Fugitive Telemetry (The Murderbot Diaries #6)(13)

Station Security swooped in like they were a big deal and not hours too late to catch anybody, and made us wait outside the transport’s hatch in the embarkation hall. It had taken seven minutes for them to arrive, and I had been able to collect a lot of visual and scan data in that time, including the download of the bio scan filters that Ratthi had suggested. I felt we had done a complete job, even with Gurathin distracting us by standing in the hatchway yelling at us to get out of the ship.

A bot that worked for the Port Authority had shown up before Station Security, pinged me, and then it just stood there. I’d seen it in the embarkation area a lot, and I’d never seen it do anything but just stand there.

(I had considered leaving a few drones hidden strategically around the transport to keep track of the investigation. But I had seen the thorough imaging scans they had done of the area where Lutran was found, and if the drones were discovered it would have been humiliating. I felt like I was at least one if not two points up on Station Security at this moment and I wanted to keep it that way.)

The initial response team was three Station Security officers and a Port Authority supervisor. They had taken a verbal report from Gurathin while eyeing me like they expected him to turn me in for whatever I had probably done. The first officer, feed ID Doran, said, “How do you know there’s no one on the transport?”

Ratthi and Gurathin looked at me, and I said, “I checked the transport for possible fatalities and injured crew or passengers in need of assistance, as well as potential hostiles. It’s clear.”

The expression range was dubious to skeptical.

Gurathin made an exasperated noise and said, “That’s what SecUnits do, that’s their job. Why don’t you do your jobs?”

“That’s what we’re here for,” Officer Doran said, beginning to fluster.

I said, “Station Security Initial Incident Assessment procedures require one of you to view and verify the scene before calling additional assistance from the Major Incident Team, if the surroundings are safe.” Not long after I’d first gotten here, I’d downloaded all the Station Security procedures so I’d know what I was dealing with. I added, “The surroundings are safe.”

Ratthi had to fold his lips almost completely inside his mouth to keep from reacting.

“We know that.” Officer Doran said to the Port Authority supervisor, “We’ll go in. You wait out here.” The Port Authority supervisor rolled her eyes and went to go stand with the Port Authority bot.

They had gone in, and after three minutes, came out again and stood around talking on their feeds. The PA supervisor started to set up a feed marker perimeter to warn off the hauler bots. The PA bot followed her around, which while not exactly helping, at least was better than just standing there.

Then Indah showed up with the same group of techs and officers who had been at the Lutran site. A second response team from the Port Authority, this one with more bots and different techs, showed up to mill around. Ratthi said they were here to assess the damage to the transport and try to repair it. (Apparently on Preservation this would be free? Gurathin said it fell under what they called a traveler’s aid rule. In the Corporation Rim, the transport would have had to sit there damaged and racking up fines until its owner or an owner’s rep arrived.) Station Security told the PA team to hold off, since the damage to the transport was evidence and would have to be documented before it could be repaired.

Gurathin kept saying we should leave, but I didn’t and Ratthi didn’t, so he stayed too, shifting around uneasily and occasionally pacing. “You don’t think this is related to GrayCris, do you?” Ratthi had asked me after he had called Station Security.

“It’s a possibility,” I said. I explained my idea about Lutran being another corporate agent who had been killed by a GrayCris agent. “But without corroborating evidence, the threat assessment is undetermined.” I could come up with scenarios where a GrayCris agent would have reason to kill another passenger on their transport, but without evidence I was just making up shit. (If I’m going to make up shit I’d rather do it about something else besides how a human got murdered by another human.)

“Then why was this Lutran killed?” Gurathin asked, his big brow creased.

“We don’t have enough data to make a guess yet,” I said, not as patiently as would have been required by my governor module. “There are too many factors involved, like did Lutran and the killer know each other before they boarded the transport. We don’t even know yet if the killer was another passenger or someone who was invited aboard, or who managed to trick or force the transport into letting them aboard. We don’t know how they moved the body from the transport to the station mall junction. We don’t know the motive, if it was corporate espionage, theft, a fight, or even a random opportunity killing.” We didn’t know shit, basically.

Because this is Preservation, Ratthi said, “What is a random opportunity killing?”

“When a human kills another human just because they can.” It’s also the kind of thing that’s much more common on media than it was in real life, but still.

Neither one of them seemed happy with that answer. I actually wasn’t either. From everything I’d seen in the media, assholes who just like to kill other humans are hard to catch. But without more info, I thought it was more likely there was a reason that Lutran had been killed, and that it would have to do with who Lutran was and why he was traveling. Threat assessment agreed.