Thomas pressed a few places on the tracker and they all moved off, including the trackers, following Investigator Yugoslav.
“Hey, Yuri, slow down. This must be your natural walk speed, probably due to your long legs, and you lied about it being a short distance,” Tracy panted.” Being a bare five foot two, her legs were short by his six-foot plus measuring stick.
Yuri finally stop half way down the side of a large. metal warehouse. The location was easy to spot: the side of the building had a clean look that extended into the broad passageway. The rest of the building and passageway were a dark, soot brown. Even with a government that actively tackled environmental issues, they could not totally eliminate the air pollution in the warehouse district.
“Is this the spot we are to start tracking,” Thomas asked with a smile? It was obvious that Thomas enjoyed his work. “I need some details before I start the tracker,” Thomas said.
“Militia Central received a comm night before last saying there was a woman bleeding at this location,” Sgt. Yugoslav said. “A patrol vehicle was dispatched immediately and also a medical unit on the advice of a superior. The officers report that she was still alive when the medical unit left for the hospital. Ja’haal was part of a team we had been looking for all the last two weeks. The forensic expert determined that she had been drug not more than three hundred feet.”
“Less than forty-eight hours ago, this is going to be a snap,” Thomas said.
Thomas pressed several areas on his tracker which then started a very slow walk towards the end of the building.
“Í have been thinking that she was pulled from an aircar and then drug to where she was found. That doesn’t make a lot of sense.” Sgt. Yugoslav explained to Tomas. “But how else could she have gotten here?”
“We will see,” Thomas said quietly.
The tracker slowly tracked down to the end of the building and then turned along the southern face.
“This must be about three hundred yards, isn’t it,” Tracy asked?
Just as Yuri was about to reply, the tracker stopped at an indented door.
“There it is, she came out of this building,” Thomas stated.
You could have blown both Investigators over with a feather.
“I don’t believe it. What was she doing down here in the port district,” Sargent Yugoslav said?
Tracy tried the door but it was locked.
“Looks like a wrap for me,” Thomas said. “This must have been one of the quickest job I have ever done. My tracker and I are going back to the shop. I had to tell a prospective client that I probably couldn’t get to him today, but now I can.”
Yuri and Tracy shook Thomas’ hand and would have shaken the hand of the tracker if it had one. While Thomas headed back to the coffee/santee shop where he had left his aircar, Yuri and Tracy walked around to what was probably the front of the building. Eventually they found a somewhat fancier entry way, not by much, but that door was also locked. Further down the building there were a series of large overhead doors that large freight vehicles could enter. They didn’t even check those doors as they knew they would be locked until in use.
I will check Central Records and find out exactly who owns and who uses this building,” Yuri said as they walk back to his aircar.” Shouldn’t take long, I will give you a comm when I find out. Late this afternoon or possibly tomorrow early.”
“Just drop me off at the OSI Headquarters. I will catch a ride home
when I am ready,” Tracy said. “Do you really think whomever is using that building are responsible for the stabbing of Ja’haal?”
“You saw the tracker end up at that door. And it was about three hundred feet. I am now thinking she initially was stabbed in that building and then broke free to run and crawl as far as we found her.”
“They must have followed her to inject that poison. They really wanted her dead,” Tracy said.
“Who knows what goes on in the minds of these crazies. My best guess is that they thought she would quickly die and they didn’t want to be anywhere close to her when she was found.”
They were quite after that, thinking their own thoughts. “I think they might have given her the poison in the hospital,” suggested Tracy. “If she had been given the poison before she ran out of the building I don’t think she could have run or even crawled as far as she did.”
“Maybe so. It is worth our time to check out that hospital. We can see about the lack of notification too.”
Yuri gave her a kiss when he dropped her off at OSI Headquarters.
*****
“I tell you Vera we have to get rid of Captain Santos. She is flying to talk to Chief Onn and if those two get together we will have deep trouble.”
“Do you think we could sidetrack her some way,” said Vera.
“No way. I have seen her on many cases. She gets her teeth into something and won’t let go. I tell you that she has to be taken out of the picture. Either killed or kidnapped until this whole project is complete.”
“What about her kids. I know that Captain Santos would do anything for those girls,” Vera said.
“Kidnapping the girls would be a good idea, but do not, under any conditions harm either one. If you think that Captain Santos could give us problems, it is nothing like we would see if one of the girls came to harm.”
“Ok. Kidnap the Captain or the two girls, or kill the Captain. Giving us more options, we are sure to succeed. We will get right on it. There have already been too many screw-ups.”
“Don’t think you can stop and pull out. If the project fails, so do you.”
“Don’t worry, I am staying with you all the way,” Vera said. I will stay with you till I stab you in the back, Vera thought to herself.
*****
Ronald and James Desota were twin brothers, although they did not look that much alike. They were the two most senior OSI officers, having joined the Department the same day, and worked for nearly twenty-five years, refusing any promotions at all. When asked, they say that they always liked to work together and they had never both been offered a promotion at the same time.
