The Mysterious Case of Betty Blue

by Louis Shalako

  “Okay. No one came out. What about the other paths?”

  “As near as we can make out, most of the cameras on Basil Street were operating at the time of the incident. Nothing there. Some of the other side streets, not so many good cameras available, but again, you’d think sooner or later they would have to walk past one that was good. No such luck, uh, Gene.”

  Gene thought about it.

  “Where else could they have gone?”

  “We’ve swept the park, and they’re not in it, unless they’re in a hollow tree or maybe we just saw some winos. But no one we spoke to answered to our profile.”

  “What does that leave?”

  “There’s a ravine there, and a culvert under the highway.” Parsons thought. “If they turned back and beat it southwards, strictly staying in the brush, sooner or later they would have to come out on a street. To the south and west, those are better neighbourhoods. Better lighting, more cameras. We can say with at least some confidence, that they probably didn’t do that.”

  Parsons went on.

  At the south end of the park, there was a heavy steel grating over the culvert, which went under Appleby Road. The grate at the north end of the park had been removed by vandals years before. It was a quick way to get across the highway. This was typical enough in certain neighbourhoods, where every avenue was an avenue of retreat for any number of reasons. Some of those reasons were legitimate, as people simply evaded violence or crime in their neighbourhoods. The nearest overpass might lie in another gang’s territory—it was strange, but when not wearing obvious colours, gangstas rode the bus and the trams all over town with little conflict. Every town was different. It was like an informal little agreement they had. Everybody needs a night off once in a while, he thought.

  “Okay. So we have an assault, and two people—or one person and a robot, unaccounted for.”

  “Yes.”

  “And if they disappeared, we must ask ourselves why.” And if they were the victims of an attempted robbery, why not report it?

  Unless they had something to hide themselves. And how would they know just which way to get out of the park without being seen? Something smacked of real planning there. Some real knowledge. The punks were just a coincidence, and a lucky break for the police.

  “That’s about the size of it.”

  “All right. What about highway cameras?”

  “Not if they went under it. And the other side is all post-industrial wasteland. Only major intersections have surveillance, mostly for traffic, people running red lights and such.”

  Automatic robo-tickets, a valuable source of revenue for the cash-strapped city.

  It didn’t actually slow traffic down very much, the ostensible purpose. There were collisions there every day at morning and evening drive-time.

  “I see.”

  There was a silence. Parsons had done his job, and if there was nothing there, then there was nothing there.

  What they needed was a plan.

  “All right. I’ll have a couple of our people check out this Scott Nettles.” Nettles lived in this precinct, as did Betty Blue, their missing robot. “As for grounds for a warrant, I don’t think we’re quite there yet.”

  When I get a minute.

  If they did get inside, they could try lifting some prints left by Nettles and then they would have something for comparison. The numbers onscreen showed a ninety-seven percent probability of identification in Nettles’ case, as the commuter station was relatively well-lit, and had cameras intact. Their guard had identified Nettles’ PPP, the Public Profile Pic.

  Yet experience showed that even an identification of one hundred percent probability could be mistaken. Too many innocent civilians had been cut down by nervous or over-zealous officers, to place too much credence on the computer files and their remotely-sensed biometric identification programming. Good old fashioned fingerprints, up-close retinal scans and DNA were more reliable, although never really a hundred percent. Eye-witnesses were notoriously unreliable.

  “Is there anything more we can do here, ah, Gene.” It really wasn't a question, neither was it a statement.

  “Don’t know. Can I call you back? I’d like to study this guard’s statement.”

  “Sure. Absolutely.”

  MacBride got it then. Parsons would like to get out of the Eighth and into someplace a bit more civilized. Good people were hard to find these days and it might be worth a minute of his time.

  “So what’s on the other side of the highway?”

  “Desolation, Inspector.”

  “Do you guys go there?”

  This was a good question. Since the city had started rounding up the homeless and sticking them in for-profit jails for vagrancy, squatters, shanty-towns, or unofficial settlements, had sprung up on the outskirts of every major city. While this annoyed the residents of gated communities, often right next door, and commuters from the suburbs to no end, there wasn’t much the big-city police could do about it.

  A person with a tent by the side of the road, or sleeping in an alley, could be rounded up as a vagrant. Squatting was a civil crime, an injury of property, and civil and human rights, due process still came into play. An action needed a person of record, but absentee or overseas landlords were notoriously lax when a building’s costs sky-rocketed. Tenancy rates were often low to begin with, people skipping out on unpaid rent, the cost of evictions, and petty crime and property-vandalism rampant. Court procedures were still unreformed. Cops could go from door to door and knock, but without a warrant, asking to see a copy of the mortgage or lease was strictly a no-no. It was safe to say it wasn’t usually the highest priority. Proper squatters didn’t answer the door anyway, they all had peepholes and escape hatches these days. Buildings that had truly been abandoned were riddled with squatters, to the extent some of the buildings had been rather distinctively renovated, using scrounged materials and going by the unique needs of their inhabitants. Some buildings were linked by tunnels, and some were even fortified.

