What's Next
_______________________
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The following preview of the next book in the series is provided for your reading pleasure. I hope you enjoy!
Stephen
(Preview)
OMEGA
(Vol. 2)
Guardian
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As I walked into the hallway surrounding the portal gate, I took note of the filthy, grimy walls and trash on the floors. The wall panels in every station I had ever been on were sparkling white and the floors sanitary. I looked around and also took note of the lack of travelers coming to Omega. Most gates had a small crowd gathered to move through them. I checked the time and saw it was 8:00 pm. universal time. A time when traveling would be at a peak. A single traveler walked past me carrying a duffel bag over his shoulder.
I was ordered to wait for someone from the security offices to pick me up. After two hours with no contacts, I found myself walking the halls and asking questions of passersby. With another hour of search, I was given the direction I required.
As I walked down the hallway to the security office, I stopped at the entrance doors. There, clearly marked on a glass pane, was the standard New Alliance security emblem. The door itself was not on its hinges, but instead stood leaning against the hallway wall. The other door, which remained hung, had a crack in the glass that ran from the top left to the bottom right.
I walked into the offices and after asking for the captain, was pointed toward a far door with stacks of paper lining either side. As I stood at the office entrance, I knocked on the door.
A grumbling, five-hundred-kilogram Gragorian looked up from behind his desk. “What do you need?”
“I’m your new detective, Knog Beutcher.”
Gragorians had four arms. And their large, blubbery torsos were topped with a pointy, round head that sloped downward into their massive upper bodies.
The captain nodded. “Yeah, you're Butcher, right? Have a seat. I’ll be with you in a minute.”
The captain held a lit stogie in his upper right hand as his upper left hand scratched the side of his head. His two lower arms were in use, trolling through a stack of documents on his desk.
“What’s with all the papers, Captain?”
The Gragorian looked up with a scowl. “It’s my job, that’s what it is, a never-ending stream of processed pulp being shoved onto my desk. Every station in the galaxy has equipment for computerized records. In Omega, we get whatever's left. And in the last ten years, even less. Baxter out there is the only one with a working computer, and that’s because he salvaged his own parts.”
He nodded toward the outer office. “You'll learn a couple of things quickly around here, Butcher: nobody is going to help you with your work, and this ain’t paradise. Hahahaha!”
The detective captain took a puff from his stogie. “My name is Rexigal Hollif. Nobody calls me Captain, just Rex. You will decide on your own assignments, and it’s your job to carry them out. I only care about one thing. If you bring in a report, I want to sign it and throw it on one of these stacks. If I have to read it, I’m going to be mad. If someone comes in here questioning it, I’m going to be mad. If anything at all comes up about that report that requires my attention, other than me signing it, I’m going to be mad.”
Rex stopped writing and placed his two lower hands palm down on the desktop. His upper left hand took the stogie while his upper right began to scratch the other side of his head.
“So, tell me what you've learned so far, Butcher.”
I looked around the room at the stacks of papers. “That you're going to be mad?”
The captain hesitated, then bellowed out a laugh as he pointed at me with his non-stogie hand. “Why is it they keep sending me the smart-ass ones? Well, welcome to the garbage pit of the galaxy, Butcher. If you want to wait out there by that desk for a couple of hours, Meli will be in. She can set you up with a station. When you're settled at your desk, she can give you directions to your ship. When you get back from checking that out, you're ready for your first case.”
I raised my hand. “First case? You don’t have any training for new officers? Something to show us the sector and what we can expect out there?”
The Captain again bellowed, “Training? Hahahaha! You're a riot, Butcher. Look, when you get your ship, it comes with a maintenance attendant. If you need your hand held, he or she can show you the ropes. Now, get out of my office before I get mad… hahahaha!”
I sat in the chair by Meli’s desk for three hours before she came strolling in. She looked like someone had taken a Human clown circus and fused it together with a Rappelon fashion show. Everything was shining and sparkly. Her wide lips were painted a bright red, and her high heels were covered with flashing iridescent lights. She was a Magonia, a common species in the Omega sector. They were not the brightest of species on the intelligence scale, but they very much liked to be noticed.
