As the group leaves Kiiv with his pipes, Doc sighs and rubs the bridge of her nose delicately. "Right, well, we've put it off long enough - time to go interview Jincheroga and her crew. We should handle this delicately to avoid stepping on fragile egos or taunting any itchy trigger fingers."
"I can lead the conversation - she knows me a little. We don't want to seem intimidating, so some of us should perhaps wait in the wings to prevent outnumbering the goblins - at least, until things go south. Who's with me?"
"I am," Rar'gul says, nodding as he steps forward. "I may not lookkk it, but I can be quite the converrsationalist," he adds, along with the rumble of a good-humoured chuckle.
"Not to mention," the trox adds, standing to his full height. "My prresence might prrove to be just the salve to soothe those itching triggerrr fingerrs."
T'sorkel's antennae flick back and forth. I'm with you, Doctor. Perhaps if Jincheroga is occupied, a couple of us could speak to the goblins themselves. They're like unruly children, but children often observe and understand more than people give them credit for. They might tell us something Jincheroga is hiding or thinks unimportant. I'd be happy to try and speak to them.
The scene opens on a group of spacefarers, some covered in ash, heading down a starship corridor. The largest one takes a moment to look behind him, then does a double-take when he notices that something seems awry. The door to the incinerator stands partially open.
The spacefarer, a trox by the look of him, carefully approaches the incinerator.
Something is caught in the door, as if it was deposited here to be incinerated, but didn't slip all the way into the incinerator.
It appears to be a model of the Idari. There is a residue on its sharp tip.
The gym has a foul, sweaty odor. Under Jincheroga's command, the goblins are practicing drawing their dog slicers and thrusting with them. It all seems very orderly for goblins.
When the three of you enter, Jincheroga motions for one of the goblins to turn down the music. She sits on a stool and and crosses her arms and eyes you silently.
EARLIER, ON THE ENGINEERING DECK...
"What's that?" Rar'gul asks, noticing the incinerator door sitting ajar. Moving in for a closer look, the trox draws up short when he catches sight of the suspicious item obstructing the door.
"Uh, Beaurregarrrd, Dr Flint-brridge?" he calls out. "You might want to checkk this out," he says, knowing enough not to mess with potential evidence.
NOW, IN THE GYM ON THE MAIN DECK...
Upon entering the gym, Rar'gul pauses to deposit his hammer in one of the nearby weapon racks before approaching Jincheroga and her goblins. Still clad in his heavy armour, the massive trox casually approaches the group.
Running an experienced eye over the drill session and the group's response to her orders, he gives an approving nod. "You have trrained them well. You have instilled orderrr and discipline in theirrr trraining."
"I'm Rarr'gul," He introduces himself with a smiling parting of his mandibles. "My frriends and I could use yourr help."
"Uh, Beaurregarrrd, Dr Flint-brridge?" he calls out. "You might want to checkk this out," he says, knowing enough not to mess with potential evidence.
Approaching the item in question, Doc delicately waves a gloved hand near the pointed end of the model ship as if her very fingers were a chemical scanner.
Within moments, a holographic display appears just above the skin of her left arm like a second sleeve, showing a detailed breakdown of the scan's results.
Seven hells an' a mad burd, dinnae expect that to work.
"I'm Rarr'gul," He introduces himself with a smiling parting of his mandibles. "My frriends and I could use yourr help."
Grateful that the pleasant trox has taken the lead, Doc stands quietly next to and slightly behind Rar'gul, attempting to lend an air of professionalism and legitimacy to his words.
T'sorkel enters the gym behind the Doctor and the Trox. He glances around at the goblins and the drills they are doing. When one of the goblins goes to turn off the music, he reaches out with his telepathy.
That seems like hard work. Quite fearsome. I can see how you build up an appetite. Hopefully the Vesk gives you enough breaks.
Dr. Flint-Bridge examines the statue. It is made of a
dense plastic polymer, and portrays the Idari.
bulk, is of the Idari. The nose is stained with blood. The
blood has dried only fairly recently, perhaps within 24 hours or so.
This blood is from a kasatha.
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Jincheroga remains seated as Rar'gul addresses her. "I am willing to listen to the pleas of your group. We might even be willing to help with your concerns, particularly if there is something in it for us."
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The goblin that T'sorkel addresses looks around for a moment very confused about the voices in his head. He looks to one of his fellow goblins and says something in goblin, then turns and eyes T'sorkel suspiciously.
Dr. Flint-Bridge examines the statue. It is made of a dense plastic polymer, and portrays the Idari. The nose is stained with blood. The blood has dried only fairly recently, perhaps within 24 hours or so.
This blood is from a kasatha.
Doctor Flint-Bridge turns to the other investigators, backlit by the eerie light of the incinerator. "One of two things is true."
She holds up a finger on her left hand. "Captain Rameem Vi Siala Corsen is dead, murdered violently by a member of his own crew."
She holds up a finger on her right hand. "Someone very much wishes us to believe that, and has painstakingly fabricated evidence and tracked our movements to ensure we 'discover' this information."
