Record keeping: Hello everyone! I hope you are doing well and will continue to do so.

In some cases, I do telegraph or outright tell people wat I am planning to do in this story. However, the major things I will not divulge. It is entertaining to see what people think and how they are anticipating where I am going. I say to you, have fun. I may or may not tell you where I am going here. But below is some background, and some hints. So here we go. I received a few comments that I will quickly address. First, this chapter is a bit longer and I almost doubled it but that was too much for one sitting. We will be delving into the Colonial and cylon side of things in the Cyrannus Star system in this chapter. Things are not going well, which brings me to my first point, in reference to a guest's comment.

It has been approximately four weeks since Earth Alliance has invaded the colonies. Three days before that, the Drakh invaded the cylon territories and it was Earth alliance who nuked the Colony and the hub and wiped out most all of the resurrection ships (and yes, that was a collaboration with the Drakh and Earthforce). One ship survived and is damaged but the Cylons still have that one. Three worlds of the colonies are confirmed denuded of life. Caprica was nuked but Earth Alliance is saving it from total destruction for now. the surviving worlds haven't suffered much more at this point as the EF is more interested in stealing every thing they can get their hands on, ship wise. They do not know about the Drakh heading there first. That battle will start in chapter 46. Once Clark gets what he wants, he will have his forces kill the colonies. That's who he is. Check canon for details of his personality profile if you believe this is overkill in this story on his part.

Genocide? Yes, but not yet and not completely …not until he's ready. He wants the colonial leadership tosee what is coming and know there is nothing they can do about it. There are jump gates being built in colonial territory for the EF's benefit. Plus they are gathering their forces. To be clear, the Drakh's agenda is for the Shadows not the EA, they are helping but only to a point and as a diversion to the Shadows own plans.

Right now, the Earth Alliance is focusing on establishing a beach head in their plans to head to Earth. And they are spread across the system not held up in one place, so they do not have large scale drydock being built. They are taking apart some colonial mobile docks for use at home to service the stolen vessels. Suffice to say the Earth Alliance is in a bad place right now.

President Clark wants the secret of resurrection and he now has most of that data from the surviving records of a captured, badly damaged resurrection ship. It will take a while for IPX to figure things out. The cylons believe there are two resurrection ships left but there is only one, theirs. As the fleet tracking the delegation fleet was blown to pieces.

Everyone knows this is coming. The delegation fleet is about to go ballistic. The Earth is not about to share with their elder cousins. You might say that the reaction will be extreme? For that, we will see.

Now, please enjoy this chapter and AUOC BCD will be coming up next posting. There. Will find out what is going on with the Shadows and Vorlons heading to the Rim. Let's just say, they will not be happy.

Again, please enjoy. Skeet

Roads Paved in Shadows

Chapter Forty-four

Cylon Territory-Outskirts

Cylon war-Week Four

Rally Point Twelve

Four weeks earlier, a yet-to-be identified enemy waged a full, unprovoked war against the Cylon empire. Three days before that, other forces, now believed to be from Earth, attacked them, destroying the Hub and the Colony in a war of conquest. While the cylons were fighting for their very lives, reports came in about the Kobollians being attacked by the Thirteenth Tribe! The Cylons didn't know why the Thirteenth struck the Colonies, but many of the clones had expected something like this to happen, eventually. Rumors as to the reasons why they had spread across the Cylon Empire, who were trying to understand exactly why they were being attacked, especially as it was related to the struggle they were enduring.

Some believed it was in retribution for the attack against a small Thirteenth ship more than fifteen years earlier. Others believed all Humans were warlike and cruel, taking pleasure in fighting and killing. There were those who believed that this was a preemptive strike because the Colonials would find and attack their brethren. One of the more radical rumors was that the Prometheus, when told about the Cylons, had prepared long-term plans to strike at both the Cylons and the Colonies, removing both potential threats.

It was also possible that the Cylon force tracking the Colonials had contacted Earth, and the action had gone badly and the Thirteenth was taking no chances. There were so many possibilities. It was known that the force sent to shadow the colonials had sent back data concerning the direction they were travelling towards.

