The Blue King Murders

by Tom Shepherd

  “Delightful.” Tyler climbed out of his casket. “Where’s Demarcus?”

  “Disembarked the diplomatic shuttle and headed straight for the Imperial Compound. I think he’s got a contact there.”

  “Our Chief Investigator seems to know somebody everywhere. Someday, I’m going to have a talk with Inspector Platte about his secret lives before we met at Sedalia.”

  “The Mindorians pulled some strings and got us a face-to-face with the Chief Prosecutor.”

  “Yerzail-whatsisname? I met that asshole at the Orbital Hub.” He stretched, shaking off the stiffness from sleeping in a hardbottom box. “The Prosecutor can wait. Let’s find Mr. Blue.”

  “You might want to snap this onto your belt first.” She tossed him a disc-shaped device about half the size of his hand. “It’s set for Suryadivan male. Tap with the heel of your hand and voilà, you transform like a shape-shifter. Visual illusion only, so don’t touch anything or you’ll shimmer.”

  He activated the device and transformed into a ruddy colored amphibian-marsupial with red wine hair and a large fin rising across his head, ear to ear. Instead of a nose, Tyler now sported two bony breathing horns that connected beneath dark eyes and swept upward where human sideburns might go.

  “Just don’t touch anything,” she reminded him.

  “I will remain aloof,” Tyler said in Suryadivan.

  She frowned. “Keep your mouth shut, too. Your Missouri accent is atrocious. I’ll speak to the locals in Pharmaadoodil.”

  Tyler intended to hire a public taxi but discovered a dark red auto-skimmer with Mindorian embassy registration awaiting them at the west entrance to the compound. When Tyler and Julieta climbed into the U-shaped, four-seat passenger area, its onboard computer announced in Terran Standard that the vehicle was theirs for the duration of their stay on Annistyn.

  “Outstanding,” Tyler said. “Take us to the place where Prince Zenna-Zenn is being held.”

  “Tyler,” Julieta said, “let me remind you—I do all the talking.”

  “It’s an auto-driver,” Tyler protested. “All right, all right. Nudge me when I’m allowed to speak.”

  “I can’t. You’ll shimmer.”

  The car stopped in front of a thick, coppery stem which supported a saucer-shaped building far above. The onboard computer announced it was the Hall of Custody and suggested they look for Prince Zenna-Zenn at the Pre-Trial Incarceration Section.

  When Tyler and Julieta moved into an access lift with a small knot of blue locals, he tried to keep clear of contact with the elevator walls and the people who ascended with them. Julieta stationed herself between Tyler and the crowd, but his image flickered twice when he contacted the back corner of the lift. Fortunately, other passengers were deep in their reveries or concentrating on the changing Pharmaadoodil symbols above the door, which Tyler assumed must indicate floor levels.

  Julieta spoke a few words in the native tongue and a graying female answered with a single word. Tyler’s cousin translated into Suryadivan, “Top level.” He nodded.

  At the last stop, they lingered in the rear of the lift before disembarking, carefully avoiding contact with new passengers who waited to go down. Finding the main office was easy enough, but getting access to Mr. Blue without appearing to be his legal defenders was a bit more problematic. Julieta knew the plan, so Tyler followed her wordlessly into the reception area of the Pre-Trial Incarceration Department and stood behind her, flipping his head fin nervously.

  “I am Dr. Julieta Solorio, Chief Medical Officer for Star Lawyers, Incorporated,” she announced in the auxiliary language of all Earth’s citizens. “Does anyone speak Terran?”

  As expected, they did not. But Julieta was fluent in the local lingo. After a few tense minutes of negotiation with desk clerks in Lower Caste Pharmaadoodil, a junior staffer handed her a pass key.

  “Prince Zenna-Zenn is allowed to meet with authorized personnel in an unsupervised space,” Julieta explained to Tyler in Suryadivan as they hurried down the hallway. “We’ve been granted access to perform a ‘medical-psychological evaluation’ of the defendant for his legal team.”

  “So, it worked,” Tyler said. “We aren’t here as defense lawyers, ergo no capital offense attaches to our conduct.”

  Her dispatcher training kicked in. “We’re still too exposed. This is their turf. How do we know they’re not listening during this ‘unsupervised’ visit?”

