You're ganging up on me again.

Which ought, perhaps, to suggest that you are in error in this instance. I second Alicia's agreement that training must continue, but not even I can stop other events while she does so.

Hmph. Just where did you have in mind to go?

"MaGuire, I think. How does that strike you, Tisiphone?"

MaGuire? I should have thought Dewent or Wyvern would be more fruitful ground, Little One.

"I don't disagree, but I still think we should start at MaGuire." The lift stopped outside Alicia's quarters, and she stepped out and sprawled across the comfortable couch. "We've got to have some sort of cover before we move in on them for real, and MaGuire's a good place to begin building one."

"Cover"? The Fury sounded faintly surprised.

What did you plan on her doing? Busting down doors in battle armor to ask questions at plasgun point? Ever hear of something called subtlety?

"Hey, give her a break, Megaira! She never had to put up with these kinds of limitations before."

I am not offended, Tisiphone said, and somewhat to Alicia's surprise, she meant it. The Fury felt her reaction and chuckled dryly. As you say, I am unaccustomed to mortals' limitations, but that does not mean I am unaware of them. What sort of cover did you have in mind, Little One?

"I've been thinking over all the intelligence you pulled and looking for an angle we could follow up without simply duplicating everyone else's efforts. It looks to me like Colonel McIlheny's people are doing a much better job with overt intelligence gathering than we could. He's got tonnes more manpower and far better communications than we do, and unlike us, he's official. He doesn't have to hide from both sides while he works. Agreed?"

Alicia paused, then shrugged as she felt the others' joint agreement.

"That being the case, let's leave that side of it to him and concentrate on areas where our special talents can operate most effectively."

And those areas are, Little One?

"I was particularly interested in Ben Belkassem's locked files, because I think he's on to something. I think he's right about there being someone on the inside, probably pretty far up, which means that same someone may well be feeding the pirates advance warning on Fleet sweeps and dispositions. If so, they'll know how and when to lie low, and that suggests Ben Belkassem's also hit on the most likely way to find them."

By tracking the loot? Megaira sounded dubious. That's a tall order, Alley, and we can only be in one place at a time. Shouldn't we leave that angle to him? O Branch has all sorts of information sources we don't.

"Maybe, but we can probably do a lot more with any information we get our hands-pardon, my hands-on. Ben Belkassem may have more reach, but he can't get inside someone's head, and I doubt his computer support can match what you're capable of. Even better, we're a complete wild card, with no connection to Justice or Fleet however hard anyone looks. Add all the other things Tisiphone does, and you've got a hell of an infiltrator."

And how will you use those abilities? the Fury asked.

"I think I'm about to become a free trader," Alicia replied, and felt the others' stir of interest. "We don't have much cargo capacity, but half the 'free traders' out here are really smugglers, and we can probably match the lift of any of the really fast hulls in the sector. Besides, specializing in delivering small cargoes quickly would make us look nicely shady."

That I should live to see the day I became a freighter! Megaira mourned, but amusement sparkled in her thoughts.

But can you? Tisiphone objected. Surely Fleet has spread the alarm since we left Soissons. From what I have seen of Sir Arthur, he, at least, would insist that the Rogue Worlds be warned, as well, embarrassment or no, since he believes Alicia to be mad. Will they not be on the watch for us?

"Of course they will, but I don't think you realize quite how talented Megaira is. You can be a regular little changeling, can't you, Honey Cake?"

Call me, "Honey Cake" again and you'll get a migraine you won't believe, Alley. Yeccch! But, yeah, I can do a real number on 'em.

I realize you can disguise your electronic emissions, but you cannot hide the fact that you possess a Fleet Fasset drive. And even if you could, would not visual observation reveal you for what you are?

The answers are "it doesn't matter," and "no." Two-thirds of the merchantmen out here use Fleet-design drives. I can fudge mine to make it look a lot less powerful by shutting down nodes, and there're a couple of tricks I can play with frequency shifts, too. I can't look, oh, Rishathan, or Jungian-built, but I can produce a civilian power curve.

As for the visual observation angle, that's one of my neatest tricks, if I do say so myself. BuShips came up with it for second-generation alpha-synths, and I'm one of the first to get it.

And what, if you are through extolling your own virtues, is "it"?

Sticks and stones can break my bones-assuming I had any-but words will never hurt me, Megaira caroled, and Alicia laughed. Even Tisiphone chuckled, but she clearly still wanted an explanation, and the AI obliged.