  “Yes. In daylight, and with proper orders and everything.”

  “I see. Okay, I’ll get back to you. Other than that, good job, Dave. I'm going to call the makers and see just what the capabilities of that robot girl actually are.”

  “If that’s her, she’s tougher than effing whale-shit.”

  MacBride grinned from ear-to-ear.

  “Thank you, Sergeant, for my first good laugh of the day.”

  MacBride and Parsons rang off, Parsons to go home, long after his shift was officially over.

  Looking at his watch, MacBride tapped his name into the computer.

  Parsons was divorced, had two kids, and would have been considered overdue for promotion in almost any other precinct. Carrying six and a half-million in personal debt and with alimony and child support running at about forty-k a month, a promotion would be very welcome. His motivation was clear enough.

  The Eighth Precinct was definitely special. It was an urban hell out that way. They would take anybody, and if they had any talent or integrity at all, they were just as loath to give them up.

  From across the room, his partner Francine was waving imperiously, as was her fashion.

  MacBride waved back and shut the screens down, as it sure looked like they had another body.

  With his rank and experience, it was the only thing that really interested him these days. He looked at his watch, a private joke between he and Emily. It was a countdown watch. There were four years, six months, nine days, and a few hours, until he could take early retirement. He swallowed the rest of his coffee hurriedly, made a quick note for later, and then got up out of his chair.

  Detective Suleiman was the investigating officer of record, and this one was her baby. She gave the Inspector a wintry grin and then cleared her throat. That’s what you get for answering the phone sometimes.

  Wait a minute. He nipped back to his desk. Grabbing a pen, he made a quick notation.

  Drones. Flood the area with
drones. Somewhere. Some area.

  He really couldn’t think of anything else. It was like his mind went blank. He shook it off and joined the others.

  They were all in the huddle, looking expectantly at Francine.

  “All right people, listen up.”

  ***

  Scott awoke with a start, shivering.

  It might take a while for it to pass.

  While he hadn’t slept outdoors in years, but the dampness in the air and the fitful chirping of robins told him that it was dawn or shortly before. With nothing but pitch blackness, and the place beside him cold, he knew instantly that Betty was gone.

  “Fuck.”

  His own voice startled him, and he resolved to shut up in any such future situations. It was a risk he didn’t have to take. The sounds of the wilderness were all around him. Betty had said they were in an old auto parts plant.

  He had to accept her word for it, but the sounds said otherwise. The wind luffed in the treetops, and he imagined them in his mind’s eye, growing out of broken windows and holes in the roof. There were crickets and spring peepers—how many years had it been since he’d heard them?

  There was always the sound of distant traffic off in the background. That part was familiar enough, although not very reassuring.

  Scott’s lower back hurt from sleeping on the ground. He had to go to the bathroom, and there was no sense in just lying there frozen in fear.

  It was no pleasure lying on the hard ground, but he was reluctant to show himself. He had money on him, he was alone, and he was blind. He didn’t even have the stick. The sounds were reassuringly natural. It was interesting not to hear voices. It was so quiet he could hear a solitary jet airliner coursing from east to west overhead at something like ten thousand metres. It didn’t mean much, but it was something.

  He sat up, carefully taking stock of his situation. If he wandered too far, he’d lose the blanket and the backpack, the food, the water.

  “Damn.”

  The little flutter in the region of the heart wasn’t very nice.

  All right. Time for a pee. He got up creakily, and thought it through. Walk a few steps, pee and then return.

  No stick. That was bad. There might be some obstacle directly in front of him. Tottering there on one leg, he poked with a foot. Nothing. He took a step, prodded with his foot again. Nothing there, and he cleared his throat. There was no real echo.

  “Shit.” The thoughts of another fucking ravine, or a steep drop like a loading dock, made the skin on the back of his neck prickle.

  Shuffling onwards as carefully as he could, he went about three metres and then relieved himself. It sounded like it was splashing on concrete, but the ground under him was still soft, dead leaves, moss, maybe even grass and weeds. Something scraped his hand, and he felt small, soft leaves and shrubbery to his left.

  Feeling a little bolder now, he turned and felt his way back carefully to their sleeping area.

  A smoke, some water, and maybe some candy or something from his backpack would keep him going, at least for a little while.

  Feeling around, the suitcases didn’t seem to be right there.

  That made a lot of sense.

  He began to feel better about things.

  Betty had left him somewhere safe. He had to believe that. She had gone on, not needing nearly as much sleep as he did.

  She must be scouting ahead and she’d be back as soon as she could. That didn’t do much for the fear.

  Scott stretched and his jaw worked back and forth. His mouth tasted like a garbage can.

  He’d poke the Devil’s eye out for a good cup of coffee right about now, that and an actual chair to sit on.

  His sensitive fingers fished out a cigarette and the lighter was in his jacket pocket.

  “Come on, Baby. Don’t leave me here waiting too long…please.” Oh, God.

  Betty.

  Where in the hell had she gotten off to?

  They weren’t even really out of the city yet.

