C11 Cheese Roll (Patreon)

More of Executioner's Gambit, but this can't be good...

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Tori sat in the market with her cheek resting on a table and a blanket draped over her, shivering. A familiar voice called out, “Tori? Are you okay?”

She glanced up at Sese and shook her head with a tiny movement. “No, I’m cold, and I’m tired.”

“Yeah, whatever’s going wrong with this ship, engineering needs to find it and fix it,” complained the big security officer. “It was chilly this morning, and it must be ten degrees colder now!”

Tori knew that engineering was dropping the temperature intentionally, but that was a secret, of course, so instead she mumbled, “I guess the reactor rebuild is keeping everyone busy.”

Sese pulled out a seat and sat close beside Tori. She reached over to touch the investigator’s face, but when Tori flinched, she lightly touched the blanket instead. “Where have you been? I’ve been calling, leaving you messages. I’ve been worried.”

“I’m sorry, Sese,” Tori sighed. “The captain assigned me a really important task.”

Sese’s ears splayed in confusion. “Really important? What could be more important than hunting a serial killer?”

Tori desperately wanted to tell her friend the truth, that the commissioner had been murdered and if they couldn’t conceal the truth, that they’d all die, but naturally she couldn’t. “He’s got me supervising three shifts of engineers. I’ve been grabbing a few minutes’ sleep here and there, but they’re running me ragged.”

“But what about the case? You’re the only one with access to the wireless logs.” Sese asked, “Did you find any proximity overlaps between Computer Chief Nija’s murder and Inspector Rae’s murder?”

“Aw, crap, Sese. I’m sorry,” groaned the rusty red geroo. She covered her face with her paws. “Captain Gutassi has kept me so busy that I completely forgot to look.”

“Well, can you look now—or give me the files, and I’ll look?”

There was no way that Tori could focus on her strand at this point. All she could think of was the exotic forensic methods that krakun investigators had available to them: fingerprints, DNA typing, stochastic heat mapping… What would a detective from Krakuntec use to prove the geroo had tampered with Troykintrassa’s shuttle? Would there be any way to save the crew? “Here, take them. I’m really sorry about this,” she whispered, pulling her strand from her shoulder and flicking at the files. “You could have had the case solved already, but I’m the one holding it up.”

“It’s fine. At least I’ve got them now,” said Sese with a compassionate smile. She poked at her own strand. “I’ll just sort both lists by name and check each name on the shorter list to see if it’s also on the longer one…”

After a few moments of fiddling with the data in silence, she asked, “Why does the captain have you supervising engineers anyhow?”

Tori closed her eyes and pulled the blanket over her head. The disheveled heap of cloth mumbled, “I can’t say. It’s all super top-secret stuff.”

“Oh,” said Sese. Then, “Oh! Oh! Oh! Here’s a match.”

Tori’s head popped from the blanket with eyes wide open. “You found one? Who?”

“It says, ‘Thojy’.”

“Oh, wow!” said Tori, her eyes wide. “Not Thojy.”

“Wait, do you know him?” asked the officer.

“Yeah, he’s my next-door neighbor’s best friend.” She snapped her fingers at a memory and pointed. “Remember, the electrician who helped us find Nija’s office?”

Sese nodded. “White fur, charming, told us a ridiculous story about a food delivery mishap?”

“Yeah, that’s him.”

“Huh.” Sese set her strand on the table and sat back in her seat with ears lowered. “Well, maybe it’s a coincidence that Thojy was in both places?”

“Or maybe it’s more than that,” said Tori. “Thojy really hated his boss, Nija. He said he hoped the killer got her before we caught him.”

“Oh, yikes.” Sese grimaced, her ears nearly turning inside out. “Perhaps, the killer is setting him up as a patsy, like he did with Asui?”

“Maybe,” the smaller geroo conceded, “but Thojy also had to downgrade apartments when he couldn’t make his rent. Yet on V-day, he bought a bottle of what was probably the most expensive brandy this ship has.”

Tori pulled the covers tighter around herself. “If he wasn’t getting paid a towering heap of credits for the murders, then where did he get so much money?”

The two lapsed into silence, leaving only the subdued bustle of the central market in their ears. “That’s a great question.”

