Kick the Beehive (FT, CLOSED)

[United Colonies of Kobol]

Commander Alexander S. Spencer, CF
Battlestar Ares, Colonial Fleet Reclamation Facility
Second Cylon War, Day 42

---

“That would be great,” Commander Spencer nodded. “As soon as we can declare the ship safe, we can power her up and work out what still needs to be done.”

Spencer nodded thoughtfully at her question. Over the past few weeks he had been wanting to go on the offensive, or at least conduct some raids to help fleet morale and ensure that the Laudians got the necessary combat experience they would need if he was to be able to trust them in a combat situation. Between the Battle of System 22 and the Battle of Ragnar, not to mention the initial engagements that each of the ships of his fleet had survived, the Colonials had enough combat experience to be trusted in such a situation, but beyond Melody herself and the veterans of the Audeamus, the same could not be said for the Laudians. He and Melody had discussed such raids some days ago, however more immediate events and considerations had pushed the matter back in favour of other priorities. As such, getting out there and conducting some raids killed two birds with one stone, ensuring that morale (hopefully) improved with a few minor victories whilst also getting their allies some practical combat experience under their belt. The question was who to send; on the one hand he wanted to go himself with Acheron however he also knew that Commander Constanza and the newly-formed crew of the Battlestar Solaria could do with getting into a scrap together.

“I think that is a wonderful idea,” Spencer agreed, as they began to make their way back to the port flight pod and the waiting Raptors.

Spencer paused and looked thoughtful as he made a decision.

“I’d quite like to have Commander Constanza take the Solaria out and put her through her paces, she’s got a crew that could do with some team building, and combat is a good bet for that,” Spencer said after a moment. “Some of our reconnaissance Raptor have reported that the Cylons have taken over our frontier Tylium refineries, taking out one of them would help cause them some logistical headaches.”

[Maxis Laudi]

Battlestar Ares
Captain Melody Insaro

“I would be glad to join Commander Constanza on a raid to fuck with Cylon logistics.” Melody replied. “Lord knows the Provoco could use some combat experience as her crew is pretty much all new to the idea of actual fights. Good people, just inexperienced.” She frowned a little. Intent on the problem she seemed to have fully ‘recovered’ from her little breakdown and back in her usual form.

“Iubar hasn’t had a chance to fight Cylons either, so if you don’t mind me taking an escort along, we can leave Audeamus here for protection and We can bloody three crews at once.” Melody looked up as they entered the flight pod, her lone shuttle standing out starkly with the swarm of raptors. “I could always come back to to Acheron with you and we can work out something now unless you’d rather take a breather to... tell your commanders about what happened here.”

[United Colonies of Kobol]

Commander Alexander S. Spencer, CF
Battlestar Acheron, Colonial Fleet Reclamation Facility
Second Cylon War, Day 42

---

“Yeah, if it’s okay with you, please come back to Acheron with me and we’ll get all the details of this raid all worked out now,” Spencer replied with a nod. “That way I can give my fellow Commanders news of the raid at the same time, saves dragging them aboard twice.”

With that agreed, the assault team left the Ares and were quickly replaced by new Raptors, primarily from the Boneyard itself, full of engineers who would go over the ship with a fine-toothed comb in order to get Commander Spencer a full engineering assessment as soon as possible. Most of the extra CAP that had been scrambled began to move away and return to their ships, but the Gunstar Cerberus would remain with its guns trained on the old Battlestar until it was given a full clean bill of health and was confirmed not to be a risk. Ideally, this would not be until the ship was safely powered up and in the hands of at least a small crew. However, as the Boneyard was not exactly a combat zone, thank the gods, this was not too much of a problem as it would be if they were in a location that was likely to see Cylon attacks, such as any of the four systems if the Colonials were able to secure even one of them. It was for that reason that, even one they began to have some success the secrecy of this place would remain essential.

Much of the deck gang turned out to watch as their Commander, and the marine detachment, returned safely aboard, doubtless hoping that there would be some sort of indication of what had transpired over on the old Battlestar but would be bitterly disappointed by the completely normal return to the Acheron. Spencer begged a moment of privacy and quickly changed out of his combat gear and back into his service blues, before offering Melody a seat in the seated area of his quarters and his steward brought in cups of coffee for the pair.

“I assume you can actually drink coffee,” Spencer commented with a slight smile.

Sipping his own drink gratefully, Spencer leant back into the comfortable armchair.

“The only concern that I have got about this little raiding party is the overall inexperience of all the commanders involved,” Spencer sighed. “No disrespect to you, as you’ve fought as much as we have, but Commander Constanza in particular was one hell of an XO but has never commanded a Battlestar in combat before… I’m tempted to go along but I don’t want to upstage her in the CIC of her own ship, so she’ll just have to learn quickly.”

[Maxis Laudi]

Colonial Reclamation Facility
Battlestar Acheron
Captain Melody Insaro

As soon she was on her shuttle, Melody contacted Audeamus and ordered Limstrom over to help the Boneyard engineers with their check. Not that she didn’t trust any of her of her own officers or the AI on her ship, but Kit was a sharp mind, and while not a cyber security AI, he wouldn’t look out of place being sent to help with checks for malicious code.

So by the time she was sitting in Spencer’s quarters, having taken her helmet off and settled into her seat with the cup of coffee, everything seemed to being going the right way for once.

She did wait until his steward left before responding. “I do have a fondness for coffee, though I don’t actually need to eat so you don’t have to waste your food supplies on me.” Melody gave a snort of laughter then took a sip of her coffee, listening to his worries and understanding them completely.

“I would say I can keep a tight leash on Constanza but I’m here and under your command for your war and the different rank structures don’t help.” She tilted her head a little as she looked up at him. "I'll listen to her directions of course and I'm sure we can always put our heads together before we leave so we don't clash too much."

She took another sip. Then shrugged. "Not exactly off topic but with Ares coming into the fleet sooner than expected this means you are going to have yet another commander to join the gaggle you already have. Have you considered claiming a higher rank title so you can make sure you have the rank bars back up your unofficial claim to lead this fleet?" She paused, seeming a bit uncomfortable. "All it would take is some other commander with more seniority showing up to throw things completely out of whack. Can you afford to have someone else trying to wrestle control from you... even with a fleet that's mostly made from your friends and subordinates?"

[United Colonies of Kobol]

Commander Alexander S. Spencer, CF
Battlestar Acheron, Colonial Fleet Reclamation Facility
Second Cylon War, Day 42

---

Commander Spencer nodded thoughtfully.

“It’s a relatively simple operational all things considered, and Constanza knows how to fight a Battlestar in combat, did it by my side well enough, just she’s not had the opportunity to do so, but I’m sure she’ll do fine, she has commanded before, just not a Battlestar,” Spencer commented. “Besides, she went to the war college, she knows the tactics, it’s just a case of putting them into practice and, given the enemy force strength she should have some leeway if we send the Solaria, a Gunstar, and one of your own ships.”

Spencer leant back in his chair and sipped his coffee as she question that had been asked several times over the past few weeks came up once again. It was a fair question; as the rank of Commander within the Colonial Fleet was effectively a combination of line officer and flag officer, due to the need for the commanding officer of the Battlestar to also be able to command the rest of the Battlestar Group, it was almost unheard of for a multi-battlestar force to exist without a designated officer of the rank of Rear Admiral or higher. Of course, given that the Colonial Fleet only existed in his own fleet these days, everything that had once been ‘untold’ had been blown out of the water by the Cylon Attack.

