On Patrol

[Anonymous]

The station was alive with different alien species traversing this key hyper-jump point in deep space, each moving swiftly to make their detach destination or board their space craft, each with their own agenda, and not caring what others may have to accomplish before the evening was out. Time on deck was 22:00.13, and Setsuna was just an hour into her nightly patrols. Even with the EvenLight on overhead, mimicing dusk on Otherworlds, she could see quite easily, her slitted eyes dialated enough to welcome the dim lightning.

She moved aside as a willowy alien type brushed by quickly with a small offspring in tote, its many arms waving as it was drawn into the crowd. Setsuna smiled a soft, toothy grin and made a small wave back. These moments made her patrols pleasant.

She adjusted her LinkNode (TM), an implant that connected directly to the sound-wave cochnial receptor in her ear, allowing her to hear the transmissions of her partners on her RHINE team. She keyed in her brain the ONLink for Emerald, her RHINEstone optinode-code-sign, allowing the other teammates to triangulate her position. It was a quite night so far.

"Emerald codex to ONLink Diamond, come in, Dia."

There was a slight flash of static in her head as she saw in the back of her retnia the codex for Diamond, a small bead of white light, come online. At that moment, a female voice responded in her head.

"Dia to codex Emerald, whatcha got there, Em?"

Setsuna smiled to herself, a cattish ear flicking above her head.

"Nothing much, Dai, pretty routine for tonight. How are you?"

The feminine voice came back instantly. "Doin' good...not much on my end either. I see you're nearing the Red Light...got some shopping to do?"

Setsuna chuckled. Dai, or Minako Tesuo, a canine trans-mod who was lead investigative for their team, could be so absent minded, though her DNA wa spliced with a bloodhound. Setsuna could imaging her floppy ears and deep black nose, though her nose was still human in shape. Lucky Setsuna had splicings with a feline; the altering of the nose ridge was less noticable.

"My patrol schedule has me here tonight, remember?"

A pause, then a laughing return. "Ooooh, right. Well, buy me some Milkbones...I've got the munchies!"

Setsuna laughed into the link. "Right, gotcha. Emerald out."

She was a demure woman, only 5 feet, five inches in height, weighing just under 130 lbs, with short, whispy brown hair crowned with two brown cat ears. Her eyes were large and also a soft, golden brown, reflecting intelligence beyond her years. She was young at 22, however, one of the youngest on the RHINE team, though she was thoroughly in charge, largely due to her maturity. She was lithe, with a tawny body slender yet athletic. Her clawed hand, though the claws were at present retracted, curled around her Taze, a weapon which consisted of only a slender metal shaft that reacted with the LinkNode of its bearer. A high-heat energy beam which was released could be manipulated into many different shapes to suit different purposes. The back end of the rod has projectile type Taser weapons like they had on old Earth, but with a much more effective energy burst.


Setsuna passed through the hissing gates that allowed her into the Red Light district, bustling and alive with shoppers out for late evening purchases. It was always open, 24 klicks a day, 7 days a week. Setsuna eyed the crowd with eyes now slightly slitted, for the neon, pulsing lights required less dialation.

Speaking of pulsing, Setsuna turned toward the loud techno thump eminating from Club Static. A line snaked its way from the door for a few yards down the street. The punks looked satisfied for now, but were getting antsy. Setsuna took up roost in a shadowy alcove across the way and opted to watch for a time, just in case things heated up.

[Anonymous]

((OOC: Is it okay to just wander in here?  ^^; ))

Leaning against the doorway of the 'Black Hole', one of the quieter clubs of the Red District, Paradigm scratched the back of his neck with his left hand and stared with one wide purple eye as the station police appeared to be trying to blow up Club Static.

It wasn't that it didn't happen often - this was the third one he'd seen so far - it was more... their techniques that fascinated him.  Always going in like a planetside bull in a proverbial china shop, he was sure they only ever provided enough distraction for their quarry to get clean away.  Still, he supposed it gave them something to do.

As his interest began to wane in the proceedings, he took a fresh look around himself and noticed for the first time a slender young woman not too far from him sidle into a shadowed space.

Well, it had been a while since anything interesting had happened to him; he was feeling positively daring...

Leaving the comforting shadows of the club's arched doorway, Paradigm positioned himself with arms folded against the wall to the right of her alcove and, hoping his words would be loud enough for her to hear yet quiet enough not to attract the attention of any passers-by, said without turning in her direction, "are you spying on anyone interesting?"

[Anonymous]

"Aiyee!" came the short squeak of a reply. Setsuna flattened herself again the wall and turned sharply toward the locale of the voice, her ears pressed back against her head, her hand on her Taze. Her eyes slitted, she glared at him.

"No one YOU need to kn ow about, Sir! Why don't you get a move on?"

Suddenly her codex came alive with Daimond blinking behind her eyes, alternating white and red. Meaning URGENT.

Setsuna activated her OnLink.

