…

Just who is this Alexander Bergman?

…

Bryson was fully aware that you can only get answers to the questions according to what you know about a victim.  It’s why no one told him about Bergman having any military service or anything that might be relevant outside his usual business, and affairs.

A conversation between Worthey and Bergman’s daughter raised the possibility of military service, most likely in the Army, and equally likely somewhere in the Middle East, but a follow-up conversation between Worthey and her over the phone produced no further results.

It did yield one more interesting fact, that the daughter was from an earlier rather brief marriage and that Sandra had remained with the mother and had known nothing about her father until the mother had died and left his details in a letter to be given to her.

Her acquaintance with him had been relatively brief, six months at most, and in that time, she had failed to find out anything about him other than he was selfish and inconsiderate, and that it was no surprise her mother had not told her about him.

She was surprised to learn that he had made her a beneficiary of his will, not that it would amount to much.

Bryson then moved on to his most recent spouse, Stacy.  She had been number four.  The most she could say about the other three was that the first was a mistake, the second lasted exactly six weeks, and the third was to an older woman, a rich widow, Stacy said, who died in suspicious circumstances.

It was where Stacy said, Bergman got the funds to set up his business.

Stacy had first met Bergman in a night club where she was a dancer, no, not an exotic dancer, and he had been with wife number three at the time.  She should have realized that Bergman was not trustworthy when he asked to date her on the pretext that he and his current wife were estranged and were in the process of divorcing.

She hadn’t realized at the time that her death might have been suspicious, just that she had conveniently died so she and Bergman were free to marry.

She knew nothing about any military service, he did not mention it.  He said he had once worked for an international aid organization and had often travelled and remained overseas for months at a time, but those visits had been curtailed once he married her.  However, he frequently made flying visits to both suppliers and clients, but these, she was assured, were all in America.

She had never seen him with a passport, had seen his travel arrangements from time to time in the form of itineraries, and on several occasions had asked her to go with him, but she had declined.  She did not travel well in aeroplanes.

Wendy Anderson proved to be a more difficult case to get information out of.

It was clear from the outset she knew a lot more than she admitted to.  The call on the telephone started badly and ended abruptly.  He sent Worthey and several officers to arrest her and bring her back to the station.

Once in the interview room, a lawyer by her side, Bryson told her, “At the moment I’m half inclined to charge you with obstruction.  I asked a simple question, do you know whether Alexander Berman was in the military/  It isn’t a difficult question.”

“It is as if what he did was something he was not supposed to mention or talk about.”

“He obviously told you.”

“I can keep a secret.  I made a solemn promise never to repeat to anyone what he told me.”

“He’s now dead, that hardly seems relevant.  What is relevant is the fact that whatever it is he did might have some direct effect on why he’s dead.”

“It wasn’t that spectacular.  If you’re looking for a murderer look no further than James.”

‘So you keep saying, but the facts say otherwise.  I assume you knew he had four wives, the most recent Stacy, and that he has a daughter, Sandra.”

“Did he?”

“You mean in all of the thirty-odd years you have known him he never mentioned it?  Or the fact he was briefly married to one Annabelle Bentley, shortly after he graduated from University?”

Bryson was observing Wendy Anderson very carefully and when he mentioned the daughter, she showed genuine surprise.  That wasn’t the same when he asked her about military service.

“If he did have a daughter, I’m sure it was a surprise to him as well.  Perhaps they had parted, and she was pregnant and forgot or deliberately didn’t tell him. 

It was a logical assumption, Bryson thought.

“And as far as I was aware, Alex was in the National Guard for a brief period, arising from his time in a cadet corps when he was much younger, something his father made him do.  I had no idea if he carried that forward, and he never mentioned it.”

“How do you explain the obvious absences?”

“The charity work involved staying overseas for long periods.  From time to time I would visit him in various locations.  Not one was he in uniform, or anywhere near military action.  If he was, he hid it well.”

Or she just wasn’t all that observant.

“You have other matters you wish to ask me about?: she asked.

Perhaps it was time to throw the car among the pigeons.

