“Secondary alert in place, Commander.”

Kat stared at the display. It was projecting the video feed from outside the ship, displaying the partially clouded surface Santis. Her stormtroopers were on the ground, by all accounts still fighting to assert total control. She couldn’t pull them back now. Her orders about Santis were clear. She hated to leave the troops on their own, but she couldn’t stay in orbit. If Invictus was facing a Confederation battleship, Kat knew she had a real fight on her hands. And floating in orbit, ceding the initiative to the enemy, made her vessel a sitting duck.

“Prepare to leave orbit, Optiomagis.” She paused, thinking. “Plot a course to planet five…twenty percent thrust, full baffles. We’ll hide there and wait. With any luck, the enemy will go into orbit here.” The Confeds wouldn’t have detected Invictus yet, at least not unless their scanning technology was vastly superior to anything the Alliance had seen. They knew they had an enemy, but not what it was. And that was an advantage.

“We’ll leave orbit on the far side of the planet, and use its shadow to block the enemy’s scanners.”

“Course plotted and entered into the computer. Ready to initiate on your command.”

Kat almost gave the order, but she paused, staring at the screen but seeing only the images in her mind. “How many laser buoys do we have left, Optiomagis?”

“Forty, Commander.”

“I want them equipped with full stealth suites and launched into orbit before we leave. Program them to appear as communications satellites.” She knew it was a long shot that the ruse would work. The enemy would know a world as undeveloped as Santis wouldn’t have such an extensive satellite network. But even a few seconds of confusion, of uncertainty, could make a difference. The enemy would have trouble detecting the buoys until they got close. Very close. And if they were careless, if they went blindly into orbit, the buoys would get in some shots at point blank range. It wouldn’t take too many hits from a few thousand kilometers to cripple even a battleship as large as the one she was facing.

“Preparing laser buoys now, Commander.”

Will the enemy fall for this? Would I?

Kat was silent, her mind deep in thought.

No…I wouldn’t. Not after what happened at the transwarp link. Too simple. Too obvious…

“Belay that last order. I want twenty laser buoys in orbit around the planet…and ten around each moon.” It still might not work, but it increased the complexity of the trap. “Deploy two assault shuttles to ferry the buoys to the moons.”

“Yes, Commander.” A pause. “That will delay our departure from orbit.”

“Yes,” Kat replied, “but not by much. Calculate a course for the shuttles to swing around each moon and pick up a gravity assist to match our velocity. They can dock with us en route to planet five.”