Late in the afternoon, Kir Lak climbed aboard the tug, carrying a small travel bag over his shoulder. May met him on board and escorted him to the guest cabin. While the ship was in flight, May invited Kir to dinner in the dining room. Kir Lak entered the dining room, said hello, and sat down at the oval table. May, as a hostess, served the meal to her guest and asked her to evaluate her culinary skills. Kir liked May's hospitality and praised her for it. Yuki, who was sitting at the other end of the table, smiled seeing how Mei was asking for praise, in addition, she noticed that Kir Lak was trying to catch her eye. This behavior of Kir Lak caused Yuki to suspect that he knows who she is. Yuki tried to remember where she saw him. She had to quickly finish dinner and go to her cabin, avoiding unnecessary questions.

The rest of the crew seemed oblivious to her departure, as everyone was interested in Kir Lak. May begged him to tell how he was connected with the vaccination against DNA anomalies. In turn, Kir Lak told them a story about a journey to the planet Grothar, the brave titarian Sam and the girl Sueli. The same as he told the members of the pilgrim council, without much detail. But Kir did not know that Tai had a flair and special attention to minor details, which is why he was an ERS inspector. He had many solved cases of insurance fraud. And Tai, in a relaxed manner, clarified some of the details of Sam and Sueli’s escape from the Grothar dungeon. Kir felt that he could say too much and hastened to change the topic to the advent of a vaccine. Having finished speaking, he leaned back in his chair, accepting praise from his attentive listeners.

Tai stopped pestering Kir Lak with clarifying questions and asked him to tell him about the missing ship. Kir explained everything in detail and showed the ship's insurance card. After discussing the stages of finding the ship, the brothers left the dining room, while Kir and May remained.

Mei decided to find out why Yuki left so quickly. She began to ask Kir Lak whether he knew Yuki or not. Kir, in response, suggested that he could know her parents, but citing the remoteness of events, he ended the conversation and went to his cabin.

After Yuki left the dining room, she couldn't find a place to sit, she walked back and forth in the small cabin. She decided to return to the dining room, but on the way she went into the engineering room, where she repeatedly warmed herself near the ventilation chamber. Yuki leaned her ear against the ventilation pipe coming out of the dining room and began to listen to what they were talking about. As soon as everyone left the dining room, Yuki got out of her hiding place and came to the search room, where Tai was at that time. For him, Yuki's visit came as a surprise, since she showed no interest in how the search for ships was carried out. Tai readily explained everything to her; he was pleased to communicate with her. Their conversation was interrupted by the arrival signal at their destination. Tai updated the database and went up to the bridge. His brother, May and Kir Lak were already waiting for him there.

The tug arrived at the system where the team sent by Kir Lak last made contact. According to the insurance database, the ship they were looking for headed for the Gaia 591 system. Fourteen hours later, the rescue team was on site.

The yellow star illuminated a dozen small rocky planets and a massive gas giant, whose satellite was a small planet with signs of life. On navigation maps this planet was listed as “Ice Desert”. About fifteen years ago, ice was mined on this planet, but as is usually the case, production was stopped due to unprofitability. There are a huge number of such systems; as a rule, such planets are private property. The lack of orbital infrastructure suggested that the owner had forgotten about his property.

Tang scanned the system for the presence of ships, but found nothing, not even space debris. The team decided to start the search from the Ice Desert. An 3S “small search ship” was sent to the planet in autonomous mode. Kir came into the control room and inquired about the search results. Tan made it clear that the result leaves much to be desired. He explained that the planet is completely covered with ice, under which there is a warm and habitable ocean. The climate on the planet is harsh from minus ten to minus eighty degrees. In the endless ocean of ice there are small stone islands. These are the tops of volcanoes around which four bases are built. In five hours, two thirds of the planets were scanned. Several sunken harvesters and ships were discovered. All four bases with ice harvesters were mothballed, and there was no one on the planet.

Kir was disappointed. Tai asked him not to despair, because there were places on the planet that were worth paying attention to again. Tan pointed to one of these places and sent the 3S there again. It was a mountainous area with a volcano, a dense column of steam rising from the crater. Tan noticed the presence of a small landing platform in this place. Kir, looking at the scan of the surroundings of the volcano, noticed two long protruding pieces of ice. Tang sent the 3S to fly over the area again.

The result of the repeated scan showed two icy vertical wings. This was the same ship that Kir Lak was looking for. People called such a ship “Locust” because of its shape and color of the hull. Ships of this class were very popular in the thirties of the last century. Kir was even more upset when he saw an image of a ship frozen in ice. The 3S dropped a reconnaissance robot, which inspected the frozen ship. There were no people on board the locust. Apparently, the pilot recklessly landed the ship on the ice at the edge of a cliff; due to the temperature change, the ice under the ship cracked, and the bow fell into the water, and the stern caught on the rocks.

May, having studied the background data on the system, proposed rescuing the ship from the ice in twelve days, when the planet emerges from the shadow of the gas giant and warming occurs. Kir supported this idea. But he was more worried about the missing crew of the ship. Tang sent the robot to the crater of a volcano to find out what was hidden behind the dense wall of steam. The robot was unable to take off due to engine icing and had difficulty reaching the edge of the crater. Visibility was zero, there was interference on the scanner, and steam was pouring out of the crater. The robot, hooking a rope onto a boulder, began to descend into the crater. As he descended, his manipulators became covered in ice. The boulder on the edge of the crater could not withstand the weight of the icy robot and fell off the cliff. The robot fell into the mouth of a volcano, having managed to transmit data to the 3S. After a few seconds, rescuers received images transmitted by the robot. There was no lava in the mouth of the volcano; instead, in the center there was a tower as long as the mouth of the volcano on strong struts.

