Chapter 3

KREINE ESTATE

Meyer Cruz, the head of security, paced across the floor. “I know you,” he said, addressing the security network for the entire estate. “I know that the vast majority of you are hard working and honest. It disappoints me that there is somebody among you that has betrayed all of us.”

            Meyer glanced out at them. There were dozens of security guards, none at their posts because there was no longer anything of extreme importance to guard. The Empress was already gone. None of them could leave, since all but one of the guards would stop them. The spy was in here. He�"or she�"had to be, since none of the human servants, however few, had access to the door that the intruders had gone through. The androids were programmed to obey only the computer that controlled the housekeeping, and no amount of convincing or money would be able to make them any other way. Alibis had been found for the Empress, her son, and her two bodyguards. Only security was left. Meyer looked out at the crowd. One of them had let the kidnappers in, that day and in the first attempt, only days ago. Everyone had let that unlocked door slide. One time could be an accident. Twice?No.

It was only a matter of time before whoever it was spoke. 

            “If you know who this traitor is, please speak,” said Meyer, spitting out the word ‘traitor’ as contemptuously as he could as he stared out at the dozens of uniformed guards. He paused to catch his breath, and they stared back.

He could see nothing but honesty in all the faces he could see, as hard as he looked. Damn. Meyer had finally started to realize how difficult his job was going to be.

 *** 

            A couple of medical androids tried to stop Kallie as she stormed past the clinic, and she shouldered them out of the way. “I don’t have time, I don’t have time!” she yelled at one of them as it said something about blood on her face. After it had been established, rather quickly, that the EL craft carrying the Empress was gone for good, Captain Grant had abruptly left the east lawn and, a minute later, Kallie had received a command to meet him in a conference room within the estate.

             This has all gone downhill, she thought as she reached the door. It’s spinning out of control. If Grant had just listened to me, nothing would be wrong. Nothing!

            She stepped into the small, gray room, and Grant looked up from the datascreen he was holding. “I just called her son and got the security head to find the person who left that door open,” he said, not bothering to sit down at the ridiculously long table.

            Kallie nodded curtly, and waited for him to continue. She still had no idea why she was there, and, given Grant’s performance so far, couldn’t wait to leave.

“The Empress told me about what happened earlier this week,” he said finally. Don’t we have places to go? Didn’t the Empress just get carried away in some random, beaten-up car? wondered Kallie, annoyed at his slowness.

“She didn’t give me any reason for this, but apparently the police were not alerted of this…assault. I need to know why.”

“I don’t know why either; she never told anyone,” Kallie replied, slightly aware of the edge her voice had. “Sir.”

“Then why did you let her do that?” he asked incredulously.

“Her son was behind her, just because he trusted her, or so he said, and I couldn’t get either of them to budge,” she answered flatly.

“You can’t take that for an answer! It doesn’t matter what they say, your priority is her safety! Now she’s been dragged off to some unknown location to do god knows what because nobody called in the police! I can’t believe…” he said, shaking his head.

 So this is on me, now? thought Kallie, annoyance turning to anger. “The real reason, sir,that she’s not here is because you didn’t look around yourself and think when you interrupted my ambush out on the east lawn after you refused to listen to me despite of my experience getting around the estate. Okay?”

            Grant stopped leaning against the wall and stood up straight, his gray eyes chips of ice burning holes in her. “Lieutenant, shut the hell up and stop creating problems!” he snapped. “I’m not going to tolerate this. We can be enemies if you want, but that would be a hindrance. There are better things to do.”

            Kallie let out a breath and nodded slowly. She knew that he was right, even though she hated his attitude towards her. It’s to be expected, she told herself. I need to stop pretending that we’re on even ground here. It just felt…strange, to have full command, in emergencies, of the estate only to have that taken away by a stranger who knew less about the situation than she did. “She refused to reinforce her choice to hide the crime from the authorities, sir,” she said finally. “Caden�"her son�"he just said that he trusted her, and I felt that, since the threat wasn’t very large, it was safe to obey orders.”

            “Nobody investigated the door that the attackers got through?” he asked, less aggressively.

            “It was…overlooked.” Kallie suddenly felt incredibly stupid. Miara hadn’t wanted any investigations, but she’d been overreacting and the order to postpone investigation had been one order Kallie knew she should have defied.

