Distance and perspective salve many ails, insight often presents itself when the issue is put to an arm's length.
Or that was the plan at any rate.
Daniel Conner, or so claimed his card, reconciled the differences between a filled bottle of sipping whiskey and an empty shot glass as he pondered the flow of traffic swirling around the docking points of Newark station.
Business had been good, fantastic even, in the Omegas. A number of contracts had been presented which catapulted opportunists such as the Reavers into a mixture of corporate warfare and territorial contest. The systematic slaughter of every IMG, Kruger or Hessian ship which had crossed through that yellow hell had netted tens of millions within the space of a week.
Then a saber rattle later that contract had evaporated. Something about it felt weird.
So he did what he always did when the situation turned curious. Life on autopilot, look where you end up.
Which was at a lonely table in the Ship Inn with the dossier of Ashley Patrick Benson in his hand. A wholly unremarkable pilot whom had been hired for reasons which, at the time, proved extraordinarily illusive.
Something about her profile makeup had caught his eye. There was something fishy running beneath the current in the Omegas. Something with connections, he felt, very very far from that region of space. Something which had caused him to find himself where he was looking at the life story of another hard luck nutcase trying to make her way by killing the slower pilot.
He sipped filled his shotglass and knocked back the bolt, grimacing.
But Newark was, if anything, the right place to find answers.
Or find something.
Or so he imagined. Maybe he'd simply seen too many movies. But, hell, if his credit had to be checked to get him through the door he figured that a body might be able to find what they need.
He illuminated a call switch, eventually summoning a buxom young lady who looked radiant enough to have the station built around her. He briefly wondered what her earning salary was.
Hi. Ah. I need whoever around here solves problems discreetly and charges about fifty million credits to make things happen.
