Ballistic (The Palladium Wars), стр. 46
“Just imagine,” Midshipman Boyer said. “Checking that cargo and finding out you’re carrying half a megaton of boom in your hold. I bet there wasn’t a clean flight suit left on that deck.”
The boarding was a calculated risk—Dunstan figured that if the other ship wanted to blow itself up, its crew wouldn’t be happy with a mere squad of Rhodian marines to take with them. But he still felt a familiar anxiety as he watched the boarding skiff leave its docking recess on Minotaur and make its way over to OMV Zephyr, which was obediently holding a parallel course just a little over a hundred kilometers away. Boarding actions were always inherently dangerous, and the presence of an unsecured nuclear warhead added an unsettling variable.
The skiff approached Zephyr, then changed course to come alongside. With the little skiff next to the courier ship, Dunstan saw that Zephyr was barely three times longer. It was a sleek ship, or as sleek as the designer could bend the blueprint around the general cylindrical shape required for a modern spaceship. Most civilian ships had their exterior sensor arrays and auxiliary gear on top of the pressure hull with no concern for stealth, but he could tell that some thought had gone into making this little courier less observable to eyes or sensors. Whatever protruded from the hull was set into streamlined fairings, and the hull plating itself had been coated with a nonreflective layer. On stern and bow, he saw the telltale emitter cupolas of point-defense energy mounts.
“What does the database have on that class?” he asked. “Tanaka model two thirty-nine.”
“It’s barely a class,” Mayler replied. “Custom run of four. Built as speed and pleasure yachts. They named them after the four winds. This one was launched first, but it wasn’t officially registered until two years later.”
“Whatever that thing was when they launched it, I know I am not looking at a speed yacht. What do you want to bet they spent the first two years on a custom retrofit right out of the shipyard?”
“I’ve seen lots of yachts with electronic countermeasure suites,” Bosworth said. “But I’ve never seen one with an ECM suite and a Point Defense System. That’s expensive tech.”
“And an expensive restricted-technology permit on top of it all.” Dunstan watched the optical feed, where the skiff was extending its docking collar toward Zephyr’s airlock. “While we have them nearby, let’s get every little bit of data we can. Feed it to the AI for some sims to compare to our past encounters. See if we may have run into them before without knowing about it.”
“You think they were the sensor echo from the internment yard, sir?” Mayler asked.
On the screen, the sensors of the skiff gave them a high-resolution view of Zephyr’s hull. The spotlights from the little boarding craft seemed to get soaked up and dimmed by the exterior coating that covered most of the other ship.
“It’s small, it’s stealthy with intent, and we know it’s very fast. You put those three properties together in a civilian ship, and I start to get nervous. But unless Bosca finds an internal launch tube tucked away somewhere in the hull, I’d say it’s unlikely.”
“Minotaur, Bosca,” the marine sergeant sent from the skiff. “We have a hard dock. Commencing boarding ops.”
“Fast but thorough, Sergeant,” Dunstan said. “Secure the nuke, detain the crew, search the ship for contraband. Specifically unauthorized weapons and munitions.”
“Affirmative,” Bosca replied.
The first boarding team crossed the docking collar and entered Zephyr’s airlock. Ten seconds later, the second team followed. If something was going to happen, it would be now, when the boarding party was in the most vulnerable stage of the process. Two minutes of comms silence passed. There was no gunfire, and the tethered combination of boarding skiff and courier ship did not disappear in a blinding nuclear fireball. Dunstan allowed himself to relax just a little.
“Minotaur, Bosca. Nuke is secured, six crew detained without incident. I’m sending them over in the skiff with second team while first team and I search the ship.”
“Very good, Bosca. What’s the ordnance tech’s word on the warhead?”
“He says it’s the fission core. It doesn’t have a fuse assembly, so it’s safe to bring over to Minotaur.”
“Understood. We are standing by to receive the skiff with the crew. Take your time with the search. I think these people will be with us for a little while.”
“You want to have the master-at-arms put them in the brig for now, sir?” Bosworth asked.
Dunstan thought about it, then shook his head.
“I don’t want to treat them like prisoners just yet. They contacted us. They asked to surrender that warhead. Let’s give them the benefit of the doubt for now and assume they’ve been telling the truth. But I do want to talk to them separately when they’re on board. Have the marines move them to the officers’ mess once they get here.”
“Aye, sir. I’ll let the master-at-arms know.”
The Oceanian captain was a woman with blue eyes and blonde hair, which she wore in a tight braid. She had a no-nonsense air about her, but Dunstan could tell that she was off balance right now, separated from her ship and with her immediate fate in the hands of the Rhodian Navy. The marine who had escorted her into the compartment stepped outside and took up position out of sight next to the open door.
“Please,” Dunstan said. “Have a seat.”
She sat down in front of his workstation, hands resting on her thighs. He could tell that she was trying to figure out the level of shit she had gotten herself into. Dunstan didn’t need to ask her name, or anything else about her. While the Zephyr crew had still been in transit on the skiff, he