            “Well, it’s being looked into now,” Grant replied. “There was no good reason�"no reason at all�"for the police not to get involved?” he asked, double checking.

            “No, sir.”

            “Then I think we should bring them in,” he said, looking at her for a second and waiting for any disagreement.

            “When is her son going to get here?”

            Captain Grant looked down at the datascreen. “He’s at the capital, or he was. It’ll take him another half hour. Are you suggesting that we wait until he arrives?”

            Kallie paused. “It would be a good idea…but in 30 minutes it’s going to be even more difficult for forensics to trace the EL.”

            Grant nodded. “Then it’s set.” He tapped his waveband and then mumbled something into the receiver. Kallie sighed, and looked around the room for lack of anything else to do. She’d failed�"not once, but twice; since, according to Grant, it was her fault that the second attempt happened at all and since she hadn’t been able to work with him to stop the second attempt in its tracks. She remembered when she’d thought that nothing would happen on Arae, when she’d thought that the Empress was just a crazy, overly paranoid rich woman. Maybe it was my nonchalance about this whole thing that ruined it all, she thought.

            “Security’s going to handle the police for now,” said Grant, interrupting her from her thoughts. “Until they get here.”

            Kallie nodded grimly.

            “Let’s head over to the front,” he said finally, after they’d stood in silence for a second, reflecting on the hopelessness of the situation. It was very difficult to trace an EL craft…nearly impossible, in fact, since Kallie hadn’t thought to make a detailed observation of the one they’d used. There I go again.

            “She’s hiding something,” said Grant as they left the room.

            “I know.” Kallie thought about it for a second as they walked. “There’s probably something illegal going on here. I thought so before, but now…I’m almost certain.”

            “We can’t talk to her son about this; there’s a very good chance that he knows what’s causing this and won’t be cooperative, and if we bring in anyone else…the cops, other relatives, politicians…then the press may get in and the entire planet knows that there is probably something dishonest going on behind their throne.”

            “Of course, but…” Kallie sighed as they kept walking. “It just feels wrong. Like I’m doing the wrong thing for, hell, the wrong reasons too. I’m tempted to bring in the press.”

            Grant shook his head. “You’re forgetting, Lieutenant. Don’t be tempted. We’re not here to protect the greater good.” Kallie ground her teeth together as she heard the sarcasm in his voice. “We’re here for the Empress’s best interests, and if she doesn’t want everyone to know about some ridiculous scandal or something, then we don’t show everyone. You understand?”

            He was right, of course, but Kallie didn’t like the direction things were taking. She was, apparently, the root cause of the kidnapping of one of the most idolized women on Arae, and now she was getting wrapped up in something…big.

 *** 

            Caden Kreine ran out of the EL that had taken him back to the estate. He’d been at the family property for the past month, since his father’s death, and just as he’d left, the day he’d gone back to his home in the suburbs…another crisis.For some reason, there were no guards at the entrance to the main building and he burst in, the door recognizing the pass in his pocket. He had received the call from the new guard, Captain Grant, half  an hour ago, and he didn’t really know what to think.

            Caden ran around a corner and stopped short. There were people going in and out of the room, forensics teams most likely, and none seemed to notice him. He had yet to see a single security guard. Just then three came around the corner, talking quietly. They saw Caden and began to hurry along, not really wanting to look him in the eye. The estate was locked down, but security wasn’t present. Then he realized that there was no reason for them to be, really.

The only thing…person…for them to protect was gone.

            He stared down the corridor where everything had happened with wide eyes.

            A door opened and Caden turned suddenly, already put on edge by everything that had happened. Lieutenant Hayward stepped out of her room and looked at him in silence for a moment.

  “You heard?” she asked softly after a second, walking toward him.

            He nodded. “How did this happen?” he asked.

            She shook her head. “I’ll explain later. The police should be here in a few minutes and we need to get over to the front.” Hayward glanced at him. “Captain Grant knows about what happened a few days ago. We were going to wait until you got here before we reported this, but you took while to get here.”

            Caden was surprised when he felt no anger; after all, she had just practically blamed him for attack. She was reminding him of the previous assault, when his mother had talked him into not calling the police. Instead, guilt flooded him. What was I thinking when I let her do that? he thought.

