0515 hours 25 November 2552

Slipspace

UNSC Able

Captain Brian Jackson looked up from his desk as the door to his stateroom opened and Commander Aaron Wilson walked in. The jump from Scorpia to the coordinates that had been recovered from the Colonial pilot Lieutenant Kara "Starbuck" Thrace would be about three and a half hours.

"Our esteemed guest is awake" says Arron as he leans against the bulkhead.

Brian closed the file he was reading over titled "Kobol" "ok let's go see what our unfriendly Vice admiral has to say."

As the two men started walking the halls of the destroyer before they could take a few steps towards the brig, they came across President Elizabeth Horner. She was looking from a datapad to the corridors to her left and right.

"Madam president are you lost?" asked Wilson

The president almost jumped at the voice turning to look agt the two men coming from behind her. "Ah Captain, commander." she greeted them both "just the people i wanted to see."

The two men looked at each other before turning back to Elizabeth "what were you looking for us for?" asked Brian.

"The President's smile faded slightly." I wanted to talk about your plans if you're able to go back to Earth."

Brian nodded understandingly "you're worried we will immediately head back to our space? "At her nod he smiled as well " while there is no guarantee we can go back." he said "it is my plan and my duty to return and continue the fight against the covenant."

"And with the last two months of combat" started Aaron "and the weapons and facilities either operational or already complete i have no doubt you'll be able to continue pushing the cylons back and reclaim your homes."

She nods uncertainty "everything your ships and crews have done can never be repaired." she said taking both men's hands in one of hers "however when you get back id like for you to pass along a request for the Colonies to join the UNSC in their struggle against the covenant. You should know before we left I passed along these sentiments to my husband and several other members of surviving colonial and colony governments and they approved that without what your people have sacrificed none of us would be alive today."

Both men looked shocked at the president's request to join the UNSC against the covenant. But before they could say anything she continued "to make sure we pull our own weight i also ordered the non stop construction at Scorpia of UNSC design ships." she said proudly "as well as a eighty percent conversion of Picon's yards."

Brian held his hands up for her to stop "Madam president while that is good news for your people that is above my paygrade." he looked at her and then at Aaron who understood

"Madam president you do understand the covenant holds a significant technological edge over us right? He pressed "you saw at least some of the carnage and destruction in the Artemis archives we have been pushed back for the last thirty years, our largest military and shipbuilding star system was under attack when we came here. Even if half the fleet joined the system defence force, chances are better than even that the planet has been glassed by this point and the fleet…what's left of it anyway is high tailing it to Earth."

The president looked determined "And? We were on the verge of extinction and you still threw your lot in with us." she looked both men in the eyes in a way that made it clear she wasn't backing down. "How can we do any less than you"

Brian pinched his nose and sighed "very well upon our return we will pas the word along to the diplomatic corps"

Aaron tapped him and said "now that that's out of the way remember the deserter."

Brian sighed again and turned to look at the president "if you excuse me madam president i have an urgent matter to attend to."

She stepped to the side and they continued along towards the brig.

Back on their way Aaron asked about the file "that Kobol file, anything useful in it?"

"Their sacred scrolls tell of a story how humans evolved on Kobol around five thousand years ago with great prosperity and technological innovation developing space travel and setting up colonies and the like even living side by side with their gods. and then something went wrong. It's not clear but it seems like a tech uprising and they were cast out in some kind of disaster leading to a great exodus leading the survivors to flee across the stars to find the twelve colonies. I have found several mentions of Earth like "Athena resting place seals the location of our brothers of Earth to unseal the bounty your aim must be true with Apollo's arrow" and "when the thirteenth tribe set upon the earth they looked into the heavens and could see their twelve brothers."

"That's some crazy shit if true." said Aaron "to think the ancient Greek myths may have some truth behind them." he turned to look at Brian i have a plan so just follow my lead."

"Your show but let's focus on the issue at hand." Brian reminded him "the admiral" opened the door to the interrogation room to expose the man in question secured to a chair behind a table, hands and ankles secured to the chair.

"Good Morning" said Brian with a small smile "Admiral"

John Jacobe, a rear admiral in the now defunct CMA stared daggers at them "you have no right to do this i am an innocent man."

Aaron scoffed, pulling a chair out and sitting next to Brian opposite John " an innocent man?" Aaron sets a file with John's name on it on the table and opens it "its public knowledge in UNSC data files now that you were using the manufacturing bays of the Olympus Mons to manufacture weapons and vehicles for the successionest all over the outer rim."

Photos were brought out and John's eyes grew wide and sweat beaded on his face "no that wasn't me i wasn't doing that."

Brian was playing his role not reacting to Aarons ploy, simply watching quietly. As Aaron continued.

Old surveillance photos showing gold bars being exchanged for a warthog with a trailer full of weapons. Shipboard cameras showing still shots of men and women in civilian clothes climbing into the cockpit of old F-29 Nando's and S-14 Baselard fighters and Pelicans. Seeing these the former Admiral mouth snapped shut.

"So admiral." Aaron said with a small smile leaning forward "tell us what you know and maybe we can cut a deal."

"H…h…how?" stammered the so-called admiral.

Leaning forward Aaron whispered into John's ear "Semper Vigilans" before leaning back with a wink at Brian.

John's eyes went wide hearing it his mouth dried up and he started to shiver at the thought of what those two words in latin meant scooting his chair back as far as he could John stammered "f…fin fine i'll tell you whatever you w….wa…want to know…"

Brian looked at Aaron with a slightly lifted eyebrow that said we will talk about this later. Before turning back to the quivering John "you will answer truthfully on the record and if my assistant here says you're lying." he paused letting the threat remain unspoken.

