Part 38

2672.241 Apollo's quarters Battlestar Galactica: The time for the coming battle was getting nearer, and yet he couldn't sleep. This was the battle that every Colonial warrior for the last 1000 yahren had waited for. He smiled, "I doubt anyone is getting any sleep tonight." Even his wife wasn't sleeping; she was in the other room going over tech reports on her squadron. Apollo got out of bed and began to dress. He walked into the other room and saw Sheba reading the tech reports. He quietly came up behind her and kissed the top of her head.

"Shouldn't you be getting some rest?"

She looked up at him and smiled, "Shouldn't you?"

Now he smiled, "Couldn't sleep. I thought I would walk the decks for a while, to relax a little."

Sheba smiled at him again, and nodded. She knew why he couldn't sleep, and she knew that there was nothing she could do to help him. He had made a decision that every Commander hates to make, he has to send someone he loves into harms way. Sheba also knew that he had made the right decision, for if anyone could pull it off, he could. But her heart was heavy, because she knew that the chances of him pulling it off where really small.

..
Officers quarters Battlestar Galactica: He quietly dressed in his flight suit, and then looked over at the bed. She was asleep now, and he just watched her for a minute. Last night had been special, but it hadn't started that way. After Chris had told him, he went to her and asked her to join him. She knew from the look on his face what he had to say. She had just looked at him and asked him, "When."

He told her, and then he saw the tears in her eyes. He gently wiped the tears from her cheeks, and he kissed her. They kissed slowly, lovingly, their hands exploring each other's body as if this was their first time. He stripped her clothes off slowly, and then with each area uncovered, he covered it with kisses. Then they lie in bed together, neither of them rushed the moment. They delighted in the feel of each other's bodies. He caressed every curve and she gently touched each muscle. She pushed him down on the bed, and then straddled his hips. She guided him home, and then began to move in slow circles. As she increased her speed, the sensation caused him to grab the sheets. They were both moaning as they kissed, and she soon lost all control. She no longer cared who heard them; each thrust of his hips caused her to moan louder and louder. The movement of her hips was bringing him closer and closer. Finally she lost all control and she screamed in release. He screamed as well at his own release, as the waves of pleasure, then darkness overtook them. He quietly walked to the bed and kissed her forehead. Now he picked up his helmet and walked out the door, and headed to his flight briefing.

..
Pilots briefing room Battlestar Galactica: He walked in and took a seat in the front row, and then he looked at Chris.

"So when do we get started?"

Chris looked at him, "In a few minutes, the flight crew is doing the final system check on the Anubis as we speak."

He looked at the layout of the system on the monitor, and he realized that the fleet had moved away from the Paradigm. He looked at Chris, who seemed to know his question before he asked it.

"We moved the fleet, because the Paradigm is packed from stem to stern with enough Solonite to level a small continent."

He smiled at Chris now, "You're kidding right."

Chris smiled now, "Of course I am. A large island at best."

"Well that makes me feel a whole lot better."

"Don't worry, Apollo says you're the best pilot in the fleet. And to tell you the truth, I agree with him."

"He said that?"

"Yep."

"Well I'll be dammed."

Chris looked at him, "You already know what you have to do, so this briefing is going to be simple. Once you launch, you need to shut down your comm. system. We wouldn't want any premature detonations."

He just shook his head. "Wouldn't want that."

"There are two techs waiting for you on the Paradigm. They'll hook up your ship to the control systems. Like you, they have their comm. systems turned off. So all communication will be through hand gestures. Once your connected, the Paradigm will respond to your flight controls. Once the techs have cleared the area, you'll need to cloak, and then move the ship into position. Any questions?"

"Nope, sounds like a milk run to me."

He and Chris stood up and headed for the Flight deck. When the briefing room door opened, he saw that everyone in all of the squadrons were there. They came to attention and saluted him. He snapped to attention and returned the salute. Now they lined the hallway from the briefing room to the flight deck. When they got to the flight deck, he saw Apollo and William waiting there. They came to attention and saluted him. He returned the salute, and then shook their hands.

"Don't worry folks, I'm coming back."

Apollo looked at him, "See that you do."

Alpha Flight Bay Battlestar Galactica: William, Apollo and Chris watched as he walked to the Anubis fighter. He stopped before climbing in and turned around. He looked at them, and then he smiled at them and climbed into the ship. He went through the startup procedure, and was soon cleared for launch. As he rocketed out of the launch tube, he wondered if this would be the last time that he would experience this rush. Now he lined up with the Paradigm, and he saw two figures in EVA suits standing on the hull of the ship. He slowed his descent, and carefully lined up his ship. Because of the amount of Solonite packed into the ship, the fleet had already moved a safe distance away. He watched as the techs made all of the connections between his ship and the Paradigm. Finally the techs were done, and they gave him the thumbs up sign.

