HSNS Thor

From the bridge of the Daedalus almost a dozen people looked on the name, written in large, bold print, each letter the size of a house. Different emotions ran through each of their heads, ranging from impressed awe to proud satisfaction.

Jonas Quin, however, was slightly confused. "HSNS?"

"Homeworld Security Navy Ship," answered Richard Woolsey, crisp and business-like as ever. His normally faultless veneer of insouciant professionalism wavered as everyone on the bridge, from Colonel Caldwell to Doctor Daniel Jackson, looked at him incredulously. "It tested well with the focus groups!" defended the poor bureaucrat, conveniently omitting that he was the one who had suggested the acronym in the first place.

O'Neill clapped a hand on the back of the beleaguered man, smiling at his embarrassment. "Woolsey, I don't care if we have to name her the SS Cracker Barrel," remarked the man who had saved the Earth so many times it had practically become an annual routine for him, like filing his taxes or getting a check-up. "I'm just glad I finally got my big, honking spaceship!" Laughter echoed across the bridge as the veteran diplomat gave a knowing look of thanks to the veteran soldier. Woolsey knew a bailout when he saw it, and he wasn't so proud as to not acknowledge the small favor the General had just done him. For his part, Jack returned with a knowing look of his own as he quietly slipped away to the front of the bridge to stare at the goliath vessel whose christening they were celebrating.

The name stood there, a sense of strength and defiance radiating from it, like warmth from a sun. The moment was more sobering for the original members of SG-1, as they quietly paid tribute to the ship's namesake. For O'Neill, however, there was an even greater weight upon him, almost as heavy as the stars on his shoulders. To him, the God of Thunder was more than just an ally who had helped them out. He was a friend, a being who had risked his life several times to save the lives of people who weren't even his own. A deep regret panged within him, first that Thor wasn't here to see the very ship that was being named in his honor, and second that he hadn't been there that fateful day on Orilla, when the Asgard race ceased to be.

Colonel Cameron Mitchell carefully observed the four living legends of the SGC. He hadn't known Thor as well as they had, but he knew enough to tell what they were thinking. He caught the look in General O'Neill's eye, nodded understandingly, and turned around, perhaps to steal another glass of champagne.

"Hey guys, why so glum?!" Vala mal Doran had no such compunctions, however.

Jack and Daniel exchanged looks, and inwardly the archeologist sighed as he turned to deal with the incorrigibly corrupt "infiltration specialist."

Teal'c also turned as an IOA official began to speak with him, displaying a level of patience that would've made the Nox seem as temperamental as the Goa'uld. Lately, the struggles of politics as a member of the High Council of the Free Jaffa had forced him to develop skills he didn't even know he had, skills which he wasn't entirely sure he wanted to have. Among these were the ability to tolerate the constant pestering of civil servants. Teal'c, with no other choice, walked away from the front of the bridge, a little man in a suit shadowing his every step.

Major Evan Lorne figured he was only here because they wanted a representative of the Atlantis expedition to be there, and Shepherd was back in Pegasus, probably saving the galaxy again. Still, that didn't mean he wasn't glad to be here.

"Beautiful, ain't she?" said O'Neill, noticing the subdued look of awe and wonder on Lorne's face, despite the Major's best attempts at concealment.

Now discovered, Lorne didn't even try to not look like a child glimpsing through the candy store window. "Like a true mistress of battle, sir..."

"Well she should," remarked General Carter, with more than a hint of pride in her voice. "I designed her, after all."

"A fact that still makes McKay green with envy. He won't stop flooding my inbox with his carrier designs," said O'Neill.

Carter and Lorne ignored the exasperated look on O'Neill's face. "So what's her power output?" asked the Major.

Inwardly, Samantha approved Major Lorne's line of query. Most people would've immediately asked about her weapons, or her shielding, or her F-302B complement, or maybe even her hyperdrive. Those were the fun things, the flashy toys that most people would focus on. Few people would've thought to first ask about the background systems which quietly powered all those toys.

She pointed at the behemoth, 400 meter-long warship outside, shaped like a larger version of the Daedalus-class battlecruiser. She gestured towards the two pods attached to the main body.

"We replaced the flight pods with massive Neutrino-Ion Generators."

Lorne's eyes widened. "Just like what the Asgard used on the O'Neill-class?"

