The Ancients use the blast energy to recreate the Wraith as vegans.
And, there's nothing more dangerous than that.
The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
Moderator: LadyTevar
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U.P. Cinnabar
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Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
And, there's nothing more dangerous than that.
"Beware the Beast, Man, for he is the Devil's pawn. Alone amongst God's primates, he kills for sport, for lust, for greed. Yea, he will murder his brother to possess his brother's land. Let him not breed in great numbers, for he will make a desert of his home and yours. Shun him, drive him back into his jungle lair, for he is the harbinger of Death.."
—29th Scroll, 6th Verse of Ape Law
"Indelible in the hippocampus is the laughter. The uproarious laughter between the two, and their having fun at my expense.”
---Doctor Christine Blasey-Ford
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Eternal_Freedom
- Castellan
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Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
The End of All Things
The Higher Planes of Existence
It had taken Janus and Morgan two precious minutes to assemble the leaders of the Ascended. Many of them had been a great distance away, observing things of inscrutable interest. Morgan had wondered just what could be fascinating about observing a barely sentient tree move towards the sunlight on a world in the Andromeda galaxy, but for the handful of Ascended leaders who were there it was sufficiently interesting that Morgan had to practically drag them away to inform them of the urgent situation.
Another two minutes had been wasted explaining just what would happen if the ZPM detonated as intended and answering questions from the more skeptical leaders. Apparently even having access to all the knowledge in the universe hadn’t prevented some of her fellows from developing an open mind.
Yet another two minutes had been spent in debate about just what they should do. Once again, their vast, almost limitless knowledge worked against them – the Ascended had become complacent, arrogant even, and with vast powers and immortality, the idea of “urgent” and “new” had disappeared from their minds.
Doing nothing, maintaining their strict non-interference policy was not an option – for doing nothing would end them all. Preventing either bomb from detonating was suggested and debated, but those among the assembly who wanted to help the lesser races argued fiercely that this was an unacceptable choice – not only would it be interference on a massive scale, it would prevent the annihilation of the Wraith threat and make it obvious to the humans that the Ascended would rather save their former enemies than their descendants.
Eventually, it was decided to allow the bomb to detonate but to contain the destruction within Lantea’s solar system, thus destroying the Wraith but sparing everyone else and allowing the humans to believe their plan had worked. Doing this however would require the combined powers of every single Ascended being in the three galaxies. They were fighting reality itself, never an easy task.
Every single Ascended being was assembled and given their instructions. This gathering and briefing consumed their last minutes of time. It was now or never.
Lantea
The ZPM timer, ignorant of both the near-panic among the Ascended and the tremendous danger that would soon be at hand, reached zero and carried out its final instruction. A strong electrical current was passed through the ZPM, causing the naquada and potassium mixture that Camulus had coated the device with to explode violently, shattering the container and liberating the energy within.
The former System Lord had no idea just how dangerous this was. His sole intent had been to let the resulting explosion destroy the Ancient Weapons Platform that guarded Earth, leaving it open to his forces. The coating would have done precisely that, and wiped out a substantial chunk of the southern hemisphere in the process, causing untold environmental devastation.
Doctor Lee and Colonel Carter had been more or less correct in their predictions of how much damage would be cause, but they had both overlooked something crucial. They had thought only in terms of energy released – Doctor Lee contending that only the naquada/potassium coating would explode, effectively destroying all life on Earth, while Colonel Carter had believed that the energy within the ZPM would be liberated, destroying everything within a billion kilometres or so.
What they had both overlooked was exactly how a ZPM functioned.
A Zero-Point Module was the pinnacle of Lantean technology. A small canister, barely a foot long and six inches wide, contained enough energy to power a city or starship under normal use for millennia. This was achievable because the ZPM contained within its crystalline structure a small, artificial region of space-time, one that could be safely drained of its vacuum energy.
The region of space-time contained within the canister was approximately one light year in diameter and, most importantly, had a very different set of physical laws that governed it, laws and constants that were utterly incompatible with the regular space-time inhabited by the Lanteans, the humans and every other species.
Most important among the differing constants was a lower energy ground state and a higher speed of light.
When the casing was shattered, this one light year diameter bubble of artificial space time expanded outwards extremely rapidly, five hundred times faster than the speed of light in normal space-time to be precise. Within one second, everything within one hundred and fifty million kilometres found itself inside this bubble and unable to exist under the new physical laws.
This included the ZPM, the decoy platform, the planet Lantea, the entire Wraith fleet, the planet’s moon, two other inner planets and the system’s star.
All these objects could no longer exist. Every molecular bond was sundered. Every atom was shattered into its constituent particles and then even those were obliterated. Every single gram of matter within the bubble was instantly annihilated and the mass was liberated as energy. That this mass included all of a mid-sized main sequence star meant that the energies released were on the order of a supernova explosion.
If this had been all that happened then the Ancients would not have needed to interfere. However, since this huge bubble, which continued to expand to its normal size, had a lower energy ground state, it posed an existential threat. This meant that the rest of the universe now existed as a false vacuum, something that would cause the bubble to experience a negative pressure and continue to expand outwards, obliterating everything in its path. Human scientists knew of this concept, it was one of a few nightmare doomsday scenarios that scared even the smartest of them.
They called it a false vacuum collapse.
The Ascended knew that they had to prevent this. If the vacuum bubble was left unchecked and with so much energy contained within it thanks to the annihilated star system then it would spread, outwards forever, gaining more and more energy as more and more matter was consumed by it. It would eventually spread right across the universe and nothing would survive. Not even the Ascended could exist under these new physical laws and constants that the bubble contained.
What was highly problematic was that this bubble was expanding far faster than light in the normal universe, a quirk of the subspace properties that the artificial region contained. If the Ascended could slow the expansion long enough for the liberated energy within to escape into normal space then the bubble would collapse in on itself, forming a new black hole, something far safer to the inhabitants of the Pegasus Galaxy than the bubble itself.
Every Ascended being waited for the signal. One second after detonation, they began pressing against the spherical walls of this new space-time, slowing its expansion. It took every erg of energy and every iota of concentration they possessed, but the expansion was slowing.
The wave of liberated energy, a deadly storm of x-rays and gamma rays was quickly catching up with the expanding edge of the bubble, aided by the fact that the radiation too could move much faster than usual. With the radiation accelerating outwards and the bubble’s expansion slowing, the Ascended only had to continue pushing for one full minute and the energy could escape.
Even for immortal, all-knowing beings, that minute passed very slowly. Every single thought and will was directed to holding back the bubble and moment by moment they were succeeding. The bubble was now expanding at barely half the speed of light.
Finally, just when some of them were beginning to flag, the outrushing energy wave reached the edge of the bubble and passed it, bursting back into normal space and slowing down, sending out a shower of Cherenkov radiation in the process. The X and gamma rays continued outwards to be eventually observed by the wider universe.
The bubble was now starved of energy and began to collapse inwards, aided and abetted by the Ascended, who could now work with reality instead of against it. The collapse accelerated inwards, concentrating the remaining energy into a tighter and tighter space. Eventually the compression grew too high and gravity took over. A new singularity was born.
The entire false vacuum event had taken barely sixty seconds, but they may have been the most important sixty seconds in the history of the universe, not that any of the mortal beings realised it at the time.
For the Wraith that had been around Lantea, there was no opportunity to escape or even comprehend their fates, they simply ceased to exist. The scattered collection of probes and sensor buoys left by the Terran fleet saw and reported the event, sending back footage of a white spherical mass that suddenly appeared in place of the planet and star, then a flood of x rays and finally a sensor picture of a newly-formed black hole. Scientists on Earth, Terra and Orilla would spend decades analysing the data and trying to work out just what had happened.
The detonation had done its job and wiped out the sum total of available Wraith ships. While it was true that substantial numbers of Wraith remained in the galaxy on planetary facilities, and new ships could be grown, they would never be able to build such a fleet again, especially since the Terrans would not give them enough time to do so. The Wraith would never again be a serious threat to planets and civilisations in the Pegasus Galaxy.
There were unexpected consequences however. On the fringes of the galaxy Ba’al would eventually detect the explosion and would learn that the Wraith’s power was broken. He would use this to seize control of several other worlds, convincing them that his Godly power had ended this vile threat. The Last System Lord would soon be back in business, but he knew to avoid contact with the humans and limit his expansion for now; it would take years to build up his power base. He could bide his time and take his revenge later.
More concerning though was something the Ascended beings had overlooked. With every scrap of concentration focused on pushing back the vacuum bubble, they were no longer able to hide the civilisations in the three galaxies from distant, prying eyes.
Two and a half billion light years from Pegasus, another group of Ascended beings suddenly became aware of what had been hidden. It was only for a moment, but it was enough for these beings to know what was going on. They discussed the revelation and slowly, inexorably drew up plans against the inhabitants of Pegasus, Ida and the Milky Way.
The ZPM bomb had ended one threat, but the universe was vast enough that others would rise up in its place.
========
So there we go. Big kaboom!
