The Phoenix Crisis by Richard L. Sanders

from what Calvin could
tell, no one had a personal grudge against him. Or truly benefitted
from his death.
    “ What do you think?” Calvin
turned to Pellew.
    The special forces captain gave Calvin an
indifferent look. “I think it’s a case of bad luck, nothing more.
Good thing Patrick was in the brig when the systems failed and not
someone we actually needed alive.”
    Calvin wasn’t surprised by Pellew’s callous
regard for life. He’d seen firsthand what the soldier was capable
of when convenience demanded it. Calvin doubted he would ever
forgive Pellew for flushing a civilian crew out into space—whose
only crime was being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Sure
Pellew had situation reasons for why he’d done what he had, and
there was a kind of morbid logic to it, but it was still cruel,
wrong, and not the sort of thing Calvin was capable of. Or so he
hoped.
    “ Why did it take your
soldier so long to discover something was wrong?” asked
Calvin.
    Pellew shrugged. “She said it wasn’t until
Patrick refused to awaken for food and water rations that she got
suspicious that something was wrong. Carbon monoxide is odorless
and colorless and someone breathing it in doesn’t show signs of
distress. “
    Calvin knew that was true. “Did the soldier
on duty report any visitors?”
    “ No, she says she was on
watch the entire time and Patrick had no visitors.”
    Calvin nodded. He doubted the soldier
herself had the technical expertise to sabotage the system so
smoothly into killing Patrick, and he had no reason to distrust the
soldier’s word. After all, she had elected to remain a fugitive on
the Nighthawk at her own expense, and if she’d allowed someone else
to enter the deck and tamper with the systems she had no incentive
to protect him or her.
    “ When Cassidy gets the
chance I’m going to have her look over the systems thoroughly,”
said Calvin. “On the off-chance that you missed something,” Calvin
looked at the analyst, who nodded. Calvin next turned to Pellew. “I
want you to take Patrick’s body to the infirmary. I’ll have Rain do
an autopsy and see if there is anything else about this death that
stands out—anything suspicious. I’m leaving you to clean this
up.”
    “ Understood,” said
Pellew.
    With that Calvin left and headed for his
office. Once he was there he took a seat and used the intercom to
summon Cassidy.
    “ You wanted to see me, sir?”
she asked once she was inside and the door had closed behind
her.
    “ Yes,” said Calvin. He
didn’t know Cassidy particularly well, and he hadn’t forgotten that
during his contest with Summers for control of the ship on the way
to Abia, what seemed like decades ago, Cassidy had taken Summers’
side over his. But since then Calvin had learned to trust Summers
so he supposed he should trust Cassidy as well, and—now that Shen’s
talents and expertise weren’t available to him—Cassidy was the
best-trained operations officer on the ship. “Have you completed
your sweep of deck one?”
    “ Yes, sir,” she replied.
“And I did find a listening device.”
    Calvin leaned forward.
“ And? ”
    “ It had been placed inside
the vent just behind you. I sent it to the lab for
analysis.”
    Calvin tapped the intercom again and called
the lab.
    “ Midshipman Hughes
here.”
    “ Mister Hughes,” said
Calvin, “is the lab currently analyzing a listening device that was
sent down there?”
    “ Aye, sir.”
    “ Any results on that so
far?”
    “ We found some skin cells
and hair that the computer is analyzing for a DNA match currently.
As for the device itself, it’s still being checked over to see if
we missed anything.”
    That sounded promising. “Has the computer
come back with any results?”
    “ The analysis is completing
now—hold on one moment, sir.”
    “ Very well.”
    Calvin waited for over two minutes before
Hughes replied.
        
    “ Sorry about that,
sir—”
    “ It’s fine, just tell me you
have