FSE

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Tristan's claws clicked on the board as he tapped his fingers, he was looking at the screen with the readout of the planetary scan, but he wasn't seeing it. He was remembering moving against Alex, the way his skin felt under his hands only a few minutes ago as far as his body was concerned. Months ago objectively. He wanted to touch him again.

He closed his eyes and rubbed his face. He'd spent too much time in close quarters with the human, that was why. He was getting used to having him nearby, within easy reach. He was indulging himself too often because of that.

Was that so wrong? The human was there and certainly willing, so why shouldn't he enjoy himself? The human was the one who'd gotten attached, not him.

He growled quietly to himself. That was why he shouldn't indulge. It caused distractions. He should be figuring out how to get on the planet, not thinking about taking Alex to his bed again.

With an effort he pushed those thoughts down and looked at the readouts. Bramolian Six was a Corporate world, which meant that almost every corporation in the universe had a building there, and on top of that, it was one of the worlds on which Space Gov had a center, which meant that security was tight.

The sensor net around the planet was six layers deep, each one tighter than the other. The last time he'd been here it had taken him six weeks of floating in space in a sensor dead zone watching the planetary net to work out the pattern that allowed him in.

Of course, then he hadn't been in a hurry and he'd wanted to be certain his quarry wasn't aware he was coming. This time he was against someone who wanted the same thing he did, so he couldn't afford to sit for six weeks.

He glanced at Alex's reflection on his screen. Six weeks in the ship with the human, out of cryo. He had a momentary vision of what they could get up to during that time and chased it away.

He needed time alone, and soon.

Evading the sensor net was out of the question, so they'd have to get down by docking at the station and renting a shuttle. That meant using one of his other identity.

He liked being someone with power when this was the only way in. Power meant people like guards were less likely to look at him, even if he wasn't human. He had a dozen such IDs, all linked to companies that existed, with large enough credit vaults to impress any functionary. The problem he had now was that if he played that role, Alex would have to be subservient.

Tristan had no problem with that, but humans would notice. They would wonder how it had happened, they would want the story, they would look into their past. The Identities would survive the investigations, but that would be yet more things to make the two of them memorable.

It would be more credible for Alex to be a person of influence and Tristan subservient, and Tristan had no problem playing such a role, but Alex didn't have any Identities in a position of power, every one of his dozen identities were common people. He didn't have the time to create an identity with power that would survive scrutiny.

Friends then, traveling together, here to see the sights. He picked the lawyer identity for Alex, and an accountant for himself, then added details, made them work for the same company, included previous trips taken together, all mundane vacations, and then created a transaction history matching them.

If anyone dug this deep into them, they might suspect they were more than friends, but the people who did those kinds of investigations didn't have the time or the inclination to care about who slept with whom.

With their identities secured, he altered the ship's ID. He made is a rental from a medium class provider. One vehicle among millions traveling in space.

Altering a ship's ID should be impossible, and it wasn't easy. Tristan had spent weeks, when he first obtained it, modifying the transponder, bypassing its security, setting up an access point so he could give it orders. Alex's skills as a coercionist had helped, but most of the work had been physical.

Most criminals used different transponders to give their ships new identities, but then they had to hide those transponders in a shielded box, and if there was one flaw in the box, any Scans would detect the transponder. It was certainly easier to hide something like that, but his method was more secure.

The station contacted the ship, they exchanged information, confirmed all the registrations were in good order and then requested control for the approach. Reluctantly Tristan gave it.

He didn't spend the forty-three minutes it took for the ship to approach the station, enter the gigantic hangar, moved among the other ships and land at the assigned berth, nervous. Tristan didn't get nervous. What he was, was on high alert, keeping an eye on every type of passive scans his ship was equipped to receive for any indication something was amiss. Any ship that moved out of an assigned lane could be a Law ship maneuvering to intercept him. A stray signal could be an attempt to infiltrate his computer past what the automated controls allowed.

These were reasons why he hated going through proper channels to get ground side, there were just so many ways someone could screw him over.

The ship landed with soft clang and Tristan immediately shut down the computer. He hadn't detected any intrusion, and now he was going to make sure no one could get in his ship.

He sent Alex out to arrange planetary transport, something private, and Tristan set about securing his ship. Normally he'd be happy with removing power to the computer and then booby-trapping the ramp's lock, but the level of government on this planet was such that he took extra precautions. He disconnected every power coupling that had a significant power reserve, that was eighteen of them that someone clever enough could use to reroute to the computer to get it going long enough to give it orders.

