Bher

The office still smelled like Commissioner Skrue, like tobacco and whiskey and body odor and stress. Commissioner Javan adjusted her nose to tune out the scent, and put in a work order for a more thorough cleaning.

A paper box sat on the corner of her desk. She still hadn't unpacked it after the promotion. She ran her gloved right hand down the side, contemplating whether now was a good time. She looked at the glove. The one place the synthskin refused to grow back. Her memory flashed to a nightmare that stuck in her head: holding a gun in that hand, pointing it at Vadstalle. She shook her head, clearing the memory, at least temporarily. Poor Vadstalle went missing after being put on administrative leave. She had reviewed his file once she had been promoted. Poor guy was dealing with a lot. Her accident probably pushed him over the edge.

She glanced at herself in the reflection on the glass. Her skin had grown back everywhere flawlessly, except for on her hand. Why wouldn't it take? She peeled back the black glove revealing the bone-white metal hand beneath. She pulled the glove back, concealing the lack of skin there.

According to Doctor Vomisa, nobody beyond Vadstalle knew her true nature. Not even Skrue. She opened a desk drawer and noticed that it had a false bottom. She opened that and found a half-empty bottle of whiskey. Poor Skrue. Couldn't handle all the events of the past few months. The dismissal of that beat cop, the administrative leave of Vadstalle, the extended medical leave of Javan, the missing files, the mysteriously closed cases, the everything. He took his retirement early, leaving a vacuum that Javan naturally filled. Whether it was pity for her after the accident, or pity for her because of her partner disappearing, or her stellar police record, or some combination of all three, she was the natural successor to the office of Commissioner.

Even though she had not yet unpacked her desk, she had started several initiatives. With the success of the PARD program, she took it to the next level, ordering a prototype Beatbot unit, nicknamed Buddy. He took PARD to the next level, providing all the same capabilities of the AR units the police carried, but also being able to execute basic police tasks. Soon, Bher projected, half the police officers in the precinct would be Beatbots, working alongside their human partners, much like what she had with Vadstalle. Though, she wished they had come up with a better name. She made a note to brainstorm some ideas. BuddyCop came to mind, but that seemed too obvious.

This box wasn’t going to unpack itself. She looked at the surface of the desk. It was made of wood, stained and varnished, though the varnish was losing its shine from use. She thought this gave it character, and by proxy, gave a sense of legitimacy to her position. Look at that desk. It's well used. The person behind it must know what she's doing.

In her field of vision, she laid out a grid across the surface. One by one, she unpacked the box. There was the cup of pens and pencils and a stylus. That went naturally next to the phone console, as did a notepad. She didn't need to bring over her computer, as they were all virtualized. Her desktop experience followed her wherever she logged in, so Skrue's system was now her system. She set down her trivet and her mug, and some of the other ephemera she had acquired during her tenure as a police. The only thing missing was the Arai-kun figurine she had received during one of those times when the police demystify themselves by spending time around children.

She couldn't quite remember what had happened to it.

Once everything was unpacked, she folded the box flat and left it by her door. Eventually it would go to some storage room for future police officers to move their stuff, either to another desk, or to their homes.

She logged into her computer terminal and pulled up the internal new feeds. She wanted to make sure that she was keeping herself informed of all the latest progress of her precinct. Fortunately, she had an advantage over Skrue, in that she could process large quantities of information trivially, linking different seemingly incongruous things with each other. Things would be different around here with her as the commissioner.

There were several incidents involving people acting strangely, almost all of them verified “gearheads,” people who rented out their brains as additional computing resources. Sometimes, as with any intersection of technology and biology (the back of her right hand itched when she thought this) things didn't go as planned. However, the incident rate was higher than expected. There were also reports of erratic drone behavior, as well as people calling the police about their personal computers misbehaving. One less than reputable caller even said something about “agentry,” but perhaps they meant the word “agency” or something. These sort of things happened. Still, there was something odd about the whole thing. She remembered stories Vadstalle would tell her of the earlier gearhead days, when it was less regulated (and still, even now, it was not regulated enough), and some people found a way to bypass the motor controls, creating a savage army of meat puppets. She had read up on it later, and there was something about what she was seeing now that reminded her of what she had observed.

That word, “agentry,” stuck with her.

Someone knocked on her door. She looked up. It was Buddy. It was then that she noticed the half-empty whiskey bottle on her desk.

“Someone to see you, ma'am,” said the robot police officer.

“Thank you,” she said. “Oh, and Buddy.”

“Yes, ma'am?”

She handed him the bottle of whiskey and nodded at the folder cardboard box. “Please take care of these.”

He took the bottle and picked up the box. Then, outside the office, he said to someone she couldn't see, “She'll see you now.”

When Joe Czeslaw entered, she instantly pulled up memories about him. He was the cop who was on the Conchobhar murder case, and was eventually dismissed for misconduct after his PARD presented evidence to Skrue.

“Mr. Czeslaw,” she said. “Welcome back. What can I do for you?”

Joe looked around the office, then at Javan. “What happened to Skrue?”

“He retired,” she said. “What brings you here today?”

“And you're the new commissioner?” He said. “We're you a homicide detective?”

“Yes. And I was. But that's not why you came here today, is it?”

“Hey,” Joe said. “You're the one who got caught in the explosion at the chemical plant.” He looked at her, his eyes scanning her face, her hair, her gloved hand. “I'm surprised you're still in one piece.”

“I was very fortunate,” she said. She tapped the fingers on her gloved hand. “But, I must ask once again, Mr. Czeslaw, what brings you here?”

“Oh,” said Joe. “Sorry. It just brings back old memories. You know?”

She nodded. “I'm aware of your previous occupation. Our records indicate that you're a private investigator now. I assume you're here because of that.”

“Oh, yeah,” said Joe. “I was recently hired to investigate the Tuttle disappearance.”

Javan blinked, and the records appeared in her field of vision. Archie Tuttle disappeared last night, and his employer, Solstice QuantBank, had filed a missing person report. There was nothing more substantial. “We have very little, but as there is no open investigation, we will gladly share our records with you. Do you have a good point of contact?”

Joe pulled out a smartcard with his business information on it. The front said “JUST CALL JOE.” “Use this,” he said, handing it to her.

She took it in her left hand, her gloved right hand not wanting to move, not wanting to make itself more noticed. She blinked at the card, picking up the secure dropbox, then without a word, transferred the records pertaining to the Tuttle disappearance to it. “You should be able to access them soon,” she said.

“Thank you,” he said. He paused, lingered, looked around.

“You miss being a police officer,” she said. It wasn't clear if it was a question or a statement.

“Maybe,” he said, shrugging. “It sure brings back memories. You know, even though I've only been a little while, everything looks so different now that I'm on the outside.”

She nodded. “Things change in miniscule ways that we barely notice when we're around them, but when we go a long time without observing them, those miniscule changes add up into majuscule ones, and start to grow unrecognizable.”

He nodded, only following her enough to get the gist of what she said. “Yeah,” he added. He looked at his watch, noticing the new documents. “Well, it looks like I got them.” He tipped his hat to her. “Good day, Madam Commissioner.”

“Good day, PI Czeslaw,” she said.

Joe left the office, making his way toward the front of the precinct building like a man with a purpose. As he left, more memories of Vadstalle flooded her mind.