The “Milli-Cochrane Caper” {Act 1.3}

Posted on Thu 15th Oct, 2020 @ 3:48am by Renato Solis & Mozatholm Zaldekulmu

1,960 words; about a 10 minute read

Mission: Denouement
Location: Brown Sector: Section 221-b "Midnight"
Timeline: MD 2, 0700

Renato was reading the coroner's report of the body found the morning before. There were a few fair points, no direct contact points and electromagnetic determinants were a likely sign a bio-bed was used as a restraint. Power demands were not difficult to mask, though the wiring had to be split to several conductive grids, given safety concerns. Rewiring the plate grid was hard work, and very noticeable. He slurped breakfast cereal to Kya's chagrin, as he spoke to her between bites.

"Moz will need to go to the junk bins later. Where is he? We need to get started."

Kya just raised an eyebrow. "It's 0700, so he is with his family, likely asleep. He will be here, but do not call him to wake him up. You know that's inappropriate, right?"

He hated waiting but knew she was right, "Well take notes, I've got an idea forming here."

Kya slammed a pen and paper in front of him. "Or talk to your PADD, I'm not your secretary."

Knowing him all too well, she also topped off his cereal, soaking up the excess milk and making a soggy half wet bran-cake. He glared at her but said nothing, knowing better than to bite the hand that fed him. He resigned himself to re-reading the reports, looking for angles, hoping his partner in crime would arrive soon.

Mozatholm arrived at the community center at about 0800 hours. He knocked on Renato's door with a freshly-baked cheese roll in one hand. "Good morning," he said. "I am sorry I'm late; it was my turn to wash the breakfast dishes. Do you want a cheese roll?"

Solis smiled at the offer, "Yes! Kya managed to ruin cereal. Call herself a chef, does she?" He winked at Moz, taking the cheese roll.

Kya ignored him, "Moz, is cheese all you've had this morning? I saved you a pear."

Full mouth, Renato was wide eyed looking at her, "Hyooh hfed we wuh owt."

"No, Ma'am, I had breakfast at home," Mozatholm said. His eyes sparkled with mischief--or amusement. "I wouldn't pass up a pear, though. Thank you."

Kya looked to Renato, "See, Moz would have gone without a delicious pear." She had it cut and plated in seconds, those chef hands a whirl.

"Eat your pear then, favorite son. I need to run the day's work by you. First, tell me you have special insights on the ghosts around here. I've been eating up any data, and I'm trying to get a composite sketch done of what people saw, but results have been varied. Poor Deputy Kiro seems to be blinded."

"As if you think I wouldn't share," Mozatholm said. He picked up a chunk of pear and bit into it as he slid the plate toward Renato.. "Mm! This is good. Thank you, Kya."

Kya smiled at him, "You deserve it, and you're welcome." She returned to the day's stew preparation, since lunch service started in three hours. The noise and clamor, the rich and savory smells, both provided the perfect backdrop to read the briefs and talk shop. Also, Kya fed anyone she was near unconsciously without tracking it. One could eat very well staying quiet and sitting still near her.

Renato was hesitant to launch into the third item. He had been operating on slightly wrong information. Li Kainon's office had dispatched a reply to the earlier message Renato had sent, Man with Red Shoes from the Fools Errand was meeting with Kit and Fisk, at Madame Morbo's. Secret tunnel connecting Morbo's and Siskar's Casino behind the painting in ....

The reply had been succinct, cutting to the quick. Private citizens are not allowed to discuss ongoing cases or pursue private investigation of affairs. This will serve as your only written warning, you are not authorized to investigate any crime. It is a breach of Station Ethical Protocols to pursue such investigations on your own. You are ordered to maintain lawful sound distance, and report to your local constabulary any evidence of wrongdoing. The elected sheriff, Li Kainon, has entrusted this office with upholding the standards fought for in previous generations. Further action in violation of this order may result in actions taken by this agency.

There was a comment, added in the private log attached to main file, Secret Tunnel? We have internal sensors, and no there is no tunnel.

Renato's attention returned to the table, and he decided to leave that out. His association with Moz was largely clandestine, and he trusted the lad to carry this out. "We need to find that tunnel or explain how they are crossing between two places like that. Transporter... personal cloak maybe? I messed up, and got barred from the investigation."

"Disappointing, but not terribly surprising," Mozatholm said. "Have you ever thought about getting licensed?"

"I think about it all the time." Renato deflected the immediate anxiety the thought of taking any official tests for law enforcement gave him.

"Then stop thinking about it. Study for it, and do it," Mozatholm said, as if it were that simple.

Solis simply harrumphed mildly in his throat, and grabbed a piece of pear. He used the work to distract himself, "Now then, these gentlemen cross a whole deck unseen, Kit and Fisk, enter Morbo's at 0900, and exit Siskar's at 1450. They meet a man from Fools Errand, disappear for 5 hours, reappear without this man in red shoes ...."

