The Data Traders

Guild Monetary Policy

Because of the very large numbers of political entities involved, interstellar politics and regulations can produce barriers to commerce. One of these is simply the currency in which the transactions are to be conducted. In order to facilitate the flow of interstellar data transactions, the guild has established a single common currency. This currency is the only valid form of payment for any guild sanctioned data transfers. Sometimes referred to as a “Guilder,” the actual name of the guild currency unit is “Guild Data Transfer Credit.” This currency is pegged at the rate to transfer one terabyte of data (1TB) one light year (1LY). Because this currency is pegged to a single real transaction value, there is no possibility of inflation or deflation associated with this currency.

Any guild member convicted by a sanctioned Guild security court of accepting transactions in any currency other than Guild Transfer Credits will be banned from the Guild for life. Appeals can be made to the quarterly Guild security council meeting.

Any world, system or political entity which refuses Guild Transfer Credits will be Banned for a period of at least one Terran year and not exceeding ten Terran years.

Excerpted With Permission

Data Trader’s Handbook

Copyright 3250, Interstellar Data Trader Guild

Leo was filled with trepidation. He felt stupid about it, but that didn’t change the way he felt. A routine chip delivery assignment was nothing he should fear. He’d done similar duty dozens if not hundreds of times over the years. While most data was simply transmitted via laser or RF relays, some data was considered by the owners to be too sensitive for transmittal. Always open to extra profit, most Data Arks were happy to hand carry data chips from point a to point b. In Leo’s mind this was a completely useless extravagance, but the customer was willing to pay so the guild was happy to oblige. In this case, Leo had a chip that was to be delivered to a named party on one of the space stations orbiting Titsim Prime. The delivery instructions were very clear and there didn’t seem to be any strange details. Titsim prime was a fairly large world and it was considered safe for the guild to operate there. Leo had never been to orbital eight, but he had been to the Titsim system before and there was nothing special about the world or the system.

No, it wasn’t anything to do with Titsim or the delivery that was making him anxious. He was remembering the last time that he had checked out a cutter. He still had nightmares about Ramona shooting the mysterious kidnappers on U-I Buoy Six. He told himself over and over again that this was a totally different mission and a different situation. However, he also told himself to listen to Ramona next time she was worried about something. If he had listened last time, they would have run a deep scan and probably would have found the guys waiting on the Buoy before entering. The dead spacer would probably still be alive if Leo hadn’t just barged ahead into the Buoy despite Ramona’s warning. He told himself not to worry. He also sent Ollu a note asking her to assign them a different cutter than the one they had used for in the U-I system. Her response was a simple affirmative, no question about why he wanted a different ship.

As before, Ramona was waiting for him at the ready pad on the boat deck. She still looked good in the tightly fitted suit liner. She was armed again, but this time she had a duffel under her arm. At his questioning look, she replied: “civvies. Don’t want people leering at me in my suit liner on the station. It gets annoying.” Leo looked down. He hoped he hadn’t been “leering” but he was looking this time. Apparently, Ramona was checking him out also. “You strapped?”

Leo wasn’t really sure what that meant. “Uh, what?”

He must have had a goofy look on his face because she laughed. “Unless you’re really happy to see me, that’s a gun I see on your hip, Journeyman Timur.”

Leo was embarrassed before, now he was really red. “Well, after our last adventure, I thought I’d better learn to shoot. When I told Gunny that I had been practicing to get my small arms quals he told me that I should carry a sidearm when doing away missions.”

“Yeah, I’m sure that’s what he said.”

“Well, I think his exact words were, ‘Son, I don’t give a fuck if you shoot yourself or not. But Eddington is one of mine; you better bring her back without any holes in her or you are walking to the next fucking system. Read me?’” Leo’s imitation of Gunny’s low grow must have been pretty good because Ramona started laughing and didn’t stop until tears ran down her face.

Naturally, Ollu chose this moment to finish her walk-around of the cutter. “You children going to stand around chit-chatting all day or are you going to fly this bird off my deck?”

