A Boatload of Interviews
Posted on Mon Jul 4th, 2022 @ 4:48pm by Commander William Gerhard & Petty Officer, 1st Class Christian Tremblay & Lieutenant Avira zh'Kenarh M.D. & Lieutenant JG Ethal Reade & Ensign Michael Sloan & Ensign Victoria Jemison & Ensign Duncan McManus & Ensign Alexandra 'Lexi' O'Connery & Lieutenant JG Calanthe 'Cal' Diaz & Chief Petty Officer Manishie Karalo & Petty Officer, 3rd Class Kiyara de Vos & Petty Officer, 3rd Class Lottie Daglish & Crewman Finn Jones
Mission:
Mission 6 - Memory
Location: Various Locations
Timeline: Day 300 - 19:30-20:30 hrs
2004 words - 4 OF Standard Post Measure
William checked to make sure his recorder was working before looking to the two men of his security team that would accompany him. Currently, all off-duty personnel were confined to quarters. William's next job was to obtain alibis from everyone who had not already been cleared and was off duty. "Ok, we weill start with the senior officers and work our way down. All those who were on duty at the time of death have been cleared," he said before motioning them to follow him, "Let's go."
William came to the first set of quarters and pressed the chime. The door opened revealing Lieutenant Reade. "Lieutenant Reade, I apologize for the inconvenience, but given the circumstances we can't be certain of anything right now. I must ask, where you were at 1430 hours today," William said.
Ethal looked stressed. She did not like being holed up in her room. She wanted to be in the labs, she saw them more of her quarters than the room where she slept.
“I was in the main labs at the time of her death, I was getting together the research we acquired about the pod.” Ethal said sheepishly. She had nothing to hide but the fact she was being interviewed and the stress she was already feeling were putting her on edge.
"Where was I at 14:30 today?" Sloan repeated. Looking to Gerhard, he almost immediately knew that whatever he said would be doubted. "I was in the shuttlepod bay examining the emergency pod," Michael replied. As if expecting the next question the Chief Engineer explained, "I was with Ensign Jemison. We were there there until about thirty minutes before the meeting in the Science Labs. Internal sensor logs as well as my scanner can pinpoint where I was and what I was doing during that time period. Victoria will probably be in Main Engineering and the scanner will be in the charging dock with the rest of them." Pausing to think, he added, "Scanner C-three-four to be exact."
"Yes, I was with the Chief," Victoria stated. The young officer had never been part of any kind of criminal investigation, so being nervous was an understatement. She tried to keep eye contact with William, but the pressure of the situation mixed with the overwhelming realization that someone aboard the ship was capable of such a monstrous act was enough to keep her off balance and rattled. Going back to her reply, Jemison said, "We were trying to scan every millimeter of the pod. It made no sense that it lived in our world after leaving another universe. It was our job to make it make sense."
Lexi looked at the person who was asking her the question and almost burst out laughing there and then but decided to humour them. She brushed back her growing hair and just let the question sit between them before she finally decided to break the ice. “Me? I was at my duty station on the bridge.” She said simply with a shrug. It was that simple and did someone really think she would be able to get around the ship in a sneaky manner when she was not able to do much without the crutches that were currently waiting for her to take up again. “I am very much not able to move around easily so I think I’m the least likely suspect out of the two of us.” She added, staring them down.
Duncan’s face twisted in embarrassment as much as he twisted in the chair and looked at Gerhard awkwardly wishing he was not being asked that question by him. Anyone else he could have dealt with but the chief Armory officer. “Well Sir… you see I definitely did not murder her but I was not exactly doing something right either. I was in the engineering workshop making a controller for the still to create alcohol.” He said holding up the device from where he had brought it with him when the Armory officers had interrupted him. He had not heard the original announcement asking for the captain and the officer to attend the Starboard nacelle, so he had been distracted but he had a good alibi even if it was an awkward one.
"Probably plugging another nose bleed, or prescribing painkillers for stress headaches." Avira looked exhausted and having to get cleared on this before being allowed to start the autopsy was not making her feel any better. It had been a long day and all of this was only making it longer. She sighed, and leaned behind her desk to grab a PADD, she made sure to switch on the privacy setting to make sure he wouldn't be able to see who she was actually helping, and with what. "Can you clear Lotti next? I need her to assist me."
Liang Van was in his quarters when Armory arrived at the door with questions.
"Where was I? I was on the Bridge for Alpha Shift. Oh-Eight Hundred until Sixteen-Hundred hours. Got a lunch relief at Noon for thirty minutes"
William looked up from his PADD, "Is there anyone who can corroborate your alibi?"
"Witnesses? Yeah the rest of the Bridge team, I went to lunch with Jones, we went to the Mess Hall and back to the bridge together."
"Did you see the XO at any point during your shift," William asked.
