"That's right, scramble all vipers, right fracking now." Tigh shouted to the flight crew.
"Galactica's supposed to stay out of it," Adama muttered. The unshielded battlestars all had the same order— let the shielded ships handle things first.
"Wish we would have had more time." Saul growled as he watched the four battlestars advance on the Hataks "Bastards aren't even trying to evade them."
"According to the intelligence, they really do think they're gods." Adama said. "Good luck for us— those ships are more maneuverable than our battlestars and if they just wanted to strike the planet…" He didn't bother to complete the thought.
Between the capital ships, a huge mass dogfight was starting to build up as vipers and death gliders engaged. The humans had the number advantage with nearly a dozen flight groups engaging and more waiting outside the immediate area to replace vipers that had expended their ammunition. The death gliders had no such weakness, their staff weapons continually firing, but they were less accurate, albeit more damaging than the rapid fire cannon of the vipers.
Goa'uld Flagship:
"My lord." Mot's First Prime said, "Four of the ships have shielding."
Mot waved at the world below. "We have superior weapons and they must defend their world. We will destroy these ships, then bombard their capital. If the other ships had shielding, then they would already have intervened." Absently he thought and then nodded to himself. "Not all of our cannon will bear on the enemy— have them start to bombard the city. It will remind them to never defy their gods."
"Yes my lord."
Defiant:
Commander Terice Alba kept her eye on the readout, while a pair of technicians babied the shield generator control system that had been installed into the CIC. The transmission from the Thanos filled the room.
"Defiant, this the flag. You and the Archon will take Ha'tak 1, we'll take the second one. When it's dead, shift to our target."
"Understood, flag." Terice replied. Normally they might peel off and fight them ship to ship, but nobody knew how long their shields would last, and command thought that losing one of their big ships might lead the Goa'uld to break off the engagement.
And if two of our ships can't take out one of theirs, we're fraked anyway.
The four ships closed and soon Colonial KEWs were firing on the Goa'uld motherships. The Ha'taks' energy weapons struck the battlestars' shielding while the KEW rounds with their newly designed anti-shield systems struck the Goa'uld shields— straining, but not defeating them.
"Target one's shield is not down." The XO reported as Terice held on to her station as the Defiant rocked from the impacts of the plasma cannon.
"Any effect at all?"
"It's about 70 percent power." The report came back. "We're at 85 percent."
"Good news," Terice said. She'd half expected the system to pack it in at the first volley..
"Vipers are reporting most of those death gliders are down."
"Have them rearm with anti-ship munitions." They didn't have any of the Tau'ri's anti-ship missiles with their shield penaids, since they'd focused on building warheads for the heavy cannon and you couldn't do everything…
But every little bit would help. Her father had told her of the battles over Caprica, how he'd looked up from the emergency hospital he had worked at, watching the nuclear detonations and wondering if the fleet would hold.
This fleet will hold, she swore. "All cannon fire— don't wait for my order, Jenks, the moment those shields are failing nail them with the heavy missiles."
Goa'uld Flagship:
Mot was almost flung out of his chair by another volley from the warships. Their shields were at least as heavy as the Ha'tak's and if their cannon had not penetrated the shields yet, they had come close. Especially given the way they were attacking the shields— instead of gradually overloading the entire system, they were producing localized spikes. No Goa'uld energy weapon could have the tight focus needed for that.
On the other hand, these ships were almost certainly the only ones with such weapons, or else they'd be moving more ships to engage.
"My lord," his First Prime said, "a small Tau'ri ship has moved into position to interdict our fire."
"Then commence firing on it with all cannon that will bear." Mot said. The city was ultimately less important than the Tau'ri ships and if they were foolish enough to die for those on the planet, it made his job easier. And after the insult they had delivered him, let the people on the world below see their would be protector fall.
John Brown:
WHAM! The John Brown shook madly as the first impacts struck the shields. They could neither maneuver nor fire back, but at least they were attracting the enemy's attention. They could only interdict a single ship at the time— unless all the ships chose to shoot at the John Brown rather than the city.
Which may not be a good thing, Cam thought.
"We're going to start losing shields pretty soon." Cho said from her console.
"Do your best." Cam looked at the readout and gave an involuntary cheer as one of the Ha'tak's lost its shielding moments before it exploded. Then he groaned as one of the battlestars, shields failing, fell out of formation and started to withdraw, shielded by the others.
