"The goods are ready, sir."
"Very well. Find those two traders and give them the usual ten per cent, then bring me an inventory of the remainder."
Musa stood, fists clenched, facing the recorder play-back. "The usual ten per cent, he says! Why, I'd like to slaughter the lot of those murdering thieves!"
Lanko snapped off the switch. "Don't blame them too much," he laughed. "After all, they're only trying to make a living, and it's the only trade they know."
As Musa nearly choked on his attempted reply, Banasel broke in.
"Sure," he chuckled. "Besides, it's guys like them that keep guys like us in business."
Lanko noticed the horrified expression on Musa's face, and quickly composed himself. He put his hand on the man's shoulder.
"Look," he explained seriously, "if we got so we took people like these to heart, we'd spend half our time getting psyched to unsnarl our own mental processes." He gestured to the reels of tape in a cabinet.
"Here, we have the records of hundreds of cases like this one. Some are worse, some are not so bad. Every one of them had to be—and was—cracked by members of our Corps. This is just another of those minor, routine incidents that keep cropping up all over the galaxy. It's our problem now, and we'll get to work on it." He turned.