Murder on Moon Trek 1

by Diane Vallere

  “Sylvia,” Vaan said. He stepped toward me and I stepped back. I rearranged the uniform with my fingers and held the fabric in place like a shield.

  “I was just changing,” I said.

  A smile toyed with Captain Swift’s lips. He pointed to the doors. “We’ll be right outside.” They turned around and left.

  Well, that was just great. I turned my back to the door and stepped into the uniform, and then reached around the back to zip it up. The fabric was thick and impervious to both heat and cold. I ran my hand over the gold insignia, and a small sound came out of it.

  “Neptune,” said a voice.

  “You can hear me?” I asked.

  “Stryker?”

  “This uniform is bugged?”

  “Security uniforms are fitted with radio chips so we can communicate in case of emergency,” he said. “New advancement after what happened to the Moon Unit 4.”

  That meant it hadn’t been mentioned in the outdated BOP I’d memorized. “Can I turn it off?”

  “No.”

  “Not even at night when I’m alone in my room?”

  “No.”

  The initial luster of being given security clearance tarnished. “I have to finish changing,” I said.

  “I’m not stopping you.”

  “How do I end this conversation?”

  “Say ‘Over and out.’”

  “Over and out.”

  “Yes.”

  “No, I mean, I’m saying it to end the conversation.”

  “Okay. Over and out.”

  “Whatever.” I was pretty sure I heard him grunt before the insignia went silent.

  I stuffed my old uniform into the laundry chute on the wall and then went outside to where Captain Swift and Vaan waited.

  The captain spoke. “Lt. Stryker,” he said. “I came to your ward to introduce Commander Vaan Marshall to you, but I understand you two have already met.”

  “Yes. Commander Marshall,” I said, holding out my hand.

  Vaan glanced down at it, up at my face, and then back down at my hand. “Lt. Stryker,” he said. He shook my outstretched hand. Like me, Vaan was Plunian. His skin tone was darker than mine but in the same neighborhood. Regardless of how I felt about having a Federation Council officer on board Moon Unit 5, after morning’s encounter with the little Martians, it would be nice to not be the only purple person on the ship. Vaan’s professional standing might even lend me an air of respectability by affiliation.

  Vaan’s hand was warm. He held onto mine a moment too long and, awkwardly, I pulled mine away. He smiled at my discomfort.

  Captain Swift seemed not to notice. “Lt. Stryker, I wanted to thank you personally for your help in the engineering room last night. The two officers are recovering nicely and should be back to their posts by the end of the day. Commander Marshall will be assisting Neptune in the investigation. Give him whatever information he requires.”

  “Of course,” I said.

  “I’d like to start by interviewing you about what you saw in engineering,” Vaan said.

  “I’m due in security section, but let’s make time to talk later today.” The insignia on my uniform buzzed against me, like a tiny electrical shock. I slapped my hand over it. “Um, hold on.” I lifted my hand. “Hello?” I asked.

  “Give your report to the Federation Council representative. Come to Security after you’re done.”

  “Roger that. Over and out.” I looked up at the men in front of me. “I’m still figuring out how this thing works.”

  Captain Swift and Vaan both stifled grins. The captain spoke. “Lt. Stryker, when you and Commander Marshall finish, come join me on the bridge. I’d like to give you a tour as a thank you.”

  I smiled back at the captain. Take that, eavesdropping Neptune! “I’d love that,” I said. I may have shifted my weight a little to make sure the insignia radio receiver on my uniform picked up my response.

  Vaan followed me into the uniform ward. The soles of my boots were silent against the smooth floors. I sat on the bench along the far wall next to a locked case of gravity boots. Vaan pulled a chair up in front of me and sat down.

  “Do you want me to just tell you what happened?”

  “I thought we could sit and talk first. I haven’t seen you in years. Not since—”

  I cut him off. “Not since you people convicted my dad.”