"Well, not quite," answered the resident genius. "We've barely skimmed the surface of the Asgardian database. The generators we've built are only capable of a fraction of the power output of the originals. But combined with the Asgard core, and our fusion and naquada reactors, and you have enough energy to power all of the Americas for about a year."

Major Lorne gave a low whistle. "The whole US?"

Carter smirked in a horrifyingly McKay-esque fashion. "Actually I was talking about the continents. North and South."

If he wasn't in uniform, Lorne would've sworn colorfully. Of course, O'Neill, being the highest ranking military officer on the bridge and on the planet, had no such qualms.

"Holy shit..."

Carter cast a withering gaze at her boss, before continuing with Lorne. Now that the essential stuff was covered, it was time to move on to the fun part, the aforementioned 'toys.'

"She's equipped with 80 point-defense railguns, arrayed to allow for 360 degrees of cover, firing 50 mm naquada-tipped, trinium coated rounds with depleted uranium cores, capable of firing 10,000 rounds per minute. In a pinch, each is equipped with an Asgardian energy-to-mass synthesizer. While it takes too much time and energy to create more complex munitions, it can create millions of titanium-tipped, lead core rounds on demand. She has three dozen Zero Gravity Missile Launch systems, able to launch every flavor of missile in the armory, from EMPs to Mark IX warheads."

Lorne was confused. "Zero Gravity Missile Launch system?"

O'Neill interrupted Carter before she could go into another long, technical spiel. "She just means the artificial gravity is shut off inside the missile silo to make it easier to launch."

Carter frowned. "It's not quite that simple, sir."

"Carter, I listened to you explain its inner workings for about an hour and a half last night. I KNOW it's not that simple."

Major Lorne figured he'd interrupt their lovers' quarrel. "Asgard Plasma Beam Cannons?"

Carter and O'Neill smiled, as if they'd been waiting all day for him to ask. Carter answered the Major's question. "Four facing forward, six port and starboard, two covering the rear, and one on the ventral and dorsal sides."

Lorne gave another low whistle. "Twenty cannons in total. Five times more than what the Daedalus-class can carry."

Carter nodded. "All upgraded with new, high-quality focusing crystals, power recyclers, and thermal sinks to allow for increased efficiency, decreased cooldown, and increased rate of fire, and arrayed to allow for complete coverage, just like the railguns. We've also upgraded the targeting systems for both weapons. You could write your initials on the side of the enemy ship before you blasted it to kingdom come. Those same upgraded targeting systems are used by the ship's point-to-point matter transporters, so you won't have as much trouble beaming to and from smaller, fast moving ships, and it should be easier to cut through interference, like what the Wraith used to keep us from beaming warheads onto their ships back in Pegasus.

Shields are the same kind of Asgardian Shields we have on the Daedalus-class, just bigger to accommodate the frame, which is almost twice as large. Multiple, redundant shield emitters, of course, to protect from any unexpected power surges. Hyperdrive is also the same, just sized up. We had to cut down on the size of the Sublight drives, so her acceleration isn't as good as the battlecruisers' are. She has a small flight deck for deploying F-302Bs and other small craft, but at most it can only carry four of them. Leaving space for emergency landings though, it's more like two."

Lorne looked slightly worried. "So she's not as fast, and she's got almost no strike craft."

"With all the firepower at her disposal, she won't need it," remarked Carter. "Combined with her massive power output, she can take as much punishment as an Ori Mothership, while outputting more weapon's fire. Unless someone finds one of the old O'Neills, there's no other ship in the galaxy I'd rather take into battle." Carter hadn't looked this proud since the day Cassandra had graduated from the Air Force Academy at the top of her class.

"Christ, I'd love to sit in her commander's seat. Do you know who's gonna get her?" questioned the Major.

O'Neill and Carter exchanged knowing glances before answering simultaneously. "Yes. Yes we do."

Lorne smiled ruefully at the big, beautiful lady, sitting at rest in the airless void like a sleeping giant. "God, I'd love to be that lucky sonofabitch..."

O'Neill looked at the man, a smile on his face he didn't even try to hide. "Well then, it's a good day to be you... Colonel." The General's smile grew as he revealed the real reason he had brought Lorne all the way up here, pulling out a black box which he handed off to the former Major.

