Chapter 2

When the pressures had equalized and the lock released, Jerimiah and I entered Mosley Station Customs Control. In front of us were 10 Customs Control stations. If we had been a cruise ship from one of the planets, those 10 stations would have been crowded with dirtsiders looking for their fun in the barbaric and hedonistic world of a deep space station.

The adventurers would have been led to believe that the procedure they were going through was to weed out the bad influences to the station. To keep out the criminals, the drug dealers, the sharks bent upon causing mayhem. Of course, it doesn’t dawn on the traveler that these evil doers are their fellow passengers. And that they had already been fleecing the sheep, and had been doing so for the whole trip, slowly but surely.

In reality Customs control on Mosley station was nothing more than a credit check. discrete inquiries are made from the identity documents of the newly arrived. These entries will be used by the various vendors and merchants on the station to determine pricing for their products. The goal is to strip as much wealth from the tourists, without causing trouble, as possible. Trouble does happen, But the station council also has an agreement with the various cruise operations.

Trouble makers could easily find themselves the victim of a Mickie Finn, or an overly amorous companion, and miss the departure of their cruise ship. That person could then be milked of every credit to their name, pending the arrival of the next cruise ship. Which would, as a sign of good customer relations, allow the trouble maker a return ticket on credit, at highly inflated interest rates.

And if the unfortunate idiot doesn’t have the resources to pay for all of this, A friendly loan agent will be standing by to negotiate the terms of his return to civilization.

Basically, the smart traveler keeps his mouth shut, leaves His money in the safe in his stateroom. His drinks are bottled and non-alcoholic. See the sights, take your pictures, eat the local foods. Buy a couple of overpriced geegaws for the folks back home, and to keep the shop keepers happy. And when the ship sails, Be on board.

But today wasn’t that kind of day. There was only Jerry and myself.

Standing in front of the customs stations was a gaudily dressed dandy in an imitation semi-military uniform. The braids and brass were dazzling to the eyes. And to a veteran meant nothing but hours of shining costume jewelry.

Speaking with an air of superiority, He addressed me, “Captain Sheridan, Welcome aboard Mosley Station. I need to see your ship’s paperwork and identity documents. Also, I’ll need your passenger’s ID.”

I have always considered this part of the belt bureaucracy as foolish. My personal estimate was that 90 percent of the identity documents, if any, were forged. And forged so well that the original issuing office couldn’t tell the difference. And with ships documents, if you included ALL of the various ownership, change of ownership, title, certificate of destruction, certificate of salvage, etc. Even if legitimate and valid, would be the size of a city library. Out here in the belt, the phrase “Possession is 90 percent ownership”, takes on a more immediate and valid meaning. Ownership disputes are more likely settled in the bilge spaces, with fists. Or knifes.

After taking our paperwork, he directed us to a waiting area. Hard plastic chairs, just like every government waiting room I had ever been in. This one was slightly different because of the bank of slot and vending machines along one wall and the automated bar/cafe on the other.

After about an hour, Jerry stood and started towards the bar. “Not a good idea son.” I Warned, “Those slots are a sucker bet.”

“What do you mean? I’m thirsty, I was just going to get some water.”

I reached into my booty bag and pulled out a water ration. “Here ya go. First thing you need to learn is that EVERYTHING in the station is overpriced. And the stuff offered here in waiting rooms is always a sucker bet. Anytime you are a captive, everything costs more. That’s one of the reasons that they have us cooling our heels. Given enough time, they hope we’ll drop some slugs into those sucker bets, and make their boss happy. But, now that they know it won’t work with me, they’ll have decided to let us go about our business.

About 5 minutes later a clearly unhappy clerk came in. Followed by a uniformed bully boy, carrying the standard station enforcer stun baton. “Captain Sheridan, I am SO sorry for the delay. And normally we would release you with the apologies of the station management. But it appears that there is a minor issue with your identity documents. If you would please follow Mr. Jones here, He will escort you to the station security offices. I’m sure that any problems will be solved, Post Haste.”

I had anticipated this. I stood and offered a slip of paper, with a 100-credit slug showing, to the clerk. “I’ll be more than happy to accompany Mr. Jones. But maybe if you were to look at these documents again, they would solve the issues you speak of.”

The clerk looked like he was violating a galactic rule. He got red faced and forcibly stopped himself from reaching for the slug.