Aron inserted the cylinder Kas had given him into the slot. He then typed in his UserName and Passcode. He had designed the TAN almost himself. It was originally a project of his at the New Republic, but when he left, he took everything of his with him, including the blueprints to TAN. Fixing it to suit Seth Vinda's needs weren't all that difficult. Aron rather enjoyed filing anyway. Statistics. They fascinated him. A CD-ROM drive opened. Aron reached into his pocket and pulled out a disc-holder. He opened it and put the contained CD in the drive. As it closed, the screen lit up hugely.

"YOU'VE JUST ENTERED THE 1000th TREATY INTO
THE VINDA TREATY ARCHIVE NETWORK!" the machine said in a robotic, yet excited voice.

"Obviously not my idea," Aron thought. He looked with near-indifference as a line went down the middle of the screen. On either side of the line, there was a treaty. On the left, the first treaty entered and on the right, the treaty he had just entered. Aron thought, "What the hay?" and tapped the screen on the left side.

"Odd. Vinda Corporation isn't even a party to this treaty."

A horrible thought shook Aron. Perhaps the slicers had gotten in. He remembered that Kas had said that some of them were "half-way decent." But he pushed that thought away. VC had doubled its V Guards. He was reading with intense interest now. Aron had graduated from the New Republic Diplomacy Academy summa cum laude as an Ambassador of Galactic Jurisdiction. He remembered a class that he wasn't all that fond of: Loopholes. The whole class was about finding loopholes in treaty provisions of our opposite numbers from whatever faction. He appreciated the knowledge now...but it was useless on this treaty: it was without loopholes.

"Whoever worked this one knew what he was doing," Aron said aloud.

It was a treaty obviously years old, possibly not even a treaty. It could have been a charter or license or something. The first party was the Corporate Sector Authority. Aron could barely remember the days when there was an active governing CSA. It was before he graduated. The second party, and obvious host of the negotiations, was...

"Amcron Corporation?" Aron had never heard of them.

"Must be defunct," he reasoned.

He was most intrigued. But the brass would ask questions if an associate ambassador spent an hour filing a treaty in V-TAN, even if he took a moment to soak up the success of having entered the thousandth one. As such, Aron tapped the treaty twice, ordered the disc ejected, and placed it in the holder that had carried the thousandth treaty. He would take it home with him that evening and read it fully. But, for now, he had to get upstairs to his office. The elevator seemed the quickest way.

"I don't mind paperwork unless it's in the way. And NOW, it's in the way," the frustrated ambassador uttered.

As the doors to the elevator slid open, the rather tall figure of Achinta became apparent, and as he regarded Aron for a moment, the bodyguard greeted him...

"...Good afternoon Mr Antilles, everything running smoothly I hope?...."

As a rather startled Aron turned to face the direction of the voice, Achinta couldn't help but let a subtle smile escape across his face...

The Ambassador appeared to be elsewhere...

tap tap tap tap tap tap

The sound came slowly to ‘Skopos’s ears, registering with a subtle pain. “Her? What is she doing here”

tap tap tap tap tap tap……taptap

“I’m sorry Mr. Skopos, but Mr. Katta has an unplanned trip. He is going with Mr. Vinda to check the Brentaal Prisons. He told me to give you the paperwork you are cleared for. Mr. Vent already has the high classification orders; here are yours.”

thud ‘Skopos looked at the imposing pile of papers with a slight wonder. How does she manage to dig up all that paper work? I though we did ninety percent of our work off datapads…

“That’s… that’s fine miss…… th-h-ank’s.”

“Do you have the hiccups Sir? If gone untreated they are potentially deadly. My mothers taught me the bes…”

“Perhaps for your species, but not mine.” ‘Skopos cut in. “Thank you, I’m fine.”

How does he stand her? Giving medical advice?

‘Skopos sat down, the tap tap tap fading out of hearing. As he began to sort through the pile of flimsy, a small part of his mind began to examine different creative ways of disposing of this annoying secretary.
I do believe I dislike her very, very much.
At the same time, another part of his ever-active brain began to digest the new advancements.

“Going with Vinda to examine the Brentaal prisons eh? Could things get any better? One less stop for me to make.”

“Good day, Mr. Soom, Mr. Vinda.”

Secretary Katta entered Mr. Vinda’s office, and nodded his head to the two men.

“Twenty minutes until we need to be at the space port sir. I was just informed of the trip myself. Bit of an inconvenience…”

Kas’ face did not appear at all annoyed at the prospect of a trip. Stretching slightly, he peered at the sole paper lying on Vinda’s desk. Lucky bugger… ah, the recent slicings…

“I see you have been informed of the latest slicing attempt?”

Mr. Vinda nodded.

“I believe the guard has been doubled on all data connection pipelines, and the virtual guards have also been… doubled.”

Turning to Mr. Soom, he continued to speak, though his words seemed to be addressed to both.

“Any ideas? The people under me can only think it’s because we are such a … prominent target. But an increase in slicing attacks this large, and with some actually being halfway decent…”

Aron almost jumped.

"Ahem. Mr. Vega."

He quickly collected himself. Vega was paid to be able to suspect.........almost always correctly. "He called me Mr, >:" Aron thought, but waved it away.

"Yes...er...very smoothly. Just entered..uh...what appears to be our corporation's thousandth treaty. V-TAN can hold a near-infinite amount, but I was, ahem, just going up to my office, to take care of my ten-meter-high stack of paperwork, and perhaps have a drink."

Aron chuckled nervously.

