The Genevian Queen: The Complete Series by MD Cooper

Author:MD Cooper [Cooper, MD]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2021-05-25T22:00:00+00:00

* * * * *

“What do you mean the ship’s empty?” Kora asked as she approached the crew standing near the Jay Rig’s airlock.

“Well, not empty empty,” the crew’s supervisor said with a sour grunt. “It has all the normal ship stuff in it…minus people.”

“How did it dock, then?”

The woman shrugged. “Engines, I assume. We just service ships, we don’t throw ropes around the hull and heave to.”

“Any chance they just left before you got here?” Kora asked.

“Nope, we were waiting at the airlock when they latched on.”

Kora shook her head. “OK, thanks. Mind if I go aboard and look around?”

“Knock yourself out. Nothing we can do till someone signs off on the resupply.”

Walking onto the ship, Kora immediately noted that the Jay Rig was clean. Exceptionally clean. The registry said it was a sixty-two-year-old pinnace, but the interior didn’t line up with that.

“Maybe they’re just neat freaks,” she muttered, knowing that it would be unlikely that she’d find any evidence of the mysterious Captain Belfas aboard.

After releasing a pair of small drones to survey the vessel, she walked down the single corridor to the cockpit, noting that three of the seats were still covered in plastic film.

“OK, a refit, then.”

The ship’s public network had only the most rudimentary log entries and information, but it did note that the current complement was only one crew member. Whether that was true or not was another question entirely. Kora flipped through the inventory, and it reported three EV suits in a nearby storage locker. Upon inspection, she saw that all three were still there.

Of course, whoever was aboard could have brought their own—or just altered the records.

She also considered that the ship had flown from Capeton to Hanging Garden on autopilot. NSAI were more than capable of doing that, and the onboard system could have faked a human during docking.

The ship had a second airlock on the port side, and she checked it for any evidence, though the only hint that it had even seen a human’s presence was a scuff mark on the floor that could have been made by anything.

<I need to speak to the HGS security head,> she said to the NSAI that operated the station’s administrative offices.

<That would be Lieutenant Merl,> the NSAI replied cordially. <He is, however, busy at the moment. Can I help you with something?>

Kora doubted it, but figured it couldn’t hurt to ask. <I need to see if anyone exited this pinnace on its port side.>

<I’m sorry, that’s privil—>

She interrupted the automation with her detective tokens and auth codes provided by Chancellor Tremon.

<Checking logs. One moment.>

<Thanks,> Kora said and waited for over a minute for the NSAI to come back. When it finally did, the response was not what she expected.

<Hanging Gardens Station has no external monitoring at that berth. I’m sorry.>

<None?>

<Not at this time, no.>

Kora walked back through the pinnace to the docks where the service crew waited.

“Is there really no external monitoring in this section of the station?” she asked.

“Not for a bit, no,” the woman replied.

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