Author's Notes: Having reached Chapter Four and realizing that not everyone here may have played Deadlock, I feel I should include the link to the Deadlock Wikia. All, or at least most, of the ships I will be using in this story are detailed there. I will be making a few changes on things that are based on gameplay mechanics such as squadron sizes and numbers, but for the main part I will stay true to the game. Thank you for reading!
wiki/Battlestar_Galactica_Deadlock_Wiki
Battlestar Galactica, and Battlestar Galactica: Deadlock, along with any places, characters, and such do not belong to me, but to Universal Studios and Black Lab Games, respectively.
Chapter Four
"I should have been comforted by the return to Scorpia. It had been the closest thing to home I'd had since joining the fleet, or at least the space around it had. I had even taken some of my shore leaves there instead of returning to Tauron. Everything was different now though. I was the new girl aboard Acropolis and had a hell of a learning curve to meet. Knowing that we were going to be handling missions directly from Admiral Cain was exciting, but it also left some of us wondering what that meant for the front lines. If Commander York knew what the Admiral was planning, he wasn't saying anything."
With a series of flashes, the fleet jumped into orbit above Scorpia. It hadn't been that long since they had left for Picon, but the change that week had brought was obvious. Scattered wrecks littered the sky and the shipyards looked abandoned. Alarms started pinging as the DRADIS reports came back showing a mass of Cylon ships off the starboard bow. Four Talon frigates, two Nemesis corvettes, with a Revenant in the lead, a hefty force.
"Multiple DRADIS contacts, Commander. According to Scorpion intel, they're not friendlies."
"Action stations, Lieutenant. Launch Vipers."
BSGBSGBSGBSGBSG
Seated in her Viper, Hades waited impatiently. The order had been for all planes to be ready for launch on arrival at Scorpia, which was a wise precaution in her opinion. It had been a long time since she had gone down a launch tube. Blue squadron was assigned to the front half of the starboard flight pod, and that meant upon launching they would be vectored forward of the ship. There were twenty launch tubes in total per flight pod, each set at a forty-five degree angle to the rest of the ship. The first ten on either side angled forwards, the second set towards the rear. Once the first round of fighters were launched, the second wave was loaded into the tubes. Originally these ships had been designed to only carried two squadrons, but wartime had doubled that.
On her screens she saw the enemy formation appear as the fleet arrived. Through her comms came the voice of the LSO. "All Vipers, clear to launch."
In a control room along the side of the launch tube, behind a pane of thick glass, one of the launch officers gave her a thumbs up and pressed a button on his console. Instantly she was pressed into her chair as the Viper was propelled forward by the magnetic cradle. Halfway to the exit her engines came fully online, adding their own speed to her forward velocity. Breaking free of the end of the launch tube, she climbed, banking towards the Cylons. To her right she saw nine raptors taking off from the flight pod.
"All squadrons, form up on me." She called into her comm, flicking over to the fleet frequency, and listened to the replies. Suddenly a piece of wreckage appeared low to her right and she jerked her fighter around it.
"Watch yourselves. This place is a mess."
BSGBSGBSGBSGBSG
"Commander, we're receiving orders from Admiral Cain. She says to engage the enemy." Rigel called up from the crew pit.
"Acknowledge the order. Order the fleet into attack formation three, all ahead full" York answered.
The Cylon fleet had already broken off their attack on the shipyards and were moving to intercept the new arrivals. It appeared that the Colonials had managed to catch the Cylons flat footed, their Raiders a long way from being able to protect their carriers.
"Order Hades to take out those Raiders. Can we get a target lock on that Revenant?"
"Acquiring lock now, Commander." Called a crewman.
Guided munitions weren't the primary weapon of Colonial ships like they were for the Cylons, but that didn't mean they didn't carry them. Nuclear weapons had once been the go-to's, but since they had been outlawed thirty years ago all that was left was conventional warheads. In their battle at Cocalus, the debris from the asteroid field had made anything but gunnery practically useless, which the Cylons figured out the hard way. Almost all of their missiles had blown up long before they hit their targets, the exception of course being those that had hit this ship. Now, in relatively clear space, they were the perfect weapon, especially as the Cylon raiders were too far away to intercept them.
"Target locked, and guns have a targeting solution." Reported Agathon.
"All ships, fire missiles." York ordered.
Across the formation missile tubes opened along the hulls and gleaming warheads emerged, bathed in red light. On the order, they were launched in sequences programmed by their creators. Fifty six in total were launched, all for the same target. Overkill, perhaps. But Commander York had no intention of letting that Revenant get close to his ship.