However, John, the self-proclaimed leader, kept that data to himself and had released only the most basic information to the others. What they hadn't known was that John had sent an eleventh basestar, that joined the others as a backup, to be implemented in case the original forces failed. Having eleven basestars tracking the diplomatic fleet was his idea of generating a backup, believing that his fellow Cylons were incompetent without his extra, indirect aid. He wanted a total of thirteen basestars, his idea of a private joke. That, he couldn't do because it would have alerted the others.

The number Ones, Randall and Gregor Cavil were ordered to take command of the Cylon force, but they never knew of John's plans, plans that got most of the Cylon forces into a battle that killed three quarters of the crew and caused the total destruction of their squadron. The Leoben models were a plant by John to keep an eye on the mission and to make sure everyone followed his covert, convoluted plan in case something went wrong. John would never know the depths of the disaster he initiated. In an act of irony everyone could appreciate, he was shot in the head by one of his own centurions, killing him and then his pattern permanently deleted by a model he trusted the most to do his bidding.

Naturally, being paranoid, he had made plans to prevent just this scenario from happening. Sadly, he didn't take into account the tenacity of the Eight who struggled to delete his program. His pattern might have survived, if it hadn't resisted the deletion so quickly after the first attempt. The Eight saw the pattern rebuild itself seconds after the initial erasure. It took an hour to terminate the program and for her to feel satisfied that she had performed the cleansing. Then, to make sure, she had Caprica Six and Richard double check her work.

His demise occurred three days after the attack. The cylons lost the Hubs, the Colony, and most of their ships. A month earlier, they had forty-three ships in various stages of repair. Now, they had thirty-seven. Billions of patterns were lost, billions died. All of their resurrection ships were destroyed except two, (as far as they knew). One was badly damaged and hidden. The other was with the tracking forces.

What they didn't know was that one ship, severely damaged, was being data-mined by Earthforce scientists extracting the secrets of resurrection, something that President Clark of Earth Alliance was very, very interested in. They also hadn't known that the enemy who attacked them were taking captives by the tens of thousands and presenting them as a gift to Earth Alliance, specifically Clark. He had used for the clones he considered not human, less than truly living. Those captured would suffer in ways that made mere slavery something to be dreamed of.

The Cylons abandoned Rally Point Omega three hours before the Drakh converged in the system.

All thoughts of fighting back vanished and thirty-seven ships fled for their lives.

It wasn't just the Thirteenth Humans. It was the unimaginable. Their enemies were alien.

"I vote we try for the Ragnar station," Katrina Six muttered once more. She was tired, hungry, and terribly frightened, as were her other brothers and sisters, who were still alive. "These aliens knew where every hidden base and supply depot we have is located. How many of us have been captured or killed trying to get to one of those supposedly secured areas?"

"We have to get what supplies we can and leave!" agreed Tanya Three. "Get them and run."

Rachael Eight also agreed. "We should have done that and left weeks ago. I vote yes."

Richard cavil hadn't said a word since his fellow Cylons had started this idiotic vote. It was a waste of time. Everybody knew they were heading to Ragnar. The Colonial station was supposedly a secret. What a laugh. Once, it figured prominently in The Plan, something that was now obsolete. The Cylon's information about what was happening in Colonial territory was sparse. They were under attack, beginning around the same time as the attack against the Cylon people.

The Cylons didn't have time to investigate. They were fighting for their lives, what few of them that were left. They were running now, panicked, and trying to find a place to run to. Whether they fully understood its subtle truth, they were connected to their Colonial parents. Their people could have left for parts unknown long ago, but the truth was, they had nowhere to go. They hated their creators, wanted them dead, or under Cylon control. Only then would they finally be free. They would find Earth if it existed and remove the humans there and live the lives they were destined for. Past that, no one knew what they were going to do.

Living was complicated.

Earth was a myth–until it wasn't. The Prometheus proved the existence of earth. Or, it proved that there were other humans elsewhere who called their planet earth, and that was close enough.

The Cylons needed to know where Earth was located. The Colonials had some idea, but their security was competent enough so that the Cylons couldn't steal the data. The security on the Colonial's diplomatic fleet was so tight that none of the models were able to infiltrate it. Therefore, they were reduced to following the fleet as it plodded its way in the perceived general direction of Earth. The Cylon tracking vessels were forced to follow and try to find earth before said Colonials could. Their mission was to find, identify, kill as many Earthers as they could, wipe out the diplomatic fleet, and report back their findings.