            It made him wonder why she had talked him into it.

 *** 

             “Nobody leaves the building! Nobody! I don’t care who!” yelled one of the cops over the outdoor intercom. Dusten winced slightly. The lights and noise were almost too much�"it seemed like there were legions of armed men and women running about, talking to each other, yelling at each other, and the front of the estate was lit up by the floodlights and the extra searchlights brought along for the hunt. It was about two hours after sunset and six hours until dawn; the darkness would make everything that much more difficult, and Dusten thought about his conversation with Hayward. The Empress was gone, for now, and their only hope was probably the evidence the intruders had left behind. Days on Arae were only 17 hours, but Dusten felt like this one would never be over. This is going to be a long night, he thought.

            The man shouting into the mike was young for his position, though probably still older than Dusten. He was a short man, with bulging muscles, close-cut black hair, and, from the permanent glare on his face, a difficult personality. Dusten didn’t know who he was, but he had to be important to be in charge of this operation. Dusten walked over as policeman climbed out of the sleek black EL with the fox design of the Thalian Republic etched on its side.

            “You hear what I say? Who are you?” asked the man angrily, not realizing that the intercom was still on. The phrase bounced around the front expanse of the Kreine property, and some of the police swarming around looked up. Dusten read the nameplate on his uniform. Detective K Moreno.

            “One of her bodyguards. Captain Dusten Grant,” he said, managing to keep his annoyance in check and ignoring Moreno’s first question.

            “Get inside,” said Moreno, and Dusten noticed that he had a strange drawl in his voice that he couldn’t quite place. It didn’t actually seem as if the man had heard what Dusten had said, even though Dusten’s title usually bothered people. Moreno walked forward with short, rapid strides, trying to herd the other, taller man back into the building. Dusten started walking as well, backward, but slowly. The police officer was getting on his nerves. “Were you at the scene of the kidnapping?” asked Moreno in his strangely accented voice.

            “No,” said Dusten, leaving it at that even though it was only partially true.

            Moreno opened his mouth to say something else when one of the other investigators called him over to the side. “Get that guy inside!” he yelled over his shoulder.

 ***

             After a hectic half hour of trying to create some kind of order in the chaos that the police had caused, Kallie gave up and sat down in one of the chairs in the lobby. She buried her head in her hands, ignoring the pain from the bruises on her jaw. There’s just too many of them, she thought. I can’t control them, nobody can control them. There were the security guards, the police, the panicked staff…and no Empress, obviously. It was only a matter of time before the press and the frantic paparazzi hit.

The main doors opened and Dusten Grant walked in, flanked by two of the officers that were swarming the estate. They turned and left after leaving him in the front lobby with an exasperated expression on his face.

“This is bull,” he muttered, sinking down into a chair to Kallie’s right.

            Before Kallie could voice her agreement, Meyer Cruz, the security commander, burst through the opposite doors. “I’ve got them,” he said excitedly.

            “Who?” asked Kallie, sitting up straighter.

            “The people behind this, ma'am. The ones at the estate, at least.”

            “Great.” Kallie stood up.

            “Should I get the police?”

            “Don’t,” said Grant tiredly.

            Kallie didn’t bother questioning him and Cruz didn’t dare. “I have them both in the lower parlor for now.” said Cruz. He started toward the inner doors and they both followed.

            “Who?” asked Kallie.

“Younger guard. Nobody important,” said Cruz.

            “How did you find out?” asked Grant.

            “You’ll see, Captain,” said Cruz as they went down a small flight of ornamental steps. The two security guards standing by a door before them parted as they almost ran in. There were two chairs in the middle of the room and two people were attached to them with suspension braces. They looked like they belonged in a grimy, bloodstained basement rather than the violet-walled, violet-carpeted room with the delicate cream arches over the doors.

            “Two?” Kallie looked at Cruz in slight surprise. “It only takes one person to unlock a door.”

            One of them didn’t even look like a security guard. She was terrified, with wide, panicked eyes, and her whole body was trembling. The man in the other chair was staring off into space when they entered, and turned to look at them with cold, unblinking, uncaring green eyes. Cruz slipped a datascreen into Kallie’s left hand, no doubt containing the names and information on the suspects.

