Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall... and, after all, it didn't really matter which of us picked up on which fact, as long as together we got all of it. Taking a deep breath, I chased away the tinge of jealousy from my mind and, my vision clear again, turned my attention back to Chun Li.

"...I presume you'll want to go over our records; we have them for you right here." Reaching beneath his capelet, he withdrew a cyl. "This is everything for the past five years," he added, placing it on the formite surface in front of him and giving it a gentle push. The tube rolled across the table, picking up speed as the formite first concaved, then convexed, coming at last to a stop in front of Randon. "All previous records will be on Portslava, where I presume your associates will be picking them up."

"Thank you," Randon nodded, scooping up the cyl and pocketing it. "I presume you've also got copies of those older records on hand?"

A touch of uneasiness flickered through Chun Li's sense, though he was able to control his face and voice remarkably well. "Yes, of course," he acknowledged. "If you'd like copies I can have them sent to your ship this afternoon."

"Why can't I have them now?"

Blake and Karash were registering heightened tension, too, and it was in fact Blake who answered Randon's question. "The problem is that they're scattered around through the system in rather unreadable code," he said in clipped tones. "It would take at least an hour to chase them all down and put them into coherent form."

"Oh, that won't be a problem," Randon said, voice almost lazy but with a hard edge underneath it. "Schock, here, is quite good at that sort of excavation. If he can borrow a hard terminal for a few minutes he can probably get that out of the way while we finish our talk."

Blake visibly clenched his teeth. "I don't mean to be obstructive, Mr. Kelsey-Ramos, but the data is really so scattered through different files and even different listings that it'll take a good deal of time to gather it all."

My eyes turned elsewhere, I could still sense Randon smile. "The wonders of modern technology, Mr. Blake. Ever heard of a Templex decoder?"

From the senses of the others, I could tell none of them had... and that none of them was looking forward to hearing about it. "I'm afraid not," Chun Li admitted cautiously. "I take it it's something used for this kind of data retrieval?"

"And also for bypassing various blockages," Randon said, choosing his words with care. "Split files, scattered data—that sort of thing."

As well as for getting around intentional barriers. The three across the table picked up on that one at once, and the play of emotions twisting through them became even more interesting. There was just the briefest hesitation, then Karash rose to her feet. "Well, then. If you'll come over here, Mr. Schock...?"

Schock pushed his chair back and got up; Chun Li and Blake followed his motion with their eyes. "Now," Randon said briskly, "while they're doing that, I'd like to hear what sort of projects you've got going at present. Mr. Blake?"

Blake turned his attention back from Schock with an effort. "As you may know, a new Rockhound 606—number four—has recently gone to work in the rings. It's slightly modified to allow it to take in and break up rocheoids of up to a hundred meters across—"

"I was under the impression," Randon broke in calmly, "that it was the pebble-sized rocheoids that contained the purest ores."

An almost-glare leaked out before Blake could stop it. "Yes, sir, that's true," he said with strained politeness. "Though the surfaces of most of the larger rocheoids, down to a few centimeters of depth in some cases, are also rich in heavy metals. However, in this case what turns out to be more important is that the interiors of these larger ones contain a more standard distribution of light and heavy elements, and some of those light elements are used in the extraction and refining processes. Getting them directly from the rings will save us having to ship them out from Solitaire."

"I see," Randon said blandly. He'd known all this already, I could tell; as could most of the others. Again simply reminding everyone of his control of the conversation. "So. Rockhound Four is in operation...?"

Blake pursed his lips, smoothed them out. "Yes, sir. Anyway, we're negotiating with them for a share of their light element harvest, as well as for a contract to handle some of their molybdenum and tungsten output. We're also—"

"I was under the impression that you were at your full transport capacity already," Randon interrupted again. "You're authorized for, what, a hundred trips in and out per year?"

The twitch-faced guard made an almost-serious reach for his needler. Even schizoid, I noted, he was careful to stop before he got close enough to the weapon to trigger either of our shields' own combat reflexes. "We're already at our full trip capacity, yes," Blake said stiffly, his tension level rising markedly. "As I was about to say, we also have an order in for a pair of new Fafnir-class freighters. Once those are delivered our total carrying capacity will increase significantly."

"Assuming the Fafnirs are able to keep flying," Randon commented offhandedly. "Those things are right up against the Mjollnir Limit, and I don't know as I'd trust them for more than a couple of trips."

Blake's face darkened; clearly, the Fafnir purchase was his own pet project, and he wasn't the kind to take even implied criticism well. But before he could say anything more, Chun Li jumped in. "We'll make sure they come with an adequate guarantee," he said dryly. "In addition, we have a petition pending before the Patri seeking to raise our trip quota to one hundred twenty per year." A soft beep came from the back wall, where Schock was working under Karash's watchful eye, and the sound seemed to throw Chun Li off stride a little. "We think it may be worth trying to revive the old idea of using terminally ill patients and voluntary suicides to supplement the currently available number of zombis," he went on, a bit distractedly.

"If not, perhaps the crime rate will go up?" Randon said cynically.

Chun Li flushed with anger. "That's not fair, Mr. Kelsey-Ramos."

Randon met his gaze without flinching... but he realized he'd indeed gone a step too far with that one. "Perhaps not," he conceded. "My apologies, Mr. Chun Li. Ah—Schock. Finished already?"

The others twisted their heads to look as Schock and Karash returned to the table. "Yes, sir," Schock nodded, holding up three cyls. "I think I've got it all."

I had no doubt of that, myself. Karash's face, as she trailed behind him, was a nice mixture of amazement and tension, with the tension winning.

Randon nodded back. "Well, then, I suppose that will about do it for now," he said, rising to his feet as Schock came around the table. I stood up, too, feeling Kutzko, Calandra, and Ifversn come up behind us, the two shields moving unobtrusively into flanking positions at our sides. "Thank you for your time and hospitality, Mr. Chun Li; Mr. Blake, Ms. Karash. I'm looking forward to our tour of the ring mines later this week; until then, I'll be keeping in touch."

And that was that. In the space of a few minutes we'd gone in, learned everything of importance—or at least gotten it on cyl—and walked out again... leaving tension and perhaps even the first signs of panic in our wake.

Lord Kelsey-Ramos would have been pleased.