Cale snatched the printout. It was a translation of Admiral Gonzalez-Villareal's orders to Captain De la Vega. De la Vega was ordered to report to Admiral Gonzalez-Villareal to report and 'for consultation on future actions'. Zant was right. Both of Gonzalez-Villareal's destroyers would be tied up for weeks at Ilocan while their Captains attended meeting after meeting, "consulting" with the Admiral. This was their best chance. Besides, the number of prizes had tapered off as Santiago's trade dried up. Most of the remaining Santie-flagged ships were in orbit around Santiago itself. Even those that could find a cargo were reluctant to brave the minefields and gunboats.
Cale hurried to find Mong. He showed Mong the message, and touched off a flurry of activity. Ilocan's Revenge was readied, as all available boat pilots were rounded up, sobered up, or just poured into their bunks aboard.
Meanwhile Cale was making sure that Cheetah 's ammunition supply for the quickfirer was replenished and that her fusactor was at peak output. For the most part Tess managed to keep him from obsessing over details. Zant's Strengl had been in Cheetah 's small hold since their arrival from Torlon, but it would be released before the final jump to Santiago. Strengl s were equipped with jump engines, and both the Ilocan's Revenge's astrogation comp and Zant's would be slaved to Tess's so they could be certain of arriving in the Santiago system simultaneously. This would give them a better chance of survival in the almost certain case that the jump point was picketed.
Privately, Cale was glad for Zant's Strengl. He hoped that the fighter's small jump engine would be able to spin down, and her inertial drive spin up much faster than either the Ilocan's Revenge 's or Cheetah 's, which should give the fighter weapons and shields before the picket could man its own weapons.
Cale didn't even bother trying to leave Dee behind, since he preferred to fight battles he had at least a small chance of winning. Besides, he needed a gunner, and she was experienced.
After a short, hurried briefing, they lifted off; Ilocan's Revenge 's astrogation comp slaved to Cheetah 's. Zant's Strengl remained in Cheetah 's small hold until just before the last jump into the Santiago system.
The tech manning Diego Del Florio 's sensor suite monitoring Santiago's jump point was bored. It was 0400 ship's time, and he had a seemingly eternal two more hours on watch. When he had been assigned to Del Florio a year ago, he'd been mildly disappointed not to have been assigned aboard a destroyer, but pleased that at least he had been assigned to a real warship, a frigate. The real disappointment had come when Del Florio had been picked to remain behind in the Santiago system instead of going to kick some Ilocano ass. The good news was that they were due to be rotated to Ilocan, to relieve one of the ships there. No one had really expected the war to last long enough for rotations to be necessary; but the Ilocano savages were stubborn, and so next month they would be going into combat! well, at least to a combat zone. Rumor had it that all the fighting was on the ground, but they would still get combat pay and a combat zone medal.
A needle on his panel stirred, and then jumped. Finally! Some traffic was emerging. Since those damned Ilocanos had found a way to mine the jump point, very few ships dared to transit.
He frowned. Odd. The readings were almost right for a Beta-class; but they were far enough off to be confusing. Before he reported the emergence, he had better double-check.
No, the readings were accurate; that was no Beta-class. Then what? The only thing that made sense was two ships in close company, with a slaved astrogation comp. But that meant…
" Teniente!" He shouted.
The Lieutenant who was Officer of the Watch roused from a lurid daydream. "What is it, Gomez?" he asked irritably.
"An emergence, Teniente. It appears to be two ships in close company."
The lieutenant jumped to his feet."But slaved comps are a combat procedure," he said. "Check your figures again."
"I checked them three times, Teniente," Gomez, complained. He turned his attention back to his screens. " Teniente! There appear to be a number of small craft that weren't there before!"
A chill ran down the lieutenant's spine. He whirled to the comm tech and snapped. "General Quarters! Sound the alarm. We are being attacked!"
The drowsy morning watch joined the sleepy spacers rolling out of bunks in cursing their Captain as the alarm sounded. Another damned drill. And at this time of night! Then the Officer of the Watch's voice sounded excitedly from every speaker. "Battle Stations! Battle Stations! This is not a drill! I repeat, this is not a drill! All personnel to battle stations!", and panic erupted.
The gunnery tech, still suspicious that it was only a drill, followed his procedures and raised the retractable five-shot missile launcher that comprised Del Florio 's main battery and began charging the lasers in the ship's nose.
The missile rack rose just in time to attract the attention of a nearby boat pilot, and a bolt from his laser fused the controls and cut the cables.
Though the ships had to wait for their jump engines to spin down and their inertial drives to light off to power their shields and weapons, the boats had no such limitations. As soon as Ilocan's Revenge emerged, she opened her cargo doors, and eleven gunboats poured out, driving max toward the unprepared frigate.
With her main armament destroyed, the boats turned their attention to the secondary weapons, the nose-mounted lasers. Laser bolts and quickfirer rockets sheeted toward the weapons emplacements. The design of Old-Empire-style frigates had not changed in centuries; the weapons locations were very well known. Both lasers became non-functional in seconds, and the boats turned their attention to antennas and sensor arrays.
Meanwhile, Zant's Strengl had spun up its inertial drive, and headed for Del Florio 's vulnerable inertial drive nozzles.
By the time the confused crew had nearly all reached their battle stations, the battle was over. The weapons techs found there were no weapons left to operate and the engineering crew found her inertial drive inoperable.
Meanwhile, the Captain had reached the bridge, just in time to hear a voice communication over the short-range comm on the Santiago military frequency.
"We are privateers commissioned by the government of Ilocan," it said. "Your weapons and inertial drives are destroyed. Surrender or die."
"There is no government of Ilocan," the Captain replied. "Ilocan is under the control of the Republic of Santiago."
"I won't argue political niceties with you, Captain," the voice replied. "Boarders are inside your vessel as we speak. If they encounter any resistance, your ship and crew will be destroyed."
A quick glance at the tell-tales showed that the emergency releases had been used to enter Del Florio 's airlocks. The captain sighed. His crew was unarmed, and improvised weapons would be of little effect on suited, armed invaders. His shoulder slumped as he saw his career ending. "We surrender, under protest," he said slowly.
"Good thing." The voice came from behind the Captain. He whirled to see a suited figure standing in the bridge hatch, a blaster in hand. Three others followed as the first entered. All four opened their faceplates as the leader reported "Bridge Secure," and one of his men headed straight for the comm station.
The leader approached the Captain. " Capitan," he said in fluent Santiagan, "the first thing I need is for you to get on the speaker and announce the surrender. You will also order your people not to resist or interfere with mine."
The Captain sighed again and nodded. As he turned to his command chair to make the announcements, the leader turned to the man who had pushed the comm tech from his station and was operating it with obvious familiarity. "Did they get a message out?" he asked in standard.