            “Think her son should see this?” asked Grant.

            Kallie shook her head. “He’s got enough to worry about, sir.” Nobody mentioned the police again, and Kallie didn’t try.

            Grant had returned his attention to the suspects. “Explain,” he said, in a frosty tone that made the woman’s body quiver even more.

            The man looked at him. “I left that door open.” He stopped there, not bothering to offer further explanation, his expression unchanging.

            “The first time, too?” asked Kallie, quietly, remembering the unlocked balcony door inside the Empress’s study.

            “Yes,” said the man bluntly.

            “Anything else?” asked Dusten.

            “Told ‘em where she sleeps and when she might be there,” offered the man easily, unflinchingly. That explains a lot, thought Kallie, remembering how the attackers had seemed so sure of where to hunt down the Empress.

            Grant didn’t say anything else to him and looked at the woman, or girl, rather. She looked like she was less than twenty customary years of age. “Why are you here?” Even though she was obviously terrified, or a very good actress, Grant’s tone wasn’t any softer.

            “I… I knew that…” she stumbled.

            “Knew what?”

            “I knew he was going to do it,” she whispered.

            “Before he did?”

            “Yes…”

            “How?”

            “I…I heard him…talking,” she stuttered, on the edge of tears.

            “To?”

            “I don’t know!” she whimpered.

            “Stop it,” said Kallie. “Just talk.”

            “Why didn’t you tell anyone?” Grant’s tone was extremely accusatory by this point.

            “Because he blackmailed me.”

            “About what?”

            She was silent.

            “I told her I would report her to the staff head. If you’ve  got a few extra marks with you, she’ll bang you right here. It’s that way for everyone with a�" ”

            “Shut up,” growled Grant.

            Cruz leaned over. “We don’t have interrogation machines here,” he whispered.

            “I didn’t think so,” replied Grant quietly. “But I think I’ll know if either of them lie.”

            Kallie didn’t take her eyes off the two captives. The man’s expression remained the same, and the girl wasn’t showing any sign of calming down.

            The man waited patiently as they talked quietly, a small smile plastered on his red face.  

            “Who did you contact?” asked Grant.

            “I already said that I don’t know.”

            “Bullshit,” responded Grant in a flat tone.

            “I didn’t even contact them. They called me.”

            “They called you?”

            “I’m puzzled about it myself. I don’t care who it was. Whoever it was sent five hundred marks to my account on ThaliCredit because I was listening to them, not dropping the line. Why would I? They were offering me money. I checked the account, might I add. It was there, under a long code of digits. Three hundred thousand more of it was promised to show up if I left the door unlocked. So I agreed.”

            “What did they sound like?” asked Kallie, even though she thought she already knew the answer.

            “Nothing. Just a robot, not anything you’d recognize, sugar,” he said, still stony-faced.

            “Cut the crap,” snapped Kallie, but he didn’t flinch. “Do you still have the code?”

            “No. A few hours before the kidnapping, I checked again and the deposit was labeled as ‘undisclosed’.”

            Captain Grant opened his mouth to say something else before hesitating. He turned towards Kallie and Cruz, and stepped to the side. “What do you think?” he asked in a low voice.

            “It’s unusual that they found his code, and knew who he was,” said Cruz. “He’s probably lying, or the person that called him may work here as well.”

            Kallie shook her head. “That’s always possible, but if he’s not lying�"and I’m almost certain that he’s not�"then the person or people behind everything aren’t necessarily employed here. He doesn’t seem too smart, and obviously doesn’t have a problem with going along with things that would seem suspicious or dangerous to the rest of us. His intelligence is probably no coincidence, either. He’s probably got all of his personal info�"waveband code, occupation, picture, name, account number, everything�"circulating the interplanetary datachain somewhere, on some dating or fetish site. Maybe, even, we have a good hacker on the other end, one that got into the estate’s employee information block and found the code there, chose it at random, and got his credit account information as well.”

            “There are a lot of possibilities,” said Grant. “We’re not going to narrow it down, not tonight.”

            “Should we wait until formal police interrogation or should we continue, then?” asked Kallie, looking back at the prisoners.

            “I can set up a formal interrogation, Lieutenant,” said Cruz helpfully.

