Chapter 2

"I… I've never seen a dead body before."

Dan Keenan was shaking as he drank from a glass of water clutched in his nimble hands. As Reena Bird's assistant, he had discovered the murder, and was still recovering from the sight. Brown and Kostopoulos now met with him in his quarters, right next door to Bird's, where he had recounted the discovery with some difficulty.

"It's okay, Mr. Keenan," Brown said, patting the young man on the shoulder. Brown recognised Keenan from yesterday, where he had introduced his employer on the stage at the expo. "Just a few more questions."

Kostopoulos shifted on her feet. She had silently deferred to Brown's leadership in the investigation, although this was only their first port of call, but Brown could tell she was uncomfortable with the more awkward side of police work, such as speaking to the deceased's distraught acquaintances. She was a soldier, not a cop.

Brown didn't relish the task either, but it helped remind him of the Human element to any crime. There was rarely only one victim.

"I'm not even supposed to be here!" Keenan said, his voice cracking. "Ms. Bird's original assistant got sick, and I'm just an intern, but I have experience with aliens 'cause I grew up on colony worlds, so they sent me instead, but I've never… I've never…"

"Focus, Mr. Keenan," said Brown, before the boy broke down completely. "You can help us find out who did this. Now, you were in your quarters all night?"

Keenan nodded.

They would need to verify that, of course, with the corridor's security footage.

"Okay," he said. "We'll need a list of everyone Ms. Bird met with that evening."

"Certainly," Keenan said, happy to have something to concentrate on. He got up and moved over to his desk, retrieving a padd for Brown.

Brown thanked him and briefly checked the padd's readout, then shared a quick glance with Kostopoulos. They both knew the murderer's name could be on that list.

"Just one more thing, Mr. Keenan, then we'll leave you in peace: Ms. Bird had her own personal computer that we found, she didn't seem to use the one provided in her quarters…"

Keenan nodded. "Yes, she didn't want to risk entering any company information on another device."

"We haven't been able to access Ms. Bird's private computer," Brown continued. "Do you know how to?"

Now Keenan shook his head. "It's heavily encrypted, only… only Ms. Bird herself can access it."

"Well, we'll have out people take a crack at it…"

Keenan almost jumped at this. "No! Um, I mean, it's set to self-erase if there's an unauthorised access attempt. Ms. Bird takes… took business security very seriously." He looked down glumly.

Brown patted his shoulder again. "Thank you, son. We'll be very careful. I'll let you know if we need anything else."

It felt wrong to leave the grieving young man alone in his quarters, but the next leg of their investigation awaited.

There were answers out there, and Brown intended to find them.

Brown and Kostopoulos sat in the former's cramped, cluttered office in the Security Centre, reviewing the camera footage from the corridor outside Bird's quarters on the evening of the murder. So far, it had verified Keenan's account: He hadn't left his room until the following morning. Bird had never left hers at all, and there had been no visitors after her final guest.

She had only met with four potential investees in total, each of whom had visited her quarters for periods ranging from twenty minutes to over an hour. Brown had recognised a couple of them from the expo floor.

They now rewatched the final guest leaving Bird's quarters - the redheaded alien woman who had asked the questions at the site-to-site transporter demonstration. Brown paused the footage on her.

"We'll speak to each of the interview subjects, of course," Brown said, "but we should start with this young lady."

Kostopoulos nodded. "Last person to see Bird alive."

"Right." He checked the padd that had been sent down from the Infirmary. "Doctor T'Ling estimates Bird's TOD to be some time after her last visitor too."

"You think it was her?" Kostopoulos nodded towards the spotted woman on the monitor. "No one else went in afterwards."

Brown stared at the image on the screen. The woman's face was an inscrutable mask.

"Somehow, I doubt that this case is going to be so simple… The killer might never have been in the room. Until the doctor determines the cause of the heart's malfunction, we can't rule anything out."

They both sat in silence a moment, the air hanging heavily, before Kostopoulos spoke.

"Listen, I know you probably don't want me looking over your shoulder, but I promise you; you're in the lead on this. I'm no detective."