Ramona managed to choke down her laughter. “Ready to fly, master ship handler.”

“Right, off with you then.”

The exit from the ship and subsequent departure were completely uneventful. That didn’t really help Leo’s nerves as much as it should have done.

Ramona wasn’t really big on letting sleeping dogs lie, either. “So, what are you packing?”

“Um, sorry, what?”

She leaned over the command console separating the two pilot seats and growled a fairly convincing Gunny imitation. “What kind of fucking gun is that, son?”

“Uh, it’s one that we had demo license for so I thought I’d try it out.”

“Oh, really? Did you consult with the weps pit?” Her humorous tone had a bit of an edge to it.

“Uh, yeah. They have a shit-hot trader apprentice over there. She says it kicks ass.”

“Oh? And who is this hot trader over there that you are so enamored with?” Her tone was much less amused than it had been. A bit tart even.

“She’s new. Apprentice Eddington.” Leo suddenly found that he needed to re-confirm their course and busied herself with the console.

“oh.” Ramona found herself at a loss for words. Perhaps she should confirm their course with the computer.

Leo shifted slightly to ease the unfamiliar weapon and it’s holster within the harness of the pilot seat. He didn’t know much about weapons but he did know about trading and traders. He could tell that Ramona would be one of the great ones. She was still raw and had a ton to learn, but she had the gift that you could not teach and she was fearless. This certainty made Leo feel happy in a way he could not really describe. He felt protective of Ramona even though she had shown no need to be protected by him. He wanted her to succeed, to become a trader. Aw crap, he thought, am I really falling for a new nugget apprentice? And what the hell is up with the masters and her anyway?

His internal consternation continued until they eventually contacted Titsim approach. Getting into and out of such heavily traveled space wasn’t exactly hard but it wasn’t something you wanted to be nonchalant about, either. In theory, the automatics would guide them in and ensure that everything went were it was supposed to go. In practice, the ship guidance protocols were designed for an “average” amount of traffic. There were exceptional circumstances that could throw them off. In the end, as the pilot in command, it was Leo’s responsibility to bring his ship in safely.

“Tisum approach, this is Trader Flight Reggie Two-Niner. Asking for vector to orbital eight.” Leo was always amused that voice control was still the preferred method for approach controllers; but in the end, the safest way to ensure you had a good lock was to talk to the person monitoring the system on the other side.

Titsum approach was prompt with a tone that said this speech had been given thousands of times. “Roger Reggie Two-Niner. We have you in the system and you are locked to orbital eight. Good lock on mamma’s gadget. Course request green. Please be aware of the no-fly within 500 kilometers of the geo-sync system defense orbitals.” Ramona just looked at Leo. Mama’s gadget? Leo shook his head. Must be local slang for the flight controller.

Leo just responded with the exact response recommended in the training manual. “Roger Titsum approach. Locking in the course. I have a green light. Reggie Two Niner out.” And that was that. While Leo continued to monitor the automated systems, he was really just watching for something unlikely that the system couldn’t handle. The odds of that happening but allowing him time to recover were slim to say the least, but he still did his job.

Orbital eight was actually on the other side of the planet from them at the moment. It would come around eventually, but the computer plotted an intercept vector that used the planet’s mass to sling them around behind the station on a closing course. Better to Chase it than Race it was the pilot’s aphorism. It was much more energy efficient to approach an orbital from “behind” because the planet’s mass would help you match your course. Allowing the station to overtake you meant that you had to reduce speed to overtake which decayed your orbit then you had to add delta-v to make that up. Leo wasn’t paying for reaction mass, but he approved of the more elegant approach vector that the computer had picked. This also gave them a good view of the planet and he rotated the ship so that the planet was “up” and they got a good view of the blue/green marble as they performed a gravity slingshot around the back side of the heavily populated world.

“It looks like home.” Leo looked at Ramona in surprise. From the look on her face, she didn’t realize she had spoken aloud until he turned his head.

