1140 hrs 2 December 2552 (Military Calendar)
Kobol Orbit
UNSC Able
Captain Brian Jackson stood on the catwalk inside the Able's small hanger as his airwing of four Longswords came in to refuel and rearm. Ever since the flood had emerged from the Pelican and absorbed nearly all of the naval and marine personnel on the dig site every Longsword the UNSC and Viper the Galactica had was flying overwatch at the ancient human AI Genesis instruction. As he watched the Longswords head back out again his mind drifted back to last night.
He was on the bridge overseeing the surveys and gig going on as the fleet drifted in a high geosynchronous orbit over Kobol President Elizabeth Horner was standing still in awe at the ancient homeworld of humanity to her left was the new Vice president Laura Roslin and Pope Titus on the right. Roslin was looking better then she had when they found her thanks to the anticancer medication.
"As you can see Madam president and vice president the situation is well in hand UNSC and Colonial survey parties are planet wide already and many ancient artifacts of our peoples have been recovered and are awaiting transport into orbit."
"When would we be able to walk the holy ground of Kobol ourselves?" asked Pope Titus
"Civilian's will be allowed to make planetfall once we make sure it's safe from the information we have from your own scrolls as well as what we got from Genesis there was a brutal war we wouldn't want you or some other civilian to hit a booby trap or mine that's still active."
Roslin and Horner looked at each other for a moment and started to say "that makes since how long do you thi…" the viewscreen came to life cutting them off.
"Hawaii-Actual this is Marine 3-1." First Sergeant Gene Ruiz called from the excavation site. His armor covered in ice and snow reloading his rifle as gunshots and screaming could be heard in the background over the video "The pelican contained…fuck i dont know we have muliple marines and squids down request evac and cover.!" The camera looked to show grotesque and malformed humans shooting towards naval and marine personnel with a wide scope of weapons.
"Marine 3-1 this is Able-Actual understood." Brian said turning to order only to have the Arrow of Apollo blink into view glowing an ominous orange rather than the normal incandescent blue and Genesis's hologram appeared "Flood biomass detected." she turned to Brian with a look of sadness "they may already be infected."
"Then we can treat them." said Brian turning to nod at Aaron who started typing out commands. Before turning back to her "we don't leave people behind we have nearly a thousand people on the Planet down there."
"I'm sorry Brian." The Ai said "chances are they are already infected. If you bring them up here you will surely infect the rest of your people and the rest of the humans of this galaxy."
Brian clenched his fist watching as the pelicans and longswords tore away from the fleet toward the planet leaving the slower vipers to escort the raptors launching from the Galactica "can you detect the infection?" Brian said "what if we quarantine them?"
She shook her head "the moment they are infected by a flood form it takes only an hour to become contagious." she said "when they exhale a breath they can spread the spores infecting others. By hour two they begin to suffer neurological effects as the flood rewrites their DNA. By hour five they are a prisoner inside their own body timescales do shift from person to person but the end result is the same. "
"Still we have to try..Evacuate the Colossus and divert all pelicans and raptors to carry the survivors there." Brian ordered " we can remotely screen them there and get the uninfected out of there before the ones that become contagious can be frozen in cryo while we look for a way to cure them."
Brian caught a small sad smile but ignored it. He watched as the Hyena and Rushmore came alongside the Colossus evacuating her entire crew. When Genesis spoke up in a quiet voice "it might be a good idea to disable the ship to ensure they can't move during the screening and cryo process."
He nodded "have Commander Wheeler jettison the Slipspace drive and the primary reactor." brian said "the ship's batteries are more than enough to keep life support, medical, and cryo online."
He watched as the corvettes Deimos and Nightfall took the two jettisoned pieces in tow and pulled them clear of the ship just as the first Pelicans left the atmosphere.
