The Dyson File, page 5
“What are you doing?” Parks asked.
“Fixing your mistake.”
“SysPol Support,” a woman said over voice chat. “Good day to you, Sergeant Chatelain. I see an existing case number referenced in the call. Give me a moment to pull up its status. Ah, here we are. Looks like the case hasn’t been reviewed for assignment yet. How can I help you?”
“I need to cancel the support request.” He shot Parks a fierce eye. “My partner placed it by mistake.”
“Sarge—”
Chatelain made a sharp slashing motion across his throat.
“Of course, Sergeant,” the dispatcher said. “I can take care of that for you. Can you please give me the reason for the cancellation?”
“Lack of communication between me and my partner. We weren’t on the same page when he called earlier.”
“I’ll put that down as ‘incomplete information.’ Since you’re Trooper Parks’ superior, you have the authority to close his support request yourself. Please confirm you wish to close it.”
“Yes. I want it closed.”
“Very good. I have appended the case with your cancellation request. Is there anything else I can help you with today?”
“Nope. That’ll do it.”
“Then have a good day, Sergeant. SysPol Support out.”
The comm window vanished, and Chatelain turned back to Parks.
“I’m going to let this one slide just because you’re new at this, but if you ever pull shit like that on me again, I’ll make sure it ends up on your permanent record. You can argue with me all you want. I’m a big boy. I can take it. But once your superior makes the call, that’s that. Get in line or get out of the force. Have I made this clear enough for you?”
“Yeah, it’s clear.”
“Good.” Chatelain switched on the quadcopter’s rotors. “Now let’s get this corpse back to the station.”
* * *
Mitch hated meetings.
Which wasn’t surprising, since there were a lot of things he hated, and he wasn’t shy about sharing his ever-growing list of disdain with those around him. For one, he hated when people asked him “Mitch what?” as if they found the simplicity of his name offensive.
Which, he considered, was perhaps a form of symmetry since he found most names from his fellow abstract citizens to be pretentious drivel. What was wrong with “Mitch?” He saw no reason for anything fancier. It was the name he’d chosen to identify his artificial connectome. What more did he need? Certainly not an example of audible diarrhea like “Quantum Luminary” or “NeoHawking.”
He let his actions speak for themselves, without the baggage of frivolous word association. It was one of the reasons why he preferred to keep to his own quiet corner of the Kronos infostructure. The solitude allowed him to focus on what was important, which was overseeing the many Themis departments under his command so that they continued to shove their boots up crime’s figurative ass.
He loved that part about his job the most, especially the look on a criminal’s face/avatar when he/she/it was brought to justice. It represented the moment when a measure of beautiful order was restored where only chaos had once reigned, and it was as sweet to him as a tall glass of ice water at the end of a long day working in the sun.
He didn’t drink, of course. Didn’t eat either, virtual or otherwise. He’d never seen the point in integrating with some walking meat terminal so he could experience the physical world through shared organic senses. Why were so many of his fellow ACs obsessed with “eating food” through the senses of an integrated companion? What was the point? The solar system would be a better place if everyone would hurry up and abstract already, but he’d accepted long ago that for all the advancements in medical science, there still wasn’t a cure for dumb.
He’d been rereading one of Horace Pangu’s books recently. His most famous one, in fact. It was titled A Tale of Stars and Meat, and it advocated for the complete virtualization of the human race. The book was one of his favorites, and he tried to find time to reread it once a year.
Mitch’s austere views extended to his choice of avatar for this meeting. As a being of pure data, he could manifest in the meeting with any shape he wished. His fellow superintendents often criticized him for his rudimentary approach to avatar selection, but what they didn’t realize was he took extra care in selecting the most annoyingly simplistic designs he could find.
Today he’d chosen a large circle suspended over his seat at the conference table like a yellow full moon, complete with exaggerated eyes and mouth. The face wasn’t smiling or frowning. Rather, it was locked in a dull expression, neutral and unimpressed.
His fellow superintendents all sat at the table physically, most of them old enough to have transitioned into synthoids, along with a virtual representation of Colonel Raj Heppleman from the SSP, who’d joined their meeting remotely from the Second Engine Block. He’d spent the entire meeting complaining.
“Well, Mitch?” Ishii Takuya asked pointedly, arms crossed as he glared at Mitch’s expressionless hover-face. “Got anything to add for the colonel?”
Ishii was head of the Kronos’ Arete Division, in command of SysPol First Responders in the Saturn State. He was a bicentennial in what Mitch assumed was meant to be a “ruggedly handsome” synthoid body clad in the red of Arete Division. He was also no fan of Mitch’s methods or personality, and the feeling was very, very mutual.
Mitch had a lot of opinions about Ishii, most of them negative. For one, the Arete superintendent had a truly obnoxious habit of scheduling meetings for pretty much everything, as if talking about a problem was somehow the equivalent of solving the problem.
“No,” Mitch replied. “Not especially.”
His avatar’s mouth didn’t move with the words.