“We have managed to get access to the text messages on one of Bergman’s cell phones, and there is a considerable exchange of sometimes very explicit tests between yourself and the deceased, as well as some attached photographs which suggest that your relationship is not what you are portraying it as.  That phone is currently missing.  Now, I will ask you once again, what was the nature of your relationship with the deceased.”

An almost priceless expression on her face, surely she had some idea if anything happened to her boyfriend the police would be looking at his phone records.

“And you were not the only woman he was conducting this type of relationship with.  We have, so far, found three others, equally as intense, shall we say.  The nature of the text messages and the tenor of one of the last he sent you, which I’m sure you are aware of, where he said he would have no hesitation in showing your husband those photographs, gives you a clear motive.  And, if you say your husband has a gun, I’m assuming you know where it is, and how to gain access to it, if you follow my meaning.”

It was very clear by her expression she did.  “I did not kill him.  He did not tell me what he was about to do, though I did ask him to destroy those photographs.  Equally, if Bergman intended to use those photographs to get my husband to sign the divorce papers, for whatever reason, then would that equally give James motive?”

It would, or it might have been a case of good riddance, but Bryson could not allow his snap judgement of wither to interfere in an unbiased investigation.

Yes, the expression had changed again, he thought, having realised what she’d said.  It was apparent to him she was truly angry at a husband, but for different reasons, none of which were attached to Bergman, but she had been handed a perfect opportunity to set him up for the murder.

And one thing was certain about her.  She was making it noticeably clear to him that she wanted her husband to take the fall for the murder.

“Just so you know, we believe there is another phone, the one that he received a message to meet him at the Zoo carpark at 10pm.  There was evidence in the car and on his person of perfume, Mrs Anderson, not unlike what you are wearing now.”

…

© Charles Heath 2019-2023

Back on the alien vessel

…

The ‘ooh’ from Nancy was unmistakable the moment we rematerialized in the alien’s ship’s bridge.  It could be one of those awe-inspiring moments, had it not been for the circumstances.

The second time on the bridge, I realized that it was a little more sparse than it had been before, with a wall of control panels missing, along with a panel that stretched across the front of the Captain’s chair, but with no crew members present.

It was now a blank space.  The whole space could have been a large empty room with windows overlooking empty space, except in the distance, our two ships.  Beyond that, there seemed to be a thin streak of light, or colored lights, flickering.  At a guess they might be a long, long, long way away, but whether it was in the direction we had come, or where we were going, or somewhere else, I couldn’t tell.

On the other side of the bridge, the female alien was still holding the Russian Captain, some sort of weapon at his throat.

I was still feeling the tingling sensation that was the effect after re-materialization.  The first time it was disorientating, I was prepared this time.

I was also not sure what to expect, now that it was clear the aliens were not what they portrayed themselves to be.  Of course, it was naive of me to expect that others in the galaxy would be better than us.

“An explanation of what this is really about might go a long way towards preventing tragic consequences.”  I thought I’d throw out the opening gambit.

“Agreed.  I had hoped the problem could have been resolved before your arrival.  As you might be aware, we have the ability to transport our people, and I had hoped to recover the missing citizens that were taken by this,” he pointed to the Russian, “captains ship.”

“They asked for asylum, we did not take them.”

Another piece of the puzzle, the female must be one of the Aliens crew, and had beamed aboard, taken the captain hostage, and demanded the release of the citizens.

Question: why hadn’t he simply beamed them back?

To the Alien, “Is this true?”

“Semantics “

Note:  this alien had a very good grasp of the nuances of the English language.

“Semantics or not, if you know anything about earth culture, it’s that we look after those who need help, and if people come to us asking for asylum, we generally give it.  You will also be aware that those who ask for asylum generally are in fear of their lives.  The question is, why would these people ask for asylum.”

“The people aboard that ship are criminals who were serving their sentences in one of our remote facilities.  Your captain apparently came across this remote facility and assisted in setting the criminals free.  When we sent a ship to apprehend them, they were taken aboard the earth ship and it attempted to leave.  We were going to stop the earth vessel from leaving when your ship appeared, and it seemed prudent not to display hostility.  There was also the possibility you were working together.”

