10 Minute Tales

Feb 4 (Untimed)

The room was lit by a handful of spotlights, flooding the room in powerful illumination. Queenson donned a pair of dark-lensed glasses. The light dimmed to normal, but highlighted key areas with Sentinel's help.

"God, it's a mess." Queenson frowned. "You're telling me you don't have anything on where the victim was?"

"Negative." Sentinel replied. "While I can track the state of the body, a positioning system of that nature is planted only in augmentations. Without it, I do not have any method of the precise tracking we need."

"Fantastic." he sighed, looking around. A holograph of the body was on the floor, splintered into the parts they were expecting. He walked through it, grimacing slightly as it offered no resistance. "Blood splatters are pretty consistent with what you saw, at least."

"Simulations suggest the majority of the fight took place in the centre of this room." A square glowed to show the area.

"There's a higher concentration of blood over here, though." Alyssa pointed out, making Queenson look over.

"Any clues what could have been valuable over there?"

"It is possible that there was an object of value in this area. The blueprints do not reveal anything, nor do the victim's personal logs." Queenson looked around.

"Any fingerprints or anything?"

"Nothing, sir." another officer informed him. "The only prints we can find are the victim's own."

"Aug arms, then? If it had a blade, it'd explain a lot."

"No augmented device, arm or otherwise, has been within this room for the past- data corrupted." The sound of thoughtful conversation died, replaced with deafening silence.

"... what do you mean, corrupted?"

"Data has been edited beyond recognition. I cannot access it."

"What the hell?" Alyssa asked. "I thought you couldn't accept edits like that, not when it's corrupted."

"Forget it." another officer huffed. "Anything could have edited it accidentally - hell, the sun could have done it, electromagnetic waves do that." The others murmured their agreement, but Queenson remained quiet. It was too convenient for him.

"Alyssa, let me know if anything comes up. I'm going to try and figure this out."

"Sir." she nodded. Queenson removed his glasses, pocketing them again and marching out of the room. A hunch had already formed; now to chase it.

It was another quarter of an hour and three phone calls before he was allowed to walk into the research lab. Two of those had been to a confidant, Avo, who was working away on a damaged leg. He looked over as Queenson entered the cool, dim lab.

"Afternoon, Inspector!" he smiled, chirpy as ever. "What can I do you for?"

"Just answer the questions I've got, shouldn't take more than five minutes." Queenson sighed. He had always disliked Avo, for some reason. Something about his perpetual optimism, even in the face of adversity... nothing got him down, and Queenson hated that.

"Sure thing!" he grinned. "What's the problem?"

"What do you know about Sentinel's data getting corrupted?" he cut straight to the punch. Avo winced, his grin dropping briefly.

"Well, no computer is without its problems, you know? Uh, it usually happens by accident, just Sentinel mis-processing something. It also happens by electromagnetic waves, ranging from a simple school magnet all the way to the sun's radioactive patterns."

"Yeah, yeah, but can it be done deliberately?"

"Well, possibly? It's very unlikely, though, Sentinel's firewalls are constantly self-upgrading. So is most of Sentinel, actually, its discoveries have helped us advance as far as we have."

"But it is possible?"

"I mean... yes, I suppose it is." Avo grinned awkwardly.