“If the Themis superintendent doesn’t,” Heppleman said, “then I do. This lack of results is intolerable. We informed SysPol of these disappearances nearly two weeks ago, and what do we have to show for it? A big, fat zero. That’s what. The city council is breathing down my neck on this one. They’ve been doing their best to keep public perception of the case under control, but sooner or later we”—he made a sharp, all-inclusive gesture around the table—“need to show them and the public we’re not sitting around picking our noses!”
“Colonel, please.” Ishii put on a forced smile. “We’ve demonstrated for you how seriously we take this problem. Arete has dedicated a full department to supplement the city’s own police force.”
“Throwing more people and equipment at a problem is a start, but where’s the progress? Where are the results? Where are our missing people?!”
“I’m sure it’s only a matter of time, Colonel.”
“And what about Themis?” Heppleman demanded, eyeballing the floating yellow face. “What about the investigation itself?”
“Mitch?” Ishii asked with a raised eyebrow. “Care to field this one?”
“Appropriate resources have been allocated to the case,” he answered simply.
“Yes,” Heppleman scoffed. “One additional detective!”
“And support staff,” Ishii said.
“Hardly a meaningful addition!”
“I disagree,” Mitch said.
“And why’s that?”
“Because you, like everyone else at this table, seem to be in a state of perpetual confusion.” The table sucked in a collective breath, but Mitch continued before any of the others could cut him off. “And that’s because you fail to grasp the difference between quantity and quality. Tell me, Colonel, what matters more? That we throw large numbers of aimless head count at a problem, or that we put the right people with the right experience and support in the right place? Which do you believe will produce the best results?”
“This case has been poorly staffed from the start.”
“You raise a point I’ve already conceded,” Mitch said. “Yes, we underestimated the extent of the problem, and the initial resources we allocated were insufficient for the task at hand. However, that issue has been rectified to my satisfaction.”
“Your satisfaction?” Heppleman sneered.
“Indeed. The Themis department now has the right people on the case. What more could you possibly want?”
“How about some damned progress? What are you doing to solve the case?”
“Nothing at all.”
“And why is that? Your colleague from Arete is practically tripping over himself to help us out, and yet you insist on sitting this one out?”
“That’s because I’m not a micromanaging jerk.” Mitch didn’t say the words “like the rest of you here.” He thought he showed considerable restraint with that omission.
“Ex-cuse me?” Heppleman said.
“Listen, Colonel. Management, at its core, is a simple vocation. Either you have the right people working for you, in which case you should trust them to do their jobs, or you don’t, in which case you should replace them. Or at the very least give them tasks that better match their lackluster skills.”
“Then you don’t believe this case warrants your personal attention?”
“No. It doesn’t.”
“I think what my colleague is trying to say,” Ishii said, “is all of us here have to be attentive to all the issues in the Saturn State, not just your own case, and that we must apply our time accordingly.” He shot Mitch a stern eye. “Isn’t that right?”
“Sure,” Mitch said. “You can think of it that way if it makes you feel better.”
His avatar changed for the first time since the meeting started, snapping from its bored expression to a toothy grin with wide, exaggerated eyes. A detached thumbs-up appeared beside the face.
Heppleman snorted.
“Perhaps there’s more we could be doing,” Superintendent Fergus Kayson offered, speaking up for the first time in the meeting. He wore the black of Argo Division’s patrol fleet. “I could move one of our larger cruisers down to Janus and position it near the Second Engine Block. From there, it could provide logistical support for the other divisions. Its presence would also serve as a clear visual reminder of how seriously we’re taking the problem.”
“An excellent idea,” Ishii said. “Colonel?”
“At this point, I’ll take whatever I can get.”
Mitch didn’t pay much attention to the rest of the meeting, mostly because the presence of the Argo cruiser would serve no practical purpose other than to “show people how much we care,” and that sort of style-over-substance decision-making held its own slot on his list of disdain.
He transferred back to his work area once the meeting wrapped up and began processing his mail, starting with a review of any unassigned cases. He worked through the newest messages, rejected a couple nuisance calls that Dispatch let slip through and forwarded the rest on to different departments depending on location, capacity, and the nature of the case.
He was near the end of the list when he stopped, his workflow halted by an unusual support request. Not because of the nature of the suicide case—the fundamentals seemed straightforward enough, at least on the surface—but because of the call record. A Trooper Randal Parks had placed the initial call, which was unusual in its own right. Troopers rarely placed such calls themselves unless it was an emergency, and a room temperature self-termination didn’t qualify. Even stranger, his sergeant had canceled the request almost immediately.
These two facts sparked Mitch’s curiosity. SSP troopers tended to reach for the simplest conclusion, and this suicide might be an example where the new guy saw something his more seasoned partner didn’t. Or didn’t want to see because of the extra work it entailed. Not all SSP troopers shared this lack of attention to detail, whether deliberate or otherwise, but it was a common enough trait to be a problem for Themis detectives.
The two troopers were flying to Janus, so Mitch sent them new orders, routing them back to Atlas mobile headquarters where they would await the arrival of a Themis detective. He checked the caseload of the departments working on or near Janus and forwarded the case number to Omar Raviv for assignment.
CHAPTER FOUR
“Here we are at last!” Nina declared, her overacting a sure sign she’d returned to her Radiant Blaze character. She brushed back one of her fiberoptic dreadlocks and smiled at Isaac and Susan. A nearby atmospheric unit switched on, and garbage fluttered across the street outside the dilapidated warehouse.