“We are not, as you are now aware.  Nor would I be willing to interfere with your internal matters, except that it involves another of our ships, one I didn’t know about, which only complicates matters.

Why do you have the captain.”

“He refused to set the prisoners.”

“If you could beam your operative and the captain here, why not just beam the criminals too.”

“They are currently protected in a special part of the captain’s ship that does not allow us to bring them back.  They obviously told him what our capabilities are.”

Criminals, if they were criminals, seeking asylum.  If it was me, I would be happy for someone else to take away the criminal element and make it someone else’s problem.  The unfortunate truth in our world is that criminals didn’t go to jail anymore, they were shipped off to remote mining planets where they spent the rest of their days working in very harsh conditions.  Over time it had proved to be a very good deterrent, so much so, that off plant mining operations now had to pay large sums of money to get people to work there.

“Number One.”

“Sir?”

“Find the so-called criminals the captain has stowed on his vessel and ask them what their side of the story is.  Quick as you can.”

“Yes, sir.”

I looked over to the Russian Captain.  “You might want to tell your second in command to make things easier for my crew.”

A look from me to the alien, and back, time to consider my request, then gave the order.

“On my way, sir.”

…

© Charles Heath 2021-2022

This case has everything, red herrings, jealous brothers, femme fatales, and at the heart of it all, greed.

See below for an excerpt from the book…

Coming soon!

An excerpt from the book:

When Harry took the time to consider his position, a rather uncomfortable position at that, he concluded that he was somehow involved in another case that meant very little to him.

Not that it wasn’t important in some way he was yet to determine, it was just that his curiosity had got the better of him, and it had led to this: sitting in a chair, securely bound, waiting for someone one of his captors had called Doug.

It was not the name that worried him so much, it was the evil laugh that had come after the name was spoken.

Doug what? Doug the ‘destroyer’, Doug the ‘dangerous’, Doug the ‘deadly’; there was any number of sinister connotations, and perhaps that was the point of the laugh, to make it more frightening than it was.

But there was no doubt about one thing in his mind right then: he’d made a mistake. A very big. and costly, mistake. Just how big the cost, no doubt he would soon find out.

His mother, and his grandmother, the wisest person he had ever known, had once told him never to eavesdrop.

At the time he couldn’t help himself and instead of minding his own business, listening to a one-sided conversation which ended with a time and a place. The very nature of the person receiving the call was, at the very least, sinister, and, because of the cryptic conversation, there appeared to be, or at least to Harry, criminal activity involved.

For several days he had wrestled with the thought of whether he should go. Stay on the fringe, keep out of sight, observe and report to the police if it was a crime. Instead, he had willingly gone down the rabbit hole.

Now, sitting in an uncomfortable chair, several heat lamps hanging over his head, he was perspiring, and if perspiration could be used as a measure of fear, then Harry’s fear was at the highest level.

Another runnel of sweat rolled into his left eye, and, having his hands tied, literally, it made it impossible to clear it. The burning sensation momentarily took his mind off his predicament. He cursed and then shook his head trying to prevent a re-occurrence. It was to no avail.

Let the stinging sensation be a reminder of what was right and what was wrong.

It was obvious that it was the right place and the right time, but in considering his current perilous situation, it definitely was the wrong place to be, at the worst possible time.

It was meant to be his escape, an escape from the generations of lawyers, what were to Harry, dry, dusty men who had been in business since George Washington said to the first Walthenson to step foot on American soil, ‘Why don’t you become a lawyer?” when asked what he could do for the great man.

Or so it was handed down as lore, though Harry didn’t think Washington meant it literally, the Walthenson’s, then as now, were not shy of taking advice.

Except, of course, when it came to Harry.

He was, Harry’s father was prone to saying, the exception to every rule. Harry guessed his father was referring to the fact his son wanted to be a Private Detective rather than a dry, dusty lawyer. Just the clothes were enough to turn Harry off the profession.

So, with a little of the money Harry inherited from one of his aunts, he leased an office in Gramercy Park and had it renovated to look like the Sam Spade detective agency, you know the one, Spade and Archer, and The Maltese Falcon.

