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Battlestar Wasp

Chapter 5

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The Cylons were created by Man.

They were created to make life easier on the Twelve Colonies.

And then the day came when the Cylons decided to kill their masters.

After a long and bloody struggle, an armistice was declared.

The Cylons left for another world to call their own.

A remote space facility was built...

...where Cylon and Human could meet and maintain diplomatic relations.

Every year, the Colonials send an officer.

The Cylons send no one.

No one has seen or heard from the Cylons in over forty years...

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Until Now…

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Note: This chapter marks the fifty-first chapter since October 1st.

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Day 65 ATF;

Raptor 8383;

Zetes System;

Captain Mickey 'Boxer' Hastings looked out the main window of his stealth Raptor and wanted to weep. Scattered before him were the remains of ninety-seven civilian ships along with fourteen small warships. The broken hulls of the ships were drifting and banging into each other as he watched. The largest remains were from the Horus class repair ship that had dwarfed the Leviathans. She was bent in partial V at the dock and hull of the ship, and was slowly tearing herself apart as it spun around. Its once giant internal dock that once could hold two Valkyrie class Battlestars was shredded and he could see the remains of dozens of ships inside the bay. Her top deck, once able to hold another Battlestar was ruptured along with all four agriculture domes.

Ensign Maria 'Cookie' Tension had gasped out as she saw the devastation before her, "Detecting no life signs," she stated as she wiped the tears from her eyes.

"Nothing could live through that," Boxer replied as he powered up the engine and entered the debris field.

They flew past destroyed freighters, liners, cargo ships, botanic cruisers, dozens of barges and many yachts. There were destroyed Gunstars, Patrolstars and Cutters scattered among the debris.

"Let's check out the Horus, see if anything can be recovered," Boxer said as he turned the small Raptor towards the large ship.

As they approached the damaged repair ship, they saw many of the external hatches had been blown. Flying around the ship, they saw where several missiles had hit the ship, but the reason she was breaking apart was three of her forward struts that held the massive bay were gone. It also didn't help that there was a ship wedged in-between the hull and the dock. Several gaping holes were in the side of the titanium dock and when they eased their way inside the sensors started going crazy.

"Life signs detected," Cookie shouted out.

"I know, seems the dock bay's shell hid them. Try and contacted them," Boxer ordered.

"This is Raptor 8383 of the Colonial Navy. Can anyone hear me," Cookie said as she keyed the handset.

They waited for a response but none came.

Cookie adjusted the frequency and tried again, "This is Raptor 8383 of the Colonial Navy. Can anyone hear me?"

"HELP! We trapped in here, oh please help up," came the response.

"Oh, Frak!" Cookie said as she tried to figure out what to do.

"Hello?"

"We're here. How many are you?"

"Almost seven hundred of us are trapped in here, many of us are wounded," came the reply.

"Hold on, we will get you help," Cookie said and then turned the ship around and headed out of the dock before jumping away.

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Day 76 ATF;

Fishing ship Louise;

Planet Acis;

Captain Brigitte Hawkins held the wheel of the ten thousand ton trawler Louise as it rolled in the heavy seas. The Louise was one of the last of the planets deep see fishery ships that still sailed the seas to gather fish for Rear Admiral Joshua Anderson and his fleet that was hiding. Of the original fifty-eight factory trawlers on the planet, only eight were left. The ship still showed the battle damage from where they had been strafed on the third day after the attack but any round that had actually penetrated the hull was plugged. It would do if the Cylons thought they were still alive. Every eight days since the attack a pair of Raiders would arrive and fly by looking to see if any human activity was on the planet of in the system. They would get a warning from one of the Raptors that were docked to the remains of the station and the remaining eight ships would shut down and the crew would play dead on the decks to make the illusion of a dead ship.

