Battlestar Group 41

Ionian Nebula, Viper 3

"Galactica, Apollo. I'm in Viper 3. I have a bogey at my ten, I'm gonna go check it out."

Apollo rolled his Viper mk.VII over and pulled out straight, heading for the contact. It was big, whatever it was, or was that just the radiation thrown out by the nebula?

He had cause for concern when several more contacts appeared around the original contact, heading for the Fleet. They would pass him in several seconds.

Apollo peered through the perspex canopy, trying to find the ships in the clouds. He wasn't having too much luck. The luminous clouds were very good at concealing things.

He checked his DRADIS again. In a matter of seconds he would be in the cross-hairs of over twenty Raiders, or over twenty unidentified fighters, he couldn't decide.

He didn't have to. They were...

Vipers?

"Galactica, Apollo. Contacts are inbound Vipers. Mk.VIIs."

They couldn't be from Galactica or Pegasus. That was certain. But then where were these Vipers from?

One of them caught his attention. In this swarm of advanced state-of-the-art fighters, one mk.II was tagging along.

Battlestar Galactica, CIC

"Confirmed. Colonial transponders detected." said Gaeta. "They're heading to intercept the Cylon squadron."

"Anything from the larger contact?" Tigh said quickly. He was still trying to act normal after discovering his true nature, but he knew he could easily try too hard.

"There's a wire- Colonial transponders! I'm getting Colonial transponders." Gaeta burst out. He still remembered the time Pegasus had shown up, but could a fluke like that be repeated? What were the chances of another battlestar showing up?

"What was that?" Adama asked. "The first part?"

"Uh, sorry, sir," said Gaeta. "We're receiving a wireless communication,"

"Put it through," said Adama. "On speaker."

"Aye, sir." said Gaeta, already manipulating his station. Lieutenant Hoshi, at Comm, forwarded the signal to the speaker.

"...contacting the Battlestar Agrippa. Ramius, come in. Battlestar Agrippa, come in. Mission accomplished, repeat, mission accomplished."

"They must think we're the Agrippa." said Tigh. "But who are they?"

"The battlestar Agrippa was the flagship of Battlestar Group 41." said Adama, pensively. "Hoshi, send hostile challenge."

"This is the battlestar Galactica to unidentified vessel. Please identify or you will be fired upon. Reply."

There was amazed chatter on the other end of the line, then: "This is the battlestar Valkyrie. Adama, is that you?"

"Patch me in," said Adama. "Valkyrie, this is Galactica Actual. I assume I'm speaking to Commander Nelson."

"Admiral? You got promoted? Congratulations, sir. I'm sure Admiral Greer will be happy to see you too. They should be on the other side of the nebula."

"Vipers have engaged, sir." reported Gaeta. "The Valkyrie is moving into attack formation."

"Nelson, we're coming in to assist. Are you sure about the Agrippa?"

"This is where we left them two months ago."

Two months? That was well after the Cylon attack. What the frak were they doing out here?

The Galactica rotated to bring her dorsal turrets to bear on the lead basestar. The Vipers and Raiders from both ships continued to dogfight in between the capital ships, ducking through clouds of flak and missiles. The Valkyrie then launched two nuclear torpedoes, tearing through the nearest basestar.

"DRADIS contact!" Gaeta shouted. "Multiple contacts! Coming up through the cloud!"

"Let me guess," said Tigh. "Colonial?"

"Affirmative." said Gaeta. "I'm reading five Viper squadrons on DRADIS. Approaching from the other side of the nebula."

"A whole frakkin' battlegroup!" Tigh said. "This is a stroke of luck like you read about!"

Ionian Nebula, Viper 3

"Galactica, Apollo, Raiders are bugging out, repeat, Raiders are bugging out. Basestars are getting ready to jump."

He squeezed off another shot at a retreating Raider, and witnessed an amazing sight.

"Galactica, Apollo! There's a whole frakkin' battlegroup out here!" Sure enough, a battlegroup came charging out of a cloud bank, and Apollo saw the magnificent shape of a Mercury-class battlestar come straight at him. The hull was pristine and undamaged, and all the bowchasers were firing into the last of the retreating basestars.

