The Romance Of Crime Part 1

THE ROMANCE OF CRIME.

by Gareth Roberts.

1.

The Killings.

It was not a planet for humans.

Steaming blue slime s.h.i.+fted constantly, the top layer of the boiling sludge that coated the planet's compacted core.

Bogs gulped, fermenting pools in which chemicals combined oddly, below treacly inflammable gases. Patches of the gas cleared occasionally and revealed bright near stars. The growls and belches from the ground accompanied the low note of the slow wind.

Three figures appeared through the thick screen of gases, tramping with difficulty through a mire. They wore bulky black atmosuits, rubber-jointed at elbows and knees. A range of equipment was slung over their shoulders and strapped to their sides in metal webbing pouches. Tiny sprinklers sprayed their faceplates every fifteen seconds. Their bearded faces were uplit inside their helmets.

The oldest of the men, their leader, stepped forward and pointed to a nearby ridge of rock. 'I was right. It's behind there.'

One of his companions unpacked a large communicator from his equipment pouch, sprayed its indicator panel clean with the sprinkler on his wrist unit, and punched in a recognition code on the panel below with slow, metal-gloved fingers. He waited a few seconds. The others heard his sigh over their radio links. 'Still no response.'

The third man said, 'There has to be a fault back at base. I still think so. I reckon a storm or something knocked down the communicator aerial. I think that's what must have happened.'

The leader did not comment. He had heard a number of the young man's theories in the three days since contact with base had been lost, and contributed several of his own. None of them were convincing. The base had been constructed to stringent standards and its power source, external transmat link and communication systems were backed by infallible failsafe mechanisms.

So why had they lost contact?

It had baffled the expedition from the start. They had sunk a deep rig in the wasteland as intended and collated results for two uneventful days. Early on the third day of the mission, the hourly check call from base had not come. Moments later the guidance line had snapped out.

The team had a.s.sumed the fault was with their equipment, possibly influenced by a small increase in local magnetism, but a thorough check on systems and backup components confirmed that these were functioning normally in the circ.u.mstances.

They had waited a few hours, continuing with their work in the belief that this was only a temporary error. At any moment the communicators would crackle back to life, and a voice from base would appear to explain everything. After all, this planet was renowned for the ability of its superdense atmosphere to m.u.f.fle signals and baffle sensors.

But no reply came, and the leader decided to turn back.

Without the guidance line the team were forced to rely on their own sense of direction and a flimsy, grime-coated metal map.

It had taken three days to retrace their route. The outward, computer-aided journey had been covered in one. On a shorter journey, they would have used the base's skimmer, but the board had not wanted to risk flying it over uncharted territory.

Now they were back at last. Over the ridge was the deep valley of solid ground selected by McConnochie Mining for the establishment of its base.

The leader squared his shoulders inside his atmosuit.

'Right. Over we go.' He took a leap forward and scaled the ridge in three jumps. The others followed.

The base consisted of three low, rectangular outbuildings, housing storerooms and laboratories, connected by narrow walkways to a central dome. Windows lined the walls. The wind had covered the base's metal plates with dark blue dirt.

An aerial, which served to carry radio, video and transmat information, stood unbowed next to an emergency launchpad.

There were no signs of activity inside or outside the base.

The survey team padded down the sides of the valley and leapt over to the dome's entrance.

The team leader flicked open his personal radio channel.

'Survey team to base. This is Hogan. Request entry.'

There was no response. He stepped forward and keyed his emergency entry code into the panel next to the air-lock.

The youngest man shuddered. 'If that door won't open,' he said, 'we'll be trapped outside.' He looked behind him at the barren surface of the planet. 'What a place to die.' He raised his hands to his helmeted head and took deep breaths. Hogan recognized that as a training exercise that was supposed to quell claustrophobia. It didn't work.

The panel beeped its agreement, and a few seconds later they heard bolts drawing back automatically. The air-lock s.h.i.+eld swung open and the team clambered through into the base.

The s.h.i.+eld swung shut behind them, and the compression process began. An indicator on one wall of the small chamber clicked from red to green as oxygen was released. The three men stood in silence, obeying drill. A minute pa.s.sed.

The internal door opened. The youngest man reached for the seals of his helmet. 'I've got to get out of this thing.'

Hogan stopped him. 'Wait.' He carried out a sensor check using his wrist unit. A red light winked. 'Life support's gone.

No oxygen, temperature a hundred below zero.' He lifted a leg. 'Grav field's off, too.'