Ronald, probably the most senior of the two, by a few minutes anyway, glided their patrol aircar down on the mostly level strip of rock in front of the Satellite Control Center. It was a large, stone building with a multitude of different size antennae sprouting from the roof. It was windy and cold, and a gray overcast reduced the meager light, even here in the middle of the day.
“I don’t think I could stay here a week, much less a month,” Ronald said, sitting for the moment in the patrol aircar. “Also… something doesn’t feel right about this place.”
His brother, James, didn’t reply, but he also did not move to get out of the aircar.
“I don’t think we are going to find out anything sitting here,” Ronald said after a few minutes and began getting out.
James still didn’t say anything but got out of the aircar. Both Officers immediately drew their lasers without any further comment. These were the heavy-duty law enforcement lasers only issued to those officers that spent a lot of their work time putting out fires by themselves. The twins had been carrying them for over twenty years. As they approached the front door of the building, they spread out to either side as neatly as a dance team. Ronald opened the outside door then stood to keep it open while James slid past to open the inner door. Together once again they spread out through an almost dark room. James had obtained a print of the building design, so he knew the door on the left led to a living area and the one on the right to the instrument rooms. They quietly entered the door on the right, figuring that the two staff probably would be working this time of day. Inside the door, and down a short hallway, they again had two options. The first room was empty except for multiple noisy devices with no furniture and no staff. They then tried the other instrument room. This room seem to have padding against outside noise. There were at least three very complicated and large machines as well as other communi
cation equipment. There were three very comfortable chairs pulled up to two of the comm units.
“I bet the third chair and comm unit was used to train new staff,” James said in a very soft voice.
There were no staff in this room either. As they crept towards the living quarters they suddenly heard a muffled explosion outside the building. Both Officers had heard many explosions in their years of service so they instinctively knew what happened. They both ran out the front door to see the remains of their patrol aircar scattered over half an acre. The Officers stood and stared at the smoke and destruction of their patrol aircar for several seconds. Then James turned and ran back into the building, redrawing his laser he had just put into his holster. Ronald turned and followed him.
“Are you thinking what I am thinking; if that bomb was put into the aircar, the ‘putee’ must be still here,” James said to Ronald.
“That’s what I was thinking of too,” Ronald said. “It is also possible that they used a timer set to explode while over the water. I know you drive very fast, particularly when you are on a hot trail, but I don’t think that is known in the general population.”
This was spoken very quietly by both of them. They had worked together for so long that they could stand and talk to each other while other officers could stand right beside them and not be able to hear what the twins said, other than catch one or two words of a long talk. Once inside they headed for the second door. We will come back to the operation rooms if we don’t find anything in the recreation rooms,” Ronald said.
They quickly found another split: one room looked like the recreation area, when the officers cracked open the first door on their left. There were all kinds of electronic game sites which could be operated by two staff members at the same time, with single play, and gaming sites with other gamers on the mainland.
“It looks like they may have a pool, if you wanted to kill someone a swimming pool would do a great job,” Ronald said as they stood looking at the huge recreation area.
“Wow…Maybe we could retire from the OSI and get a job working here,” James exclaimed. “Go check the sleeping area Thomas, I don’t think anyone could be sleeping after that aircar blast.
“I agree. I don’t think anyone could be sleeping but if we have to try and find them on this stony rock of an island I am going to suggest we try and find their aircar,” James said.
“Ha, got you,” Ronald said. “The paperwork they gave us before this mission contained mention that originally the staff did arrive in their private vehicles, but after a couple of vehicles were trashed, the company used a large aircar that took the two staff members to the island and brought the relieved staff back to the mainland where it could otherwise be used all month.”
James sneaked into the sleep quarters still not convinced that there were still staff around, dead or alive. When he got to the sleep room, first he gasped in surprise. There were three extremely large beds with different sound monitors for each bed. Each bed had a cooling unit that could provide anything you wanted in food and drink. He had only seen a set-up like this before at the scene of the murder of a whole family at a rich industrialist’s vacation home in the mountains.
That wasn’t a case he liked to remember. Nor was this.
“They didn’t have it cushy all the time,” said James in a quiet voice.
“Why not, why not,” Ronald said. After he turned around and saw his brother’s face, he knew. Two of the three beds apparently had bodies in them, kept from smelling by sealed temperature control units.
“I am guessing that they probably died three and a half weeks ago when we first started hearing about the static on the civilian comm systems.” After a minute he continued. “Surprisingly I recognized those temperature control units as being used in mortuaries and butcher shops. You can tune those suckers so low, the bodies could have stayed for years.”
“Were both of them in there,” Ronald asked?
“There are two somebodies in there but I am not going to get any closer than I was. The autopsy and forensic guys can have that job.
“Does that mean you don’t want to sleep in one of those fantastic
beds? Since there is one bed with no one in it we could sleep in that!”