“Doesn’t look like much,” Susan said, surveying the building. She’d been looking forward to the Solar Descent session since Isaac had mentioned it after lunch. The day, like the ones before it, had dragged on with very little to occupy her time, and she welcomed the after-work diversion.
“Looks can be deceiving, though,” Isaac said, his purple eyes glowing from beneath his hood. “If our information is correct, the cultists behind Klynn’s disappearance will be inside.”
“Vanguard Cantrell!” Nina swung around to face her. “Since you’re the most heavily armored of us, would you be so kind as to check the door?”
“Sure.”
Nina and Isaac took a few steps back, almost as if they expected something bad to happen. It was a simple sliding door, rusted and unlocked. She grabbed the handle—
—and the door exploded outward into flame and scything shrapnel, throwing her back across the street until she skidded to a halt in a mound of trash.
“An exploding door?” Nina waved her hand back and forth to clear the smoke. “Really? What is with these developers and trapped doors?”
“Maybe they think it’s funny,” Isaac said. “You okay, Susan?”
“Umm.” She checked her health on her wrist display. “Mostly. Regen’s kicking in.” She rose to her feet, brushed herself off, and drew her sword. “I take it the bad guys know we’re coming.”
She paced toward the door with long, meaningful strides.
“Hold up,” Nina said. “Maybe there’s another entrance we can— And she’s gone inside.”
There was a spaceship in the warehouse. Not a nice, new, sleek spaceship, but one that looked like it had been cobbled together from junk and held in place with welded metal and prayers. It sat in the warehouse like a misshapen, metal egg on four squat legs. An elevator platform dropped down from the belly on four extendable poles.
Several figures stood on the platform, jammed so close together they resembled a singular, horribly mutated blob of flesh and machinery. They were humanoid rats about half Susan’s height armed with short swords, maces, and scimitars, their bodies augmented with all manner of cybernetics in place of their limbs and eyes.
“Rats,” Nina grumbled from the blasted doorway. “Always with the rats.”
“For the dark gods!” shouted one of the cyborgs, and the cultists charged off the platform.
A message alert from outside the game beeped next to Isaac.
“Hold on. It’s work.” The cyborg ratmen froze mid-charge, and he opened the comm window. “Hello, sir.”
“Isaac,” Raviv said. “Sorry to disturb you after hours.”
“It’s no trouble. What can I do for you?”
“The super sent in a new case, but it’s an odd one. On the surface, it looks like a straightforward suicide, but the deceased is a major player in the Dyson Project, and that makes me nervous. The case shouldn’t take more than a quick trip down to Janus, but we need to be certain this really is a suicide before we close it. Would you and Susan mind taking this one off the pile?”
Isaac made eye contact with Susan, who gave him an emphatic nod.
“Not at all, sir,” he replied. “We’d be more than happy to take care of it for you.”
“Wonderful. I’m sending you the details now.”
“We’ll get right on it.” Isaac closed the comm window.
“Does that man ever go home?” Nina asked.
“It’s not that late,” Isaac said, opening the case summary. “Deceased is named Esteban Velasco, one of the senior engineers for Atlas. Discharged a pistol into his own mouth.”
“Ouch.” Susan winced.
“We should go over the rest before we leave. Meet you back at the office?”
“Sure. I’ll head right over as soon as we disconnect.”
“Wait up.” Nina pointed to the cyborgs. “Can’t we at least reach a good stopping point? We’ve got space rats to kill.”
“Sorry, Nina.” Isaac gave her a sad smile. “Duty calls.”
* * *
“I can see why Raviv is torn on this case,” Isaac said once he and Susan were back in the office. He stood next to his desk, an array of abstract screens hovering before them. “Nothing stands out as unusual besides the SSP call record, and even that appears to be little more than a disagreement between two troopers. On the other hand, Velasco was a huge player in the Dyson Project, which has been notorious for the ugly politics and sabotage attempts that have dogged it since day one. That, plus the obscene amounts of money at play mean the project’s rife with temptation for bad actors. It’s no wonder he wants us to be extra certain on this one.”
“What kind of company is Atlas?” Susan asked.
“Large-scale construction with a heavy focus on megastructures and, to a lesser extent, terraforming. Atlas is best known for their macrotech constructors. They eschew the use of self-replicating swarms whenever possible.”
“Why’s that?”
“Mutations mostly. Any self-replication system, no matter how well designed, runs the risk of unexpected mutations as it expands. There are always countermeasures in place, but the risk of a dangerous change is never zero. By approaching their design problems on a macro-scale rather than a micro-scale, Atlas has earned a reputation for robust, reliable solutions, even if they give up some flexibility in the process.”
“Now that’s a philosophy I can get behind,” Susan said.
Isaac thought he understood her sentiment. Self-replicators were a Restricted technology in the Admin, and that was “Restricted” with a capital R. One of the Admin’s purposes was to enforce the Yanluo Restrictions on forbidden or limited technologies, and Susan—as a Peacekeeper—was sworn to uphold them.