'They must have been holed,' said the third man. 'Hope they got out in time.'

Hogan shook his head. 'No. It's a vacuum. The support systems have failed.'

He stepped through the internal door.

The base was unlit, and the bodies were revealed in beams cast from the team's helmets. Their twenty friends and colleagues lay frozen in small groups. Frosty white bile was spattered around their blue-lipped mouths. Their limbs were twisted, the fingers of grasping hands outstretched like claws.

The youngest man was crying. He was crouched against a wall. Nearby was Doctor Couper, who often used to sit with him in the refectory and who had beaten him in a poker game only last Friday night. Her face was lit by the report she had been compiling.

PLANET ELEVEN MINERAL SURVEY.

Month Three, Day 3 Relative Date 28/2 The board may be interested in the results transmitted by the survey team. Their deep mini-rig has uncovered only a small survey team. Their deep mini-rig has uncovered only a small seam of iron ores, as expected, together with the antic.i.p.ated seam of iron ores, as expected, together with the antic.i.p.ated excess of low value minerals, including goominum, portizol excess of low value minerals, including goominum, portizol and a trace deposit of helicon. We must a.s.sume that the and a trace deposit of helicon. We must a.s.sume that the Jilharro mountain range beyond will provide similar findings, Jilharro mountain range beyond will provide similar findings, and this will be confirmed by the end of next week. and this will be confirmed by the end of next week.

So, finally, we have reached our conclusion. Planet Eleven is further from the company's standard exploitation threshold is further from the company's standard exploitation threshold than we might have hoped. It remains the board's decision than we might have hoped. It remains the board's decision whether to move in, but I would remind the directors that whether to move in, but I would remind the directors that although a full mining option is obviously unfeasible, limited although a full mining option is obviously unfeasible, limited exploitation ma exploitation ma A cursor flashed at the end of the report.

The young man pressed a b.u.t.ton on his wrist unit and a mint-fragranced coolant was released into his helmet. He looked up as he sensed a presence. His colleague had returned alone.

'Where's Hogan?'

His colleague's face was pale under the faceplate and there were blobs of vomit in his beard. His voice was cracked.

'Gone to check the life support unit. He reckons Karl went crazy and turned off the life support himself'

'Karl?' The computer operator and life support technician had been one of his closest friends. 'No, I don't believe that.'

The other man's face dropped. 'Hogan says only Karl had the know-how to override the safety checks. Lots of the other computers have gone crazy as well. Everything's gone from survey records.'

'What about the transmat?'

'Disaligned. But we've counted the bodies. Everyone but Karl accounted for. n.o.body else had the time to get to the transmat, or even to send the distress beacon.' He put his hand on his colleague's shoulder. 'It must have been over in under a minute.'

The voice of Hogan crackled in their ears. 'Davis, Wilkin.

I'm at life support. Get over here.'

The two younger men stepped nervously into the humming life support chamber. Rows of neons bathed it in amber. Their leader stood in the centre of the large room. His head was lowered. At his feet was an oddly shaped bundle.

'Mr Hogan?'

He looked up. 'It wasn't Karl who did this.' He indicated the bundle and turned away, sickened. 'That's Karl.'

The younger men looked down. They saw that the bundle was a set of overalls containing a flattened mess of skin, bone, hair and blood. The body of the systems operator had been compressed.

Hogan walked over to a panel in a corner and pressed his thumb down on a b.u.t.ton marked EMERGENCY DISTRESS. A light next to the b.u.t.ton started to flash. He crossed over to a window and looked out onto the surface of the small, worthless planet.

The youngest man spoke. 'Somebody got in, then. From outside.'

Hogan nodded. 'But how? Why?'

The base shuddered as the distress beacon, flaring red, shot from its mooring on the topside of the dome. The three survivors watched as it sizzled up and away through the gas clouds.

2.

Sentence of Death.

Humanity is an industrious species. In the early years of the first great break-out, humans came to the Uva Beta Uva system, a complex of fourteen planets that sits near the centre of the Milky Way. The explorers discovered that the fifth planet was capable of supporting human life, and after a few years of tinkering with its polar caps to improve the temperature, settlers started to arrive. They brought with them idealistic visions of escape from life on Earth, which was becoming grubbier and crowded. The planet was green and pleasant and for a few years they lived there, undisturbed.

Their only major dispute was over what to call their beautiful new world. Uva Beta Uva Five was not only long and clumsy, it lacked poetry and vision, something of the pioneering spirit.

