Obsidian Detective

by Michael Anderle

  “Exactly,” Jia exclaimed as she leaned forward. “Because we let disorder get out of control in the past, people suffered. Not just the people of Old Los Angeles, but everywhere. All I want to do is ensure that corruption doesn’t root here. If history teaches us anything, sir, it’s that eternal vigilance is the only way to protect our society from anarchy.”

  Captain Monahan nodded slowly. “True, true.” He cleared his throat. “I’m not going to pretend I haven’t been frustrated with you, and I stand by what I said about what happened with your partners. A big aspect of being a good cop is getting along with other cops. We’re a team here, and we need to know we can depend on each other.”

  He pointed at her, and she raised one eyebrow in return. “To do that, Lin, we need people to stay in their lanes. When they do, it makes it easier to figure out who is a team player and who isn’t. Those people will rise up the ranks, and when they rise up the ranks, they have a better opportunity to control how resources are expended. You understand what I’m saying?”

  Jia sighed, shoulders drooping just a touch before she straightened her back. “Stay in my lane?”

  “Exactly.” Captain Monahan smiled. “Come on, Lin. I’m not trying to be difficult here. As frustrating as I find you, I do admire your passion, but you need to respect the experience of the men and women who have been doing this job almost as long as you’ve been alive, or longer.”

  “And what about the case?” She raised an eyebrow. What harm could there be in trying at this point?

  Captain Monahan shook his head. “Trust me. There’s nothing there, and I don’t want you wasting resources. Am I clear this time?”

  Jia nodded slowly. “Okay. I hear you, and yes, you are clear.”

  “Dismissed, Detective.”

  Jia stood and exited the office, her thoughts laden with doubts. The captain’s explanation made sense, and he was right. Even if she believed either her enforcement zone or the department wasn’t effectively using their resources, the best way to counter that was to rise up the ranks.

  She didn’t want to doubt her captain or her former partners, but she couldn’t deny that her mind and instincts told her there was something more there.

  She walked back through the bullpen, thinking the matter through as she wove into her office, and sat behind her desk, muttering. “I can only hope he changes his mind.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Erik leaned over the railing of his new apartment’s deck, staring at the forest of towers and platforms filling the metroplex, along with the long skywalks connecting many of the nearby platforms and towers.

  He turned, bringing his head around to look up the side of his building before looking down.

  He couldn’t even see the ground with the slight haze, flitters, and different platforms and skywalks blocking his view.

  He craned his neck upward one more time. The sun hung in the cloudless sky, but the towers extended well past his apartment, blocking what could have been a beautiful view. The memories of countless sunrises on different worlds and the views of their moons flooded him for a moment.

  Beauty before the placing of humanity’s technological glove on a world.

  He looked from building top to building top.

  Erik chuckled and shook his head. It was easy to ignore all the imperfections of a place if you stuck them somewhere people wouldn’t see them. Earth wasn’t so different in that regard than many of the other planets he had visited.

  No one ever put a major ore processing facility right next to the governor’s residence on a colony.

  His PNIU chimed with a message alert.

  He brought up the message and grunted, his eyebrows raising.

  It was an intersystem message, delivered via Hermes Corporation’s priority message queue. The sender was Nigel Anders, the former governor of the Mu Arae colony.

  The message had been sent about two months ago from New Samarkand in Gliese 581, with the Hermes header information indicating the delays involved in message transmission from a system twenty light-years from Earth.

  The message had been sitting in their queue for a while.

  From what Erik could tell, the governor had attempted to route it through military channels. While Erik’s ID was still officially linked to the UTC military, most of his other accounts had been transitioned out of their control.

  It was surprisingly hard for a man to extricate himself from the military bureaucracy after thirty years. He hadn’t finished registering and interfacing all his accounts locally until that morning, and Hermes Corp’s systems had finally caught up with him.