            “Do that when we’re done here,” replied Grant. “I want to finish with these two without dealing with the police. We’re almost done.” He turned back to the suspects, looking at them both before focusing on the man.

            “What went wrong? Why are you here?” There was no malice in his voice now, just an expressionless tone that mirrored that of the man he was interrogating.

            The man jerked his head toward the woman sitting across the room from him. “She heard me talking to them a couple local weeks ago. Of course, I thought that I could get her to keep her mouth shut, but that didn’t work.” He looked at Cruz. “After I’d gotten away with it at the security meeting, she came up crying to him over there and told him that I was responsible.” He made eye contact with the girl. “I don’t know what you were thinking, sweetheart, maybe that you would get away unpunished. Stupid girl,” he muttered. She whimpered and tried to shrink.

            “Let me get this straight,” said Grant, looking at the girl. “You knew that the Empress’s life was in danger, and you did nothing to prevent the kidnapping? No anonymous notes, nothing?”

            “…no…” she said slowly, regretfully, almost as if she’d never thought of paging security without disclosing her identity.

            Kallie turned away in frustration. She was getting the feeling that she was dealing with the two least intelligent people in the estate, and that they could do little to shed light on the kidnapping. There was nothing. The person or people behind the crime had left no tracks. No DNA, fingerprints, written evidence, nothing.

            Grant seemed as frustrated as she was. “There’s nothing here,” he muttered, then turned to Cruz. “Make sure that these two are locked up properly, in police custody, and set up the formal interrogation you mentioned.”

            Meyer Cruz nodded quickly and waved the other guards over. Kallie left the room on Grant’s heels. Nearly two hours since the attack, and no progress had been made. She shook her head slightly as they walked down the hallways.

            “The security cameras got clear IDs of the people that actually broke in,” said Captain Grant as they started to return to the main lobby.

            Kallie nodded. “I know, sir. A crew of the investigators already told me that the people in the vid don’t, as far as our government or any other is concerned, exist.”

            “Right.” They walked in silence for a couple seconds. “Not terribly uncommon for people to escape the radar if they really, really want to, but unfortunate in this case. They’re no help to us at all.”

            “I’ve already reported that none of them appeared to match with the three men that got in earlier this week,” said Kallie, trying to think of more evidence. “If I’m right about that, and I’m nearly certain that they were different, we have two different, smaller, parties going after the Empress, or, more likely, we have a larger entity that’s interested in her. The more important people in the operation probably didn’t come to take her.”

            “I heard. I’m still trying to decide if that’s to our advantage or not. For one thing, these untraceable people aren’t the ones we want anyway, but if something powerful has her, some huge underground force, then this may be very difficult.”

            Kallie nodded. “I’m just…I’m just trying to think of why she would have done this to herself, why she insisted on secrecy the first time. Why would she be involved in something like this? She may have even staged this disappearance herself.”

            “She sent for us,” he reminded her.

            “Just before she gets kidnapped. She got us to make herself look like she wasn’t responsible, and then leaves.”

            “I still don’t see any kind of motive here, Hayward. You’re going a little too far with this.” He paused. “I can’t say you’re wrong, though.”

            Kallie didn’t reply, trying to think of something, anything, that would make it seem obvious that the Empress had something to do with her kidnapping. There was nothing. No motive, as Grant had said. And we’re supposed to be saving face, thought Kallie. If she’s a criminal, somehow, we’re not supposed to find out. We literally have to comply with every single one of her wishes, her whims, her commands…

            Before they could continue discussing the matter, Kallie heard Grant’s waveband go off at the same time as her own. Caden Kreine’s voice issued from them. “I got a call. Get over here,” he said in a fast, scared voice.

            “Where?” asked Kallie.

            “My office,” he said, and them promptly signed off.

  

NEAR NORTH POLE; ARAE ORBIS

            Eridan Heidrich wasn’t much of a hacker�"wasn’t a hacker at all, actually�"but that hadn’t been as huge a problem as he’d thought it would be. It was easier to find solid datachain nerds on the black market than he’d thought, and just as easy to get rid of them as anyone Eridan had ever encountered.

            He had feared another failure; the first had been nearly disastrous, and only a stroke of luck had prevented one of his men from being shot down, something that would have revealed much about Eridan and his intentions.

            This time, everything had been perfect; a sharp, beautiful contrast to the first attempt. It was just as hard as one might expect to qualify for a security position in one of the most famous buildings on Arae, but, for some reason, not all excellent guards were necessarily intelligent. And apparently, not all excellent guards were paid enough to be satisfied with their salaries.

            Of course, the man had squandered all of his on various gambling interfaces and probably every single strip club within the vicinity of his work. And as luck would have it, the guy believed that women found security guards alluring.

            If so much hadn’t been at stake, Eridan would have found the dating profile of his mole-to-be hilarious. Everything had been there except for his bank account number, and, according to his hired hackers, that had been “easy meat” once the other, public, info had been taken into consideration.

            Maybe this isn’t as crazy as I thought it was.

***

            “No expensive paintings for you here, lady,” explained the man in a falsely apologetic tone. Miara squirmed, but he didn’t release her arms. She was walked into the cell. Her captor unhooked a loop of ordinary rope from his belt. He held it in one hand and ripped off her waveband with the other. “Fancy, huh?” he asked as he looked at it, the fake leather band torn and the smoked glass body shining in the dim light streaming through the tiny window. Then he tossed it up onto a high shelf easily, hardly paying attention as he did so.

            It all felt surreal. Miara had never dreamed that this would happen to her, and she knew that if she died, the Kreine family secrets…secret…would die with her. Just the thought of facing death sent her heart up into her throat.

            The man unwound the rope. “Stand still, and put your arms at your sides.” Miara eyed the handgun sticking out of one pocket and obeyed. She remembered at the last second to hold her arms away from her body.

            He’s going to notice, she thought, as he started to wrap the rope around her chest, the prickly plastic fibers cutting into her arms. She gritted her teeth but didn’t allow her arms to press against her midsection, and prayed that the moron tying her up wouldn’t see what she was doing.

            He didn’t, and stepped back as if admiring the knot he had made. Then he left, leaving her waveband on the shelf. Miara let out her breath and relaxed her arms, feeling the ropes loosen around her body. They were still fairly tight, and for a minute she thought she wouldn’t be able to get loose. The idea of not getting free sent her into a frenzied panic until, eventually, she managed to get the ropes off. Feeling foolish, she looked out the little square window. To her immense relief, no one was watching  her.

            Her heart thudding wildly, she reached for her waveband and found that if she jumped, she could brush it with her fingers. Finally, she got it to the end of the shelf and it fell off, landing with a light thud on the metal floor.

            Miara wasted no time in picking it up and turning it on with shaking fingers. She had no idea where she was finding the courage and strength to continue. She didn’t know how much time she had, but she needed to call someone. “Caden,” she said without thinking. The waveband blinked, and her son’s face projected from the screen for a second before it flashed back and went into record mode.

            “Caden,” she whispered, praying that he could hear her.

            “Mom!” she heard from the other end. “Where are you? Thank God �"“

            Miara cut him off. “Listen.” She suddenly realized that her voice was trembling. “I don’t know exactly where I am, and I don’t have time to explain how I’m contacting you. All I can tell you is that I’m north, near the pole. There are some mountains, but I don’t remember what they’re called.” She calmed herself, struggling to keep tears out of her eyes and sobs out of her voice. “I’m in a building, but I don’t know what the outside looks like, I think it’s underground. It’s too clean in here, and we passed a door that says ‘research’ on the way here.” Miara realized that she was babbling and paused, thankful that Caden was silent. “That’s all I know. It’s all I can tell you. Do you understand?” Her voice wavered a little, threatening to crack.

            “Yes…” Caden whispered.

            “I’ll try and keep my waveband. Maybe they won’t notice and I can relay information to you.” It was too much to hope, but it was possible. After what she had done to get free from her ties, anything could happen.

            “Is there nothing else you can tell me?” Caden sounded miraculously calm.

            “I don’t �"“

            There was a shout from the corridor outside. Miara heard it clearly through the cracks in the door. A jolt of pure panic rushed through her body. Damn. “Who’re you talking to over there?” shouted a man’s voice. A face, contorted with rage, appeared in the small window. Miara dropped the waveband, fingers frozen in terror. The door opened. She could hear Caden yelling, as the connection wasn’t broken, but she couldn’t make out a word he said.