There were four other ships in this group as well. A sleek Griffyn-class destroyer alongside a boxy Adriatic-class strikestar and two Nonsuch-class frigates. He couldn't make out the names on the ships, but he knew he would be finding out soon.

"Apollo, come in Apollo." came a familiar voice on the wireless.

"Seelix, is that you?" Apollo asked.

"Ouch. Lee, I'm hurt. Should I bait you or just save you the trouble?"

"Who..." said Apollo as he saw a mk.II viper pull alongside him, and inside...

"Kara?"

"What were you expecting, the Spanish Inquisition?"

Apollo shook his head. "What?"

"Never mind. Let's just go back to Galactica. I'm going to show us to Earth."

Battlestar Agrippa, BSG-41-A

"Galactica Raptor, coming aboard!" announced the XO, Franklin Bateson. "All hands, atten... Shun!"

The deck resounded with the shifting position, the footfalls so close together they sounded like one.

The hatch to the Raptor opened, and Adama unfolded himself from his seat.

"To the front... Salute!"

Adama returned the salute as the ship's band started playing 'General Salute', with all the honours granted to an arriving flag officer.

Adama stepped down from the wing of the craft, and stepped up to his counterpart.

"Admiral Adama, welcome aboard the battlestar Agrippa." said Joseph Greer.

"Good to see you again, Joe." said Adama. As a Rear Admiral he was on equal terms with Rear Admiral Greer. That also put them on a first name basis.

It was then that all ceremony broke down. "Come on, Bill. Let's get out of here. Bateson! Dismiss the hands." Greer then led Adama up the gangway to the second level of the hangar deck.

"Bill, I didn't expect you this far out," said Greer. We're way beyond the Red Line. We've come further than any ship has before. The last thing we were expecting was an encounter with another battlestar."

"What are you doing out here?" Adama asked.

"This way," Greer motioned. "I'm afraid our mission is classified. We were sent out here by Fleet Admiral Corman after you returned from the recon op.

"You knew about that?"

"Of course I did." Greer slid his keycard through the slot and opened the doors to his quarters. "Sit down." he said, motioning to the leather couches in the centre of the room. Why do you think you were reassigned?"

"Because I botched the mission."

"Wrong!" Greer exclaimed. "Corman re-tasked 41 come out here, and he wanted the best. You were famous, but coming to the end of your career. I told him your skill and experience would be crucial, but he decided you were too old. Besides, he thought you would appreciate being given command of the first ship you ever served on. He didn't think you would regard it as a reprimand, of sorts."

"So this was his idea of thanking me?"

"He thought so. They couldn't promote you, they had an excess of Admirals." Greer stood up and walked to his desk. "Coffee, tea?"

"Just water, thanks."

"Nelson completed his mission, thankfully. Now I can't tell you what that mission is at the moment and why it required us to come all the way out here to the boonies to complete it, but we're heading back to civilization now."

Adama stopped breathing. Oh Gods. He didn't know!

"Joe, there's something I have to tell you."

"Sure, Bill, anything." He handed Adama a glass emblazoned with the Agrippa's mission patch and sat down in a leather armchair.

"You're really not going to like it..."

"Try me." Greer said, making it even harder for Adama to say it.

"There's nothing to go back to, Joe," said Adama quietly. "The Cylons wiped out the Colonies, nuked them flat. Apart from your battlegroup, my ship is all that's left of the Colonial military. And my fleet's all that's left of the Colonies. We are the highest ranking Colonial officers in existence."

"What the hell..." Greer whispered after a moment of silence. "How could we have been beaten so easily?"

"They used a new navigation program to hack our networks and shut down our ships. Your entire battlegroup-"

"Had her networks disconnected when we left Caprica," said Greer. "Corman didn't want to take any chances. Now I'm glad that was so."

"Joe, what were you doing out here? What mission? What did the Valkyrie do?"

"We completed the mission, Bill. We found the Cylon homeworld."