  Erik,

  * * *

  Based on the message you sent me a month after leaving the colony, you should be close to Earth by now. Or maybe you decided to make a new life in the colonies. I wouldn’t blame you if you did, but I also understand that you have unfinished business on Earth.

  * * *

  But I’m not you. I’m a coward. I’m settled on New Samarkand now, although not as its governor. You don’t go from presiding over a failure to keep terrorists off a colony to leading a more developed colony.

  * * *

  I’m working at an import/export company here, a subsidiary of White Tiger. I’m keeping my head down, but I’m not without contacts in the UTC government. If you ever need help, just let me know, and I’ll see what I can do.

  I hope you find what you’re looking for back on Earth.

  * * *

  Nigel Anders

  Erik grunted and closed the message. He wasn’t sure when his revenge would come, but he suspected he would need allies to accomplish it. Nigel would be useful, as would the various military officers Erik had impressed throughout his career.

  Contacting them immediately wouldn’t be very helpful. He needed something more concrete than some missing messages and too-well-equipped terrorists.

  A quick chirp of a high tone followed by a low tone sounded.

  A few seconds passed before Erik recognized it was from the door. It sounded a lot nicer than the harsh buzz he was used to from most standard-issue UTC military doorbells.

  “Not in the military anymore, Erik.” He kept having to remind himself he was living in a nice apartment in a quality residential tower.

  It was not cheap, but not too expensive, either. He didn’t want to appear concerned with money to anyone checking on him, but wasting money on a top-tier apartment remained pointless.

  The doorbell sounded again, and he headed toward the door. He pressed a button and the front door slid open, revealing a massive auburn-haired bearded man.

  The man was a wall of muscle, which was saying something, given Erik’s height and fitness, but any chance at intimidation was undercut by his spiked crest of hair, more of a mane than something you would expect on a human.

  Maybe it was popular on Earth, but he hadn’t seen anyone else with hair like that yet.

  The new arrival grinned and threw up his hand. “I was hoping to catch you. I saw that someone had moved in, but I was waiting for the right time to introduce myself. I’m Garth.” He pointed across the hallway to the closed door of another apartment. “Your neighbor.”

  Erik reached out and shook the man’s meaty hand. “Erik.”

  Garth nodded inside. “Mind if I come in?”

  “Sure.” Erik gestured to his mostly empty living room. The monotony of the empty white room was broken only by a dark-brown sofa near the back wall.

  Garth looked around with a slight frown before he faced Erik with a raised eyebrow, a smile trying desperately to not break out. “Not much of an interior decorator, are you?”

  “I’m still figuring out what I want.” Erik shrugged, sticking his hands into his pockets. “I’ve been away from Earth for a while, and in my old job, I moved a lot. It was hard to get too settled into anything resembling a style.”

  Garth leaned forward, peering at Erik with unabashed and obvious curiosity. “What job was that?”

  “UTC Army Ex
peditionary Corps,” Erik replied.

  There wasn’t any reason to lie to the people around him. He was using his veteran status to get himself a job, after all. He was still waiting to hear back on his particular placement, but all the messages he had received indicated there would be no problems.

  The main issue stemmed from no one knowing the proper procedures to deal with someone invoking the old Obsidian Detective clause. It’d been too long.

  “Expeditionary Corps?” Garth reached out to shake Erik’s hand again. “Thank you for your service.”

  He grunted. “It’s no big deal,” he replied, but left his hands out of his pockets this time.

  “You said you were in the Army, but what are you doing now?”

  “I’m going to be a cop,” Erik explained.

  Garth’s breath caught as his head pulled back just a bit. “You get to investigate mysteries? That sounds cool. I always thought about joining the police, but I’m not good at taking orders and following rules.”

  Erik chuckled. “I’ve had a few decades of training with that.” He flashed a smirk. “I don’t think it’ll be a problem.”

