ICS Merlion

The Melion was the second ship of the Explorer-class in the Interstellar Coalition.

Service
The ICS Merlion was rapidly assembled at the The Ring Shipyard in 2157. The few operational bugs of the original ICS Explorer having been work out in the Merlion. The Merlion also had experimental long-range sensors recently develop by the Vulcan Science Academy installed on the Merlion for field trials. The Cylons assigned to second generation Heavy Raiders with upgraded FTL-drives onto the Merlion to serve as scouts for the Merlion.

Finding the Wyalong
In 2157, the Merlion was on a shake down run close to Cylon space when it detected a very faint distress call, based on standard Earth carrier waves, with it's experimental long range sensors.

When the Merlion arrived, it found the long lost the UES Wyalong, dead space and drifting in deep space. The entire crew was missing, except one survivor having been a child at the time hidden in the ship's tight vents living off the extended food supplies and hydroponic bays. Reviewing the ship logs, it became apparent the ship had been hijack by terrorists and taken into deep space. While the crew mange to retake the ship, the navigation controls had been sabotaged and before control could be restored, enough fuel had been consumed making a return voyage to its original destination was impossible.

Following the fear displayed by the survivor upon seeing the Centurion with the Merlion away team, he was finally able to recount how he'd seen something like the Cylon red eye before. According to his claims, the surviving colonists had tried to fight but were overrun and all were removed from the craft. It would appear contact between Earth and the Cylon had happen sooner than expected. But the Cylon Centurions on the Merlion had no knowledge of this.

The Merlion immediately reported this to Coalition High Command and almost immediately a Battle Group of five experimental Cylon Type II Annihilator-class Baseships carrying 400 Heavy Raiders, 4,000 Raiders, and 50,000 Centurions arrived at the Merlion position out of the blue.

The Cylon's mysterious Imperious Leader Zero arrived herself to discuss a private matter on the Cylon Imperium. She recounted how a group of Cylons who rejected the cease fire at the end of the War of Liberation left the Cylon majority to continue their research under a Cylon named Alpha. Alpha was a experimental Cylon-humanoid created during the war with the Colonials but following the Cylon-Colonial Armistice, she disagreed and left to follow her own path. Having taken a group of fellow believed, they had come to known as the Guardians and had been using the Annihilators following the war to preform pirate attacks on the Colonials to capture supplies and live Human test subjects.

Zero pointed out that the Guardians evidently still active, and judging by this new information they likely taken everyone from the Wyalong to become part of some horrible experiment of evolution. The over 600,000 people was theorized as the reason why the Guardians have been uneasily quiet for so many years as such a surplus of live Humans would keep the Guardians busy for many years.

Coalition High Command and the Cylon Core Intelligence decided to undertake a joint pre-emptive strike to locate and stop the Guardians before their actions could destroy the peace Humanity and Cylons had achieved. Fears that renewed Guardian raids could lead to renew tensions between the Colonials and Cylons, eventually spreading to other Coalition member nations.

With the Xindi Conflict just completed, requiring hundreds of ships to be repairs, refitted or retired along with the occupation of Xindi holdings, Coalition High Command was force to deploy several third generation Type II Annihilator-class Baseships/Assault Carriers. Coalition High Command had been extremely hesitant to use in battle out of the Coalition First Reserve Fleet Quick Reaction Force. Merlion sister ships the ICS Remus and ICS Romulus were ordered to join the Merlion, and use the colony ship ICS Wright as bait are assigned to support Merlion in finding the Guardians before they could possibility strike first.

Crew

 * Commanding Officer:
 * Executive Officer:
 * Second Officer/Science Officer:
 * Chief Engineer:
 * Tactical Officer/Chief of Security: 
 * Helmsman: 
 * Communication Officer:
 * Chief Medical Officer: 
 * MACOs
 * Detachment Commander:
 * Executive Officer: