Dr Nof is Missing 2: Michael Brin, Homicide Detective Series, #3

By Thadd Evans

Detective Brin heads for a moon called Riet, wanting to find and arrest the shape-shifting robot that murdered Dr. Nof.

Can Brin find the shape-shifting robot that murdered Dr. Nof? Because it can hide in this moon’s jungles or its deserts tracking down the android will be difficult.

• Language: English
• Publisher: eXtasy Books Inc
• Release date: Feb 18, 2018
• ISBN: 9781487416027

Book preview

Chapter One

It was the year 4020. I was sitting in a cocktail bar on Galactic Space Station Six. In the near distance, a beautiful Dseo woman with orange skin glanced at me, smiling.

My phone rang, and Tesk appeared in my contact lenses. He said, We have some new information on Seoom.

I frowned, wanting to spend more time with this woman.

"A week ago, when a satellite orbiting a moon called Riet was over the Soor Jungle, photographing it, PRE detected a settlement. Two hours later, PRE picked up a radio signal, a message coming from one of its buildings. According to the signal, the settlement is called Seoom.

Four days ago, we sent two UA’s to investigate. Forty-five minutes after a PTC dropped them off in a clearing that was a seventh of a mile from Seoom and left Riet, video cameras and scanners in both robot’s foreheads shut off, stopping an SA probe.

I winced, concerned. PRE, Pattern Recognition, software detected villages, towns, and cities even if they were cloaked or hidden beneath jungle canopies. It also noticed important radio and neutrino signals, ones that were cloaked or disguised as primary cosmic rays.

SA, Shape Analysis application, recognized sixteen billion different faces and bodies, making it easier to solve cases.

Seventy percent of the time, using neutrino movement, it could tell me how long a suspect had been in a specific area three seconds after these subatomic particles recognized their DNA. What was in the video?

Dimly lit bushes and foliage, meaningless information.

That doesn’t help.

I agree. At any rate, IT personnel haven’t heard from either UA since.

I blinked, worried. Although humanoid UA’s, Utility Android’s, carbon nanotube bodies and hip-mounted AUW’s, Automatic Weapons that fired smart bullets and laser beams, had been improved within the last two months, several problems had been overlooked. The UA’s might have broken down because IT didn’t test their BOC enough. BOC, Body Coordination software, made it possible for these robots to keep going even if they had to climb mountains, hike through jungles or cross rivers.

That’s impossible. IT personnel tested them six hundred times.

Although IT, information technology, personnel were thorough, their budget was limited. As a result, they took shortcuts. Where did IT test them?

Tesk glared at me. In three-dimensional holograms.

They should have done that in the real world.

IT knows what they are doing. Your flight for Riet leaves in twelve hours.

My adrenaline started pumping, a worried reaction. Do you have any more information about Riet?

He glowered. Your pilot and PMA will.

PMA, Planetary and Moon Analysis software, provided over nine hundred terabytes of information.

After an ITC, an Interstellar Transport Carrier, docked on a PTC’s, a Planetary Transport Carrier, back, a hatch opened. I climbed inside the PTC, a spacecraft named the Introa, and sat next to the pilot, he was an Aito male humanoid with blue skin.

He said, Brin, they call me Yorn.

I nodded. The Introa dropped, ramming us against our seats. I exhaled, trying to relax. What else do you know about Riet?

"Fifty-one percent of it is a desert. The rest consists of two jungles, the Soor and the Gonn. The only sentient beings on it, maarn humanoids, live on an oasis, close to the Soor.

An Aito spacecraft called the Yizza was sent to this moon nineteen years ago to excavate niobium.

I nodded. Niobium, a valuable superconducting mineral was used in computers, robots, and spacecraft.

Dr. Clu, a geologist, was in charge of this expedition. A week after their PTC landed on Riet, Clu emailed four three-dimensional holographic reports to an ITC called the So Na, a routine procedure. So Na responded within minutes. Clu did not. In a desperate attempt to figure out why Clu wouldn’t talk to them anymore, So Na’s crew sent twenty-five three-dimensional emails to him. They never heard from Clu or any other members of his team again.

I frowned. Did they send any rescue ships after that?

No.

I glowered. Why not?

He paused for a long time, his forehead tight.

Ninety percent of the time, the Aito, a race from the planet Faway, who loved to explore deep space, alien planets and moons they had never been to before, worked around the clock organizing their journeys.

No reasons are mentioned. Many Aito historians looked for So Na’s ship logs in sixteen billion archives but couldn’t find them. Aito and I have spoken to say that many of their early space missions to Riet were poorly organized and understaffed.

I winced, shocked by their lousy planning.

Nine spacecraft have gone to the Soor since then. Their crews wanted to excavate billions of dollars’ worth of gold, niobium, and other valuable minerals. Eight left this jungle before they accomplished all of their goals. If any of these crafts had ORA and DAL, we would know a lot more about them and Riet.

Do you, yourself, have any more information about those eight?

No. Check my ship’s databases.

What about the ninth spacecraft? A new invention, ORA, Organism Analysis software, detected six trillion types of viruses, eighteen trillion categories of viroids, nine hundred billion kinds of phage and eight hundred trillion bacteria classes. DAL, Daily Activity Log software, organized and saved the crew’s important comments and essential scans regarding their journeys to the planet Cirok and several of its moons.