  “I recused myself from the vote against him. Federation Council made the decision, not me.”

  “That’s right, Vaan. You recused yourself. You didn’t defend him; you didn’t open an investigation into the allegations against him or encourage them to review their facts. You stepped aside because you were afraid of making a stink first thing after getting appointed to the council.”

  “That’s not fair, Syl. I’d been in the position for less than a moon cycle. It would have had long-term implications on my role within the council going forward.”

  “As long as you were thinking about your reputation long term, then, sure, that’s fine. I totally understand your reputation comes before my father.”

  “I’m not here to talk about your father.”

  “Then why are you here? The first thing you would have done after the request came through to Federation Council was to look at the ship roster and make sure there were no conflicts of interest. You would have seen my name. Why recuse yourself back then and not now?”

  “I’m here because the council was alerted to some strange activity onboard Moon Unit 5. First murder, then sabotage. Questions surround the ship’s security team. I was sent to observe and make an arrest if necessary.” He glanced down at my black and gold uniform. “Moon Unit security,” he said. “That’s what you always wanted, wasn’t it? It’s what you studied and trained for at the academy. It’s good to see you sitting there in that uniform. It’s good to see you period.”

  “We should get started,” I said. “The council will expect you to follow procedure with a post-critical event interview. Are you ready?”

  “It’s been ten years, Syl. We don’t have to rush anything.”

  “You’re here to do a job, so do it.” I reached forward and activated the recording device in his hand. “Preliminary interview with Lt. Sylvia Stryker aboard Moon Unit 5 as conducted by Commander Vaan Marshall. Space date: Two-twenty-three. Time: Zulu Eight.” I held the wand toward him to speak or take control of the interview.

  He took it from me and held his hand over the wand. “This is how you want it to be?”

  “Yes.”

  He moved his hand from the recording device. “Lt. Stryker, why was your name only added to the security roster after the presence of Federation Council was requested aboard this ship?”

  15: Suspects

  I should have expected the question. Vaan had tried to talk to me before turning on the microphone, and he’d even commented on my uniform. Back when we were in the space academy together, he’d had a leaning toward politics and I toward security. He knew what my dreams had been up to the point when the Federation Council officers arrested my dad. That’s when I vowed never to become one of them. And here I was, dressed like my enemy. Neptune didn’t know that. Nobody on the ship did. Except for the person sitting in front of me recording my interview for the council to judge.

  “My reassignment to security was recent. I’ve been a member of the ship’s crew since Moon Unit 5 departed.”

  “Your name wasn’t on the roster that was submitted a month ago.”

  “I was a last-minute replacement for the uniform lieutenant. And before you ask about that, the original hire had to back out of her assignment because of a broken leg. For the ship to meet its scheduled departure date, all open positions had to be filled. Since I’d already passed the background check, I was assigned to oversee the uniform ward.”

  “Until two days ago, your records weren’t in the computer manifests.”

  “Ask Neptune. He’s the head of Moon Unit security. He’ll corroborate these facts.” Neptu
ne had to. If he told them I was lying, we’d both be taken into custody and removed from the ship. I had the benefit of knowing Neptune could hear whatever I said thanks to the communication device embedded in my new uniform. I didn’t believe for a second he wasn’t listening in.

  Vaan seemed to find my answer suitable. “Describe what happened the night of the engineering emergency.”

  “Captain Swift told Neptune to check out the engineering quadrant. They suspected sabotage, and he wanted Neptune to investigate.”

  “Were you both on duty?”

  “We were at First Dinner. The entertainment was about to start.”

  “Were you there on official security detail? First Dinner is for senior officers and passengers.”

  “We were dining.”

  “Together?”

  “Yes.”

  Vaan’s expression changed. I could have told him the real reason I’d been there with Neptune. I didn’t. He didn’t deserve it.

