B2 Computer Search (Patreon)

Made a little more progress on Executioner's Gambit today. In the previous version, Asui was suspected of filming Boots, not murdering people, so I had to do a lot of re-arranging.

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Tori’s strand rang, and although the number wasn’t in her address book, she immediately recognized the adolescent living next door. “Tori?” he said with worry clear in his voice. “Hey, this is Inea. Mom gave me your number. I really need your help. They arrested my best friend!”

“They did? Who did?” she asked, turning off to a quieter, lonelier corridor so she wouldn’t miss a word.

“I dunno. Security! They accused Asui of being The Executioner and dragged him out of class,” Inea said. “I heard them say something about searching his apartment.”

Tori scratched the back of her head. She’d never even heard the name before. He wasn’t in any of her notes. Was he a suspect she needed to know about? And a teenager who’d been “dragged from class”? That was intriguing!

She set her jaw, determined to learn more. “Okay, I’ll handle this. What’s his address?”

She hurried as quickly as she could, but by the time she arrived, she found an older gal with evenly mixed grey and brown fur blocking the door to the apartment. Chief Tipohee and Officer Sese were confronting her, but the gal’s golden eyes were fixed on the chief, her ears set in a clear I-will-not-budge posture.

“Problem, sir?” asked Tori.

Tipohee rolled his eyes. “Won’t be, as soon as Nija gets out of my way and lets me do my job.”

“There’s no damn way that’s happening,” she huffed. “My son is a good cub who’s never been in a lick of trouble. There’s no way I’m gonna let you interrogate him like he’s a common criminal.”

“Asui is a suspect in The Executioner case?” asked Tori, butting in once more.

This raised the chief’s ears in surprise, as he clearly didn’t expect the investigator to know the suspect’s name and why the chief wanted to question him. But only for a moment, then he lowered his ears back down and glared at Tori. He hissed, “You may want to work alone, but it’s still my case,” he growled. “Security is a team.”

Tori nodded. “Yeah, and as a team,” she replied, “I’d appreciate you sharing any leads you get. This case is my only job, y’know?”

“Okay, fine,” he agreed. “I got a tip-off that Asui is the killer.”

“A tip?” growled Asui’s mother. “From who?”

Tipohee turned back to face her and snarled. “It was an anonymous tip!”

“You liar!” she shouted.

Tori rubbed her face with one paw and tugged on her boss’s wrist with the other, leading him a short ways away. “Sir, an anonymous tip about a teenage murderer? You realize this is a shit lead, right?”

“Why? Teenagers are incapable of poisoning people?”

“No, I’m sure they’re capable of it,” sighed Tori, “but they’re also capable of making up anonymous tips to get their classmates in trouble. You can bet that whoever gave you this tip was way more interested in seeing Asui dragged from school than they were about stopping a serial killer.”

“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you, you moron!” Nija practically shouted.

The chief closed his eyes. In a quiet voice, he admitted, “I’m sure you’re probably correct, but what if the tip is legit?”

Tori shrugged. “Doubt it.”

“What happens if it turns out that Asui was the killer all along?” He stared into her eyes. “What do you think will happen to me, to my job, if I could have prevented a murder, but I didn’t bother following up on a tip?”

Oof, yeah, that would look bad, she admitted to herself. “Yeah, good point,” she whispered. Tori let a casual smile spread across her ruined ears as she stepped closer to Nija. “Well, since we all know this is obviously a fool’s errand and the chief just needs to check this interview off so he can get on with his real work, why don’t you let us in for a quick and casual—”

“Are you as deaf as you are ugly?” shouted Nija. She shoved Tori hard against the wall, and the investigator cried out in agony at the unexpected contact. “I just said that I’m not letting anyone in!”

The chief’s eyes went wide at Nija’s reaction, but Sese was far quicker to respond. She shoved a muscular arm between the two and forced the older gal back as she inserted herself between. Nija backed away, clearly not wanting to take on the larger officer, but there was no indication that she had changed her mind about allowing the interview.

“Are you okay, Tori?” Sese asked, not taking her eyes from Nija.

“I’ve been better,” she groaned, straightening back up. “Bet you didn’t think you’d be breaking up a fistfight today, huh?”

“Okay, enough of this stupid crap,” grumbled the chief. He shoved a stubby finger into the middle of Nija’s chest. “I asked if we could interview your son only out of professional courtesy, but I’ve got a million other things to do today, and I’m not wasting any more time on this task than I need to. I’m going to search your cub’s room for evidence, and I’m going to interview Asui.”

She started to growl something, but Tipohee ignored her. “Officer Sese, if Nija attempts to interfere in any way, you have my permission to sit on her until I’m finished.”

Nija’s jaw hung open. “You wouldn’t dare!”

But that just made Sese grin. She leaned a little closer, but Tori could hear her whisper, “Please give me an excuse.”

“Or charge her with assaulting an officer and haul her before a judge,” said the chief as he pushed his way inside. “I really don’t care.”

With an indignant Hrmph! the older gal hurried after Chief Tipohee and called out to her son, “Go to the kitchen, hon.” Then, in the same breath, she snarled at the chief, “Make it quick. You do not want me as your enemy.”