"Em here, what's up?"

"Those blasted coppers think they can take out a whole block based on faulty information!" returned Dai's miffed voice. "Earlier this evening there was a duel murder and they chased some punk into Club Static...that's your jurisdiction, Em. They don't have the details but it was a pretty clean kill...two plugged in the back of the head. A man and woman." There was a slight staticky pause. "You want some back up fer this one?"

Setsuna groaned as she held her right ear, making sure her OnLink was transmitting. Damn those local police scrubs. They were like the old Earth patrol cops that did street rounds...really only had the authority to bust people for theft and other petty crimes. But, Commissioner Cheklov Vurden had to -have- his own little protection force so they always got the high-tech SWAT style gear and the authorization to go banging down doors. It was too bad that RHINE Consulate Alexi Penderghast was politically embroilled with the restructuring of the Intergalactic Interagency Response Initiative, otherwise known as the 2RI Docterine, otherwise with RHINE in place they could shut these police bums down for good. But unfortunately the Docterine dictated interagency cooperation, even if one of those agencies were a complete waste of time, equipment and flesh.

RHINE enforced inter-federal-galactic law and had a top-notch investigative team. Since Cancer was on the cusp of two universal dimensions and on a key hyper-jump point, it was really  RHINE's jurisdiction, not Vurden's, even though his forces were assigned to protect the station.

Setsuna keyed her ONLink node.

"Do they have any idea who the pair were?"

"Not certain," Dai replied, "but the autopsies should reveal much. Doc Comnick has them now."

Ah, Doc Comnick: a tall, willowy alien type with a penchant for little speech but wonderful with a scalpel. He had four arms, slitted yellow eyes and close cropped blond hair crowning his blue skin. Setsuna liked him very much...he was very fatherly when dealing with these bad cases.

"I see. I'll swing by on my way back. Looks like all the hub bub is down down here. The line at the door's a bit antsy...not much to talk about. I wish I'd known this sooner...I'll inquire of the club owner and see what went down. Out."

The ONLink went dead.

Setsuna noted in her perenfrial vision that the stranger was still there.

"And what are YOU looking at?"

(OOC: YAY! A Poster! Hee hee, you're cool...come on in. )

[Anonymous]

With arms still folded and gaze fixed ahead, Paradigm opened his mouth to say something, when to his astonishment the smaller cat-eared woman apparently began speaking to herself instead.  For the first time since he had stood there, he turned his head to look at her clearly and did his best to pay attention to her one-sided conversation.

Not that it did him much good: there was nothing he gained from listening that he couldn't have already worked out from simply looking at her.  He couldn't help wishing that he had looked a little more closely a little sooner.  It didn't matter which organisation they were working for, an official of any kind was still an official and officials usually meant trouble somewhere along the line.

He just hoped that she wasn't anything to do with the docking security staff from the shuttle bays...

It took a few seconds for her last sentence to sink into his mind.  "I'm looking at someone who stands in dark corners and talks to themselves."  He idly rubbed the skin under the black eyepatch covering his right eye with the second and third fingers of his right hand, watching her face carefully.  That Taze she had looked nasty, and he had no wish to end up sampling its caress first-hand.  "You should be wary of voices in your head, you know."

[Anonymous]

It took a moment for Setsuna to compute the snide remark. She had other more pressing needs, but the cat-toys-with-mouse mode kicked in and she had a few minutes to spare. She grinned a toothy one at the stranger, the little points on her canines gleaming in the low light.

"All right then, Mister," she said, pulling out her Uniformed Credentials Card. "I am RHINEstone Emulate Emerald of the R.H.I.N.E. protection force. May I see YOUR Credentials?"

She expected him to know what RHINE was. Everyone knew who the federal intergalactic enforcement team was...

...or DID they?

[Anonymous]

Paradigm glanced from the card to Setsuna's face, then back down to the card with one eyebrow raised.  "You're a jewellery store bodyguard?"  Reaching up carefully to scratch the back of his head in as non-threatening a manner as possible, he tilted his head a little to one side and added, "you seem a little heavily armed for a glorified escort."

With evident caution, he lowered his hand again and slowly folded his arms, his gaze flicking now and again to her Taze.  "My credentials?  Can I not be a simple tourist?"  Beneath the apparent calmness of his soft voice was a hint of unease accentuated by the guarded look on his face.

[Anonymous]

Setsuna's eyebrows dropped. She eyed the stranger warily...he was acting nervous, and her feline senses picked up the pulse of a mouse cornered by a predator. She stood there silently, just watching him, her hand still hovering just about her Taze.

Within the same instant, she was speaking silently through her ONLink.

"Codex Emerald to Codex Daimond, Topaz...standy for backup at Red District Sector One for immediate detainment of persons of interest acting suspicious. I SAY, STANDBY ONLY. DO NOT ENGAGE ORDER."

The two separate codexes, white and a smokey yellow, flashed green for compliance behind her eyes.