  “We don’t,” he said. “Demarcus could sweep for spyware, but he’s free-lancing for local contacts.”

  The pass key was a plastic strip of encoded data. When Julieta pressed it against a glowing amber oval, the color changed to blue and the door hissed open. Inside was another, smaller reception room with a clear acrylic conference table and six blue chairs. At the far end of the waiting area, a small figure in pure white perched in full lotus position upon a turquoise sofa. She had braided black hair and honeyed skin, but her composure gave away her identity before the face turned to them.

  Nobody he had ever met was as utterly cool in all circumstances. Yumiko Matsuda, Tyler’s missing security officer, left the Patrick Henry immediately after Mr. Blue departed for his homeworld to surrender himself to the Quirt-Thymean authorities for regicide.

  “Yumi-san!” Tyler bounded across the room, snapped off the holographic disguise, and scooped her up in an awkward, feet swinging embrace.

  “Tyler-san, Doctor Julieta. I am very pleased to see you.”

  Julieta rescued her from Tyler’s embrace but hugged the Japanese security expert herself. “How did you get here?”

  “I follow Blue-san. Honor requires me to protect him unto death.”

  Tyler scratched his chin. “Wait a minute. This is starting to make crazy sense. At the Mardi Gras party, Kichirou Tsuchiya said you are a rare traditionalist who follows ‘all seven virtues of the Bushido code.’”

  “Kichirou-san was a bad man,” Yumiko said. “However, that one time he spoke truth.”

  “Mr. Blue is your liege lord,” Tyler said.

  “Hai.”

  “Unpack this for a simple girl, please?” Julieta said with a smirk.

  “When the pirates attacked Sedalia, Mr. Blue showed up at Police HQ where Yumiko worked,” Tyler said. “I never caught the significance of that before now. And she was always inquiring about his whereabouts and well-being.”

  “Okay, now I get it,” Julieta said. “How did you get attached to Zenna-Zenn?”

  “I met my Lord Zenna at the Suryadivan colony world of Kosyadin when my father worked in the import business. We were very young, but soon became old friends.”

  “And later you became his bodyguard?” Julieta said.

  “No, Doctor Solorio. I am not my Lord Zenna’s bodyguard. I am his First Wife.”

  Tyler’s mouth dropped open. For a long moment no sound emerged. He finally squeaked, “Okay, I didn’t see that coming.”

  A door hissed open at the center of the conference room. Tyler tapped his holo-projector and became a mauve, fin-headed Suryadivan again. Three blue guards escorted His Royal Highness Tertiary Sub-Prince Zenna-Zenn Ringadool-Khelida-LeBokk, Junior, into the room.

  “Who takes full responsibility for this accused regicide?” the tallest guard asked in Terran.

  “I do,” Yumiko said.

  “Are you his doctor?” the guard said.

  “First Wife.”

  “Your visitation periods are expired until next week.”

  “I am Dr. Julieta Solorio. The Prince is my patient.”

  “DNA imprint here.” The guard offered a data pad and Julieta placed her hand upon it. “You have ninety-four Terran minutes. Tomorrow, you may return for a similar period. If the accused departs from this space, you will be charged with regicide and stand trial alongside him. Do you have any questions?”

  “Yeah,” Tyler said in Terran. “Do you have to be a dick to qualify for this job, or is it an acquired skill?”

  Julieta glared at him. “Forgive my foolis
h nurse assistant, please.”

  “We allow for such misbehavior in certain species. Suryadivans are all religious fanatics.”

  Tyler started to speak again but Julieta’s murderous eyes shut him down. The guards left and they were alone with their runaway friend.

  “Hello, Tyler Matthews,” Mr. Blue said. “I don’t think they understood your dick metaphor. Very nice disguise. Is it Mardi Gras again?”

  “My Lord Zenna.” Yumiko bowed deeply. “Are you well?”

  “Hungry. I cannot get them to make human food. As you Terrans say, I would kill for a pizza.”

  Tyler’s Suryadivan head fin went flat. “Indigo, this is not a good time to be joking about homicide.”

  Julieta asked Mr. Blue to sit while she did a quick check of his vitals. She took a collapsible medi-scanner from her jumpsuit pocket and began the examination.

  Tyler sat on the sofa arm. “Yumiko, is this room free of listening devices?”

