Battle of the Void

"Currently, Stargate Command has no vessels capable of engaging the Hive Ships before they reach Earth. They cannot be allowed to get that far."

- Elizabeth Weir

The Battle of the Void was an event that took place in the Void between the Milky Way and Pegasus Galaxies in 2006 between the Tau'ri and Wraith.

Prelude
"All we want is the retrovirus. It is the key to ending a civil war that could go on for centuries."

- Hive queen to Elizabeth Weir

In 2006, a Wraith faction proposed an alliance with the Atlantis Expedition after Dr. Beckett tested his Iratus bug retrovirus on Michael Kenmore and he returned to the Wraith with the knowledge that Atlantis still existed. The alliance was turbulent as the Wraith were actually using the alliance to gather two key pieces of information: the Aurora mission report, in order to work out how to upgrade the Wraith hyperdrive, and the location of Earth, by planting a spyware computer virus into the Atlantis database.

Whilst on the "allied" Hive Ship to over see the deployment of the retrovirus gas on an "enemy" Hive Ship, Ronon Dex and Rodney McKay were captured. Meanwhile, the Daedalus fell victim to a surprise attack by both Hive Ships as they immediately opened fire on the Daedalus the moment the ship came out of hyperspace. In an attempt to resist the two Hives, the Daedalus opened fire using all main railgun batteries and a squadron of four F-302s was launched to deal with the incoming wave of darts. Before the Wraith promptly withdrew from the engagement, John Sheppard, who was attempting to blow up the Hives' hyperdrives, used an F-302 and latched onto the hull of one of the Hive Ships before it took off into hyperspace.

After discovering the Wraith were headed for Earth, Dr. Zelenka worked out where the Hive Ships were to drop out of hyperspace. Dr. Weir then commissioned the Daedalus and the, newly acquired, Ancient ship Orion to the location, in the massive void between the Milky Way and Pegasus galaxies. Col. Steven Caldwell pointed out to her that this could very well be a suicide mission, a futile one at that (which she regrettably acknowledged), but ultimately agreed with her decision. Meanwhile, at the same time Michael discovered that his life was in danger as the Hive Queen no longer trusted him, McKay and Ronon managed to escape from captivity and attempted to sabotage the Hive Ship that they were in. Micheal managed to contact Col. Sheppard and instructed him to attack the Hive with what little ordinance remained in his F-302. In the attack, he damaged the hyperdrive of one of the ships before being attacked by a squadron of darts, which critically damaged the F-302. He was then taken aboard the Hive and questioned by the ship's Queen.

The Battle
"I was coordinating a strike against the Hive Ships when you recalled me... With everything we've got."

- Elizabeth Weir

On the bridge of the ever approaching Daedalus, Col. Steven Caldwell ordered all operable missile launch tubes to fire Mark III tactical warheads the second the Daedalus exited hyperspace. As the ship emerged at the coordinates and launched all missiles, hundreds of darts were detected in proximity to both Hives. In the Daedalus' opening salvo, the ship managed to severely damage one of the Hive Ships in a brilliant blue explosion, but not completely destroy it as all but one of the warheads were intercepted by the numerous wraith darts surrounding both Hives.

Moments after the Daedalus' initial attack and both Hive Ships opened fire, the Orion, commanded by Maj. Evan Lorne arrived. However, Dr. Zelenka had some difficulty simultaneously transferring power from the shields to weapons. When the problem was corrected, the Orion fired a massive salvo of drone weapons.thumb|200px|right|The Battle of the Void.Upon leaving the Orion, the hundreds of drones raced toward one of the Hive Ships, weaving in and out of the massive wave of approaching darts in order to reach their target. After just a few seconds, this massive salvo of drone weapons bombarded the hull of the Hive Ship, blasting thousands of deadly holes as these lethal and resilient weapons propelled themselves into and out of the craft several times. This brutal attack was more than enough to completely destroy one of the Hive Ships. However, in order for that deadly salvo to be launched, the Orion's powerful shields were sacrificed. The remaining Hive Ship then shifted its attack toward the Orion and the ship's hull began taking multiple hits. As the Daedalus was too far out to intercept, Orion's crew was beamed over to the Daedalus by the request of major Lorne. As the force of the attack was too much for the unshielded ship to bear, the Orion finally succumbed to the intense firepower of the Hive and was, moments later, destroyed in a massive, fiery explosion.

Meanwhile, Michael, Sheppard, Ronon, and McKay managed to escape from the remaining Hive Ship in a small transport ship and were beamed directly onto the bridge of the Daedalus moments after the Hive opened fire on them. Before their departure, Michael managed to deactivated the ship's jamming code, which would enable them to beam a nuclear warhead into the Hive. However, none remained as all Mark IIIs were fired in the Daedalus' opening salvo.

As the Hive Ship then began to launch a wave of Darts against the Daedalus, the Daedalus brought all railguns to bear on the Hive's main Dart bays and every ounce of power was channeled to the forward shield until the Col. Caldwell gave the order to stop. In the barrage of railgun fire that followed, these projectiles impacted the Hive's dart bays at ineradicable speeds, completely destroying the incoming darts moments after they launched. The concentrated fire on the bays also created a number of secondary explosions inside the ship, which stopped the Hive from firing, and left the entrance to the bay in a fiery cloud. However, in the process, the Daedalus' shields became completely depleted and the ship sustained several direct hull impacts, exposing several interior sections directly to space. The last blast the Daedalus sustained took out life support and left the back-ups unresponsive. With the only breathable air in light years being aboard the Hive Ship, the Daedalus beamed over the retrovirus gas in order to convert the Wraith on the ship into Humans. A small team of marines was later sent, after the gas had a chance to "run its course", to secure the Hive.

Aftermath
"We're out of food and water and we haven't slept in days but, yeah, we made it."

- John Sheppard

Many Wraith died in the conversion process and some even fed on each other. However, the surviving 200 Wraith were transformed into humans and were placed in stasis chambers aboard the Hive Ship, which was commandeered by the Atlantis expedition. After the battle's conclusion, the Hive Ship was briefly taken to Atlantis.As the Daedalus had sustained heavy damage to many systems, including its hyperdrive, the ship was taken aboard into the Hive's hangar where it remained during the Hive's voyage back to Atlantis.

Due to the strain on the Hive Ship's energy reserves caused by keeping 200 human-converted Wraith in stasis, a more permanent solution was devised; The humans would be taken to M8G-352 where they would be placed under quarantine. However, after discovering that they were in fact Wraith and not humans, the captured Wraiths started to transform again and reverted back to the point were they could telepathically contact a Wraith-controlled Hive ship to rescue them. As to not let them, once again, fall into the hands of the Wraith, the Atlantis Expedition's hive opened fire on the planet shortly after the Wraith-controlled Hive exited hyperspace. The team aboard Atlantis' Hive Ship escaped in a Puddle Jumper shortly before it was destroyed by the Wraith controlled Hive, which later retrieved the transformed wraith from the planet's surface. After the Daedalus' hyperdrive was repaired, the ship was sent to retrieve the team in the Puddle Jumper and return them to Atlantis.

Although the Wraith suffered heavy losses with the destruction of a hive ship, Michael still survived the battle and was picked up by the other hive ship. It is unknown if any other Human-form Wraith survived, but if they did, they were likely killed by the Wraith as Michael ultimately had to flee for his life.