Battlestar Argo
by AJ Marks
Part 20: Confrontation
The senator sat at his desk waiting for his two men to come into the room. It had been a long six months since he had heard from them. A few short messages had come to him but they had relayed nothing. All his efforts to track down where the messages had originated from ended in failure. Now their time from where ever they had been was over and they were heading back.
“Sir, your appointments are here,” his secretary said over the intercom.
“Great, send them in at once,” the senator said hoping to gain information about what Senator Sam was doing.
Two men walked into the room and took a seat waiting for the senator to say something.
“Well, what did you discover,” the senator said. “What is our dear Senator Sam doing with millions of dollars?”
“It’s not what you think, that’s for sure,” Mike said from where he was sitting. He had learned a lot during the last six months. He and David had worked quite a bit on several things.
“Well then, tell me what I’m thinking because I have quite an active imagination,” the senator said.
“For one, it was not located on Earth that was for sure,” David said.
“It’s on the moon, that would explain why you were out of contact so much,” the senator said.
“Actually sir, that’s not where we were either,” Mike said. “It’s actually a planet that they call Centari One.”
“Another planet,” the senator said surprised at what he had just heard. It sounded quite incredible already. “And how did you get there, teleport?”
“No, they had a ship called the Argo at first, but now they have a transport ship called the Hermes which they use to transport people to and from Earth and Centari One,” Mike said.
“And what are they doing on Centari One,” the senator asked his tone saying that he was sure he liked what was being said.
“They are building a fleet, a war fleet,” David said.
The senator’s eye brows went up with this news. He was sure that he did not like this. “And who is the enemy?”
“It seems that we’re helping a group of humans from another planet build a fleet to help them fight an alien race called the Cylons,” David said.
“The Cylons, and another planet full of humans, sounds ridiculous to me,” the senator said scoffing what he had just heard.
“It may be, but they are building a warship right not, they are calling it the Tiger,” Mike said. “I worked on it during my time there.”
“That idiot Sam,” the senator said. “It’s obvious that they are using us to build a fleet of warships to use on us,” the senator said. To him it all made perfect sense. “We must destroy that base now before things progress too far.”
“I agree, and I have a plan,” David said. It was something that he had been thinking about for a while now. He did not believe anything that he had heard about a race called the Cylons. He thought that they were part of a group that was disguising themselves to look like humans in order to overtake Earth using ships they had built.
“Good,” the senator said. “Let hear it.”
*****
Bri climbed up into her viper and let the crew hand her her helmet. Adjusting it and putting it on she then went through the start up routine. All three engines were fueled and ready for launch. Renee had just finished relaying the information to her about her patrol. She then had permission to launch when she was ready. With a deep breath and a slow exhale she pushed down on the thruster button.
The three massive engines roared to life accelerating the viper out of the launch tube forcing her back against the seat. It took a few seconds for her to adjust to the speed as her viper existed out of the launch tube. In front of her she could see Troy’s viper which had launched just before her. She had really thought that after they had been sealed that Commander Ares would split them up.
Bri was sure that there was not going too much of a problem with the patrol. There was nothing out there that they had found yet. The commander however was not going to take any chanced of anything happening. Ever since Troy had mentioned his vision to them Ares had stepped up the patrols.
That really did not bother her as it gave the pilots something else to do rather than just shuttle people to and from the planet’s surface. This time their flight path would bring them in on the path of the returning Hermes. They were going to test the new scanners to see if they were improved enough to detect the ship. It was something that Weaver and his team of both Colonials and Earth personal were working on.
The scientist had taken to Earth technology with a renew energy when he learned about all the technology that they had. Computers that were more advanced than the computers they had. They were also learning about how to divide up all of the computers on the upcoming class of ships so that if one system was affected by the Cylons the rest of the ship would not be.
“Heads up,” Troy said over the radio about half way into their patrol. “I’ve got the Hermes on my scanner.”
Bri looked down and noticed that the ship did appear on her scanner. It was not very strong but it was there. She was sure that if they did not know the route that the ship was taking then it would be considered a meteor in space. As long as it did not change direction someone would never know. The old scanners would not have picked up the ship at all.
“Let’s make the flyby,” Bri said as they turned their vipers towards the incoming ship.
“This is patrol one to Hermes, we have you on scanners,” Troy said as they made their way to the transport.
“This is Captain Roy of the Hermes, we’ve had you on our scanner for the past thirty minutes,” the captain said.
“Figures,” Bri said. “At least we know it works.”
“The Hermes had more than enough time to change course or come up with a battle plan before we even saw them on our scanners,” Troy said impress with the stealth technology. The good thing was they had a way to detect the ships right now and that gave them a leg up on the Cylons.
Bri had to agree with what Troy said. She also knew that the next time they would see the Hermes they would be boarding the ship for some vacation time on Earth. They had received some pay that they could use on Earth and vacation time. Bri had been studying some of the places that Earth had to offer. She was amazed at the amount of variety that was on the planet.
Then there was also the problem of what might happen on Centari One. She knew that Troy would want to stay but she was ready for some time alone with him and not on the ship.
“Have you thought about what I said to you before the patrol,” she asked.
“About the Earth cruise, yeah, if you want to go then book it,” he said.
“Great,” Bri said almost jumping up in her seat and a smile on her face. They would have a great time she figured.
They turned their vipers on the last part of the patrol before heading back to the Argo with nothing to report. The captain of the Hermes would give the report to Ares about how the mission went.
*****
Rebecca waited while Nall went over the instructions for the new people that had come to the planet’s surface. He had volunteered to help tell the people why they were there and what the purpose of the station was. She could see the looks on the people’s faces as they mostly did not believe him at first. A few did but she had told Nall and his friends that their story would be a bit hard to believe at first for anyone from earth.
Rebecca waited until he was done before heading over to where he was standing. They had a few people returning from their first trip over. Rebecca could spot them easily. They were the ones who were looking and listened a bit more to the story. It was if they were trying to gain more details than they had heard the first time. They had also talked with others from the Colonies that came here aboard the Argo.
Nall watched as the group separated and went their separate ways. This group would begin the training for the new ship. The Argo did not carry enough extra crew to man another ship even if the ship was not another battlestar. The Tiger class destroyer would be a great place to begin many things. The first of which was gaining a new ship which to train the volunteers from Earth.
“Hey beautiful,” Nall said as Rebecca came up beside him.
“What are you doing after this,” Rebecca asked him.
“Well, I thought that I would try to hook up with a spunky small blonde,” Nall said with a smile. “See if she wants to join me somewhere.”
“Hmm, sounds dangerous,” Rebecca said. “Perhaps you should just ask me instead.”
“Well, all right, what are you doing tonight,” Nall said.
“A small spunky blonde asked what we were doing for dinner tonight and if we wanted to join them,” Rebecca said.
“I take it they said yes,” Nall said watching as Rebecca nodded her head. “Good,” he said as a smile came to his face again.
“Oh boy,” Rebecca exclaimed as she shook her head. “I think Troy’s right, you do like it.”
Troy just grinned and a wicked thought came to Rebecca’s mind. She would have to talk with Bri about it but it would definitely be worth seeing.
*****
Bri and Troy walked over to where Nall and Rebecca were sitting waiting for them. The main cafeteria had grown on Centari One during the last couple of months. Troy wondered how much longer Nall and Rebecca would see each other before joining. Everyone could see how much they cared for each other. It was actually something that had helped out quite a bit early on with some of the newer recruits.
“Hey, beautiful,” Nall said as the pair joined them.
“You’ll make Rebecca jealous if you keep that up,” Bri said.
“Who said I was talking to you,” Nall said turning to Troy. “So can I offer you a chair?”
“Keep that up and you’ll gain some people’s attention all right,” Bri said with a shake of her head over to another group.
“Right,” Nall said then turned back to Bri and offered her the chair again.
“Why thank you,” Bri said then with a slight wink in Rebecca’s direction spun and planted a firm kiss on Nall. She then sat down with such an innocent face that Troy started laughing at his wife.
Nall stood frozen for several seconds. It was not what he was expecting from Bri that was for sure. Slowly the sound of laughter came to his ears and he could tell that they were all laughing at him. It was one of the few times that he had been stunned like that. Quickly he sat down and regained his composure.
“If that was all it took to get you to kiss me I would have done it sooner,” he finally managed to get out.
“Maybe, but you couldn’t handle me,” Bri said in a sexy voice making Troy almost spit out the drink he had taken. Nall was left speechless again. Usually he was the one talking like that not Bri.
“All right, who are you and what have you done to Bri,” he finally said looking right at Bri.
“I don’t know what you mean,” Bri said sitting down next to Troy.
“No I’m wrong, you are Bri,” Nall said. “You just changed you tactic against me that’s all. I don’t think there is a spot on my body that you haven’t hit me, well actually there is.”
“I can rectify that if you want,” Bri said with a grin.
“No, that’s perfectly fine,” Nall said rather hastily then sat down.
The four of them continued to talk for though out the meal. Troy then realized that Rebecca’s attention was focused to a group across the room. He gave a quick glance around to see if he could see anything. There was a group of four men sitting across the way.
“What’s up,” Troy finally said gaining Rebecca’s attention.
“Huh, oh,” Rebecca said. “It’s probably nothing,” she said trying to pass it off.
“No, what is it,” Nall said wondering what was going on.