He was talking to himself in a rant. "How do they go up a deck and over a thousand feet away without a secret passage? So, I ask, cloak? No. Observation rules that out. Transporter? Power generators down here are only accessible via tiny shafts or site to site. Guess what the crews use most often. It's impossible to sort the signal decays on top of the fusion generators and containment. However, EPS power trunks demonstrate only Siskar's mounts a 4X manifold even remotely able to power a transporter pad independently of the station grid. My access to Station power consumption records is not great, but even with what I have, it shows there is no power demand equal to the task of single station site-to-site beaming."

He couldn't help but smile, the message from Li's office had confirmed with internal sensors that no official passage or secret one was made. Or, at least, one evident to prying unlicensed investigators. Madame Morbo's was a casino with sexy women. Siskar's was a gambling den with smoke and dancing. Both trafficked in illegal industries. They were connected, working together to obfuscate their business practices. Kit and Fisk were two new contacts, seen from their respective operations interacting. This one time, they slipped up, and Renato knew the two businesses had a secret connection. It just had to be found.

He pointed to the reconnaissance photos he had gathered, the vaults of the two businesses. "How would you sneak from one to the other? Here are the pictures of the offices and vaults. Look at that over-drawn, oversized, garish monster of a painting on an otherwise sparsely decorated wall and tell me there isn't a tunnel behind there?"

"Why have a garish painting there?" Mozatholm asked. "Why not just a boring landscape? But anyway, a tunnel that large, if it exists, ought to show up to internal sensors. Is there a way to mask such a tunnel? And if there truly is no tunnel, and not enough off-grid transporter power to transport a person, what about airlocks? Almost six hours is plenty enough time to get from Morbo's to Siskar's, even if you're having to travel one at a time in a workbee. No one pays attention to workbees."

Moz had a good idea there, but it was something else he said that gave Renato pause. "Why did they pick an outlandish painting? And where did the man in red shoes go?" He hated to leave a mystery dangling, but that was all the information they had to act on.

"Maybe he just changed his shoes?" Mozatholm suggested. "If his shoes were all anyone was paying attention to, that might be all it would take for him to disappear."

Moz earned his pay every day with good points like that. "I was tracking red shoes, he had other hallmarks, 1.7 meters, humanoid, gray skin, long brown workman's coat, not burned or stained by oil. Shoes were expensive velour, no limps, hands in unburnished leather gloves. There were no other passengers on Fools Errand, so he booked private passage on a freighter that holds a dozen passengers. I know him to his molecules."

Changing the subject again, Renato asked, "Have you talked to anyone who has seen one of these ghosts?"

"No, but everybody's talking about them," Mozatholm said. "I heard an entire restaurant got cleared out because of someone screaming. I thought maybe it was someone pulling a prank to rob the place, but the restaurant wasn't robbed. Whatever's going on, the sightings sound pretty frightening. Do you have any ideas?"

Leaning in for another slice of pear Kya cleared her throat to stop him. She wasn't even looking this way. He hated her for that, felt bad for hating her, decided he would watch the children and let her go out, to make it up to her and not say a word about why he offered. Suitably resolved, he grabbed the slice anyway.

"Worth looking into about the restaurant. I can see if anything was reported missing. I've heard of four sightings so far, and poor deputy Kiro was blinded ... hold on ...."

Epiphany took him for a ride, and Renato felt his pulse quicken. "No, it was a rich man covering himself in a poor man's jacket. Kit and Fisk are gophers in this, that man was the package .... You know Moz, that painting really shouldn't be so garish. I mean there are straight, vertical lines on a large flat wall. The decorator would have to be tacky or blind. It's a door. They framed a door, disguised it as a painting. Moz! There isn't a passage, but a room. If there is a room, there can be a power supply we aren't aware of!"

"If there is a room, why would they need a power supply for a transporter? Just cut a hole in the far wall to get into Siskar's," Mozatholm said. "There are plenty of builders in the Sector and the Zodiac who would do that off book, for the right price."

Hearing someone else arrive to a logical conclusion he had also arrived at was confirmation enough of that line's reasoning. "Marvelous, my boy, you've volunteered for a trip to the junk bins. Internal scans compare to previous ones. I'll look into the computer logs for changes, and you see if there is debris from recent construction. You'll know it's from Siskar's if it has nicotine tar buildup on it. I should have an access code for the center here. Kya?"

He knew she was listening, she knew he knew. She said nothing, so he simply spoke on, "Do you have the codes for the bins?"

"I'll go with him, it's keyed to my biometrics." This was a lie, but she felt it necessary; the junk bins could offer real danger. It was a large facility with many dark corners. She was aghast Renato would send Moz there alone. He had no grip on reality and relied on her far too much for sensibility.

Mozatholm shot a look at Kya. "Us and what army?" he muttered. The junk bins were a popular place for scavenging. "We'll have to fight off half the Zodiac just to take a look." He glanced at Kya. "When are you able to go?"

 

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