No one had heard a word from the forces since they began, no one except John. He kept all of the reports to himself and now he was permanently deleted and unlamented.

"Everyone, listen to me. We don't have to vote on this. We all know where we're going. What we need to do is choose where we need to go after that. We have to get away from these aliens." The fact that this enemy working with the humans were alien was unquestioned. The two bodies they managed to retrieve were frightening and like nothing they'd ever seen before. The most intact creature, a male they determined, was in what they could best describe in a state of flux. The creature almost appeared to be out of phase with reality. That frightened everyone. Such things were never even imagined, but the proof was in front of their eyes. The dead alien slowly decayed despite their best efforts to preserve it. The phasing should have ceased, but it hadn't and no one could explain it. It was horrible, undeniable proof. Now, the Cylons were more than terrified and wanted nothing other than to flee.

"Where will we go?" a Two asked.

"Away from all of this!" Richard growled. "We will vote on it when we leave Ragnar and head for deep space," Richard sarcastically answered. "Look, I am not John. I Know when to cut our losses. We should have done this two weeks ago. Our people are being slaughtered. Our ships cannot stand against those energy weapons or nuclear missiles."

Tanya Three agreed. "We cannot fight them in our present condition. They have destroyed the Colony, destroyed more than eighty percent of our most powerful capital and support ships. The older basestars are gone. All but one of our resurrection ships were destroyed. We don't have contact with the forces tracking the colonial diplomatic fleet. We are low on reserves. The hybrids are coherent enough to talk about running. I think we're being tracked. We have to leave this space now."

"What if we run into the Colonials?"

Richard thought about it as everyone waited for him to answer. "No fighting. They may be as bad off as we are. We don't need to fight them unless they get in our way. But if it's true that they're fighting, then they will be too busy to Run to Ragnar before we get there. We get in and get out. The Colonials can take care of themselves." He paused for a second. "For once, I hope they can defeat these aliens. I despise the Colonials, but I hate these creatures more. Why couldn't they have been peaceful?"

"Coordinates set. All ships acknowledge jump to Ragnar nebula."

"No fighting unless necessary," he reiterated. "We need to conserve our munitions. If the colonials are there, we'll try diplomacy first," he sneered. "But we will take what we need, whether they like it or not. Then we'll follow our forces tracking the Colonial diplomatic fleet as best we can. Maybe they found something useful, far enough away from this place."

"Should we vote on this?" asked Tanya.

"If anyone has a better idea, we will discuss it after Ragnar."

"Fifteen seconds," the hybrid announced. "Follow the seeds of destruction and hope. All systems nominal."

Battlestar Pegasus

An exhausted Admiral Helena Cain and her surviving battle group of two battlestars, two cruisers and one missile carrier, flashed into existence two hundred thousand kilometers from the edge of the designated Cylon-Colonial version of the neutral zone. There, the fourteenth Colonial fleet was assigned, Patrolling the border.

"Contact the fleet admiral," she ordered. "I need to speak to him."

"Yes, Admiral. We are receiving hostile challenge."

"Good. Respond and send the confirmation codes."

Saying that the fleet commander Admiral Taxia was enraged was understating his actual feelings. The admiral was ordered to stay and patrol the border, not to return home and engage the enemies, tearing the Colonies apart. His group of twenty battlestars and support ships were awaiting reassignment and to be placed in the thick of the fighting against the Earth pirates.

And that was what he considered them. The Thirteenth had ravaged the home worlds, offered no terms and indulged in an orgy of rampage and thievery. The Colonials were caught off guard and the Earth people were far more powerful than the Brass had suspected. What he and the rest were, was perplexed by the savageness of the attack, going on for the last three, almost four weeks, and he was not allowed to do anything to aid his people. His orders were specific. Remain at station, and continue patrolling the border.

His fleet was stuck here because the President was more afraid of the Cylons than what was happening in his front yard. But as angry as he was, he understood. Long range scans and very discreet and highly illegal probes sent into Cylon territory suggested something very bad was happening with the toasters. EM waves had spiked and unconfirmed instances of huge numbers of nukes detonating had begun three days before the reported attack on the Colonies. There were no signs of the Cylon patrols on the other side of the border being present in the last month, and that set his teeth on edge. He came to the conclusion that the Cylons were fighting someone, and it was very likely the Earthers. That frightened him because it meant the Thirteenth resources were vast enough to come after them both.

