by Sid K
Mr. Warwyk thought about the proposal for a minute and then said, “Never mind, I will do that myself when I am ready.”
“You would be more persuasive with SPASI if you have political backing of one or two Constellars,” Taktar said. “But even if they decline you, we will be on to these bank robbers. Remember we are here to help.”
“Thank you,” Mr. Warwyk muttered under his breath as a matter of formality. He turned around and exited the room. He did not bother with the elevators and he took the nearest stairs
Constellar Taktar was right about one thing, he thought. SPASI was much more politically powerful than the House of Police, and he wouldn’t have been able to get a meeting with any of the SPASI’s top leaders on the fly like he did here. He would call on Chief Yucker, but not just yet. He was going to line up a few more bankers, get an entire industry behind him. Then he was going to call the Head of the House of Banks, who was a powerful and veteran Constellar. His backing would be key to getting the SPASI to take over these bank robberies and break up this syndicate.
When he walked out of the House of Police, a car sent by the local branch of his bank was waiting to take him to the hotel his assistant had booked in the Capital.
chapter 3 – the smugglers
08/20/958
Chief Detective Sayett was flipping through the bank robbery report papers he had been handed by Constellar Taktar, the Head of the House of Police, as his plane neared the northern city of Northstar. He also had with him a listing of all the significant smuggling operations busted up by coastal town and city police departments that were sent to SPASI’s Counter-Smuggling Division. He did not have to search much at all, because the Northstar police chief had drawn attention to a couple of smugglers they had caught and this is what had prompted Sayett’s hurriedly planned visit to Northstar.
Sayett was a forty-seven years old man of 5’9’’ height and medium built. He had an oblong shaped face, had mixed black-gray hair on both sides of his head and his hair on the top was thinning, but he still covered it with a comb over. He was one of the Chief Detectives of SPASI, which was Starfire Nation’s spy department and it was also responsible for national detective work.
Detective Sayett had been handed the bank robbery case by the SPASI Chief Yucker himself and first thing he had done was to drive to the House of Police and get all the reports they had. He had pored through them as his team was being put together. Some of the detectives he wanted on his team were in different towns and they would be flying in during the next couple of days. Sayett had decided to take advantage of this and start the inquiry at a place where he didn’t require a team’s support, since not much work would happen before the team was assembled. Northstar police chief had made his job easier.
The guns that had been retrieved from these bank robberies were Ranx Rifles. Importing foreign arms was illegal in Starfire Nation, and the only way they could have had those was if they had smuggled them in. This gave Sayett his first clue and he had looked through the smuggling reports that came in routinely. He eyes had quickly caught sight of a letter sent by Northstar police chief and he was coming there to follow up on the details of it.
Sayett looked out the window as he lit up another cigarette and asked the air hostess for another cup of coffee. Northstar was the second biggest city in Starfire Nation with a population over five million people. It was also the biggest port for commercial shippers as well as a sea army base. One of the great sights one could see flying in to Northstar airport were all the aircraft carriers, battleships and submarines on maintenance schedule that were neatly lined up along the coast in the shipyards. Their plane began the descent to the runway and Sayett cleared his ears to reduce the unease due to rapid air pressure change.
After the plane landed, Sayett met a policeman who had arrived to drive him to the Northstar police headquarters. It was a large forty-four floor building; Sayett wasn’t sure if the police occupied all the floors, but this was definitely the biggest police headquarters he had seen after that of the Capital police. He took the elevator straight to the top floor where the chief’s office was. His chief-detective badge opened all the doors without questions till he was right in the chief’s office being offered expensive whiskey by chief Catovyk himself.
“Thanks for the fine whiskey,” Sayett said, “but more importantly thanks for taking the initiative and writing that letter. You saved me a day’s of dry work, reading every smuggling report that poured into SPASI for the last year.”
“Well I got this alert from the House of Police to increase the patrols near the big banks,” chief Catovyk said. “As I read about those robberies something clicked in my mind. I realized that we had just busted a shipment of Ranx rifles, two crates with twenty-five rifles in each, just a couple of weeks ago.”
“I would like to see those smugglers, but first tell me about your raid,” Sayett said.
“Sure,” Catovyk said, “We are holding them here temporarily, but the raid itself was routine and uneventful. Our port division’s patrol boat found a boat with a couple of smugglers from the Gyo Nation and assorted goods including those two rifle crates. Didn’t think much about it then. I glanced over the report in a couple of minutes and had forgotten about it till that alert from the House came in a week ago.”
“Let’s go meet them,” Sayett said.
Catovyk led him to the elevator where they exited on the tenth floor, a temporary lockup facility for prisoners who hadn’t yet been tried by the court. Catovyk walked through a couple of corridors till he came to a room with a locked iron door. He told a policeman to bring the two smugglers in there and a few minutes later the two smugglers, along with two policemen guarding them, joined Catovyk and Sayett in the room. They placed the smugglers on two chairs side by side and a table in front as the rest of them stood in the stark room.
“I want you water rats to use your brains if you have any and tell me who the Ranx rifles were for,” Sayett said and tapped both of them on the back of their heads with his knuckles. “They seem empty, but I can still hope.”