Brigitte watched as the large net was let go off the stern of the ship while below the crew processed the catch. This would be the last voyage of the ship as she would head into the hidden port they had built and unload the cargo into fifty foot freezer storage units for Heavy lifters came in and took the cargo back to the admiral. Then the crews of the eight factory trawlers and fifty smaller trawlers would be off loaded and taken away to join with the survivors of the colony that the Cylons had destroyed. Once the planet had a population of five hundred and fifty thousand people, less than nine thousand survivors had been found not counting the thirty-seven hundred survivors of the fishing fleet. Everything that was caught was being processed below, no more throwing back the poor harvesting fish they were now being processed and the boxes labels changed to show the new content.

Unknown to Brigitte or any of the other ship crews, Heavy Lifters had lifted nineteen of the sunken factory ships off the harbor floor of the destroyed city of Acris, capital of the planet. Crews also were stripping the fishing fleet docks of all essentials needed to keep the fleet sailing. Rear Admiral Anderson had the bottom third of the Calypso Mining Station storage and dock areas where cargo would be unloaded and loaded turned into ship docks. The area was so large that two hundred of the fishing ships could be stored there but he was planning on only twenty-seven factory ships and the smaller trawlers be docked in the station. The question was would the ships survive reentry to a planet's surface to be usable but for now they were an asset. Already nine of the big factory ships had been lifted to the astrosphere and jumped away to the fleet.

While this was going on, the cattle that survived on the farms were rounded up and all but the calves were butchered and processed for the fleet while the calves were loaded into two modified liners and taken to the station to be set up in some of the domes. The same was done for pigs, sheep and goats while hunting teams moved through the backwoods harvesting the deer like creatures. They were gathering as much meat that could be processed to keep everyone alive as well as stripping farms. The five fowl farms were also stripped of live fowl and feed that was stored for them and the birds taken aboard the ships.

Six hours after laying her nets, Brittney started reeling them in and the crew starting processing the catch. After the net was reeled in and the massive catch sent below the nets were stored and Brittney turned the ship for home. The journey took two days to get home and they arrived six hours before the next Cylon patrol was due. Around the bay, tied to the shore were the other eight ships in the fleet and the camouflage netting was extended across all the ships and down to the water where unless a ship was hovering in the center of the bay, they wouldn't be seen. Across the coast, north and south of the bay, the fifty trawlers were tied up and hidden by netting or in the rivers that flowed into the oceans. Right on time, the Cylon patrol arrived and flew along the wreckage of the station and destroyed ships and then down to the surface of the planet, not detecting anything before activating their FTL and jumping away. Ninety minutes later, the factory ships moved to the hidden docks one by one and started unloading their cargo into the cargo containers that had been brought in before the ships said into the center of the bay and anchored. The crews were unloaded and boarded a small liner that had been brought in and as they were lifting on, engineers started lowering the masts and booms on the ship and then eight hours after the first boom went down, Heavy Lifters in pairs landed and attached themselves to factor ships and using the powerful magnetic clamps lifted the ships out of the water and jumped away to the fleet where the ships would be stored for their crews in special docks they had put together.

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Day 78 ATF;

Raptor 8383;

Zetes System;

Captain Mickey 'Boxer' Hastings watched as the two cradle docks attached themselves to the wreck of the Horus and jumped it away. While the docks recovered the Horus, the rest of the recovery fleet and dozens of heavy lifters attached themselves to the remains of the ninety-seven civilian ships and fourteen small warships that had once protected the planet. It had taken three days to extract the freighter that had rammed the Horus and reattached the broken struts for the dry dock. The three thousand meter long ship was then searched for beacons or transmitters before the cradle docks were jumped in and attached. The recovery of so many wrecks would take four days before the Cylons swept through the system and were shocked to find all the wrecks gone. They would immediately report back to Cornel would throw a fit and order any other wrecks destroyed and send more of his Raiders out on search missions but the fleet wouldn't be found.

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Day 121 ATF;

Crispin Nebula;

Commanding officers quarters, Battlestar Wasp;

Admiral Joshua Anderson watched as the fleet left the nebula. The fleet had grown to seven repaired Mercury, three Jupiter and nine Valkyrie class Battlestars with nine Alberio, sixteen Titan II, five Balen, four Aach, twelve Abbateggio and four Abydos class Gunstars. Eleven Missilestars of the Eurytion class, four Escortstars of the Anala and twenty Ranger class cutters covered the fleet of three hundred and fifty civilian ships and military support ships, and eight repair ships like the Horus and the Leviathans.