There’s a movie and a book by Dashiell Hammett if you’re interested.

So, there it was, painted on the opaque glass inset of the front door, ‘Harold Walthenson, Private Detective’.

There was enough money to hire an assistant, and it took a week before the right person came along, or, more to the point, didn’t just see his business plan as something sinister. Ellen, a tall cool woman in a long black dress, or so the words of a song in his head told him, fitted in perfectly.

She’d seen the movie, but she said with a grin, Harry was no Humphrey Bogart.

Of course not, he said, he didn’t smoke.

Three months on the job, and it had been a few calls, no ‘real’ cases, nothing but missing animals, and other miscellaneous items. What he really wanted was a missing person. Or perhaps a beguiling, sophisticated woman who was as deadly as she was charming, looking for an errant husband, perhaps one that she had already ‘dispatched’.

Or for a tall, dark and handsome foreigner who spoke in riddles and in heavily accented English, a spy, or perhaps an assassin, in town to take out the mayor. The man was such an imbecile Harry had considered doing it himself.

Now, in a back room of a disused warehouse, that wishful thinking might be just about to come to a very abrupt end, with none of the romanticized trappings of the business befalling him. No beguiling women, no sinister criminals, no stupid policemen.

Just a nasty little man whose only concern was how quickly or how slowly Harry’s end was going to be.

© Charles Heath 2019

50 photographs, 50 stories, of which there is one of the 50 below.

They all start with –

A picture paints … well, as many words as you like.  For instance:

And the story:

It was once said that a desperate man has everything to lose.

The man I was chasing was desperate, but I, on the other hand, was more desperate to catch him.

He’d left a trail of dead people from one end of the island to the other.

The team had put in a lot of effort to locate him, and now his capture was imminent.  We were following the car he was in, from a discrete distance, and, at the appropriate time, we would catch up, pull him over, and make the arrest.

There was nowhere for him to go.

The road led to a dead-end, and the only way off the mountain was back down the road were now on.  Which was why I was somewhat surprised when we discovered where he was.

Where was he going?

“Damn,” I heard Alan mutter.  He was driving, being careful not to get too close, but not far enough away to lose sight of him.

“What?”

“I think he’s made us.”

“How?”

“Dumb bad luck, I’m guessing.  Or he expected we’d follow him up the mountain.  He’s just sped up.”

“How far away?”

“A half-mile.  We should see him higher up when we turn the next corner.”

It took an eternity to get there, and when we did, Alan was right, only he was further on than we thought.”

“Step on it.  Let’s catch him up before he gets to the top.”

Easy to say, not so easy to do.  The road was treacherous, and in places just gravel, and there were no guard rails to stop a three thousand footfall down the mountainside.

Good thing then I had the foresight to have three agents on the hill for just such a scenario.

Ten minutes later, we were in sight of the car, still moving quickly, but we were going slightly faster.  We’d catch up just short of the summit car park.

Or so we thought.

Coming quickly around another corner we almost slammed into the car we’d been chasing.

“What the hell…” Aland muttered.

I was out of the car, and over to see if he was in it, but I knew that it was only a slender possibility.  The car was empty, and no indication where he went.

Certainly not up the road.  It was relatively straightforward for the next mile, at which we would have reached the summit.  Up the mountainside from here, or down.

I looked up.  Nothing.

Alan yelled out, “He’s not going down, not that I can see, but if he did, there’s hardly a foothold and that’s a long fall.”

Then where did he go?

Then a man looking very much like our quarry came out from behind a rock embedded just a short distance up the hill.

“Sorry,” he said quite calmly.  “Had to go if you know what I mean.”

I’d lost him.

It was as simple as that.

I had been led a merry chase up the hill, and all the time he was getting away in a different direction.

I’d fallen for the oldest trick in the book, letting my desperation blind me to the disguise that anyone else would see through in an instant.

It was a lonely sight, looking down that road, knowing that I had to go all that way down again, only this time, without having to throw caution to the wind.

“Maybe next time,” Alan said.

“We’ll get him.  It’s just a matter of time.”

© Charles Heath 2019-2021

Find this and other stories in “Inspiration, maybe”  available soon.

