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comes back around, it’s going to finally answer my questions.”
    “Yes sir,” she replied, then set off to search the hangar for what
she needed.
    I turned to Stinson, “Jeff, I need you to access this hangar’s
security grid and destroy any video or audio recordings. I’m going to tie up
our guests—hopefully it’ll give us enough time to get off this station before
this gets out.”
    “On it,” he said, then went to the security junction on the wall—stopping
along the way to pick up a pry bar from an open tool bin.
    Mendoza found some rubber coated bailing wire, and I used it to bind
the mechanic’s hands behind their backs. Despite their protestations that the
ship might collapse, I tied them to it as well; the ship was stable, and those
two weren’t going anywhere.
    I hog-tied the bodyguard’s hands and feet together, and left him
lying on his stomach. He started swearing at me as I walked away, so I found a
nice oil soaked rag to shove in his mouth.
    Mendoza used the bailing wire to tie Del to the float, and sighed loudly
when I double checked her work.
    “Better safe than sorry,” I told her.
    Despite its tremendous strength, I didn’t think Del could get out of
the restraints without our help. But after what we just saw…
    Stinson joined us at the floatpad, “All evidence of our visit has been
destroyed.”
    “Good,” I said.
    “What about our witnesses?” Mendoza asked.
    “They don’t know who we are,” I assured her. “And do you think
anyone is going to believe a fight happened between two Sentients?”
    “Probably not,” she agreed.
    I put the mask back over Del’s face, closed up the coat to hide
his body, then started pushing the floatpad out of the hangar.
    “But just in case,” I said. “Let’s get the hell outta here.”
    *****
    We found ourselves back in the crowded docking ring, pushing the
floatpad through an even greater mass of people than had jammed the area just a
few hours before. The air was thick with the smell of perspiration and perfume—the
telltale scents of various drugs intermittently adding to the mélange of odors.
    It was clear that even more ships had arrived, disgorging their
passengers to join in the growing festivities. I lit a cigarette and took a
deep drag, slowly exhaling and putting forth my best apathetic attitude—projecting
what I hoped was an ‘everything is normal’ aura. With luck, it might help us
get to the ship without having to answer too many questions about our overly
burdened floatpad.
    I needn’t have bothered.
    Getting past customs, if it could be called that, was far too
easy. In any other port in the galaxy, an apparent corpse might elicit at least
a cursory examination. On Harrakan Station, it was simply:
    “What happened ta’ im?”
    “He got sick and died.”
    “Hey! It’s not contagious is it?”
    “Nah”
    “Fifty creds for the lot of ya.”
    “Here you go.”
    The customs ‘officer’ took the money and shoved it into his
pocket, stepping aside and grunting assent to pass. We made our way back
through the foul smelling docking tube—passing two guards Stinson had posted at
the hatch—and then boarded the Babylon .
    There is something to be said for a no questions asked policy , I
thought.
    There would soon be more than enough questions when the events at
Bitra Mechanicals came to light, but I hoped to be far, far away by then. Mendoza
took over pushing Del, taking the Sentient to one of the med-bay slips in the
ship’s small infirmary. Stinson and I went to the bridge.
    “Dead end?” Stinson asked, falling into his chair.
    “Not at all,” I replied. “I’m now certain that the Sentients are
up to their asses in this case. What good it does us—I don’t know yet.” I brushed
a hand through my hair pulling several loose strands out of my eyes.
    “Please have the pilot undock, and move to the outer edge of the
system while I figure out our next move.”
    “Yes sir.”
    I laced my fingers together