The Higher Planes of Existence
It had taken Janus and Morgan two precious minutes to assemble the leaders of the Ascended. Many of them had been a great distance away, observing things of inscrutable interest. Morgan had wondered just what could be fascinating about observing a barely sentient tree move towards the sunlight on a world in the Andromeda galaxy, but for the handful of Ascended leaders who were there it was sufficiently interesting that Morgan had to practically drag them away to inform them of the urgent situation.
Another two minutes had been wasted explaining just what would happen if the ZPM detonated as intended and answering questions from the more skeptical leaders. Apparently even having access to all the knowledge in the universe hadn’t prevented some of her fellows from developing an open mind.
Yet another two minutes had been spent in debate about just what they should do. Once again, their vast, almost limitless knowledge worked against them – the Ascended had become complacent, arrogant even, and with vast powers and immortality, the idea of “urgent” and “new” had disappeared from their minds.
Doing nothing, maintaining their strict non-interference policy was not an option – for doing nothing would end them all. Preventing either bomb from detonating was suggested and debated, but those among the assembly who wanted to help the lesser races argued fiercely that this was an unacceptable choice – not only would it be interference on a massive scale, it would prevent the annihilation of the Wraith threat and make it obvious to the humans that the Ascended would rather save their former enemies than their descendants.
Eventually, it was decided to allow the bomb to detonate but to contain the destruction within Lantea’s solar system, thus destroying the Wraith but sparing everyone else and allowing the humans to believe their plan had worked. Doing this however would require the combined powers of every single Ascended being in the three galaxies. They were fighting reality itself, never an easy task.
Every single Ascended being was assembled and given their instructions. This gathering and briefing consumed their last minutes of time. It was now or never.
Lantea
The ZPM timer, ignorant of both the near-panic among the Ascended and the tremendous danger that would soon be at hand, reached zero and carried out its final instruction. A strong electrical current was passed through the ZPM, causing the naquada and potassium mixture that Camulus had coated the device with to explode violently, shattering the container and liberating the energy within.
The former System Lord had no idea just how dangerous this was. His sole intent had been to let the resulting explosion destroy the Ancient Weapons Platform that guarded Earth, leaving it open to his forces. The coating would have done precisely that, and wiped out a substantial chunk of the southern hemisphere in the process, causing untold environmental devastation.
Doctor Lee and Colonel Carter had been more or less correct in their predictions of how much damage would be cause, but they had both overlooked something crucial. They had thought only in terms of energy released – Doctor Lee contending that only the naquada/potassium coating would explode, effectively destroying all life on Earth, while Colonel Carter had believed that the energy within the ZPM would be liberated, destroying everything within a billion kilometres or so.
What they had both overlooked was exactly how a ZPM functioned.
A Zero-Point Module was the pinnacle of Lantean technology. A small canister, barely a foot long and six inches wide, contained enough energy to power a city or starship under normal use for millennia. This was achievable because the ZPM contained within its crystalline structure a small, artificial region of space-time, one that could be safely drained of its vacuum energy.
The region of space-time contained within the canister was approximately one light year in diameter and, most importantly, had a very different set of physical laws that governed it, laws and constants that were utterly incompatible with the regular space-time inhabited by the Lanteans, the humans and every other species.
Most important among the differing constants was a lower energy ground state and a higher speed of light.
When the casing was shattered, this one light year diameter bubble of artificial space time expanded outwards extremely rapidly, five hundred times faster than the speed of light in normal space-time to be precise. Within one second, everything within one hundred and fifty million kilometres found itself inside this bubble and unable to exist under the new physical laws.
This included the ZPM, the decoy platform, the planet Lantea, the entire Wraith fleet, the planet’s moon, two other inner planets and the system’s star.
All these objects could no longer exist. Every molecular bond was sundered. Every atom was shattered into its constituent particles and then even those were obliterated. Every single gram of matter within the bubble was instantly annihilated and the mass was liberated as energy. That this mass included all of a mid-sized main sequence star meant that the energies released were on the order of a supernova explosion.
If this had been all that happened then the Ancients would not have needed to interfere. However, since this huge bubble, which continued to expand to its normal size, had a lower energy ground state, it posed an existential threat. This meant that the rest of the universe now existed as a false vacuum, something that would cause the bubble to experience a negative pressure and continue to expand outwards, obliterating everything in its path. Human scientists knew of this concept, it was one of a few nightmare doomsday scenarios that scared even the smartest of them.
They called it a false vacuum collapse.
The Ascended knew that they had to prevent this. If the vacuum bubble was left unchecked and with so much energy contained within it thanks to the annihilated star system then it would spread, outwards forever, gaining more and more energy as more and more matter was consumed by it. It would eventually spread right across the universe and nothing would survive. Not even the Ascended could exist under these new physical laws and constants that the bubble contained.
What was highly problematic was that this bubble was expanding far faster than light in the normal universe, a quirk of the subspace properties that the artificial region contained. If the Ascended could slow the expansion long enough for the liberated energy within to escape into normal space then the bubble would collapse in on itself, forming a new black hole, something far safer to the inhabitants of the Pegasus Galaxy than the bubble itself.
Every Ascended being waited for the signal. One second after detonation, they began pressing against the spherical walls of this new space-time, slowing its expansion. It took every erg of energy and every iota of concentration they possessed, but the expansion was slowing.
The wave of liberated energy, a deadly storm of x-rays and gamma rays was quickly catching up with the expanding edge of the bubble, aided by the fact that the radiation too could move much faster than usual. With the radiation accelerating outwards and the bubble’s expansion slowing, the Ascended only had to continue pushing for one full minute and the energy could escape.
Even for immortal, all-knowing beings, that minute passed very slowly. Every single thought and will was directed to holding back the bubble and moment by moment they were succeeding. The bubble was now expanding at barely half the speed of light.
Finally, just when some of them were beginning to flag, the outrushing energy wave reached the edge of the bubble and passed it, bursting back into normal space and slowing down, sending out a shower of Cherenkov radiation in the process. The X and gamma rays continued outwards to be eventually observed by the wider universe.
The bubble was now starved of energy and began to collapse inwards, aided and abetted by the Ascended, who could now work with reality instead of against it. The collapse accelerated inwards, concentrating the remaining energy into a tighter and tighter space. Eventually the compression grew too high and gravity took over. A new singularity was born.
The entire false vacuum event had taken barely sixty seconds, but they may have been the most important sixty seconds in the history of the universe, not that any of the mortal beings realised it at the time.
For the Wraith that had been around Lantea, there was no opportunity to escape or even comprehend their fates, they simply ceased to exist. The scattered collection of probes and sensor buoys left by the Terran fleet saw and reported the event, sending back footage of a white spherical mass that suddenly appeared in place of the planet and star, then a flood of x rays and finally a sensor picture of a newly-formed black hole. Scientists on Earth, Terra and Orilla would spend decades analysing the data and trying to work out just what had happened.
The detonation had done its job and wiped out the sum total of available Wraith ships. While it was true that substantial numbers of Wraith remained in the galaxy on planetary facilities, and new ships could be grown, they would never be able to build such a fleet again, especially since the Terrans would not give them enough time to do so. The Wraith would never again be a serious threat to planets and civilisations in the Pegasus Galaxy.
There were unexpected consequences however. On the fringes of the galaxy Ba’al would eventually detect the explosion and would learn that the Wraith’s power was broken. He would use this to seize control of several other worlds, convincing them that his Godly power had ended this vile threat. The Last System Lord would soon be back in business, but he knew to avoid contact with the humans and limit his expansion for now; it would take years to build up his power base. He could bide his time and take his revenge later.
More concerning though was something the Ascended beings had overlooked. With every scrap of concentration focused on pushing back the vacuum bubble, they were no longer able to hide the civilisations in the three galaxies from distant, prying eyes.
Two and a half billion light years from Pegasus, another group of Ascended beings suddenly became aware of what had been hidden. It was only for a moment, but it was enough for these beings to know what was going on. They discussed the revelation and slowly, inexorably drew up plans against the inhabitants of Pegasus, Ida and the Milky Way.
The ZPM bomb had ended one threat, but the universe was vast enough that others would rise up in its place.
========
So there we go. Big kaboom!
Baltar: "I don't want to miss a moment of the last Battlestar's destruction!"
Centurion: "Sir, I really think you should look at the other Battlestar."
Baltar: "What are you babbling about other...it's impossible!"
Centurion: "No. It is a Battlestar."
Corrax Entry 7:17: So you walk eternally through the shadow realms, standing against evil where all others falter. May your thirst for retribution never quench, may the blood on your sword never dry, and may we never need you again.
Centurion: "Sir, I really think you should look at the other Battlestar."
Baltar: "What are you babbling about other...it's impossible!"
Centurion: "No. It is a Battlestar."
Corrax Entry 7:17: So you walk eternally through the shadow realms, standing against evil where all others falter. May your thirst for retribution never quench, may the blood on your sword never dry, and may we never need you again.
Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
Wow.... it was actually a metric weapon - directly buggering around with spacetime itself. And the countdown to human understanding and development of same has begun.
One that got the Ascended to brown their pants, despite lacking a) pants and b) digestive tracts.