As much as he despised the mechanicals, he acknowledged them as a known enemy. The Earth people were something else. Either way, he was stuck at the border, awaiting orders he prayed would come. If it didn't, then he feared the worst.

There might not be anyone left to give the orders.

"Respond with current IDENT codes. I want to talk to Admiral Taxia."

Moments later, a concerned Taxia was on visual. "Good to see you, Cain. What's the news?"

"Bad," she said. "We need a secured line to talk."

"We'll talk on the Horizon."

"Prepare to receive us,. We have casualties,"

With their identification confirmed, the Pegasus fleet approached. Admiral Taxia, a Piconese, took a quick survey of the incoming CDF vessels. Without exception, they all looked like they had been through Hades. The Pegasus had visible damage everywhere. Some sections looked melted. Two more of the newer Minoans barely appeared space worthy, and that worried him. The destroyers showed no signs of damage. Quickly, he ordered the fuel tankers to the incoming ships as well as sending one of his med-evac cruisers to assist. As the ships moved closer, he was surprised that the Minoans were able to continue movement. Whatever hit them was very, very destructive, and that didn't bode well for the CDF.

One hour later, the two admirals were in his private quarters. Cain looked worse for wear. She had a broken wrist. Popped up on meds, she barely noticed. Her focus was on something else. "They took the Zeus while they cut every other ship apart with their death rays. I've never seen anything like it," she told the other admiral as she took the glass of ambrosia and downed it in one attempt. "I saw Tauron burning. The Earth Alliance used nukes, super nukes. Those weapons blew the atmosphere into space," she hissed while she was offered and accepted another glass. "They killed everyone!" she muttered viciously. The memories were burned into her brain and she couldn't get them out of her mind.

Taxia was furious. "So, it was the Thirteenth Tribe attacking us! Why are they doing this?"

"Don't know," Cain growled viciously. "Don't care. I just know we're going to find a way to make them pay for what they've done. We're going to wipe out the Thirteenth no matter how long it takes."

The other admiral had no problem with that. "We are stuck here. We have no orders to engage at home," he said, his voice full of frustration. "Info is sparse. I need to know what we're fighting against."

Cain glared at him and nodded. "First-hand experience," she explained. "The records are already downloading into your ships." Helena's voice was cold as she told her story. "They hit us without warning. Jump point sensors didn't trigger. They don't use jump points. They use some kind of open tunnel from what we're calling dimensional space. It throws them into normal space and takes them a while to slow down enough to maneuver."

"Taxia, that's their one major weakness. They had four kinds of capital ships. The smallest looks almost like a water submersible. The firepower is impressive. It uses missile, and lasers. But it also has a single beam cannon using an energy type we still can't identify. The next is a heavy cruiser class with multiple weapons platforms and missiles. It carries a small number of fighters. The largest is a monster. Every ship that went up against it died." Cain looked at the XO who just arrived and sat down to hear her story.

"Listen to me. They have energy shields that can block as many as three direct hits from our heavy nukes. There was another problem. We couldn't get a sustained lock. Those ships have some kind of scattering field which skews targeting as much as three percent. Out standard targeting cannot come lock on. Weapons don't come anywhere near their ships at range.

"Gods," the XO whispered. "You couldn't target them even if you could get through the shields."

"Getting through their shields is possible," She told them. "Twelve to fifteen direct hits can overwhelm those shields. But that causes another problem. the Earther's weapon's range is three times ours. Those beam weapons are strong enough to melt and cut apart battlestars. Their gunships can swarm battlestars and cut them apart like cheese. The only thing we have are our vipers against their fighters. Theirs are strong and have longer weapon's strike capability. We have better pilots, and DRADIS can burn through their stealth and ECM of the fighters and small capitals."

Taxia was quiet as he digested the information. "It sounds like suicide going up against them," he muttered. "We need some kind of edge."

"We received a raptor courier yesterday. The brass wants us to hit the Scorpio ship -yards. Destroy everything, leave nothing for the Earthers. It's a delaying tactic. The President is preparing for a general evacuation of the colonies when the mission starts."

"That is impossible," the CO hissed. "Sirs, we can get maybe three percent of the population to safety. Where can they evac to?"