"We must assume the first, for the time being. Jincheroga doesn't strike me as the type to resort to murder by tchotchke, but that doesn't mean we should not tread with the upmost caution."
T'sorkel includes the other goblin in the conversation. That's right. I can speak into your mind. Nothing to be afraid of, it's how my people talk. If you think back thoughts, I can hear them. Has the hobgoblin been teaching you? Do you have good beds in the room? He really shouldn't be so mean to you.
"Thankk you," Rar'gul rumbles in reply to the hobgoblin. "You would have hearrrd the earrlierr announcement about the ship's status?" The trox pauses a moment to allow Jincheroga to respond.
"We have since discoverred that the mechanical issue with the engine may not be accidental. We have also encounterred a trrap and the potential tamperring of a passengerr's perrsonal effects. Security Chief Iom also remains unaccounted for."
"We thought that the many eyes and keen earrs of your company..." he gestures from the goblins back to Jincheroga. "... would be awarre of things we are not."
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Kasatha blood on the ship model next to the incinerator. Interesting. Seems panicked to me. If it was planned, someone could have ordered a knife from the fabricator and then made sure it got down the chute. Hmmmm, can anyone do a metallurgical analysis on the model? My guess is it isn’t made of weapons grade material, which means the perp would have had to catch the Kasatha, presumably our erstwhile captain, in her skivvies. Any armor, even basic stationware, would have stopped a blow from any but the strongest of assailants.
He enters more data into his profession -private eye kit.
The goblins can only manage to titter when T'sorkel attempts communication. They make little finger guns and shoot them at the shirren, laughing hysterically as they do. Jincheroga ignores them as they do this.
Jincheroga, on the other hand, seems quite willing to talk to Rar'gul.
"If someone has killed the security chief, then she was weak. Like
most of you.”
The space goblins titter in agreement, and one of
them mimes stabbing another in the chest.
She continues, “When we boarded this vessel, that woman looked me
straight in the eyes and said, ‘I know what you’re up to you,
and I won’t let you ruin this for us.’ I have no idea what she
was on about. Perhaps she mistook me for someone else, or
she was paranoid or something. Perhaps I just frightened her.”
Jincheroga smiles and picks at her teeth with a fingernail.
“Maybe you should talk to the vesk. I saw the two of them getting very friendly at a bar on Legacy Station the night
before we left that heap.”
"Oh, she was quite paranoid; rest assured. And if she has been killed, well, she's hardly the only one." Doc flashes a knowing glance at her companions as she turns to leave, speaking to the hobgoblin over her shoulder.
"When I met you, Jincheroga, I was concerned about what you knew. Now I'm concerned about what you don't know."
Jincheroga seems to be exceedingly angry for a moment. Then she gives a growl and commands the goblins to reform for more drills.
She has moved on.
"Ah, that's too bad," Rar'gul laments. "I'd thought forr surre you knew something that we did not." Rar'gul watches Jincheroga's reaction and the goblins' antics.
"Parranoid? No more than any other securrity officerr I've met - occupational hazarrrd," he chuckles. "We might do just that," he says in reply to the connection between Iom and the vesk.
So much for non-confrontational, the trox thinks, glancing at the Doc.
"Maybe we can orrganise a sparrr once we get this done," he offers the hobgoblin. Turning to follow the Doc, he scoops up his hammer and joins his companions in the hallway.
T'sorkel watches the goblins return to their drills. He looks at the others and shrugs. Guess that didn't work so well. The goblins didn't seem to want to talk. Maybe the telepathy unnerved them.
Assuming what he said was true, I wonder what Algiada meant by what she said to him. I'm not sure I can see a reason he would lie if he isn't involved. He might be rude, but he could be telling the truth.
Rar'gul's further attempts at engagement are only met with a shrug and a grunt from Jincheroga, who continues to drill her cadre of goblins.
Rar'gul shakes his head as he rejoins his companions in the corridor. "Nothing new therre," he says with a shrug.
"Wherrre to now?" he asks.
"Wherrre to now?" he asks.
"The more we learn, the more Lozu seems caught up in the middle of all of this. At minimum, we need to inquire about the funds she supposedly received from Algiada and the current state of our esteemed captain."
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Yariel continues to attempt to figure out how to hack into the security feed while her current allies chatter in the hallway.
This does always seem to come back to her, doesn't it? Let's pay her a visit and perhaps see if we can get access to the Captain. It would be nice to hear his side of things if he isn't dead.
Yariel figures out two things:
1. There appears to me minimal security cameras on the vessel. Yariel certainly notices one in the long central hallway. There is a probably one in the dining hall, and perhaps both cargo holds. There may be more, though you can't be sure.
2. Hacking into them is trickier than it sounds. Your guess is that these cameras feed a system that is mainly accessible on the bridge. It is not part of the general data network available on throughout the ship. The only possibility might be rigging something that would transmit the camera signal to one of your devices as well as the main security system on the bridge .