Holding his breath he watched the DRADIS readouts. The raiders were trying like mad to reach their ships, but were intercepted almost two clicks away by a wave of Vipers. With no choice but to fight, they could only watch the havoc unfold. With baited breath the crew in the CIC watched the many small dots converge on the enemy ship. With a faint chirp the blip representing the gunship disappeared from the DRADIS display. Cheers broke out, though York thought that was somewhat anticlimactic. Aboard Daidalos there had at least been a chance of seeing the explosion through the broad windows. He guessed he'd have to settle for this though.
"All ahead half, commence enemy suppression barrage. Send to all ships, Weapons free." Shudders through the deck told him that the eight double heavy turrets located on the dorsal hull had opened fire before the gunnery officer could do so.
"Sir, I have more contacts." Agathon said, shifting the view of the screen. There, about fifteen clicks away, were a trio of Cylon Talons. They were far enough away for him not to consider them an immediate threat, but any Cylons on the board needed to be dealt with.
"What are they doing, Lieutenant?" York asked.
"I'm reading several wrecks from Scorpia's fleet out there." She answered.
"They're probably scavenging them for ammunition" said a low voice behind him. Turning, York saw Sinon Quade standing on the main floor looking at the screen.
"Notify the Admiral. Sinon, what are you doing here?"
"I was aboard supervising repairs when we jumped. No one told me until it was too late to return to Daidalos." The man said shrugging.
"Commander, I'm receiving orders from the Admiral now. She wants us to destroy those wrecks." Called Rigel.
"Have Hades dispatch a squadron to take care of it." York ordered, starting to turn away from Sinon. "Commander, a word?" Sinon said, "I don't often have the luxury of investigating field damage. Could I ask your pilots to get a few minutes of footage before you destroy those hulls. It could provide invaluable data about their weak points."
York considered the request. On one hand, it made sense. At the same time, ignoring a direct order from the Admiral, even only temporarily, was a dangerous gamble.
"Relay the request to whichever squadron gets the detail." He said to Rigel, who had heard everything.
"Aye, Commander." She answered, "Better your head than mine" she muttered before switching over to the Viper frequency and relaying the orders.
BSGBSGBSGBSGBSG
"Wilco, Acropolis" responded Hades without really paying attention. Quickly, she toggled a switch on the side of her cockpit she had had installed a year ago. It automatically saved the last thirty seconds of her comm traffic, a safeguard against moments just such as these. She had been trying to take out the same raider for almost a full minute, and it was a slippery bastard. "Got it!" she cried as her tracers intersected with the Cylon's port engine and the whole thing exploded. Looking down at her DRADIS, the sky was already almost clear of raiders. Lacking targets, three of her squadrons had broken off to engage the Cylon capital ships themselves. Replaying the recording and locating her new objective, she decided to take care of it herself.
"Blue Squadron and Blue Devils, follow me. Command has a job for us." She called to her pilots. Coming around to aim for the unengaged Cylons, she threw full power to her engines and raced towards them. The wrecks were of six Adamant frigates, and she recognized the names on two of them. Cylon Heavy Raiders were attached to the hulks, probably offloading the slugs.
"Alright, break into flights. Someone wants some pretty pictures of these wrecks before we blast them to bits." She ordered and selected the nearest one for herself.
BSGBSGBSGBSGBSG
Acropolis' guns blazed in the darkness, ripping the plates off the side of a Talon. With a shudder, a wave of Cylon torpedoes that had slipped under the flak field detonated against the hull, just ahead of the massive engines. Lights flashed in the room but thankfully nothing exploded. Stealing a quick glance at the Damage Control board over on the far right of the CIC, York saw a few red lights but most of them remained green.
"Colonel, take over DC." He ordered to Melville and she hurried to the board.
On the DRADIS screen it appeared the battle was going well. With the three frigates arrayed around Acropolis, two above and one below, they formed a wall of fire, dealing out death to anything in range. The three Manticore corvettes were using their impressive speeds to get around the sides of the enemy group, while keeping they Cylon's corvettes from doing the same. One of the enemy ships seemed to be attempting to withdraw.
"Order Lancer and Scout to make sure that one doesn't escape" ordered York, pointing at the screen.
Several minutes later, there was a call from below. "Sir, It's the admiral. She wants to talk to you personally."
"Put her through" York answered, with just the slightest hint of dread.
