“Yeah.”
“Count how many times it blinks,” she teased with a grin.
Finn couldn't help but chuckle as Cynthia shook her head.
Captain Valance didn't show any amusement or irritation. His manner was calm and neutral. “Stay sharp everyone. We can't afford to commit to this action without being prepared.”
Several minutes passed in silence. Ashley was looking at her controls, calmly going through the flight checklist in her head. Finn was looking over the reports from engineering. The new tactical officer — Daryl Garretty was his name — was reviewing the instructions he had received for the maxjack and Cynthia was watching for any new transmission sources. Captain Valance sat calmly, resting his chin on his interwoven knuckles.
“I see wireless noise,” Cynthia reported.
“Gravity distortion off our starboard side,” reported navigation excitedly.
“How far out?” Captain Valance asked.
“Nine seconds.”
“Everyone get ready.”
For some the few seconds before the Lilla came out of hyperspace were too few. For the seasoned crew of the Samson there were just enough time to take one deep breath before everyone got a chance to play their part.
The deep space hauler, Lilla came out of hyperspace a few kilometres away from the point predicted. For several minutes they barely moved.
“What are our passive sensors picking up?” Asked Captain Valance.
“Twenty two aboard, all systems running except for weapons, no shield emitters. The cargo train is reading fully loaded. Just over two kilometres,” replied the new tactical officer.
“Their weaponry consists of rocket launchers, they don't need to be charged,” Finn corrected. “They have three launch turrets, two of which they can point at us if we approach from above.”
“All right, we'll give them a chance to start accelerating towards the system interior.”
“Sir, I'm picking up a thermal reading from inside our ship,” Finn reported. “It looks like someone's bringing our engines online early, trying to shut it down.”
“Too late, bring it all on line. Get us out of this storage container, there goes our surprise. Whoever did that is getting left behind at the nearest safe port. For now, let's just try to get this done.”
The rear end of the cargo container hiding the Samson blew apart in all directions, drifting away in small pieces. Ashley fired the engines, backing the ship out into the clear. She spun the Samson so the upper side faced the Lilla then began accelerating in the direction of the much larger vessel. “Beginning hard three second burn. Bring the shields up now please.”
The tactical officer nearly jumped and brought all the shields online as quickly as he could. “Sorry!” He replied. Alarms began going off, the power systems couldn't handle such a sudden drain. It was something he had been warned about more than once. Garretty floundered, near panic trying to figure out what he had done wrong.
Captain Valance stood up and tossed the young officer aside, taking the controls and sending more power to the dorsal shields, reducing power to the rest of the emitters. The sensors at the tactical station warned that missiles were firing. “Incoming!” Was all he had the chance to say.
The ship rattled only slightly, but everyone could hear the inertial dampener systems straining to compensate for the force of the impact. He checked the damage. “Flip us around Ash! We lost an emitter and we have a hull breach.”
Ashley flipped the ship end over end so the maxjack was aimed perfectly at the port side of the cargo hauler and began decelerating.
The tactical officer picked himself up off the deck and tried to take his station, butting right in beside Captain Valance, trying to step in front of him. Jake elbowed him in the chest so hard he was sent across the deck onto his back. “You touch my ship again and I'll strap you to the bow for the ride home!”
“Impact in three, two-” shouted the navigator.
Captain Valance barely had the maxjack ready in time, but the main heavy grappler claws compensated for the impact and grabbed hold of the other ship's hull like an eagle's talon around the neck of a fish. He looked over to Finn who was checking hull stress.
“We're good sir.” Finn said hurriedly. “With your permission I'd like to go help secure the breach and check damage.”
“Go, they need you more back there.”
The tactical officer looked at Finn helplessly; “What do I do?” he asked as he shrugged helplessly.
“Get off the bridge!” Captain Valance snapped. “Go putty that breach with your worthless ass for all I care!”
Finn shook his head and quickly left the bridge, hauling the tactical officer behind him. “Follow directions, watch everything, stay safe,” he informed the slightly younger fellow.
“Ramirez, how is your op going?” Captain Valance asked.
“We're just sailing the solar breeze sir, almost right where we want to be.”
“Be aware, the maxjack is firing.”
“We're clear. Don't worry about us,” reassured Ramirez.
“Cynthia, inform Lilla command; they are to shut down systems and abandon ship.”
“I'll send it, but I don't think they'll like it,” she said as she watched the engineering station for hull stress problems as Finn had instructed the day before and operated communications at the same time.
Captain Valance checked the maxjack's hold on the ship and manipulated the other, more fine sets of arms to reinforce their attachment.
“ Samson, we are part of a convoy. The rest of our group is not far behind. Your capture will not succeed and our escort will fire on you,” came the reply over the bridge speaker system.
“Cut communications,” ordered Captain Valance. “Firing maxjack.”
The plasma cutters began making a hole in the Lilla's hull. At first the armour was resistant, but after he managed to focus the white hot jets of plasma the going went much easier. After less than a minute he was almost finished. “Stephanie, get set for boarding action.”
“All set down here.”
“Ramirez, are you ready?”
“Yes sir, the packages are in place and we're ready. The bridge staff are in for one hell of a light show.”
“Good. Patch in to our communications with the Lilla. You'll know when it's showtime.” Captain Valance looked to Cynthia and nodded. She opened a channel between the bridge and the Lilla. “This is Captain Valance operating under the authority of the Aucharian Government. Abandon your vessel in a quick and orderly fashion or we will take further action.”
“If you're sending a boarding party through that hole you're making, it'll take you hours to get to our command center,” replied someone from the other ship.
“We're working on another entry point. Allow me to demonstrate.”
Ramirez took that as the signal, judging from the sounds over the communicator. There were several loud pops followed by the sound of cracking and creaking.
“Oh no,” Ashley said quietly, turning to face the captain.
The unmistakable sounds of atmosphere being pulled out of a hole and screaming came through the speaker system and then there was silence. Absolute dead silence.
“Ramirez, that was supposed to be a warning. The command crew were supposed to be scared, not spaced.”
“Oops,” was his only response.
“Get in there and check the bridge. See if you can patch into their internal comm system. Stephanie, start your boarding action as soon as the maxjack's airlock is secure.”
“Frost was our demolitions guy. I took an educated guess,” Ramirez tried to explain.
“Let's just hope some of them were smart enough to wear their vacsuits on the bridge,” Captain Valance replied.
“Hooking into the comm system now,” Ramirez said a moment later. “You can address the crew sir.”