What are the other Ascended mob over in the Woop Woop cluster? (Question is probably rhetorical - E_F won't tell us at moment).
One that got the Ascended to brown their pants, despite lacking a) pants and b) digestive tracts.
What are the other Ascended mob over in the Woop Woop cluster? (Question is probably rhetorical - E_F won't tell us at moment).
A mad person thinks there's a gateway to hell in his basement. A mad genius builds one and turns it on. - CaptainChewbacca
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U.P. Cinnabar
- Sith Marauder
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- Location: Aboard the RCS Princess Cecile
Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
Ori assholes, no doubt. Can't we just ZPM BOOM! the bastards put of existence, because, fuck the Ori?!
"Beware the Beast, Man, for he is the Devil's pawn. Alone amongst God's primates, he kills for sport, for lust, for greed. Yea, he will murder his brother to possess his brother's land. Let him not breed in great numbers, for he will make a desert of his home and yours. Shun him, drive him back into his jungle lair, for he is the harbinger of Death.."
—29th Scroll, 6th Verse of Ape Law
"Indelible in the hippocampus is the laughter. The uproarious laughter between the two, and their having fun at my expense.”
---Doctor Christine Blasey-Ford
Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
Not sure if they are.
First, there's the git writing this. He's shown himself to be fond of a damn good banger, and subverting our expectations with gleeful abandon. Might be a completely original bunch of Ascended tossers. Crush the lesser races, unlimited rice pudding for all, et cetera, et cetera! (even though the Dr Who shoutouts have, so far, mostly been to the 21st century continuation).
Second, I'm not sure if aforementioned git is referring to the Alteran (wot the un-ascended Ancients/Ori used to be) home galaxy - might be far enough away to count (800-odd kpc away according to most recent story bit), but I don't think its relative location was ever established with any certainity in SG canon. It could also be the lid-removal event that, in said canon, occured when when Daniel and Vala visited Alteran HQ via long-range comms.
Third, a second metric weapon deployment (to dish out much wtfpwnage to the Ori) runs, as far as I can see, the same existential risk of false vacuum collapse (aka giving the universe an annihilation wedgie). Once might be ignorance, but the second attempt might leave the Ancients feeling the piss is being taken.
First, there's the git writing this. He's shown himself to be fond of a damn good banger, and subverting our expectations with gleeful abandon. Might be a completely original bunch of Ascended tossers. Crush the lesser races, unlimited rice pudding for all, et cetera, et cetera! (even though the Dr Who shoutouts have, so far, mostly been to the 21st century continuation).
Second, I'm not sure if aforementioned git is referring to the Alteran (wot the un-ascended Ancients/Ori used to be) home galaxy - might be far enough away to count (800-odd kpc away according to most recent story bit), but I don't think its relative location was ever established with any certainity in SG canon. It could also be the lid-removal event that, in said canon, occured when when Daniel and Vala visited Alteran HQ via long-range comms.
Third, a second metric weapon deployment (to dish out much wtfpwnage to the Ori) runs, as far as I can see, the same existential risk of false vacuum collapse (aka giving the universe an annihilation wedgie). Once might be ignorance, but the second attempt might leave the Ancients feeling the piss is being taken.
A mad person thinks there's a gateway to hell in his basement. A mad genius builds one and turns it on. - CaptainChewbacca
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U.P. Cinnabar
- Sith Marauder
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- Location: Aboard the RCS Princess Cecile
Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
Point, but one can dream, can't he? Especially when it comes to a whole race of nothing but George Warleggans.
"Beware the Beast, Man, for he is the Devil's pawn. Alone amongst God's primates, he kills for sport, for lust, for greed. Yea, he will murder his brother to possess his brother's land. Let him not breed in great numbers, for he will make a desert of his home and yours. Shun him, drive him back into his jungle lair, for he is the harbinger of Death.."
—29th Scroll, 6th Verse of Ape Law
"Indelible in the hippocampus is the laughter. The uproarious laughter between the two, and their having fun at my expense.”
---Doctor Christine Blasey-Ford
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Sky Captain
- Jedi Master
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- Location: Latvia
Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
Wow, it actually messed with spacetime itself. Is this something that only happened because alteration made by Camulus or any ZPM can end the universe if destroyed violently since the big nuke going off would also triggered it. This would make ZPM technology far too dangerous to even attempt to develop. Destroyed violently situation could also happen by accident or in combat. Ship with ZPM onboard destroyed by hostile weapons ending the universe doesn't sound good.
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Eternal_Freedom
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Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
Ahhh, glad to see you all approve of the promised giant kaboom. The other bunch of Ascended are...for another story. I have yet to decide if I'll write a sequel, but I want to leave some threads open here so I'm not pulling a new storyline out of thin air.
ZPM's overloading would not normally cause such devastation. The potential damage in this case was due to two main factors:
1. Camulus' sabotage coating, which would destroy the containment structure and allow the spacetime to revert to normal size.
2. The amount of nearby matter that was annihilated and released as energy to accelerate the expansion (like I said, the entire mass of a main-sequence star, when converted to energy, is about 1.8x10^47 Joules...which is actually on the high end of supernovae IIRC) - had the weapon detonated in free space there would have been a great deal less energy available, so that while the bubble would still expand outwards it wouldn't become self-sustaining and would collapse back in on itself.
Ordinary ZPM that are caught up in battles wouldn't cause such damage, for the simple reason that ZPM's are damned sturdy and difficult to break open in exactly this way. Simply overloading the ZPM (as is seen in the series) would just realease all the contained energy but not the spacetime bubble. It'd still be devastating to anything within a million km or so but no more than that.
This really was a near-perfect confluence of circumstances. The Gatebuster would still have triggered the vacuum explosion though, as the energy released would trigger the sabotage coating and set off the bomb just as easily as the massive electric current that was actually used.
Whether the SGC and the TCN will consider developing this is highly unlikely. Firstly, they do not as yet have the capacity to build more ZPM's - so at present they have just four (the one found in Egypt and the three recovered by Thor from Ancient outposts in Pegasus) and they are far more useful as power sources than munitions. They only used the Camulus ZPM because it was otherwise useless to them.
Secondly, given how smart the Asgard are they will quickly realise just how close they came to ending everything and will strongly encourage the humans to dismiss such ideas. Morgan le Fey and Janus/Prometheus may well have something to do with that. Once the humans realise they only averted a universe-ending screw-up by (almost literal) divine intervention, they'll agree.
EDIT: Oh, and using another ZPM vacuum bomb on the Ori galaxy (and I remain noncommittal on whether thee are the Ori that are mentioned) is an obscenely bad idea. When fuelled by the mass/energy of just one star the bubble woudl have been self-sustaining and universe-ending. Now imagine that said bubble is left unchecked and consumes a whole galaxy - now you have (assuming Milky-Way-sized galaxy) 400 billion times as much mass-energy fuelling the expansion. That's 7.2x10^58 Joules. That would be a vacuum bubble that would spread throughout hte universe, wiping out everything.
Even if such a weapon could be contained so it only destroys one galaxy - that's still billions of worlds and hundreds of trillions of lives. That's genocide on an appalling scale, almost exclusively of innocents. No one on Earth, Terra or Orilla would be willing to consider that. Hell, I don't think even The Doctor would countenance that unless there was literally no other choice. Certainly it wouldn't be used as a first strike!
ZPM's overloading would not normally cause such devastation. The potential damage in this case was due to two main factors:
1. Camulus' sabotage coating, which would destroy the containment structure and allow the spacetime to revert to normal size.
2. The amount of nearby matter that was annihilated and released as energy to accelerate the expansion (like I said, the entire mass of a main-sequence star, when converted to energy, is about 1.8x10^47 Joules...which is actually on the high end of supernovae IIRC) - had the weapon detonated in free space there would have been a great deal less energy available, so that while the bubble would still expand outwards it wouldn't become self-sustaining and would collapse back in on itself.
Ordinary ZPM that are caught up in battles wouldn't cause such damage, for the simple reason that ZPM's are damned sturdy and difficult to break open in exactly this way. Simply overloading the ZPM (as is seen in the series) would just realease all the contained energy but not the spacetime bubble. It'd still be devastating to anything within a million km or so but no more than that.
This really was a near-perfect confluence of circumstances. The Gatebuster would still have triggered the vacuum explosion though, as the energy released would trigger the sabotage coating and set off the bomb just as easily as the massive electric current that was actually used.
Whether the SGC and the TCN will consider developing this is highly unlikely. Firstly, they do not as yet have the capacity to build more ZPM's - so at present they have just four (the one found in Egypt and the three recovered by Thor from Ancient outposts in Pegasus) and they are far more useful as power sources than munitions. They only used the Camulus ZPM because it was otherwise useless to them.
Secondly, given how smart the Asgard are they will quickly realise just how close they came to ending everything and will strongly encourage the humans to dismiss such ideas. Morgan le Fey and Janus/Prometheus may well have something to do with that. Once the humans realise they only averted a universe-ending screw-up by (almost literal) divine intervention, they'll agree.
