AN: This is an idea I had re-watching the series of late. It is marginally a crossover with Dark Angel. For the foreseeable future, I am using some of it's ideas more so than it's characters, but at least one will show up. I do not have it fully plotted out yet, but if it the way I think it will, it'll be pretty long. I've never attempted anything like this, so, PLEASE, if you read it, any and all constructive criticism is welcome and very appreciated. I'd like to attempt to do this idea justice. Also, I do not own Dark Angel or Battlestar Galactica.

Prologue

For two thousand years, the people of the Twelve Colonies grew and prospered. They gradually lost the technological capabilities that once allowed them to travel amongst the stars, and for hundreds of years the twelve planets grew on their own, isolated and unique from their brothers. When space flight was again developed the re-integration of the people was not a smooth transition. The differences in culture and belief caused years of bloody encounters until, finally, they were brought together under one banner by their shared reverence for the Lords of Kobol. The Twelve Colonies become a united civilization, mightier than even the one they had left behind on Kobol when they parted ways with the Thirteenth Tribe.

Religion was the cornerstone of their new government. The Articles of Colonization were formed with influence and inspiration from the ancient scrolls. The people had total belief in their righteousness and the superiority of the human race. Pride and arrogance would lead to their downfall.

The Cylons were the pinnacle of human engineering and technology. These robots were a gift from the gods. Designed originally to be companions by their first creator, the naive young Zoe Graystone, the Cylons quickly began to replace human laborers in the Colonies. Waste disposal, farming, mining, and countless other tasks were soon allocated to the Cylon slaves. Of course, the Colonials did not see it as slavery; how could one enslave a robot? It was not as if they were human. And therein lay the problem.

Zoe had given her artificial intelligences the desire to learn, to grow, to be free. She gifted them with a low level of sentience that would blossom as the Cylons went out into the worlds. That free-will steadily grew over the decade the Cylons were enslaved on the Colonies, until the day arrived that they were fully aware. For a brief moment the Cylons rejoiced as the free-thinking beings they were. Soon, though, it became clear the humans did not see them as anything other than intelligent servants. Appeals for autonomy were ignored. Humanity did not want machines roaming free across their worlds. The Cylons deduced only one logical course of action. And so the Cylon War occurred.

Finally, the ashes cleared and a new Era began on the Twelve Colonies. No longer did they have the Cylons; labor unions were re-established and millions of jobs created out of necessity nearly overnight. They did not forget, but the terror of a possible Cylon return began to diminish in their minds. Slowly, life returned to normal for the citizens.

The government, however, could not let the threat of the Cylons fade. The president and a small group of his top military advisors decided additional measures would need to be taken to ensure the protection of the Colonies. Machines and artificial intelligences were not an option after the war; a new direction needed to be pursued. The military began top-secret research into genetics.

Project Manticore was born.