“Well, its just that those men, for some reason I just don’t trust them. I’ve seen them around where they probably should not be,” Rebecca said.
“Interesting,” Troy said as he fell silent thinking about that. He went over everyone that he had strange feeling about or seemed to act a bit odd compared to others. There were several people in the group that Troy did not trust much either.
“Come on, I came here to relax, not be sucked into another adventure,” Nall said. He knew that somehow he was going to be sucked into another mission or mystery. He was wondering it it was Bri or Troy that seemed to find the trouble.
“Maybe you just attract it,” Bri said.
“No, I never had an exciting adventure until I met you and you convinced me to volunteer for this mission,” Nall said.
“Yeah, but let’s face it, you’re enjoying it,” Bri said daring Nall to dispute that fact. “Ha, I’m right.”
“All right, you’re right okay,” Nall said. “Beside I guess if I hadn’t come I wouldn’t have met you,” he said looking right at Rebecca.
“And that’s a good thing,” Rebecca said before turning to Bri. “So have you made your reservations for the cruise?”
“Yep, I did it on-line before coming here to meet with you,” Bri said. “Seven days of nothing but relaxing and my partner.”
“Sounds like fun,” Nall replied. He did have to admit Bri was happy with Troy and that made him happy as well. “I will admit it won’t be the same without you here.”
“Yeah, who else would smack him around for free,” Rebecca said.
“You two sound like I like it or something,” Nall said.
“You do,” Troy said getting into the act as well.
“Gee thanks,” Nall said.
“Aww, my poor baby,” Rebecca said leaning over to give him a kiss. “Feel better,” she asked.
“Let me think about it,” he replied then saw Bri’s eyes. “Yes I do.”
“Darn,” Bri muttered earning a look from Troy. He never quite knew what she was going to do to Nall each time. She somehow managed to continue to surprise him.
The conversation turned to what was going on as they ate their meal. Troy however seemed to keep an eye on the men. There was something that he was feeling coming from the. It was almost as if trouble was brewing and they were to be the cause. He made a mental note to talk with Commander Ares about them.
*****
Mike sat at the table with the others listening to the conversations going on around them. He was not sure that what they were doing was the right thing. There was still a lot to learn about this group. Blowing everything up just did not seem like an acceptable answer to him. He could see the technology that the aliens were using that could easily help out the overpopulation on Earth. The others did not see this, only that there might be a threat to Earth.
“What’s your schedule like Mike,” David said turning to the man.
“I’m off tomorrow, but then I have a normal work shift for the next four days,” Mike replied to the man.
“Good, I’ll get with you then so we can enable our plan,” David said.
“Good, the sooner the better,” another man said.
“All right,” Mike said getting up. “It was a long day, I’m going to head back to my quarters and get some rest.”
The group watched him go as they continued to plan what they were going to do over the next couple of days.
*****
Ares sat at his desk wondering what the next thing that would happen could be. He had received reports from the Colonies. It seemed that the war against the Cylons was still at a stalemate. He could only wonder at how long that would last. He was sure that something would happen sooner or later to remove the stalemate that had occurred. Then there was the news that Troy had told him. Something would happen to the base on the planet’s surface.
Ares was not blind to not recognize that something like this might happen. He had wanted everyone screened that was coming in to the base at first. Sam had told him that such a thing was not considered ‘PC’ and could cause problems. When Ares asked him what ‘PC’ was he was told that it stood for ‘political correct’. That was so that something would not offend anyone regardless of race or religion on Earth.
Ares remembered laughing at such a concept but it seemed like it had a good hold over Earth. He had reluctantly allowed loose restrictions on the people coming in. That meant that he had to instruct his people to be more on guard then normal. He sighed to himself as he realized things had been way too quiet recently. Whenever something like this occurred it usually meant that something bad was about to happen.
Ares could only hope that they reacted in time to stop anything before it became too bad.
*****
David set up the last part that was needed for their plan. So far he was sure that no one had discovered what they were about to do. His one concern was now for a certain member of his own team. The group was sure that Mike was a liability to the mission. David was sure that these aliens needed to be taught a lesson for sure. He did not buy into the story that these aliens told. He was sure that their real purpose was to conquer Earth for their own reasons.
David watched as some members of their group were gathering together. They had made a few friends on the Hermes who would allow them to get on board. A few would remain behind to find out what type of damage was caused and if they were totally taken out of commission. That was the goal that they had to put the alien’s base out of working order.
“Everything set,” David asked one of the men.
“We’re ready to go,” the man replied to David.
“Good,” David said. “Let’s get moving then.”
The group began to break up again and head to the area that they were to wait until it was time.
*****
Bri and Troy walked along the corridor heading towards a shuttle that would take them towards Hermes. The ship was due to leave Centari One in four Earth hours. The ship did coordinate with the traffic going to and from the moon and certain controllers that were aware of them. This way the ship would not cause any alarm when it appeared to unload and load people and cargo.