  “And by the way, ‘No big deal?’” Garth laughed. “It’s a big deal to serve, but I wish the UTC sent fewer troops out to border planets and kept more on Earth. We need them more here.”

  “Why is that?” Erik asked. “It’s not like insurrectionists are going to launch a surprise invasion of Earth. I don’t believe that is possible. We’d know they were coming months in advance.”

  Garth shook his head. “It’s not humans I’m worried about.” He lowered his voice. “And we’re going to need all the help we can get eventually.”

  “You worried about the Local Neighborhood?” Erik eyed the man. “Let me tell you something. I’ve been out there. There’s not going to be an interstellar war anytime soon. It can get tense, but they’re minding their business, and we’re minding ours.”

  “Exactly!” Garth’s eyes widened and he nodded slowly. “You get it, and you’re right. I don’t care about the Local Neighborhood races. They’re unimportant. Even the Leems.” He rolled his eyes. “To this day, it’s hard to get people to understand they aren’t some huge part of human history versus representing a small group of lost aliens. We reverse-engineered a few things from them, but we were well on our way to a lot of that stuff anyway.”

  Erik nodded and leaned against the wall. “Yeah. I never fought any aliens, if that’s what you’re getting at. Most of the people I fought were insurrectionists and terrorists, and all of them were humans.”

  “Aliens?” Garth waved a hand, dismissing Erik’s comment. “That’s the big question. What’s an alien?”

  “What we were just talking about.” Erik stared at the man for a second, frowning. “Like Zitarks or Orlox. Or Aldrans, or any of the others.”

  “Oh, oh, oh.” Garth nodded quickly. “I see what you’re saying. You’re making a common mistake.” He stopped for a moment, looking up in thought. “It’s my fault, too. I didn’t make it clear what I was talking about, so I can see where you got confused. Sorry.”

  “And what mistake was that?” Erik replied, irritation coloring his voice.

  Garth waved his hands. “Allow me to explain. If you’ve been away for a while, I can see how you might not have access to some of the new and best information, so some of the things I’m about to tell you might prove shocking.”

  Erik grunted, his frown admitting he wasn’t too sure about Garth’s warning. “I can handle it.”

  Garth sighed and folded his arms. “It’s like this. Everyone’s worried about the insurrectionists or Zitarks or the other Local Neighborhood aliens, but they should really be worrying about the Navigators.” He nodded slowly as if that was all Erik needed to catch on.

  Erik was still clueless.

  Garth continued, “They are the only aliens we need to care about since they are the only known alien species who are likely significantly more advanced than humans.”

  “The Navigators?” Erik’s eyebrows came together as he thought. “No one has found anything from the Navigators other than a few of their artifacts.” He shrugged. “If they’re still around, they’re not hanging out in our galaxy.”

  Garth pursed his lips. “What do you think happened to them?”

  Erik scratched his chin. “Personally, I think they all turned to dust a long time ago. It just goes to show you, no matter how much tech you have, you can still die out.”

  “Oh, oh. I see you’ve bought into the official narrative.” Garth rubbed his hands together, his eyes filling with glee. “I have so much I have to teach you.”

  “Official narrative?” Erik echoed, his batshit-crazy alarms starting to sound. “What exactly do you do for a living, Garth?” He eyed the man, wondering if this was some attempt at a strange con.

  “I’m a tech at a Hermes hub, but that’s just my job. It’s not my passion, and I want to share that passion with you, because it’s not just the passion. It’s the truth, and that’s where we get back into the official narrative.”

  Erik sighed. Keep him here or throw him out? He glanced at his balcony. Throw him out the door or throw him off the balcony. He smirked. Nah, let him chat. Learn about my neighbors, as long as he doesn’t ask for a donation.

  If that happens, it’s the balcony.

  “And what truth is that?” Erik dared to ask. “Because I’m not clear on what you’re talking about, and I’ve been to more systems than most people on this planet.”