Meli sat in her chair and turned my way. “You must be the new guy. I’ve got a sharp eye; I can tell these things. Let’s see here, it says you come all the way from Alpha. Wow! Who did you kill to get sent here?”
Meli began to laugh with a snicker that turned into an all-out snort. “OK. That desk over in the corner, it used to belong to Hal Boban. Hal won’t be needing it anymore, so that one will be yours. If you want to clean it up, that’s up to you. None of his reports were complete, so the captain just says to pitch them. I figured I’d leave that for you if you're so inclined.
“After you get settled, come see me again, and I’ll take you down to Bay-68. That’s where the other four detectives can be found when they're here on station.
“Your maintenance guy is Gomelander; everyone calls him Go. Hal always had good things to say about him, other than always calling him a moron. Come to think about it, I don’t think Hal really liked anyone, so the kid must have done something right. If you need to know where anything is, just ask Go.
“Now, on to your quarters. Your housing is on level 99, hall F, room 17. That’s a bad draw. Level 99 does not have the best of crowds. I wouldn't walk around with my credit store visible if I were you. I personally know several people who've been robbed down there. Probably why most of the detectives just sleep on their ships.
“If you have any further questions, then don’t ask the captain; he gets mad. And don’t ask me because I don’t care, and it’s not my job to care. You five detectives work out your own schedules. When you're done with an assignment and ready to give a report to the captain, make sure all he has to do is sign it. Go tend to your desk, and when you're ready, I'll take you down to Bay-68.”
The desk in the corner was stacked high with papers. I wondered if it was just the dumping ground for anyone who didn’t want to walk down the hall to the recycling chute. I scoured the office for a cart with wheels and was soon making repeated trips to the chute. Fifteen minutes into my effort, Meli stood and walked out of the office.
An hour passed before I had the top of the desk in order, a second hour before the drawers and surrounding shelves had been emptied and dusted. I was delighted to see that my desk came with a lock and a key. I again scoured the office, this time in search of supplies. After not finding any, I turned to the old tried-and-true method of office pilfering. When I was satisfied with my haul, I closed and locked my desk. Meli was nowhere to be found.
Under my own initiative, I wandered out into the hallway. After asking numerous personnel who seemed to be aimlessly walking about, I received directions to Bay-68. The detective offices were on level 16. The e
levator only made it down to level 54 before mechanical issues prevented it from going further. I descended the remaining fourteen flights on foot.
When I entered Bay-68, I was taken aback by the scattered ship parts and greasy floors. The blue arc from a welder sparked brightly as a maintainer worked on a ship. Three ships were in the bay. Two Human men sat in lounge chairs beside two of the ships. The maintainer worked on the third.
I walked over to the two men. They seemed disinterested.
As I came to stop beside one of them, I said, “Can I guess you're a detective?”
The man looked up from the electronic magazine article he was reading. “What the? Hey, Gerald! Get a load of this guy! What are you supposed to be? I thought dinosaurs went extinct back on Earth millions of years ago. Hahahaha!”
Gerald looked up from his afternoon nap, grunted, and pulled his hat down over his eyes.
“I’m the new detective, Knog Beutcher. And if you were curious as to my species, I’m a Grunta.”
The man looked up. “Grunta? Whatever. And I think that’s junior detective, isn’t it? You have to earn your rank around here if you want to be called a full detective.”
“Is that ship over there mine? Is that Go?”
The man looked over at the maintainer and yelled, “Roger! Hey, Roger!”
When the maintainer turned to look back, the man I was standing over made a sawing motion with his hand under his chin. The man turned to move away from the ship just as another maintainer came through the hallway door.
The second, younger man yelled, “Hey! What are you doing! Thief! Get away from there!”
The man in the chair beside me snickered. “Yeah, that’s your ship over there. And that noobie carrying the bag with the squeaky voice, that’s Go, your maintainer. Good luck with that moron.”
