"How am I going to handle this?" Alex groaned. He'd gotten out of cryo an hour before, and Since neither the Captain or Anders had called for him, once the usual sickness passed, he'd decided to put his things in order, this was the last job they were pulling before heading to Samalia.

    "What's the problem?" Will asked, glancing from his datapad.

    "I have no idea what I'm going to do with all the money I made. How do you deal with it?"

    Will reached in a pocket and pulled out a credit stick.

    Alex shook his head. "I don't want to put all of it on a stick, or even multiple sticks. If I lose any of them, it'd be too much money."

    "Then it's the banks."

    "I can't transfer that in my account, it's too much. Someone would notice and start investigating where it's from." 

    "Just go in and do your computer stuff to hide it."

    Alex chuckled. "I'm not that good. I'd need a dozen account for this to be small enough, and I'd have to justify why I want so many accounts, which will have them looking into it again."

    "So get lots of people to get accounts for you."

    Alex sat up. "You know, I might be able to do that. Thanks for the idea." He headed out.

    * * * * *

    Asyr was at the main console in the computer lab when Alex entered. She looked up, then got up.

    "I'm just practicing, I'll let you have it."

    "I don't need it. The secondary will do for what I want to check." He sat down and contacted his bank on the open net. He didn't access his account, but made his way through the code until he was on the back side. Under five minutes he knew he couldn't do what he wanted. He'd expected the security to be high in a bank, but it was more extreme than he'd expected.

    Every other second he had to divert a sniffer program looking for anything out of place. The code changed as he watched on what he thought was a communication line, He couldn't make out what it was, so he figured it was an encryption. It changed again a few second later.

    He'd need a team of experts to be able to make any changes to such a system. He back tracked out, erasing any evidence he'd peeked in.

    "Well, too bad I can't do that."

    "What are you trying to do?" Asyr asked.

    "I was thinking of creating new users within the bank system to distribute my money. There's too much of it for my account, but the security is too complex."

    "So? Create the users elsewhere."

    Elsewhere? "Can't be done, I'd have to get into a government system, find the census, access that, figure out how it's setup, then insert new people in there without being noticed."

    "So?"

    "It's the government, I can't just get in." 

    "Why not? Plenty of people do it." 

    "Really?"

    "Sure, most mercs have more than one identity."

    Alex didn't believe it'd be quite that easy, but he could take a look. All government systems had connections to the open net, so it only took a moment to find one. A moment later he slipped between the code and was surprised at how lax the security was. In five minutes he didn't see any sniffers.

    The system's didn't even ask what he was doing there once he dropped the cloak. He altered some code, not to change its function, but just to see what would happen. Nothing did. He spent an extra five minutes moving around, testing the code, and watching. Once he was done, he undid the changes and backed out of the system. It had been too easy, it had to be a decoy system.

    He found another government system and tested it, to similar result. That one was a little faster, it had asked for a justification, but had accepted that Alex was passing through.

    Three more that were as simple.

    The fourth one stopped him. The moment he'd accessed it he'd been queried, it had asked for proper identification, froze the connection so he couldn't disconnect and it sent trackers along it. Alex had to disrupt all the ship's communications to break the connection. He hadn't had the time to see much more than that, but that was what he expected from a government system.

    Except he had half a dozen one he knew he could easily get in and out. If that was the ratio... no wonder Asyr said it was easy.

    Alex went back in the first system and, staying on his guard, tracked down that government's census. Names and names of it's citizens, when they were born, which city they lived in, family... and when they died.

    Making sure he was heavily cloaked he found someone who had died two planetary years ago. Johanson Belik. She'd been twenty subjective when she'd died. He removed the date of death and watched.

    Nothing happened. No program looked for the change. He made sure no trace of his presence was left and he exited. He'd check again after the job. Surely someone would notice the alteration and undo it during that time.

    * * * * *

    No one had. Six days, and Miss Belik was still alive, according to that government's census. While he waited, he'd investigated what governement looked for from living people, and it seemed that so long as their information remained up to date and taxes were paid, no one cared.