On her strand, Tori pulled up her contact list. “I’ll call Administrator Holly,” she said. “If Thojy’s been stabbed, then he probably didn’t show up for work, and his boss would have put him on the incapacitated…”

Her words faded away and the two gals stared at one another until Sese offered the thought in both their minds, “Except someone beat his boss to death with a metal pipe yesterday.”

“Yeah.”

Sese cracked her knuckles and grinned. “Looks like it’s time I paid Thojy a little visit.”

Tori grabbed her arm with both paws. “Please be careful!”

“I always am, Tori.”

She nodded and sat back, staring at the table instead of her friend. Quietly, “I’ve got a lot of questions I want to ask him.”

Sese stood with a smile. “I’ll bring backup, but if you want to talk to him before a judge tosses him in the recycler,” she said, pointing an accusatory finger at the shorter gal, “you best stop ignoring my calls.”

“Okay, yes, I’m sorry about that.”

“It’s okay.” Sese waved goodbye as she turned away, calling, “I’ll message you as soon as I know something.”

# # #

After keeping the trinity offline for twenty-eight hours, engineering had rebuilt the reactor, and Tori had run out of ideas to cover up the mess. She’d checked off the final task from her to-do list and set the tablet full of illicit notes on the to-be-recycled pallet herself. Now, she waited against the back wall of the busy bridge, wrapped up like a cheese roll and nervously swinging her paws while the captain paced.

“Where’s Onaha?” she asked.

“Med bay,” grunted Gutassi. He blew into his paws to warm them. “Broke her ankle in some kinda accident. Bad luck piled atop of more bad luck.”

Tori sighed. “She gonna be okay?”

“I presume,” said Captain Gutassi. “Anything left? Is that everything?”

Tori shrugged. “I guess,” she said, “was everything on my list, at least.”

“Well, no point in dragging our tails,” he sighed. Then, in a louder voice, he announced, “Bring the trinity back online.”

“Coming online now,” said the lieutenant who’d first broken the news about the commissioner’s plumbing. “Reactor approaching one hundred percent. Drive, recycler, and gate online.”

Gutassi sighed. “Nothing to do now but wait—”

“Incoming call from Krakuntec,” said the lieutenant.

“They wasted no time,” muttered the captain, scratching the back of his neck. “Put it on screen.”

The screen at the front of the bridge flickered, and a thick green krakun appeared. “Where in the names of the dead gods have you been?” she demanded. “You’ve been out of contact for two days straight!”

“I’m very sorry, ma’am,” apologized the captain, his back straight and paws folded behind him. “I … misunderstood the commissioner’s orders, so we ended up doing two trinity shutdowns back-to-back. It won’t happen again.” He paused. “If I may, ma’am, who am I addressing? Usually, only the deputy commissioner ever contacts—”

“You just stay right there, mammal,” warned the krakun. “Don’t you move a muscle.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Gutassi sighed.

A moment later, the call became a three-way—the screen splitting down the middle and a new krakun face appearing on the right half of the video connection. “Detective Jintauroka?” said the green krakun sweetly. “This is Overseer Saqqadr, director of the geroo fleet for Planetary Acquisitions. We spoke yesterday.”

“Yes, I recall,” said Jintauroka as his eyes scanned the image on-screen. “Is this the mammal in charge of your wayward ship?”

“Yes, sir, this is Captain Gutassi of the Sailor’s Gambit I.”

“Wayward ship?” squeaked Gutassi as he glanced back toward Tori. “Now, wait a minute. Commissioner Troykintrassa ordered us to begin the reactor rebuild as soon as he was safely back in Krakuntec space. I don’t understand why us being offline should surprise—”

“I have a number of questions for you, mammal,” interrupted Detective Jintauroka.

“Yes, sir,” sighed Gutassi. “How can I help you?”

“Not you,” huffed the detective. He pointed at the screen, his eyes in a squint. “You there, in the back. The one wrapped in a blanket.”

“Me?” peeped Tori in surprise. “Why me?”

“Prepare to receive me within the hour,” said the detective. “Don’t keep me waiting.”

The call ended as abruptly as it began, and every geroo turned to stare at the frightened gal in the blanket.

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Reviewer's link: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1X52Vn_EEAz14yXcudiWeH3jY_O629mjV1y91qUP9oQc/edit?usp=sharing

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