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"This all be very exciting, but we were hired to find out about Algaida. We be chasing hares until we find a corpse or have searched sufficiently to show she is not on the ship, or at least not in the areas we can access. Completing the search would also give us a prima facie reason to 'report' to Lozu."
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Yariel sneers, taps a couple buttons and her tattoos shift into a red glow. "I'm pissed now, crappy ship has crappy security cams. We only got central hallway, cargo holds and maaaybe the dining hall. Nothing in engineering. So maybe we can piece crew movement together but prolly not. I can't even hack it from here anyway. Closed systems suck."
She turns to the doc, "Y'all said ooze or something right? Could it have dissolved a body and then headed back through the vents?"
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"I doubt it. We don't have enough evidence, but gun to my head? My best guess is this: Iom or Lozu (or both) killed the captain. I don't think it was planned, at least not this early. They would have had to catch her in her skivvies in order for a non-weapon-grade thing like that ship model to kill her. Could have autofabricated a knife or something, so why use that Idari model? They tried dumping her and the body down the incinerator, but it didn't work. They must have been jumpy because the murder weapon fell out and they didn't notice. So Iom takes over as caption, making it look like the captain's still on duty, and Lozu continues on as if everything is normal. Only, problem with the engines, so they can't get away with it like they planned.
“Actually, that’s a thought.” Beauregard pauses. ”The more engineering-minded of you. That incinerator’s designed to take care of small stuff, I assume? What would happen if you loaded it with a whole Kasatha body? Could that cause our problems?”
You do recall throwing several rending geese into the incinerator, all at the same time. It would have been close to 150 pounds of geese.
Theoretically, the incinerator should have no problem handing something as large as a body, and it shouldn't cause any problems with the engines (and I believe Yariel is in agreement with Kiiv that there were some specific things done to the engines in order to shut them down.
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She pats the Nuar on the... hip? "Naw, those systems ain't even connected. I've been leaning a lot stronger towards sabotage of the engines anyway, these ships have layers upon layers of backups on the life support and engine systems, they don't just go out. I'm thinking more people are involved in this deal, maybe even the entire crew plus some of the passengers."
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Beauregard nods and dips his head in thought. ”Alright, let’s get back to what we know so far. We get on board the ship, and supposedly the security chief thinks the Hobgoblin and her crew are up to something. Lessie, some geese get out of a supposedly unbreakable prison. Hmmm. Later that night the Vesk and the security chief are seen in an argument about ‘it’ being too dangerous to pull off them plan’ now. Next day the ship breaks down, we find a sabotaged robot, and the security chief is missing. Robot subdues-but doesn’t kill the vesk. We find the chief has been wiring a large amount of money to the first officer, and there is coded talk of maybe taking over the ship. We also find a tchotchke with Kasatha blood on it, and no one has seen our Kasatha Captain. The vesk’s story also doesn’t add up. Hmmmm. Plus one of the passengers has a history with the security chief Try this on for size:
“The first officer and security chief were working on muscling the captain out of her ship. Security officer hired the bounty and their subduing robot for the dirty work. Something about the hobgoblin and her crew gets the security chief all hot and bothered, and there is talk of calling it off. That fits what we’ve seen.
“The thing is, these sabotages don’t make sense. The geese thing is random, if it is part of this mess, but the robot and the engines? That’s actually helpful to us. The robot took out the bounty hunter for us and clues us into his story being fake, and the ship sabotage is giving us time to solve the case before we get to Absolom and the perps have a chance to flee.”
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"We be creating chimera's. It be quite seductive to imagine ourselves at the center of a grand plot, but we should stay focused on what we know, and learning as much as we can before we start confronting the crew."
"Let's search the hobgoblin's quarters while they are training, then all of our cabins as a team. We can search Trostinek's and the Professor's at dinner. Between times we can search escape pods and the rest of this deck."
Vendo-o-matic goes to work.
It will be done following dinner this evening (by the way, delicious Pygosian Rending Geese are on the menu).
I tend to agree with Mr. Rawlins. There could be many scenarios and suppositions with fit the facts we know. It isn't useless for us to speculate, that's how good theories arise, but at some point we must return to our known data points. I do think the first mate is at the center of this, but confronting her will show our hands.
I'm open to sweeping the ship for more clues and to rule our Algaida being held somewhere, or we can talk to the first mate, but not confront her. If we can convince her to let us speak to the captain, assuming he's not dead, that would be a positive too.
A growl goes up from his dual stomachs. Perhaps we can search the ship more and then speak to her after dinner?
"I tend to favourrr addrressing things in a morre dirrreccct mannerrr," Rar'gul rumbles in reply to the suggestions of his companions. "But I see the wisdom in what you'rre suggesting."
"I ccan help with a searrch. I'm not what you'd ccall incconspiccuous," the trox continues, spreading all six arms out to the sides. "But I make for a good sccrreen and my eyes are prretty sharp."
Rar'gul considers for moment. "Also a good idea. In theirrr distrraccction, Song might rreveal morre than they intend to."