A Visitor to the Future - 23 - The Murder of Commander Jackson
We gathered in the meeting room, Sarkona having retrieved Aida from where she still sat within the drone-craft that had brought us to the challenge. Aida took a seat at the head of the table and we sat along one side. Aida continued to stare off into space expressionlessly from time to time, and we made conversation between ourselves, idly speculating about the things we'd seen.
Unfortunately for us, there were no new revelations to be had. Whatever had occurred to Tungsten was unique to him, and him alone.
After about forty minutes Tungsten entered the room, peering through the door at first. "Fantastic, everyone is here," he said and strode in. Under his arm he held what looked like a large, thick book, which he placed upon the edge of the table. Then he turned to address Aida.
"For your consideration, I would like to submit our solution to the Anchor Challenge."
With a slight, polite nod, Aida indicated that Tungsten should proceed.
"Permit me to talk you through my deductions as they occurred. When we were first confronted with the scenario, I was especially sceptical of the accuracy of the camera footage - a response that is only natural for all of us - having been raised within the Consortium. We are lucky enough to be able to easily verify the accuracy of almost any piece of evidence in our society today, provided that we have permission to do so. To us, these cameras are about as reliable as a spaceship made of jelly, unreliable and prone to coming apart if tampered with."
We all smiled at the colourful analogy.
"But," he continued, "As our recently cryocontained friend pointed out, when in such a situation or time period as this, one has to make do with the evidence in front of them. Sarkona, Antonia, and I have been far too used to perfection. So the imperfections of the camera system were a natural target for us. However, my greatest revelation in investigating this scenario was not that the camera footage was inaccurate – but rather realising that it was accurate. We may not have the Consortium to confirm that events took place as shown in the camera footage, but we do have our own wits – in our own inspection of the camera footage we found no defects. Once I realized that we had fallen into the trap of doubting the camera footage I took the opposite view entirely – what if the camera footage was accurate, and my fundamental assumptions about the case were wrong? If that were so there was zero chance of the murderer having climbed in through the window. I therefore concluded that no-one but the victim was in the room that night."
I was puzzled at that. "Then how did he die?" I asked.
"Ah, it was almost the perfect crime," continued Tungsten, "But our murderer did not anticipate one thing - a stroke of luck or fate that intervened to cast light upon their shady plans. And that was that the victim got up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom."
Tungsten mimicked a drunken sway at that. It was quite convincing - and surreal - to see a CI acting drunk.
"Yes, quite intoxicated and weakened, the victim woke to relieve himself. He drunkenly stumbled at the entrance to the bathroom, tripped over his own feet, and hit his head on the bathroom sink."
"Wait, so you're saying he died accidentally?" said Sarkona.
"Not so! There is more to this than it seems. When we analysed the body we both concluded - and in Sarkona’s own words - that such an injury would not be fatal in the Consortium. I think we were both distracted by both the realism of the synthetic flesh and the visual prominence of the head contusion. What we failed to realise was that it would not have been fatal in this time either. The blow dazed and disoriented the victim leaving him crawling weakly on the ground, but he would have been found in the morning alive - if worse for wear - were it not for the actual cause of death, which had weakened him and he succumbed to not long after."
He reached into one pocket of his waistcoat and pulled out a familiar, orange pill bottle, placing it gently upon the table.
"Acting upon my new hypothesis that the camera footage was accurate, that meant that the victim was in fact alone at the time of death. In which case the actual cause of death would have to be something that could be done remotely. I considered drones flying through the window or something crawling through the base's ventilation system but both were very unlikely. The most probable cause of death for this time period would be poisoning. So I went back to this pill bottle and tested the contents for poison in the botany lab. That is one of the things I have been doing for the last forty minutes."
"What did you find?" said Antonia.
"Nothing," said Tungsten, "They are ordinary pills – simply put, not poisoned. They contain only the ingredients listed on the bottle."
He cocked his head mischievously, though, suggesting that there was more to the story.
"However, it was in the course of looking through the ingredients that I realized the true nature of the murderer's cunning. You may recall that Hollings mentioned something off-hand – as he walked the victim back to his room that night the Commander was complaining about the walls being the wrong shade of yellow - which was utterly nonsensical. In isolation, merely a drunken ramble, but in combination with what I had deduced – an essential clue."
He slid the book onto the table - it looked to be some sort of medical journal, and turned to a page labelled Xanthopsia.
"Xanthopsia is a condition where one’s perception of colour is altered, making things seem more yellow. It has a number of causes, but it is primarily a side effect of certain medications. Which led me straight to the killer - Reserve Specialist Meers."
Sarkona and I were still confused, but Antonia groaned in frustration, saying "Of course!" To herself.
Tungsten noticed Antonia’s exasperation and gestured for her to continue.
Antonia explained. "When I looked at the medicine ingredients earlier, I saw something familiar - I even talked to you about it," she said, waving a hand in my direction. "Foxgloves! Also known as Digitalis."
"Quite so. A beautiful flower, purple and tall - we saw some being grown in the botany lab. But what is beautiful to some is deadly to others - it produces digoxin. In small doses it was used in heart medication," he said, tapping the pill bottle, "In large doses it is fatal. Had the victim not fallen and wounded his head, the large amount of it in his blood stream may not have been noticed - or if it was, blamed on an overdose of his medication, which of course contains the substance. Like I said earlier it was almost the perfect crime."
"But if the medication is normal," I asked, "How was the victim poisoned?"
"It was placed within his drinks by Meers over their night in the canteen - after all, she suggested that they all make merry together. She had access to the equipment required to distil it into liquid form. She could even have prepared it openly in front of Hollings in the botany lab that day as being untrained in botany he would have no idea what she was making, it would just look like she was going about her regular business. And she knew about the content of the victim's medication because she was being trained as a medic by the good Doctor for the next mission."
"But why would she do it?"
Tungsten crossed his arms, tapping his left upper arm with his right index finger as he spoke. "Meers had a very compelling motive from her point of view - she wanted to be on the upcoming Mars mission. We know from what Hollings said that it was extremely unlikely there would be another one. Okumu also said he disagreed with the commander’s crew choice - presumably this meant if Okumu were in charge Meers would be selected for the mission. Even if the crew selection did not change, Meers was not only a Reserve Specialist, her staff file stated she was first reserve - if Okumu became mission commander there would now be a vacant spot on the crew which would automatically be filled by her. Were it not for the commander’s late night accident she would have been on the crew without issue. And I think that wraps things up nicely."
I took a moment to think about it – it all made sense, everything falling neatly into place. I couldn't think of another explanation that could reasonably fit what Tungsten had told us.
"Are you all satisfied with your teammate’s explanation?" asked Aida, face still expressionless.
We all nodded without hesitation.
"Congratulations," she said, the hint of a small smile finally appearing on her lips. "You have passed the Anchor challenge."
We all crowded round Tungsten and celebrated a little, before Aida waved to calm us down.
"Now, I must describe to you why this particular set piece was the subject of the Anchor Challenge." She stood up and resumed her perfect standing posture. "Please, come with me."
We followed her out of the building, where the beautiful cityscape of Anchor awaited. She leaned on a railing at the very edge of the layer, facing toward the massive cable of the space elevator which led to the stars.