Personal Log 94: 25th - 31st January, 3302 (Part Five)
09 Oct 2016Jemine Caesar
25th - 31st January, 3302 (Part Five) The next day, 31st of January, saw Sam and I breezing into the Lightspeed Hotel looking the very image of wedded bliss. I had never got around to disposing of the engagement ring that I'd been given by John Graham when he proposed to me, so I slipped that on beside the wedding ring.
"It's purely for appearances sake," I assured Sam. "It means nothing to me."
The honeymoon suite had been booked for us under false names by Lt Kowalski, Admiral Remi's personal aide. There, Sam and I prepared ourselves for what lay ahead.
While Sam went to locate our informant in Maintenance Deck 4, I headed for the bar to find our blue-haired contact. It didn't take long. He was working behind the bar, so I stood at the counter and ordered a white wine. Once I had satisfied Blue-hair of my identity (using a pre-arranged coded conversation supplied as part of our mission briefing) he told me all he knew.
"Russell's lot" said Blue-hair, "has been using hotel rooms for their deals. Deck 5 had to be decontaminated the other day, after traces of uranium was found there. It was probably a sample, as a sign of good faith. Russell himself never shows, but his number 2 does; I don't have his name, but he's about 5'10", ugly, bald, well-built, with an African lilt in his voice. There are at least four of the gang in the hotel right now."
Blue-hair causally slipped a data-chip into my hand.
"What's on this? " I asked him.
"Security footage of their last deal," he answered. "You can recognise them by a tattoo they all have, a black spider with a skull for a head. They use Eagles and Vipers to get around, but they also sometimes use Haulers to move big stuff. That's all I got."
I thanked him, and left the bar.
Sam and I had agreed to meet up in the casino. He had also met with the other informant, who had provided more or less the same information as Blue-hair had. Sam couldn't resist trying his luck at the black jack table, managing to win two games whilst I dutifully stood behind him and watched.
It was a few minutes before midnight GST when we left the casino, still very much in character as starry-eyed newlyweds. As we reached the door of the honeymoon suite, we overheard a rather disturbing conversation between two hotel workers...
*****
"... and do they know how it happened?"
""Well, they think she went down to check a delivery of beef. Seems she went in, tripped, and knocked herself out."
"Oh, gawd!"
"She didn't stand a chance after that. By the time she came round, she was too far gone to be able to move."
"So she froze to death?"
"Yeah!"
"Oh gawd!"
"Poor girl. She's had no luck. Ever since her kid died of that neckyphilly-whatsitsname a few years ago."
"And when was it she died, did you say?"
"January 17th."
"Poor ol' Bounty Brown. What a terrible way to go!"
*****
Sam and I looked at each other. Hurrying into the room, I took out my dataslate and checked the Harem file, already knowing what I would find.
Bounty Brown was the third name on the list.