“I’ve never been to Raeburn’s.” Leo winced as he said that. Of course, he as a trader would never go to a “banned” system. Well, in for a credit, in for a guilder. “Do you miss it?”

Ramona paused as if considering her answer. “Not really. There are some people I miss. My parents, some friends. But I always wanted to go to space. I’ve visited home since I joined the militia but I haven’t lived dirtside since I gained my majority.”

This was the most Leo had ever heard her say about herself. Perhaps the beauty of green continents, blue seas and white swirling clouds above them had loosened her usual reluctance to talk about herself. “I miss the Connie.”

Now it was Ramona’s time to stare. “The Connie?”

Leo looked abashed. “I was born on the Connor Loic. My parents are both master traders. It’s considered bad form for you to apprentice under your own parents so I moved to the Reggie when I became an apprentice. If I make master, I could move back but I’ve been on Reggie so long, I can’t imagine leaving her either.” He checked the controls again, training and habit forcing him to check and recheck even while having a conversation. “Of course, I may have to quit the Reggie if the masters won’t pass me for master.”

Ramona looked interested. “Is making master that important?”

Leo nodded. “Yes, until you make master you’re just working to make the masters rich. You don’t control your own destiny until after you make master.” Leo sighed. “I have worked my whole life for this one thing. I really worry that the masters are against me and I’ll have to leave.”

Ramona made a sympathetic noise. “Well, if you have to you have to. It was hard leaving home, but I’m starting to think it was the right move.”

The ship quickly passed the terminator line and the continents below twinkled with artificial illumination. Leo was keeping an eye on the screens and orbital eight was now showing on instruments. “Five minutes to deccel burn. I have the orbital on instruments. Should be coming up six o’clock low in a few minutes.”

As their higher orbital speed pushed them up into a higher orbit, they slowly gained altitude relative to the planet. Since they were inverted, that meant they were moving “down” towards the station and “away” from the planet. Of course, such terms as up and down meant little in space but the human monkey brain insisted that up and down mattered, so such terms persisted even for those born in pace like Leo. The deccel burn started right on time and the now visible orbital gained visual mass as they got closer. The original dot had grown to a toy and now filled the windows as the five kilometer long station got closer.

Leo wasn’t impressed. “This thing is ancient.” Pointing to the twin rings of the main habs with a wince, “look, they’re using rotating hab modules. Don’t they have a-grav?”

Ramona was starting to get used to Trader arrogance, but she still didn’t like it much. “Leo, not everyone has the credits to buy whatever IP they want. This design works and I’m sure they got it super cheap. Don’t judge.” Her tone was flat, but Leo heard the rebuke in it.

He had to think for a minute to figure out why she was mad at him. “Sorry. Sometimes I forget that some people have to pick and choose their IP buys. This is a wealthy system, that shouldn’t have been a make or break buy for them.”

Mollified, Ramona smoothed her tone. “Perhaps not, but you don’t know what they are investing their Guilders in. Look how perfect their world is. Perhaps the terraform was more expensive than you think.”

Leo nodded. Terraforming could be amazingly expensive. While there were many inhabited systems, the total number of terraform projects were relatively small. This meant that the IP got re-used infrequently and not many specialists had the ability to do primary research on the subject. Low volume, specialty work that was literally life and death for a new colony meant that the IP didn’t come cheap. He knew intellectually that setting up a new world was expensive, but he didn’t tend to think about things in terms of generational projects like terraform specialists did. You don’t terraform a world for yourself. Only your children or grandchildren would really enjoy the fruits of your labors. This explained the premium placed on T-norm worlds. While rare, they did exist and there were millions of star systems in just this sector of space. Even something extremely unlikely like a T-norm world happened quite often when you were talking about millions of lottery draws.

