Ivan obligingly led the way to the corridor the bazaar had set up in.It was one of the larger corridors, but the nature of the market wasthat it had no permanent address upon the base. Yohanna tried to be discrete as she browsed amongst the stalls. Peyton reflected it mighthave been better if Yohanna was out of uniform.
"Over there," Ivan whispered.
Immature hemp did not look like iconic mature marijuana, but the produce was clearly from an unauthorised plant. The danger of contamination would have been almost as great if it had only been a tomato. Yohanna tried to inspect the table without becoming too conspicuous.
The stall holders were already packing their wares away. The group decided to fade out of view and see where the merchants went. Once everything was loaded onto a trolley, the traders began to wheeltheir produce away. Yohanna gestured to Ivan, Doran and Peyton to fall back while she followed on stealthy feet.
The merchants went down the corridor and around the corner. Alonganother corridor and down a sloping ramp. Finally, they reached the basement area, which was mainly used for storage. That figured, Peyton mused.
Peyton hid in an alcove as the merchants activated a door using a keycard. Once the door was closed, Yohanna activated her communicationsdevice and called for Moon Security to provide backup. Confident in the knowledge that reinforcements were on their way, Yohanna steppedforward and used her custom's master-pass to open the door.
Two startled faces looked out through the open doorway. Behind them,Peyton could see a long tank of unauthorised plants. There was perhaps more than one species, some legal and some contrab and, but all representing an infection risk. One merchant reached into their pocket and pulled out a knife. Peyton gasped because she was sure they meant to attack her cousin.
Yohanna drew her customs issue stunner-pistol and fired twice. The customs officer was an excellent shot and both merchants fell to theground unconscious. Moon Security arrived soon after and began to lock handcuffs on the culprits. The guards would take them to theholding cells for questioning.
(Sci-fi illustration generated using AI Photo Editor v.4.0 (ChatGPT-based creative tool from OpenAI), with creative direction by the author.)
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