EDIT: Oh, and using another ZPM vacuum bomb on the Ori galaxy (and I remain noncommittal on whether thee are the Ori that are mentioned) is an obscenely bad idea. When fuelled by the mass/energy of just one star the bubble woudl have been self-sustaining and universe-ending. Now imagine that said bubble is left unchecked and consumes a whole galaxy - now you have (assuming Milky-Way-sized galaxy) 400 billion times as much mass-energy fuelling the expansion. That's 7.2x10^58 Joules. That would be a vacuum bubble that would spread throughout hte universe, wiping out everything.
Even if such a weapon could be contained so it only destroys one galaxy - that's still billions of worlds and hundreds of trillions of lives. That's genocide on an appalling scale, almost exclusively of innocents. No one on Earth, Terra or Orilla would be willing to consider that. Hell, I don't think even The Doctor would countenance that unless there was literally no other choice. Certainly it wouldn't be used as a first strike!
Baltar: "I don't want to miss a moment of the last Battlestar's destruction!"
Centurion: "Sir, I really think you should look at the other Battlestar."
Baltar: "What are you babbling about other...it's impossible!"
Centurion: "No. It is a Battlestar."
Corrax Entry 7:17: So you walk eternally through the shadow realms, standing against evil where all others falter. May your thirst for retribution never quench, may the blood on your sword never dry, and may we never need you again.
Centurion: "Sir, I really think you should look at the other Battlestar."
Baltar: "What are you babbling about other...it's impossible!"
Centurion: "No. It is a Battlestar."
Corrax Entry 7:17: So you walk eternally through the shadow realms, standing against evil where all others falter. May your thirst for retribution never quench, may the blood on your sword never dry, and may we never need you again.
-
U.P. Cinnabar
- Sith Marauder
- Posts: 3932
- Joined: 2016-02-05 08:11pm
- Location: Aboard the RCS Princess Cecile
Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
I suppose the cost is too high just rid the cosmos of the smug, self-righteous bastards.
But, I just realized, TCN. Does that mean the newest battlestar will be Tiger Claw?
Will we see Maverick and Maniac(and Rachel and Paladin too) in the next installment?
Find out next week, same frakking time, same frakking channel.
But, I just realized, TCN. Does that mean the newest battlestar will be Tiger Claw?
Will we see Maverick and Maniac(and Rachel and Paladin too) in the next installment?
Find out next week, same frakking time, same frakking channel.
"Beware the Beast, Man, for he is the Devil's pawn. Alone amongst God's primates, he kills for sport, for lust, for greed. Yea, he will murder his brother to possess his brother's land. Let him not breed in great numbers, for he will make a desert of his home and yours. Shun him, drive him back into his jungle lair, for he is the harbinger of Death.."
—29th Scroll, 6th Verse of Ape Law
"Indelible in the hippocampus is the laughter. The uproarious laughter between the two, and their having fun at my expense.”
---Doctor Christine Blasey-Ford
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Eternal_Freedom
- Castellan
- Posts: 10413
- Joined: 2010-03-09 02:16pm
- Location: CIC, Battlestar Temeraire
Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
Tiger's Claw as a name already came up for the TCN, and sadly the answer is no. They've hit their maximum sustainable fleet size for the foreseeable future at 1 Warstar, 13 Battlestars, 24 destroyers and 16 Explorers - though the destroyer and explorer production will continue, no new capital ships though except one to replace Excalibur. Something new and potent, a Terran-built version of Eridanus perhaps, a "Heavy" Battlestar.
Maverick, Maniac and Paladin are good choices for callsigns though, so they may well appear. I think "Maverick" would suit Temeraire's Captain quite nicely
And yeah, using a ZPM/Vacuum bomb is definitely too high a price for destroying any other bunch of smug, evil Ascended...when the cost is universal annihilation...
Maverick, Maniac and Paladin are good choices for callsigns though, so they may well appear. I think "Maverick" would suit Temeraire's Captain quite nicely
And yeah, using a ZPM/Vacuum bomb is definitely too high a price for destroying any other bunch of smug, evil Ascended...when the cost is universal annihilation...
Baltar: "I don't want to miss a moment of the last Battlestar's destruction!"
Centurion: "Sir, I really think you should look at the other Battlestar."
Baltar: "What are you babbling about other...it's impossible!"
Centurion: "No. It is a Battlestar."
Corrax Entry 7:17: So you walk eternally through the shadow realms, standing against evil where all others falter. May your thirst for retribution never quench, may the blood on your sword never dry, and may we never need you again.
Centurion: "Sir, I really think you should look at the other Battlestar."
Baltar: "What are you babbling about other...it's impossible!"
Centurion: "No. It is a Battlestar."
Corrax Entry 7:17: So you walk eternally through the shadow realms, standing against evil where all others falter. May your thirst for retribution never quench, may the blood on your sword never dry, and may we never need you again.
Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
So Eridanus herself, post-rebuild, will become a class lead, much like Warspite did?
Are there any substantive changes in fitout between the Flight III Lionheart hulls currently under double-time construction and the Flight II examples driving around now?
Bummer, no more space-shattering kabooms.
Are there any substantive changes in fitout between the Flight III Lionheart hulls currently under double-time construction and the Flight II examples driving around now?
Bummer, no more space-shattering kabooms.
A mad person thinks there's a gateway to hell in his basement. A mad genius builds one and turns it on. - CaptainChewbacca
Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
That was terrifying.
Me: Nope, that's why I have you around to tell me.
Nitram: You -are- beautiful. Anyone tries to tell you otherwise kill them.
"A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved, except in memory. LLAP" -- Leonard Nimoy, last Tweet
Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
"Hit anything hard enough, strike sparks. Biggest damned spark ever struck by human agency."
When will Asgard pants get browned, nonexistence of said pants notwithstanding? (Maybe give the line to Thor - he seemed the snarkiest canonical Asgard).
After the denizens of the Stellar Boffinate do a preliminary data crunch and point out an allegedly "natural" phenomenon (a blast wave) propagating at approx 500c for a million terrifying microseconds?
Would certainly cause a careful reappraisal of ZPMs, given each is one sabotage coating away from becoming a metric weapon.
When will Asgard pants get browned, nonexistence of said pants notwithstanding? (Maybe give the line to Thor - he seemed the snarkiest canonical Asgard).
After the denizens of the Stellar Boffinate do a preliminary data crunch and point out an allegedly "natural" phenomenon (a blast wave) propagating at approx 500c for a million terrifying microseconds?
Would certainly cause a careful reappraisal of ZPMs, given each is one sabotage coating away from becoming a metric weapon.
A mad person thinks there's a gateway to hell in his basement. A mad genius builds one and turns it on. - CaptainChewbacca
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Eternal_Freedom
- Castellan
- Posts: 10413
- Joined: 2010-03-09 02:16pm
- Location: CIC, Battlestar Temeraire
Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
The Flight III's are basically the same as the Flight II's, the only major difference is that the Asgard beaming systems for emergency evac are built-in rather than being a field refit like the Flight II's are.
Eridanus will probably not become a class leader like Warspite did, mainly because there's only one of her and there won't be another for the foreseeable future. The replacement for Excalibur will be a new class of ship though, something bigger and heavier than a Lionheart, intended as a command ship for when you can't send the Warstar.
LadyTevar: Thanks, I'm glad the final epic kaboom lived up to expectations.
Eridanus will probably not become a class leader like Warspite did, mainly because there's only one of her and there won't be another for the foreseeable future. The replacement for Excalibur will be a new class of ship though, something bigger and heavier than a Lionheart, intended as a command ship for when you can't send the Warstar.
LadyTevar: Thanks, I'm glad the final epic kaboom lived up to expectations.
Baltar: "I don't want to miss a moment of the last Battlestar's destruction!"
Centurion: "Sir, I really think you should look at the other Battlestar."
Baltar: "What are you babbling about other...it's impossible!"
Centurion: "No. It is a Battlestar."
Corrax Entry 7:17: So you walk eternally through the shadow realms, standing against evil where all others falter. May your thirst for retribution never quench, may the blood on your sword never dry, and may we never need you again.
Centurion: "Sir, I really think you should look at the other Battlestar."
Baltar: "What are you babbling about other...it's impossible!"
Centurion: "No. It is a Battlestar."
Corrax Entry 7:17: So you walk eternally through the shadow realms, standing against evil where all others falter. May your thirst for retribution never quench, may the blood on your sword never dry, and may we never need you again.
-
Eternal_Freedom
- Castellan
- Posts: 10413
- Joined: 2010-03-09 02:16pm
- Location: CIC, Battlestar Temeraire
Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
Mwahaha...
Echoes of the Bang
Task Force Rally Point, in orbit over Atlantis
The Terran and Colonial ships flashed into existence at the rally point over the new world Atlantis had moved to. All appeared worse for wear, though in three cases this was purely cosmetic as their shields began recharging. The Nemesis, Warspite and Victorious all bore visible damage, but these were leftovers from earlier engagements.
That one of their number was missing was immediately and painfully apparent. Over the next ten minutes there was a flurry of activity as shuttles and Raptors flew back and forth, moving casualties and supplies around as needed. It was evident what was going on, the Task Force was waiting for its other ships.
