"This is Epsilon Guard. You are entering a restricted area. Identify yourself." Sally looked up from her station. "Two interceptor class craft, Captain." "Thanks, Sally." He touched his panel. "This is the Athame flying under private charter en-route to a classified destination. We wish to negotiate some trade and work that we think you can supply." "That registry isn't in my files. Who are you?" the voice asked. "Captain Christopher Blankman. I've space dropped supplies for Epsilon before." "Okay. But you better be who you say you are. Come to new course Zed, Zed, Aleph, Zed. You will be covered all the way in so stay on course." "Athame complying." "Course set." Sally looked a little nervous. The escort guard ships were Hawk class fighters. Very effective and very hard to kill. He spun his seat about again. "Okay. I've never seen the base itself as I said before. The time I was here the deal had been made with someone calling himself Kono. Whether he was the man in charge I couldn't tell you. They are nervous and they don't really like unknown company as you may have already surmised." They rounded the curve of a planetoid and the sky filled with the brilliant, hot glow of a galaxy that loomed like a sea of light over the station. The sight was stunning. Below them the base, large as it was, seemed insignificant against the backdrop. "Athame, you will land on the elevated runway next to the tower. Station defense has you in their sights now." "Athame complying." He took the controls and began his landing approach. The Athame floated in. "Sally, the minute we touch down start locking things. I don't want any snoops to get in and rummage through the databanks or less mundane things." "Yes, sir." Her fingers were already flying over the console. "That's a little paranoid, Captain." Lady silver arched eyebrows as she looked at him. "I just hope I'm paranoid enough and that they don't have anyone as good as Sally on the station. Coming in now." The Athame bounced as the landing shocks settled. Through the cockpit canopy they could see armed men gathering. "Our escort. I'm sure they will want us all at the meeting." He grinned. "Done, Captain. I left them an easter egg." He turned and looked at her. "A what?" "They won't find the stuff I've locked up but I've left them access to things like the housekeeping and sanitary system files and some dummy stuff I loaded up when I was bored. It's an ancient computer term." "I like it. Shall we go meet our escort?" He rose from his seat as the ship powered down and headed towards the back ramp. The others rose and followed. A cool, fresh wind greeted them along with the overwhelming light of the star-filled sky. Even the harsh station lighting couldn't overpower it. A group of armed men waited for them. The leader walked up and looked at each of them in turn. "You, I remember," he said as he looked at me. I watched him try to match stares with Lady Silver. He lost but covered it up well. "Follow me," he said as his goons surrounded us making his statement a bit of a cliche. The runway had been lowered so we stepped off and crossed a space into the tower. We entered that and finally reached a room occupied by several people. A heavy, dark skinned man spoke first. "You say you're here to trade. What you got that we want?" Lady Silver moved until she could seat herself in front of him. "Universals via quantum connection transfer." A bigger, uglier fellow off to the side laughed. "But what if we want more? We could use some female entertainment around here." Others laughed. To be continued...