of the Tau'ri Capital. All of them had access to the same report which caused a few of them to raise an eyebrow at the report.

"A reptilian race, called the Race?" inquired a Senator "They actually call themselves the Race? Kind of full of themselves to do that."

"They do indeed, they call their home world Home as well." added the intelligence expert a former member of the Israeli intelligence services until it like all the others had been folded into a single large intelligence agency responsible for the entire galaxy. "From the basic information, we have gathered and gone through so far, they have 4 worlds under their control with three separate races and we are their next target."

"Well they are going to fail at that." Stated General Leong, she had gone straight to the military breakdown of the enemy, most of all their armor. She had gone up in the ranks as an armored warrior and knew the breakdown of multiple different tanks from around the world along now with the main weapons of the Tau'ri and the Colonial army. "If I was to place this tank and other equipment aside from the space ships, I would put it in the late 70's early 80's tech range. Our own ground weapons would beat them senseless, even the Colonial weapons where more advanced then these where on the ground."

"We agree and from what we gathered they believe they would have a cake walk here." Said the intelligence officer as he pulled up the image of a medieval Knight. "This is the enemy they are expecting to fight."

"My God, they are really failing in the field of recon if they think that is what they will go up against." said an Admiral

"They must not advance that fast themselves." said President Elect Carter as she took command of the meeting. "We have meet races and civilization on our travel which have advanced very slowly compared to us. I image these are the same and they assumed that all civilization is like them."

"That is what we believe." Confirmed the Intelligence officer "We are sending Akulas class ships to each of the 4 worlds under their control to get more information. They recently conquered a race on a world they call Vantic 5."

"How recently conquered?" inquired a General

"By our years 74." explained the Intelligence officer "That was when they were conquered but they follow up with a colonization fleet that was about 40 years ago. They have been getting updates saying that terrorist attacks have kept going on."

"Which raises an issue, if we make contact with the Vantic people do we help them win back their world." Said the General

"We are getting ahead of ourselves." Stated Vice President elect Jonas Quinn "We need to make contact with the fleet heading toward us."

"With your permission, if you are going to contact them I advise you hold off on contact with them for about 6 hours." Said the intelligence officer "It is the middle of the night on their ships and we want their commanders on the bridge and fully awake when we make contact. We don't want some young officer shooting first out of fear."

"Yes." confirmed Carter as she looked down at the holographic map which covered a lot of the table. She tapped in a few commands and the fleet of the Race jumped to their likely location of their fleet in 6 hours. It was still outside the max range of the defense stations but that was ok. "Alright, when they reach this line we will make first contact."

"How do we want to do it?" inquired General Leong as the discussion began about how they were going to make contact with this race. When they agreed the meeting broke up as the leaders went to get some rest while they waited for the oncoming fleet to move into the position they wanted. The Race still had no idea what they were walking into and shortly they would learn just how wrong they were.

Well I hope you enjoyed this chapter, I would like to thank everyone who reviewed and I ask that you keep reading. Also if you are reading from the USA, have a fun and safe 4th of July. Thanks Wilkins75.