Murder in New Eden
by Charles C. Cole
Welcome to New Eden, an isolated city floating in space, whose founders believed the start of the 20th century was as good as it would ever get. Gun-free police supervise from atop their penny-farthings, carrying only batons. Aggression has been chemically suppressed for years. But then violence erupts. In response, the chief of police weighs the prospect of thawing secret soldiers. In the middle of it all, two bright young women push for equality and recognition.
Chapter 25: Preparing for Delumbria’s Army
Cody tries to pierce the inky darkness by sheer determination, but it remains resolutely impenetrable. Though the chief is standing just four feet to his right, you wouldn’t know it, except for an occasional characteristic sigh of self-satisfaction.
“What exactly are we doing, Chief?” asks Cody, somewhat impatient. “Are there alarms to worry about?”
“No alarms. Just appreciating the escape from the real world, before we do what we came down for.”
“Do you come down often? Really, no alarms?”
“No. And nope. Then more people would know; follow the tell-tale siren. Nothing of interest here,” says Schiavelli. “Nothing to check out.”
“I don’t suppose you have some night-vision goggles in your pocket,” says Cody, “because it’s going to be difficult to avoid bumping into something.”
“Hah!” Schiavelli whispers. He claps twice quickly, and the overhead light comes on. “Let there be light!”
“Interesting,” says Cody.
There are two immense doors, resembling old-fashioned black steel bank vaults, on opposite sides of a short passageway.
“If one’s the armory, what’s the other one?” asks Cody.
“Your friends. They’re safe. You’ll have to take my word for it. We can visit them another time. Right this way.” The chief steps up to a combination lock. He stretches his fingers, knuckles popping. He feels his pockets for a piece of paper with the combination on it.
“Problem?”
“I’ve never opened it. I wrote down the combination, but I must have left it in my office.”
“Why don’t you try clapping?” suggests Cody sarcastically.
“Then we’ll be back in the dark. Oh, you mean to open the vault. You’ve been hanging out with Nakamura too much.”
“Do you want me to go back upstairs?”
“Nobody ever comes down here. I bet it’s not even locked. Hell with it.” Schiavelli grabs the vault handle and pulls. The door swings outward with a faint low-pitched groan. “Feast upon the one collection kept out of the city’s museum: Weapons of War from the 20th century.”
It’s empty. Nothing. At a certain point, a bare ceiling bulb pops on, triggered by the opening of the door. There are no tags or paperclips or a note with an IOU.
“Crap,” says Schiavelli.
Cody says, dryly, “A least you have a spare safe room to hide in when the town is overrun.”
“That’s not funny. This room should be full to overflowing, like a cave in the Tales From the Arabian Nights.”
“Sorry.”
“Maybe they were never here,” says the chief. “Maybe it was just an urban legend handed down from chief to chief, the stockpile getting larger with every generation. I can’t say I’m disappointed, but I am shocked. My father always talked about them like they were real. He must have believed. He wouldn’t lie to me, not about this.”
“No one could have smuggled them out, little by little, over time?” asks Cody, trying to make sense of it. “It’s unlocked after all.”
“It’s possible, but wouldn’t they have used them? Except for Bernie’s, I’ve never seen a real gun before. I have to think, if they were stolen, it was a long time ago. Or it’s an urban myth.”
“So you’re not worried that Delumbria’s army is battlefield-ready?” pushes Cody.
“Battlefield-ready?! No! Even if they have guns, that doesn’t mean they know how to use them. They wouldn’t know which end to point in which direction. I refuse to believe it. I don’t know where they are, if they’re anywhere, but we’re not going to see them anytime soon. Take my word for it.”
“I’ll try,” says Cody.
“Well, damn.”
“They would have been nice to have, you have to admit,” says Cody.
“You should get ready for self-defense class. That’s the only weapon we’ll need. This doesn’t change anything. Maybe it just means fewer people will have to die as we duke it out.”
“Do we shut it and lock it to continue the urban legend?”
“Why bother? But for now, let’s keep this little discovery between ourselves.”
* * *
City Operations resembles a modest retail store for used televisions; the screens are smallish and the monitors look like they’ve seen better days, whether it’s due to dust or fingerprints or some being slightly out of focus. Real-time, mute images flicker on nearly a hundred individual screens: a young, pretty couple jogging in matching outfits; an eight-months pregnant mother struggling to keep up with twin three-year old boys tethered to child harnesses, two battling paddle boats loaded with rambunctious high school boys, an empty park bench with a forgotten white scarf hanging from one armrest.
