Timothy Zahn - Judgment at Proteus

{Did you see the actual contract?} Tan One asked.

I looked expectantly at Wandek. “He wishes to know if Asantra Muzzfor delivered his contract to you,” he said.

“No,” I said. “He said the killer had destroyed the contract. I don’t know for sure, but I had the impression that Asantra Muzzfor thought the killer might actually have been targeting Ms. German, with the other victims killed just to muddy the waters.”

The Fillies exchanged glances. Aronobal or Emikai would have given the group my explanation of the killer’s motives. But for all they knew I could have been wrong, and neither of them had any way of knowing if Muzzfor himself had come up with an alternative theory. “Why would the murderer have destroyed the contract?” Wandek asked.

“I assume he was hoping that Asantra Muzzfor would expire before I awoke, thereby leaving Ms. German and Dr. Aronobal stranded at Venidra Carvo with no knowledge of where they were to go next,” I said. “And of course, with the contract gone, I myself would have had no way of knowing I even needed to get in touch with them.”

{But Dr. Aronobal wasn’t summoned?} Green One asked again. { Asantra Muzzfor might not yet have been completely dead.}

“According to the LifeGuard, he was,” I said. “Anyway, at that point the Spiders intervened, wanting to get all the bodies out of the inhabited parts of the train as quickly as possible. There was some thought that the killer had used an unknown biological agent against his victims, and the Spiders were afraid it might spread.”

“But you did search for the contract?” Wandek asked.

“I gave the compartment a quick look, but didn’t find anything,” I said. So that was the real reason for this little interrogation. They wanted to know whether I’d found the evidence of Muzzfor’s true affiliation and the Shonkla-raa’s existence. “From the smell in the compartment, I’m guessing he burned it.”

{What was the smell like?} another of the doctors, whom I dubbed Tan Two, asked.

“Sort of like burnt almonds, with a hint of oregano,” I said. That answer I actually knew, because that was what the papers had smelled like when Bayta and I had burned them for real after we’d examined them. “Of course, I’d just been knocked on the head,” I amended. “My nose might have been a little off-kilter.”

A blue-clad Filly gestured to Bayta. {Has the female anything to add?}

To my mild chagrin, Bayta didn’t wait for Wandek’s translation. “I was unconscious even before Mr. Compton and the others arrived,” she said. “I woke up only after Asantra Muzzfor was already dead.”

Blue One shifted his eyes back to me, his blaze darkening. {So in other words, we have only Mr. Compton’s word for what happened.}

“Were there any other witnesses to these events?” Wandek asked.

“No one who lived through them,” I said, letting a little indignation into my voice. It was time I started getting annoyed at being interrogated like this when I’d merely been doing a Filiaelian santra a favor. “Look, I’m sorry he’s dead, and I honor his memory and all that. But if I’m going to finish the job I’ve started and get on with my life, I need to get back to Ms. German.”

Once again the Fillies exchanged glances. Blue One looked around, and I caught a small twitch of his ear. “You may go,” Wandek told me. “We may have other questions to ask later. If you’ll follow me, I’ll escort you to Ms. German.”

“Thanks, but we’ll find her ourselves,” I said, taking Bayta’s arm and backing toward the door. The watchdogs, who’d been standing patiently at my sides, came along with us.

Wandek’s hand lanced out and again caught my arm. “Forgive us if we sound harsh,” he said. “It was a terrible blow to lose such a close colleague. Naturally, we wish to know all we can about his death.”

“I understand that,” I said, dialing back on my annoyance. “You’ll forgive me in turn if I’m not in the best mood. It’s highly unpleasant to have come all this way only to be immediately put under arrest for crimes I didn’t commit.”

“Yes, we heard about that,” Wandek said, letting go of my arm. “If there’s any way we can assist in your defense, please don’t hesitate to call on us.”

“Thank you,” I said, letting my eyes drift around the group.

It was like looking at a group of sharks. These Fillies were my enemies, every one of them. They knew who I was, or were ninety percent sure of it. They knew about my war against their ally the Modhri, they knew I was lying about what had happened to Muzzfor, and they wanted to kill me.

The only thing keeping them from doing exactly that was the small sliver of doubt that I was not, in fact, lying about Muzzfor’s death and how it related to the murders aboard the super-express. If there was another player in this game, someone who had in fact tried to get Terese German away from them, they needed to find out the who and the what and the why. Right now, I was the best source of information that they had.

But I was only valuable as long as they thought such information might actually exist. The minute they were convinced otherwise, Bayta and I would be in serious trouble.

We had to make sure we were finished with our own investigation and far from Proteus before that happened.

Predictably, I suppose, Wandek followed us out of the building. “As a small gesture of gratitude for your time,” he said as we headed toward the building Terese and Aronobal had disappeared into a few minutes ago, “allow me to escort you to Ms. German.”

“That really isn’t necessary,” I told him. “We saw where she went. We can find our own way.”

“Of course you can,” Wandek said. “But this way you will not need to deal with questions or forms at the reception desk.”

We had made it halfway there when Doug suddenly stopped, turned his head, and gave a sharp yip. I was starting to look down to see what the trouble was when there was an answering yip from the distance.

I turned to look. Near the edge of the dome another watchdog was striding along at the side of a Filly, this one not in simple doctor’s garb but dressed in the usual upper-class set of ancient-Mongolian-style layered tunics. The watchdog was peering across toward us, the Filly himself ignoring us completely.

I was trying to figure out what another criminal would be doing here, especially such a well-dressed one, when Ty gave a yip of his own. Once again, the other watchdog answered.

And with that, all three animals went back about their original business. “What was that all about?” I asked Wandek.

“You mean the greetings?” he asked, gesturing down at the watchdogs.

“Yes, if that’s what those were.”

“The sounds function as a greeting and identification between msikai-dorosli ,” he explained. “Each burst contains a wide range of ultrasonics unique to that particular animal.”

“Some kind of jailer-to-jailer code?”

“That Filiaelian you saw was not a prisoner,” Wandek said, a little stiffly. “Many citizens, even aboard Kuzyatru Station, keep msikai-dorosli as companions.”

I looked dubiously down at Doug’s non-furry and decidedly non-pettable back. “They’re considered pets ?”

“They’re considered companions ,” Wandek repeated, leaning on the word a little. “They can be trained to assist their owner with various tasks.”

“Like what?” I asked. “Making tea? Calling up the morning mail?”

“They can perform simple tasks such as fetching objects, particularly for those with post-operative weakness,” Wandek said. “They can also be fitted with harnesses for carrying medium-weight items.”