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Duke Wilberstone's office was always a mess.
Many times his boss came by and shook his head with wonder how the detective
could function with the piles of paper, trash and banana peels that covered his
desk to the point where some of the piles had spilled on the floor.
Nonetheless, he said nothing. Wilberstone was his best investigator and had saved
the insurance company millions over the years. He had the deduction skills of a
Sherlock Holmes; some trivial thing that others would regard as not worth their
notice would lead Wilberstone to the heart of the matter, whether it was
insurance fraud, suicide made to seem something else or the location of a
valuable. That's why they gave him this important case which could cost the
insurance company a lot of money and possibly have a chilling affect on the
entire humbot industry.
Wilberstone leaned back on his chair with
his feet on his desk reading one of several news blogs on his comp-phone. This
was his way of getting into the investigation proper by going over every
reporter's description of the incident. The particular new blog he was reading
was posted on the Eridani City Chronicle. Since it was written by a reporter
close to the scene, he felt it would be the most accurate. Under the headline,
"Humbot Murders Exoarcheologist in Level Four Apartment," the article
read, "
The reason Wilberstone was given the case
was that Mr. Martilonzo was suing Galactic Robotics for a defective product
which he claimed caused the wrongful death of his wife. Galactic Humbots was
insured by Universal Coverage Insurance, the company Wilberstone worked for. If
it was determined by a civil court that the humanoid robot had a factory defect
that directly led to Gabriella Martilonzo's death, both Galactic Humbots and
Universal Coverage would stand to lose millions. The cost of losing the lawsuit
was not the worst of it. If people began to worry that humbots were capable of
committing murder, the consequences to all humbot manufacturers and even to society
as a whole would be disastrous, especially on Moon Four where almost everything
was done by automation and humbots. .
Galactic Humbots had issued a statement
that they stood behind their product one hundred percent and that all humbots
are tested thoroughly at the factory. They said that the only way that a
Galactic Humbots humbot could cause the death of a human being was if it was
tampered with. A company expert would be sent to the Epsilon Eridani system to
examine the humbot accused of the killing.
Wilberstone scratched his head. He was
under a lot of pressure to come up with an alternative explanation for the
death of Gabrielle Martilonzo than the humbot shooting her in cold blood. He
had been assured by several experts that humbots absolutely could not cause
deliberate harm to a human being, unless of course the humbot was defective. The
humbot involved had been in service for several years and had never shown any
propensity towards violence. One possibility was that a circuit in its
positronic brain had malfunctioned. Under most circumstance baring accident or
deliberate damage, positronic brains lasted for hundreds of years. Had this one
a factory defect that caused it to fail prematurely? Not only that, a
positronic brain was supposed to be failsafe. If a brain circuit failed, the
humbot was supposed to automatically shut down.
Wilberstone's instincts told him that it
was not the humbot who murdered Mrs. Martilonzo, but her husband, who found a
way to blame the humbot. In ninety percent of cases involving the murder of a
woman, it turned out the culprit was a husband, a boy friend, or a lover or an
ex-husband, ex-boyfriend, or ex-lover who did the foul deed, someone who knew
the victim and had something to gain by the woman's death. On rare occasions
the murderer turned out to be a jealous woman who was having an affair with the
victim's husband or boyfriend. In ninety-nine percent of the cases he had
handled the motives were jealousy, monetary gain or both.
The one who had the most to gain by the
victim's death in this case was Rick Martilonzo, the husband. If the lawsuit
went in his favor he would become a millionaire. There was also a substantial
award from a life insurance policy that he had purchased the week before the
murder and other valuable assets that he would inherit from his wife. Also, he
had been overheard many times to curse his wife for causing them to move to the
airless Moon Four. The man had wanted a career as a naturalist and loved the
outdoors. It was likely that the only reason he took a job as a plant manager when
he could not find work in his field was that he did not wish to be dependent on
his wife for support,. As a result he was probably resentful that his wife's
profession had taken them to a place where they had to live underground, away
from the natural world he loved so much.
In Wilberstone's mind the only question
was how Marilonza got the humbot to commit the murder. Marilonza had a perfect
alibi. He was on the surface of the moon far from where his wife met her
untimely death at the time the murder occurred. He could have sent a signal or given
the humbot orders to murder his wife while he was away. But that seemed not
possible either. According to everything Wilberston had read, a humbot in good
condition could not obey such an order unless the husband tinkered with the
humbot's circuits. According to the information Wilberston had received, Martilonzo
knew nothing about electronics or robotics. In fact he was the type of person
who hated technology.
It was a puzzler. And he had to solve it
quickly, before the media sensationalized the whole thing, implying that any humbot
could turn on its owner and kill him or her. Once the trial began there would
be a media frenzy around the courtroom. Already, many journalists had left
Earth for the Epsilon System.
Death
on Moon 4 may be purchased at Page Turner Editions and other online
e-book sellers.