Genesis turned to him "before I leave to scan the survivors I recommend a blockade of the planet. We don't know if the flood has access to any other ships and all of your pelicans should be thoroughly decontaminated before letting them back aboard if a single flood spore can destroy a world." and with that warning the arrow blinked, taking the hologram with it turning back to watch the feed of the Colossus.
POV change
Genesis cursed in nearly ten thousand different languages as the arrow reappeared hovering off of the frigate's hull. Her ancient masters spent nearly a thousand years fighting and researching the flood in her databases; she held a large amount of that information. Using the nanites that the arrow was made of she connected to the frigate and easily bypassed the firewalls and cyber security without bothering to use the passwords she had found inside the Able's computer.
Interfacing with the repair and maintenance drones aboard the Colossus she began modifying the life support and internal sensors to take constant samples of the atmosphere and body information on the people boarding. Using the ship's internal sensors she watched the first fourteen people come aboard all of them UNSC personnel from their implants information.
Using the drones she pulled marine and navy utilities from the ship's stores pulling them to medical. As well as incendiary grenades from the ship's armory to incinerate all clothing and weapons from the surface on the off chance they may have been contaminated.
Taking DNA samples from their implants medical scan she called out "All personnel are to strip to ensure no contamination from the surface can spread. All discarded clothing and equipment are to be stored in the compartment on your immediate right. Samuel Connors, Micheal Thomas, and Janie Roberts, i have detected trace amounts of infection in the hopes of stopping or slowing down the infection please head directly to Cryo Bay one. Where you will immediately be put on ice while medical and science personnel have a chance to find a cure. Everyone else heads to Medbay for decontamination."
The three people she had indicated started to protest but were quickly shut down by genesis "you have approximately forty three minutes" she lied "before you become contagious to others so it's up to you everyone can go into storage as the infection spreads or just the three of you."
As the three people she had indicated with early stage one infection filed off towards the cryo bay, the other eleven headed towards medbay talking amongst themselves. Once they were clear she had a drone deposit the grenade on top of the pile and triggered the weapon. Her holographic eyes watched as the weapons melted and the clothes and armor turned to ash in the intense heat and then when she was satisfied opened the hanger to space to snuff the fire out. Just in time to accept the next pelican of people.
Over the next forty five minutes the same routine progressed until there was only a handful of Pelicans remaining. Of the eight hundred and forty nine people recovered from the surface two hundred and eight were found to be infected and put into cryosleep. The others were given a full decontamination shower and deep clean to get any minute traces that remained unabsorbed.
As she mapped out the infected people's location on the planet after each group there was no pattern. It was widespread. Some of them were infected dozens of kilometers from the pelican…
"Able-actual this is Genesis beware of additional flood sources on the planet. There have been infected personnel recovered planet wide."
"Genesis this is Able we 's not just the single pelican."
POV change
Brian Jackson watched as seismic activity on the planet triggered the collapse of a sinkhole on the southern continent and dozens of banshees Spirits and Phantoms came soaring out all of them covered in a moldish green.
The UNSC Deimos, Nightfall, trebuchet, and Catapult in a low orbit screening the last five Pelicans of the ground personnel turned their Ramparts point defense guns toward the new enemy.
"Sir!" called Ensign Conners from her weapons station " we are detecting a huge amount of Nanolaminate armor somehow fused with the rock at the center of the sinkhole."
"If it's a full Covenant ship we can't afford to let it get clear or dig itself out of the ground." said Brian "I want a MAC barrage aimed for the center of the sinkhole ready, one of the new Shiva's as well, just in case."
"Aye sir," replied Conners "from what we can see of the Nanolam armor it does not match any known Covenant ships"she said, typing in firing solutions and targeting parameters.
"Doesnt matter its covenant and they are infected with this flood." Brian said "fire when ready."
Six MAC's fired in sync towards the sinkhole. The shells' shockwave through the planet's upper atmosphere shattered several of the small dropships and fighters, their remains falling back to the ground.