“I’ve considered it, and it’s something that has been raised by my fellow Commanders several times; they’re all happy to follow my lead, and I am the most senior of them, but from a purely practical perspective it would be far smoother if I assumed Admiral rank,” Spencer nodded. “However, I’m reluctant to do so, as it would just be me unilaterally claiming the rank without the authority to do so, which would not solve the scenario you raised, and I’m concerned that doing so would undermine good order and discipline.”

Spencer sighed and took another sip of coffee.

“I suppose it would be acceptable if we organised the civilians into something approaching a Colonial Government-in-exile, and then they promoted me officially, or if the other Commanders got together to ‘elect’ me admiral, but I obviously can’t organise that myself,” Spencer shook his head. “Ultimately, it is unlikely to be an issue in the immediate future, as I was one of the most senior Commanders in the Fleet, after all, this is the Acheron.”

Spencer paused, glanced across at Melody and laughed.

“Oh gods, I never told you did I? At first it was hardly the best thing to say to the new people you just met, after that it never came up,” Spencer smiled wryly. “Before the Fall, the Acheron was the fleet’s dumping ground, everyone aboard was on someone’s shit-list, which is why I never made it to Admiral on my own.”

[Maxis Laudi]

Colonial Reclamation Facility
Battlestar Acheron
Captain Melody Insaro

Melody actually seemed surprised by Spencer's admission to what Acheron had been for his fleet. "I... never would have guessed. Your ship always seems in top form whenever I've been here and when we fought she never seemed to lag or hesitate. Then again I don't have to deal with the Discipline issues being a dumping ground usally involves as an outside observer. Must have a damned fine commanding officer then." She said with a smile as she sipped her coffee again.

"But you are the expert and my superior officer so I won't argue the point of your rank Commander." She joked lightly, giving him a small informal salute. "I'll be happy to help Constanza in a fight."

[United Colonies of Kobol]

Commander Alexander S. Spencer, CF
Battlestar Acheron, Colonial Fleet Reclamation Facility
Second Cylon War, Day 42

---

“Well, the true discipline problems were out of the Fleet in the normal process, the reason that people ended up on the Acheron, which is named after the mythological river we cross to get to hell by the way, is that they are too valuable to lose from the service, but have pissed someone off during their career, or have some other ‘undesirable’ quality that counteracts their skill or experience,” Commander Spencer replied with a laugh. “So, I end up with hot-shot Viper pilots with too many flight safety violations, and a deck gang that is constitutionally incapable of going on liberty without getting in a bar fight, so I arguably have some of the best people in the fleet, they’re just a handful! Thankfully, the one thing where my people are top-notch without any caveats is my Marines, so they keep the rest in line.”

Spencer smiled wryly; although he spent more time conducting a Commander’s Mast than he could recall, he was really rather fond of his crew and they were loyal and devoted to him. The irony that it was the unwanted officers and enlisted crewmen of the Fleet that had been amongst the minority to survive was not lost on anyone on Acheron, or any of the other Battlestars. However, as Melody had said there had been nothing in Acheron’s conduct during the war so far that gave any indication of her former status within the Fleet, and arguably vindicated the decisions to keep such people in the Fleet.

“Alright, well I’d quite like to get started with these raids, we’ve waited long enough as it is, and it’ll distract from the situation on Ares,” Spencer added. “If you can be ready, I’ll make sure that Commander Constanza is ready go first thing in the morning, ship’s time.”

[Maxis Laudi]

Colonial Reclamation Facility
Battlestar Acheron
Captain Melody Insaro

Melody nodded. "I will be ready to head out by then. I'd say Provoco could leave now if she wanted but then I remember we literally just got back from a big 'upset' and thr Marines need to cool down and the crew time to settle a bit as well. Tomorrow morning works fine."

As she finished her coffee her expression became a bit unsure. "Are you sure about telling the other commanding officers about abput well..." she made a motion to herself. "I'm not going to lie that it makes me nervous, it's been a somewhat close secret of my navy for a while so while I am glad I didn't have to keep lying, it was a hard choice for me to make."

[United Colonies of Kobol]

Commander Alexander S. Spencer, CF
Battlestar Acheron, Colonial Fleet Reclamation Facility
Second Cylon War, Day 42

---

Commander Spencer nodded understandingly.

“I completely get your concern, I fully appreciate that it is something that you have had to keep secret for a while, literally under pain of death, and that I am asking you to trust not just me but also the other Commanders, who you have not had as much interaction with,” Spencer nodded. “However, I need these people to trust me as much as I need to be able to trust them, that means that I can’t keep something of this magnitude from them, especially given the questions that will be asked around the situation on the Ares.”

Spencer smiled comfortingly.

“I know these people pretty well by now, and I’m confident that once I explain the background to them they’ll come to the same conclusion, that you are very different from the Cylons and that we should trust you, and that we should keep your secret,” Spencer added. “In any case, Sam Byrne will trust me from the get-go, as will Constanza, and the others will follow my orders if it comes down to it, and we’ll keep the circle as small as possible, this group of officers are going to be the leadership of this fleet going forwards, so they need to know… other people don’t.”

[Maxis Laudi]

Colonial Reclamation Facility
Battlestar Acheron
Captain Melody Insaro

Melody took a deep breath, to try and calm her nerves. It didn’t honestly help her feel any more relaxed and she wondered what she would of done had she not had all of the ancillary code that made her act more human.

“Of course.” She said, though it sounded more ‘forced calm’ than she intended. “You know them better than me so I’ll trust your judgment. I can logic my thoughts to your explanation but sadly as a 1.0 AI I do have emotions and can’t turn them off.”

Melody stood, setting down her cup. “I will head back to Provoco and prepare her for her scuffle tomorrow. Thank you for your trust.” She gave him a crisp, professional salute, picked up her skinsuit helmet and left.

[United Colonies of Kobol]

Commander Macia J. Constanza, CF
Battlestar Solaria, Colonial Frontier System 14
Second Cylon War, Day 43

---

Commander Constanza stood at the command table in the CIC of her ship, a little nervous, as the jump preparations continued around her. Although she had previous command experience, of the Combatstar Ariadne, this was the first time she would be taking her ship into a combat situation and was her first operational tasking as the Commander of a Battlestar. She knew that she was ready for it; had it not been for some unfortunate business several years previously she would have had a Battlestar before now, and she knew that Commander Spencer would not have appointed her this command if she was not up for the task. She had been right there alongside the Commander, which was how she still thought of him even since her own promotion, when he had fought the Acheron in several engagements with the Cylons, and she knew the tactical concepts back-to-front, so she knew her stuff. Moreover, although her crew was a composite collection of officers and crewmen who had survived the destruction of their ships, they were all professionals and they had come together well enough. Nevertheless, Constanza was still feeling a few nerves but that was natural.

Ultimately however, the Solaria was more than sufficient for this raid on her own, without even considering the presence of the Gunstar Megaera, and the Laudians. As a Galactica-Class Battlestar like the Acheron, the Solaria was a formidable combatant despite her age and having been decommissioned over five years ago. Several successive reconnaissance runs had confirmed that there was only one Cylon baseship protecting the tylium refinery, which was several jumps from the Four Systems and several from the Boneyard.