"Tr…truth i'll say nothing but the god's honest truth." John said.

"Good first question" Brian said "how did you become a prisoner of the jackal pirates?"

John answered without hesitation "I was on my way to meet with Commander Samual Davis at the Conklin Aerodynamics ship storage yards of Bliss in the Faelith system. They had just received a shipment of Charon class frigates and Mako class corvettes the CMA was getting rid of them to make room for modernized ships. And Davis messaged me saying they were for fale for the right price." looking at Aaron's expressionless face he continued. "I arranged for their purchase as well as lots of other equipment recently deemed out of date and when my fleet arrived it was burning. The covenant was in the process of bombarding the planet from orbit and everything was gone."

"Did you try to fight?" asked Brian "Or just run"

John's eyes narrowed "we did both." he smiled "we always arrive in-system with fully charged MACs since the Covenant first attacked Harvest. That far out in the outer colonies. Can't tell you the number of times it saved our lives. We kept on the move never staying one place too long as the war progressed we kept our armories and hangers filled with salvaged munitions and equipment." he looked at both of them "when we received word that Alpha Covill fell to the covenant we waited nearly a week for them to move on. Once they left we moved in, the UNSC had lost a dozen ships. The covenant continued chaining the fleet as they withdrew. We rescued nearly a thousand people from the wreck and even patched up a pair of Halberd destroyers to keep pace with us as more and more repairs were made, we kept following the covenant battle after battle we swooped in, rescued the survivors if there were any and salvaged what we could. We encountered and destroyed our fair share of Covenant ships too." he grinned looking into their eyes "by time Cole lost Harvest i had nearly fifty ships under my command"

His grin faltered "that's when everything fell apart we were heading to Biko in the Kolaqua system when something happened with the Mons slipspace drive we some kind of malfunction but we had no idea one moment it was drawing no power and we were in real space all alone and the next it would draw neary ten times its normal power. And the inky black of slipspace would be a kaleidoscope of colors." the color drained from his face "and then it just shut down…the Mons at least some of her was suddenly somewhere else less than ten percent of the ship was picked up by the kig yar pirates along with nearly a hundred of my crew."

"So the reason you tried to take command of the Colossus and the rest of the fleet?" asked Aaron.

"To rescue whatever remains of my crew. i was a prisoner of theirs for nearly a month." he said his voice solidifying "i was forced to watch as they ate three of my men for so called disobedience."

Both men looked at each other "wait you have been here only a month?" brian said, "Are you sure?"

Aaron turned his head to show off an older neural link port at the base of his skull "I've been here since 30 October 2552…Why?"

Brian blinked "we have been here since the 30 August of 52 and intel we got from the human crews of Rushmore and Hawaii as well as the others we have recovered say they arrived around the same time."

Without a word Brian tapped Aarons shoulder and they left the room. Once outside the men looked at each other "There could be others." said Brian

"Is that a good thing or a bad thing?" asked Aaron.

Before Brian could reply his comlink buzzed Captan Jackson and Specialist Samuels in sickbay. It's about the incident with the marines from Caprica."

"What did you find out, doc?" inquired Brian as both of them listened in

"Well sir it's strange physically they are fine a bit of vertigo nothing serious." said samuels "however once our equipment interfaced with the marines implants we noticed a sophisticated intrusion fingerprint in the code a copy was made of the linked network shared by the marines."

"English doctor what happened?" said Aaron.

"Oh XO didn't know you were here." said the doc "this really should be more of a classified matter."

"It's fine doc just get to the point."said Brian "what happened to our men."

They could practically hear the doctor's eyes roll as he continued "in layman's terms the marines were hacked and copies of language and history taken, but nothing strictly military speaking like ship deployments or timetables. What's more the arrow is emitting a very weak channel on the Epsilon band." The doc signed the sound of scratching his scalp coming over the line "we placed the arrow in a faraday cage once we detected the channel."

"Good job doc," said Aaron "we should go check this arrow out for ourselves." he said to Brian as he turned toward the sickbay.

Brian reached out a hand to stop him placing it on Aarons shoulder "yes we should. AND on the way there we should talk about what happened in there"

Aaron smiled and chuckled weakly "Is that an Order Captain?"

"What do you think?" Brian asked sarcastically.

As they walked toward sickbay Aaron spilled the tea. He was a ONI spook and had been for nearly two decades primarily deployed among ship crews to better gather intel on the covenant for the information war. And to keep an eye out for any indication of insurrectionist or rebel activity.

The news surprised Brian he had served with Aaron for nearly eleven years. "How many spooks were in my fleet?"

A sad smile crossed Aarons face "I consider you a friend Brian but it's classified even now."

Brian nodded as they walked in silence into sickbay. The thirty bed sickbay was mostly empty except for several engineers standing over a mobile faraday cage with a golden arrow inside.

Specialist Samuel Rogers, seeing them come in, walked over "welcome to sickbay and a temporary lab. The Marines were all cleared for light duty and released"

Brian nodded and looked at the caged arrow "has there been any attempts at communication? You said it had a open channel on the Epsilon band,"

Rogers looked at the arrow "no sir it's been in the cage since we detected it since it immobilized twenty marines i'd hate to see what happens if it connects to the Ables computers."

Aaron nodded this time "understandable can you set up an isolated and secure two way chan…" his voice died in his throat and his eyes widened looking at the arrow.

Brian turned to look and felt his hair stand on end.

It was hovering inside the cage glowing an incandescent blue…