It meant they wouldn't be able to leave in a hurry, but if it did come to that, there were thousands of other ships available he'd be able to break in and steal.

Anywhere other than here he'd disconnect outside couplings too, but he didn't want to attract attention. There was only a certain level of securing a ship that wouldn't attract attention.

When Alex returned, they grabbed their packs, leaving most weapons behind. Alex kept his three undetectable knives, but firearm they'd need would have to be procured once they'd landed. Fortunately, where there were corporations and governments, there were criminals.

Once the ramp was closed, Tristan quickly opened the locked panels, switched a few wires around, closed it and entered a code. The panel switched to red, indicating it the ship was secured. OF course since this was Tristan's ship it was even more secure than the common thief would expect.

"You know," Alex said as they walked through the station's concourse, "I think we've been on too many stations recently, they're all blurring together."

Tristan only acknowledged the comment with a flick of the ear, but it was enough for Alex to continue.

"It feels like I've been here before."

He glanced at the human. Was this an indication of a weakness in his memory or just travel exhaustion? After this job they were taking a break. Going back to his workshop. Being able to spend his days alone with his research would do him good, help get Alex off his mind.

The shuttle Alex picked was a small family shuttle, the pilot's seat and four extra space in the back, enough modularity that people could eat, although there were no food printers or preparation space, or sleep.

He indicated for Alex to fly them there and he moved one of the seats to face forward. This would be a simple job, which was how Tristan liked them. In and out. Destroy a few things, avoid detection and then leave. He already knew where everything was and with Alex's coercion skills infiltrating the complex would be simple.

Not like the last time he'd been here, chasing an assassin.

The man had been the closest Tristan ever came to dying. Somehow he'd managed to plant explosives on his ship without Tristan noticing. The only reason he'd survived the initial explosion was that immediately after departing Valgar Station, he'd had to do repairs. That ship had been old. Tristan had been younger, not quite as careful in maintaining his ship.

The compartment had been away from the explosives, and when they'd gone off, the life preservation measures had engaged, sealing him in. He floated in space for two days before he was able to get a signal out, and it was three more before a ship came to his rescue.

Of course the first thing the group of miners had done on extricating him out of the compartment was to try to extort money out of his as payment for the rescue. Tristan had killed them, taken their ship and flown back to Valgar.

The assassin had been too confident in his work. He hadn't bothered hiding as he planted the explosives and the station's security system had recorded him. Of course Valgar didn't care about it, after all so long as the station didn't get damaged, who cared what happened in or around it.

Tristan had tracked the assassin all the way to Bramolian Six, where he'd taken close to four months hunting him, then extracting information, before killing him.

Of course, Justin had been behind the assassin, and Tristan had had to teach his brother another lesson. This was when he'd destroyed the Osagua, of which his brother had proclaimed himself captain and delighted in regaling the passengers with stories of his exploits in space. Tristan had considered just blowing up the ship without telling Justin, but this was to be a lesson, so he contacted him, explained to him exactly why he was doing this, and then blown up the Osagua.

He wasn't surprised when, a few years later, he found out Justin had escaped the explosion. Unfortunately Justin hadn't learned his lesson.

The shuttle banked hard and Alex cursed.

Tristan smiled. If the shuttle had had weapons, that other driver would have been blown out of the sky.

They were over a city, and Tristan recognized the landmarks he'd memorized before going into cryo. This was Hastead. He found where the Telrize complex was, but they were too high to see details.

"Find a travel lane that will take us closer to the complex. I want a look at it before we land."

Alex searched the cityscape before finding it and then bringing up the city's transit map. He manually set a path that would take them by the complex and then beyond it.

The Telrize complex was big, enough it had its own land roads. The warehouse was easy to identify since it was the single largest building there. On the north end shuttles were landing and taking off from the roof. The other buildings looked minuscule.

Alex whistled. "We need to find one machine in that place? I really hope I can work out where it is, because we're going to be at it for months otherwise."

"You said you'd be able."

"Don't worry, I'll do it, because I don't want to search that entire thing." He looked at a screen on the dashboard. "Almost two K wide, more than three deep. Based on the height, I'm guessing a dozen floors. Does the planet only have the one warehouse?"

Tristan didn't reply. From here he couldn't tell which building housed the servers. But that wouldn't be too much of a problem.

Alex glanced at him. "If you need another look I can route us around. Depending on their security we might be able to do a few flyby before they start wondering what we're doing."

Tristan shook his head. He'd seen what he needed from this height. The rest would be done from the ground.