“The board is green, Sir,” Colonel Sebastian A. McEvoy, Solaria’s executive officer, reported. “The ship reports ready to jump.”

“Very well, take us to our target, Colonel,” Constanza said simply.

“Yes, Sir,” Colonel McEvoy nodded. “Major McHale, execute the jump.”

Major William T. McEvoy, the tactical officer and formally of the Battlestar Icarus, nodded and picked up a handset.

“All decks, prepare for immediate combat jump, the clock is running.”

A few moments later the Solaria and Megaera completed their combat jump and a few moments later the Laudians arrived, having been carefully coordinated to arrive at the same time. As expected, a lone Cylon baseship sat in orbit over the planetoid that held the refinery.

“DRADIS contact, rated highly probable Cylon basestar,” Major McHale reported. “She’s launching Raiders.”

Constanza nodded acknowledgement of the report, doing her best to maintain a calm expression as if the Cylons launching their full complement (434) of Raiders was nothing to be concerned about. Indeed, in many respects it was nothing to worry about. This was the standard way in which every engagement with the Cylons had progressed as far back as the First Cylon War; the Cylons would launch large numbers of Raiders requiring the Colonials to not only launch Vipers but to commit most of their weapons (including their heavy guns, firing flak rounds) to forming a perimeter rather than in engaging the baseships. The outcome of any engagement was usually decided by the success or failure of the Vipers in dealing with those Raiders that survived outside the defensive perimeter which would, in time, allow the Battlestar to focus on engaging and destroying the baseships, ideally before the Cylons were able to pummel the Colonial ships with their missiles. It was precisely for this reason that the Colonials operated Battlestar groups, the idea being that the other ships would allow for both a perimeter to be established and for the Cylons to be engaged and destroyed. It wasn’t that a Battlestar could not do so on her own, it was just that its as significantly quicker and less costly when she had full support.

“Enemy suppression fire, all batteries, execute,” Constanza ordered crisply.

“All batteries, commence firing,” Colonel McAvoy echoed over the 1MC.

A few moments later the deck plates began to rumble as hundreds of point defence emplacements opened fire, flooding space within the firing solution with fire that would rip an approaching Cylon Raider to shreds, whilst every few seconds the heavier guns would fire adding their flak rounds to the the deadly fusillade.

“Perimeter established,” Major McHale reported. “Cylons are firing missiles.”

“Launch Vipers,” Constanza ordered, not yet too worried about the enemy missiles. “Signal Vipers engage fighters only, leave base stars to us. Execute.”

Constanza and McAvoy stood looking up at the DRADIS screens as eighty Vipers were launched and began to manoeuvre around the firing solution to take the fight to the depleted Raiders. Theoretically, the outcome of the engagement was a foregone conclusion, but she wasn’t about to count her chickens before they hatched and she would do everything by the book. At this point it was a matter of delicate judgement; switch fire too early and you risked letting the Raiders inside your defences where they could fire their short-ranged missiles, switch fire too later and you risked getting pummelled by the baseship’s missiles. It only became more complicated when there were more baseships, and it was a skill that could only be picked up not taught. It was something that became easier to recognise, and take advantage of, when you had a full Battlestar Group, and was made a little more complicated this time with the presence of the Laudians and their unique capabilities outside the normal tactical paradigm.

Keeping her eyes on the DRADIS screen, Constanza grimaced as the Solaria rumbled beneath her as it took at least one missile hit, but a quick glance at the damage control boards indicated minimal damage; the armour doing its job.

“Order batteries, one, three, five, and eight, to switch to salvo fire, one-to-one AP-to-HE, maintain defensive fire on the rest,” Constanza ordered, making her judgement. “Order Megaera to continue her defensive fire, leave the baseship to us.”

As was usually the case once a Colonial Battlestar could turn its guns on a baseship it quickly began to have some effect, especially given that they were at medium-range and accuracy was high, and the missile barrage from the baseship began to slacken. With the Vipers mopping up they would soon be able to turn their attention fully to destroying the baseship and that would be that.

“New DRADIS contact!” Major McHale reported urgently. “Three contacts, one eight zero carom zero five zero, rated highly probably Cylon Baeships.”

Constanza felt her blood run cold; three new baseship contacts would be bad enough, but they had put themselves on the exact opposite vector to the existing threat and that was very dangerous for any Colonial warship, as having to spread defensive fire across a wider area not only significantly lightened the weight of fire but was a nightmare for Vipers to operate alongside. Considering the number of Raiders that three baseships carried this was the last thing that any Battlestar Commander would want, especially given that the air wing was already engaged and would need time to refuel and re-arm.

“They’re launching Raiders,” Major McHale added. “Also reading Raiders launching from the refinery.”

“Frak,” Constanza muttered to herself as she looked up at the DRADIS screen.

It was a bad situation but it was far from unrecoverable. It was a totally unexpected turn of events, and some damnable bad luck.

“Order Megaera to keep up her defensive fire against the refinery, but switch to salvo fire on some batteries to take out the baseship,” Constanza ordered. “Switch our own suppression barrage to the new vector, re-arm the Vipers and other the Laudians to pick a target and start shooting, we’ve got work to do.”

[Maxis Laudi]

Colonial Frontier System 14
Ego te Provoco
Captain Melody Insaro

Melody sat calmly in her command chair while she watched the final seconds tick off the timer telling her when the ship would come back out into normal space. She had brought along her own escort, Iubar as well.

It might be overkill for a single basestar, but Iubar needed to see what combat looked like for real, not just the recreated simulations she'd run with her ships.

"Normal space in 30 seconds." Tactical reported.

"All hands, prepare for combat." Melody said into intercom.

The ship popped back into normal space, Iubar quickly tucking herself into Provoco's side as the basestar began to launch raiders.

"One basestar, no other shipping visible." Tactical reported after a moment to study his sensors.

"Good, lets kill it. Tactical see about point defense helping thin the raiders and launch missiles at the basestar. Coms," She turned slightly to the officer. "Make sure you and Yaden keep an eye for intrusions or viruses."

"Yes Ma'am, though at the moment the attempts are pretty weak." Yaden replied.

She didn't have much time to wonder why, watching the basestar withering under the fire of Solaria, the raiders suffering heavy losses from defensive fire and the vipers. It looked very good so far.

"New contacts! 3 Cylon basestars." Tactical called out and Melody frowned down at the data she had. She wondered if this was just bad luck or a very well laid trap. Either way, they were going to muscle there way out of this.

"Alright, its a target rich environment so they should be harder to miss." Melody's voice was calm. "We need to give the Colonials time to rearm their fighters, it looks like Megaera can handle the refinery vector, direct most of ours to the swarm coming from the new arrivals. We are taking the one to port of the center one."

Provoco and Iubar shifted most of their attention to the newcomers, their point defense reaching out to destroy the raiders as they closed even before they began to reach the limits of Solaria's suppression barrage. Her own ship had 10 launchers per side, and paired with Iubar's 5 that made for a healthy 15 missile broadside, if they wanted to double stack and loose some time, it could be 30. She would hold off on the double stacking until more raiders were dead as they had shown a willingness to suicide themselves to save the basestars and she didn't want to waste missiles. She could put a little pressure on though as her ship's tubes launched their first salvo. Anything that would thin the paider numbers and keep the pressure off of the Colonial Vipers.