"Er Lieutenant Leyton? Yeah, she relived me at the helm for a while, went we first encountered that Escape Pod, I stayed on the Bridge, then took over again. I think she left the Bridge a little while after that, not really sure exactly when. The Science Officer, Reade, had the conn after everyone left to go to the hanger for the pod coming aboard"
"Do you know if anyone had a grudge against the XO, anyone who wanted to do her harm," William asked. He was taking longer with Liang Van since he was Leyton's junior officer in her department.
"Somebody who would do something bad to Lieutenant Leyton," Liang Van exclaimed, "No! She was a good boss, she was strict about duty, helm, piloting that kind of thing but otherwise she was cool and laid back, everyone in Flight Control likes her."
"1430? Just after second lunch rotation?" Head tilted to the side in a mockery of consideration, Calanthe cradled her chin in her hand thoughtfully and then swiveled in her chair to regard the Executive Officer with a pointed look that didn’t afford nearly as much deference as he was probably due.
“I was here, skipping second lunch rotation,” She said. Dark eyebrows goaded him to at least look somewhat apologetic. “You've got us going through logs from the past week for I-don't-even-know-what, if I'm honest; do you know how long that takes? 'Anything anomalous' is kind of vague if you ask me. Even your 'priority period' between finding the escape pod and bringing it on board is hours upon hours of communication traffic. I don't know what we’re expected to find but I do know that I was still here looking for it all afternoon. Why ask me when you can just check security logs though? I’ve been submitting updates for hours.”
The brunette’s abundance of familiarity took a sharp veer into sudden curiosity.
“Ulterior motive maybe. Does it have something to do with the fact that you made Lexi cry? Again?” The chair creaked as the Communications Officer leaned back to watch Gerhard stride out.
"Thank you for your time Ensign," William said as he quickly strode out of the room. He could feel his temper rising, but he had a job to do and there wasn't time for this.
“Twice in a week! Not that anyone’s counting. Except me,” she added to herself, rolling her eyes and then returning upright to continue her systematic analysis of highly uninteresting inter-departmental text messages. Several taps and it was clear she’d completely lost track of where she’d cross-referenced. With a thunk, Cal’s forehead hit the input pad and the linguist pondered, not for the first time, if a person could actually die from a combination of boredom and frustration. “Just shoot me now.”
"I was in the main science lab at 1430 hrs, sir," Christian said looking the Armory chief directly in his eye. Christian had nothing to hide, in fact he was still shocked that the XO had been killed. He had been in the science lab working on the metalurgical analysis requested by Lieutenant Reade of the pod. "Lieutenant Reade had sent down some samples she wanted analysed for any indication on a point of origin for the pod. After my analysis was complete, i went to Sickbay around 1500 and briefed the rest of the science team," he continued before stating clearly," And i can vouch for those officers as well sir."
Lottie knew it was a standard process in any investigation and convenient for her to be the person to attend and help with the autopsy that she had to be cleared but it still annoyed her to a point. “Me? I was in sickbay with our new guests making sure they did not hack the computer or wander off. Do you know how hard that was?” The nurse asked. Lottie was tired and really wished she could get back to her duties or bed depending on what needed to be done but she needed to be cleared before she could do that.
Finn stared at Gerhard with big eyes as he was asked where he was at 14:30. “Um where I normally am most of the day… Sir.” He murmured quickly as if the answer was obvious but when silence reigned, he looked all around the room. “Hydroponics Sir.” It was where he normally was so it was a given he would be there. “About that time, I was talking to Black about the mint she wanted for something to make a mouthwash. Did you know she worked in a cosmetic company before joining Starfleet…. No I suspect you did not…” Finn said going queued again as he waited for the next question.
"Seriously, boss?" Manishie rolled her eyes, why would she even be considered a suspect? "I think I was going for an afternoon snack." She tried to think back, "So I'd have been in the mess." She knew it wasn't personal but it was frustrating to jump through these hoops. "Resequencer logs will show you I had a banana kale smoothie because I wanted to be better and have a healthy afternoon snack since I was feeling fatigued and stressed lately, and then five minutes later it will show you I ordered dark chocolate because that was a really bad idea, and I need chocolate in my life."
Regardless of the fact that they weren't anywhere near the place of the incident the question still rattled the young damage control specialist. "I, uh. I'm. I was working on figuring out some sensor ghosts." Kiyara pulled up a record on the work they had been doing, signed off by Sloan. "There's these reports of access from rooms that don't register anyone being present. I think. Yeah. Maybe someone from your team might have called it in as a bug report."
"Thank you," William said as the last crewmember he interviewed closed the door to their quarters. He sighed as he rubbed his face looking down at his PADD which was close to capacity with notes. He and his team had interviewed everyone, and so far he had nothing. Everyone's movements could be accounted for, but that was impossible. Someone on board had murdered Samantha, and that meant that one of the people he interviewed was lying. He felt his headache growing in intensity as the realization of that fact dawned on him. Hopefully the autopsy would reveal something he could use, otherwise he was still at the starting line.