  “Hai, Tyler-san. I swept the space thoroughly, as Inspector Platte taught me. Is Demarcus-san here, too?”

  “In the city, rooting around for clues and contacts.” Tyler dropped his Suryadivan disguise. “Julieta, make a transcript of our conversation, please.”

  She touched the medical scanner. “Recording now.”

  He turned to Mr. Blue. “Okay, partner, who killed the Blue King?”

  “I do not know,” he said.

  “You’ll have to do better than that.”

  “I was unconscious when the High King perished.”

  “He knocked you out?”

  “No, someone—perhaps King Bandu-Jeewan—stunned me with an energy weapon. When I awoke, Queen Veraposta stood over the remains of a very well toasted Quirt-Thymean, whom I suppose was the late King. She held a rifle blaster.”

  “That’s not exactly the story she’s telling,” Tyler said. “According to her, the King knocked you out and she killed him to save your life.”

  “Very strange,” he said. “I assumed the King stunned me and attacked her with his bare hands. She said he tried to strangle her, but she broke free and got the rifle blaster and shot him.”

  “Why did the King want to kill his Queen?”

  “He was a dick.”

  “Okay, okay. Be more specific.”

  “Veraposta did not love him.”

  “She loved you?”

  “Yes.”

  Yumiko nodded. “Their love was pure.”

  Tyler shook his head. This was way too civilized for a Missouri boy. Back home, two girlfriends sharing one cheating boyfriend have two options. Rip his balls off, or pull each other’s hair out. Maybe both. He tried again.

  “That night you scheduled coitus with her, and he interrupted your plans, and—”

  “No, the opposite,” Blue said.

  “Excuse me?”

  “It was Bandu’s week with Veraposta. However, she sent a messenger who said the Queen wanted me to come to her chambers and plead with the King to give her respite. She wanted to couple with me.”

  Tyler turned to Julieta. “Prima, is there any way you can tell if Indigo was knocked out or stunned?”

  “When did it happen?” Julieta said.

  “Four Terran years ago,” Mr. Blue said.

  Julieta shook her head. “Stun weapons leave no lasting effects, and my scan of his cranium shows no history of blunt trauma or concussion.”

  “If you don’t know what happened,” Tyler said, “why did you take the rap for Veraposta?”

  “Because they would have executed her, Tyler Matthews.”

  “Look at the facts. She calls you to her bed chamber on the night Bandu has booked for sex with her. You arrive, somebody stuns you. When you awaken, Bandu is a charred burger on the marble floor. Veraposta wails that he was trying to strangle her, yet somehow she broke free from a large, powerful male and retrieved her rifle blaster, conveniently parked nearby. Sizzle-sizzle, she’s a widow. You gallantly take the blame for the crime and flee into the night, away from the woman you love. Is that what happened?”

  “I… I do not know,” Mr. Blue sputtered. Tyler had never seen the unflappable Quirt-Thymean so nonplussed.

  “She set you up, Indigo.”

  “No, Tyler-san.” Yumiko said quietly. “That is not what happened.”

  Tyler’s eyebrows arched. “What do you know, Officer Matsuda?”

  “Zenna-san did not kill,” she said.

  “So, it was the Queen?”

  “Veraposta did not kill.”

  “I don’t like where this is going,” Tyler said.

  Yumiko lowered her head. “I killed the Blue King.”

  “Oh, shit,” Juliet whispered.

  “Bandu-Jeewan, very evil man,” Yumiko said. “He sent Quirt-Thymean ninja to murder enemies in their beds, also wives and children. He ordered families to break up and gave wives to other husbands. He seized the property of his enemies after having them killed.

  “The night of which we speak, Veraposta sent note, asking me to be sure Zenna-Zenn was safe, because she was inviting him to confront the High King on her behalf. I waited in the corridor with her half-brother, Sub-Prince Erkinood Atbarasoo.”

  “Sash,” Tyler said. “We call him Sash.”

  “When I hear screaming, I march toward bed chamber. Prince Erkinood tried to stop me, but I knock him aside. My liege lord was in danger.”

  “You have always been my dearest friend,” Zenna said.

  “My prince lay on the floor, unconscious. At first, I thought King Bandu and the Queen were making love, but when she saw me Veraposta cried that he was raping her. Bandu slapped her face and put hands around throat and began choking the High Queen.”