"Well, here they go." Melody heard the coms officer mutter and bent in to work with Yaden as they fought off the intrusion attempts. She was sure they would do a passable job but there was a reason Private Young and one of her engineers had been thrown onto this crew as cyber security AIs. She couldn't quite shake the growing 'headache' in her head. Unlike the last time, this time Melody wasn't an observer to the action, but fighting two of her ships. She could ignore the pain, if you could call it that, but it still was mildly distracting and she prayed that it was an unfortunate side effect of the broadcasts of Cylon hijacking attempts, not an active effort.

[United Colonies of Kobol]

Commander Macia J. Constanza, CF
Battlestar Solaria, Colonial Frontier System 14
Second Cylon War, Day 43

---

Commander Constanza grimaced, gripping the command table tightly as the Solaria heaved beneath her feet as she took another missile impact, this time to the starboard flight pod. It was a common enough strategy for the Cylons to target the flight pods first, as by their nature they were less well protected than the main body of the ship, and even if the armour held up there was a much better chance of damaging launch tubes or the flight deck itself. It was also entirely possible for damage to the flight pods to ignite the tylium storage for the Vipers and Raptors, which was part of the reasons why the flight pods were extended away from the ship in the first place; a Battlestar could lose an entire flight pod to a tylium ignition and the rest of the ship would survive such was the armour protection of the main body. After all the Battlestar was designed to be both a carrier of Vipers and a ship of the line, the initial design intention being to combine what benefits of both with as few of the drawbacks, and as such even if the fight pods were disabled the ship was still a formidable combatant.

As it stood, however, the armour of the flight pods were standing up well to the non-nuclear missiles being launched by the three Cylon baseships that the Battlestar was turning to engage. With the Vipers on the deck and being quickly refuelled and re-armed, a process which would take some time even if corners were being cut and the squadrons rotated through to ensure at least some Vipers were in space and defending the ship, the defensive perimeter was spread dangerously thin as the Cylon Raiders tried to take advantage of the lack of Vipers to attack from multiple vectors. It was this spreading out of the enemy suppression fire, which by definition was supposed to be concentrated, that was resulting in more Cylon missiles being able to make it through the fusillade and enter attack range. Some of the missiles were being drawn of by electronic countermeasures, however others were hitting and even a Battlestar could only withstand so much punishment, to make matters worse the Cylons knew this as well as she did and the three baseships were spreading out to widen the vector down which their missiles were being fired. However, with over thirteen hundred Raiders launched from the three Cylon basestars, it was not a good situation to be without Vipers.

Behind them, Megaera made short work of finishing off the first Cylon basestar, given that her gun firepower was respectable albeit less a Battlestar, and her defensive fire was sufficient to rip the handful of squadrons from the refinery to shreds. It was the first piece of good luck they had enjoyed in this encounter, had the Cylons jumped in sooner they would have trapped the Colonial force between operational baseships rather than giving them time to deal with the first one. Nevertheless, it was still not a great situation to be in even as Megaera slipped back into formation and added her own defensive fire to Solaria’s, whilst the Laudian ships also added their own fire whilst starting to engage one of the Cylon baseships at long-range with missiles. It was a rapidly apparent weakness of the modern iteration of the Cylon’s baseships, that they lacked any real point defence capability of their own beyond fire from their own Raiders (who would often suicide themselves to save the baseship), however the same had not been true for the examples of the First Cylon War and as missiles had historically been ineffective the Colonial Fleet had not really invested in them over the years.

As a result, the Laudians were a valuable addition to any Colonial group for exactly that reason, although with so many Raiders the Cylons were able to detach several squadrons to serve as ad hoc point defence for the moment. It did, however, have the effect of lightening some of the pressure on the Solaria’s defensive perimeter.

As she now had a little bit of breathing room, Constanza quickly considered how to proceed. Her orders were to destroy the tylium refinery, depriving the Cylons of its resources for the foreseeable future. The original plan had been to secure the orbital space and then destroy it with conventional weapons, as tylium was rendered inert by exposure to nuclear radiation and although there was no practical way for the Colonials to operate a refinery this close to enemy territory it was something they might want in the future. It would be difficult to fully secure the combat zone long enough to turn their guns on the refinery, and sending a Raptor strike force with so many Raiders out there would be dangerous in the extreme. As such, it was rather tempting just to nuke the site and get the hell out of a bad situation. It was not that they could not face down and destroy three Cylon baseships, between a Battlestar, a Gunstar, and two Laudian ships they had enough firepower, but rather a matter of whether it was worth suffering excessive casualties and battle damage for a relatively minor target.

“Major McHale?” Constanza said, making her decision.

“Sir?”

“Spin-up nuclear ground-strike missiles in launch tube one,” Constanza ordered firmly, locking her eyes with Colonel McEvoy who looked surprised for a moment before nodding his agreement.

“Aye, Sir,” Major McHale nodded, picking up his ship’s broadcast handset. “This is a nuclear mission order, spin-up launch tube one.”

It was only a few moments later, that Major McHale nodded.

“Missile is spun-up, Sir.”

“Open launch tube doors,” Constanza ordered. “Load target package 1 Alpha, set ground zero for the refinery.”

“Launch doors are open,” Major McHale reported. “Target package loaded, and ready.”

“Very well,” Constanza nodded, picking up a ship wide broadcast from the command table. “This is the Commander, release of nuclear weapons is authorised.”

“Understood, Sir,” Colonel McEvoy nodded, taking up his own handset. “This is the XO, release of nuclear weapons is authorised.”

“Major McHale, disable launch and warhead safeties on tube one,” Constanza ordered, walking over to the tactical station and entering her launch code into the console. “XO, please input your firing code.”

“Safeties disabled,” Major McHale said as Colonel McEvoy approached the console as well. “Warheads are armed.”

“Launch keys,” Constanza said simply, entering her own key into the console and waited for McEvoy to do the same. “Fire on my mark.”

Constanza was silent for a moment, her eyes on Major McHale’s DRADIS repeater as the ship shook under another impact. The swarm of Raiders was certainly thinning, and it looked like the Laudian missiles were getting closer and closer to there targets, but there was still a long way to go. Moreover, there were still enough Raiders out there that it would cost her a significant number of Vipers, with irreplaceable pilots, not to mention that the Solaria and the rest of the group would take a pounding, which would take days if not weeks tor repair adequately. It went against the grain to take the easy way out, but she knew that it was the right call.

“Fire.”

With a nod of consent from Colonel McEvoy, which was required under the two-man rule, Major McHale pressed a button on his console that would send the order to the fire control officer for the launch tubes; a few moments later a single missile launched from the tubes on the Battlestar’s dorsal hull and immediately sped away back towards the planetoid. The Cylons had clearly had a radiological alarm as several squadrons of Raiders broke from the main attack to try and intercept the missile but they were far too far away and the missile did not have all that far to travel. Although not visible to the Colonials, the nuclear explosion that detonated on the planetoid a few moments later was very obvious from the interference that began to fill their DRADIS displays.