“I think we’re a little past that,” grumbled Tipohee.

Inside the apartment, Nija gestured to the hallway with a flip of her paw. “Asui’s room is on the left. But you won’t find anything, and you definitely won’t wreck anything. If any of my son’s possessions get broken, you will be buying him replacements.”

With a nod from Tipohee, Sese headed to the bedroom. Nija followed her cub to the table and laid a gentle paw on his shoulder. “Dear, sit at the table. It’s okay. I’ll be right here.”

There were three chairs around the table, and Asui took the far one. Nija took the nearest seat and scooted it around to the table’s corner, crowding the remaining seat between her and her son.

Tori growled softly in frustration. She ached badly now—far more than usual—and she really wanted to sit down, but she wasn’t going to climb over the older gal to get to the empty seat.

Asui was a handsome cub—a bit scrawny and still in that awkward stage where all his growth had been up, not out. He reminded her of when cubs made noodles out of clay, rolling a ball between their palms, turning it longer and skinnier.

This whole interview was a waste of time, and Tori’s mood was growing darker by the moment, but she refused to lash out at the cub. “Asui,” she said, “this is Security Chief Tipohee and I’m Investigator Tori. We want to ask you a few questions about the murders.”

“My son wouldn’t know anything about that!” insisted Nija, with nose in the air. She put a paw protectively on the cub’s shoulder.

“Mom,” he groaned, drawing the sound way out in a whine and trying to shrug his shoulder out from beneath her touch, “everyone knows about The Executioner, everyone knows he’s putting Boots in the trash.”

Nija looked as if she’d smelled something unpleasant but didn’t respond.

Tipohee had left the front door open behind him, and a tall geroo with a bright yellow pelt peeked in. “Is everything okay, Nija?” he asked. “I heard—”

“Mind your own business, Tati!” shrieked Nija, and the male darted out of sight.

Tori blinked a few times, her eyes flashing between Nija and the empty doorway. Eventually, she cleared her throat and turned her attention back to Nija’s son. “Did you take the pills from the pharmacy?”

“No,” he said.

“Did someone steal them for you?”

“No.”

“Do you know who did?”

“No!”

Asui breathed hard, the air whistling as he sucked it in and spit it out, clearly upset by the questions. Tori gave him a moment to relax. She tried to be non-confrontational. “Any guess as to who might have said you did?”

Asui’s chocolate brown ears laid flat, and his expression darkened. “There’s a few cubs at school that are mean to me, but I didn’t think any of them would lie about something like this.”

Tori opened her muzzle to ask more questions but paused when Sese emerged from the youth’s room. “Did you find any evidence?”

“Tablet,” said the big officer. She handed the computer over to her boss.

“So what?” growled Nija, pushing back her chair to stand. “He has to have a tablet for his schoolwork! And what does a tablet have to do with murder?”

“Searching a suspect’s computer is a standard part of every inquiry. I’ll need Asui’s strand too.” Chief Tipohee ran his paws over the tablet’s surface. “And this is a really nice tablet, really expensive. I bet it’s super-fast.”

Nija started to sputter, too angry to form words, but despite Tori’s lingering aches, she asked, “Where’d you get such a great computer, Asui?”

“It’s a hand-me-down from my mom,” he said. He looked particularly worried now, and his eyes stared only at the computer.

Tori turned back to Nija, but the older gal was glaring at her. With a growl, she explained, “I’m the ship’s computer chief. Is it surprising that my old tablet would be a nicer model?”

Tori gulped. The computer chief? Ancestors help me! she thought. First the chief of security, then the captain, the commissioner, and now the chief of DevOps? If I never have to deal with someone in charge again, it will be too soon.

Tipohee pulled a small memory stick from the holster on his shoulder and stuck it in one of the tablet’s expansion ports. When her eyes caught his, he explained, “Just scanner software.”

Tori blinked. “You have a program that searches for murder evidence? How convenient.”

He smiled, but Nija sneered, “The company maintains a database of hashes and heuristics that will detect suspicious messages and contraband files.” She glowered at the investigator until Tori lowered her eyes. “Want to guess whose group maintains it?”

Instead of replying, Tori watched the progress bar creep its way slowly across the screen. The silence was so oppressive that she thought she might scream. The minute it took to finish felt like hours.

But she wasn’t the only one suffering. Asui looked like he might keel over at any moment. Tori bit her lip. “Afraid the chief might find something, son?”

Asui lowered his eyes, refusing to look at anyone.

Tori turned to Sese. “I take it you uncovered nothing else suspicious in Asui’s bedroom?”

Sese smiled but shook her head.

The tablet beeped suddenly, and everyone turned to stare at Chief Tipohee while he casually scrolled through a long list of files.

When she could wait no longer, Tori whispered, “So? Did you find anything?”

The chief yanked the scanner stick from the computer and tucked it back in his strand pocket. “Buncha porn,” he said with a shrug. The insides of Asui’s ears heated bright-red and his mother glared at his lowered head. “There’s a copy of Boots too, but I think everyone’s downloaded it at this point.”

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Reviewer's link: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ysYEqJTb7kbwpbLjAlplEIFYPf-NwybtDpJMhBOFTpk/edit?usp=sharing

Thoughts?