I walked over to Go as he looked over the damage the other maintainer had done. “Jerk was trying to steal our wing modulator!”
“Wing modulator?”
Go nodded. “Yeah, it’s a piece of gear I added that will help absorb small blaster fire. There are a lot of illegal small arms out there and a lot of crews who'll shoot at your ship if you get on their bad side. I don’t like patching blaster holes, so I came up with the modulator. That jerk Roger will rob you blind if you turn your back.”
I pointed at the man in the chair. “Who's the detective I was talking with?”
Go sighed. “That’s Malcom Barber. He’s a waste of oxygen. He does nothing all day, rarely takes his ship out, and when he does, he always comes back flush with credits. I think he shakes down the legitimate captains out there. Most will give up a hundred credits without argument to avoid being harassed. The other one is Gerald. He leaves and comes back but never talks much. I don’t think he's turned in a report in two months. He mostly just sleeps.
“The other two who aren’t here are Carter and Boglio. Boglio is a Magonia. You met Meli. Boglio's the male version of her. All flash and no dash. Carter seems to be about the only normal guy out here. He minds his own business and turns in at least one report a week, and his maintainer, Elissa, well, she’s kind of hot.”
“Hot?”
Go nodded. “Yeah, well, you know, Human hot, cute, attractive. I don’t know what she's doing out here working on ships. I would have thought some rich guy would have grabbed her up. I think she comes from a rich family too. Whatever, I like having her around to look at. And she treats me nice, so, she’s hot.”
Go walked over to the hatch on the side of the ship. “Want to see her? I call her Mabel, but you can call her whatever you want, since she’s your ship.”
Go popped open the hatch and pulled it to the side. “There you go!”
I stepped in and immediately noticed the low ceiling. It was a full meter shorter than the one on the Daunte and a half meter short of its new captain’s height. I bent over as I stepped up into the cabin.
Go followed. “This is your bunk on the left. Your galley is here on the right. Your restroom and holding cell are here in the back. I mounted this fold-down guest chair in case you ever wanted to take someone else along. And there is your captain’s chair. I’m told that seat is real Earth leather. I couldn’t say for sure, but it’s real comfortable to sit in.”
I pointed to the console in front of the pilot’s chair. “Do you have an understanding of all the dials, gauges, and meters in this ship? I’m used to a consolidated view on a holo-display.”
Go smiled. “Yep, I’m the maintainer; I have to know what everything is and what it does, if I want to be able to fix it. You said your last ship had holo-displays? Wow. I think we're about five hundred years behind Alpha sector out here. Alpha, that’s where you came from, right?”
I nodded. “My ship was about three times the size of this one. I could stand up fully inside her. You would board her from a ramp-way beneath. She had two holding cells that were as big as this cabin. The restroom was separate. And there were two bunk rooms.”
Malcom spoke up from behind us. “Kid, don’t let the dino jerk you around. Captain said this is what all the detectives in the Alliance fly. They may get newer parts in Alpha, but they aren’t any better than we are.”
I turned toward Malcom with an irritated stare. He held up his hand as he backed out of the ship.
I looked to Go. “I think Mabel suits her. If you like Mabel, we’ll keep it.”
Go’s eyes got big. “Really? You like it?”
“I think she looks like a Mabel, and she feels like a Mabel.”
Go stuck his head out of the hatch as Malcom walked away. “Ha! It’s Mabel! He likes Mabel!”
Malcom looked back as he walked. “That’s because he’s a dinosaur! Oh man... I crack myself up.”
As Go turned back, I said, “Is she ready to fly?”
“Absolutely. That’s my job, to keep her ready to go whenever you need her.”
I sat and leaned back in the pilot’s chair, reaching over to unfold the extra seat Go had mounted to the wall. “Let’s go for a ride, then.”
Go stared at the chair. “Really? I get to go?”
“Well, seeing as how I don’t yet know how to fly this thing, yes.”