…

Detective Worthey investigates a car crash

…

Detective Worthey had some experience with arguments and death.

It was a simple scenario and it happened more than one thought.  Only recently there had been a case where a husband and wife had an extreme argument, a number of residents in the apartment block attested to it, and to the fact the husband left in a fit of pique, and not thirty minutes later was killed in a car crash caused by his inattentiveness.

For all intents and purposes, it was an open and shut case.

The case notes before him were anything but an open and shut case, even though the investigating detective had considered it so.  On the surface it was.

The son was a recovering drug addict.  His mother refused to accept that the boy was an addict, that he had a problem that could easily be overcome and was being handled.  According to her statement, the son had told her it was not a problem, as it was being made out to be.

The father knew the extent of the problem and had been working with the medical team to look after his son, and the considered opinion of the medical team and the father was for an extra period in rehab.  The problem: the treatment was working but the son was not strictly adhering to the program.

It was that old story, the son didn’t think he had a problem and had fallen off the wagon.

And, of course, the program was not like jail.  The participant was not obligated to stay if they didn’t want to, and the son had considered he was sorted and signed himself out.

Only to go and visit his old friends, and, that mistake made, he was convinced just a little wouldn’t harm him.  Define ‘just a little’.

Another statement had the son returning home, clearly under the influence, and a meltdown ensues.  The wife takes the son’s side, not acknowledging the son was back on drugs, the father tries to convince them that the son needed to return to rehab, and while the parents are fighting, the son takes the car and leaves.

Not twenty minutes later the son was involved in a car accident, failing to stop at a red light, and cleaned up by a car who had a green light.  The son is severely injured, and the car is wrecked.  The other car is also disabled, but the driver just got out and ran.

There were seven witness statements covering the crash and aftermath.

Each was different.

Each said the son’s car ran the red light and the other car had nowhere to go.

Each said the driver of the car that hit the son’s car got out and simply walked away.

Seven descriptions of the fleeing driver were basically the same in that it was a man, he was wearing a dark blue suit, and he had short reddish hair.

That was it.  Two said he was tall, two said her was short, and the rest of average height.

Three said he was a black man, and the others said he was Mexican.

Four said the man stopped to look in the car that he’d hit, saw the driver, and completely changed expression, to one of recognition followed by shock.

The others said he looked in the car, shook his head, and then walked off.  The detectives’ notes said the car was registered to a man named…

Phillip Megarry.

Worthey re-read the paragraph again, and then shook his head.

The report then went on to say that Megarry had been contacted, did not match the description of the man who had ran not the son’s car, and then reported the fact the car was stolen, having not realised that it was not in the garage where it should be.

That man showed the Detective the garage where the car was stored and provided the registration papers for the car.  The Megarry then, was not the Megarry aka Bergman now.

But, that Megarry was short, slight, and spoke with a German accent.  The Bergman Megarry was American with no sign of any accent.

Worthy made a note: Follow up interview with Megarry the owner of the car that hit the son’s car.

But, if the Megarry that did hit the son’s car was the Bergman alias, then the killing of the son was from the very person Wendy was having an affair with, whom she had known for a long time, and was the cause of all Anderson’s problems.

What are the odds of it being such a small world? Worthey asked himself.

This was adding a new level of complication that he was sure none of the family knew about.

The accident wasn’t James Anderson’s fault.  Whether or not he could have prevented his son taking the car, that could also be applicable to the mother.  That accident was always going to happen, one way of another, because the son’s ability to do anything was impaired by drugs.

And Worthey was curious what the mother would say when she learned who it was driving the car that caused the death of her son.  No, that was Bryson’s problem to sort out as the lead detective on the case.

But there was one lingering possibility, had James Anderson known it was his best friend who had virtually killed his son, and did he kill him because of it?

…

© Charles Heath 2019-2023

It was, perhaps, the saddest week of my life.

It started with a phone call, and then a visit by two police officers.  It was about my parents, but the news could not be imparted over the phone, only in person.  That statement alone told me it was very bad news, so I assumed the worst.

The two police officers, standing at the front door, with grim expressions on their faces, completed the picture.  The news, my parents were dead, killed in a freak car accident.