The Daniel Jackson was the first to arrive, dropping out of hyperspace with the badly wounded Daedalus in tow. They took up their positions in the formation and began transferring the wounded to the hospital facilities aboard Nemesis. A few minutes later the three Asgard battleships arrived, the Teal’c of Chu’lak sporting visible damage that was stunning in its severity, while the other two ships were clearly moving more sluggishly than usual.
With a handful of orders Jellicoe, Mace, and the other Captains and Commanders beamed down to Atlantis. It was time for the post-battle debrief. Weir and O’Neill joined them in one of the city’s larger briefing rooms, only for Jellicoe to ask them to dial Terra and establish holographic communications with his superiors. He only wanted to go through this once.
There was a short delay while that was done, and all the human officers took the opportunity to fix themselves a large mug of tea or coffee. Several of them held onto those mugs as if they were a life preserver thrown to a drowning man; they had all seen battle before but nothing on this scale.
Soon, holograms appeared, allowing Lethbridge-Stewart, Bill Adama and Presidents Roslin and Matthews to join them. Lethbridge-Stewart looked around and was immediately concerned when he couldn’t find one of his Captains, this didn’t bode well.
Jellicoe took a long swig of his coffee and moved to the front of the room to deliver his report.
“Mister and Madam President, Admirals, ladies and gentlemen, I am pleased to report that the operation was a success. Sensor data from the probes we left behind in the outer system confirm the ZPM bomb detonated as planned, though the effects were greater than anticipated. Lantea was destroyed, along with the system’s star. The Wraith Fleet was completely annihilated. None of them made it out in time.”
His face took on a pained expression. “That’s the good news. The bad news is the price we paid. I have to report the complete loss of the Battlestar Excalibur.” There were intakes of breath from the holograms and from Weir and O’Neill. “Before she was destroyed we managed to beam out two hundred and forty seven of her crew. Her entire Cobra complement was in the air at the time and have also been recovered aboard Nemesis. Across the entire Task Force we lost sixty-three Cobras and Vipers, four Scythe gunships and one Raptor, though Daedalus managed to save the Raptor’s pilot.” Colonel Caldwell’s face bore a mixture of pride and regret at that- he was pleased they’d saved the pilot, but aghast at the damage taken in the process.
Jellicoe continued. “I also have to report that severe damage was sustained by the Daedalus and the Teal’c of Chu’lak with moderate internal damage on the Samantha Carter and the George Hammond. The Nemesis, Victorious and Warspite have all taken mild to moderate damage as well, enough to require considerable dock time to repair. Right now only the Pegasus, Republic, Galactica and the Daniel Jackson are at full strength and combat-ready.”
The holograms of Lethbridge-Stewart and Adama exchanged a look before the former spoke. “I speak for everyone here on Terra when I say congratulations Admiral. Yes you have taken serious losses but you went to another galaxy with just twelve ships and a severely limited supply line and successfully engaged and destroyed a force over ten times your number in capital ships alone. That is an incredible feat of martial skill.”
Jellicoe sighed. “Thank you for that Admiral. I know in my head that you’re right but my heart isn’t listening right now.”
Adama spoke next. “What’s your next step John?”
“Next step is to finish mopping up Wraith ground bases and shipyards. According to our prior recon data supplied by the Asgard and Earth ships, we know that this loss represents something like ninety-five percent of the total Wraith population. After a day’s break here at Atlantis I’ll be sending my operational ships out to finish off as many of those bases and shipyards as we can. They’re all on worlds uninhabited by humans so we’re not going to be even remotely subtle. We’ll just nuke them from orbit, it’s the only way to be sure we’ve got them all.”
That didn’t sit well with either senior Admiral or the Presidents, orbital nuclear bombardment reminded them far too strongly of the Cylons. On the other hand, the Colonial-built Battlestars had all been fitted with space-to-ground missile silos for exactly this purpose, and these were worlds devoid of human life.
Adama had something to query though. “How will you manage that with the Terran-built ships? They don’t carry a missile armament except for the Warstar.”
Jellicoe smiled. “I’ll detach a Scimitar squadron to each of the Lionheart’s, they can launch a bomber and volley-fire the missiles from orbit in total safety.”
Lethbridge-Stewart nodded, seeing the logic in that. ”Very well. What about the survivors from Excalibur? What’s their condition?”
“The pilots are mad as hell. The crew…most of them are catatonic at the moment, including Arthur and his XO. It’ll take them time to come to terms with what happened. I’d like to send them back to Terra via the Stargate, having family around should help them.”
Both Admirals were relieved to learn that Captain Pendragon was among the living. Lethbridge-Stewart quickly agreed to the request. There wasn’t much to say after this so the holograms faded away and the assembled officers began to really relax. Saul Tigh had an idea and leaned over to whisper it to Lee, the younger Commander quickly nodded and moved over to Tyr to ask a favour. The Asgard and the human had become good friends over the past few weeks so Tyr quickly agreed to help. Some quiet conversations over the wireless and the plan was made.
Saul moved over to Jellicoe and quietly explained his idea. John felt this was exactly what they all needed so he gave his blessing. Another quiet word with Tyr and Commander Fischer appeared in the flash of an Asgard transporter, carrying a tray laden with glasses and a large decanter. He placed it reverently on the table before withdrawing from the room – this was for the commanding officers only, and he had plenty of other things to keep him busy aboard Pegasus anyway.
Jellicoe and Saul began pouring glasses of the vintage Ambrosia and passing them around. Once everyone present, except the four Asgard, held a glass, John once more stood.
“Technically we’re all still on duty but as Commander of the Task Force I’m waiving that regulation for the moment. Ladies and gentleman, a toast to our victory!”
“Victory!” Echoed the crowd, before a sip of the potent liquor was taken. Saul took up the challenge next, this was not the same traditional toast he Bill, Lee and Kara had shared on Olympus Base months ago, but the feeling was the same.
“To our honoured dead, may they rest in peace!”
“Our honoured dead.” Replied the group, and another sip was taken. O’Neill spoke next, as the senior Earth officer he felt compelled to participate.
“To the friends and allies who fought at our side!”
“Friends and allies.” Came the reply. Doctor Weir went last, she felt that a less martial theme was needed, especially in this group.
“To the future that is now bright and peaceful.”
“The future!” came the final reply, and the last of the Ambrosia was drunk. Jellicoe placed the glass back on the table and the group stood in silence for a few moments. The Admiral looked back up and spoke again, closing out the meeting.
“I think we all needed that, thank you Saul. Right, Wayne, see about transferring the Scimitars over to Victorious, Republic and Galactica, make sure they’re re-stocked with missiles. Same goes for you as well Lee, and you David. Everyone else, get some rest, shore leave to Atlantis is at CO’s discretion. In twenty four hours we move out to hit the last Wraith bases. Get moving.”
Various officers began disappearing as beaming systems returned them to their ships. Caldwell remained behind, as did Jellicoe. The Earth Colonel knew full well his ship wasn’t considered operational and wouldn’t be participating in these final raids; he fully expected to begin the long, slow voyage back to Earth for repairs within a day.
The Admiral, the General, the Colonel and the Doctor left the briefing room and headed up to Weir’s office. As they passed through the control room they could see McKay, Carter and Zelenka arguing over the sensor data from the ZPM explosion, while Doctor Jackson looked on in bemusement. The four wandered over and listened in.
McKay, ever the skeptic, was unconvinced that Carter and Zelenka were right, and said so repeatedly.
“…oh come on, you can’t be serious! A vacuum collapse is an absurd idea, there’s no way a bubble could nucleate, expand and then just collapse in on itself, it would keep expanding until the universe was destroyed!”
Carter was having none of that. She had realised just what the rigged ZPM had done and it terrified her. The thought that she had come so close to ending everything was deeply troubling.
“How else do you explain the data McKay? If this was just the contained energy being released why did it appear to move faster than light? And why did it then collapse into a black hole? The data support only one conclusion, and that is that we got unbelievably lucky.”
At this, Jellicoe broke in. “Hold on, what do you mean we got lucky Colonel?”
“Sir, that bomb…it should have destroyed the universe, not just Lantea and the Wraith.”
That was quite a statement, and it left the four newcomers exchanging baffled, and worried, glances. Carter pressed her advantage, explaining briefly about the false vacuum collapse that almost occurred.
O’Neill was incensed. “Ok, so we blew up a solar system by mistake and almost took out the entire universe as well? Why didn’t it do what you think it should’ve?”
“Because we stopped it General O’Neill.”
At that, the entire group of scientists, officers and diplomats spun around. Standing by the wall of the control room, in a space that everyone present swore was empty a moment before, were two figures. The male was tall, with handsome features and kind eyes. The woman was shorter, with long brown hair and an expression that was some mix of pride and censure.
Jellicoe and O’Neill both reacted the same way at the unexpected appearance of two people in a high security area. They reached for their sidearms, but neither was carrying one at the moment. They both realised this at the same moment, looked at each other and grimaced. Jellicoe looked back.
“And who are you two? For that matter, how did you get in here?”