I looked at the controls that spanned from the near left to the far right across the console. The graphic display in front of me showed several lists. I had no idea of where to begin. Powering up and launching the Daunte was almost completely automated.
I looked down at the open floor space beside my chair. There were four bolt holes where I would have presumed a copilot’s chair would have been.
I pointed down at the floor. “Did that used to have a chair bolted down there?”
Go replied, “Yeah, Hal wanted it removed; he usually had a little refrigerator there instead. I think Roger broke in and stole the fridge a few weeks ago. It’s probably on Malcom’s ship right now, but I can’t see in there to verify it.”
I turned back to Go. “Do you still have the chair?”
Go shook his head. “Malcom's sitting in it.”
I nodded as I stood up and hunched over. “Let’s go get our chair back.”
Go leaped up, giddy with excitement. “I sure am happy to be your maintainer, Mr. Beutcher. I think things are finally looking up around here!”
I walked over and stood next to Malcom with Go eagerly standing behind me, sporting a big grin. “Mr. Barber. I believe you're sitting in my chair. I would like it back now.”
Malcom replied as he looked at his magazine, “It wasn’t bolted down. Rules of the bay say that makes it fair game for whoever can put it to use. And as you can see, I’m using it!”
Go reacted. “That’s our chair, get out of it!”
I turned back to face Go. He went silent.
When I returned my gaze to Malcom, he continued to swipe through his magazine.
“I’m asking you to please get out of my chair.”
Malcom shrugged. “Hmm.”
I leaned in close to his head and let out a low growl. “I wa
nt my chair. Either you get out of it now, or I pull you out by your head.”
Malcom showed a sudden nervousness. He stood and held out his magazine in a 'take it' gesture. I picked up the heavy leather-and-steel chair with one hand and turned back toward the Mabel. Go was beside himself.
As I walked away, Malcom said, “I should report you for threatening me!”
I laughed. “I’m sure the captain will want to hear all about that. You should go up and tell him right now.”
Malcom turned toward Gerald. “Gerald, did you see that? The dinosaur took my chair!”
Gerald glanced up, chuckled, and pushed his hat back over his eyes.
I carried the chair into the cockpit. “How long to get this bolted in?”
Go replied as he headed for his tools, “Give me three minutes.”
The scrawny Human was in and out of the cockpit several times in the three minutes he had budgeted. On his third trip, the lights on the chair arm lit up and the console recognized the copilot’s controls.
Go smiled. “All set!”
I pointed back. “Button up that hatch, and let’s take her out.”
We soon lifted off the deck. Go walked me through the steps for exiting the gravity wall into free space beyond.
I asked, “We don’t have to file flight plans? And what of portal sweeps? Do we call them in if we have the coordinates?”
Go laughed. “Portal sweeps? You're dreaming; we haven’t had those in fifteen years. Something was broken when the AMP was in charge, and no one out here could fix it. If we want to actually go somewhere, we have to actually go there, I mean fly there the whole way.”
I pushed the throttle to full and was surprised by the acceleration of the old ship. Mabel, for a rusty barge, still had some guts left in her.
After an hour of tutorial, I brought the ship to a stop. “Should we do an inspection?”
Go replied, “What? Now? I don’t know, I’ve never been out here for one of those.”
I laughed. “Well, I think it’s time you saw how the professionals do it. Pull up the nav display and pick out a vessel.”
Go eagerly complied. “How about this tug? He’s not even hauling anything. That should be simple, right?”
“Tug it is. Set us a course for intercept, and we'll see what she’s hauling.”
Fifteen minutes later, we were pulling alongside the space tug. “Captain of tug WXM44788A. This is Detective Beutcher of the New Alliance security force. You have been selected for a random inspection. Under the shipping laws of the New Alliance, I am ordering you to a full stop for the undertaking of that inspection.”
Several seconds passed before a response came back. “What? Who is this? I’m not even hauling anything.”
“Captain, come to a full stop, or I will be forced to shut down your core.”
Several more seconds passed before the tug began to slow. I pulled the Mabel alongside and connected with a universal docking collar. I crossed through the docking tube with Go close behind.