I've got a holo imager built into the aft quadrant of my Fasset housing. I can use it to build up any exterior appearance I want.

Indeed? An impressive capability, yet how well will it endure close observation should they bring more than the unaided eye to bear upon it?

I can jigger my radiation and mass shielding to give an alloy return off the "solid surface" against most of their active sensors, Megaira returned promptly. Old-fashioned radar's the hardest, but if we decide what we want to look like and leave it that way, I can fabricate reflectors to return the proper image. The holo itself will stand up to any scrutiny, except maybe a spectograph. It won't "see" anything off the holo.

"Yes, but a spectograph doesn't tell them anything about mass or size," Alicia mused. "Suppose we plan our holo to incorporate a few good-sized chunks of your actual hull and let them get their readings off that?"

They'd get readings, all right, but the wrong ones for a merchant hull. I'm made out of Kurita-Hawkins battle steel, Alley.

Yet you have substantial quantities of less noble alloys in your machine shop stores. Could we not cover the exposed portions in a thin sheath which would appease their sensors?

I suppose so… . My "paint's" fused into the basic battle steel matrix, and my remotes are designed for fairly major field repairs. I could use a pigment fuser to spray a thin coat of plain old titanium over the battle steel. It'll look like hell whenever I drop the holo, and I'd be ashamed to be seen in a Fleet dock wearing it, but it should work.

"Then since we can look like a suitably decrepit smuggler, the next item on the agenda is to build a believable identity. That's why I want to start at MaGuire and work our way towards Dewent. Megaira can work up a flight log before MaGuire, Tisiphone, and you can sneak it into the planetary data base when we first contact the port. By the time we dock and they call it up to check our papers, it'll be 'official,' as far as they're concerned."

Be a good idea to make this our first trip into the Franconia Sector, Megaira suggested. How about we pulled out of the Melville Sector in a hurry? That's close enough for us to've moved here but far enough away nobody should be surprised that we aren't a familiar face, and according to my data Justice just shut down a major inter-system smuggling ring there.

"Perfect!" Alicia chortled. "You and I can make sure the last few entries are suitably vague-the sort of thing a real smuggler would put together to cover an embarrassing situation for a new set of port authorities. It'll not only get us in with the criminal element but provide a perfect cover against any Fleet units looking for the real us."

That's what I had in mind. Okay, I'm started on that- Alicia felt a fragment of the AI's capabilities go to work on the project even as Megaira continued to speak -so what do we do after we get there?

"I doll up to look as little like me as you look like you and start trolling for a cargo. With Tisiphone to run around in the computer nets and skim thoughts, we shouldn't have too much trouble lining up a less-than-legal shipment headed in the right general direction. Once we deliver it, we'll have established our smuggler's bona fides and we can start working our way deeper. In a way, I'd like to head straight from MaGuire for Wyvern-if there's one place in this sector where those bastards could dispose of their loot, Wyvern's the one-but we need to build more layers into our cover before we knock on their front door. Still, once we get there, I'm betting we find at least some sign of their pipeline, and when we do, we can probably find someone whose thoughts can tell us where to find them."

This will take time, Little One.

"Can't be helped, unless you've got a better idea."

No, I have no better strategy. Would that I did, but this seems sound thinking in light of our capabilities.

I said she had good instincts, didn't I? I like it, too, Alley.

"Yeah, the only thing that really bothers me is losing the Bengal." Alicia sighed. "The cargo shuttle won't be a problem once we get rid of the Fleet markings and change the transponder, but nobody could mistake that Bengal for anything but an assault boat."

So? Keep it. I'll ding it up a little and make a few unnecessary hull repairs to take the shine off it, but it's too useful to just ditch.

"It's not exactly standard free trader issue," Alicia objected, but she heard temptation waver in her own voice.

Again, so what? As far as I know, there's no official free trader equipment list. Hell, it'll probably get you more respect! Think how they'll wonder how you got your hands on it.

I believe she is correct, Little One, Tisiphone chuckled. I should think your possession of such a craft will raise your stature among these criminals greatly.

"Yeah, you're probably right." Alicia's mouth twitched and her eyes twinkled at the thought. And, she admitted, it was a great relief, as well. "Let's think up some incredibly gaudy point job to hang on it, in that case. If you've got it, flaunt it."