He waited as they maneuvered themselves back to the shuttle waiting for them. He watched as it moved by thrusters only, until it was a safe distance away. Now, for the first time in a long time, he felt alone. He looked at the HUD and saw the time.

"Now let's engage the cloak and see if we go boom or not."

He slowly reached for the button on his flight console and then pushed it. He saw his ship disappear, followed by the Paradigm. He realized that he was holding his breath, and slowly exhaled.

"Now lets see how this conglomeration flies."

He pushed his throttle forward, and saw that everything started to move ahead very slowly. "It's like flying a building."

He had always been a fighter pilot, and now he had a whole new respect for the big ship pilots. He found that getting this behemoth to turn was a little harder than he had expected. Now he fired the braking thrusters and waited. If he was lucky, he wouldn't have long to wait.

..
Bridge of Battlestar Galactica: Apollo watched as the Paradigm began to fade as the cloak activated. Everyone on the bridge let out a sigh of relief. Apollo turned and looked at Admiral Eisen.

"Move the fleet to the ambush site."

William just nodded his head, and began to give the necessary orders. Soon the fleet was in position and began to go into stealth mode, except for the Lexington. It had stayed near where they believed the jump tunnel exit point was. After only an hour, the area flared and a jump tunnel point formed. The scanner tech on the Lexington called off the ships as they exited. Six Cylon destroyers and 3 Basestars exited the jump tunnel. Commander Jacorski listened to the tech.

"Helm, head to the rendezvous point. Set alpha speed."

"Aye aye sir."

The Lexington began to move quickly from the area, with the Cylons in pursuit. Col Taylor smiled as she turned toward the Commander, "Looks like it's working, we've got six destroyers moving up quickly, followed by the basestars."

"Have they launched fighters yet?"

"No sir."

"Well it looks like they want to take us out with their big guns. Since their fighters can't get through our shields."

He turned to the scan tech, "Time to rendezvous point?"

"Fifteen minutes sir."

"And time until the Cylons reach us?"

"At our current speed, twenty minutes until they overtake us."

Now everyone on the bridge was smiling.

..
Bridge of Central Cylon Basestar: The IL series robot Damius watched the scanners. The unknown human ship was here, as the Imperious Leader had said it would be. Damius ordered all destroyers to advance and destroy the human ship. The order was given, and all six destroyers increased their speeds to attack speed. Amazingly, the human ship was able to stay just ahead of the destroyers.

"Centurion, how long will it take to intercept of the human ship?"

The gold Centurion turned toward him, "Twenty sectons"

"Good, send a message to Cylon beta that we need assistance in capturing a human vessel. And also inform them that the Imperious Leader will not be pleased that they have allowed a human ship to be traveling freely in the system."

"By your command"

Damius turned and was looking at the scanner reports. "I wish we could get a better reading on the ship, the power levels are equal to a basestar, but it is so small."

The gold Centurion came up behind him. "We are unable to contact Cylon beta. There is no signal with any of the relay stations in this part of the system."

The IL series robot thought for a centon, "The Imperious Leader will truly have his hands full getting these frontier rejects up to true Imperial quality levels."

..
Bridge of Battlestar Galactica: Apollo watched the feed from the Lexington. The Cylon ships were getting closer. Soon they would be in position for them to close the trap on them. The Cylons were so intent on getting the Lexington that they were flying directly into the formation that William called the buffalo. It seems that it was a tactic of a general on earth over a thousand years ago. But it looked like it was going to work. Apollo watched the scanner feed carefully, then looked at the comm. tech and nodded.

"This is Apollo, close the horns and attack."

The ships of the group came up to full power, and the outer gunboats moved quickly into position. The Lexington spun on her axis faster than anyone thought possible, and opened fire with her Pulsar cannons. All of other ships opened fire as well, and the Cylon ships were ripped apart by the M/AM blasts in moments. A cheer went up on every bridge in the battle group, but Apollo was already giving orders for them to head back to the jump tunnel exit point.

..
Jump Tunnel exit point Terra system: He had sat quietly in his ship as the Cylon group flew by, and began to follow the Lexington. Now he knew the exact coordinates of the jump tunnel exit, so he programmed the course into the Navcomp of the frigate.

"Computer. How much time will it take for the frigate to fly from its current position to the Jump tunnel exit coordinates?"

The computer ran the calculations and showed an answer of 75 Sec. He now programmed the timer connected to the Solonite for 75 sec, and placed the timer on standby. Now all he had to do was wait. Twenty minutes later, his scanners were showing an energy spike consistent with a Jump tunnel exit point.

"Oh frak, their early" he thought.