Such a t.i.tle reeked of bureaucracy and red tape, the old way.

The council of settlers plumped eventually, with a pitiful lack of originality, for New Earth. At the same time, they declared their independence.

Not long after, an agent from one of the big mining companies came for a sniff at Uva Beta Uva Five. He was sent away with a b.l.o.o.d.y nose by the citizens of New Earth, who were happy to sacrifice their principles when it suited them.

Rather than return home empty-handed, the agent took a quick look at a couple of the other, inhospitable planets. Just to be sure.

So it was discovered that Uva Beta Uva Three was a solid giant composed almost entirely of belzite, then fourth in the league of precious non-terrestrial minerals posted by Earth Government.

This being the case, the settlers of New Earth suddenly found all their legal rights rescinded under a little-known sub-clause of the Intergalactic Mineral Exploitation Act of 2217.

The mining companies blundered in, and the Uva Beta Uva system became the centre of a rush unparalleled in cosmic history.

A hundred and fifty years later, things were very different.

The belzite was long gone, the third planet ripped apart.

Almost all the other worlds in the system had been drained of whatever wealth they possessed. Planet Five, as it came to be known, remained populous and industrialized, but money was running out. Tourism and service industries boomed, as the colonists attempted to glamorize their past with tales of ore pirates and ghost bases.

Then came the galactic recession, crippling the central markets on Earth and sending waves of financial discontent through the optic beams the length of its influence.

Somewhere between the erratic, spooling orbit of Planet Two and the graceful arc of the gutted Planet Three, an object was moving. It ploughed through s.p.a.ce on a direct course, but it was not a s.p.a.cecraft.

An asteroid, two miles wide. It had been plucked from its natural home and converted to a specific purpose. It was propelled by gigantic rocket ports bolted to its rear.

A magnificent building sprawled over the asteroid. Had it been built on a planet, it might have been taken for the residence of an eccentric billionaire with a fascination for the Gothic. Its stacked storeys and array of turrets and towers appeared to be made of stone but were not. Light poured from windows in the vaulted halls and high-ceilinged chambers that led away from the central block, and through them a ma.s.s of people could be seen rus.h.i.+ng about inside. Barristers and their clerks, solicitors, law students, ushers, administrative workers, psychologists, wardens, security operatives, criminals. Each had a place somewhere along the nine miles of coiled corridor.

Other features included a concealed docking port, unused since the construction of the building, and a laser cannon, ceremonially ornamented, and still primed for the unlikely event of an attack. An aerial whirled on top of the central tower, providing a constant link to the civilization that had deemed it necessary to build such a place as the Rock of Judgement.

All in Courtroom One stood as the door to the debating chambers opened with a theatrical creak and High Archon Pyerpoint returned to p.r.o.nounce judgement. The defendant, a thin, sharp-featured man in his early thirties, dressed in grey coveralls, got to his feet. His knuckles whitened as he gripped the handrail of the dock. Two burly security officers in full dress uniform, red frockcoats with black edging and gleaming gold b.u.t.tons, stood on either side of him.

Only feet away, High Archon Pyerpoint cleared his throat and settled into the red leather upholstery of his chair. 'You may be seated,' he mumbled. Everyone apart from the defendant and his guards sat.

Pyerpoint's lined face was expressionless, but his stare was penetrating and swept the large room. Seated on the bench below him were counsels for the defence and prosecution.

They wore the fleecy wigs and black gowns that had symbolized their profession for centuries. Beneath them were court officials and a stenographer typing the details of the hearing into a small terminal.

The recess had lasted three hours and the tension in the courtroom was reflected in the absolute silence observed by its occupants. Motes of dust drifted down slowly through square shafts of light cast by artificial skylights mounted in the high vaulted ceiling. After four days of debate, counter debate and wrangle, the truth had been decided.

'The State of Uva Beta Uva Five versus Jarrigan Voltt,'

Pyerpoint began, reading from a prepared statement scrolling up on a screen before him. His sonorous tones echoed dramatically around the courtroom. 'I have accepted the evidence submitted by counsels for the defence and prosecution. I have studied the computer records supplied by prosecuting counsel for the night of November third last. They indicate clearly that the accused Voltt entered the premises in question,' he consulted his notes, '503 Winter Street, Coppertown, and there, in a state of intoxication, raised his vibro-knife and murdered the unfortunate Viktor Stott.'

Voltt's face flushed. 'No!' he shouted. 'Them records were fakes! I never went nowhere near Stott that night!'