I heard the motion, pretended to ignore it at first while tracking it audibly, then turned and gave a slight wave and nod. It didn’t work.
He hit the spotlight, revved up and braked in front of me.
This was not good. Detention would pretty much be the end for me. I had to be polite, though, if I wanted to get out of this.
He stepped out, armed and armored and polite but sturdy.
“Good evening. What are you doing here?”
I said, “Good evening, sir. I’m in wholesale back home and thought I’d take a look at some of the operations here.” There was no point in lying about being an offworlder.
“You should probably do that in daylight,” he said. “It’s not something done in the dark on Earth.”
“I apologize,” I said.
“No harm done yet. I’ll need to see your system ID and scan your chip. You are wearing it, yes?”
I had a fake one on the phone in my pocket. It did match my ID.
“I have it with me,” I agreed, while looking for a way out of this. I was worried about that ID, because we had limited resources. I should have changed it in the escape, but didn’t have a spare on hand.
He waved a scanner, I handed the card over carefully, and it pinged somehow. Likely, they’d tagged everyone leaving that convention.
“Were you at the Direct Marketing Strategies convention in Destiny Block earlier today?”
“I passed through there, yes. Professional interest. I didn’t see much that would translate to what I do,” I said.
“Did you hear about the incident?”
“I heard something. I was heading out as it happened, I think, and decided I was better off not being in the way.”
I’d been as reasonable as possible, and so had he. However, there were too many flags for him to let me go.
He tried the standard routine. “I must detain you. Please stand in place, put your hands on your head, and don’t move.”
I complied. I needed him close. I was surprised he was alone; usually they’re in at least pairs. It was probable his partner was in the area, too, and this was considered a nicer area. Safe. Family friendly. That’s why I stood out.
He approached cautiously, and I remained relaxed inside, stiff and compliant outside.
Then he hooked my ankle to pull me off balance, and reached for my left hand with the binders.
I reversed that with a kick and twist. He was off balance, I had his arm, turned into a bar locking it back against his elbow armor. I had to wiggle a bit to get past his helmet and tap him in the throat, but that and a knee to the solar plexus, even through armor, slowed him down. It also made my knee hurt like hell. He had a plate in there. He grunted and slumped a bit.
Still, I had enough time to flip his stunner from the holster and away. I pulled his flex baton, passed it up to my right hand, poked it into his throat, and continued pulling stuff from him. I caught his phone and slung it, tossed his gas dispenser away, pulled out the stickyweb gun and the knife in his pocket. That last was illegal, for some unfathomable reason, but almost all cops carried one anyway. We spun around three times like some kind of bizarre dance.
I smashed the baton into his headset and it blinked a fault as I unsnapped his helmet and peeled it up. Then I bent him over my knee. I took a moment to clip the web gun to my belt.
“I need information. I require that you provide it. This is within the law, your oath and the practicalities of this situation.”
He still tried to argue.
“Assaulting an officer is an—OWWW!”
I wasn’t going to break his elbow. Not yet.
“I’m doing the fucking explaining. Give me the information, you’ll be fine. Try to fight, you die. You are nothing in this fight. Nothing,” I repeated. “You and a thousand like you can die and not matter. Now you can give it to me and live, or I can pluck your fucking eyes out and jam them against the scanner while they’re still warm.” I was nose to nose with him, intimately close and encroaching, and I had him pinned. It hit all the panic buttons of an Earthie. In his position, he expected to have physical and psychological superiority over a single detainee. I wasn’t playing by the rules.
“Oh, god,” he muttered. His struggles changed from aggressive to fearful, just like that. He wasn’t prepared for that kind of emotional onslaught backed up by someone who actually knew how to fight.
I really had scared him to that level. He was completely limp and unresisting, without even a bluff of authority.
“I’m looking for the individual who orchestrated that attack. That’s why I was there.”
“Yes, sir.”
“I need to find him, so this can stop. You may have heard of a pattern of killings in other systems.”