From a purely economical point of view, planets didn’t make sense. Even for a post scarcity society, the investment required to build a functional society on a new world was absurd. It was much simpler to build habitats. Habitats were controlled environments that could be built in completely automated fabs. Planets were uncontrolled environments which required human ingenuity to overcome. Each one was unique which meant that automation was very difficult if not impossible. While most human societies had human resources to spare, it was tough to get a couple of thousand people to agree to leave their homes for years at a time to work on a project that would provide zero value to them in their lifetime. However, humans were illogical creatures. Having a “home” on a real world was the goal of a significant percentage of the human population. For this reason, habitable planets very rarely suffered from lack of population. In fact, most had strict population control efforts in place to prevent the types of tragedies that had occurred on old Earth before FTL drive was discovered.

None of this was relevant to the job at hand, however. Leo got himself back on task with difficulty. “Orbital Eight, Reggie Two Niner, requesting docking bay.”

They must have a decent data net because the response came back instantly. “Roger Two Niner. Daily or hourly docking rates?”

Leo wasn’t really prepared for this question. Most stations handled docking fees afterwards. Much easier to set the rate when you were already locked on. “Expect to be onboard less than one t-norm day.”

“Roger Two Niner. Proceed to docking bay 11, hourly rates apply. Course laid in and locked.”

The indicated course correction showed up on the nav system and the docking bay started blinking green through the window. “Roger Orbital, I have the bay visually. Course accepted. Reggie Two Niner.”

The ship made its precise way to bay 11. There was a large amount of other traffic, but the system seemed to be efficiently managing everyone and Leo was able to relax once he felt the mag clamps pull the small ship onto the docking collar. Leo started the shutdown checklist and tossed half it to Ramona’s console. Together, they were able to safe the ship in only a few minutes. Since this wasn’t a trader orbital, there were some extra steps to ensure the security of the ship which they planned to leave unattended. Leo opened the safe built into the after bulkhead and removed the courier bag with the data chip in it. “Give me your RFID.” Ramona looked confused. “We never allow our RFID to leave the ship. Too easy to compromise. I’ll lock them up here while we’re gone.” She nodded and handed the RFID over. Twisting around, she recovered her duffel and moved aft to the head to change into civvies. Leo hadn’t brought a change of clothes. It hadn’t occurred to him until she showed him her bag back on the Reggie and he hadn’t wanted to admit his oversight. He usually just dropped the chip and left the station as soon as possible. Clearly, Ramona had larger plans.

“You in a hurry to get back?” She had already changed into a very sharp looking outfit of black slacks, a turquoise top and a leather jacket. “I wouldn’t mind eating at a real restaurant.”

“A restaurant?” Leo knew what they were, but had never been to one.

“Yeah, you know with food made by humans?” Ramona had look and a tone that implied she wasn’t sure if Leo understood the concept.

“I know what that is. I’ve just never been to one.”

“Never?”

“No, I don’t spend much time off the ship and we don’t have one. The Connie didn’t either.” He consulted the nav system for a moment. “We have six hours of slack to catch the Reggie before she hits the e-limit, no hurry, I guess.”

“OK. We are definitely going out to eat then. You know that you get paid, right? The locals will happily take your guiders you know.”

“Yes, I’m not an infant. I’ve been on dozens of stations before.”

“But not a restaurant?”

“Seemed like a silly extravagance. I can get food for free right over there.” He gestured at the replicator in the corner. “Why trade for something you can only use once? I would rather buy the pattern so I can have it as many times as I wish.”

Ramona sighed dramatically. “Leo, it’s not the same thing. Real food tastes better. Plus, it’s the ambiance that you’re paying for.”

“Ambiance?”

“Ambiance.”

“Right.” Leo looked down. “I am not sure, but I don’t recall people eating at restaurants in suit liners.”

Ramona laughed. “Not usually, no. Here, I looked up some clothing designs when you told me we were coming. A couple of them are more appropriate for a man than a woman. Print something out.”

It took a few minutes to print, but the outfit Ramona had suggested seemed appropriate for dining on a civilian station. Despite his rather sheltered upbringing as a trader born, Leo did know how to get around on non-trader stations. He had made many trips off the ship and it was part of his job to understand the cultures of the various systems that they traded with. Picking suitable clothing wasn’t really hard but it wasn’t something he thought about when doing a courier run. He took a quick look in the mirror and decided that the dark brown slacks, deep burgundy shirt and station jacket looked good on him.