Daniel, meanwhile, was feeling memories long suppressed returning. “I know you both…”
“Indeed you do Daniel Jackson. My name is Janus.” That drew a gasp from the Expedition leader. “It is a pleasure to see you again Elizabeth. You, Admiral Jellicoe, would know me better as Prometheus. My companion was once known to the people of Earth as Morgan le Fay, though the Kobolians would know her as Athena.”
That set everyone’s minds reeling. For Weir, it brought back sad memories from the day they found a much older Elizabeth Weir in a stasis pod and the story she had told. For Jack and Sam, it was the realisation they were facing Ascended beings straight out of Greek and Arthurian myths. For Jellicoe, it was the world-shattering feeling that he was staring at two of the Lords of Kobol, the very same Gods he had never professed much faith in.
Jack found his voice first. “You’re Ancients.”
Janus smiled. “That is what you call us, yes. We have many names. Alterans, Lanteans, Ancients, Ancestors, the Ascended, the Lords of Kobol. We are usually sworn never to interfere in the mortal realms, as you well know Doctor Jackson. This time, however, we had no choice. Your bomb would have ended everything, including us. We held back the expanding bubble, allowing the energy within to escape and letting it collapse into the singularity.”
Sam had her own question. “If it were that dangerous, why even allow it to detonate?”
Morgan le Fay smiled gently at her. “We managed to convince the others that the Wraith threat needed to be ended, and this was the best opportunity. You have also managed to finally break the cycle, something we are very pleased about.”
Caldwell asked the inevitable question. “What cycle?”
Janus answered. “The cycle of races being consumed by their own creations. We, as the Alterans, were driven from Avalon by a plague of our own making. We started over in Pegasus, only to be almost annihilated by the Wraith, while another creation, the Replicators, almost brought the Asgard to the brink. Then there were the Tribes of Kobol, a world we tried to build and protect as our legacy, a people we intended to be our successors as the protectors of Avalon.”
Morgan took up the tale. “But the Thirteen Tribes argued and war broke out, bringing devastation to Kobol and forcing you all to leave. Then came the Cylons, machines built to serve that rebelled. An endless cycle. Admiral Jellicoe, you may not be a man of faith but surely you know the first words in the Scroll of Pythia?”
The Admiral answered, his voice shaking slightly. “All of this has happened before…”
Janus finished. “…but it will no longer happen again. The cycle is broken now, the peoples of the Three Galaxies are free once again.”
Jack wasn’t entirely satisfied with that, it sounded far too much like destiny and horoscopes for his tastes.
“Why are you telling us all this? Surely this counts as interfering?”
The two Ascended Lords looked at one another and then Morgan replied. “We were allowed to give you this message, and a warning. Do not try and replicate this vacuum explosion, we may not be able to stop it next time. Admiral Jellicoe, when you return to Terra, tell your people the Lords are pleased with what they have accomplished.” John nodded dumbly, he was still amazed that this was happening.
Janus had one other thing to say. “Oh, and Daniel? As much as we enjoyed your company while you were Ascended, you can do a lot more good here. Try not to die again.” The archaeologist nodded at that, amusement written on his face.
The two beings exchanged another look, deciding that they had said what they needed to. Then, in unison, they said their final words.
“Even we cannot see the future, but we believe the Second Great Alliance will prosper. Stay true to your allies and you will endure whatever time brings. Farewell” With that, they faded away entirely.
There was utter silence in the control room for almost five minutes after that encounter. McKay was forced to admit that he’d been wrong about the data – but only to himself, he’d never say as much to Carter or Radek of course. Jellicoe was still stunned at meeting the actual Lords, while Carter and O’Neill were processing the huge implications of the message, and the warning, they had been given.
Daniel was the first to speak, his voice full of emotion; regret, sorrow, and delight vied for primacy.
“I think we’ve just been given an Ascended telling off.”
No one present felt the need to argue with him on that point. After another few moments of silence, they carried on with what they’d been doing. There were still Wraith remaining to be eliminated after all.
=================
Thus endeth Part Three: The War in Heaven.
There will an epilogue, possibly in several parts, up next. It will probably involve a time skip of a few months, maybe a year. This will wrap up the last of the things here and set up a few other odds and ends for a sequel, IF I decide to write one.
Echoes of the Bang
Task Force Rally Point, in orbit over Atlantis
The Terran and Colonial ships flashed into existence at the rally point over the new world Atlantis had moved to. All appeared worse for wear, though in three cases this was purely cosmetic as their shields began recharging. The Nemesis, Warspite and Victorious all bore visible damage, but these were leftovers from earlier engagements.
That one of their number was missing was immediately and painfully apparent. Over the next ten minutes there was a flurry of activity as shuttles and Raptors flew back and forth, moving casualties and supplies around as needed. It was evident what was going on, the Task Force was waiting for its other ships.
The Daniel Jackson was the first to arrive, dropping out of hyperspace with the badly wounded Daedalus in tow. They took up their positions in the formation and began transferring the wounded to the hospital facilities aboard Nemesis. A few minutes later the three Asgard battleships arrived, the Teal’c of Chu’lak sporting visible damage that was stunning in its severity, while the other two ships were clearly moving more sluggishly than usual.
With a handful of orders Jellicoe, Mace, and the other Captains and Commanders beamed down to Atlantis. It was time for the post-battle debrief. Weir and O’Neill joined them in one of the city’s larger briefing rooms, only for Jellicoe to ask them to dial Terra and establish holographic communications with his superiors. He only wanted to go through this once.
There was a short delay while that was done, and all the human officers took the opportunity to fix themselves a large mug of tea or coffee. Several of them held onto those mugs as if they were a life preserver thrown to a drowning man; they had all seen battle before but nothing on this scale.
Soon, holograms appeared, allowing Lethbridge-Stewart, Bill Adama and Presidents Roslin and Matthews to join them. Lethbridge-Stewart looked around and was immediately concerned when he couldn’t find one of his Captains, this didn’t bode well.
Jellicoe took a long swig of his coffee and moved to the front of the room to deliver his report.
“Mister and Madam President, Admirals, ladies and gentlemen, I am pleased to report that the operation was a success. Sensor data from the probes we left behind in the outer system confirm the ZPM bomb detonated as planned, though the effects were greater than anticipated. Lantea was destroyed, along with the system’s star. The Wraith Fleet was completely annihilated. None of them made it out in time.”
His face took on a pained expression. “That’s the good news. The bad news is the price we paid. I have to report the complete loss of the Battlestar Excalibur.” There were intakes of breath from the holograms and from Weir and O’Neill. “Before she was destroyed we managed to beam out two hundred and forty seven of her crew. Her entire Cobra complement was in the air at the time and have also been recovered aboard Nemesis. Across the entire Task Force we lost sixty-three Cobras and Vipers, four Scythe gunships and one Raptor, though Daedalus managed to save the Raptor’s pilot.” Colonel Caldwell’s face bore a mixture of pride and regret at that- he was pleased they’d saved the pilot, but aghast at the damage taken in the process.
Jellicoe continued. “I also have to report that severe damage was sustained by the Daedalus and the Teal’c of Chu’lak with moderate internal damage on the Samantha Carter and the George Hammond. The Nemesis, Victorious and Warspite have all taken mild to moderate damage as well, enough to require considerable dock time to repair. Right now only the Pegasus, Republic, Galactica and the Daniel Jackson are at full strength and combat-ready.”
The holograms of Lethbridge-Stewart and Adama exchanged a look before the former spoke. “I speak for everyone here on Terra when I say congratulations Admiral. Yes you have taken serious losses but you went to another galaxy with just twelve ships and a severely limited supply line and successfully engaged and destroyed a force over ten times your number in capital ships alone. That is an incredible feat of martial skill.”
Jellicoe sighed. “Thank you for that Admiral. I know in my head that you’re right but my heart isn’t listening right now.”
Adama spoke next. “What’s your next step John?”
“Next step is to finish mopping up Wraith ground bases and shipyards. According to our prior recon data supplied by the Asgard and Earth ships, we know that this loss represents something like ninety-five percent of the total Wraith population. After a day’s break here at Atlantis I’ll be sending my operational ships out to finish off as many of those bases and shipyards as we can. They’re all on worlds uninhabited by humans so we’re not going to be even remotely subtle. We’ll just nuke them from orbit, it’s the only way to be sure we’ve got them all.”
That didn’t sit well with either senior Admiral or the Presidents, orbital nuclear bombardment reminded them far too strongly of the Cylons. On the other hand, the Colonial-built Battlestars had all been fitted with space-to-ground missile silos for exactly this purpose, and these were worlds devoid of human life.
Adama had something to query though. “How will you manage that with the Terran-built ships? They don’t carry a missile armament except for the Warstar.”
Jellicoe smiled. “I’ll detach a Scimitar squadron to each of the Lionheart’s, they can launch a bomber and volley-fire the missiles from orbit in total safety.”
Lethbridge-Stewart nodded, seeing the logic in that. ”Very well. What about the survivors from Excalibur? What’s their condition?”
“The pilots are mad as hell. The crew…most of them are catatonic at the moment, including Arthur and his XO. It’ll take them time to come to terms with what happened. I’d like to send them back to Terra via the Stargate, having family around should help them.”