"Ahem, I, uh, put in a call to the Secretary of State to inform him of the "milestone" but, his receptionist said that he was in conference with Mr. Vinda. Have you heard of the recent attempted hacking...no what did Kas call them....SLICING...yes, slicing incidents?"

Aron hoped a change of subject might thin the air.

“Any ideas? The people under me can only think it’s because we are such a … prominent target. But an increase in slicing attacks this large, and with some actually being halfway decent…”

Kaneda bowed his head slightly in greeting as Kas entered the room, and as he spoke , the Section Agent took a moment to digest his words before offering a response.

"...that would be a plausible explanation , but due to the perseverance of the Slicer, or Slicers, I feel there is something more to this than meets the eye..."

The leather on Vinda's chair creaked slightly as he sat back down into it, listening intently as the operative spoke...

"...The first priority we have is to find out just what, exactly, this slicer is looking for. This would lead us to a motive, and hopefully... a lead...

...however...

Kaneda paused for a moment, as if to collect his thoughts more, and continued.

"..One thing we have noticed about the attacks is that they appear to be quite random this leads us to believe perhaps the slicer doesn't know himself what he is looking for...if this is the case, then I have a proposition..."

The operative's voice bordered on the menacing as he explained further.

"..perhaps we could offer him something, something so irresistible , he perhaps thinks, he has found what he is looking for..."

Vinda's eyes narrowed as he followed Kaneda's train of thought...

"...bait. You're proposing a set-up.."

Kaneda smiled faintly..

"..yes....

...In fact Section thought that maybe this...excursion you were planning to go on , might help draw out whoever is behind this"

Walking over to a chair just to the side of the room, Kaneda sat down, and gauged the two men before him.

"...We have not ruled out this being an internal problem, and as such, all Vinda-Corp personnel's terminals are being monitered for unsual activity..."

As he finished Kaneda focused his gaze to look at both men in turn, as they reflected on his input on the matter.

Achinta smiled, a little surprised at the level of information Aron had volunteered, in response to what was, to all intents and purposes, just a simple greeting.

...talkative fellow...

Nodding slightly, Achinta tilted his head in curiousity, as he observed the Ambassador speak...

...nervy too...

As Aron finished , Vinda's right hand responded ...

"...yes... I have heard about them, I am sure it won't take long to find out who is behind it, I would not worry about such matters..."

Although extremely profficient in conversing with all kinds of beings in general, there were rare moments where Achinta sometimes perhaps missed the odd nuance in a conversation... after all, small talk was a difficult art for most humanoids, let alone Androids.

As a result , the two men seemed to regard each other in silence for a very brief moment, and at almost the same time each made a gesture as if to leave...

Achinta had just experienced his first awkward silence.

After capturing and processing the moment for further study later on, he stopped and spoke, causing Aron to turn back around to face his direction...

"...congratulations on the Treaty Ambassador...

...and enjoy your drink..."

Then in a flurry of black leather, continued into the elevator...

...fascinating...

Aron thanked Vega for the congratulation, stepped out of the elevator when it came to his floor, then walked slowly toward his office, not eager to get to the paperwork, but eager for closing time to come, so he could go to his quarters and see what this Amcron treaty was all about. The pressing question was, "What is V-TAN doing with a treaty that concerns Seth Vinda in no way whatsoever?" As Aron sat down, looking dismally at his stack, he thought that, from where he was sitting, a thousand piece holo-puzzle would have been easier.

“A… decoy? Or… a trap…”

“If the slicer doesn’t know what he is looking for himself, how are we supposed to know what he really wants? Setting up a trap for someone we don’t know is even after us could be … expensive, to say the least.”

There was a slight agreement in the faces of both the men Kas was addressing, but it was slight.

“You can never be too safe though. Vinda, you have a price on your head in many a system. I’m sure the CSA remnent would be happy to have you in their clutches. The same can be said for Mr. Soom, and myself.”

“What kind of … set up are you thinking of?”

Kas checked his crono, eighteen minutes before they were supposed to leave.”

not like the pilot will leave without Vinda aboard…

Kaneda nodded slowly as Kas raised an important point...

"...I agree with your assessment Mr Katta, to rush headlong into something like this would be most foolish, the option Section put forward was precisely that, an option..."

The operative leaned back into the leather chair slightly as he chose his words carefully...

"...at the moment , however, Personally, I feel it is too risky, not until we have a better understanding of who might be behind this..."

A slight smile became evident as he continued...

"...and I can't imagine Mr Vega would agree to it either.."

Kaneda's fingers drummed upon the Silver top of his cane, as he spoke further...

"..As I said before, we need to find a motive for the attack, we need to know whether these attacks are for profit, or for something altogether more sinister. The only way , we see, is to draw out these attackers in some way, a decoy, or a set-up appear to be our only options with which to do so..."

"..you must have something up your sleeve..."

(Vinda interjected).

A wry smile crept onto Kaneda's face..

"..we have leaked details of a very expensive shipment, designated to arrive in two days time, we have named the place, the time , and the security details...fake, of course...if these attackers make any moves to intercept this shipment, we'll be waiting...and if they don't , then we can probably assume....its not profit they are after..."

The scowel that had etched itself onto Vinda's face as the suggestion for bait was put forward , lightened a little as Kaneda continued further. The Vinda-Corp CEO had no enthusiasm for such an adventure, he had been there and done it before, and hadn't been too keen on the result then. Taking another toke on his cigarra , Vinda picked up on Kas's other point.

"...Kas is correct...all of this sounds... expensive..."

Kaneda's reply was instant.

"...if all goes to plan, it won't be..."