  I’d often wondered how it would go the first time I saw Vaan after Federation Council voted to convict my dad. Now I knew. Vaan’s questions were like a knife to the scar tissue of a previously broken heart. Even his attempted apology felt thin. His eyes searched my face seemingly looking for signs of the Sylvia he once knew. I couldn’t let him see the vulnerability just below the surface.

  “There was a vacant table and Uma Tolst, The Space Bar hostess, notified the captain,” I said. Without thinking about it, my hand felt for the communication device embedded in my new uniform. “He instructed Neptune to be at dinner, and Neptune took me.”

  “Oh.”

  “It wasn’t—” I cut myself off. I knew it wasn’t a date and Neptune knew it wasn’t a date, but there was no reason Vaan had to know that. “During dinner, Captain Swift told us about the problem. We slipped out right before the entertainment started.”

  “And you went to engineering. Did you have any idea what you would find when you got there?”

  “Neptune said there was a problem with the computer readings, and that security protocol mandated he be there to oversee the technicians.”

  “Why did Neptune take you with him? If that’s what the problem was, there wouldn’t be a reason for a uniform lieutenant to go with him.”

  I wasn’t about to tell Vaan that I’d been in Neptune’s custody at the time. I searched for a plausible explanation that wouldn’t raise additional questions. Unfortunately, there was only one thing that sprang to mind.

  I sat up straighter. “I already told you. Neptune and I were at First Dinner together. Considering the circumstances, I would think you’d understand exactly why he didn’t leave me alone. Gentlemen aren’t expected to ditch their companions in the middle of an evening.”

  Vaan’s brows dropped down over his eyes and his lips pursed together like he’d bitten into a rotten lemon. He studied me for a moment and appeared to choose his words cautiously. “How well do you know Neptune?” he finally asked. I suspected that wasn’t one of his preselected questions.

  “Well enough to accompany him to First Dinner.”

  “Neptune has a reputation in the galaxy, and it’s not as a gentleman.”

  While I was both considerably interested in the details of Neptune’s not-a-gentlemen reputation and the fact that Neptune himself was probably listening to the conversation, I fought to control my reaction. “Sometimes people aren’t what they seem.” I smiled a knowing smile.

  Vaan looked away. I felt a wall of tension between us. That’s what you get for choosing sides, Vaan Marshall. Or what you don’t get. You don’t get me.

  “You arrived in engineering and found two men down. What happened next?”

  I went on to describe the scene as we’d discovered it: the flashing red lights that cast the quadrant in an overall gray state, the sirens that made it impossible for Neptune to understand what I’d tried to tell him when I first saw the two men lying unconscious behind the computer.

  “When Neptune rounded the corner and saw the men, he wanted me to help carry them out. By that time, I’d found the hose wedged in the seam between the wall panels. I felt the air on my fingertips first and then sniffed it. I knew right away what it was.”

  “And that was what?”

  “Carbon monoxide. When we were kids on Plunia, we used to stand outside the carbon mines. Remember? It was the only place where we could escape the mostly pure oxygen that came from the ice mines. It made us dizzy—almost like how I feel when I drink too much Saturnian wine.”

  Vaan held his hand out as if he was about to touch me, and then he stopped and put it back onto his lap. The memory was there right below the surface. That’s where we’d spent our first night together. The intoxicating combination of love, lust, and carbon monoxide had kept us out past curfew.

  Vaan missed class the next day. As a result, he’d been enrolled in remedial studies and given a battery of tests to gauge his dedication to the program. I’d been grounded. The only time I was allowed to leave the mines was to attend class. And even then, I’d had a chaperone. My dad was between deliveries of ice to neighboring planets, and he shuttled me back and forth to the space academy. Those were the last memories I had of my dad before he was sent away. And in hindsight, I’d do it all again.

  “So that’s it. I inhaled the gas so it wouldn’t spread deeper into the engineering room while Neptune got the men out.”

  “Lt. Stryker, for the record, what is your background?”