“I’m looking forward to this,” Bri said as she walked along side Troy. She had managed to get them booked on the cruise even though it was a bit of a last minute deal. There was an arranged transport to and from the space port in Los Angeles.
“So am I,” Troy said. “It’s good to get away from everything for a while. But I just wish I knew more about why I feel a bit uneasy about everything.”
“Does it have to do with your vision,” Bri asked him as she turned to look at him.
“I don’t know,” Troy replied honestly. “It might have to do with it, not sure.”
“I’m sure that you’ll figure it out,” Bri said with confidence.
They wound up at the shuttle hanger where a few shuttles were waiting to take people up to the Hermes. They recognized several pilots who were hanging around waiting until it was their turn to pilot the shuttle. Several people were also new and in training. Bri spotted Jax standing over with a couple others from the Argo.
“I’m going to go on over and say hi to Jax over there,” Bri said to Troy who just nodded his head. He watched as Bri walked on over to where Jax was along with Gunther.
Jax saw Bri heading her way and waved to her. Jax had not seen Bri in a couple of days and wondered what was going on. She knew that Bri and Troy were about to go on a vacation. The last she had heard was the pair was thinking about going on a cruise on Earth. She wondered if they had made plans and if so when they would be leaving.
“Hey,” Jax said when Bri got close enough. “When’s your vacation?’
“We’re starting it today,” Bri said with some excitement in her voice.
“Today,” Jax said then. “I thought that it was going to be a few more days before you two were leaving. Nall isn’t going to know what to do then.”
“He’ll survive, he has Rebecca to watch out for him,” Bri said.
“Perhaps, but I know that he’ll still miss you,” Jax said.
“So what are you two doing for your vacation,” Gunther said having been quiet during the conversation.
“We’re taking an Earth cruise,” Bri replied.
“Hmm, wonder if that will be anything like on Gemini,” Gunther said. “If so that was beautiful. You’ll have to be sure to bring back pictures of everything.”
“Oh, that reminds me I need my camera,” Bri said. She had bought an Earth camera not too long ago and had received a message that it had arrived in the mail room. “I forgot to pick it up earlier this morning.” She quickly walked over to where Troy was standing and told him that she was going to pick something up and suggested that he go on ahead up to Hermes and that she would meet him up there.
“What did you forget,” Troy asked.
“That’s for me to know,” Bri said with a smile. “I’ll meet you on board. Be sure to get a good seat.”
“All right, I will,” Troy said as the call to board the shuttle was announced.
With a quick kiss Bri was off walking away to head to the mail room to pick up her package. Troy walked on over to the shuttle along with a few others.
*****
Mike walked along the corridor passing people that he recognized and had slowly begun to consider friends. He really wondered if what they were doing was the right thing. He also had the reservations about what this ‘alien’ group was doing however he also had become friends with a few of them. He had met a few of them, such as a man named Gunther. The man seemed to talk human and act human to Mike.
Make turned the corner heading to where he was to meet up with some others of the group. Looking around he did not see anyone that he recognized. A blonde haired woman came walking by. He had seen her before a few other times. Gunther had mentioned that she was another pilot, Gabrielle and had recently married a pilot in her squadron.
Make began to get a strange feeling about everything. He knew that the others thought that he was not committed to their cause. That was true he thought that they needed more information about their group. Just as he was thinking that everything seemed to suddenly turn into his worst nightmare.
*****
The shuttle had landed on Hermes allowing the passengers to get out of the shuttle. Troy had been watching a few of the men. The pilot had been someone new from Earth. The pilot program was taking off and new recruits were being trained everyday. They would need new people to man the new ships that were to be built. He knew that the Tiger was rapidly approaching completion and would soon be ready for a crew.
Troy walked on over to where he was sure that Bri would want to sit. The trip would take a few hours and the ship had a nice large passenger area to go with its large cargo capacity. At first it had been used for food, but now they base was almost self sufficient, except for meat. But they were also able to send back raw materials to Earth to sell making the operation more cost effective as he had heard some people say.
There was a large window where they could look out and see the space station where the Tiger was being built. There was another spacedock under construction nearby which would begin the construction of the first new battlestar. A new destroyer class would be build where the Tiger was once it had been completed. The details of that ship looked impressive to Troy.
He was also able to see the base on the planet’s surface. It stood out in contrast to the rest of the planet’s surface. It was the only place where green could be seen. That and there were stark white buildings dotting the area. It was then that he saw something that made his heart stop. Orange was erupting from the buildings. He knew what it was he had seen it in his vision. Centari One had been attacked. He could only hope that Bri was all right.
End Part 20