EMPIRE: Imperial Detective

by Stephanie Osborn

  “I think he’s just trying to avoid dying,” Bobby noted. “I’m sure that Carr’s gurney got wheeled right past his cell on the way to the padded lockup. He saw what the drugs can do. He’s looking for a way out that doesn’t involve… that.”

  “Short of life imprisonment at hard labor without parole, there’s nothing I’d offer him,” she replied with disgust.

  “Which is what I was just thinking.”

  It took some few minutes for the response, but after about ten minutes, Mercer’s gaze went distant once more. When he came back from VR, he met Bradly’s eyes.

  “The evidence is stacked hard against you, Mr. Bradly,” he noted. “We have VR recordings from Mr. Peabody of the two principal planning meetings, as well as recordings of conspiracy conversations from within the temporary IPD headquarters, provided by Director Carter and Detective Ashton, and drugged and undrugged testimony from your fellow conspirators…”

  “Then why are you interrogating me at all? Why bother?” Bradly asked bitterly. “We both know you’re going to execute me.”

  “If you have mitigating circumstances, Mr. Bradly, the Throne will take them into account when issuing a ruling,” Mercer explained. “If you were coerced, if you were blackmailed, if you had a temporary mental aberration, now is when this would come out.”

  Bradly sighed.

  “He’s not willing to plea-bargain with me, is he?” he asked.

  “On the contrary. He has offered you one choice.”

  “He has?” Bradly sat up straight. “What’s that?”

  “Rather than execution, should you plead guilty, His Majesty offers your life… in prison, at hard labor. On the mining planet of Galena.”

  Bradly winced; Galena was an airless rock, where the mines were supplied with breathable air by artificial means. It was rich in metal ores, true, but many of those were radioactive. Its only inhabitants were prisoners too dangerous to be sent to a standard lockup, and therefore used as miners. Some people considered it a slow death sentence – and Bradly was one of those. “Parole?”

  “No possibility of parole.”

  “Quick death or slow death, huh?” Bradly said then, and it was almost a snarl, as his anger toward this Emperor surged once more. “No thank you, and you can go to hell.”

  “Dr. Martin,” Mercer said aloud, “your assistance, please.”

  It only took the yellow-flagged ampoule to force Bradly to open up. When he did, he was still surly and ill-tempered, but he could no longer restrain the answers from flowing from his brain to his mouth and out. Even so, certain things, the absolute convictions of his being, refused to be swayed.

  “What is your full name?” Mercer began.

  “Theodore Armstrong Bradly.”

  “Were you a former IPD Headquarters staffer?”

  “Yes.”

  “What was your rank?”

  “Captain.”

  “What is your current rank?”

  “It should be Chief, but it’s only Captain.”

  “The IPD no longer uses military-style ranks, Mr. Bradly. What is your current rank?”

  “I told you – Captain.”

  “Do you refuse the new ranking system?”

  “Hell, yes.”

  “How did you survive the destruction of the original Headquarters?”

  “I was on a case with Carr and… it was an inspector, but I can’t remember who it was. We were away from the building.”

  “Why did you come back to the building?”

  “It was the end of shift. We’d seen something go down in that direction, but didn’t know it was a strike on HQ until we got there.”

  “Were you challenged by the Imperial Marines?”

  “Yes.”

  “What did they ask you?”

  “What we were doing there.”

  “What did you tell them?”

  “That we’d come back to report in.”

  “Did they ask if you were a straight cop?”

  “Yes.”

  “What was your answer?”

  “That I was. I am. I do things the way they need to be done.”

  “Did you lie when you told the Imperial Marines you were a straight cop?”

  “Of course. That’s just how you do things. It was none of their damn business anyway, toadying bastards.”

  “Was it your idea to assassinate Carter?”

  “No.”

  “Whose was it?”

  “Carr’s.”

  “William Harold Carr had the idea to assassinate Carter?”

  “Yes.”

  “Was it your idea to assassinate Ashton?”

  “Yes.”

  “Whose idea was it to assassinate Detective Ames?”

  “Mine.”

  “Whose idea was it to assassinate Colonel Peterson?”

  “Mine.”

  “Who called the first meeting to plan the assassination?”

  “I did.”

  “Who attended that meeting?”

  “Me, Carr, Peabody, Williams, Seeger, Warner, Lowe, Wang, and Holland.”

  “Did you believe Peabody was with you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Who ran the meeting?”

  “I did.”

  “Did you work out a verbal contract with Hennig and Brandt to kill Director Lee Carter, Colonel Maia Peterson and Detectives Dominick Ashton and Callista Ames?”

  “Yes.”

  “What did this contract consist of?”

  “Go to Carter’s house and sabotage it to kill all four of ‘em when Ashton and Ames were over for dinner.”

  “In exchange for what?”

  “Their old jobs as enforcers, at the standard pay.”

  “Did you ever seriously consider Peabody for the director’s position?”

  “No.”

  “Did you have any follow-up meetings?”

  “Yes.”

  “How many?”

  “Two.”

  “What happened in those?”

  “In the first, the enforcers reported back that the sabotage packages had been successfully installed in Carter’s house. Then we started planning for what to do once we’d taken back IPD Headquarters.”