“What is this?” Kir was surprised.

“Judging by the design, this is a fragment of an orbital station; the body is lined with thermal panels, so the station is not visible on scanners.” Tai suggested.

“It's a shame we lost the robot.” Tan lamented.

“We need to go down and see what it is.” Tai suggested. “It’s possible that there is a tunnel between the loading dock and the station, and the ship’s crew could be there.”

After four hours of preparation, the rescue tug entered the atmosphere. Tai, Tan and Yuki landed on the loading dock. Yuki asked to go with them, explaining that she was a doctor and if there were survivors, her help might be needed.

The entrance to the platform's technical rooms was covered with a thick layer of ice. Tang cut a hole in the freight elevator door and the team ended up inside the platform. There was no light, and the walls were covered with a thin layer of frost. The first thing that caught the rescuers' eyes was the chaos that reigned in the engineering rooms; people seemed to have left the place in a hurry. In one of the rooms on the wall hung a diagram of the location and installation systems of the station inside the volcano crater. Tai launched drones to inspect the rest of the loading dock and the tunnels leading to the station. It turned out that both tunnels were filled with rock, and the only way to get to the station was the station support maintenance shaft, located half a kilometer from the platform.

The rescuers had to walk, fortunately the snowfall had already stopped, and a thin but strong crust of ice formed on the surface of the snow, which prevented them from falling through. The entrance to the mine was covered with snow up to the ceiling, and it took them about half an hour to dig a hole and get inside the mine. In the mine it was damp and not as cold as on the surface, two-meter ice stalactites hung from the ceiling, and technical lighting lamps shone somewhere in the distance. After walking a kilometer through the mine, the rescuers found themselves at the mouth of the volcano. It was warm here, water was falling from above, and steam was rising from below, the lava was somewhere far away at the bottom of the vent. Rescuers had to walk fifty meters along the support and climb two hundred meters along the wall of the station. A fine cold rain was drizzling at the top. Having looked around, Tai determined that this structure is a multifunctional station module, a tower type. Tan directed his brother's attention to the landing pad.

Cargo containers and heavy fuel tanks were scattered around the landing site. The stern part of the ship lay across the platform, leaning on its side. Tan and Tai moved to the opposite side of the module and looked down. The remaining parts of the ship were stuck between the rock and the module. They examined the wrecked ship. It was a figure eight commercial ship. Apparently, something exploded in the cargo compartment, the ship was torn apart and the bow section, falling from the roof of the module, pierced its hull. But that was half the trouble. At the edge of the crater, the glacier melted and water flowed down the crater of the volcano, encountering the remains of the ship on its way and flowing into the module. This meant only one thing: when water filled the entire inter-hull space, the module would fall off its supports and collapse into the hot lava. Tai assessed the situation and called May over the communicator. After discussing the situation, they decided, without waiting for the pilgrims, to try to find survivors. And evacuate using rescue baskets.

“What's next?” Asked Yuki who came up. “I examined the airlock compartment, the doors are closed, there is no power.”

“We will enter the other way.”  Tai smiled. He had already removed one panel on the floor, under which there was a hatch marked “For Emergency Services.” Yuki was surprised.

“This is a standard element of any station and is installed at the factory, otherwise the manufacturer will not receive a safety certificate. “ He explained.

“We can find out what happened at the station and control the life support system.”  Tan added and was the first to climb into the hatch.

After going down the stairs, the rescuers found themselves on a service level with several rooms. There was a control room, a small dining room, a shower with a rest room. Yuki offered to dry the wet clothes. The brothers agreed.

While Yuki was changing clothes, Tan shared his observations with his brother “Yuki is a brave girl. I think she's what you need.”

“In all this time, we have not become closer.” Tai objected. “I don’t know anything about the real her; when there is no trust, it’s difficult to count on anything. Although we are drawn to each other. For my part, I'm doing my best, but Yuki. She stays away.”

“And what are you waiting for? Take the initiative!” Tan advised grinning.

“What then?” Ty interrupted. “Such relationships quickly begin and end the same way. After a while, people realize that they are strangers to each other, torment each other and eventually break up. And who would talk about this? You yourself didn’t marry Asami, but Mei, whom you’ve known since childhood.”

“By the way, May said that Kir Lak recognized her, she is not a smuggler, but the daughter of some official.”

“It’s hard for me to believe in such an opportunity, to recognize a person decades later, in a galaxy where there are more people than stars.” Tai answered doubtfully.

“I'll tell you more, apparently she recognized him too. She avoided meeting Kir Lak in every possible way.” Tan added.

“In principle, this explains her behavior. Yuki was never interested in how we find ships, apparently the appearance of Kir Lak prompted her to find out. I believe that she returned to the Quiet Wharf on purpose; it is quite possible that a small ship is hidden somewhere in the vicinity of this station.” Tai shared his thoughts.

Tan, hearing Yuki’s steps, spoke in a whisper: “About trust, brother. Maybe you should tell Yuki about our family. Do not look at me so. I told May back when we were in school. Think about it brother.”