The merchantmen came steadily on, and now the freighters that led were directly underneath the part of the Zone in which the pirate fleet hovered. Thorn knew the aura-charts of the freighters would show the pirate ships only as part of the great meteor swarm they were lying near. That was why Lana had chosen the position.
Thorn's nerves tensed as the Jovian freighters came directly underneath, a little flock of gleaming specks swimming on through black space toward distant Saturn, the slow tankers still lagging behind. Sual Av was leaning tensely over his bank of keys, and there was no sound in the ship except the throb of its power chambers.
Abruptly from the audio-speaker flared Lana Cain's silver voice.
"Attack! Dive on them!"
Forty pirate ships streamed blasting white fire from their stern tubes, forty grim torpedo-like shapes roared down through the spatial vault toward the thirty hapless freighters.
As they swooped, the forty corsair craft split into five divisions of eight ships each. The eight led by the flashing cruiser of the Three Planeteers headed toward the sunwise end of the freighters. Jenk Cheerly and his division headed for the counter-sunwise end. Kinnel King for the sunward and Brun Abo for the outward sides. Lana Cain herself, with Stilicho Keene's ship and six others, cometed down below the merchantmen.
John Thorn saw that the swift maneuver had succeeded. The freighters were “boxed" — hemmed in on every side except the upward one, which was closed by the dreaded Zone. The pirates had not included the worthless, lagging tankers in their trap, and those dumpy ships were still coming bewilderedly on.
The freighters, as the corsairs swooped down around them, milled confusedly with blasts from their bow-tubes braking them, seeking to find a way out of the trap. The few atom-guns with which they were armed spat shells frantically, that exploded in blinding flares of atomic energy.
"Ahoy, freighters"’ rang Lana's silvery voice from the audio. “Cease firing or we'll gun you out of space! Surrender and nobody will be harmed!"
"How do we know you'll keep your promise?” came the hoarse, fear-laden voice of the freight squadron commander.