He pushed the throttle forward and activated the Solonite timer, even as he was thinking this. He had the computer show the time to intercept of the jump tunnel and the remaining time on the timer on his HUD. He watched the countdowns as he flew this behemoth toward the forming jump tunnel. Both timers were down to fifteen seconds, when he locked the frigates navcomp on its final course. The timers were at ten seconds when he popped the connections to the frigate, and turned to Anubus's nose away from the area. He pushed his throttle to full, and hit his turbos.

"Time to minimum safe distance?"

His computer showed twelve seconds on the HUD. Now his hands started to sweat, and he began to mumble "C'mon, c'mon."

He saw on his rear scanner that the frigate decloaked as it neared the jump tunnel exit. The first Cylon ship was moving to intercept it when the blast went off.

The blast seemed small to him at first, then the sky around him became very bright, and his ship was hit by an enormous EMP shock wave. He nearly blacked out as the ship was buffeted by the wave. When the wave had passed, he found that all of his ships systems were dead, and he was drifting. He tried to activate his emergency beacon, but it was fried. He now checked the systems of his flight suit, and they were at only twenty percent, and that meant he had maybe thirty minutes of air left.

He smiled to himself, "At least I got the Cylons."

..
Central Command Cylon Basestar One: The Imperious leader watched as the command centurion began the sequence to return the fleet to normal space. Soon the fleet would be in safe territory, and even if that human ship was present in the Cylon Beta system, the ships that he had there would easily destroy it. Then he would begin to prepare for the final annihilation of the race known as human.

The command centurion spoke to him, "An unknown ship has appeared at the jump tunnel exit point."

Then the scanners on the ship were burned out by the blast that occurred, and the imperious leader could feel its body being torn apart as a huge energy wave nearly instantly hit the Basestar.

..
Bridge of the Battlestar Galactica: The scanner tech called him, "Sir, I'm showing a massive Solonite detonation at the Jump tunnel coordinates. I'm also showing a level five shock wave coming right at us. ETA thirty seconds."

Apollo opened a channel to all ships of the group.

"All ships shields to emergency settings brace for impact."

The crews all over the group quickly prepared for a rough ride. The shockwave hit them and all of the ships were buffeted. When it had passed, Admiral Eisen began to gather the damage reports from the group.

Apollo looked at him, "How bad William?"

"Not to bad Apollo. Some reports of minor injuries from the ships, and the Main energizer on the Panther was shorted out. Most of the ships have some structural damage, but that can be repaired."

"Any signal from our pilot?"

William just shook his head. Apollo looked at Chris, "I want a full search of the entire area, use every ship we've got."

"They're already launching Apollo. But the background radiation count is pretty high, our scanners are going to be limited at best."

"I know Chris, but do the best you can."

"Yes sir."

..
Terra system: He sat there in his cockpit and tried his systems again.

Nothing happened, "Hell even the repair system is fried."

Now he saw a flight of Vipers in the distance, and he started to relax.

"Come and get me boys." but the Viper flight flew on by.

"Damn, the radiation count must be to high, their scanners didn't see me."

Now he was really worried, "How can I make them see me?"

He got a wild notion in his head, and then looked at the reading on his flight suit.

"Twenty minutes of air, better not waste it."

He found the manual release for canopy and pushed it open. Now he grabbed the manual release for the tylium fuel supply and opened it as far as it would go. He counted to ten and then shut it off. He stood up in the cockpit and looked behind his ship. He could see the liquid tylium floating in space and watched as it began to freeze and solidify. He pulled out his blaster and took aim at it.

"Here goes nothing."

..
Gold Spar squadron Alpha wing: Sheba was watching her scanners for any signs of life, but the background radiation count had severely cut the distance on their scanners. "Does anybody have any readings?"

Everyone in the wing replied no. "Keep your eyes open people, right now they're probably working better than your scanners."

Now Sheba thought to herself, "Where are you? If we don't find you, she'll never forgive Apollo."

Ensign Tigh saw a flash reflected on his canopy, and turned around. He saw the last bit of a fire behind him.

"Col. Sheba I may have something in our rear sector. I'm going to check it out." and he turned his viper into a sharp left bank.

As he neared the area of the fire, he saw something that almost made him laugh. "Col. I think I found him."

Sheba breathed a sigh of relief, "Roger that Tigh, stay there, were vectoring in on you."

Now she opened a signal to the Galactica. "Galactica command, this is Gold Spar leader, we've found our boy. Sending the coordinates. Please send a S+R shuttle."

Apollo got on the line, "How is he?"

Sheba looked at him as her Viper came up along side of the Anubus. "Apollo, he's just sitting there with an ear to ear smile."

Apollo smiled now, "We have a shuttle in route, it should be there in a few minutes."