Defiant:
"We just lost Archon!" The tech said, "They've got fires on all decks, lost their fire control and are having to evacuate their crew."
"Understood!" Terice snapped. "Focus on the second target!" Lords they're fighting dumb, she thought. The Goa'uld, either out of contempt or lack of experience, had failed to focus his ships' fire on a single battlestar at a time. Even so, it was clear that the battlestars' shields were less durable when damaged than the Goa'uld's, and they had few technicians to keep them up and running when they were damaged.
Galactica:
"Bill, they're not going to stop them before the Tau'ri ship goes down." Saul said.
Adama nodded. "Mr. Gaeta!" he called, "I need an FTL jump plotted to these coordinates."
Gaeta took one look and turned pale. "Yes sir," he said, and turned to start plotting the jump.
Adama looked down at the plotting board and turned to Saul. "Get me the John Brown."
John Brown:
Cam could barely hear the voice over the set.
"Say again!" He shouted as a shower of sparks erupted from a burning console. The John Brown was a good little ship, but the big Ha'taks were beating it to death.
"You need to stay in your position for 4 minutes."
"We may not be alive in four minutes!" Cam shouted, "But we'll do our best." Turning he looked over at Cho, "Jennifer, put everything we have in the shields— it doesn't matter what happens at four minutes +1 second."
"Understood."
Galactica:
"It's done sir!" Gaeta wondered if anyone had ever plotted a jump as fast as he had. And If it turns out that I fraked it up…
"Good." Adama said, "All personnel stand by for jump. All weapons stations, stand by to fire on local control— you'll know the target when you see it."
Thanos:
"Galactica is going to what?"
"They say they're jumping to, 'engage the enemy closely.'"
What the frack is Adama thinking… Sims wondered. The Galactica didn't have any shields…
Then a volley of plasma fire punched though the Thanos' shields, and secondary explosions erupted across the battlestar. CIC seemed to turn bright white, there was a sudden impact and Commander Sims knew no more.
Galactica:
"JUMP!"
The colonial drive didn't work like most species' FTL drives. Short ranged, less flexible, it was instantaneous over its range. Which meant there was no time for Mot to react when the ship hovering out of the battle area flashed out of existence, and back into existence…
Less than a hundred feet off of his flagship, actually inside the shield barrier. Mot went sailing across his throne room as the Ha'tak's generators screamed with overload. The shields were ripping huge chunks of armor off of the Galactica, but the old warship was too large, had too much mass, and the flagship's shields finally failed, grounded out by the battlestar.
Which now had every one of its heavy and light cannons that could bear pointing at his flagship. The other two surviving Ha'taks turned to engage but the Colonial ships attacked them with redoubled fury, holding them off for the vital few moments Galactica needed.
Goa'uld motherships were not armored. They had shields and the Goa'uld had never encountered an enemy that needed armor— after all the Asgard could shatter an unshielded ship no matter how heavily armored it was.
But now the heavy and light cannon on the Galactica were shredding the ship, tearing off house sized chunks. Mot watched in horror as alarm indicators came on-
"Go into FTL!" he screamed.
Moments later, the mothership vanished, trailing debris. The other two Ha'Tak's did not leave, but without their commander, they were fighting as lone units, even as the three remaining Valkyries focused fire, first on the most damaged remaining Ha'tak and then, after it exploded, on its companion.
Galactica:
Adama picked himself off the floor, ignoring the shooting pain in his arm. The bridge was full of smoke and damage control teams were putting out fires all over the compartment.
"Status!"
"We've lost FTL drive," the damage control officer reported. "Major hull damage abaft frame 42, port hanger pod is showing major stress fractures, and the primary DRADIS system is out—other than that we're good."
"Where's John Brown?"
John Brown:
"Jennifer, now would be a good time for a miracle."
"I can't give you one." Cho said, behind her console. The John Brown was dropping in a nearly uncontrolled fall.
"Can you at least ensure we hit the harbor?"
"I think I can." Cho said, "But we need to start beaming people off now."
"Do it. Bridge crew last."
The bombardment had shattered his little ship. Cameron knew that there was no chance of saving her, but even so the order was bitter. Lose you after one battle. That's not going to look good.
"Everyone else is off!" Cho shouted, "Our turn!"
"Go!"
Moments trailing smoke and fire, the John Brown plunged into the harbor, disappearing under the waves in moments.
Cam groaned. Wherever he'd been beamed to it wasn't soft.
TBC