Alex sat before the computer. Asyr was opposite him. He'd rearranged it so they were facing each other.

    "What's this?" She asked.

    "It's a game called 'Disconnect'. I Used to play with other students back in school, it's great to practice coercion skills." His display showed a fictitious system with working code. He couldn't see her, somewhere behind all of that was her connection. "In the game, the system is passive, your only adversary is me. The winner is whoever disconnects the other first."

    "I'm going up against you? There's no way I can win." 

    "I've adjusted the game to give myself a handicap. We should be on a balanced level." He checked the settings were as he wanted them. "Are you ready?"

    She shrugged. "I guess."

    He started the game. Immediately he searched for her, both visually, her connection would show as active, and by sending out a search program. It was just beginning its search when he was disconnected.

    "Did you just let me win?" Asyr asked.

    "No, I slowed my system more than I thought." Alex couldn't think slower, so he had adjusted how fast the game processed his commands, giving Asyr a bit of an edge, well, too much right now. He increased his speed twenty five percent. "Lets try this again."

    This time he saw her coming, and launched programs to rewrite the code around her, confusing her search program. She erected a wall of code, forcing him to decide between breaking through or going around.

    "Why are we playing this together?" she asked. "Couldn't the ship's system offer me a more realistic challenge?"

    "No, in my fifteen years as a corporate coercionist, I can count on one hand the number of times I've gone up against only a system. There's always someone on the other side backing it up. If your opponent is in any way competent, the system plays little part in putting up an opposition. Until you've managed to disconnect the other coercionist, he's the one you have to fight against." He wrote a quick program to dismantle her wall. While her one search was confused he rewrote the system path to his connection, lengthening it and coding himself more time.

    "Why? Considering how fast systems are, why would a person be what gives me problems?" Her search vanished.

    He frowned, paying attention to the display instead of answering. Stopping a search meant she had a different plan. He saw it, an alteration of the code traveling in his direction.

    Clever, if she had kept the search going he wouldn't have noticed the approach in time. He rerouted the path, connecting it to the already coded extension.

    "Systems are fast, but for all the advancement in self awareness we've made, the human, well organic, brain is still much better at improvising. We can change direction in a moment, and not go in the expected direction." He was through her wall, she didn't have anything behind it, having relied entirely on the code to delay him. He disconnected her. "Ten minute, A respectable time. Lets go again."

    The fictitious system was different, preventing them from memorizing the pre-established paths.

    "So what am I suppose to do? If the guy I'm going up against can out think me, I can't win."

    He spoke as he worked. "The starting point is you want a faster system, as close to your connection point as possible, but that isn't something you can control. What very few people will tell you is that we're predictable. We spend years learning not to be, but we all fall back to our habits. Even the experts will have their favorite programs they always use. That's why you want to do as much research as possible ahead of time."

    He sent out his search program again, but this time he had it look for unusually dense code, instead of the connection. He put up a wall of his own, but instead of making one solid block of code, he layered them.

    "But even without any research, if you can prolong the confrontation, you'll notice patterns. He might go back to hard defenses each time you take one down, or maybe he always sends a decoy program just before attacking."

    This time he focused more on her wall, expecting her to simply make it harder, less experience coercionists usually went with the same, but more of it.

    "So do you have any patterns?" she asked.

    His program was having a hard time going through, as he'd expected, more of the same, which was why he added more burrowing programs.

    "I've been at this for so long that I've overcome most of them, but you might have noticed that I like to talk, when I code. I'm the same way as a coercionist. My preferred method is to use psychology, get the system to work with me, have it slow my opponent down."

    "But you said the system wasn't a factor if he was good enough."

    Alex smiled. "Yes, but being good is relative. And sometimes it only takes a little delay to change how the fight is going." He caught sight of something approaching his connection. It took him a moment to realize she'd warped the code itself to twist his wall until a path opened.

    He sent the command to take the section of the system code she was using and wrench it apart, but he could tell it wouldn't reach it in time. He smiled as his connection died.

    "Very good, I didn't expect you to have read about the Asterdam maneuver yet." He reset the game and they play twice more, the third game being interrupted when the captain called Alex to the bridge.

    * * * * *

    The bridge was near panic when he got there.

    "I want you to disable them," the captain pointed to the screen, where a sleek ship in gold and silver colors was displayed.

    "Who are they?" Alex asked, sitting at his usual post. "Local law."

    Alex froze. "The law? Why are you attacking a law ship?"

    "We're not. They aren't who was suppose to show up. Just do what you did that first time, get them to think we're just a large rock."

    "I can't do that." Alex exclaimed. "That's the law, I can't just sneak in and coerce their ship, that's illegal."

    No one stopped what they were doing, but the room quieted.

    The captain leveled his gaze on Alex. His eyes narrowed for a moment.

    "My ready room, now," he ordered Alex, and then followed him there. The door closed and captain growled at Alex. "Just what do you think you've been doing these past month? I'm not a corporation, because I tell you to get into a ship doesn't make it legal."

    "It isn't the same. Those were just freighters, and passenger ships. By taking over their system I ensured as few people as possible got hurt, on both sides. If I get into this ship's system, I'm attacking a law enforcement agency. I can be thrown into the deepest hole they have and forgotten if they figure out it's me."

    "And what do you thing they're going to do when I have to open fire on them? That's a pretty recent ship by the design, it's probably faster and better armed then us. If they board us, they're going to find out about that guard you killed."

    "You'd sell me out?"

    "No. I don't turn my back on anyone who works for me, but only one person is going to be missing from that ship, and it won't take much for them to realize he ended up here."

    "I made the ship forget."

    "And you think that made the crew forget what happened? I don't care how good you are, they are going to have worked out who attacked them. I never kept my crew safe because I thought I wasn't noticed. I do it by being one step ahead of the law. They're after us, I promise you that. The guard was killed on this ship, they won't know you did it, but we're all going to be held accountable."

    "But I'm a passenger."

    "You took your cut of the loot." 

    "I never sp-"

    "How about those computers you took? Lea marked them as yours. It's in the system, and because of how well you got that to work, I don't think it's going to take them long to get to that." He got in Alex's face. "I told you I don't turn my back on my crew. Are you going to turn your back on us? On Will? The people who have been helping you?"

    "I didn't sign up for this!"

    "Universe ain't fair. Never was, never will be. What are you going to do?"

    Alex wanted to scream he wasn't doing this, there was no way he could. He wasn't a pirate, he told himself. He didn't want to break the law. He'd explained why he'd done it on the other times.

    But he couldn't leave. He could die if they blew up the ship. Or hide. If they caught them the officers wouldn't leave any part of the ship unsearched. And if they did manage to escape, what would the captain do? Would he just drop him off at a station now? After he'd taken part in some of the jobs? With what he knew? Wouldn't it be safer for the crew if Alex died?

    He didn't want to die, but if he was caught, it was prison time. He could kiss his chances of rescuing Jack goodbye if he ended up in prison. Damn it, he couldn't give up on Jack, Alex was his only hope.

    He only had one choice.

    With a curse he shoved the captain aside and left the ready room. He had his ear piece in the time he sat at his board. "Tell Asyr to get to the lab and take the main console, We're going to need backup on this."