They were leaving the stripped remains of two hundred and fifty ships behind in the nebula with the bodies of one hundred and twelve thousand people who died from their wounds and radiation poisoning. They were carrying away almost seven hundred and fifty-thousand survivors. Behind them they would leave fifty billion dead, slaughtered by the Cylons in a nuclear holocaust. The jumps they planned to take were well plotted and all ships in the fleet were prepared for the long journey.

Civil discord never happened because they were just happy to be alive. But Joshua knew it wouldn't last once the journey began. He was prepared for it and his plan had been met with success in the civilian fleet. The military ships would stay under his command and have veto authority as they were the protectors of the fleet.

The ships in the civilian fleet were group in random groups of twenty five and they would form a council of captains with one captain carrying the vote to a main council where they would meet and decide policy. Fourteen ship captains would decide the fleet assets and would head the council to notify the police force headed by the Ranger cutter fleet and Admiral Anderson. Director Marlow was on the council because the Calypso station and its refinery were owned by him and employed a huge amount of the survivors. It had taken twenty days to get everything sorted out. So the power of the fleet was similar to the council of twelve but instead of twelve seat holders there was fifteen.

The first thing the council decided was what ships should be stripped down and which would be taken. The first was how many people each ship could carry safely and ones that had domes for crops. The next item was the economy and for money in the fleet, they would use the gold and silver stockpiles that the Calypso mining facility had been supposed to sell to the Colonial Government. Director Marcus Mallow had donated the money to the fleet to be used as wages. The gold and silver were melted down in to cubics along with some copper to make the money. They would use the same standard as the colonies did at twenty silver cubics to one gold and forty copper to a silver. Pay for the military was drastically reduced. Admiral Anderson saw his pay cut from five thousand cubics a month to a thousand because they just didn't have the reason to pay so much. Each person in the colonial fleet had their pay cut by four fifths. So a lowly deck hand went from eight hundred cubits to two hundred while the civilian were given twenty-five cubics per month and what every they made working on the ships. Two large freighters were converted into prison ships and the thirty-two hundred prisoners who had been on the prison ship were gone through and their crimes were either commuted if they enlisted or they were sent to the new prison ships. A judicial branch was set up with one Colonial military officer and four civilian judges that were found in the survivors to handle major crimes like treason and murder while twenty other judges were used for smaller crimes. The Barkly a Ebba Maersk supper freighter was converted into the judicial ship and staffed with the officers from the police force.

The health department was centered around the Gullwing and eight medical ships in the fleet and Doctor Maria Hanta was assigned as the CMO of the fleet. She insured the vaccination of everyone for radiation sickness and the Gullwing started turning out the anti-radiation medicines that were need that everyone needed.

More departments would be added when they were needed but for now they needed to get away as the Cylons were checking the systems very carefully and it would only take one ship being found and then they would jump in with their full might and if they did so, the fleet would have been trapped in the nebula with nowhere to go.

"Com, notify all ships to jump to Baker one-able-two," Joshua ordered.

On the dradis screen ships started flashing out for the thirty light year jump. The first three days there would ten jumps per day at thirty light years and then they would drop to twenty light years for five a day. They were hoping to catch up to Adama but they were not counting on it as the Galactica was a hundred and twenty days ahead of them.

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Edited By

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Battlestar Galactica™ is a registered trademark and copyright (©) Glen Larson & the SciFi Channel. Thank you to the Battlestar Wiki and The Battlestar Galactica Role Playing Game, Battlestar Prometheus have proven invaluable for the information they contain. All material found in this story is for entertainment purposes. No copyright infringement should be inferred or is intended. Battlestar Wasp and all its original characters and story lines presented here are the copyright (©) of their creator (©) 2010.