Author: Richard E Schell

By the second week, she had already learned when to laugh. She didn’t laugh first or too loudly; instead, she would join in just after the others started. She cast a glance down to appear modest rather than observant.

At work, she limited her questions to those a new employee would typically ask. She wanted to learn which labs required two badges, which doors were accessible after midnight, and which safeguards were real and which existed only to satisfy policy.

Later that evening, over wine, the group asked about her family. “They’ve been living overseas ever since I graduated with my master’s degree,” she said. When they asked about the man she was seeing, she looked away for exactly long enough. “He’s ambitious and kind,” she said, “but he never has enough time for me.” Sara reached across the table and touched her hand. “You deserve better than that.” Sara’s touch brought her close enough to record the digital signal from her security badge beneath the table.

She smiled, then turned to Mark. “I’m really glad you walked me through the security protocols. I wanted to hit the ground running, and I’d have been lost without you.” She held his gaze a moment longer than necessary. It deliberately created a pause that he would misinterpret as desire. By that time, she had cloned Sara’s security signal, memorized Mark’s commonly used passwords, and knew which engineer had complained about the security bypass left running on the main system.

Before dawn, she sent all the information she had gathered. It would take nearly half an hour to reach her crew’s vessel just beyond Mars.