The two prisoners looked at each other but said nothing.
“You aren’t going to tell, I see,” Sayett said after an interval of silence in the room, “Well let me present your condition to you. I am from SPASI.” He showed his badge to them and let them look at it for a few moments, “I can have you transferred to our custody. Smuggling foreign weapons earns a ten year jail sentence and when you are out, we will tell your government in Gyo all about you, and you will have a permanent police record. Or you can help me here, I will let the town police charge you with the lesser crime of plain vanilla smuggling, three years jail penalty and we will tell nothing to your government. The police representative to the court will forget to mention that you smuggled rifles if you were to tell me who those rifles were for.”
The smugglers looked at each other and then one of them spoke, “Give us a few minutes to talk it over between us.”
“Sure,” Sayett said, “You have ten minutes.”
Sayett, Catovyk and the two policemen walked outside and locked the door. They talked about fishing for a few minutes till the smugglers knocked on the door. The two policemen opened it and were the first ones inside and seated the smugglers back on the chairs as Sayett and Catovyk entered.
“We will tell you what we know,” one of the smugglers said. “Some Ranxians came to our boss and asked to smuggle in Ranx rifles into your country. Normally, we don’t do contract work for strangers, but they agreed to pay a high fee. We were supposed to hand it over to some Ranxians here in the parking lot of a Northstar hotel at night.”
“When is that exchange going to happen?” Sayett asked.
“Was supposed to happen ten days ago.”
“Damn,” Sayett slammed his fist on the table. “We could have caught the Ranxians in the act.”
“We put out news when we catch smugglers,” Catovyk said, “They would have known the next day that we busted these fellas.�
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“What smuggling syndicate do you fellas belong to?” Sayett asked them.
“That wasn’t part of our deal,” one of them said.
“Never mind,” Sayett laughed. “You are Blue Wave Smugglers from eastern Gyo.”
The smugglers were stunned, as was the police chief.
“How did you know?” Catovyk asked.
“I worked in the counter-smuggling division of SPASI for years,” Sayett said, “There are three main smuggling syndicates operating out of Gyo who have divided their coast amongst themselves. I know them by their accents and that’s eastern Gyo these water rats are speaking.”
“Well, who were these Ranxians that hired you?” Catovyk asked.
“We don’t know.”
“Don’t lie, water rats,” Catovyk shouted.
“SPASI detective, you know we are telling the truth,” a smuggler said. “This is the first time we ran Ranx rifles. Our boss does the deal and we do the running without asking.”
“They are right,” Sayett said. “The smuggling syndicates keep their client’s identity secret from their operatives. We are done here.”
The two policemen took the smugglers back to their cells as Sayett and Catovyk walked to the elevator.
“Where is this boss?” Catovyk asked.
“Far away in eastern Gyo; we can’t get to him,” Sayett said. “SPASI has sent assassins after him for years, but we can’t locate his hideout.”
“Well, you didn’t get much then,” the Chief said as they stepped in the elevator.
“On the contrary, I got my first lead,” Sayett said. “They confirmed the clients for rifles were Ranxians—that much information gets around in a syndicate. Criminals aren’t stupid; they will leave false clues to throw off the chase. We could not assume that just because they used Ranx rifles, they were Ranxian crooks. Now we know, and that narrows down our search considerably.”
“Then I am glad,” Catovyk said. “Mind having dinner with me and a few other policemen tonight?”
“Appreciate but I have booked a flight back to King Starryvk City this evening.”
Sayett took police chief’s leave when the elevator reached the first floor. The policeman with the car assigned to him was waiting to drive him back to the airport. Sayett was happy his first inquiry had been fruitful. Now it was time to do a more detailed analysis of the robberies themselves and he decided he would do that the first thing when he reached the Capital.
chapter 4 – colonel and constellar
Colonel Sthykar was driving his army car—a big, sturdy and powerful vehicle—down the inner roads of the Capital towards the Constellation. With him was his wife. Slyntya, of a few years and a newly selected Constellar. Slyntya was looking straight ahead wide eyed and alert as she always did when Sthykar was driving.
“Sthykar, slow down,” she said. “We are not even on the national road.”
“I am slow, driving only at eighty miles per hour,” he replied. “You know I drive a hundred on the national road.”
“You have to stop that, or I will introduce a bill to put a speed limit on the national roads.” She turned towards him and smiled.
“You will get laughed out of the Constellation,” Sthykar laughed and she shook her head with a blush.
Colonel Sthykar was a man thirty-three years old, standing 5’10’’, big eyes, thick eyebrows, wavy hair with a slight receding hairline on the sides, a muscular body around 200 pounds, looking handsome in a rugged, masculine manner. He was a Colonel in the Mountain Cavalry, which was part of the Elite Army. Today he was wearing his dress uniform: King’s Red hat and full sleeve shirt with black combat boots, pants and a big two-inch wide leather belt that was always worn over the shirt. There were insignia of his army and rank on the upper left chest of his shirt and medals on the upper right chest. Golden epaulets flowed down from both the shoulders; his hat’s center symbol and the belt buckle were both a shiny King’s Red star with a black horse head in the middle—the national symbol of the Starfire Nation.