Yorn blinked. "Three months ago, a PTC, the Charc, the ninth, touched down in the Ler, forty miles northeast of Seoom, a short walk from the edge of the Soor. Dr. Moga, a software engineer, the expedition leader, had studied Toen’s maps and notes for months.

Forty minutes after they arrived, Moga and his crew, six geologists, a PIM, a SR, along with four GSA, stopped sending text emails and three-dee holographic emails to an orbiting ITC, the Scaut.

I raised an eyebrow, curious and baffled. PIMs, Physicians who specialized in Immune Systems, knew how to use genome enhancement methods to treat patients with eighty types of fevers, thirty-five classes of plagues and other illnesses. SR, Surgical Robots, operated on those with heart conditions and six million other medical problems. Geological Scan Androids scanned as they walked. They could extract three million different types of minerals as long as the minerals were four miles from a moon or planet’s surface or closer.

Ninety percent of the ITC’s were designed to orbit planets or moons, not land on them. When these ships reached a celestial body’s stratosphere, a team climbed into a PTC that was attached to the ITC. Then the PTC pulled away, headed for the planet or moon’s surface.

If star charts, statistics, and computer models indicated that a moon or planet might be dangerous, every ITC’s interferometric telescopes, laser Doppler scanners, and neutrino analyzers started examining these celestial bodies’ surfaces more closely. If these tools determined that too many dangerous beasts roamed most of their jungles, grasslands, deserts or savannahs, the ITC left, bound for another moon, planet, space station or a starship. Since there were too many dangerous beasts, any PTC’s inside the ITC’s hull remained there.

Did the Scaut send another PTC to investigate?

Yes, the Rax. Dr. Foos and his team searched Charc’s landing site for five days. Unfortunately, they only found debris, the Charc’s remains. They didn’t find any corpses.

I winced. Did the debris help them figure out what happened to the ship?

To some degree, yes. According to three forensic scientists, members of Foos’ team, thought a sandstorm might have destroyed it. However, they’re not sure. Unfortunately, I’ve been busy and haven’t had enough time to examine all of their studies.

I bit my lip, disappointed that he couldn’t tell me more about the Charc. Did any creatures attack them, then drag their corpses away?

It’s possible.

Why didn’t the team spend more time there?

"Forty minutes after they arrived, five crew members complained about severe headaches, maladies that made it impossible for them to stand or eat. A PIM scanned them with a neutrino compiler. According to the compiler, something was destroying the patient’s red blood cells.

"Two hours went by, and two members went into a coma. The crew placed both in the ship’s recovery chambers.

One day later, the chamber’s alarms went off, indicating that both were dead. A PIM told Foos they should leave Riet immediately or else others would die.

I flinched. What disease caused this?

Yorn scowled. A virus the PIM had never seen before. She called it Menostos, after an Aito scientist.

I rubbed my face, nervous. Do they know anything else about this disease?

After destroying eighty percent of the patient’s red blood cells, it attacks the central nervous system.

I clenched my teeth. Did she or anybody else find a cure?

Yes. If it’s treated early enough with CUSP, the patient will survive. However, the virus’ molecules mutate when they enter the body. If treatment is put off for more than half an hour, the mutated ones kill the patient.

Chromosome Updating Streaming Proteins, a forty-year-old cure, saved millions of lives. Eighty-eight percent of the time, CUSP cut lethal exons and toxic introns out and replaced them with healthy DNA strands.

I glowered, disappointed. Did anybody else conduct forensic tests?

Yes. A team on an ITC Aito ship called the Anat.

Who was on Anat’s team?

Doctor Gef and three FIP.

FIP, Forensic Intensive Programmed androids, examined every part of a body. At the same time, they compared their results with MPStation_4 police reports and medical records. Because these included police reports and medical records from GSSS, the planet Cirok, and forty-five spacecraft, along with the Esok, it was easier for them to determine the cause of death. Did they find out anything else about Menosto’s mutation?

Yes. The mutated cells can do this because their electrons use IB entanglement.

I blinked, surprised. IB, Interstellar Based, entanglement made it possible to import DNA related information, especially subatomic particles, from anywhere in the Milky Way. Amazing.

Yes.

When did Gef’s team reach the Charc’s crash site?

Fifteen days after the Rax left. If you want more information, use your lenses’ database.

Chapter Two

PMA analysis appeared in my lenses. Eighteen years ago, the first of the eight, an expedition led by Dr. Smoth, a geologist, was sent to a small clearing that was fifteen miles west of Seoom to find and excavate perovskite and niobium, superconducting minerals, and transport them to Cirok.

Other members of the expedition, four geologists, and a PIM, the only other sentient beings aboard a PTC called the Praab, placed twenty-one-inch square compressed huts in an adjacent clearing. Within minutes, they expanded until each was big enough to house all four geologists, the PIM, an SR and five EA. Smoth called this outpost Maax.

EA, Element Analysis were humanoid robots that could hike through jungles without falling down. As they traveled, accompanied by scientists, every EA used