“Hold launch on all Vipers, and recover those we have aloft,” Constanza ordered with a sigh. “Order all ships to jump away to the pre-arranged fallback position… let’s get out of here.”

Under heavy fire the handful of Vipers in space were quickly recovered through combat landings, meaning that they could not slow down and land vertically but instead had to land as quickly as possible which tended to result in dents in the flight deck that would need to be pounded out. As soon as they were aboard the Solaria began to retract her flight pods, as she could not safely jump with them extended, which delayed the jump by a few seconds as the Cylons got closer and closer.

“Landing bays secure,” Major McHale reported urgently.

“Jump!”

With that simple order, Solaria and Megaera activated their FTL drives and jumped away, doubtless soon followed by their Laudian allies, and were safely at their deep space rendezvous point a little over five lightyears away. Almost immediately the flight pods began to extend once again to allow for the CAP to be launched, as they needed to make sure the Laudians made it out before heading home.

[Maxis Laudi]

Colonial Frontier System 14
Ego te Provoco
Captain Melody Insaro

Melody watched with a grim expression as Solaria launched a nuke at the refinery, what a shame too, if they ever could of have come back here perhaps they could of used this deposit of tylium for their own purposes. Now being nuked it would render most of it worthless. It was too bad the Colonials had to use such a rare material for their fuel, even if it’s properties were much better than fission or fusion as they claimed.

“Madam, Commander Constanza is ordering us to fall back.”

Melody glanced over the entire situation, seeing what damage all the ships had taken, including poor Iubar whose shields were suffering much more under the weight of fire than her new ship was. They could still handle this fight, but it wasn’t a target worth the loss. The refinery was killed, so objective complete. Any further fighting would only cost with little gain.

“Then tell Iubar to jump and get us out of here as soon as she had left.” Melody ordered.

She watched, somewhat nervously, as Iubar fell back and away from the ship she was supposed to guard and the Cylons as well. This was one of the worst parts of hyperwarp drives, the safety zones. If Iubar tried to jump into hyperwarp while she was in her safety zone, she would be fine, though the entrance wouldn’t be as smooth, Provoco, on the other hand, would likely be torn in two by the warped space generated by the drive. So it was common practice for the smaller ships to be covered by their larger comrades as they fell back and left first. A larger ship had a larger safety zone and couldn’t be clear itself from the wild melee of a fight as fast as a smaller cruiser.

She watched as her escort vanished, leaving her the only ship still here and the focused attention of all the Cylons left she waited a few seconds, watching as raiders closed into to try and no doubt get to the act of killing her.

“Jump now.”

A groan passed through the structure of the ship, the tremor almost too light to feel as the drive activated, twisting space by sheer force and murdering any raider unfortunate enough to have gotten close enough to be in the danger zone. And like that, Provoco was gone from the fight, the bridge suddenly silent as they entered the safety of hyperwarp.

“How’s everything look?” Melody asked her executive officer, who was currently bent over the damage control panel on the bridge.

“Good. Lost a little armor when our shields flickered here and there, but we held up remarkably well.” He said with a relieved tone. “Getting a little hairy there.”

“Nothing we didn’t handle.”

“Arriving at the rendezvous point.” Someone called out and Melody’s eyes fixed back on her plot as data filled the screen. There they were, the Colonials and their vipers flying CAP. Iubar was waiting as well, so every ship had made it out.

“Com, get me Commander Constanza please.” Melody asked and waited til the link was established. “Commander, may I congratulate you on the success of your first operation, even if it got a little crowded there at the end. How are your ships holding up?”

[United Colonies of Kobol]

Commander Macia J. Constanza, CF
Battlestar Solaria, Rendevous Point
Second Cylon War, Day 43

Commander Constanza was stewing.

She knew that she had made the right decision, from a strategic perspective, but that did not make her feel any better. Academically she knew that losing dozens of more lives, and taking much more battle damage to the ships, was just not worth it to keep this supply of tylium viable. After all, there were other sources of tylium and after the war, whenever that came, it seemed likely that any entirely new refinery could be built on the planetoid to take advantage of the tylium which had not been rendered inert. However, although she had achieved her objective, which had stated that the desired end goal was the destruction of the refinery, she still felt that she should have been able to get the job done without rendering a significant amount of tylium inert and effectively useless. It was her first taste of combat command and she could not help but feel that she had failed in it, that if it had been Commander Spencer in charge that he would have been able to achieve the mission without having to resort to nuking the refinery. It had been the right decision, the nagging sense that someone else could have made another decision work better would not go away.

As she stood in the CIC, absent-mindedly going over the status reports from across the ship, Constanza was trying to remember that this was just the start of a very, very, long conflict and that winning every engagement, or destroying every enemy ship encountered, could not come before winning the overall fight. It was far better to get her ships back, mostly undamaged, and her air wing, mostly intact, and achieve her objective, than it was to take out three enemy baseships. It was a foregone conclusion that they were going to be outnumbered in pretty much every engagement, and it would not always be possible to destroy them all which meant that they would have to achieve their objectives and withdraw safely and with the minimal amount of casualties. It was a difficult distinction that many a line officer struggled with, as the natural instinct was to destroy the enemy straight up and then deal with other objectives, when the reality was almost always far more nuanced.

“DRADIS contact,” Major McHale reported. “Looks like it’s Iubar.”

“That’s one,” Constanza commented dryly.

“Second DRADIS contact,” McHale added a short time later. “Looks like Provoco.”

“And there’s two,” Constanza smiled.

“Got Captain Insaro for you, Commander,” PO Dunn reported from communications.

Constanza nodded and picked up a handset and put it to her ear.

“This is Solaria-Actual… I thank you for your congratulations, Captain, but I fear that it is a partial success at best, but we got it done,” Constanza replied. “We’re doing alright over there, Solaria is in good shape, so is Megaera… how are your ships looking?”

[Maxis Laudi]

Colonial Frontier System 14
Ego te Provoco
Captain Melody Insaro

“Don’t sell yourself short Commander, you made the right decision.” Melody couldn’t quite help an urge to try and bolster Constanza’s spirits, a need to make sure a junior wasn’t going to second-guess themselves to death... even if she was the one calling the shots for this outing. “Maybe they planned the trap when they saw the recon raptors poking around there, but the Cylons are short a fuel source and a basestar now so it was worth it.”

She paused. “But as for my ships, they are fine, they dented my armor and Iubar is reporting that some of her shield generators were overstressed but nothing we can’t fix with on hand spares.”

[United Colonies of Kobol]

Commander Macia J. Constanza, CF
Battlestar Solaria, Rendevous Point
Second Cylon War, Day 43

---

“Yes, it is rather concerning that the Cylons were able to spring a trap on us so far way from the Four Systems on such short notice, there was no indication that any of the recon Raptors were detected on DRADIS, but it is of course entirely possible,” Constanza replied with a sigh. “I’m glad to hear that your ship’s held up well enough, as much as I hated to run from a fight I think we managed to get out of there with our objective completed without taking unnecessary damage, or casualties, so I’ll just have to accept that.”

