Star Law: A Marshal Cole Series

Chapter 24 (b)

Cole waited for Orion to take a seat opposite him. She sat proper and prim like a schoolgirl. Curiously, she was attired with a gray space suit. All that was missing was the gloves and helmet. Before he could comment on why she was wearing the suit, he noticed the bruising on the neck and cheek. It was purple, a few days old.

"You're bruised," Cole pointed out, louder that he intended.

Orion's cheeks reddened. "This?" Her hands involuntarily covered the marks. "Aubrey Chase Chen."

Cole's own bruises were still visible but beginning to yellow with Doc Kripisov's treatment."You two fought," stated Cole. "In her cabin."

"In a manner of speaking," answered Orion. "I was never in her cabin."

"Chen is dead though," said Cole flatly. "Her manner of death was... violent."

"She was going to kill me," said Orion. She was calm and looked straight at the Marshal when she spoke. "A moment or two more and it would've been me dead. Chen has killed many times before."

"Self defence then?" asked Cole.

The girl said nothing at first. Her eyes were downcast. "It wasn't what I wanted to happen. She had information I needed but she attacked me the first chance she could."

"The cabin shows evidence of... well, something I haven't seen before," said Cole. "A medical examination says homicide but forensics was not particularly helpful in telling me how. Nor have I been able to ascertain motive. The one thing that keeps coming up is psi which is believed to not exist by many."

"And you too?" asked Orion."I know better," said Cole. "After all, I followed a voice here, did I not?"

"What do you know about Aubrey Chase Chen?"

"We don't know enough about her background and can't verify with the comms blocked due to the Black Adder Cloud," said Cole. "However, we did find a military uniform In Chen's possession that links her to a unit involved in psi. We also found another body hidden in her cargo."

"I had nothing to do with that!" exclaimed Orion.

"We believe the victim was killed back on Arcturus,"said Cole looking carefully to see a reaction.

"I've been hidden on the ship since boarding at the Kilkenny Aperture," said Orion.

Cole considered this. It was entirely reasonable since nearly a third of the passengers stayed aboard the Niagara when it arrived at Arcturus. More accurately, it docked at ArcTerminus and if passengers wanted to they could take the space elevator down to surface. The spacedock itself had some attractions to it such as a casino and brothel but the three day layover was often spent shipbound.

The Kilkenny Aperture was just outside the Arcturus system. It was a manufactured wormhole built by a race of beings whose planet had been destroyed by the ever expanding star it encircled nearly 2 or 3 million years earlier. Scientists figured the structure had been built as a means of escape but it could have easily been set up as a transportation system as well. The gateway linked several systems and was discovered by Commonwealth explorer Albert Kilkenny when charting the Alpha Centauri.

Arcturus seen from Earth was the fourth brightest celestial body. At 37 light years away, it was in the neighbourhood so to speak. An orange giant star that at one time was much like Sol, it had swollen roughly to 26 times the size of Earth's sun. As it expanded, it had consumed many inner planets including the home of the builders of the wormhole. Artifacts from that culture had been discovered on the planet Arcturus. It was the 11th orbiting body out from the star it took its namesake from. Early attempts to name the blue planet something else had failed so it remained as Arcturus. Of the 400 planets and moons in the system, it was most Earth-like in terms of size, gravity and look. The population had exploded to around 200 million since the discovery of the aperture but given how much space colonists had to work with, it felt empty.

It was entirely plausible and even likely that Orion stayed on the ship rather than going through security to ArcTerminus. However, he couldn't be sure based on the girl's abilities to evade detection.

"Till now, it has been hard to find you on this ship even with all of its security features," said Cole. "I can't rule out anything at this point. I simply don't have enough information."

Orion's brow furrowed. "You once said of me that I had intelligence but lacked experience."

Despite himself, Cole chuckled. "You were using psi to spy?"

"Eavesdropping actually," said Orion. "I was on a balcony above listening in."

This amused Cole even more. "Some detective I am."

"You didn't really know who I was then," said Orion.

"I still don't," said Cole plainly. "This is a murder investigation and you're someone I've been looking for. Did you call me to turn yourself in? The partition suggests otherwise."