"Well then, you can be my Watson." They both shared a grin. "But don't worry, Colonel, I'm not fussed about any jurisdiction nonsense. I'm just here to find a killer, you can have the pleasure of arresting them."

"You ever worked on a murder case before?"

Brown sighed and leaned back in his chair. "Once. Unsolved." There was a grim silence as he tried to keep the memories back. "That's not going to happen here though," he said with determination.

"Was that on Mars?" Kostopoulos asked. "The case before?"

Brown shook his head and tried to divert the subject. "No. Pretty quiet on the colonies. Occasional scuffles, petty theft, the odd minor drug deal. I once had to help a girl find her escaped pet rat though." He chuckled.

Kostopoulos smirked. "I dunno, I've been from colony to colony in my career, never seemed quiet."

"That's 'cause they send you to where the trouble is," Brown said with his own smirk. "And those were out on the frontier, I imagine. Mars is Earth's next door neighbour. Been no trouble there since the War of Independence."

Kostopoulos nodded solemnly. She probably knew her history. At the beginning of the century, pre-United Earth, several terrestrial nation states had resented that their emigrant citizens had attempted to form a unified, independent government out of the fledgling Martian colonies. This resentment was mainly due to the fact that the Earth governments would no longer have free access to the minerals mined on the Red Planet. But then, most wars were economically motivated.

The world had not yet fully recovered from the horrors of World War Three at the time, and yet it found itself plunged into a new conflict with another planet. A planet populated by fellow Humans.

Of course, most of the people on Earth knew nothing about the war, only that the Martian workers had gone on strike, delaying colony construction, terraforming, and mining efforts, and had resorted to violence and sabotage. When the truth had emerged, the shameful war had quickly ended with the Martian colonies being granted their independence, and a thorough restructuring of the relationship between politics and corporations.

Brown's parents had been star-crossed lovers in that war - his father one of the colony engineers fighting for their rights, and his mother a member of the corporate-hired private army sent to 'pacify' the rebellious colonists.

Now, though, both sides had put the past behind them. Although Mars had declined to participate in the United Federation of Planets, Brown suspected that, if the UFP was successful, it would only be a matter of time before his homeworld became a member. Unlike the Alpha Centauri colonists, the Martians had to fight for their independence, and were not ready to relinquish it so soon.

Thoughts of the oncoming government changes brought to mind another topic.

"I hear the MACO and Starfleet may be working a lot closer in future anyway," Brown said.

"That's right," said Kostopoulos, her rigid features dropping slightly. "We could be part of the same team in a few months."

They had both heard the rumours that the militaries of all UFP member states were to be dissolved and their personnel incorporated into Starfleet. This included Earth militaries such as the British Royal Navy, the US Combined Services, and the MACO. This had, understandably, disgruntled a lot of people.

"How d'you feel about that?" Brown asked openly.

Kostopoulos sighed. "I can appreciate that this Federation doesn't want to seem militaristic… Earth won its new reputation in war, we don't want to come off as conquerors… But I don't think we should completely abandon a dedicated defence force."

Brown shrugged. "That's what Starfleet will be for. We already proved ourselves more than capable during the Xindi and Romulan conflicts."

"That you did. But you know as well as I do that most people don't join Starfleet to fight. I'm sure there will be explorers who resent having to become part-soldier, just as much as there will be the opposite."

"I think, going forward, Starfleet will have to have a little of both in its ranks," said Brown, playing devil's advocate. In his opinion, if Starfleet was going to be the face of this new Federation, they'd have to be capable of defending themselves, but without compromising their open, inquisitive nature.

It would be a difficult balance, and he wondered if they could pull it off.

"Of course," he said aloud, "that's if this new government goes ahead at all. This expo was supposed to be like a trial run, right? Different species exchanging ideas, working together? It hasn't gone so well." He added the last part grimly.

Kostopoulos looked at him with determination. "When we solve this murder, that will show the galaxy that we're not so easily cowed. And that maybe Starfleet and MACOs can work together after all."

Brown grinned.

She had said "When" and not "If we solve this murder."

"Then let's get to work," he said.