"That's for the President to decide. Our is how to accomplish our mission." Helena stopped to consider. "We're going to have to be prepared for the consequences," she told them. "The Earthers may decide to retaliate. They could destroy a world, another one. We can't even surrender, not if we even wanted to. The cylons are going to have to wait."

Those words cost her. Everyone knew how much she hated the cylons. But Taxia saw that she now hated the Earthers more. She would never surrender, no matter what. He couldn't blame her, because he felt the same way.

"The cylons may not be the problem, if we're reading our data correctly. Our probes…"

"You sent probes into Cylon Territory," she yelled. "That is a violation of the treaty. It's a guarantee of war. I may have to place you on report." Her look was frightening. "Now that the reprimand is officially done, what did you find out?" she practically smiled. "Capital thinking."

Admiral Taxia never cracked a smile, but Cain knew he appreciated it. The report would never get to their superiors. "We haven't seen any signs of Cylon activity in the last month. Two weeks ago, I ordered a stealth probe to sector four. Those readings confirmed what our long distance DRADIS detected. There were multiple large scale nuclear detonations occurring in their territory. ECM went off the scales. They were fighting against someone. Maybe they had a civil war, but something's up."

"They're fighting the Thirteenth," Concluded Helena.

"I wouldn't doubt it."

Cain started to flex her fingers. The meds were wearing off, and her wrist was beginning to throb. "Let the Earthers wipe them out," Cain hissed.

"But not too soon," countered Taxia. "I hope the Cylons fight them tooth and nail to the end. It'll give us time." Helen looked hostile towards the inference, but it lasted only a few seconds, as she did agree with his sentiments. "Admiral Cain, I suggest you go to med bay. I will see that your ships receive supplies and your crew taken care of. Get some rest if you're able to."

"We'll meet in six hours and start working on plans to keep this from being a suicide mission."

"Yes, Admiral, sir," she answered.

There was a smile on her lips. Some of the burden was lifted off er. She got up slowly, almost at the point of collapse. However, Taxia stopped her.

"Hold on a moment, Helena. I forgot to ask. Have you heard anything about the status of the Pythia shipyards?"

"Earth attacked the yards two days after the initial attacks. They knew exactly where everything was located," she answered. "They had to have planned this for months, if not longer."

"No assistance from the Cylons?"

Helena paused for a bit in thought and then sat back down. "The Cylons wouldn't associate with the Thirteenth, even if they thought it was to their advantage. Some of our secret installations were attacked, and the Cylons knew nothing about them. Consider the fact that the cylons were presumably attacked before the earthers hit the Colonies. I Don't believe they were working together. With their power base, they didn't need the help."

"I agree with you. Just wanted to see if we were on the same page. Pythia?"

"The Galactica group made it there and got out before everything hit the fan. The Galactica's back was broken, so Adama took one of the Minoans and escaped with a small fleet. He may be at Ragnar resupplying, but how long he'll stay there, I don't know. He won't stay there long. The Earthers know where most of our secret bases are located."

"I'm surprised the old gal survived as long as it did. But Adama knows more about warfare than we do."

"He wishes," grumbled Cain. "I wish my father was out here." But not on my ship. The fight for the Pegasus would be epic between them. "But we need him, and theOold Man will be there when we need him. He may have gone to HenJin Station. We'll find out later."

"On a personal note, My condolences. Kunningham and Halima, and the rest of the Diplomatic fleet." His laugh was bitter. "What a fraken joke. We tried to make amends. We learned the Earthers weren't worth it. They made us look like fools!"

"The DF were good people," Helena muttered. She loved her sister, although they fought like cats and dogs. But Helena knew as well as Taxia that the diplomatic fleet was either dead or imprisoned. The Earthers wouldn't have allowed them to escape. It was likely the Earthers got most of their information from that fleet. Those people had to be dead. It was another reason why she intended to crack the Tau'ri world in two when their brethren got themselves together. "Can't blame them for trying. It seemed like a good idea, unification. We see now how that went."

"One more thing since you sat back down," the man half smirked. "This is serious. Did Brass have any hint that the cylons were experimenting with something new?"

"Like what?" she blurted out. "No, there wasn't anything told to me," she answered slowly. Now, her tiredness had evaporated, and she watched her counterpart carefully. "What made you go to this line of questioning?"

At first, she thought the man hadn't heard her, and that bothered her on a visceral level. Quickly, he snapped out of it. "Probes never saw any evidence of Cylon activity, which was unusual. But we did see…something."

