Once the clearance was given, Nico led a five-interceptor wing down to the surface. If the spies wanted to run once they caught sight of the attack vessels, she didn't want to risk that they would be more maneuverable than she was and get away before she could do anything.
With the extra four interceptors, they could make a proper containnt pattern, and their weapons would have a much easier ti getting a solid hit.
The Alliance had incredible vessels for their governnt forces, but the ones that most of the population used were not nearly as impressive, being made to a budget and often with outdated technology, thanks to millennia of peace giving them no reason to update defensive technologies beyond what was needed to handle in-flight threats like space debris.
That's the standard that Nico was hoping that this particular ship, which was shadowing their Terraforming drones, was on.
It didn't change course when they entered the atmosphere, and it didn't respond when they ford up around it, so Nico assud that they must be quite confident in their cloaking technologies.
"Unknown vessel, you have failed to report to immigration after entering the atmosphere of an inhabited planet. Please disengage your stealth technology and follow us to the city for processing." She demanded, setting her radio to broadcast on a wide range of frequencies, both Human and Alliance.
There was no response, and the ship didn't seem to be responding in any way, not sending out any signals that they could detect, so she tried again.
"Unknown vessel, we have reason to believe that you are engaged in industrial espionage. Disengage your cloaking field now, or we will be forced to treat you as a hostile corporate force."
That seed to get their attention, and the ship began to drift away from the terraforming drone.
[Hold your Position, I want to see what they do.] Nico ordered her wing as the ship gently glided through the air.
It stopped near another Terraforming Drone and took up the sa position, following it around.
"Switching Drones to observe is not a form of compliance. Unknown vessel, lower your cloaking field, or we will take hostile action. This is your last warning." Nico reported.
She ordered her wing to surround the ship again, and this ti they got a response, a strong power surge from the hidden vessel that compromised their cloaking field enough that even the most rudintary of sensors could detect it.
But for the mont, Nico held off. If they were going to make a run for it, she could learn more about the ship's capabilities before they captured it.
It wasn't planning to run, though, and half a second later, a barrage of Lasers blasted out at the Interceptors, and the ship began standard pattern evasive maneuvers.
Unfortunately for them, they were from the most basic of Alliance training manuals, and Nico had long since morized them. The Interceptors launched a return volley of Disruptor fire, and the ship went crashing to the surface, leaving a deep furrow in the freshly terraford grassland.
"Hostile Force, surrender now, or you will be summarily eliminated," Nico announced, both over the radio and over the loudspeaker.
There was no response from inside the vessel, so she approached in her Interceptor, then exited the ship, wearing a Tech Adept Harness, and using the gravity control to gently lower herself to the ground before disabling the electronic locks and pulling the hatch open to reveal the interior of the ship.
[Nico to Planetary Command. The crash appears to have been more severe than anticipated. No survivors detected.] She reported as she looked a the ss inside the ship.
By her best guess, the ship didn't have military-grade shields, or they couldn't keep them up with their cloaking field because the Disruptors seed to have passed right through to the crew of the ship while leaving the hull intact.
That ant the next order of business was twofold. First, find a water hose and clean this place up a bit. Second, start searching their computer records and see what they were up to. Most Alliance vessels would have known to simply comply, and then they could scan the terraforming drones while gathering much less interest.
The patents were a matter of public record to Alliance citizens, but the exact construction thod was not, which was the reason that everyone had assud that they were competitors to begin with.
[Terminus Trading Company Interceptors. This is Constable Dookath of the Alliance law enforcent division. We are incoming with a police contingent to examine the origins of the intruding ship.] The smooth voice of a Valkia inford them over the radio.
[You are welco to it, Constable. We are quite interested in the origin of this vessel since it's like nothing that we have on record, and there are no surviving crew mbers to tell us where they might have co from.] Nico replied while she downloaded the entire ship's computer into her Interceptor's storage space to peruse later at her leisure.
She did know a few things already, though. This was not an Alliance vessel, or at least it was not built with any Alliance patent information or a system of origin recorded in its logs.
The crew roster did show Alliance mbers, though, mostly from the Giant species, though the captain of the ship seed to be a Volga, who was not an Alliance mber, so the ship might be one of theirs.
[Sweet All Mother, what did you do to it? You didn't need to do whatever that was.] The Constable could be heard retching over the voice-activated communicator as he entered the ship.
[Our apologies Constable. It seems that our disruptor technology is incompatible with the shields on that vessel. When used against our own cha or ships, that would have only disabled the shields and possibly the drive systems to disable the ship.] She explained.
It wasn't quite a lie. Their own equipnt was hardened against attacks by the Disruptor technology. But if they had used it against basically anything else, it would have ended exactly like this. She had even optimized the weapons to do their best to bypass Alliance standard shields.
[We will keep it in mind. Beginning crew identification and cleanup procedures, and then your border patrol may take the ship into quarantine to begin the discovery process on the data they had collected to determine if any cris other than immigration violations had been committed before this tragic accident.] The Constable inford her with a grim tone.
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