  “The truth that the Navigators are still around, of course.” Garth threw his arms to his sides in a dramatic gesture. “And they might even be walking the Earth. We just don’t allow ourselves to see it.”

  Erik snorted. “Sorry. Not buying it. I’ve been all over UTC space, and the Local Neighborhood races aren’t even walking into our colonies, let alone the Navigators. Are you saying they’re invisible or something?”

  “No, no. Kind of. Let’s take a step back.” Garth shook his finger. “That’s just it. That’s what everyone believes. That they’re gone and dead and buried, but they’re wrong. Trust me. I’m not a crazy conspiracy theorist. I’m an experienced amateur researcher who has spent years plumbing the depths of misinformation and forgotten biology to pioneer the illumination of lost aspects of xenopaleontology. Of course, because my beliefs don’t fit the mainstream view of things, people try to lump me in with the conspiracy theorists,” he qualified.

  Erik chuckled, turning his head to look at Garth with one eye. “What separates an amateur xenopaleontologist from a conspiracy theorist if they both believe strange things that go against the mainstream?”

  “Because I only operate from useful, proven information, not mere speculation,” Garth clarified. “The crazies all over the OmniNet like to claim the government is hiding things from us, but I know that’s not true.”

  Erik put up a hand. “Wait, what? You believe the government?” Erik eyed him for a moment. “Ok, color me surprised.”

  Garth nodded. “I believe the government about aliens, or at least I believe they aren’t purposely lying about what they know about aliens. If anything, the government’s been very forthcoming. They could have lied about the Local Neighborhood. It’s not like anyone except a few colonists would have known any different, but they didn’t lie. They didn’t even hide the Navigator finds on Mars, and it would have been really easy to do it. They could have justified it with UTC security and all that.” He shook a finger. “Nope, the crazies don’t understand there’s no conspiracy out there, just ignorant people, including, unfortunately, the UTC government, all the way up to Parliament. Maybe a hundred years ago, Congress might have been useful, but it’s all Parliament now, so the fact that they are deluded means the delusions flow all the way down to the common man on the street.”

  Erik considered firing up a note-taking app in his PNIU. Waste of resources, no matter how infinitesimal they might be.

  “Okay, I’m a little lost, Garth. Wha
t does this all have to do with the Navigators?” Erik stared at the man, too confused to even begin to formulate a response that didn’t involve laughing in his face. Despite Garth’s warped view of things, he did otherwise seem friendly.

  Garth grinned. “Platypuses.”

  Erik’s mind suffered a reboot. “Huh? Come again?”

  “You know, like down in Australia.” Garth shrugged. “Haven’t you ever wondered about them? They’re so strange and unusual.”

  “Ahhh, no.” He shook his head. “I can’t say I’ve thought about platypuses since I was a kid.”

  “I don’t buy the transitionary animal theory. If you look into the research, really look into it, the same thing keeps coming up over and over.” Garth sighed. “Now, the next part does sound a little bit weird and conspiratorial, but if you look into the important sites and read the relevant books, you’ll see that I’ve got it right. You’re going to be an investigator, so I know you’re trained to think.”

  Erik nodded, unsure about ever answering his door again without looking out first. “What do you have right?”

  “Platypuses are Navigator genetic experiments.” Garth wagged his eyebrows. “I don’t just mean genetically engineered animals, but the Navigators themselves. Obviously, they aren’t currently sentient, but that’s just because they are in a kind of genetic stasis. Makes sense when you think about it, right?”

  “Ummm, perhaps?” Erik shrugged. “I suppose it’s not impossible, and it’s not like I know a lot about platypus genetics.”

  “I’ll send you some recommended reading.”

  Screw my life.

  Garth continued, oblivious to Erik’s internal monologue. “For now, the thing you have to realize is there are a lot of Navigator genetic experiments out there if you know where to look. Same sort of deal. Them in standby mode, basically. Again, this isn’t about the government covering them up, it’s just about people realizing it.”