A pair of young male police officers, not too long out of high school, lean with identical shiny crew cuts, are playing cards, having pushed a couple of monitors just far enough apart to make room for their game. To their credit, they glance up occasionally at the digital activity, but their hearts and their egos are not invested.
Nakamura and Wayne rush in. They have been racing the last dozen yards, and Nakamura has won, again. The police officers are caught off guard, but they are too relieved at the sight of their replacements to care. Their shift is over at last.
“Hey, guys,” says Nakamura, a little out of breath. “Prevent any crimes today?”
“Nothing to report,” says one, jumping to his feet.
“It’s all yours,” says the other, following suit. “I don’t know how you do it.”
They scramble out, without bothering to retrieve their cards or restore order.
“See you tomorrow!” calls Nakamura down the hall. She closes the door and chortles, which makes Wayne giggle. “The sad part is: I don’t even know their names. I probably should.”
“Tweedledum and Tweedledee?”
“I think I intimidate them,” say Nakamura. “Can you believe it? I’ve never intimidated anyone in my life.”
“You did beat up a couple of Delumbria’s muscle-boys,” offers Wayne. “Word gets around.”
“And I’d do it again.” She make a foolish kung-fu gesture that she’s privately performed in front of the mirror a few times.
“Tomorrow,” says Wayne, with a sarcastic twinkle, “let’s tell them the chief wants them to have more cross-training, only they are to report to me in the morgue. I’ll put Teddy Tester under a sheet, with some gory makeup.” The women laugh even louder.
Then, when they are quiet again: “You get to have all the fun,” says Nakamura, puckering her lips.
Wayne points to a blinking red light in the corner of the ceiling, on a security camera aimed directly at them. “Besides, I think they just get punchy, thinking they’re on camera all day. I know I couldn’t do it.”
Nakamura waves at the camera like warmly greeting an old friend. “It didn’t stop them from playing cards.”
“I thought you said that one was just to keep Pelkey in line,” says Wayne, knitting her brows.
“True, so I guess I don’t need it anymore.”
“But aren’t there more cables connected to it now than there used to be?” prods Wayne.
“Quit looking for clues, officer. You’re going down a dead-end. That particular camera is like Director of Communications Petrillo: for looks only.” She smiles drunkenly.
“You’d know better than me, but I’m pretty sure.”
Nakamura squints at the new wires, like staring at a light bulb, comparing “before” and “after” images in her head, and then hesitantly, reluctantly agrees. “Nicolas, you no-good, slithering snake!”
“You don’t think he did it?” Though it seems contrary to logic, Wayne actually steps closer, as if hoping to see tell-tale fingerprints somehow tying the “modification” directly to Petrillo.
“No, but I think he ordered the boys to do it. That would explain the ‘duck-and-run’ exit. They were afraid they’d give something away. They wouldn’t have lied to me. One look into their souls, and they would have spilled everything.”
“Why would Petrillo want a camera in Ops?” Wayne asks. “Nobody’s ever in here but you, and occasionally—”
“Maybe to keep an eye on Jeb; they’re not exactly bosom buddies. The mayor doesn’t trust him, but I think Nicolas is permanently jealous.” Wayne covers her ears, like she’s heard enough about Nakamura and her ‘man’ problems. “Not that way: we all know he only has eyes for you.”
“Hey, I have never given him one reason to be optimistic,” declares Wayne. “This girl is married to her job. And her kittens. Enough said.”
“Anyway, he doesn’t want anyone anywhere near him on the company ladder, in case circumstances open up another promotion.”
“What kind of circumstances? Now you’re scaring me. Have you seen activity on your snoop-a-vision that I should know about?”
“No signs of an imminent apocalypse yet,” says Nakamura, opening her desk drawer and pulling out a pair of wire cutters. “I’d tell you. But certain people are way busier topside than they have a right to be. And I don’t like it.”
“Who?”
“Certain people.” It’s almost like saying the names will leave an awful taste in her mouth.
“Pelkey?”
“For starters.”
“And Superintendent Delumbria?”
“A.k.a.: the big boss of the thug squad. I don’t like it. Pelkey should be too ashamed to be slinking around his old haunts, unless he forgot his lucky toothbrush when the chief banished him. And I can’t tell you the last time I saw Delumbria up here, if ever.”
Nakamura climbs up on a desk immediately under the camera aimed at the room at large and she unceremoniously snips a cable. The red light still flickers, as though the perky camera is none the wiser. She tucks the loose end behind the device and starts to climb back down.