"Commander, I gave you an order!" came Cain's sharp rebuke through the phone before it had even reached his ear.
"Yes, sir. I was following up on a request from Sinon for damage reports on-" he cut off.
"Mr. Quade is not in command of this fleet. Destroy – Those – Wrecks – Now." York heard a click and the line went dead.
"Signal Hades, take them out." He ordered quietly to Lieutenant Agathon.
BSGBSGBSGBSGBSG
"Raptors, pick your targets. The photo shoot is done." Came the CAG's voice, filtered through her helmet's small speaker. Ensign Alessia Stone, call sign Slingshot, deactivated the camera she had been running over the wreck of a frigate and thumbed opened her bomb bay doors. Raptors served little direct use in combat other than scouting or recovery, not being agile enough to survive a dogfight. But in their underbellies were a quartet of small grade torpedoes that could punch through light armor plating.
Killing her twin engines and pulling back on the flight controls, her Slingshot watched her forward velocity drop to zero. A short burst from her thrusters brought the nose of her ship around to point directly at the wreck below while also backing them out of the blast zone. In the compartment behind her, her ECO programmed in the course for the ordinance.
"This is Slingshot, weapons locked" she reported when the green light on her console activated. Over the channel she heard the other pilots signaling they too were ready to shoot.
"Weapons free" ordered the CAG.
With a series of clicks and thumps from under her feet, the bomb rack released its contents and pushed them downward with small blasts of compressed air. When the torpedoes were ten feet away, their onboard computers locked onto their preassigned targets and activated the small engines. White contrails blossomed out of the tail of all four, streaking away right for the hulk.
"Lords of Kobol, hear my prayer" muttered Alessia, reciting the usual supplication to the gods she had learned as a child on Gemenon, "Take the souls of the brave men and women who died here into your arms forever more." With that done she maneuvered her Raptor around to return to the fleet.
BSGBSGBSGBSGBSG
"Batteries alpha through echo, shift your fire to engage those two frigates. The Scout is being surrounded." Shouted York over the din of combat filling the room. It seemed that Major Diza had been overly enthusiastic in his pursuit of a Nemesis and had flown into a trap.
"Sir! The Scout reports-" Rigel cut off as the large screen gave another blip. The Scout had vanished. York blinked as the noise in the room dropped. Seven hundred lives had just been wiped out in a flash.
"Commander, Hades reports that the wrecks have been…what the frak?" Lieutenant Agathon interjected in a voice that started low but suddenly got much louder.
"Language on the bridge, Lieutenant" ordered Melville who had just returned from Damage Control.
"Sorry, Colonel. But all hostiles are disengaging!"
"Confirm that!" York shouted, not believing that the Cylons would just cut and run. Unlike a human opponent, until recently the Cylon combat doctrine had been to fight till the last ship.
"It's confirmed, sir." Colonel Melville reported, her voice full of surprise.
Chirps announced the departure of the Cylon fleet, along with the three Talons that had been scavenging.
"Stand down action stations. Recall our birds."
Moving down from his platform and towards the damage control panel, York saw Sinon shaking his head. "What's wrong?" he asked
"Lucinda is becoming rash in her decisions. That was valuable data I could have used. She forgets we must prove the stability of Colonial Fleet to the Quorum."
"I'm sure the Admiral knows what she's doing." York replied, not wanting to be overheard talking about his commanding officer around so many people. Sinon's face took on an almost pitying expression before turning and walking out of the CIC.
BSGBSGBSGBSGBSG
The quick turn around that most everyone in the fleet had expected didn't happen. Scuttlebutt amongst the crews had been full of claims that they would be dropping off Daidalos and jumping right into the heart of Cylon territory within hours. Hades hadn't believed the rumors of course. The Scorpia shipyards were in rough shape and it would take a while before they felt safe enough for whatever fleet Cain had scraped up to take over protection detail from BSG-30.
She was down on the hangar deck inspecting her plane, double checking the work of her new deck crew. Over the PA system the LSO announced the arrival of a Viper, probably one of the replacements she had been promised. The large door that blocked off access to the elevator while it was open to space retracted into the ceiling and a forklift moved forward to pull the fighter into the hangar. This was such a routine operation that Vale paid it little mind until she heard the gasps from deckhands around her. Looking past the squared off nose intake of her Viper, she saw why. A brand-new Viper unlike any she had seen before, looking factory fresh with its white paint and red stripes unblemished, was being pushed into an empty alcove. In the cockpit its pilot had already removed his helmet and slid the canopy forward.