Evan Lorne took the box, his eyes as wide as the ship he was about to receive. He opened the container to reveal two silver eagles, marking his promotion up two whole pay grades, and a new patch for his flight suit, marked with the proud seal of the HSNS Thor.

Lorne didn't know what to say. He had nothing to say. Such promotions were unheard of outside of battlefield promotions. He took the new rank and insignia with slightly trembling hands, hands which had fought off whole Wraith hives steadily now found they could barely hold the tiny metal birds and the accompanying piece of cloth.

"Officially, you're not supposed to know for a few more weeks. I figured I'd at least buy the ranks for you as a gift." Jack couldn't help but smile at the confused grin on the newly minted full Colonel. Truthfully, there had been a lot of resistance to this initially, but the General had been insistent. Evan Lorne had performed exceptionally during his tenure at Atlantis, and had even successfully commanded a Lantean warship, the Aurora-class battleship, the Orion.

By now, everyone had shifted their attention from the new battleship to her new commanding officer. Colonel Lorne looked at everyone looking at him.

"Okay, am I the only one who didn't know about this?"

The knowing smiles on everyone's faces, even the bridge crew, answered the man's question. Doctor Jackson approached Jack, Sam, and Evan with newly refilled glasses of champagne, offering the bubbly wine to the three officers. The General accepted the drink before raising the glass in a toast once everyone had a full glass in hand.

"Here's to the Thor and her new commanding officer. May the... solar winds be at your back... and... umm... Daniel..."

The archeologist rolled his eyes at the pleading look in his friend's eyes. Raising his glass he started up where his friend left, a string of strange, alien-sounding words, half of which sounded as if they shouldn't have been possible with the human voice. Doctor Jackson smiled fondly afterwards.

"That was a traditional, Asgardian farewell. It means, 'May the stars light your way on the path to Valhalla.'" Everyone, Jack included, smiled at his words, not realizing that Jackson had purposefully forgotten to translate the second half of the toast: 'May the screams of your enemies ring loudly from Hel.' Jackson figured they wouldn't mind.

He held up his glass one last time. "Here's to old friends. To the Asgard!"

"To the Asgard!"

As everyone finished their glasses at once, the silent guardian of Earth slept, waiting for the day when she'd roar into battle, a shield to her friends, or a vengeful deity to those few fools who would claim to be her enemy. It was enough to make the God of Thunder smile from his seat in Valhalla.

.

.

.

"HSNS Thor"

Commander William "Husker" Adama raised an eyebrow as his son's voice came in on the com. "What?" he asked.

"That's what it says on the side. HSNS Thor," repeated Lee "Apollo" Adama, looking at the massive inscription from the cockpit of his Viper. Gliding through the airless void, he effortlessly turned to avoid another piece of the smoldering wreckage.

"HSNS?" questioned Saul Tigh, XO to the Battlestar Galactica. He'd never heard an acronym like that, even

"The Thor?" retorted the CO of the ship. The word sounded strange and alien in his throat, more like a guttural grunt than the name of any ship ever put into space by the Colonies.

"How does she look?" asked Adama.

"Umm... permission to speak freely?" asked Kara "Starbuck" Thrace. Saul and Tigh looked at each other, half questioningly, half worryingly. Starbuck never asked for permission to speak freely. This had to be serious.

"Go ahead," answered the Commander.

"She's entirely fubar. Frakked up beyond all recognition. Literally. I don't recognize this ship design. Or any of the ships or fighters I'm seeing out here."

"Assuming some of these things are even ships and fighters?" questioned Lee.

"Lee, I know ships and fighters when I see them, and those are definitely ships and fighters. Hell, those fighters even have a similar silhouette to our Vipers."

"They're sure as Hades not like ours," countered Apollo. "Just look at them. They look more like giant bugs."

"Enough you two," ordered Adama. Turning to his XO, he ordered all fighters recalled and for a course to be plotted immediately back to Picon. Colonial Fleet Headquarters needed to know about this.

As the clock began winding down and the Old Lady of the Fleet got ready to jump, old Husker turned the strange name over and over again in his mind. Thor... He pondered the name like you'd ponder a riddle. His pilots were reporting thousands of pieces of rubble, scattered throughout space, and whatever the strange ship was, they had found it torn to pieces. She was a grey brick, floating in space, without power, without a crew, and almost without a hull if all the hull breaches his pilots had spotted were to be believed.

"What the hell happened to you?"