  “My mother’s family is from Earth and my dad is Plunian.”

  “Where were you raised?”

  “Plunia.”

  “What made you think that you were equipped to inhale direct carbon monoxide and survive?”

  “I didn’t think. I just acted. The day I boarded the ship, when I found the second navigation officer dead in the uniform ward, I was too late to save him. I wasn’t going to let that happen again. I saw two men passed out on the floor. I saw the hose jutting out from between two panels on the wall. I tried to get Neptune’s attention, but the sirens were too loud for him to understand me. The only way to buy time for him to get them out was to stop the gas leak, so I stopped the leak.”

  “That’s not how your mind works. You’re naturally gifted at the space sciences: physics, chemistry, geometry, and trigonometry. You’ve had a sense of them since birth. You wouldn’t just inhale a poisonous gas without first assessing the odds, knowing the risks, calculating the possible damage to you and others. You’re not spontaneous like that.”

  I glared at him. “Don’t pretend you know me, Commander Marshall. There is more to being a member of Moon Unit 5 security team than what you read in my file.” For a few long moments, we stared eye to eye. The room grew hot, and my skin felt prickly.

  Neptune entered, breaking the tension. “Is this interview over? I need Stryker in security,” he said.

  Vaan and I stood up. Vaan switched the recording device off and said, “I hope you know what you’re doing, Lt. Stryker. There’s only so much I can do to protect you, and you’ve already willfully placed yourself way outside that zone.”

  16: Debriefing and a Theory

  Vaan walked past Neptune and left. I put my hands on my hips. “What do you want?”

  “I want a debriefing.”

  “Not now. I want to get to that tour of the bridge that Captain Swift offered.”

  “You’re not going to the bridge. Debriefing. Now.”

  “I thought you could hear everything I said.”

  “I can.” He didn’t look particularly thrilled.

  “Then why do you need a debriefing?”

  “Follow me.” He turned around and left.

  I looked at my surroundings. This ward was where I was supposed to be. In a small corner of the ship, away from the passengers and the security team. In charge of folding uniforms and storing them neatly between requisitions. I’d taken a big risk to get on board Moon Unit 5 in the first place, but that was because I knew I was qualified to do the job vac
ated by the original accident-prone uniform lieutenant as soon as I saw it listed on the ship manifest. It was a low-ranking position. It was perfect for me because I could fly under the radar.

  Nobody should have had reason to question if I was qualified or how I’d passed the physical exam. Every single person on this ship had been given two uniforms before departure. The only time I’d be called on was in case of uniform infraction or promotion. The crimes on the ship had made my position far more visible than I liked.

  Neptune came back in. “Stryker. Now.”

  I may have cursed at him under my breath.

  I had to jog since his legs were so much longer than mine, but there was no way I was going to tell him I couldn’t keep up. We went into the elevator. He swiped his card and the elevator started its descent.

  “You’re not putting me back in the holding cell, are you?” I asked.

  “We’re going to engineering.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I want to know what you know about what happened in there.”

  “You do know. You just heard me dictate it to Vaan.”

  “Commander Marshall’s line of questioning was intended to elicit answers to a different set of questions than the ones I’m asking. And while you’re working for me, you will address him—and every other ranking officer on board this ship—with the proper title.”

  “I can’t start calling Vaan ‘Commander Marshall.’”

  “Unless you have evidence to strip him of his rank, then you’ll show him the appropriate respect.”

  I almost wished I did, but I didn’t. Vaan had achieved his position the hard way: through high grades and networking. Unlike the other twenty-three members of Federation Council, Vaan hadn’t been born into a legacy position. A Federation Council member had died, and there had been no family line to take over. It was the kind of thing that happened only in the rarest of situations, and Vaan had been the right candidate at the right time. He was the most honest person I’d ever met. I’d tried really, really hard to hate him after he took the position, but I couldn’t. That made it ten times harder to get over him. Eventually, I did.