“If you want to sleep in that bed, go to it. I will sleep on the floor in here before I go back in that room!”
“I guess we can do better than the floor,” Ronald said. “There are two anti-gravity beds in here. They must have wanted to take quick naps while playing games.”
“Anti-gravity beds, you got to be kidding. I didn’t know there were any here on planet.”
“Yep. They are small, and there are only two of them, but we are going to enjoy them. Too bad it will be only a couple of days before they send out a rescue team. You know the Captain keeps a close eye on outside missions.”
“Now if we could make the game consoles to work.” James said. “I know we couldn’t do anything about making some of the comm units work but we have so much gaming experience we should be able to make some of the game consoles work,”
“We still have the kitchen room and the garage where they used to keep their aircars.”
“I will check out the garage while you check the kitchen,” James said. “I think at this point we can check them out separately.”
It only took thirty minutes to check both places. They quickly set up a center in the recreation room.
“This is some place,” James said when he was back with his brother provided. But that is just a maybe. The kitchen was set up so they could make any food dish under the sun, and then some. Apparently cooking was another diversion for boring.”
“Let us get working on the game machines. We won’t be out here that long.
*****
Kristina and Tamara didn’t know what to do. Charlie was way overdue from when he said he would be back. Now their mother won’t be home until the next night, scuttling their plans to get her help. They hadn’t told her as soon as they noticed Charlie was late because they thought, probably correctly, that they were in no way to attempt to find him. But now they couldn’t tell her until the next night.
“We can’t do anything,” Tanya said. “Even though Marilyn is in-town shopping right now, she would call Mom immediately if she found us gone. Also we couldn’t go look for him because we don’t know where he may be right now and we have no way to get there.”
“Both of us know how to operate an aircar,” Kristina responded.
“Right, and where are we going to get an aircar and even if we did we don’t know where to look for Charlie.”
“We can find him, Tanya, I just know we can. We have done things like that before,” Kristina pleaded with her sister.
“Yeah, and look what happened the last time. We got grounded for weeks.”
“Mom grounded us because of the incense we were burning in our bedroom. I am sure she doesn’t know all we can do when we put our heads together.”
“No incense,” Kristina agreed. “But I think we could do it with incense and mom wouldn’t know.”
The last was said by Kristina under her breath so Tanya didn’t hear it, but she probably knew it anyway.
The two girls climbed up to their bedroom and sat down on the wood floor cross legged, holding hands and concentrating on the location of Charlie Norton
*****
Sargent Onn entered Captain Santos’ office a little after midday. “What’s up, Captain, I got a comm this morning that you wanted to see me as so as possible. We haven’t had any more caravan attacks, have we?”
“Unfortunately, Sue, we have had another attack and this one killed a woman and child.”
“Oh, just peachy.” Sue had a hobby of studying of ancient sayings and tried to use one every time she had a conversation with the Captain.
“I don’t think it was very peachy, Sue, there are two witnesses that identified some of the attackers as Pawassa.”
“I don’t believe that for a minute.
I am not saying that just because my father is Chief of the tribe.
“I don’t believe either,” replied Captain Santos. “That is why you and I are going to visit your father and see what is going on. Check out a patrol aircar from the pool while I finish up a couple of assignments.”
“Will do, Captain. Do you think we will be there longer than tomorrow? If so, I will be sure to bring a field pack”
“I hadn’t planned on staying that long but we are getting off so late in the day that we probably won’t see your father until tomorrow sometime. For sure bring a field pack If you see Sargent Lanos send him in. I think he is somewhere around.”
*****
Professor Liam Smithe was deeply troubled. He was having problems sleeping. He couldn’t seem to concentrate on anything. He knew that he had fallen hard for Amanda. In his forty-six years of existence he had never felt this way. Oh, he had any number of short affairs on the planets he was sent to, and they were enjoyable. But nothing like this. One kiss. Liam really didn’t know Amanda that well but it didn’t matter. He had to see her again, as soon as possible. But his job. That was where the trouble occurred. Never before had he let personal feelings interfere with work. He knew that he had been called something of a cold fish by the few friends he had in the Department. He wasn’t cold, just dedicated to his job. Until now. Liam plain didn’t know what to do and that frightened him most.
Working for the Federation did not lend itself to a wife and family. What woman would put up with changing planets every few months or years, depending on the job? Or worse living on one planet and putting up with Liam traveling ninety-five percent of the time. That would never work. Ye Gods, he was thinking about wanting to marry Amanda? That was crazy. Finally, Liam put the problem aside. He had to finish the job here on the Edge World before he decided any future plans, even if Amanda would have him. Something he was all not too sure about. He would see Amanda in a few days and perhaps it was time to start bringing local police authority into the picture. He would see. Amanda was a very independent, strong woman who might think he was trying to control her in some manner. He didn’t know. That was the trouble, he didn’t know. The best he could do is try and keep his feelings separate from his work.
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