"Detecting energy buld…." Aaron started only to be cut of as four solid beams of plasma shot upward intersecting the incoming Mac shells "that was a Covenant glassing beam" said Aaron
"I recognized it" Brian said at this point no one in the UNSC didn't know what that looked like "ready another salvo along with archers and the Shiva warhead. Divert all power to the MAC and fire when ready."
Conners watched her terminal as power flooded the capacitors 75% 84% 96% 100% "firing"
Across the fleet hundreds of Archer missiles fired hidden among them the new Shiva warhead using Colonial Plutonium and UNSC techniques and then the MAC's fired again. Brian and everyone else watched with bated breath as the swarm of missiles were ignored in favor of firing on the MACs. The beams fired again vaporizing the MAC shells this time, however one of the beams had been aimed to target the largest ship in orbit, the Galactica.
The beam sliced through the Galactica's engines at the same time as the thousands of missiles and the shiva. The nuke was halfway in the pack when it struck and detonated the explosion vaporized every missile behind it. The 28 megaton blast swallowed the sinkhole and everything else for over a kilometer in every direction.
The Galactica port rear engines were severed by the beam burning tilyum, atmosphere, and crew spilling into the void. Commander Saul Tigh came over the radio "we have been hit catastrophic damage, if we take another hit like that the old girl won't survive. Request medical and engineering assistance."
Brian tore his eyes from the nuclear firestorm on the planet to stare wide eyed at the Galactica "launch all Pelicans get medical and engineers over there now."
"We cant sir." said Lieutenant Wilks from her helm station all of our pelicans are contaminated from the planet."
Shit… he looked around "move the Hyena, Rushmore, and Hawaii physically dock with the Galactica to render aid." he looked back at the planet and the expanding mushroom cloud "any trace of further covenant or flood activity?"
Aaron looked over the combined reports in his head "Not at this time sir"
"We can't allow the flood on the planet to spread. We have that Raptor aboard right?" Brian asked and Aaron looked up and nodded "send word back to Scorpia we need , and every ship to meet us here we have to glass this world to ensure they are wiped from the face of this galaxy.
"Yes sir." Aaron said.
Genesis who was listening in "what about Athena? She has the authorization for the matter relay."
Aaron Grimaced "I have a plan for that."
—-
Authors note
in case anyone is confused the mass of nano armor is a chunk of High Charity thrown just like the pelican from the in amber clad they dug themselves out when the pelican of flood was fighting it's fair to say high charity would of had hundreds if not thousands of phantoms spirits and other covenant aircraft since their biggest ship building forges were there as well as their own internal defence force. Hope you enjoy it and will keep reading.
Reviews
Guest yes as of this moment she is the sole surviving member of the Virgon royal family go read the last imperial fleet by fabius maximus where i pulled the princess and the imperial Virgonese fleet from it's a great story. As for the destroyer I said when the forge was completed it could build a ship as large as that inside and they ran out of materials before the forge could be completed. Don't worry, the cylon war is still continuing in the background. We will get back to it for a few chapters before coming back to the flood. Remember, in a multi planet war things are always in motion even if you don't see it.
Morgriff yes im sure it could use some editing however its just trying to be a serious crossover across multiple POVs planet and fleet battles it's not perfect but it's an interesting read isn't it?... every group as soon as they are found are scanned i figured since ive said it multiple times by this point it would be wise the readers know its a precaution that happens each time… maybe but what if thats what drove the original human model cylons insane? Going from a mechanical body to a biological one flush with hormones and chemicals? That's why Genesis was completely shut down like power off until earth humans touched her and hit the power button so while 40k years have passed on the outside no time at all has passed since she shut herself down like blinking your eyes while driving. At least that's my thought on it anyway.
Darkfinder what?Why didn't anyone ask if the war was still going?...and yeah had to follow the timeline for starbuck to come back galactica and the fleet were running like bats out of hell think how far they traveled in just the episode 33 when they got attacked and had to jump every 33 minutes they had no clue what was going on.