    Hiding a small program to constantly update the information within the census' system would be easy. Paying the taxes might be more hands on, or maybe he could arrange something with the back system, once he had created the account there to take care of it.

    Going very slowly, it took him an hour to make sure Miss Belik would seem alive, giving her a job as an independent artist to justify the uneven income. An address the government system said was now defunct should limit the inquiries on utilities. He created a social life on the open net, something limited, but enough for the casual inspection.

    Then he contacted a bank to open her account. He gave all the proper information, and under five minutes, she had her account. Alex transfered some money from his, payment for an art piece, then disconnected from it.

    He'd made sure no evidence of his work was on the government system, now he'd give them time to see if they noticed anything. Until then he needed to look into something.

    * * * * *

    Alex limped in the hold. The security on the ship they'd attack had been better prepared than the previous one, not counting the trap, and Alex had almost lost his leg to them. Only Terrence's quick reflex had pulled him out of the way in time and all he'd had to deal with was a major burn on the calf.

    "Lea!" He called to the woman looking through a crate. This ship had carried heavy component for ship's engines. Not as valuable as some of what they'd taken, but also not as fragile. It was part of what Alex wanted to check.

    "Crimson," she answered. "I don't think we got anything this time you're interested in."

    "Do you have the list of what we got on all the jobs where I coerce the target ship?"

    "Sure, why?" She started a search on her datapad.

    "I've been trying to figure out how whoever was behind the trap managed to target us. I know it isn't by our ship's description, I made all those ships forget about us, and I doubt anyone bothered looking out long enough to get a good look. So I'm thinking the cargo is it."

    "Why don't you ask the captain?"

    "He doesn't have to satisfy my curiosity."

    "He probably would, you've been a real asset." She indicated she was ready and he took out his datapad.

    "If this doesn't provide me with what I need  I'll go see him."

    Alex ignored that first time, and the next two seemed to be

    the same, transports with a variety of cargo. But after that things changed. The next job Alex's skills were used was crystals from Abony, valuable, but fragile. After that, artisan pottery from Uganew Two. Definitely fragile. 

    "Lea, was that cargo valuable?"

    She looked at the entry and nodded. "Yes, they were in high demand by the rich folks. Something about them being the lasts ever made."

    Alex continued looking. Processor chips, [add others] he'd been right. All high value loads that could easily be damaged. Just like what had been on the trap. The captain had become predictable, and they'd used that.

    Still... what were the odds the captain would find the one ship set as a trap. Even if the cargo was exactly what he was looking for, it couldn't have been the only one with that kind of cargo.

    "Lea, you were on the ship when they sprung the trap right?"

    She nodded.

    "How long do you think it took to refit it so the area we were in wasn't connected to any of the systems?"

    "I'm not an engineer. I have no idea."

    "I'm just having a problem figuring out how they got to us." Alex tapped his datapad. "I've worked out we were going after similar cargo, so they'd know how to bait us, but how could they make sure we'd go after that one ship?"

    "Maybe they had a fleet."

    Alex thought about it for a moment. "If they have that, it means I'm not the first coercionist to work for pirates." He'd told the others all the good ones were picked up by corporations, but he could be wrong. Maybe there more like him out there than he thought.

    "Okay," Lea said, "If I only have one ship, and I want to make sure the pirate targets it, then what I'd do is file a bunch of manifests with the kind of cargo they want, and have all of them point to the same ship."

    "Wouldn't that mean the cargo on the ship wouldn't match what we expect to find?"

    "Then I put out multiples of the same kind of cargo on different manifests. The captain finds the first one he likes and stops looking. He doesn't realize there are lots more out there."

    Alex nodded. "Makes sense. Minimizes the expenses, and maximizes the exposure. And we fell for it."

    "The captain won't again. He learns fast, and I'll tell him about your thoughts, unless you want to do it yourself."

    "You go ahead. You can even take credit for it."

    "Never give up credit, Crimson. In this job,that's the only thing you have."