The tall man moved slowly through the packed transit hall. His gaunt, eagle-nosed face registered total lack of interest in his surroundings, like he had seen the same or similar ones a thousand times in the past. His garments, cheap and somber, were identical to those worn by millions of migration workers, constantly on the move from one station to another in search of work. A small satchel was slung over his shoulder, seemingly holding the man’s only possessions. At the back of his bare skull a crab-like cyber-ornament clung, its azure colored arms extending all the way to his temples.
The large transit hall was an irregularly shaped circle, with a glass dome overhead. The transit hall had been strategically positioned so that people arriving or leaving the station could gaze through the dome at the reddish planet below and the pale sun in the background. But like with so many small industrial stations in the empire’s interior the almost total lack of maintenance had long since ruined the spectacular view, a greasy-brown film of dirt giving those below in the hall only a vague idea of the vista outside. The walls were covered with a once-colorful mural depicting an often-used theme in Amarrian wall paintings – scenes of the Emperor performing assorted heroic deeds. Here and there the mural was severed by an entryway to one of the dozen passages leading to and from the transit hall.
The large man headed towards the passage leading to the lower levels of the station. For a fraction of a second his darting eyes looked directly into the security camera located above the entryway. Then he disappeared down the passage, his face as impassive as when he stepped out of the shuttle fifteen minutes earlier.
The small room was illuminated solely by a two dozen monitors mounted into the back wall. Before them sat a tired looking officer, his heavy eyes scanning the screens before him. The picture on a screen in the middle had been frozen; a gaunt face with a patriarch nose filled the screen. In the far corner of the room a figure stood leaning on a cane, the glare of the monitors only managing to paint it in a ghost-like blue silhouette.
