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| Battle of the Binary Star System | |||||||||||||||||
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| Conflict | Second Cylon war | ||||||||||||||||
| Date | Unknown | ||||||||||||||||
| Place | unnamed binary star system | ||||||||||||||||
| Result | Tactical Cylon victory | ||||||||||||||||
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Engagement in which Pegasus was lured into a trap by three Cylon basestars. The Cylons had lured two of Pegasus's Raptors out into a shroud of electro-magnetic interference (EMI) generated by a binary star system. Once the Raptors were there, the crews were killed and the craft left intact and adrift at the edge of the Colonials' DRADIS range. By all accounts, the craft appeared to be disabled, albeit non-responsive, and Pegasus went underway to retrieve them.
Once Pegasus had taken the bait, three Cylon basestars jumped in and promptly launched a full salvo of tactical nuclear missiles, scoring two hits on the battlestar. Pegasus's air wing, already spaceborne under the command of Captain "Starbuck" Thrace, immediately engaged the Cylons and began to return fire. Virtually ignoring the Vipers, the Cylon basestars focused their efforts on Pegasus, and produced a third nuclear missile hit on the battlestar's underbelly.
Pegasus's newest commanding officer, Commander Barry Garner, had recently been promoted from an engineering position, and was not experienced in combat command leadership. Furthermore, the heavy barrage dealt by the Cylons had knocked the FTL drive off-line, putting Pegasus's survival in peril. If the battlestar was to escape this trap, the FTL drive would have to be restored; thus, Garner voluntarily abdicated command to Major Lee Adama, and dashed below to Engineering.
Major Adama promptly ordered Starbuck and the rest of the Vipers to defend the compromised portions of Pegasus from further damage while the battlestar's foward batteries fired on the closest of the three basestars, inflicting severe damage and buying Pegasus more time. The wounded basestar was actually forced to withdraw; the first documented occurrence of a baseship diverging from their normal tactic of fighting to the death, perhaps due to the loss of the Resurrection Ship.
The crux of the problem with repairing the FTL drive was an oxygen leak that blocked technicians from making repairs to the damaged FTL drive components. Commander Garner heroically sacrificed himself to repair the leak and allow his engineers to address the FTL drive. Soon, they had it back operational.
With the FTL drive restored, Major Adama ordered all fighters to be recovered and an immediate evacuation jump.
From a tactical standpoint, this was a marginal Cylon victory — if their ultimate goal had been the destruction of Pegasus, this attempt failed, thanks to the quick reactions of the Colonial crew. However, Pegasus suffered substantial damage and lost a number of casualties, among them another command officer. The battlestar did return to the relative safety of the Fleet, and while the damage incurred appears grave at first examination, there isn't an implication of anything that cannot be repaired in the coming weeks. (The Captain's Hand)