"Sir, while you may be a simple tourist," she said cheerfully, trying to get the man to relax enough to let his guard down but maintaining her own, "but everyone passing through a hyper-jump point must have credentials to board ship. Even tourists. But for you," she mocked a shrug. "ANY ID will do."

She reached a pawed hand forward just slightly. "Come with it now."

[Anonymous]

That hand was beginning to make him decidedly nervous now.  He wondered if it really was necessary for her to hover it over the handle of her weapon as though she was going to draw it on him at any minute.  He wasn't even armed! he thought in frustration, carefully and slowly raising his hand to scratch the back of his head again.

With his other hand, he tentatively patted the pockets of his battered dark grey trousers, each movement exaggerated and slow.  "I think I left my ID card in my room, you know."  He tried to smile at her, although the result probably didn't come out quite as he wished.  It was hard to look cheerful when he knew someone could bring a world of pain to his body within seconds.  "I've been here for a couple of weeks now, I usually just leave it in my room."  Biting his lower lip, he paused and tilted his head slightly to one side and, glancing down at her outstretched paw with one cautious purple eye, he added, "I could go and fetch it if you like?"

[Anonymous]

Setsuna's smile faded.

"Sir, that isn't necessary." She dropped her hands and placed them in the "interview" position in front of her...folded together just over her belt, but away from all weapons and detainment devices.

"Give me your Civilian Identification number and I will run it through the C-D-E...er, Compository Database Echo. It will pull up all your information. Come now, I haven't got all night and you must always carry your credentials..."

[Anonymous]

Paradigm closed his eye briefly and offered up a prayer to any deity that might be listening - even if he didn't believe in any, surely it couldn't hurt?  At least she'd stopped looking as though she'd electrocute him, although her more formal stance didn't make him feel any more at ease.

He rubbed his right hand over his face, his shoulders rising and falling in a heavy sigh, he muttered "why do people think that everyone always remembers the details..."

Slightly louder, "I... can't remember my number off-hand.  It's..."  It was embarrassing to not be able to think up an excuse now, of all times.  It's not like you could explain something like absconding from Aedolis to someone carrying a weapon and looking as though she would have no compunction about using it on him.  "It's...  I have a terrible memory for numbers."

He tried to fix her with a beseeching look, well aware that the eyepatch usually rendered the puppy-dog-eyes technique a little ineffective.  "Is it really that important?  Surely seeing my card would be better?"

[Anonymous]

Setsuna sighed angrily and waved him off.

"I don't have time for you. Go on, get out of here. I have more important things to worry about."

With that, she turned on her heel and made her way purposefully toward Club Static, well aware that she may have wasted precious time dealing with that moron.

[Anonymous]

As she turned her back to him he felt the tense energy drain from him and he slumped back against the wall, hands resting limply on his thighs.  That was closer than he had anticipated.  He glanced down at the scar on the back of his right hand and sighed.  That thing had hurt to dig out; it wasn't a pleasant memory.  At least it meant she hadn't been looking for him in connection with his 'escape'; that would have led to something nastier than simply being arrested for piloting craft without legally being allowed to.

He was amazed that on a space station filled with people such as Cancer was, the officials could take such exception to someone flying without the right licenses - indeed, any licenses.  Surely they'd have better things to do, but apparently not, judging by the way some of the officials had been giving him askance looks.  Strange, sidelong glances as he'd carefully and nonchalantly exited the hangers, as if they just knew he wasn't supposed to be there and were only waiting for the right time to pounce on him.  It made him nervous, but not nervous enough to stop doing it.

He never felt so alive when he was cruising from one station to the other, and surely it wasn't his fault that the people who hired him to fly the things didn't check to see if he was fully certified to do so.  Was it?

Still, there was something he was curious about.  Know thine enemy and all that stuff.  Rubbing his eye with the heel of his hand, he called out to her, "hey, jewellery store security girl - what's your name?"

It couldn't hurt to find out more.  Well, it could, but he hoped it wouldn't.

[Anonymous]

Setsuna ignored him.

She strode over to the door where the bouncer looked shady and nervous, considering the events of the evening. She flashed her RHINE credentials, and he took the cord off and let her walk in.

She entered Club Static. (OOC: see respective post)

[Anonymous]

Paradigm heaved a huge and ill-concealed sigh of relief, pressed both hands to his face briefly and wondered if he was going to have to rethink his policy on religion.  Someone apparently had listened to him, after all.

After making sure that she had entirely vanished into the throng of people inside Static, he turned and almost ran down the corridor towards the room he rented at a premium from one of the more accommodating people on-board.

If people were going to start actively checking on IDs, his would have to be always at hand from now on.  Fake or not.  It's not like anyone checks them closely anyway, he thought derisively as he slowed to a more nonchalant walk, coming to a stop just at the edge of the Red district.

That had been close...

Shaking his head slightly, he continued on his way.