Bead on a hoop

This was a guild that had evolved from the Database Administrators and Systems Administrators of yore. And somehow, somewhere, they had acquired the Powers of Security, had become a Police Division in fact.

RatH and Neda were manning ISS-7, which was a member of the L5 Fleet, operating based at the earth-moon equilateral libration point L5.

There were a lot of fine details to it of course, but one thing the AP required was that any query that was run should be Optimised. There were well defined criteria for this, and it was incumbent on every tracer (legally mandatory, to be precise) to adhere to these rules. At the very least a defaulter would get a ticket. Somewhat more severe infraction would incur an id disabling procedure so there would be no more System Access for a prescribed duration. All of this was rather similar to how back on earth the traffic cops would control speeding on the roads, and how the kids would always try to one-up on them with their radar detectors (this was one phenomenon that didn't change much in the course of the last few centuries!)

Only, here it was spacecraft crew attempting to hog navigation and control data, and thereby causing potential space traffic hazards. So, enter the AP.

Another critical point was System Resources. This would be server processes, database locks and things of that nature. This was of course, related to the optimization requirement, since these were what were getting optimally utilized if the rules were adhered to. And if they weren't, it could lead to Big Trouble, oh yeah.

Well, back to the present context: Manya and Ed were on station for a couple of weeks. They were astronomers by vocation, doing some baseline interferometry stuff. They wouln't catch on to his forays into the Unknown at the Game Crystal. No way, not in two weeks. Himself and Neda were PACs for ISS-7. Permanent Assigned Crew. She could just sniff out any crazy antics that were brewing in his mind. She wouldn't even have to deploy any kind of deduction based on objective circumstance.  And Neda would be back the day before Ed and Manya were to leave.

And just then, his tryst with Destiny occured.

"What!" RatH couldn't believe it. The MetaSignal from the Commodore wagon was unbelievable. The message was: "All right, Buster. You have hit The 'Bead On A Hoop'".

To resolve this was way beyond RatH's scope. So, he would wait. And from somewhere out there in The Deep Dark, a note went out to the Master Bookkeeper that mankind had acquired a new motor skill.