"So, how does the criminal mastermind feel about this latest caper?" Zoe asked dryly. Simon jumped a little and turned around to face her, from where he'd been nervously wandering around back and forth in the cargo bay. "Getting ready to go under deep?"

"I... I'm trying, but I feel like I'm not accomplishing that much," Simon muttered. They were only about six and a half hours from landing on Whittier near the Maren's isolate cabin, and everybody else seemed to be busy getting ready to put Kaylee's plan into action. "I've been over everything that I could find out about Rickard Maren, both from Badger's files and other publicly available material on the Cortex, but... but I don't feel that same level of confidence that I would when walking into a hospital. This sort of thing is out of my depth, and he's a private guy that nobody really knows much about, and I really don't want to get all stiff and stuttery like I usually do when I'm n... n... nervous." He smiled lamely at the ship's formidable first mate.

"I know it's a bit cliche, but you really don't have that much to worry about," Zoe told him, with a slight smile. "Number one, everybody messes up a little when they're undercover, and it usually doesn't matter. Number two, the fact that your guy is an enigma really does work in our favour - nobody else knows him either or much about him, so he can be whatever you want to 'play him' as. Well, anything that's consistent with being secretive and reclusive, which shouldn't be hard. Third - you don't have to go to the conference with only the information and preparation available to us now. That's part of why we're going to Whittier first."

"Hmm, yeah," Simon muttered, and distractedly he walked over to an iron trunk which was kept in the cargo bay more as a bench seat than to store things in, and sat down on it. "Minor nit point, though - not EVERYBODY at the conference will be just as in the dark as we are at the moment."

"Oh?" Zoe wasn't too surprised about that, but she was curious about any details