Chapter 9

The range between the five crafts closed. I checked the cameras in the airlock area. Ashley had set her team up on either side of the airlock. I could see that they had sealed the bulkheads on either side of that section of the hallway incase of a leak. I left the camera up and watched while keeping an eye on the sensors. “ Helm when they dock us pretend to use the impact to line us up with Bandit 3, keep it slow enough that Ashley has a chance to start her attack before the crew of bandit 4 realizes what's going on.” The Helm officer looked at the plot and the on coming intercept. “ yes sir” I looked over “ Wep’s fire as we bare give bandit 3 a full salvo then target at your discretion but remember we only have 6 rounds for the secondaries”, “ Aye Captain “.

I felt the thump and watched as the airlocks synced up. The Airlock camera showed the pirates opened up their inside lock and five guys filled the hallway opened their outer lock and started pounding on our outerlock. It was slopping security and I could see Ashley note the same thing, the marine that had been holding the breaching charge set it down. Ashley signaled a five second warning “ helm five seconds”, “aye sir” the ship started to maneuver faster.

Ashley triggered the outside Airlock emergency open then triggered the improvised flash device in our airlock the bright flash and bang was muted by the camera but the pirates were definitely affected. Our inner airlock snapped open and Ashley led the charge. My focus was drawn back to the bridge as the ship shuddered “shots out” called the tactical station. I checked the plot. It was an old style 2d version that showed the ships based on the sensors and our estimated outgoing weapons fire the corvettes were in what was considered knife range for the long nines and less then a second after they fired the first corvette simply stopped existing. “ helm split the difference between bandits 1 and 2 , weapons I have the port guns you take starboard” normally a tactical department would have multiple gunners for divided work like this but we didn’t have that.

I pulled up the targeting equipment for the port long nines and swiveled them towards the target. The ship shook slightly “ the remaining two bandits are firing sir” the sensor’s operator commented. I lined up on bandit one and waited for the fire control, the Paladins weapons had three modes, dead reckoning called that partly from the fact it's unassisted and partly because unless you use it in very specific circumstances you're likely to be dead. Standard mode where the fire control would lock up the center of the enemy ship and track it as best as possible, and finally targeting mode. In targeting mode the turrets would track the ship but the operator would line up the specific launch point to try to target specific areas.

I decided not to get fancy with it this time and when the system locked up the corvette I tapped the fire button and the two shots crossed the void. The first round slammed into the shield being stopped but nearly overloading it the second smashed through it and destroyed the center. I felt the ship's small shutter showing that bandit two had also been targeted. I looked over to see weapons fire another follow up shot. “ Sorry Sir, they were still firing so I had to give them one more” I shrugged then remembered to be more professional. “ no worries Wep’s better to use the ammo then not and wish we had” I said that but looking at the red flashing warning showing that the 4th gun was empty still made me nervous.

“Ashley, what's your status?” I asked over a private channel. “ We have secured the vessel, there were eight of them, no casualties on our side. What would you like us to do?”, I thought for a moment “ we will keep it attached for the trip back. Have Corporal Ozawich get what she can out of the computers during the trip.” Ashley acknowledged my orders then dropped the connection.

The rest of the trip was uneventful and we prepared for the final transition to Anvilus “ three, two, one transition” when we popped through the gate I turned to communications “ comms contact local control let them know we have arrived and about our encounter with the so called brotherhood.” Communications acknowledged and spent the next fifteen minutes going back and forth with the port staff. “Sir, they have acknowledged the information we are instructed to move to a station keeping orbit behind the station, an investigator will be dispatched shortly if everything checks out they will begin unloading.”

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The next hour was routine flying. We parked in orbit just behind the space station. A shuttle whose transponder reported it as belonging to the local marshals service began flying our way. The shuttle docked externally to one of our Airlocks and I waited for them to cycle through the airlock. The door opened to reveal two uniformed individuals, one female the other male. I introduced myself “Welcome aboard the Paladin Marshals I am Captain Miles” I offered a handshake and the female officer stepped forward. “ Good afternoon I am marshal Lana Greene and this is Deputy William Garrett” we shook hands all around. “ Alright captain this should be relatively quick then we can get you the bounty certificate and you guys can collect your reward.”

“Bounty certificate?” I asked confused. Marshal Greene looked back at me now also confused “ yes, your bounty hunters after the league bounty on those corvettes right?” I shook my head “ no Ma’am we were conducting a delivery when they mistaked us for a normal transport and we decided to clean up the space lanes a little bit.” Greene blinked at me. “ Well Captain you just got very lucky then each Corvette of that group confirmed destroyed is worth a quarter million credits, to be honest we were surprised it took bounty hunters this long with how much they were worth.” I was shocked that was a lot of money for a few minutes work, granted a lot of that came from having a warship half again as large as their combined tonnage but still then I had a thought.

“ do they have to be destroyed?” I asked. “I’m not following captain?” Greene said in confusion. “We captured one of the corvettes” I explained “do we need to go blow it up to get the bounty on it, I would need to check current market values to see if selling it or blowing it up would be worth more.” Deputy Garrett spoke up excitedly. “ you captured one?”, “ yes we have it docked on the other side if you would like to see it.” Marshall Greene nodded “ Captain can you have someone show Bill over there please?” I agreed and called for Corporal Ozawich who showed Deputy Garrett the way. “No Captain the bounty language is for removing the threat of a given vessel or crew. Until now I just thought that was colorful language but I am pretty sure capturing a ship counts as removing it as a threat." We arrived at the bridge and the Marshall took a few minutes to go through the sensor logs.

“Alright Captain, everything here looks to be in order.” the Marshal said my Com.D pinged. “ that will be the certificate, in order to redeem the credits you will need to visit a League Station the nearest one is in Carnithal but” the marshall trailed off. “But what Ma’am?” I asked after a minute passed and she still hadn’t said anything. “The base commander will have to sign off on anything , he can’t deny you payment for the certificate but it may be… beneficial to review what your legally entitled to as the League Commander can be… challenging.” I thanked her for the information and walked her back to the airlock.

We met the corporal and deputy there.my com.D pinged again. “I have officially condemned the Corvette as lawfully seized during the act of piracy and as the potential victim who was solely responsible for its seizure we hereby award it to you. And done” the whole thing but the last two words were said in an official tone that made me think it was a requirement of issuing the prize notification.

I thanked both officers and they left. I went to the office and took the Marshals advice to both review the League laws and the Palades League treaties. I found that the League would be required to pay for our used ordinance and damaged equipment. During the war the Militia ships were used to deal with Theocracy privateers and the increased piracy from the League military being moved to the front..standing orders to cover their operations were still technically on the books.

The unloading finished and we decided to cast off without taking on a cargo.we decided to head for Carnithal to rearm and sell the Corvette as that planet was known as a mercenary hang out and we were likely to find a buyer there and maybe just maybe if we were lucky a final missing piece to the Paladin.