At first, it didn’t sink in.  They were on their way back from another of their extensive holidays, one of many since my father had retired.  I’d seen them probably six months out of the last five years, and the only reason they were returning this time was that my mother needed an operation.

They hadn’t told me why, not that they ever told me very much any time since the day I’d been born, but that was who they were.  I thought them eccentric, being older when I’d come along, and others thought them, well, eccentric.

And being an only child, they packed me off to boarding school, then university, and then found me a job in London, and set me up so that I would only see them weekends if they were home.

I had once wondered if they ever cared about me, keeping me at arm’s length, but my mother some time ago had taken me aside and explained why.  It was my father’s family tradition.  The only part I’d missed was a nanny.

It most likely explained why I didn’t feel their passing as much as I should.

A week later, after a strange funeral where a great many people I’d never met before, and oddly who knew about me, I found myself sitting in the sunroom, a glass of scotch in one hand, and an envelope with my name on it, in the other.

The solicitor, a man I’d never met before, had given it to me at the funeral.   We had, as far as I knew an elderly fellow, one of my father’s old school friends, as the family solicitor, but he hadn’t shown at the funeral and wasn’t at home when I called in on my way home.

It was all very odd.

I refilled the glass and took another look at the envelope.  It was not new, in fact, it had the yellow tinge of age, with discolouration where the flap was.  The writing was almost a scrawl, but identifiable as my father’s handwriting, perhaps an early version as it was now definitely an illegible scrawl.

I’d compared it with the note he’d left me before they had embarked on their last adventure, everything I had to do while caretaking their house.  The last paragraph was the most interesting, instructing me to be present when the cleaning lady came, he’d all but accused her of stealing the candlesticks.

To be honest, I hadn’t realized there were candlesticks to steal, but there they were, on the mantlepiece over the fire in the dining room.  The whole house was almost like being in an adventure park, with stairs going up to an array of rooms, mostly no longer used, and a staircase to the attic, and then another going down to the cellar.  The attic was locked and had been for as long as I could remember, and the cellar was dank and draughty.

Much like the whole house, but not surprisingly, it was over 200 years old.

And perhaps it was now mine.  The solicitor, a man by the name of Sir Percival Algernon Bridgewater, had intimated that it might be the last will and testament and had asked me to tell him if it was.  I was surprised that Sir Percival didn’t have the document in question.

And equally. so that the man I knew as his solicitor, Lawerence Wellingham, didn’t have a copy of my father’s last will and testament either.

I finished the drink, picked up the envelope, and opened it.

It contained two sheets of paper, the will, and a letter.  A very short letter.

“If you are reading this I have died before my time.  You will need to find Albert Stritching, and ask him to help you find the murderer.”

Even the tenor of that letter didn’t faze me as it should have, because at this point nothing would surprise me.  In fact, as I  unfolded the document that proclaimed it was the will, I was ready for it to say that the whole of his estate and belongings were to be left to some charity, and I would get an annual stipend of a thousand pounds.

In fact, it didn’t.  The whole of his estate was left to my mother should she outlive him, or in the event of her prior decease, to me.

I had to put all of those surprises on hold to answer a knock on the door.

Lawerence Wellingham.

I stood to one side, let him pass, closed the door, and followed him into the front room, the one my mother called the ‘drawing room’ though I never knew why.

He sat in one of the large, comfortable lounge chairs.  I sat in the other.

I showed him the will.  I kept the other back, not knowing what to make of it.

“No surprise there,” Wellingham said.

“Did you have any idea what my father used to do, beyond being, as he put it, a freelance diplomat?”

I thought it a rather odd description but it was better than one he once proffered, ‘I do odd jobs for the government’.

“I didn’t ask.  Knowledge can be dangerous, particularly when associated with your father.  Most of us prefer not to know, but one thing I can tell you.  If anyone tries to tell you what happened to your parents was not an accident, ignore them.  Go live your life, and keep those memories you have of them in the past, and don’t look back.  They were good people, Ken, remember them as such.”

We reminisced for the next hour, making a dent in the scotch, one of my father’s favourite, and he left.