Both Admirals were relieved to learn that Captain Pendragon was among the living. Lethbridge-Stewart quickly agreed to the request. There wasn’t much to say after this so the holograms faded away and the assembled officers began to really relax. Saul Tigh had an idea and leaned over to whisper it to Lee, the younger Commander quickly nodded and moved over to Tyr to ask a favour. The Asgard and the human had become good friends over the past few weeks so Tyr quickly agreed to help. Some quiet conversations over the wireless and the plan was made.
Saul moved over to Jellicoe and quietly explained his idea. John felt this was exactly what they all needed so he gave his blessing. Another quiet word with Tyr and Commander Fischer appeared in the flash of an Asgard transporter, carrying a tray laden with glasses and a large decanter. He placed it reverently on the table before withdrawing from the room – this was for the commanding officers only, and he had plenty of other things to keep him busy aboard Pegasus anyway.
Jellicoe and Saul began pouring glasses of the vintage Ambrosia and passing them around. Once everyone present, except the four Asgard, held a glass, John once more stood.
“Technically we’re all still on duty but as Commander of the Task Force I’m waiving that regulation for the moment. Ladies and gentleman, a toast to our victory!”
“Victory!” Echoed the crowd, before a sip of the potent liquor was taken. Saul took up the challenge next, this was not the same traditional toast he Bill, Lee and Kara had shared on Olympus Base months ago, but the feeling was the same.
“To our honoured dead, may they rest in peace!”
“Our honoured dead.” Replied the group, and another sip was taken. O’Neill spoke next, as the senior Earth officer he felt compelled to participate.
“To the friends and allies who fought at our side!”
“Friends and allies.” Came the reply. Doctor Weir went last, she felt that a less martial theme was needed, especially in this group.
“To the future that is now bright and peaceful.”
“The future!” came the final reply, and the last of the Ambrosia was drunk. Jellicoe placed the glass back on the table and the group stood in silence for a few moments. The Admiral looked back up and spoke again, closing out the meeting.
“I think we all needed that, thank you Saul. Right, Wayne, see about transferring the Scimitars over to Victorious, Republic and Galactica, make sure they’re re-stocked with missiles. Same goes for you as well Lee, and you David. Everyone else, get some rest, shore leave to Atlantis is at CO’s discretion. In twenty four hours we move out to hit the last Wraith bases. Get moving.”
Various officers began disappearing as beaming systems returned them to their ships. Caldwell remained behind, as did Jellicoe. The Earth Colonel knew full well his ship wasn’t considered operational and wouldn’t be participating in these final raids; he fully expected to begin the long, slow voyage back to Earth for repairs within a day.
The Admiral, the General, the Colonel and the Doctor left the briefing room and headed up to Weir’s office. As they passed through the control room they could see McKay, Carter and Zelenka arguing over the sensor data from the ZPM explosion, while Doctor Jackson looked on in bemusement. The four wandered over and listened in.
McKay, ever the skeptic, was unconvinced that Carter and Zelenka were right, and said so repeatedly.
“…oh come on, you can’t be serious! A vacuum collapse is an absurd idea, there’s no way a bubble could nucleate, expand and then just collapse in on itself, it would keep expanding until the universe was destroyed!”
Carter was having none of that. She had realised just what the rigged ZPM had done and it terrified her. The thought that she had come so close to ending everything was deeply troubling.
“How else do you explain the data McKay? If this was just the contained energy being released why did it appear to move faster than light? And why did it then collapse into a black hole? The data support only one conclusion, and that is that we got unbelievably lucky.”
At this, Jellicoe broke in. “Hold on, what do you mean we got lucky Colonel?”
“Sir, that bomb…it should have destroyed the universe, not just Lantea and the Wraith.”
That was quite a statement, and it left the four newcomers exchanging baffled, and worried, glances. Carter pressed her advantage, explaining briefly about the false vacuum collapse that almost occurred.
O’Neill was incensed. “Ok, so we blew up a solar system by mistake and almost took out the entire universe as well? Why didn’t it do what you think it should’ve?”
“Because we stopped it General O’Neill.”
At that, the entire group of scientists, officers and diplomats spun around. Standing by the wall of the control room, in a space that everyone present swore was empty a moment before, were two figures. The male was tall, with handsome features and kind eyes. The woman was shorter, with long brown hair and an expression that was some mix of pride and censure.
Jellicoe and O’Neill both reacted the same way at the unexpected appearance of two people in a high security area. They reached for their sidearms, but neither was carrying one at the moment. They both realised this at the same moment, looked at each other and grimaced. Jellicoe looked back.
“And who are you two? For that matter, how did you get in here?”
Daniel, meanwhile, was feeling memories long suppressed returning. “I know you both…”
“Indeed you do Daniel Jackson. My name is Janus.” That drew a gasp from the Expedition leader. “It is a pleasure to see you again Elizabeth. You, Admiral Jellicoe, would know me better as Prometheus. My companion was once known to the people of Earth as Morgan le Fay, though the Kobolians would know her as Athena.”
That set everyone’s minds reeling. For Weir, it brought back sad memories from the day they found a much older Elizabeth Weir in a stasis pod and the story she had told. For Jack and Sam, it was the realisation they were facing Ascended beings straight out of Greek and Arthurian myths. For Jellicoe, it was the world-shattering feeling that he was staring at two of the Lords of Kobol, the very same Gods he had never professed much faith in.
Jack found his voice first. “You’re Ancients.”
Janus smiled. “That is what you call us, yes. We have many names. Alterans, Lanteans, Ancients, Ancestors, the Ascended, the Lords of Kobol. We are usually sworn never to interfere in the mortal realms, as you well know Doctor Jackson. This time, however, we had no choice. Your bomb would have ended everything, including us. We held back the expanding bubble, allowing the energy within to escape and letting it collapse into the singularity.”
Sam had her own question. “If it were that dangerous, why even allow it to detonate?”
Morgan le Fay smiled gently at her. “We managed to convince the others that the Wraith threat needed to be ended, and this was the best opportunity. You have also managed to finally break the cycle, something we are very pleased about.”
Caldwell asked the inevitable question. “What cycle?”
Janus answered. “The cycle of races being consumed by their own creations. We, as the Alterans, were driven from Avalon by a plague of our own making. We started over in Pegasus, only to be almost annihilated by the Wraith, while another creation, the Replicators, almost brought the Asgard to the brink. Then there were the Tribes of Kobol, a world we tried to build and protect as our legacy, a people we intended to be our successors as the protectors of Avalon.”
Morgan took up the tale. “But the Thirteen Tribes argued and war broke out, bringing devastation to Kobol and forcing you all to leave. Then came the Cylons, machines built to serve that rebelled. An endless cycle. Admiral Jellicoe, you may not be a man of faith but surely you know the first words in the Scroll of Pythia?”
The Admiral answered, his voice shaking slightly. “All of this has happened before…”
Janus finished. “…but it will no longer happen again. The cycle is broken now, the peoples of the Three Galaxies are free once again.”
Jack wasn’t entirely satisfied with that, it sounded far too much like destiny and horoscopes for his tastes.
“Why are you telling us all this? Surely this counts as interfering?”
The two Ascended Lords looked at one another and then Morgan replied. “We were allowed to give you this message, and a warning. Do not try and replicate this vacuum explosion, we may not be able to stop it next time. Admiral Jellicoe, when you return to Terra, tell your people the Lords are pleased with what they have accomplished.” John nodded dumbly, he was still amazed that this was happening.
Janus had one other thing to say. “Oh, and Daniel? As much as we enjoyed your company while you were Ascended, you can do a lot more good here. Try not to die again.” The archaeologist nodded at that, amusement written on his face.
The two beings exchanged another look, deciding that they had said what they needed to. Then, in unison, they said their final words.
“Even we cannot see the future, but we believe the Second Great Alliance will prosper. Stay true to your allies and you will endure whatever time brings. Farewell” With that, they faded away entirely.
There was utter silence in the control room for almost five minutes after that encounter. McKay was forced to admit that he’d been wrong about the data – but only to himself, he’d never say as much to Carter or Radek of course. Jellicoe was still stunned at meeting the actual Lords, while Carter and O’Neill were processing the huge implications of the message, and the warning, they had been given.
Daniel was the first to speak, his voice full of emotion; regret, sorrow, and delight vied for primacy.
“I think we’ve just been given an Ascended telling off.”
No one present felt the need to argue with him on that point. After another few moments of silence, they carried on with what they’d been doing. There were still Wraith remaining to be eliminated after all.
=================
Thus endeth Part Three: The War in Heaven.
There will an epilogue, possibly in several parts, up next. It will probably involve a time skip of a few months, maybe a year. This will wrap up the last of the things here and set up a few other odds and ends for a sequel, IF I decide to write one.
Baltar: "I don't want to miss a moment of the last Battlestar's destruction!"
Centurion: "Sir, I really think you should look at the other Battlestar."
Baltar: "What are you babbling about other...it's impossible!"
Centurion: "No. It is a Battlestar."
