Let's see if I can't do two of those three cones before he wakes up.
Predictably, the port that the mysterious tramp freighter had filed as its next port of call did not have any record of it showing up. Tia hadn't really expected it to; these tramps were subject to extreme changes of flight plan, and if it had been a smuggler, it certainly wouldn't log where it expected to go next.
She just hoped that it had failed to show up because the captain had lied, and not because they were drifting out in space somewhere. She let Alex do all the talking; he was developing a remarkable facility for playing a part and very cleverly managed to tell the absolute truth while conveying an impression that was entirely different from the whole truth.
In this case, he left the station manager with the impression that he was an agent for a collection agency, one that meant to collect the entire ship, once he caught up with it.
Alex shut down the com to the station manager, and turned his chair to face her screen and the plots of available destinations.
'How do you do that?' she asked, finally. 'How do you make them think something entirely different from the real truth?'
He laughed, while she pulled up the local map and projected it as a holographic image. 'I've been in theater groups for as long as I can remember, once I got into school. My other hobby, the one I never took too seriously, even though they said I was pretty good. I just try to imagine myself as the person I want to be, and figure out what of the truth fits that image.'
'Well,' she said, as they studied the ship's possible destinations, 'if I were a smuggler, where would I go?'
'Lermontov Station, Presley Station, Korngold Station, Tung Station,' he said, ticking them off on his fingers. 'They might turn up elsewhere, but the rest all have Intel people on them; we'll know if they hit there.'
'Provided whoever Intel has posted there is worth his paycheck. Why Presley Station?' she asked. 'That's just an asteroid-mining company headquarters.'
'High Family in residence,' he replied, leaning back in his chair, and lacing his fingers behind his head. 'Money for valuable artifacts. Miners with money, and not all of them are rock-rats.'
'I thought miners were all, well, fairly crude,' she replied.
He shook his head. 'Miners are people, and there are all kinds out there. There are plenty of miners looking to make a stake, and some of them outfit their little tugs in ways that make a High Family yacht look plain. They have money for pretties, and they don't much care where the pretty came from. And one more thing; the Presley Lee y Black consortium will buy ore hauls from anyone, including tramp prospectors, so we have a chance that someone may actually stumble on the trove itself. We can post a reward notice there, and it'll be seen.'
'Along with a danger warning,' she told him. I only hope these people believe it. Lermontov first, then Tung, then Presley?'
'Your call, love,' he replied comfortably, sending a carefully worded notice to the station newsgrid. They didn't want to cause a panic, but they did want people to turn in any due to the whereabouts of the freighter. And they didn't want anyone infected along the way. So the news notice said that the ship in question might have been contaminated with Anthrax Three, a serious, but not fatal, variant of old Terran anthrax.
He finished posting his notice, and turned back to her. 'You're the pilot I'm just along for the ride.'
'It's the most efficient vector,' she replied, logging her flight plan with Traffic Control. 'Three days to Lermontov, one to Tung, a day and a half to Presley.'
Despite Alex's disclaimer that he was only along for the ride, the two of them did not spend the three days to Lermontov idle. Instead, they sifted through all the reports they'd gotten so far from the other teams, looking for clues or hints that their mystery ship could have made port anywhere else. Then, when they hit Lermontov, Alex went hunting on-station.
This time his cover was as a shady artifact dealer; looking for entire consignments on the cheap. There were plenty of people like him, traders with negotiable ethics, who would buy up a lot of inexpensive artifacts and forge papers for them, selling them on the open market to middle-class collectors who wanted to have something to impress their friends and bosses with their taste and education. Major pirates wouldn't deal with them, at least, not for like really valuable things. But crewmen, who might pick up a load of pottery or something else not worth the bigger men's time, would be only too happy to see him. In this case, it was fortunate that Tia's hull was that of an older model without a Singularity Drive; she looked completely nondescript and a little shabby, just the sort of thing such a man would lease for a trip to the Fringe.
Lermontov was a typical station for tramp freighters and ships of dubious registration. Not precisely a pirate station, since it was near a Singularity, it still had station managers who looked the other way when certain ships made port, docks that accepted cash in advance and didn't inquire too closely into papers, and a series of bars and restaurants where deals could be made with no fear of recording devices.
That was where Alex went, wearing one of his neon outfits. Tia was terrified that he would be recognized for what he was, but there was nothing she could do about it. He couldn't even wear a contact-button; the anti-