  Travelling in daylight was going to be a problem no matter where they were.

  Chapter Nine

  The briefing ended and the gathered detectives were grabbing jackets and briefcases. This particular killing was nasty enough. A woman and her two little girls were watching TV, when her husband answered a knock at the door. Hearing an altercation, she was just hustling the kids to a back bedroom when her husband was shot with an automatic weapon.

  She made the girls go down in the basement, picked up a knife in the kitchen and then her husband bled to death in her arms even as emergency responders arrived.

  “Francine.”

  “Yes, boss?”

  “I don’t think I really need to go down there. You guys can handle this.”

  “Sure. Okay.”

  “I need to call the chief, and then I might have to pull you off too.”

  “Sure. Whatever.” Detective Francine Suleiman gave him a wry look, patted him on the bicep and then did up the final fasteners on her vest.

  “If I can get us in there, we need to know a lot more about that damned robot.”

  “Still on that bullshit, Gene?”

  “Yeah. I got the lucky tap from above, and the Cartiers are VIPs.”

  “So where is this place?”

  “SimTech. They’re in Buffalo.”

  Her shoulders tensed. She was winding up, thinking of babysitters, endless calls and texts, another monkey wrench thrown into her day.

  “Okay. Try and give me a little notice, okay?” It was three hours by high-speed train.

  It was two and a half hours by air. Too much of it spent in terminals and waiting on the ground in the aircraft.

  “Why do we got to go up there, anyways?”

  “Because. I like to look people in the eye when they lie to me.”

  His frosty smile took some of the warmth and humidity out of the air. There wasn’t that much to begin with.

  She nodded ruefully, inclining her head.

  It was true enough, she supposed.

  “Thanks, Francine.”

  He watched her turn to go. The last of them filed out of the room. They were loaded for bear and carrying far too much electronic gadgetry for his liking. The helmets alone weighed eleven pounds each.

  So far the lady of the house wasn’t talking. She claimed she had no idea of who had shot her husband or why anyone would ever want to do so.

  The only thing she had admitted, was that her husband might do a little ADHD from time to time. The lady denied ever doing it herself, and no one had the heart to test her blood just then as it would just rub salt in the wounds. Privately, a lot of cops thought the kids were better off with the parents, rather than being seized and re-assigned to other parents. She was pretty sure there were two males out there on the porch. As to whether her husband Dwayne had been buying or selling, or maybe he just owed the wrong somebody a little too much money, she claimed not to know.

  The trouble was that no one ever did anything for no reason.

  She knew more than she was letting on. It was a question of whether she would cooperate, or did they have to do everything the hard way.

  ***

  Gene MacBride and Francine Suleiman stood in awe.

  The great room stretched off into a haze of atmospheric perspective. The air was blue with soldering fumes, and rows of heads, all robot girls, bent in fixed concentration upon their tasks.

  There must have been ten thousand overhead lights, sodium or halogen, all hanging on metal tubes and looking like rocket engines more than anything else.

  “Our products are the finest on the market today.” Mister Burch was in full sales pitch. “Right now we are at only twelve percent market penetration. With full amortization, certainly within the next twenty years, we foresee the cost coming down somewheres in the range of thirty to forty thousand a copy for the base models. Think of it, a household servant, one that does windows, walks the dog and can even home-school your children.”

/>   He beamed at them, and then extended an arm in invitation. Gene wasn’t quite sure if Allan Burch was selling ‘bots or selling shares. He probably did both, when you thought about it.

  Sell, sell, sell.

  That’s just the way of the world.

  Allan Burch led them on to another workstation. Here a torso, with gaping holes for the waist, neck and arms, had a pair of hatches on the back. It was clamped to the bench and separate robotic arms were working on the placement of small components. There was a more complex robot involved as well. This one was moving around, looking at a screen for specifications if Gene was interpreting correctly, and adding in accessories. Just like a new car, he thought.

  “What are we building here?”

  “This is a typical ambulatory robot.” Burch stepped in, leaned forward, and read off the screen. “It’s for commercial applications. Oh. This one will be driving for United Postal Service.”

  “Ah.” Francine’s eyes met his, eyebrows raised in amusement. “At least he’s not flipping burgers for Mickey D’s.”

  Gene nodded.

  The machine would have to have some independent reasoning skills. The nature of its job and the modern traffic landscape meant it would be presented with unforeseen circumstances. This might include anything from traffic snarls to customers refusing to sign, ducking payment or even just the usual, more run-of-the-mill psychopaths. They would have to defend their cargo from thieves and high-jackers on occasion. If nothing else, they would have to find someone or something of record to accept delivery.

  A gynoid, a lady robot designed to mimic human form, albeit in a shiny blue-chrome and featureless way, was just attaching a small chip or something into a set of sockets deep in the interior of the machine. Her hands, very deft and sure, were amazing to watch. It reached into a plastic bin and picked out more parts. It soldered them into place, with tools all lined up neatly. It took a wire harness and began snapping the leads into place. There were plastic ties to bundle the wire harness. Gene felt smarter just watching this.