She made her way to the fighter, taking it all in. "What the frak is that?" she asked to no one in particular. She had always thought that the Mark I Viper was the most lethal looking plane that had ever been fielded by the Colonies. Fast, agile, and deadly, it lived up to it's reputation as first and last line of defense against the Cylons. This new plane looked just like it, only with the many sharp edges characteristic to the Mark I streamlined. Down a ladder climbed the pilot in his green flight suit. He returned the salute of the crew chief responsible for his bird before catching sight of the major.
"Ensign Bonzo, sir." He said, coming to attention in front of her.
"Welcome aboard, I'm Major Vale. What exactly is that, Ensign?"
"Mark II Viper, fresh off the assembly line, sir." So it was true. Another bit of scuttlebutt that Hades had ignored was that Cain had been designing a new model Viper, and they were waiting for to be deployed before leaving Scorpia.
"Did you bring your kit with you?" she asked.
"Oh no sir. I'm not staying yet. I was just ordered to ferry this beauty out to you. " He answered, looking wistfully back at the plane. "I was told to bring one of your Mark I's back with me. Once we get done swapping your fighters out with these I'll report aboard permanently with my fighter."
Over the PA came the announcement that eight more Vipers were inbound. "Friends of yours?" Vale asked.
"You could say that, Major."
"See the crew chief about what birds to take." Hades said, dismissing him. When he was gone she moved close to the fighter and took it all in. It truly was a deadly looking craft, and seemed to radiate lethality even as it sat there. Quite a crowd had congregated by now around it, mostly pilots since the deckhands were busy preparing to bring in the new birds. Running her hand along the hull and deciding that rank had it's privileges, Vale grabbed a grease pen from a nearby tool cart and under the cockpit on the blank name plate wrote in large letters 'Hades.'
Several maintenance bays down the flight pod, Chief Derrick Blears held a very different opinion of the upgraded Vipers. He had been a deckhand on one ship or another since he was 16, having lied about his age to join the military. Growing up on Leonis after the Imperial Wars were over hadn't been easy, and the fleet had proved to be the easiest way to make sure he stayed fed. Over his many years he had worked on and maintained dozens of different craft, but he liked the Mark I Viper best of all. It was an old design, but it was also a simple one. The reason it had stayed in service so long, even past the retirement of relatively newer fighters, was because it combined capability with simplicity. No fancy flight control computers, no ridiculously complicated and over engineered systems to maintain, it was a dream. Now looking at their replacement, Blears just grumped.
"What's wrong, chief?" asked one of the deckhands standing next to him. The kid was new to the deck, like so many were now.
"Just looking at the latest heap of junk to litter my hangar deck, kid" He answered, shaking his head.
"That beauty?" said the youngster incredulously.
"I give it a month before the fleet is begging them to bring back the Mark I's. Those things were probably designed by someone who doesn't even know which end of the Viper is the front."
"I think it's amazing."
Blears just shook his head. Kids he thought, shrugging. They always liked what was new and shiny, never appreciating how good the older stuff was. "Well, they'll learn" he said to himself. From the back of his mind came the answer Or they won't have the chance too.
BSGBSGBSGBSGBSG
"Ahh, Commander. Come in" said Cain from behind her desk. As usual she was standing, but no one else was present besides York.
"You called, sir?" he asked, stopping opposite her.
"I know you've been chomping at the bit to get out there, and I don't blame you. As usual the Quorum is quick with its words, but slow with actions. We've finally secured some of the news hulls promised by the colonies and they should be arriving any day. I also managed to steal over half of the ships being fitted out right now over at the Scorpia Shipyards for Colonial Fleet."
"Impressive." York remarked.
"I had to give them over half of our new fighters, but it was worth it. Now, we're getting two Ranger Cruisers from Virgon and I'm assigning them to BSG-30. That, coupled with your new planes, should bring you back up to full strength."
"I take it you have an assignment for me, Admiral?"
"I do." She handed him a red folder from her desk. Breaking the tape sealing it, Commander York read the typed sheets.
Colonial Intelligence had located another batch of satellites that they believed were being used to compromise the IDRIS network. Located over the planet Icarus in Helios Alpha, it was as close to a front line assignment as possible. He was ordered to jump in and destroy the satellites along with any Cylon presence.
"Any questions?" asked Cain when he looked up.
"None, sir."
"Good Hunting, Commander."