            Two men came running in, both of them carrying huge guns. Miara shrieked and jumped back, sure that she would be dead in an instant. “Who was that?” snarled one, the barrel of the gun prodding her in the chest. The other man smashed the band under the heel of his boot.

            “What the hell? The records are lost! Now we’ll never know, dumbass,” exclaimed the first one in shock and horror.

            The man who had crushed the device shrugged. “She’ll tell you,” he said gesturing to Miara. She trembled harder, everything on the edges of her vision turning black and every shred of consciousness focused on the gun aimed point blank at her heart.

            He put more pressure on it. “Come on, your highness, who was that?”

            Miara squeaked. “F-family,” she stuttered.

            “What did you tell them?” growled the man about to execute her.

            “Good…goodbye,” she whispered, the fear threatening to overpower everything else. A gun! A gun! screamed her brain.

            The gun was removed slowly, and Miara watched it with wide eyes. “I told you it was nothing to worry about. She talked,” said the first one.

“Did you tell them where you are?” asked the second one, still wary.

“I don’t know…where I…am…” mumbled Miara.

“She doesn’t,” confirmed the first one, obviously not eager to face the punishment he would face for allowing a prisoner to contact the outside world. “Let’s go.”

Miara stared at the end of his gun, still casually aimed at her. She stood against the wall, frozen. They finally turned and clomped out of the cell, leaving the shards of her waveband on the ground. She sank into a heap next to the wall, hugging her knees and on the edge of tears. There were too many questions, too much unknown. And no way out.

 

KREINE ESTATE; ARAE ORBIS                                                

             By the time that they reached Caden Kreine’s office, the police were already there. Kallie looked around the room. The red and black uniformed officers were everywhere. She walked over to Caden and put a hand on his shoulder. “Who called you?” she asked.

            “Miara,” he said flatly, looking as if he’d seen�"or heard from�"a ghost.

            One of the cops walked up to them. “Sir, we need to hear the message now,” he said.          

Caden nodded, visibly pulling himself together, and said something to the live screen that made up the surface of his desk. Miara’s voice filled the air, no doubt from a call recording off Caden’s waveband, and everyone in the room fell silent, listening intently. Kallie winced as she heard the shouting and the crash at the end. There was silence in the room for a second.          

The short, dark-haired man who seemed to be in charge of the force turned around to face the other cops in the room. “We need to get to the bottom of this. Get investigation crews on this.”

Gradually the policemen and women trickled out of the room, leaving only a few of the higher officers, the leader, Kallie, Grant, and Caden still in the room. The leader turned to Kallie. “Detective Kendric Moreno,” he said.

Kallie nodded. “Lieutenant Hayward.” Despite his diminutive height at just a couple centimeters taller than she, the police commander was an imposing man.

Moreno glanced at Grant. “Captain,” he said, with a hint of spite in his voice.

Caden looked up. “Did the message tell you anything?” He was looking at Moreno.

Kallie turned toward the man, interested in his answer. “Could mean anything. The people that took the Empress might have wanted money, and if so, it’s only a matter of time before we receive a ransom message. There’s other reasons, though, and the whole call could have been a setup, a trap. We have to decide between going after these…kidnappers and waiting.”

“We need to go,” said Caden, almost immediately. Kallie shook her head unconsciously. Jumping into things was probably not the right decision; besides, she had gotten little from the call.

“That’s risky, sir,” explained Moreno. “It ain’t smart. Risks for us, and for the Empress. We don’t have a clue who or what took her, so we have no idea what his or her motives are,” he said stiffly.

Caden didn’t seem satisfied. “This is the only way,” he insisted.

Kallie shook her head again. Shut up, Kreine. You’re making a fool of yourself.

“Listen, Kreine. We don’t know where she is. ‘North’ ain’t a place. She could be anywhere.” Moreno evidently had no issue with interspersing his obviously habitual slang into his speech or breaking etiquette.

Caden opened his mouth but seemed to realize that he had been beaten.

Surprisingly, Grant came to his rescue. “We need to find research facilities near the pole. There are likely only a few applicable locations if Kreine’s message is correct.”