“Have you told Schiavelli?” asks Wayne, helping Nakamura back to floor level.
“He knows.”
“If ever there was a time for a good, old-fashioned jail, this would be it,” muses Wayne. “Keep the bad guys on ice.”
“That’s it! We could use the cryogenic tubes,” suggests Nakamura, with some bubbling excitement. “Let Boyer out, and put Pelkey and Delumbria in. That would be perfect!”
“Pelkey wouldn’t be a problem, but I don’t think Delumbria would fit. Sorry.”
“Probably not,” responds an already-deflated Nakamura. She tosses the wire cutters back in her desk drawer, and has an unsolicited, unexpectedly over-the-moon idealistic idea. “Hey, you’re smart!”
“So I’ve been told,” says Wayne cautiously. “Actually, the chief calls me brilliant.”
“Can you make a bigger cryogenics tube, you know, from spare parts lying around your office? Or maybe just super-enhance an empty morgue drawer or, better yet, the whole refrigerator! That’s what you call the dead-body bureau thing, right? That would be awesome! We don’t know how busy it’s going to get, so we might as well be prepared.”
“We?”
“Well, you’ve got to cross-train me anyhow. The chief told you to,” Nakamura reasons. “So I’ll be there to help out. Many hands make light work, and all that.”
“What about my other responsibilities? Hospital rounds, healing the lame, miniature golf with the pee-wee crowd?”
“The people Bernie shot up are recovering nicely. And you hate playing doctor, dealing with the living. Eartha Wayne, don’t deny it, you’re a mad scientist at heart. And this is right up your alley!”
“Fine. So long as you give me some time to play with mixing chemicals, I’ll see what I can do,” says Wayne, already brainstorming some ideas, “but I can’t make any promises.”
“That’s the spirit, ol’ girl!”
“But we have to let the chief in on it,” insists Wayne.
“Sure. Of course.”
“I don’t want to do anything behind his back. The chief and Jeb and you and me. We’re on the front lines together. No secrets from each other. I trust you guys with my life. You and Jeb can even have your private displays of affection, I’m okay with that. So long as work is work.”
“Hey! It’s not like that!” gasps Nakamura indignantly.
“Why not? What are you waiting for? My permission?”
“No! We’re still getting to know each other. We’re from different times. I don’t know if he’s going to stay.”
“Where’s he going to go, Lucy? There’s ‘here’ and there’s outer space. You’re funny. You’re smart. You can obviously handle yourself. He’d be foolish to let you go. Don’t complicate it by playing so hard to get.”
“What about you?”
“What about me? I’ve got my kittens,” responds Wayne. “And I can string Communications Director Petrillo along for a little while yet, until something better comes along.”
“So you do like him?”
“Half the time. And half the time I want to stick him in the proverbial dungeon and throw away the key. He wants to be one of the good guys, I know it, but he’s not exactly hanging out with the best role model. I wish Schiavelli had a director-type position for him, over at the station. Honestly, I think his promotion was the worst thing that could have happened to him. Then again, I probably have more faith in him than he deserves.”
“You usually have a good sense of the worth of a person.”
“Thanks. Except, remember in high school when you talked me into breaking up with Ducky Sutton? He was drop-dead gorgeous and captain of the varsity basketball team, but he had more hands than a cribbage tournament. And, ultimately, he left me for someone more ‘accommodating’, who shall remain nameless.”
“I think they have kids now,” offers Nakamura.
“My point is: there are worse guys out there. I can make this work. I just don’t have the time right now, especially since it sounds like I have to save New Eden from impending doom, fix the water treatment plant, and build a state-of-the-art cryogenics lab the likes of which this satellite city has never seen before. No pressure.”
“Sorry.”
“I’m leaving before you can come up with another DIY crisis management project. I need to visit my kittens, right now. Go find your boyfriend and do whatever it is you do at night, then meet me in the lab in the morning, and do not bring those two numbnuts officers. They can stay here and make silly faces at the broken surveillance camera. Or play Old Maid for all I care.”
“I’ll see you in the morning,” says Nakamura.
“Yes, you will, trainee. Yes, you will.” With one eyebrow arched in an imitation of a disdainful doyen, Wayne spins on her heels and exits. She is slightly overwhelmed, confidentially, but will recover with some rest, especially after a generous amount of life-affirming kitten-time.
Copyright © 2018 by Charles C. Cole