..
Galactica landing bay Alpha: Apollo, William and Chris and most of the crew were waiting as the shuttle touched down. As the door opened, they saw him as he stepped out. He was smiling from ear to ear, and puffing away on a cigar. Apollo came up to him and nearly lifted him off the ground with the hug he gave him.

Starbuck smiled at him, "I told you I would be back."

Soon everyone on the flight deck was congratulating him, but the throng of people parted as Cassiopeia came forward. She hugged him and kissed him, and then she looked at him with a slight frown.

"I'm mad at you."

"Why?"

"You didn't kiss me goodbye."

"Yes I did, but you were still asleep."

Now she smiled, "Next time wake me."

He smiled at her, "Yes ma'am." and he kissed her again.

..
Planet Terra, former Capital city of the Western Alliance: Commander Jacorski handed Apollo the stack of computer files.

"This is everything Apollo. All of our flight logs and crew reports for the last three years. I've also included all the specs and diagrams of the equipment improvements that Dr. Ravashaw's people made for us."

Apollo looked at him, "Are you sure about this Commander?"

He smiled at Apollo now. "Apollo, my crew and I are more familiar with all of the automated system of the Lexington. We'll be using them to begin rebuilding here on Terra. Besides, staying here gives me a chance to catch up with the person I've missed the most for the last three years."

Apollo smiled, "I understand Commander. I can't think of anyone better to leave here as acting Governor. Besides, now that the Confederation has the outpost here, and a perfectly inhabitable planet with cities already built. It's only a matter of time before you start receiving colonists to help populate the planet."

Commander Jacorski looked at him, "I want to thank you for taking on the members of my crew that wanted to go home."

"It's the least we could do for a crew that brought the Cylons to their knees."

The two of them looked at the park they were in, and Apollo paused for a moment. He had been in this park a very long time ago. He now looked seriously at the Commander.

"You know that Confed may appoint someone else to be the Governor."

"I know Apollo." and he looked around at the park and then smiled.

"If they do, can you think of a better place to retire?"

Both of them smiled, and then they shook hands. "Good luck Commander."

"You to Apollo."

..
Bridge of the Battlestar Galactica: Apollo had the comm. tech open a fleet and planet wide signal.

"This is Fleet commander Apollo. I wanted to first thank everyone for his or her performance in this mission. I also want to thank those crews who are staying here at Terra for their dedication. I also want us all to remember those of us who made the ultimate sacrifice."

There was a moment of silence before he continued.

"I know that for the crews staying here, life will be a little difficult. But I have assurances from Confed that all crews and ships will be rotated back home within 3 years. I also know that we are leaving you with a big responsibility. You are Confed's eyes and ears out here. You're also our first line of defense."

He looked at the crew of the bridge, and at the planet they orbited.

"But I am confident that all of you are the best. And I am leaving you an excellent Commander to follow. May the blessing's of the Lords of Kobol be upon all of you." and the comm. tech cut the signal.

As Apollo sat down in the command chair, he looked at William. "Admiral, set a course for home."

William smiled at him, "Yes sir." and in a few minutes the Galactica, the Pegasus, the Cain and the Adama and Ares were breaking orbit.

..
2672.280 New Kobol system: Apollo sat at his desk in his office. He had just looked at the latest reports from Captain Jacorski, and was pleased by the note the Captain had put at the end of it.

"Again Apollo, thank you for all that you did. You have the unending gratitude from the three of us."

Now Apollo sat back and was going over the reports of the progress of the other ships still in construction. His aide informed him of a call from Confed command. He activated his monitor, and saw Admiral Tolwyn.

"Hello Admiral, what can I do for you?"

The admiral smiled, "Welcome home Apollo. I wanted to congratulate you and your people on the fine job that you did. I've also been asked to pass on the thanks from the R+D people at central command for the new designs that you brought back with you. I must say that these new designs along with the Colonial improvements will make Confed a powerful force for many decades to come."

"Is that all Admiral?"

Apollo saw the Admiral smile again. "Well Apollo, there was some opposition to your choice of leaving Captain Jacorski as the Military Governor of Terra, but General Taggert explained to them that you made an appropriate decision as the fleet commander."

"Thank you Admiral."

"You should also know Apollo that we're sending a sizable force of people to Terra, to begin to repopulate the planet. We're sending some of the best technicians and scientists from the Confederation there to assist with the proper defense of Terra. As you know, we can't be one hundred percent sure that all of the Cylons were destroyed."

"I understand that Admiral. But I also believe that with Captain Jacorski there, your worries should be few."

"Quite right Apollo, but the extra personnel should make it easier for them to be properly prepared. Remember Apollo, the price of freedom is eternal vigilance."

The signal ended, and Apollo just sat there and wondered just what the Admiral was truly up to. Only the future would tell.