Moreno didn’t budge. “Secret scientific bases could be anywhere.”

“And the government is everywhere. Secret bases are extremely rare. I mean…they’re unheard of.”

“You work for the government, bud.”

“Exactly.”

Both men stared at each other for a second, waiting for the other to look away. Kallie noticed a trace of hostility in both pairs of eyes and stepped between them. They’ve known each other for less than an hour, and they already hate each other. It was to be expected; the two men, each in charge of the operation from separate ends, were rivals, but she’d hoped that it’d only go so far. “There is only one logical choice,” she said, looking at both of them. “Now we have to decide which it is.”

The two seemed to deflate slightly, as if they’d remembered where they were and what they were doing. “We need to locate the facilities,” said Kallie, choosing her words carefully. “And if that fails, we can wait. As in, if the base is registered correctly under the standards set by Arae, we’ll find it. If not…then we’ll find some other way to get to it.”

Moreno nodded jerkily. He turned toward the other officers in the room. “Get your people on it,” he ordered.

They started to leave. “Phoenix,” he called. A woman with long blond hair turned around. “Keep forensics at the scene. Look for evidence that’ll point to someone who really exists at the government register.”

“Yes, sir.” She left, headed in a different direction than the others.

Moreno sighed, drumming his fingers on the desk. “Seems like we’ve got our work cut out for us.”

Something’d better click, thought Kallie as everyone left in the room remained silent, half hoping, half resigned already. She didn’t know what to think of anything. For a while she thought she’d understood it, understood that the kidnapping was something the Empress had wanted. Now, after the call? It was still possible, of course, that the call was meant to throw them off, but something didn’t feel right.

Nothing felt right.

***

The police regrouped after a couple hours, and Kendric looked at the high officers in the investigation. “Tell me what you got,” he said. Kreine, Grant, and Hayward weren’t present; someone had told Kendric that Hayward had finally been talked into getting the bruises on her face treated and that Grant was in his quarters. Nobody had been able to find the Empress’s son, but he didn’t matter enough for Kendric to go looking for him.

  Phoenix Russell spoke first. “Sir, no evidence has been uncovered pointing to anyone aside from the four intruders. As I mentioned previously, the government has no record of them and they mean nothing. Useless to our investigation unless we can find someone, out there somewhere, who actually knows information about them.”

Kendric nodded, disappointed but not surprised. “What do we have on bases near the northern pole?”

A man stepped forward. “There are 208 scientific research bases, both government owned and private, in the northern hemisphere of Arae Orbis.

            “We have ruled out facilities that are not within three thousand klicks of the magnetic pole, leaving only 37 remaining. We have also ruled out government owned and operated facilities, leaving only 14. Finally, we have ruled out facilities that are not with 50 klicks of a fairly sizable mountain range. This leaves only three research bases left, two of which are underground.”

            Kendric raised an eyebrow. These were better results than he’d expected. Of course, the Empress’s message could have easily been mistaken, but it was worth investigating.

            “Which of these bases is most…interesting?” he asked.

            “The underground private facility located in Clara, a city in the Orestes Range. One other base was above ground; the other was just within 50 klicks of the Silex Mountains. Hardly within sight of them, sir.”

            “What does this facility…do, exactly?” The room was deathly silent as Kendric continued to fire questions at the man.

            “It’s one of those wildlife research ones.”

            Wildlife didn’t seem relevant to anything, but Kendric had heard enough anyway. “This seems like a good place to start,” he said, standing up. “First thing when the sun comes up, in no more than seven hours, an investigations crew is going to Clara. We need to find out more about this base. Chances are,” he continued, looking around at the faces before him. “Chances are that the Empress will not be there. However, I believe that we cannot take any risks, and we need to look into this. I only want information on the base, and this is a good place to start. Understood?”

            It had been a few hours since the attack, and, despite his orders to keep the kidnapping a secret, Kendric knew that the press would soon get wind of the disappearance. This nightmare will increase tenfold as soon as they get here, he thought. There had been some progress toward finding the Empress, he had to admit, but not as much as he’d hoped.

            It’s the Empress we’re dealing with here. Her husband was the biggest religious and political figurehead anywhere, ever. I don’t know who the criminals are or where they took her but…

            She can’t stay hidden forever.