Constanza was silent for a moment as she considered the situation. They were, as she had stated, some distance from the Four Systems of Cyrannus and the reconnaissance runs had only intensified in the past few hours, which would have been the only thing hinting that an attack was imminent. As such, it seemed unlikely that the Cylons would have been able to bring in three additional ships to lay their trap all the way from the Twelve Colonies. Instead, it seemed more likely that they had stripped the defences of other frontier systems in order to concentrate their forces at that particular system in order to try and trap and destroy a Battlestar Group in what was the first engagement since those early days of the conflict. It was obvious why they would want to do so, they had to have a more-or-less accurate count of how many Battlestars were unaccounted for, although if they had been able to identify the Solaria they would be in for a surprise, and they also had to know the damage that the loss of one such ship would do to the remnants of the Colonial Fleet. The presence of the Laudian ships, whose identity and capabilities were a comparative unknown, was likely a complicating factor but they had clearly decided it was a risk worth taking.

As such, if the Cylons had indeed stripped the surrounding frontier systems, which contained other tylium refineries or other mining outposts, it was very tempting to quickly go after one of those in the hopes of hitting them before the Cylons could reposition back to their normal positions. Moreover, even if they were able to redeploy in time it was unlikely that they would be able to setup another ambush of the same nature, which would allow the Colonials to possess an overwhelming force and defeat them in detail (which had been the original intent of this fledgling campaign of raids). However, there were two interconnected arguments against such a decision; the first was that unlike their most recent target the last reconnaissance run had been several days ago and as such the information was out of date, whilst the second was that in those days it was entirely possible that the Cylons had reinforced the entire frontier instead of moving several individual ships to the target system. Initial estimates following reconnaissance runs into Cyrannus suggested that the Cylons certainly had enough ships to spread out across the frontier without reducing their fleet strength in the Twelve Colonies to a level that the known Battlestar survivors would be able to take advantage of.

Constanza sighed; there was no point in risking a broadly successful operation, even if it had not been an unmitigated one, in an effort achieve a more perfect victory. They had achieved their objective, and that alone would be cause for celebration and would boost morale; one Cylon baseship destroyed was equally positive, and to do so with minimal casualties and damage was so much the better.

“We’re heading back to the Boneyard,” Constanza said simply. “I’ll see you there for the debrief, Actual Out.”

Placing the handset back down, Constanza sighed again.

“Recover the CAP, and plot our hyperlight jumps home.”

[Maxis Laudi]

Colonial Frontier System 14
Ego te Provoco
Captain Melody Insaro

Melody stood, looking around her bridge, everyone seemed fairly pleased with themselves having just (partially) won a battle for the first time for most of them. "Good job everyone, plot our course back to the Boneyard, let Iubar go first. I need to go down to my cabin."

A wave of cheerful ayes answered her and she turned and left the bridge, it taking only a few moments to reach her cabin.

That was a short battle, I saw it went well. Hive said to her as she entered. The 'direct to brain' speech still unsettled her a lot, she hated communicating with it except in dire circumstances, but Hive had no real external speakers and relied on hijacking the surrounding sound systems to speak, after all, if she was where were was supposed to be, she'd have ready access to any equipment she needed as well as a holographic system that was detailed and precise. But here she was, hiding in the crevices of Provoco, so while the systems were once again familiar and easy to access, she couldn't exactly swan about freely. So she was stuck with the straight up telepathy for now.

"Thanks, but as you can imagine the 3 later basestars were not a part of the plan. Can you fix it?" She asked as she sat down at her desk and Hive scuttled from her place in the corner to sit on her desk.

Without having to sneak around 24/7? Easy. Though I do have to wait til we get back to the Facility, hyperwarp isn't kind to things outside the hull.

"Good." Melody said, feeling the shiver run through the hull, this time less pronounced giving they were tearing apart raiders with their jump. "I hope this means my damage control won't get lazy."

You can yell at them if they do. They are a very nice lot of people and AI for the most part.

"Yeah, they are." Melody smiled. "No off my desk, I need to write a report."

It will take you 10 seconds flat to write it, I can stay right here. Hive chided and Meloy just shook her head as she got to work.

[United Colonies of Kobol]

Commander Alexander S. Spencer, CF
Battlestar Acheron, Colonial Fleet Reclamation Facility
Second Cylon War, Day 43

---

“…with three more enemy ships entering the fray, and in a disadvantaged position, I made the decision to nuke the refinery and withdraw, which we were able to do, resulting in one enemy destroyed, target destroyed, and only light casualties and damage.”

Commander Spencer leant back in the comfortable leather armchair and nodded thoughtfully as Commander Constanza stood before him and delivered her oral report, which would be augmented in due course by a full written after-action report. It was immediately clear that the raid had not gone off without a hitch, and yet the objective had been achieved (albeit not in the most optimal manner) and casualties had been low and that was essential for the long-term prospects of the campaign. Despite the obvious disappointment that Constanza was exhibiting, Spencer knew that he would have made the exact same decision; preserving his fleet as much as possible whilst achieving what military objectives could be managed was the only way to fight a war like this one, heavily outnumbered and at a significant strategic disadvantage. Truth be told, that was the biggest concern that he had had with promoting new Commanders and sending them off to get combat experience; to understand the nuances of military strategy and that the bigger picture was far more important than any individual engagement. He knew that Commander Byrne and Commander Maynard understood that, but there was a very real concern that newly promoted Commanders, of which Constanza was the first but would not be the last, would want to prove themselves.

“You made the right choice, Commander,” Spencer said firmly, gesturing to the other armchair. “Keeping your ship intact was more important than destroying three enemy ships, and you still achieved the objective.”

“More or less, I know you’d have preferred the tylium to remain viable,” Constanza sighed as she sat down unhappily, her shoulder’s still high and tense. “Running from a fight didn’t feel right.”

“You weren’t running from a fight, you were making a tactical withdrawal to preserve your force after achieving your objective” Spencer replied. “Moreover, you destroyed one enemy ship with minimal casualties… I would have made the same choice, Macia.”

“That at least is a comfort,” Constanza shook her head. “It’s a hell of a learning curve.”

“That’s war for you,” Spencer sighed. “You know, Captain Insaro raised the question of my rank as well yesterday evening.”

“So that’s all three of us Commanders, and the senior Laudian officer, all saying the same thing for broadly the same reasons,” Constanza commented wryly. “Have you considered that might be because it is a good idea, and will probably help morale, despite your concerns.”

“Of course I’ve considered it, I’ve been considering it since you all started mentioning it up whenever you get a chance,” Spencer shook his head. “You know my reservations, and let’s face it right now it’s not exactly urgent, you’re all junior to me, and we’re all friends here.”

“Even so…” Constanza began, but Spencer held up his hand.

“Alright, I’ll make you a deal, if we can get something approaching a Government-in-Exile established from the civilians we have on the station, and if they make the decision independently that we need an Admiral, then I’ll accept the promotion,” Spencer replied firmly, albeit with a slight smile. “Until then, we’ll keep going as we are for now as it seems to be working well enough, and we’ve got bigger concerns right now, specifically how the Cylons were able to ambush you so effectively.”

Constanza nodded and looked uncomfortable.

“The way I see it there are two options,” She sighed. “Either they’ve planned an ambush at every frontier system, in which case we’re going to struggle to make headway, or we’ve got Cylon sympathisers in the fleet.”

Spencer grimly nodded his agreement.

“Thinking about this practically, it has to be the first option; based on our recon runs we know the Cylons have the ships to do so,” Spencer commented. “Besides, if there was a Cylon sympathiser here they would surely have given up our location by now… and I find it difficult to believe that anyone could be working with them after what they did to us.”