The captain was standing in a small cabin area with his arms crossed. “What’s the meaning of this? I paid my shipping dues to the security force last week.”
I looked at the captain. “I apologize if some misguided detective has been shaking you down, Captain. I am only here to inspect your tug. Now, may I have a copy of your manifest logs?”
The captain laughed. “Manifest logs? I don’t think I’ve had manifest logs in a dozen years. Nobody requires them, so nobody carries them. You've got to be new to the force.”
I shook my head. “Forty-plus years, Captain. Only those years were in a sector where the rules were generally followed. I’m not sure there are any rules out here.”
“You want rules? You cross the slavers and you'll see what the rules are out here. Take that as a warning. They will kill you dead if you mess with their business.”
“I'll keep that in mind, Captain. The design of this tug shows two sets of storage lockers and a bilge tub. If you can show me to each of those, we'll try to get this over with and get you on your way.”
The captain complied. The locker searches turned up clean. “This is the bilge tub. I don’t think you're getting in there, though. I don’t know why anyone would want to, but it’s rusted shut.”
I inspected the leaky seal. The captain was right. The bilge tub had probably been rusted shut for as long as he had been flying the tug. After signing a log, I thanked the captain for his time and moved back through the docking tube.
As we pulled away from the tug, I said, “That was a standard inspection. Shorter than most, but largely the same. When we get back, I’ll write up the report and list you as an attendee.”
Go was all smiles on the return trip to Bay-68. When the Mabel set down on the deck, the detective named Carter was standing just outside of his ship with his maintainer.
I walked over and introduced myself. “Mr. Carter, Knog Beutcher. I’m the new detective.”
Carter continued to look at whatever his maintainer was doing. “Yeah, whatever, congratulations or condolences, take your pick.”
I continued, “I wanted to ask you a few questions, if you don’t mind. I just had a tug captain warn me about the slavers. Is that something I should be worried about?”
Tom Carter turned around with an agitated look on his face that quickly turned to surprise. “Look, I…whoa, hello? Nobody said the new guy would be Grunta.”
“I’m sorry if I startled you, Mr. Carter. Now, can you tell me anything about the slavers?”
Tom Carter puffed up his chest. “Hey, nobody was startled here. I just wasn’t expecting a Grunta. And as for your slavers question, yeah, you don’t want to mess with those people. I think they have ties going up to the station Governor, so you cause them problems and you're going to disappear, and no one will care.
“And stay away from the Dallex colony and any ship heading to or from there. I hear that’s where they do most of their trading. If a ship's registered for a Dallex pickup or drop-off, you're going to want to steer clear of it.”
“I appreciate your candid response, Mr. Carter. I'm sure I'll have further questions for you from time to time.”
Tom Carter nodded as he turned back to his ship. “Sure, no problem.”
As I began to turn away, Carter looked back for one last word. “Oh, and if you ask anything at all of Malcom, he’s probably lying to you, hoping you'll screw something up. He’s one of those guys that thinks bringing others down somehow boosts him up. You're best off just not dealing with him at all if you can.”
I nodded. “Thanks for the information, Mr. Carter. I'll keep that in mind.”
As I walked past Gerald in his chair, he said, “I heard you asking about slavers. Let me just tell you they are bad news. Detective Hal, the guy you took over for, got his throat slit by them because they thought he was nosing around. Hal didn’t want anything to do with them. I think he butted heads with Malcom one too many times, and Malcom set him up. Just watch yourself around Malcom. He plays dirty.”
~~~~~
Once again, this Human is asking for your help! If you enjoyed the book, please leave a review on the site where it was purchased or downloaded. And by all means, please tell your friends! Any help with spreading the word is highly appreciated!
Also, I have a free science fiction eBook short story, titled “THE SQUAD”, waiting for anyone who joins my email list! By joining, also find out when the next exciting release is available. Join at
[email protected] Visit the author’s website at www.arsenex.com for links to this series and other works!
Take care and have a great day!
Stephen
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