  “Meaning the destruction of the ICPD main precinct?”

  “Yes. And started talking about what to do with the Emperor.”

  “We’ll get to that in a moment, then. Did you believe your plot had succeeded?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you hire Joseph Hennig to assassinate Winston Peabody?”

  “Yes.”

  “What were the terms under which you hired Hennig to assassinate Peabody?”

  “He would get two thousand credits in exchange for ambushing Peabody on his way to work, and making it look like an old perp did it.”

  “Did you specify the perp?”

  “Yes.”

  “Who was it?”

  “The Apollo Avenue Killer.”

  “Did Peabody work that case?”

  “Yeah, about eight years back. He caught the guy, ‘cause word didn’t come down in time, but the Council wanted him loose, so the charges didn’t stick.”

  “What was the mode of death supposed to be?”

  “Multiple stab wounds in the back. That was the M.O. of the Apollo Avenue Killer.”

  “Was the Apollo Avenue Killer one of the old IPD hitmen?”

  “Yes.”

  “Is that hitman still alive and operating?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “He was killed in the Headquarters strike.”

  “When was Peabody’s assassination supposed to take place?”

  “The morning after the house bombing.”

  “When Carter, Ashton, and Peabody did not arrive for work the day after the bombing, what did you think?”

  “I thought they were dead. The news video playing on the wall screen supported that.”

  “What was next on your agenda?”

  “Taking ove
r the directorship, changing everything back to how it’s supposed to be, then going after the Imp City Police, to get them out of my way.”

  “How did you intend to do that?”

  “Bomb their headquarters. Take out the head.”

  “And then?”

  “Issue an ultimatum to the Emperor.”

  “How did you intend to back up that ultimatum?”

  “Kidnap his bitch.”

  “And do what, if he refused to cooperate?”

  “Rape her, then kill her. Slowly. A little at a time. Force him to cooperate.”

  “Are you aware that Emperor Trajan’s fiancée is the chief advisor to Consul Saaret?”

  “So?”

  “What did you intend to force Trajan to do?”

  “Go along with us or step down and let us put someone in that we wanted.”

  “Then what would you do?”

  “Take him prisoner, kill him and his bitch, and probably take the throne myself.”

  “And you thought that you could do what the Imperial Council could not?”

  Bradly shrugged.

  “Sure. Why not? You don’t know unless you try.”

  “What makes you think you would have succeeded?”

  “The Council was too arrogant and too blatant. I’m sneaky.”

  “And you believe you would have won? Against the Imperial Guard and Marines?”

  “What do they have to do with it?”

  Mercer paused, as a message under Imperial header unexpectedly flashed into his VR inbox. He opened it. It contained three words – terse, cold, harsh. Implacable.

  And utterly without appeal.

  Enough.

  Execute him.

  “Dr. Martin, did you just receive…?” Mercer began.

  “Yes, sir, I did,” Martin replied. “Complete with Imperial header.”

  “All right. Please proceed, then.”

  Bradly could only watch as Dr. Martin reached into his little bag and withdrew an ampoule with a black label imprinted in white, with a large skull and crossbones on it. Martin fitted the ampoule into the injector, then moved to Bradly’s side. Mentally, he began to scream, to curse, to tell them no, stop, get your hands off me… but nothing came out of his mouth.

  He could just see Martin’s hand, holding the injector, from the corner of his eye as Martin pressed it against his throat, where the carotid artery would be. He tried to fight, tried to move, but the drugs and the restraints prevented him. He heard the hiss, felt two heartbeats, then an awful, blinding, nauseating, migraine-like pain hit the center of his head, spreading outward, and his entire cranium felt like it was splitting open as a result of an axe blow delivered from inside his skull.

  The observers, both near and distant, watched as Bradly’s mouth dropped open and his eyes widened in horror. He paled, then the expression left his eyes, which glazed as his face turned white.

  Fractions of a second later, his head dropped forward, bobbing slightly. A dribble of spittle fell from his lower lip onto the tabletop.

  Dr. Martin felt for a pulse.

  “He’s dead,” he pronounced.

  Mercer nodded, then held up a finger as his expression went blank once more. Within moments, however, he was back to alertness.

  “I have just received the formal judgement from His Majesty, Emperor Trajan,” he announced. “For all eight surviving conspirators, the verdict is guilty on all counts. For enforcer Joseph Hennig, who cooperated in exchange for a plea-bargain, the sentence is life in prison at hard labor, with the possibility of parole to be determined by the Emperor not later than twenty-five years from now. For the rest, the sentence is execution by firing squad, save for Mr. Carr, who shall be executed by lethal injection due to his mental state. The sentences shall be carried out tomorrow, beginning at noon, and each conspirator shall be executed in turn, without blindfold, in full view of the others. The executions are to be carried on special VR channels, and to be shown onscreen in the temporary New Headquarters building.”

  In the lockups, each member of the conspiracy – except for Carr, who no longer cared – ‘heard’ the sentence read in VR, and they shuddered in dread.

  New Beginnings

  The next day, ‘Temporary New Headquarters’ was extremely quiet.