“I would tend to agree,” Constanza replied. “So, how do we check our hypothesis?”

“By springing the trap, we perform a series of reconnaissance missions against several targets in the frontier systems, like your raid, ” Spencer smiled wryly. “Then we hit one of them in force, and see if we get ambushed… then ideally ambush them to dissuade them of the notion going forwards.”

“Sounds like a plan, Sir,” Constanza nodded. “So, we’re going to take most of the fleet?”

“More than likely; a similar initial force to your own to spring the trap, we don’t want them to think we’ve cottoned on to their game,” Spencer replied. “Then we bring in an ambush force of our own, potentially as many as two or three more battlestars.”

“That would make short work of the Cylons, assuming a similar-sized ambush force, which I think is a fair assumption at this point,” Constanza agreed. “We’d still have at least one Battlestar here, so I think it’s worth the risk.”

“I’m glad you agree,” Spencer smiled. “Alright, we’ll gather the other Commander this evening, I’d like to get this rolling as soon as possible.”

[Maxis Laudi]

Colonial Frontier System 14
Ego te Provoco
Captain Melody Insaro

Melody had made sure to forward her written report to Spencer once she had returned to normal space at the Boneyard, calling up Iubar to check on her damage. Her Captain reported that repairs were going along fine and it wasn’t going to cut too deep into spare storage.

With that settled and Hive beginning to work on the armor, Melody was free for a little while, playing back the records of the battle to see how everything looked now that she wasn’t in danger.

It definitely looked like a trap, a very well planned one to be honest, not just a bad coincidence of reinforcements that happened to arrive at the right time. It was too neat, the opposite angle of approach, meant to spread defensive fire over too wide an arc, 3 basestars, meaning they outnumbered the capital ships and a hell of a lot of raiders to overtax the vipers. If they had come in earlier, there was a good chance they would of pinned them between the refinery basestar and the newer basestars at full strength and probably been an even worse position to be in.

Melody frowned, wondering how they set it up. Traps in space were usually very hard to pull off, given that most ships could just jump straight out at the first sign of danger. Or at least that how it was for Maxis Laudi. Traps took planning, misinformation and very well timed jumps which could be difficult to pull off if your opponent deviated in an unexpected way from what you wanted.

There was still a lot she didn’t know about the Cylons, hell even the Colonials couldn’t be sure of everything that had changed over the years with their foes. Well, she guessed they would learn more as they fought.

[United Colonies of Kobol]

Commander Alexander S. Spencer, CF
Battlestar Acheron, Colonial Fleet Reclamation Facility
Second Cylon War, Day 43

---

It was early evening, by the Fleet’s reckoning, by the time that Commander Spencer summoned his fellow Commanders (and Captain Insaro) aboard the Acheron for a briefing on the next step of their campaign of raids following the unexpected setback suffered by the Solaria. Spencer had spent most of the afternoon reviewing all the reports he had received around the engagement at the refinery and was more and more convinced that this was a carefully planned ambush and that the only possible explanation was that the Cylons had forces ready to ambush any raids against their outer holdings by his fleet. Nevertheless, it was still technically conjecture and he had to confirm his theory before he could proceed solely on that assumption as it would dramatically change the type of campaign that he would be able to conduct. As such, he was going to have to deliberately send another strike force into what he suspected to be an ambush, but they would not be going alone as that was the only way that he could justify the risk. Although as Constanza had shone they could evade and jump away, if the Cylons had been even quicker they would likely have been able to inflict more damage before the FTL calculations were completed.

As he was eager to confirm or refute his hypothesis, if for no other reason than it would allow him to properly plan going forwards, Spencer had gathered all of his senior commanders into the wardroom, and sat in place at the head of the table.

“Good evening, you will all by now be aware of the engagement that the Battlestar Solaria fought earlier today, in which they were ambushed by a larger Cylon force but were able to destroy their target, complete their objectives and withdraw intact,” Spencer commented, nodding at Constanza. “Now, my principle concern is that the only way that I can see this being achieved is if the Cylons have a similar force lying in wait at every one of their outer holdings, as the only other explanation would be a Cylon sympathiser here, and I think that unlikely, for a multitude of reasons.”

“However, I cannot continue to plan our campaign without knowing for sure, so we’re going to see if we can’t spring the trap and turn it back on those chrome-plated bastards. My plan is simple, I will take the Acheron, the Cerberus, and the Provoco with me, as we can’t afford the Cylons to think we’ve reduced the force we’re raiding with as it may give away our intentions. We will jump into the target system and advance on the target. When, as I suspect they will, the Cylons move in their additional forces, we will dispatch a Raptor to take a signal to a muster point a single jump away, at which point the Battlestars Majestic and Heracles, along with Gunstars Alecto and Tisiphone will jump in and catch the Cylons in a vice.”

Spencer held up a hand as Constanza looked like she wanted to object.

“The Battlestar Solaria will remain here to guard the Boneyard, your people have already seen combat today and you do have minor battle damage to repair… this is not any reflection on your service this morning, as we can all agree you did the right thing,” Spencer said firmly. “As we are expecting significant numbers of enemy Raiders, we will take on as many Vipers as we can do from the Boneyard and reserve wings, along with the nuggets we’ve been training… once we get up to strength we’re going to have to get used to operating with cramped decks, as we can expect to be heavily outnumbered on the fighter front.”

Spencer looked around at his commanders.

“I know this is something of a risk, on the off chance that the Cylons know about this place we are leaving it wide open to attack with only a single Battlestar and two Combatstars to defend it, however that is exactly why we need to take this risk now,” Spencer explained with a sigh. “If the Cylons have an ambush force waiting for us at every system, we’re going to have to move in-force each and every time, and I will only take that risk of leaving the Boneyard lightly defended if I am sure that I have to… any questions on our mission?”

[Maxis Laudi]

Colonial Reclamation Facility
Battlestar Acheron
Captain Melody Insaro

Melody listened to the plan with interest, it sounded simple enough and a good way to confirm if the Cylons were trying to turn every outpost into a trap or if there was some sort of leak. She honestly couldn’t believe that there would be a spy for the Cylons given all they had done. Her own AI had sympathy because it was honestly an unjust way they were treated and vilified, and they were slowly working to change that.

She, maybe, could feel a bit bad for being forced to do all the shitwork of a society, including murdering each other, but the way they reacted was terrible and it wiped away any sympathy she had. So how any sane human could look at what the Cylons were doing and go ‘yes, this is exactly the right thing to do’ was beyond her.

“Just one,” Melody said, “May I bring Audeamus as my escort? I want to leave Iubar to cool her heels here, her damage is light but I can’t let my other escort collect too much dust sitting around here looking pretty. Not to mention,” she shrugged, “I’m not comfortable with jumping an escort cruiser into a firefight given the jump safety margins. If Provoco accidentally collided with something coming out of jump, we have the shields and armor to survive anything up to planetary collision, an escort cruiser would lose her shields and not have the armor left to deal with incoming fire.”