His wife was Constellar Slyntya, a thirty-five year old woman, 5’8’’ in height, medium sized eyes, beautiful face, hair flowing down to the center of her back with waves and curls in them adding to the décor, big wide hips, voluptuous thighs and long legs all making for a feminine, curvy figure. It was her first year of her first term as a Constellar. She was dressed elegantly in a purple sweater over black skirt with a black belt on top and was wearing black high heels.
“Sthykar, what is this you were telling me about buying some land?” she asked as Sthykar drove on.
“My friend Relkyett has a great offer for land somewhere down southwest,” Sthykar said. “He bought a plot and told me about it. There is a lot of timber that grows on it. It would make a great investment as well as a vacation spot.”
“A vacation spot out in the backcountry.” She frowned. “Why don’t you want to buy a house in the city?”
“Alright, we will make that our next purchase,” Sthykar said, “I know you are a big city girl, and now with your Constellar salary, which is more than mine, we will buy a house in a couple of years.”
“I like that,” Slyntya said. “How long are you going to stay there?”
“Anywhere from one to two weeks,” Sthykar replied, “The way I see it, you are going to be busy over next few weeks. This is still your first year, so you have a lot of politics, procedures, history and state administration to learn. My army vacation carried over from the last year of two weeks on top of a month I will have this year, and Relkyett is getting together a lot of my friends. Might as well use the vacation time with my friends while you are busy. Later in the year, we can go together someplace.”
“I will definitely look forward to that,” she said.
They drove for approximately fifteen more minutes while conversing before they arrived in front of the gate of the Constellation. It was a big gate with steel bars with tall, concrete walls on either side. Armed guards stood outside as well as inside. One of them approached the driver-side window and saluted Sthykar when noticing his rank and uniform.
“Colonel,” he said, “I have to see identification—just a formality.”
“Just dropping off my wife, Constellar Slyntya.” He pointed to her and she held up her ID card to the guard.
“Go ahead, madam,” he said and motioned for the gate to be opened.
After they drove in and through another gate, they were on the road leading to the building of the Constellation with lush green grass on either side and patrolled by armed guards. The Constellation was the hundred member law-making body of the Starfire Nation whose members were selected every five years.
The Constellation building was shaped like a five-point star, except with one point and one triangle missing. That missing part symbolized the King whose Royal Palace was at another location and who completed the Constellation as its leader as well as a tiebreaker when needed.
Sthykar stopped the car in the parking lot in front of the main entrance. Slyntya picked up her purse and looked at her hair in the mirror and then asked Sthykar, “Aren’t you going to come in? More people know you in there, than they know me.”
“No, that’s what I am worried about,” Sthykar chuckled. “Many will want to talk to me and I rather not, but I can’t just shoo away politically powerful Constellars. Give my regards to the King when he comes in.”
“I don’t think there will be more than eight or ten Constellars in there,” Slyntya said opening the door. “You sure don’t want to come inside?”
“Ha!” Sthykar said. “Those of us in the army get up at six o’clock and start work half hour after that, latest at seven. And our Constellars are still hauling themselves in at nine thirty.”
“What are you going to be doing?” she asked while getting out of the car.
“I have to finish up some paperwork before going on the vacation,” Sthykar said. “I am going directly to the base. I will fly out tomorrow, the day after or whenever m
y work is wrapped up. You can have a Constellation car drop you off at home.”
“Goodbye, Colonel,” she said with a wide smile.
“Alright then,” Sthykar said, half saluted her in jest. He turned his car around and drove off waving to her with his hand out the window.
She stood in the parking lot watching his car drive up to the first gate, then she walked towards the main entrance escorted by the Constellation guards all the way to the door.
Once inside the hall, Slyntya saw a few Constellars standing around talking. Her guess had been correct; there were no more than a dozen who had arrived. The inside of the Constellation hall was built as an auditorium with a hundred seats facing a podium and a throne to the right of the podium. There was a big painting on the wall behind the podium of old King Starryvk riding on his horse with his bow and arrow on the grasslands of Thorac Steppes—the King who had led the Starfirians in finding and settling on the south polar continent. Surrounding him were his champions on their horses with their own bows and arrows or their swords in their hands. It was an impressive painting covering the entire length and breadth of the wall.
She turned away from looking at the painting and walked up the stairs in the middle towards her seat. There were eleven rows of seats with long tables arranged as in an auditorium with the first row lowest and on par with the ground floor; each subsequent row was a couple of steps higher. The black-colored seats with red cushions were independent and separated from each other in distance but the reddish-brown wooden table stretched continuously from one end of the room to the other with the only break in the middle for the steps. There were five seats in the first row, seven in the second, eight in the third and ten each in the remaining eight rows. Slyntya exchanged formal pleasantries with other Constellars and walked up to her seat, which was third from the aisle in the ninth row. There was no one else in her row or in the two rows above her or the row below her. She sat down, put her purse on the table and took out a few papers and a pen.
