“The life signs are going berserk. Our little prize is upset.” Foros grinned at the readouts rippling through his monitor.

“What about that mist? Where is the leak in the atmospheric systems?”

Foros scowled at his commander. “There is no leak. All of the systems are secure. Whatever that mist is, it isn’t from the station.”

“Fine. Get going. We need to have her delivered before we can collect the bounty.” The commander crossed his arm.

“As you wish, but how are you going to handle the tank connections?” Foros started pushing as the other men paused.

“What?”

“There are connections from her tank to the outside world for both the oxygen she needs and power for her nutrient pumps.”

“I thought her tank was self-sustaining.”

“It is, but not for eternity. We will need to find an Alliance-compatible connection.” Foros looked at the woman suspended in a tangle of wires and tubes. She was pale, her head was the standard shaved scalp of other tanked employees, but there was a sad expression in her dark blue eyes that part of him felt badly for her. Fortunately, it was a very small part.

With bumps, jolts and a lot of grunting, they got her tank to the open area outside the docking fittings.

The ground was hidden beneath a thick mass of mist.

The woman in the tank stopped hiding her eyes, and as she looked around her, panic filled her features. She thrashed and fought the walls of the tank, pounding from within and causing the men around Foros to laugh.

He had a premonition of ill and backed away from the tank.

The woman thrashed around, reached up and hauled on something in the top of her tank. A light blinked around the edge of the base, and Foros took the better part of valour. He ran for it and hid in a sealed room, waiting as he heard an explosion that rocked the station followed by the distinct noise of decompression.