“Let’s deliver this chip. The instructions say to hand deliver up on deck eight. They should be expecting us.”

Finding the correct address on deck eight proved a little harder than Leo expected. The station had grown organically over several centuries so the corridors were uneven and the compartment numbering was not sequential. Eventually, Ramona stepped into a local shop to ask for directions. She came back out and pointed Leo in the correct direction. The destination turned out to be a pretty anonymous office with a plain brown door. Leo ushered Ramona in and walked up to the only person inside.

“I am Journeyman Trader Leo Timor. I have a certified chip delivery for a Ms. Lark.”

“I am Terry Lark.” The older woman behind the desk was dressed in what passed for normal business attire in this system. Dark slacks, white shirt and a brown jacket. She looked happy to get the delivery and unsure what to do next.

“Nice to meet you. The delivery instructions specify a bio-metric ident before delivery. Can you please press your thumb on the reader?” Leo offered up the chip case which had an integrated bio-metric reader. In theory, only the intended recipient could open it. DNA based bio-metrics were the gold standard for secure identification. Anything powerful enough to damage the case would also damage the chip and render it unusable. The Guild had been using virtually the same design for almost a hundred years and had never had a chip stolen successfully. Terry put her thumb on the reader which quickly turned green and issued an audible click as the case opened. “Thank you.” Leo handed her the chip. “Have a nice day.”

“That’s it?”

“Yep, that’s it.” With a wave, Leo left the shop, taking Ramona with him. The delivery had been so quick Ramona hadn’t said a word inside the office.

Ramona was curious about the delivery. “What was on the chip?”

“No idea.”

“What, you don’t know?”

“Nope. Secure transfer doesn’t work like that. We just take the chip. We only need to know how much data is on it so we can charge the correct amount.”

“What if there is banned material on the chip?”

“That’s against guild policy.”

“Yes, and?”

“And it’s against policy. It’s up to local polities to enforce the law. We’re just the traders. If we know it’s illegal, we refuse the transaction. However, we don’t try to open a customer’s files. None of our business.”

“But you could be facilitating an illegal act!”

“Yes, but we’re not the police or the militia. If the local polities report the abuse, we will ban the customer from trading. That’s a good motivation to follow the rules.”

“Yes, but…” Clearly flustered, she wasn’t sure what to say.

“Ramona,” Leo tried to put it as gently as possible. “You aren’t in the militia any longer. We get paid to move bits. That’s it. It’s bad business to break local laws so we don’t do that. We try not to facilitate illegal activity but we don’t investigate our customers. That’s not our job. We just move the bits.”

“I guess I assumed that the Guild knew the details of all the bits being moved. We are very careful to inspect any IP we buy.”

“That’s different. If we are buying something, we need to know all about it. How else would we understand it’s true value? Moving bits is different. It’s the actual origin of the guild, you know?”

“What?”

“Originally, the guild was formed to move bits. That’s why the guilder is pegged to data transport rates. The trading function came later when we figured out it was more profitable to buy the IP than to just move other people’s IP around. Moving encrypted data around is just baked into our DNA. It helps even out the trading because it is so much more consistent. A good trader desk will make the transfer business look tiny but it can save you when the desk really messes up.”

Ramona was surprised that such basic information about the founding of the guild was not commonly known. “Why keep that a secret?”

“It’s not a secret. Just old news. This was hundreds of years ago. When you go to elementary school on a trader vessel you learn about that stuff in history class.”

“Oh, yeah I guess that makes sense. I learned about the founding of Raeburn’s World in school.”

“Yeah, exactly. I have no idea how Raeburn got founded.”

“Surprise, it was a guy named Raeburn.”

“Stunner. So, restaurant?”