It wasn't like Taxia to hesitate. Something was off. "What is it, Branchius?"

"We captured this video three days after I ordered the probe launched." He got up and activated a video. "I keep running this video over and over again."

At first Helena saw nothing. Seconds later, something that had never happened to her occurred. Her mouth dropped open. "What is it? Is that real?"

"We don't know." He confessed. On the screen was a monstrosity the likes of which neither of them had ever seen. It looked like a giant space spider. It was jet black, but it glistened in the starlight, which was why the probe was able to capture the image. "We measure it at almost two kilometers. My question is, did the Cylons create this thing, or is it some kind of space dwelling organism we've never seen before?"

Helena thought about it. It was an excellent question. "If they are fighting, then that may be what they're fighting. An experiment gone bad, or a new enemy? It might not be the Earthers, or the thing might just be a freak of nature that has nothing to do with anything. I don't know. There are too many questions."

"Something like that so close to our space worries me," he admitted. "The earthers are bad enough. I don't want something like that anywhere near the Colonies."

"Gods, I hope we don't have to deal with that, whatever it might be. I don't think it's Cylon related." She yawned.

"Go get some rest, Admiral. We'll disgust this later. And yes, I sent another probe."

"I didn't hear you say that, just like you didn't hear me say that I'm sending a couple of them myself."

Admiral Cain left to get some much need rest and some more pain medication, but she wasn't sure if she would get any rest at all. Something new had been added to her plate of worries and it might stay in her nightmares.

Minoan Battlestar Erétris

Commander William Adama was now acting admiral of a small fleet of Colonial warships, survivors of the unrelenting attacks by Earth forces, ravaging everything they came in contact with. What was clear to Adama was that the Earthers weren't interested in anything other than stealing everything they could get their hands on. Two worlds were known to be dead, but Caprica hadn't been hit that hard. He believed he knew why. The Earth people wanted his leaders to witness exactly what was happening and being helpless to do anything to stop it. Those thoughts burned in his gut. There was a cold fury within he could barely suppress.

The Earthers were radiating further and further from the Cyrannus system, picking off installations, shipyards both civilian and military, and generally cutting the colonials off from any and all resources. They were doing an excellent job.

Every single ship in his small fleet was damaged to one degree or another. The Galactica's back was broken in its last jump to Pythia. The surviving crew of the Galactica and the Royal Athena commandeered the newly built Minoan-class BattlestarErétris. Those that were with the commander took everything they could salvage, including the partially damaged battlestars and fled, but not before they sabotaged the shipyards. True to their pattern, the Earthers went after the shipyards and those ships left behind. When the nukes went off, three of their capitals were blown into their component parts. They believe it to be abandoned. That was true, but they didn't consider booby-trap. That cost them.

It was a small victory, but one the Colonial military loved. Clearly, the earthers were using the Cyrannus system and the colonies as a staging area. Hundreds of ships were there, with more arriving every day. All evidence pointed towards them preparing for a major thrust, target unknown.

He didn't care what their mission was. He did care about them being wiped out and kicked out of the Cyrannus system, preferably with nukes up their tailpipes. Several times, he had to be convinced not to attack the earthers directly, in some type of glorious final battle. There was no chance of winning, and their munitions were extremely low. If they were to fight, they had to get to some hidden station not already captured by the Earth traitors. That left three hidden caches. Ragnar was one of them. Admiral Cain was either at the cylon-border or heading there, and there was no doubt she was planning a massive counterstrike, and he wanted to be ready. There were a lot of civilians out there that needed help, but that wasn't his problem. If they were to survive, then colonial forces had to hit back and win. Otherwise, Colonial life as they knew it would go extinct. He had his priorities. Get to Ragnar and get those supplies and parts so his squadron would be ready when it was time to take back the Colonies.

The decision made, adama gave the order.

Colonel Tigh, sober for the moment gave the order. "Plot a course for Ragnar. We jump in one-half hour."

One half hour later, the smal Coloniall fleet jumped right into the middle of a Cylon armada.

Tigh almost threw up all the liquor he'd just ingested minutes earlier.

"All hands, battle stations!" roared a shocked, and frightened Adama.

The surrounded colonial squadron, unprepared desperately organized themselves to fight for their lives.

TBC