Corrax Entry 7:17: So you walk eternally through the shadow realms, standing against evil where all others falter. May your thirst for retribution never quench, may the blood on your sword never dry, and may we never need you again.
Centurion: "Sir, I really think you should look at the other Battlestar."
Baltar: "What are you babbling about other...it's impossible!"
Centurion: "No. It is a Battlestar."
Corrax Entry 7:17: So you walk eternally through the shadow realms, standing against evil where all others falter. May your thirst for retribution never quench, may the blood on your sword never dry, and may we never need you again.
Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
Yes, that was a very polite "Bad Children! Don't Ever Do This Again!"
Me: Nope, that's why I have you around to tell me.
Nitram: You -are- beautiful. Anyone tries to tell you otherwise kill them.
"A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved, except in memory. LLAP" -- Leonard Nimoy, last Tweet
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Eternal_Freedom
- Castellan
- Posts: 10413
- Joined: 2010-03-09 02:16pm
- Location: CIC, Battlestar Temeraire
Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
At least they were allowed to give the warning, better than what we usually saw in the series
Baltar: "I don't want to miss a moment of the last Battlestar's destruction!"
Centurion: "Sir, I really think you should look at the other Battlestar."
Baltar: "What are you babbling about other...it's impossible!"
Centurion: "No. It is a Battlestar."
Corrax Entry 7:17: So you walk eternally through the shadow realms, standing against evil where all others falter. May your thirst for retribution never quench, may the blood on your sword never dry, and may we never need you again.
Centurion: "Sir, I really think you should look at the other Battlestar."
Baltar: "What are you babbling about other...it's impossible!"
Centurion: "No. It is a Battlestar."
Corrax Entry 7:17: So you walk eternally through the shadow realms, standing against evil where all others falter. May your thirst for retribution never quench, may the blood on your sword never dry, and may we never need you again.
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Sky Captain
- Jedi Master
- Posts: 1267
- Joined: 2008-11-14 12:47pm
- Location: Latvia
Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
It's quite scary that a ZPM is one sabotage away from ending the universe. Ok, humans will not attempt another ZPM bomb, but there are plenty of other races in Milky Way and Pegasus who are reaching or soon will reach tech level neccesary to start to fuck around with ZPM they found in some abandoned Ancient base.
Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
Nice end-of-part bit.
I was asking about Eridanus becoming a class lead because I was thinking (mistakenly, as it turned out) that the new-build heavy battlewagon to replace the Excalibat would build off an existing design (and the Constellation design has (with any luck) had lessons learned from Constellation incorporated into Eridanus). Some wombat forgot about the differences in armament doctrine between the two navies.
I was asking about Eridanus becoming a class lead because I was thinking (mistakenly, as it turned out) that the new-build heavy battlewagon to replace the Excalibat would build off an existing design (and the Constellation design has (with any luck) had lessons learned from Constellation incorporated into Eridanus). Some wombat forgot about the differences in armament doctrine between the two navies.
A mad person thinks there's a gateway to hell in his basement. A mad genius builds one and turns it on. - CaptainChewbacca
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Eternal_Freedom
- Castellan
- Posts: 10413
- Joined: 2010-03-09 02:16pm
- Location: CIC, Battlestar Temeraire
Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
The Heavy Battlestar that will replace Excalibur will be similar to Eridanus, the Terran designers will certainly draw lessons from how strongly the latest Colonial ship is built, and may even mount a cut-down version of the superlaser off Nemesis...or a reverse-engineered version of the Ancient Satellite Weapon. Hell, those might completely replace megalasers as main batteries in the next round of refits.
Terran-built Heavy Battlestar will probably mount the same 6 main guns, perhaps 96 turbolaser batteries and 512 point-defence mounts, carry 240 Cobras plus 20 Scimitars and 20 Scythes, and possibly a missile battery as well.
Terran-built Heavy Battlestar will probably mount the same 6 main guns, perhaps 96 turbolaser batteries and 512 point-defence mounts, carry 240 Cobras plus 20 Scimitars and 20 Scythes, and possibly a missile battery as well.
Baltar: "I don't want to miss a moment of the last Battlestar's destruction!"
Centurion: "Sir, I really think you should look at the other Battlestar."
Baltar: "What are you babbling about other...it's impossible!"
Centurion: "No. It is a Battlestar."
Corrax Entry 7:17: So you walk eternally through the shadow realms, standing against evil where all others falter. May your thirst for retribution never quench, may the blood on your sword never dry, and may we never need you again.
Centurion: "Sir, I really think you should look at the other Battlestar."
Baltar: "What are you babbling about other...it's impossible!"
Centurion: "No. It is a Battlestar."
Corrax Entry 7:17: So you walk eternally through the shadow realms, standing against evil where all others falter. May your thirst for retribution never quench, may the blood on your sword never dry, and may we never need you again.
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DKeith2011
- Padawan Learner
- Posts: 195
- Joined: 2010-04-22 01:43am
Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
Excellent story!
Hoping and waiting for for more.
Hoping and waiting for for more.
Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
So that would give the combined Fleet three semi-specialised command ships - Nemesis, Eridanus and ... elefino... Indomitable ?
The first two I can grok - special project and salvage job, respectively - but I thought the TCN, especially, couldn't really afford the opportunity cost incurred by even semi-specialised hulls? Or were there shortfalls that turned up when flying a flag from Lionheart that couldn't be rectified by refitting the fleet ops centre?
The first two I can grok - special project and salvage job, respectively - but I thought the TCN, especially, couldn't really afford the opportunity cost incurred by even semi-specialised hulls? Or were there shortfalls that turned up when flying a flag from Lionheart that couldn't be rectified by refitting the fleet ops centre?
A mad person thinks there's a gateway to hell in his basement. A mad genius builds one and turns it on. - CaptainChewbacca
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Eternal_Freedom
- Castellan
- Posts: 10413
- Joined: 2010-03-09 02:16pm
- Location: CIC, Battlestar Temeraire
Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
The new ship can't be Indomitable, that's one of the Flight III Lionheart's.
And this isn't meant as a command ship, though it will have flag facilities on a par with Eridanus. It's not a specialist ship either, it's exactly what the name suggests, a "Heavy" Battlestar. Still carries guns and Cobras, but now with missiles and Scimitars/Scythes as well.
Same with Eridanus, it's not intended as a specialised command ship either (not like Nemesis but a "We can't have more Battlestars so we'll build more powerful ones instead."
And this isn't meant as a command ship, though it will have flag facilities on a par with Eridanus. It's not a specialist ship either, it's exactly what the name suggests, a "Heavy" Battlestar. Still carries guns and Cobras, but now with missiles and Scimitars/Scythes as well.
Same with Eridanus, it's not intended as a specialised command ship either (not like Nemesis but a "We can't have more Battlestars so we'll build more powerful ones instead."
Baltar: "I don't want to miss a moment of the last Battlestar's destruction!"
Centurion: "Sir, I really think you should look at the other Battlestar."
Baltar: "What are you babbling about other...it's impossible!"
Centurion: "No. It is a Battlestar."
Corrax Entry 7:17: So you walk eternally through the shadow realms, standing against evil where all others falter. May your thirst for retribution never quench, may the blood on your sword never dry, and may we never need you again.
Centurion: "Sir, I really think you should look at the other Battlestar."
Baltar: "What are you babbling about other...it's impossible!"
Centurion: "No. It is a Battlestar."
Corrax Entry 7:17: So you walk eternally through the shadow realms, standing against evil where all others falter. May your thirst for retribution never quench, may the blood on your sword never dry, and may we never need you again.
Re: The Thirteenth Tribe (nBSG/SG Crossover)
Fair cop, got that one wrong.
Isn't there a fixed overhead involved in supporting yet another class (regardless of number of hulls in said class)? That might swing the balance back the other way, to another Lionheart - that route would simply incur the per-hull cost, not as well as an additional per-class overhead. Yes, a lot of parts are (deliberately) common (ion reactors, megalaser assemblies, berthing modules, etc etc), but not how they go together to make up a given hull.
By my count, at moment, that overhead is already being paid for (counting only capital vessels) the Lionheart, Nemesis, Warspite and Eridanus classes. Can the combined Fleet afford a fifth, especially if it's a third one-off class?
Or is this prototyping a mass upgrade for the fourth Lionheart flight, even if they are converted in lieu of procurement?
Isn't there a fixed overhead involved in supporting yet another class (regardless of number of hulls in said class)? That might swing the balance back the other way, to another Lionheart - that route would simply incur the per-hull cost, not as well as an additional per-class overhead. Yes, a lot of parts are (deliberately) common (ion reactors, megalaser assemblies, berthing modules, etc etc), but not how they go together to make up a given hull.
By my count, at moment, that overhead is already being paid for (counting only capital vessels) the Lionheart, Nemesis, Warspite and Eridanus classes. Can the combined Fleet afford a fifth, especially if it's a third one-off class?
Or is this prototyping a mass upgrade for the fourth Lionheart flight, even if they are converted in lieu of procurement?
A mad person thinks there's a gateway to hell in his basement. A mad genius builds one and turns it on. - CaptainChewbacca