Leo wasn’t sure if he could taste the difference between the hand made food in the restaurant and the food from the replicator. However, sitting at a table in the station’s atrium chatting with Ramona was lovely. Ambiance indeed.

“See? Isn’t this nice?”

“Actually, yes. Thank you.”

Ramona smiled. “And we can split the check if you like.” She looked down. “Actually, I don’t know how to pay for anything. I don’t have a local credit account in this system.” A panicked look crossed her face. “Do you?”

Now it was Leo’s turn to smile. “No, but this is ship’s business. We are working so the ship will pay for our meal.”

“What? I thought you said it was an extravagance? You’re saying it’s free?”

“Not free, the ship pays.”

“Yes, that’s the same thing.”

Now it was Leo’s turn to be shocked. “We’re all shareholders, it’s all the same money. Why spend what we don’t have to?”

“Wait, what?”

Leo shook his head. “Didn’t you read your contract?”

Ramona looked embarrassed. “I thought I did. Something about ship’s shares but I assumed that meant a bonus if we did well.”

“Hah, no. The Reggie is a common shares corporation. Everyone on the crew is a part owner. You earn shares based on your rank and time in grade. We all own her together.”

“Even the ship handlers?”

“Well, no. They’re employees.”

“Ah. Yeah.”

Leo was feeling defensive but wasn’t sure why. “It’s a fair system. It’s a Guild ship. Without the Guild there would be no Reggie. Makes sense that we own her. You need crew but they don’t run the business. They get paid in Guilders so it’s a good job for them.”

“But without crew, the ship wouldn’t go anywhere and we wouldn’t have a business either.”

“Some ships are family businesses and the families run the ship.”

“Really?”

“Yes, every family has a black sheep.”

“Ah. Yeah.” Ramona didn’t look pleased.

“That was a joke.”

“You mean that the ship handlers aren’t considered second class citizens by their own families?”

“No, that part is true. I meant I don’t have any ship handlers in my family. Trader families who run their own ships are considered a bit eccentric to say the least.”

If anything, Ramona looked less pleased. “Ah.”

The conversation wasn’t going well but Leo didn’t really understand why. The Guild worked the way it worked. If the ship handlers wanted to be traders, they could take the test and apply. Not everyone had the abilities or the aptitude, but that was just the way things worked. Wasn’t it?

An interruption saved Leo from his confusion. An older man dressed in a conservative brown ship suit walked up to their table. At first, Leo thought it was the restaurant manager but then he realized that the man didn’t work at the restaurant.

“Excuse me, are you from Raeburn’s world?” What struck Leo immediately was the man’s accent. He spoke just like Ramona. The man was starting at her.

“Yes, why do you ask?”

“Ah, I thought I might recognize you. Are you Ramona Eddington by any chance?”

Ramona looked a bit panicked at first, then embarrassed. “Yes, I am.”

The man reached out a hand. “Very pleased to meet you. Would you mind shaking my hand? I watched you play g-ball for years. Always great to meet someone so famous.”

Now Ramona definitely looked embarrassed. “Well, thank you for being a fan.”

Satisfied with his handshake, the man wandered off. Leo was thunderstruck. “Wait, you’re famous?”

“No, not really. I told you I used to play g-ball back home.”

“Yeah, I used to play g-ball too, but nobody ever recognized me in a strange system like that.”

“Well, he must have seen me on the vids. I played in a couple all star games when I was playing for militia. People like to watch those games even though they’re not pro games. It happens sometimes. Didn’t expect to run into someone from back home here though. At first, I was worried he was a nut.”

“A nut?”

“Yeah, some fans get carried away. One of my teammates on the all-star team had a guy stalking her for a year. Not fun.”

Leo was able to pay with his Trader account. One tenth of a guilder seemed like quite a bit for lunch, but Ramona seemed to think it was reasonable. The prices were all in local currency so paying in Guilders was always a bit of a negotiation. Naturally, the restaurant was more than happy to accept Guilders which were always valuable. Leo had a lot to think about as they walked back to the cutter for the return trip.