Alone again, the thoughts went back to the second note from my father.  That’s when the house phone rang.

Before I could answer it, a voice said, “My name is Stritching.  Your father might have mentioned me?  We need to talk.”

—-

© Charles Heath 2020-2021

We seem to have a spot of bother

…

The next statement from Number One, “Sir, it seems we have a hostage situation.”

A glance back at the main screen showed the Russian ship’s bridge minus the captain and flickering on, the alien ship’s Captain.

“I didn’t open a channel, Sir,” the comms officer said quickly.

I glared at the alien representative for a few seconds, hoping to convey my displeasure, but I doubted it would have any effect.

Nor was it any surprise to discover that something indeed didn’t add up. 

Potentially we had a very bad situation, facing off an alien vessel with unknown capabilities and weapons, and a ship that was not supposed to exist, having reputedly committed unknown criminal activities.

“General, you might have to make an instant decision, so if the potential threat is life or ship threatening, don’t wait for confirmation.”

“Sir.”

“Code Red, and everyone, report anything no matter how trivial.”

“Number one, a hostage situation is only a hostage situation if the hostage-taker has a hostage.  You get a clear shot, shoot them.”

“There may potentially be casualties, sir.”

“Then at your discretion, but hold that thought until I have a word with our new, so-called, friends.”

“Sir.”

To say I was annoyed was an understatement, but I had to remember that our underlying mission was to make new friends, not enemies.

“Captain,” the alien commander decided now was the moment to speak.

“You have not been quite truthful with us, have you?”

“They did commit crimes, that is the truth.”

“Then why is one of your people holding the captain hostage?”

It only just struck me then that the alien vessel had beamed one of the people onto the Russian ship after the alien ship arrived with us.  But to what purpose?

“To force them to return to the planet where the crimes were committed.  I had no reason to believe you would force the issue.  Our experience with humans is they support each other before they do the right thing.”

“Your experience is narrow-minded, generally supported by few instances, and basically does not define the human race.  Like everyone, we have a bad element, but it doesn’t define who or what we are.  You obviously heard my instructions to my boarding party.  Your turn now to give me a good reason why I should not shoot them?”

“I assume you still want to open diplomatic relations between our worlds?”

“Not at the expense of gunboat diplomacy.”

“I could destroy both your ships.”

“You could try.  If you know as much as you claim to know about humans, you’ll know that we are at our most formidable when our backs are to the wall.  My ship is an unknown quantity to you, which means you have no idea what we are capable of, but if you want yo find out, by all means, try.”

It was hard to keep an even tone when you are terrified.  Our first encounter had been nothing but threats and violence.  Was I no better than the worse of our kind?

Number one was back in my ear, “Sir, the alien and the Captain just disappeared.”

“I would like you to join us on my ship for discussions, Captain.  I’m sure this situation can be resolved amicably.”

“I’d like a skilled diplomatic negotiator with me, and not agreeing will be considered a hostile act.”

Just in case he was intending to beam me aboard his ship.  A nod in the General’s direction showed he knew what to do if the alien tried.

“Send a message to our diplomatic representative to cone to the bridge urgently.”

I preferred this to be done privately so as not to alert the crew.

I had read the file on Margaret Simpson, and it was, to say the least, extraordinary.  Her achievements at getting the most disparate parties to the table spoke for itself, and it surprised me that she would go on what could prospectively be a one-way trip.

I had not yet spoken to her since boarding, but it had been on my list before we ran into an alien species.  Now, that introduction was lost.

She looked exactly as I’d expected, just in the prime of middle age, diminutive, but not overly imposing, but distinctive enough to stop and look when she walked into a room.

“Captain, I can’t say what comes next doesn’t excite me.”

“You got a brief description of events?”

“An alien race, hostile or not, is exactly why I came.”

“Things could go pear-shaped very quickly.”

“You are exactly as described Captain, refreshingly honest, but somehow I don’t think I need to worry too much if you’re coming with me.”

“A perk of the job, I’m afraid.”

I looked at the alien captain on screen.

“Ready.”

…

© Charles Heath 2021-2022