"The three ships had managed to survive the Cylons by hiding and joined another fleet made up of the decommissioned Battlestar Cunningham and several other civilian and military ships, about 20 or 30 strong. They had been trying to follow the Galactica and had gotten to Ragnar mere hours after the fleet had left for the Prolmar Sector. They had been following but the three ships had been separated during the process only a week ago, and from the information given on the ship they had a rough idea of where the fleet would be."
The Survivors of the Colonies: A Detailed Guide
Chapter 15: Hunt for Cunningham
"Commander, the latest raptor reports are in." Major Carry Foln asked.
"You would have told me if we found anything already." Commander Hudson replied.
"You're right sir. We're narrowing down the search pattern though and they might be able to find them soon if they still are within the grid that we are searching in."
The small fleet that he had to search for the larger fleet led by Cunningham had his ship the Lansing, four Chester Class light cruisers, and a converted civilian freighter that had been repurposed to carry supplies and more raptors for scouting. Alongside that were the three ships that had been separated from their fleet. These had extra raptors for scouting, and generally a large number of the fleet's raptors.
"You have a briefing on Cunningham I believe that you were going to share with me?" He asked.
"Yes sir. The Cunningham is a modernized block four Valkyrie Class but she does have more upgrades than what is normal for the type, making her perhaps individually one of the most modern ships in the fleet. She had been deployed with a small task force to crush several major and minor threats to the colonies, including taking on a pirate group that had stolen a Battlestar, a successor organization to Soldiers of the One that had been responsible for several terrorist attackers, and Sagitarion Separatists among others."
"Impressive," Hudson said. "What's her commander?"
"A certain Amanda Garrett sir. She's young but has an impressive record already. Did the standard track to command a Battlestar, became a Viper pilot, etc but she has a few medals for when she landed and helped save a tug and its cargo from crashing into Scorpia Shipyards. Once she got to be the commander of Cunningham she did a bunch of the things that I mentioned above, and despite her age would probably be on her way to Admiral."
"I have a list of the ships that are currently with her, or at least as of a week ago." She said as well. "The original ships in the task force are there, which include of course the Cunningham, a gunstar, a heavy cruiser, two light cruisers, four faststars, including the one that we currently have with us, a fleet tender, and resupply ship, and a marine assault ship that appears to have some modifications and holds a lot of the Marine's Special Naval Force. As for civilians, there are 28 ships including the two that we have here."
"Alright, so if I see something that matches that description I'll know what I'm looking at." He said.
It had been four days so far, and the task force was now about halfway past the search pattern they were engaging in. Due to the dozens of raptors, they had a good idea of where they were not as in the more likely places they had put beacons that would alert him as to where they were if they showed up.
"Where are you, Cunningham?" He asked himself. There was little that he could do right now but he was anxious to see where the fleet was and find it.
They had enough raptors that they could have the pilots fly in shifts and the ships fly at nearly their limits when it came to upkeep. There were over a hundred running missions and at any given time about 25 out on a mission.
Sharon had been sent to oversee the raptor scouting, being the senior raptor officer in the fleet. This had come with a promotion to Captain which she was happy with. She was starting to get used to having Crashdown as her ECO but she still preferred Helo and wondered if he was still alive.
"Anything?" She asked as the sensors went active. They hadn't found anything yet and it was starting to get annoying.
"No joy… wait never mind we have something." He said. "Looks like the hulk of a basestar that's been destroyed."
"My gods," Sharon murmured as the ship came into view. Most of it had been destroyed and the parts that hadn't had been spread over a wide area. There was wreckage of vipers, raptors, and raiders but a lot more of the latter than the former, indicating that the Battlestar had been victorious. And there was no noticeable wreckage of colonial capital ships which indicated that they had gotten away. They must have been able to get away.
"Looks like the carbon scoring indicates that this battle was only about a day ago." She said,
"And looks like I found something else, wait it's a tylium leak that is going in a clear direction." He said.
"Punch in some coordinates because I want to follow this," Sharon said. "This could lead us to the fleet."
Soon they were traveling in the trajectory of the fleet, following the leak of tylium. After a few hours, however, they had gotten nowhere.
"We can only make one more jump before we have to return," Sharon said.
"Well, at least we have a lead," Crashdown said. "These are the last coordinates that I think might have the fleet."
They entered FTL and soon were propelled across space.
And into the middle of the fleet that they were trying to find, only a kilometer from a large civilian supertanker.
Sharon jerked up and away from the fast-approaching craft as Vipers flying a combat air patrol prepared to intercept them. However, they soon realized that it was a colonial ship and this was confirmed again with a message to the fleet broadcasted by Valeri.
"This is Raptor 6527 from the Battlestar Galactica, we're friendly." She said before reading the battlestar's authentication number out that the fleet's way of ensuring the fleet wasn't facing a ship trying to imitate one of the colonial ships."
"We found three of your ships under Cylon captivity and have freed them and their crews." She continued.
"Very well Raptor, by gods this is a miracle." The ship replied. Come aboard at your leisure."
In the CIC of the Battlestar Commander Amanda Garrett looked around at the men and women in here. For the past month she had been looking for the Galactica, and assuming that this wasn't a trap she was ready to send her fleet there.
She turned to the executive officer of the ship, Colonel Ken Hiro. He had been the second in command of this ship for longer than she had been the CO but didn't mind playing second fiddle to her. She had proven herself capable of handling crisis after crisis, dealing with numerous dangerous missions before the Cylons had attacked, and even under immense pressure had led the fleet to survival time and time again.
"Come with me." She said and headed down to the port flight pod where the raptor had arrived. Marine guards had already set up a perimeter so if the Cylons were attempting to infiltrate they would be ready.
Sharon and Alex got out of the raptor and the dozen marines relaxed. They stood at attention and Amanda greeted them with a warm smile.
"Welcome to Cunningham." She said, "I'm so glad that you are here!"
Author's note: Happy New Year everyone!
Cunningham and her crew are based on a pretty obscure book series. Shoutout to anyone who can guess where I drew the inspiration.
A couple of notes about the Valkyrie Class: it's a bit confusing that the ship was seen in Blood and Chrome during the end of the Cylon war and also in Razor during the fall of the colonies.
I've come up with an explanation for the purposes of my story and also Reap the Whirlwind, along with anything else I end up doing in the BSG universe. You see, there are multiple versions of the Valkyrie. The original version was made towards the end of the first Cylon war and was actually not that large, about 600 meters in a similar size to what we saw before in terms of the size shown on screen. However, there are more variants that were created as time went on and were bigger and generally better until we get the light battlestar that is about a kilometer in length known as the Valkyrie MK 4. Both the Cunningham and Valkyrie are of this model and any other Valk mentioned in the series is also an MK 4 unless otherwise stated. So that was my brief tangent on the Valkyrie class.
The Cunningham also had some modifications that are abnormal to her type of ship, these may come up later.