Chapter 3

Manny eyed the young man as he flopped into the seat on the other side of the desk.

“So, what’s your problem today?”

Zeke shrugged. “Same as usual. Simba sent his goons to hassle me.”

Manny groaned, “Zeke, they can get you arrested and impound your ship.”

Zeke chuckled. “I’d like to see them try.”

Manny shook his head, “They have installed new cameras in the halls. They will have you on vid if you hurt them. I wouldn’t be surprised to see MPs walking in any minute now.”

Zeke shrugged again, “The only vid they will have of me, is me leaving my ship and walking to your office. Oh, and just so you know, I disabled the bugs in here. As you know, I don’t like my private business being recorded without my permission.”

“Shit! They bugged me again. So, where are they?”

Zeke pointed to two spots on the wall that faced where they were sitting. He then watched as Manny got up to inspect the wall.

The devices looked like button-headed thumb tacks and were pushed into the corners of a poster that Manny had placed on the wall. He pressed on the stud in his ear, then paced back and forth, waiting for the person to respond.

Zeke could see Manny was pissed; he took security breaches seriously. Manny was a brown haired, 179cm tall, Caucasian. He was about 34 years old and had rather non-descript looks. He did have piercing blue eyes that could make you squirm if you lie to him.

“Colonel Howe, I request a tech to come and remove illegal bugging devices from my office, again! And, it had better happen, Right Bloody Now!”

Manny pressed the stud before slamming the door shut and stomping back to his chair and flopping down into it. Zeke grinned and handed over his Padz that he held his manifest and other customs-related forms.

Manny grunted as he perused the forms. He used his stylus to sign each document before using the automatic feature to send duplicates to his flexipad. Manny checked that he received them, then sent a host of new forms to Zeke’s Padz.

Grumbling, he said, “They have new forms; again. They add a new page every damn time they change them.”

Zeke took back the Padz and started reading the new documents. Shaking his head, he muttered, “I’m going to need vernier callipers and micrometers to meet some of these demands.”

Manny chucked before bellowing out for the person knocking on his door to enter. His mirth turned to anger when Simba casually tossed the door into the wall and sauntered in, as if he owned the place. Two MPs followed him.

Simba smirked at Zeke before saying, “That’s the man you need to arrest, Officers.”

Before Zeke could speak, Manny replied, “No, you need to arrest Mr Gordano and his associates.”

Manny held up his flexipad. The four men on the other side of his desk all watched a vid of Armid entering Manny’s office with his two goons.

Armid pointed to the posters and said, “Simba said to replace the tacks with these cameras. Don’t press them hard, or you will bust them. The old fart shouldn’t be able to disarm these ones.”

Angrily, Manny growled, “This is not the first time they have bugged my office.” He then pointed to his own button camera on the opposite wall.

“My camera, which was installed legally by Colonel Howe, only turns on if I’m not in the office. It is a breach of UNSEC security for my office to be bugged. MPs, you will arrest this man and find his cronies.”

“You can’t arrest me. The Union will shut this place down,” Simba growled in retaliation.

“Good!” said a voice from the doorway. “Then UNSEC can sack the lot of you for endangering the station and breach of contract. I and many other people are sick of your people holding them to ransom,” Colonel Howe concluded.

He then grinned at Simba’s shocked face.

Zeke was still chuckling when he left Morpheus.

He felt much happier about his brothers taking over his run with Simba and Armid being removed from the station. Manny also promised to look after the boys. Since he had to stay and give statements, the day’s delay had also turned out to be profitable.

It seemed that some of the stores hadn’t been getting onto the ships they were supposed to. Several very important people had become upset when their overdue orders didn’t arrive and couldn’t be located.

Manny’s complaints had also finally been shunted to someone who cared. Colonel Howe had put two and two together and started investigating Simba and the Union. He was not happy with what he found.

One of the missing shipments were medical supplies that were to go to Terra. The transport ship had to be delayed while the supplies were found. Zeke’s was the only ship heading to Armstrong that had enough space to load the supplies, as they had to be sent in a controlled environment.

He had to give up his cabin, the spare cabin and every other spare bit of space in the living area on the ship to fit the stores. Fortunately, the run to Armstrong would only take five hours, so it wasn’t all bad.

The shipping company said they would also foot the bills for loading, fuel and water. Zeke didn’t quibble about the payment they offered for his services when he agreed to this. That was sheer profit.

Zeke was further amused when he was given priority docking upon his arrival. He was met by a very frazzled and fussy woman wearing a military-ship suit. He guessed she was in her forties, about 170cm tall, and while she looked after her body, she wasn’t a beauty queen. She had ten soldiers with her.

She introduced herself as Staff Sergeant Miller. She then took great pains to inspect every box and crate before ticking it off her list before it left Bella. It took an hour to get off his ship, which had taken less than twenty minutes to put in it.