[United Colonies of Kobol]

Commander Alexander S. Spencer, CF
Battlestar Acheron, Colonial Fleet Reclamation Facility
Second Cylon War, Day 43

---

“Of course, indeed that would be preferable as it will fit the profile of the first raid to have two of your ships along with us,” Commander Spencer nodded. “We’ll need to proceed as if we aren’t expecting the ambush, any deviation and they might abort.”

The gathered Commanders nodded their understanding; it was important to try and maintain the exact same conditions so as to truly determine whether the Cylons had laid a trap in every system or whether there was something else afoot. They all knew that getting these raids back on track was essential, not only were there obvious strategic considerations but there was also morale to think about, even small victories (which Constanza’s victory at the refinery certainly counted) did wonders in that respect.

“My only concern is that they are relying on us doing exactly this," Commander Maynard commented. “That they'll ambush us with an even larger force in an attempt to wipe us out.”

“A valid concern, however, in order to do so they would need to know which system we are intending to attack in order to concentrate their forces to overwhelm us, based on counting Raptor recon runs into Cyrannus, and on enemy ship numbers that we’ve observed until this point, I do not believe that they have the numbers required to put an overwhelming force on every frontier holding,” Spencer replied. “The Cylons have to know from our engagement at Ragnar that we have at least three Battlestars, with at least some Gunstar support, meaning that to be sure to overwhelm us they would need to have between twelve and sixteen baseships ready to pounce on us, and as there they don’t know the system, they’d have to base out of each one, and we would have noticed that kind of force reduction in the Twelve Colonies had they done so.”

Commander Maynard nodded thoughtfully, accepting the logic of Spencer’s argument. Athough they did not have a complete picture of the Cylon forces they at least had a broadly firm idea of the number of ships that they had available to them, with an additional margin assuming those defending their own space. They were, after all, not an unending bogeymen they were an enemy force that was both finite and limited, even if was overwhelmingly more powerful at this point, and as such they had the same limitations that any enemy.

“Alright, if there is nothing else, I’ll let you all return to your ships and make your preparations for this raid tomorrow morning,” Spencer ordered firmly. “Make sure your people get good rest tonight, for tomorrow we go to war.”

[Maxis Laudi]

Colonial Reclamation Facility
Ego te Provoco
Captain Melody Insaro

As Melody stepped back onto her ship she looked around the shuttle bay, a little less busy given the late ‘hour’. She’d already called her XO to tell him about their participation in the raid and he said he would relay that to Audeamus.

She walked somewhat slowly back to the bridge, looking over all the stations and officers, most of them juniors so the older and more experienced officers could get some rest for the raid tomorrow. She didn’t want to hover as the young Lieutenant sitting in the command seat was obviously trying to decide if she needed to give up her place to her commanding officer.

So she left to wander her ship, the crew still seemed pleased by their minor victory and even more pleased when Melody divulged that they were going on another raid tomorrow to some particularly eager souls who had asked, they would of learned soon enough anyways. She trusted them, had Maxis had prior contact with Cylons, she may of been worried about a spy or sympathizer, but that seemed even less likely than a Colonial being a spy given how little her people had been in contact with the toasters.

Melody walked back to her cabin and sat down, gazing at her bookshelf and the two actual books resting with all the ‘safe books’, and prayed that the raid was not going to fuck up.

[United Colonies of Kobol]

Commander Alexander S. Spencer, CF
Battlestar Acheron, Colonial Frontier System 19
Second Cylon War, Day 44

---

Despite his confidence before his subordinates the previous day, Commander Spencer was nervous as he stood at the command table in Acheron's CIC as they jumped into target system. Although he was confident in his decision, knowing that he needed to know what was going on out here, the simple fact of the matter was that they were taking a significant risk. In order to put together a force that was capable of engaging and destroying any Cylon force that could be realistically marshalled against them he had had to strip much of the Boneyard of its defences. Not only had he taken all but one operational Battlestar, as the Ares was by no means combat capable yet, but he had also reassigned dozens of Vipers from the Boneyard’s central station to each of the Battlestars. Moreover, the men and women flying those Vipers were nuggets, pretty much anyone who had even a hint of flying experience, whether civilian or military, had been pressed into Viper training, which meant that they were inexperienced and even older generation Vipers, such as the hundreds and thousands stored at the Boneyard and quickly brought back online, were a handful. As such, it was one hell of a risk.

The Colonial Fleet had realised a long time ago that the Cylons were always likely to outnumber them when it came to fighter craft, which was part of the reason why the Viper was designed to be so capable that it was a handful for even an experienced pilot in order to be able to outfly a Cylon Raider. In order to try and rectify this challenge to some extent, it had long been the plan that, in wartime, a Battlestar (or indeed a Combatstar) would operate with roughly twice its peacetime air group, which sacrificed turn-around time and sortie rate (which the peacetime air group was optimised for) in favour of being able to get the maximum number of Vipers in the air for any single engagement. With the speed and devastation of the initial Cylon attack, none of the Battlestars had been Abe to take aboard their trained and equipped air wings, which meant they had to draw from both the older models at the Boneyard and what pilots they could find and train, which only made the logistical challenges aboard the Battlestars worse as these nuggets weren’t military trained beyond the ‘boot camp’ that they had been put through over the past weeks, alongside their flight training.

As a result, Acheron, could muster one-hundred-twenty Vipers, whilst Majestic and Heracles could muster three hundred each, compared to their normal eighty and two hundred strong air groups. They were still not at their true strength, but considering the number of enemy Raiders they were expecting, it would help even the odds at least a little. Nevertheless, even though some of those reinforcements were pilots trained pre-war and assigned to the Boneyard’s defences, none of the reinforcements had any combat experience whatsoever, so Spencer was expecting painfully high casualties amongst their number.

“Jump complete,” Colonel Hastings reported smoothly as the nausea receded.

“DRADIS contact,” Major Laurence Speller, who had replaced Hastings at tactical, reported. “Highly probably Cylon baseship.”

“As expected,” Spencer nodded his acknowledgement. “Take us in, XO, launch Vipers.”

Colonel Hastings echoed the orders and began to turn them into actions. As they had agreed at the final briefing earlier that morning, only the normal air group was launched with their reinforcement squadrons held in reserve as they did not want to tip their hands to the Cylons. With the Gunstar Cerberus in the lead, the Acheron following along with the Laudians on either flank, they began to advance on the basestar which was starting to launch Raiders, as was the refinery in this system which had clearly learnt from the previous engagement as they remained in protective positions near the target.

“Incoming raiders,” Major Speller reported.

“Enemy suppression fire, all batteries, execute,” Spencer ordered simply. “Order Cerberus to engage the baseship, we need to take it out of the fight.”

Under normal circumstances it would be considered ‘tactically unsound' to start trying to engage an enemy baseship directly before it’s Raiders had been taken out, as it significantly reduced the amount of defensive firepower available when the enemy was at its strongest. However, in this case the priority was ensuring that they did not end up trapped between two largely intact enemy forces, even if the latter would be significantly larger and also be getting attacked by his own reinforcements. Nevertheless, his orders were followed and as the Battlestar put up its defensive perimeter the Gunstar went straight to work, from within the protection offered by Acheron’s firing solution, targeting the Cylon baseship at long-range with the majority of its guns putting up a firing solution of its own that would ensure that at least some of its rounds hit even at this range.

"Just a little closer,” Spencer muttered to himself, knowing that if the Cylon ambush was to come it would be coming soon.