<html><head><meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body dir="auto"><p dir="ltr" id="docs-internal-guid-f90d3ea0-7fff-643c-151e-ce2439609337" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Mission: Death in the Shadows</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Day: -94</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Stardate: 2445.10.30</span></p><br style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">(Deneb V - The Stardust/Office - Loron (owner) and Nixac (tech) - 0900)</span></p><br style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Loron rubbed his lobes, rule #7 was one of the most critical of the rules of acquisition. ‘Always keep your ears open.’ Since coming to Deneb V over 10 years ago, that had proved useful time and time again. Many of the other rules derived from this one. This one had profit, lots and lots of profit.</span></p><br style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“Do you hear it, cousin? Listen carefully,” Loron said. “That’s profit, blowing in the wind.”</span></p><br style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“Rule #22. Yes cousin. It may be whispering to us in the wind, but there is much work to do,” Nixac said. “I have to finish decoding the recording from the pleasure room. Why would a Cardassian employ a dampening field to have sexual relations with an Orion girl?”</span></p><br style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“Confidentiality equals profit. That and your genius,” Loron replied. “The reputation of the Stardust is legendary, where people can have clandestine meetings. Of course some are more clandestine than others, and all of them lead to profit for us.”</span></p><br style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“On the other front, one of the security team on the payroll says a street urchin was found dead over by the shuttle port. I’m trying to get more information now,” Nixac reported.</span></p><br style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“Any guesses?”</span></p><br style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“There are dozens who hang around the bar, looking to pick up the odd job here and there. Most are discrete and reasonably priced. They make good go betweens and such,” Nixac reported, “I’ve used them before to help spread misinformation. Remember the deal between Alchemilla and Solidago?” Nixac said.</span></p><br style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“How could I forget, we are still making profit from that information,” Loron said. “Another 10% this month, the 6th consecutive month. Steady growth is good.”</span></p><br style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“And our other arrangement?” </span></p><br style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“He is still paying. Very odd individual, but the latinum is good.”</span></p><br style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“Very well Nixac, go see what you can find out. I have to make a call.” Loron said.</span></p><br style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">(Deneb V - The Stardust/ Nixac’s workspace - Nixac (tech) - 0930)</span></p><br style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Nixac nodded, and headed off to his workspace in the basement of The Stardust. One trick to defeat portable field dampeners was to have multiple sensors working at different frequencies. Especially in ranges where vibrations were made, outside the ranges of the field damper. Since most were designed to emit random sound frequencies at high amplitude to drown out. With multiple monitors in the room, it was possible to capture what was being said, as well as the frequencies being blocked. Taken together, along with some special equipment of his own design and programming acquired from several sources, he was able to monitor all the conversations in the private suites. There were some limitations on the tech, and these rooms were designed to address that. Too bad he had never been able to get it to work in the main bar. Someday he thought has be began to review the material from the Cardassian’s room. There were others of interest as well, but this felt the most promising. </span></p><br style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">(Deneb V - The Stardust/Office - Loron (owner) - 0930)</span></p><br style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Loron retrieved a glass of hot millipede juice, without the shells and sat at his terminal. Pulling up his list of contacts, he thought who would be most interested in the information he had. And who would pay for exclusive rights. He decided on a Vickrey sealed bid auction with a standard reserve price. While most people felt the first priced sealed bid generated the highest profits, his data showed he made 15% more profit using the Vickery model. The winner of the auction paid the price of the second bidder, which drove bids up. As a wrinkle, he would give the top three bidders a chance to increase their bids. </span></p><br style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Sipping the cooling juice, he smiled as he selected 10 contacts and sent them the same message about the auction and a teaser video. These contacts were closely held and knew the quality of information he provided was always top rate. </span></p><br style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">(Mars- Utopia Planitia Surface- Martian Sunset- Fight Promoter/Entrepreneur Lar- 0940)</span></p><br style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Counting profits was a joy that took the sting out of failure and the failure to acquire a backer recently for a special acquisition was a sore point. Since returning to Mars he had been diversifying his portfolio carefully. One of the investments was in this niche bar staffed primarily by human </span></p><br style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><p dir="ltr" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Lar’s was alerted to an incoming message. It was from Loron, on Deneb V. Another bar owner in the great Ferengi spy consortium who always had top notch information for auction. The kid had a good sense for business, and information was his business.</span></p><br style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;">An auction for a full recording of a meeting between an Orion ‘slave’ and a Cardassian Legate. Lar watched the teaser and had to give Loron credit. It was indeed intriguing. </span><div><br></div><div>(Reply None)</div><div>(Posted by Tim - Loron and Nixac</div><div>and Charles - Lar)</div></body></html>