  “Take your time, honey,” Julieta said. “Samurai or not, you’re not made of steel.”

  Yumiko took a breath. “I draw my katana, deploy blade.”

  The compact weapon fit inside a hand-sized carrying bag but snapped into a full-size, micro-sharp, single edge, steel blade. Tyler recalled how mercilessly she wielded the weapon in close combat with pirates.

  “I order King to release her, but he turns to attack me.” She gestured with both hands, a thrusting, upward lunge. “My blade destroyed his heart.”

  “So, Veraposta got the rifle blaster and reduced him to charcoal, which disguised the death blow,” Tyler said.

  “Hai, Tyler-san.”

  “Zenna-Zenn, unconscious on the floor, didn’t know?”

  “I… I did not, Tyler Matthews. ”

  “Well, this is a whole different narrative.” Tyler slid onto the couch and folded hands behind his head. closing his eyes. “This will take some sorting out.”

  “I must confess my crime and free my Lord Zenna,” Yumiko said.

  “They won’t believe you,” Tyler said. “The best you get is an adjacent jail cell and execution on the same day.”

  Clearly distraught, Mr. Blue said, “Then what are we to do, Tyler Matthews? Our cook is goosed.”

  Any other time, Tyler would have chuckled at another of Mr. Blue’s butchered Terran metaphors. Not today.

  “For now, everybody clams up. That means answer no questions, offer no confessions. In fact, make no statements whatsoever. Don’t tell them what time of day it is, or whether the sun is shining. Under the legal system of the Terran Commonwealth, you have the right to remain silent. We have invoked reciprocal legal status and the Quirt government has agreed, which means Terran rights must be respected.”

  “I am not Terran,” Mr. Blue said.

  “You were employed by a Terran corporation when arrested for the offense, which extends to you the same immunity shield against self-incrimination every Terran enjoys.”

  “But I already confessed.”

  “Doesn’t matter. The confession is inadmissible, because the Quirt-Thymean government did not appraise you of your rights under Terran law.”

  “I hope you are right,” Zenna said.

  “I am,” Tyler assured him. “So, not a word.
If you are questioned, tell them to ask your attorney. No exceptions. Do you understand—Indigo, Yumiko?”

  They nodded.

  “All right. Let’s see if we can find some more witnesses to muddy the waters,” Tyler said. “God knows how many more people are waiting to confess to killing the Blue King.”

  “Yumiko, if you don’t mind, I’d like to do a quick medi-scan on you,” Julieta said. The white-robed samurai nodded and Dr. Solorio began her check-up.

  Tyler smiled. God, I hope I’m right. This is a sovereign star-empire with ancient legal traditions of their own. And I haven’t exactly made this ‘immunity shield by employment’ argument before the judge yet. Well, at least I’ve stopped Mr. Blue and Yumiko from hemorrhaging more incriminating information. Maybe Demarcus will coax his LEO cronies to divulge more facts about the murder, because Samurai or not, I’m still not convinced Yumiko is telling the whole truth. She is too respectful of legitimate power to barge into a royal bedroom with sword drawn. Yet, if she or Zenna or Veraposta didn’t kill the Blue King, who did? Well, at least I got my wish. A nice murder to solve instead of a government to overthrow… maybe. Somebody is still trying to kill members of my family at both ends of the galaxy. And why did they target Lovey Frost? Suzie, Rosalie, J.B.—I could use your help here…

  Julieta finished her scans and pronounced Zenna and Yumi-san healthy and well. They decided to reserve time from their visit and return when Tyler’s team had more substantial leads on Bandu-Jeewan’s reign of terror leading up to the night of his death. If he could be declared a criminal ruler, the act of killing him might become an event to celebrate in Quirt-Thymean history.

  When Julieta keyed the door, it swished open to reveal a large Quirt in richly tailored legal robes standing at the entrance. Chief Prosecutor Yerzail Kamariikaaa, flanked by a handful of armed guards, stepped into the conference room. It was precisely that moment that Tyler and Julieta realized the younger Matthews brother had not yet tapped his holo-disguise device. A collective Oh, shit passed wordlessly between their glances.

  “Counselor Tyler Matthews, it is very good to see you here on Annistyn,” Yerzail said smoothly. “Do you know what this means?”