  Midmorning, a statement came down from the Palace under Imperial header. It read as follows:

  Be it known to all:

  Any future attempts to corrupt the Imperial Police of Emperor Trajan and his successors shall be taken immediately as treasonous, and will be met with all appropriate force; the Imperial Police are sworn to serve the Throne and no other, and the Throne will not stand for its corruption or diversion to the personal interests of those who would pervert it.

  There will never again be an opportunity for the Imperial Police to turn against the Throne.

  Trajan Imp.

  “And that’s the final word,” Carter declared in a VR all-hands meeting to announce the statement.

  Nobody else had anything further to add.

  Shortly thereafter, once matters were starting to settle down a little but before the executions were scheduled to take place, Peabody knocked on the doorframe of Ashton’s office.

  “Sir?”

  Ashton looked up. “Oh, hey, come on in, Peabody,” he said. “Close the door if you need to.”

  Peabody entered and closed the door, then took one of the visitor chairs.

  “What’s up?” Ashton asked.

  “Nothing much,” Peabody admitted. “Just thought I’d tag up after everything. You going over to watch the executions?”

  “Yeah,” Ashton said. “Lee Carter and I will head on over, meet up with Maia and Cal, and watch. You wanna come along? You were one of the targets, too, in the end. You’re welcome to head over with us.”

  “I’ve been debating that,” Peabody said, thoughtful. “I sort of don’t want to, but I sort of feel like it might be a good closure for the past, and opening the door to my new life. Which, by the way, looks like fulfilling my dream, that I told you about.”

  “Oh really? Do tell.” Ashton grinned, and Peabody laughed.

  “Well, I’ve all but moved in with Emily already,” Peabody grinned sheepishly. “She told me flat-out, she wasn’t gonna let me get away this time. She wants to meet you and your wife, by the way. She hopes maybe you’ll both come to dinner at, um, at ‘our’ place, sometime soon.” He paused, then added, “Not until after this whole conspiracy shit is well down the tubes, though. She totally understands that, and she wants to make sure she doesn’t interfere.”

  “Okay, sure. That’s doable. So you’re commuting from the edge of the city?”

  “More or less, yeah. There’s a commuter station just a short distance from her house; she picked her place for its easy commute into the city to see her publishers.”

  “Aha! That works.”

  “Yeah, it does, pretty damn well. And… I think we’re both happier than we’ve been in a long, long time.”

  “That’s great,” Ashton said, gently enthusing. “I’m happy for you, Peabody.”

  “Thank you. That’s… another thing,” Peabody began, hesitant. “I know this is the office, so business relationship and all, but… I thought I’d like to invite you to call me Winston, or just Win, when we’re off-duty. If you want to.” He shrugged. “I know there’s a fair difference in our ages and backgrounds, but you’re somebody I think I’d like to get to know better, if you’re good with that.”

  “I think I’m good with that,” Ashton decided. “And to that end, when we’re off-duty, my friends call me Nick.”

  “Excellent.” Peabody smiled, then extended his hand. “Pleased to get to know you, Nick.”

  “Likewise, Win,” Ashton said, taking his hand and shaking. “Oh, and since we’re not really off duty, I have some news for you.”

  “Oh?’

  “Yes. Lee was very impressed with the way you handled things, and how you were willing to infiltrate
the ‘oldies’ conspiracy and provide information, including recordings of the meetings, even at the risk to yourself. You were an investigator, level 2. You are now level 3. Keep it up, and you’ll make detective inside a year.”

  Peabody’s eyebrows shot up.

  “You’re kidding,” he said in surprise.

  “Nope. I told you in the beginning, I wanted to grease the skids for you, and if you’d work with me, I’d work with you. Lee sees that, sees that you were willing to work with me, sees that you respected us all enough to risk your own neck for us, and he’s more than pleased. To be honest, it wouldn’t surprise me if he comes back and decides that you fully earned the double-bump to detective.”

  “Whoa.”

  “In which case, if he trusts you that much, you’re welcome to this office,” Ashton added.

  “No,” Peabody said, firm but quiet. “No, I don’t think I want this office for a good, long time yet. There might be too much temptation associated with it, and I like the way my life is headed right now, without it.”

  Ashton nodded, impressed. “Well, I guess that means I’m stuck with it a while longer, then.”

  They laughed.

  They were still chatting when Carter came around to grab Ashton and head to the executions.

  Peabody tagged along.

  The executions were swift and as neat as such things can be. The prisoners were, by and large, quiet and resigned to their fates, though a couple begged and pleaded for mercy. When it was pointed out that they showed none themselves, they paled and silenced.

  By a few minutes past one, the quintet of witnesses headed for a nearby restaurant and a late lunch together.

  The case of the directorial assassins was over.

  For the time.

  The temporary IPD headquarters was even quieter that afternoon than it had been that morning. It was also politer and more courteous, especially to the Director and his division leads, or what passed for leads.

  Midafternoon, Carter called an all-hands meeting in VR to present the preliminary plans for the new headquarters building, to be constructed on the site of the old building once the last of the debris had been carted away and the site prepared.