Zen had the suspects transported to a jail in the governor's building. Of course they had cells at their base as well, but with only 4 people working there effectively, it was simply way too much trouble to enforce. Laying on his bed he stared at the ceiling. Zen felt uncomfortable.
Something told him he had yet to see the end of this, he wasn't stupid. He overheard the suspects talking about a third party, according to the things he had heard they were responsible for the defective transport. But the scary thing was, he couldn't find anything pointing to a single clue, which, unfortunately was a common problem for investigative officers.
'Well, there's always tomorrow. Better luck next time.' With that fleeting thought, Zen fell asleep, letting all the exhaustion he had experienced the past few days wash away.
That night Zen dreamed. He couldn't remember what it was about, but it felt. Important. He felt a lingering feeling of dread and fear remaining in his body.
"A nightmare?" He looked back at his bed to find it soaked in sweat. Grumbling, he rose from his bed and scratched his head.
'I haven't had nightmares since I was a kid, I must've been more exhausted than I knew.'
He tried thinking back to his dream, but nothing came up. It was almost like his memory was absent for as long as he had slept.
Zen chalked it up to simply being too nervous or some other easy scapegoat, but truthfully he felt. Disturbed.
Entering the office, Zen swiftly grabbed his coffee, as though it were his lifeline. And sat down at his desk, sipping the piping hot beverage. Zen noticed a folder laying neatly on his desk. The others had yet to arrive so someone must've put this here yesterday, he read the report silently.
'Weird, this is the same file as from the records. Hundreds of robots seemingly disappear overnight' Just then he noticed something strange. The date.
This report was from yesterday. Zen originally thought the file became lost and someone had put it on his desk thinking he would clean it up.
He read it over once more and got the similar file from the records, reviewing both side by side. 'They're practically identical! Apart from the location and owners every detail from the initial report is nearly the same.'
Zen leaned back and thought it over. 'I'm not the only one who can do interrogations, besides investigations is more my speed. God knows I have trouble coming across as threatening, better ask Robert or Ard.'
Zen decided to ask Ard for the interrogations, he at least had some experience as his stand in. If Zen was totally honest he scared the shit out of him. And besides, Ard was already in the same building as the suspects. So if not the best option it was certainly the most convenient.
Slowly the rest of the team trickled inside, it had been a little less than two weeks since he arrived. And compared to his recent precincts he actually fit in quite nicely. Only one person hated his guts! But he had several pieces of blackmail on her so it was to be expected, even so it was for the greater good of office productivity.
Robert and Amelia had once again a slow day and started their day with a well deserved morning nap, Zen couldn't expect much movement from them for the next two hours.
He looked around for Effy but she had already started her day inside of the hanger.
Should I ask her to join me? It'll be less likely to miss something with the two of us instead of just me' Zen couldn't find a flaw in his logic and made his way towards the hanger.
The hangar was massive, housing both the smaller spacecraft and the X3 as well as Effy's workspace which was almost always cluttered with something or other.
Though Effy wasn't visible, the faint sound of music and her occasional curses echoed from somewhere in the hangar. Being a mechanic and the engineer was, according to Effy hell. Mainly because if you found something stupid while doing mechanic work you couldn't simply blame the engineer.
Zen approached the noise and saw Effy tucked away in the landing gear of the X3, she was occasionally singing along to the lyrics of the song only to stop, curse and then continue singing. Zen coughed to make his presence known.
Which worked, because Effy immediately shot up and hit her head, prompting a series of curses to spew forth from under the X3. She dropped down from her spot as she saw Zen standing before her, she was absolutely covered in grease and filth, and the worst part she had only been busy for maybe fifteen minutes.
"H-hey Zen what's up?" Effy felt a little embarrassed by her un-lady-like appearance, but if she knew one thing for certain it was that Zen didn't really care.
"Got a new case, a real mystery this time. Want to tag along?" Zen Wasn't in a hurry according to the report somewhere around a hundred or more robots went missing, those things weren't getting off the planet anytime soon.
"Afraid not, the transport is finally coming down today so after I've fixed this old thing it's the next with no time for fun in between." Effy looked genuinely disappointed, but her busy nature couldn't allow for some tag along right now.
Zen sighed. "No, it's alright I'll be fine on my own. Just thought that two heads would be better than one." Effy contemplated for a few moments then sprung to action, grabbing something from her workplace and giving it to Zen.
"Here!" she said, filled with confidence.
"What is it?" Zen asked fiddling with the contraption Effy handed him, it looked like a miniature drone of some sorts.
"It's a small camera complete with a microphone, you take it with you and when you need my insight you activate it and bam. I'm right there with you. In robotic presence then." Effy seemed proud of her creation. It was a drone, nothing new. But it was way smaller than Zen had ever seen before. He stashed the drone in his pocket.
"Hey by the way, do you have any plans tonight?" Zen spoke before he properly thought and realized halfway through. But if there's one thing he learned it's never,ever, stutter in front of Effy.
Effy was quite taken aback. "Shooting your shot? Nice. You know girls love confidence right?" Zen felt Effy go off topic and directed it back immediately. "So are you free tonight?" Zen's nerves were eating him up inside, but he couldn't let himself falter now.
Zen realized something the past two weeks. He had fallen for Effy. Hook, line and sinker. He had to admit their first night out was fun, and there was a lot of tension. But Zen had chalked it up to simply the alcohol's influence. But the more time they spent together, the more he realized the truth.
Now it was Effy's turn to be nervous. "N-no, I'm free tonight." She played with her hair a bit, which still looked cute despite the grease dirtying it considerably. Zen pressed the assault. "Cool, want to have dinner after work?"
Effy had shut down looking Zen barely in the eyes. "Yeah I suppose we could."
Zen had to be quick, his newfound strength was escaping him faster than he expected. "Alright then see you after work, those robots aren't going to find themselves." Zen quickly marched towards the small spaceship and climbed on board.
Effy remained in the hangar, still starstruck at the recent events as Zen departed. She had noticed that Zen was growing more resistant towards her teases, occasionally even firing back a tease of his own. But this. She hadn't expected this from him, not yet at least. He caught her off guard, which Effy would pay back in kind a hundredfold.
***
The trip to the mining station that reported the missing robots was short, Zen landed in front of what was supposed to be the front door. In truth it was just a gate with a simple camera and display, but it was still rude to land in someone's backyard, protection force or not.
Zen exited the spaceship and walked up to the gate. As soon as he stood in front of it a melody played, resembling a barely legal copy of some old song. Zen stopped, facing the camera and screen as it sprung to life. The screen displayed an old man slightly disheveled and decrepit, at the bottom right of the screen he could see himself standing in front an endless expanse of red rock.
"Whataya want." The voice over the intercom was rude and intimidating, but nothing like what Zen was accustomed to, so he simply replied.
"Zen Jones, Protection force. You reported your robots missing?" Zen kept a friendly yet firm tone, aiming to display his manners and professionalism at the same time.
"Not missing! Stolen! What. Do you think they went on strike!" The old man had quite a lot of energy left in him for a man his age.
"Right, my bad. Still, mister…" Zen paused, allowing the man to interject. "Gray." the man responded. "Right mister Gray, I'll need permission to enter the property and investigate the incident."
Gray remained silent for a while then finally spoke. "Yeah yeah, go ahead. Just don't take anything! I'm watching you."
'A civilian fearing an investigative officer would steal from him? Seemed my predecessor was as much of an asshole as the reports and the governor made him out to be.' Zen collected his thoughts quickly and looked at the camera one more time.
"I won't take anything mister Gray, you have my word."
"Your word?" Gray snorted. "If that was worth something I'd be rich! You better find my bots."
With that the screen blacked out and Gray was gone, leaving Zen alone in front of a now eerily quiet mining station.