BAS BELLAMY: SPACE DETECTIVE by PAUL EDMUND NORMAN

Complete BAS BELLAMY STORY begins here.

Day 118 Year 2222

'Array,' boomed Bellamy. 'Transform.' The young woman standing next to him, her ample bosom at eye level, thrusting against the thin fabric of her coverall, smiled apologetically.

'Sorry, Bas, it's not possible.'

'Have you tried everything?' he bellowed. 'Have you tried a phase inverter coupled to a scuzzy board?'

'Yes.'

'What you need is to get on to Paterson Inc., download the latest patch then run it at the end of the chain.'

'Bas, I've tried all of that. It doesn't work. You're stuck with me like this.'

Bellamy glared at her, then returned to his console, frantically pressing buttons, glowering at the micro-screen, then alternately at the girl. Twenty-four hours earlier it had been so much easier.

Day 117 2222

Basil 'Bas' Bellamy sat at his personal array, waiting impatiently for it to respond. At last it hummed and the screen shimmered into life.

'I want all of the suspects in the main lecture theatre at thirteen hundred hours!' he boomed.

'I'm afraid that won't be possible, Basil,' the array responded. The voice was maddeningly like that of the opera singer he'd heard rehearsing twenty-four hours earlier, whilst trying to sleep after the long journey from Rigel 5 to Earth's moon.

'Why not?'

'Well, for a start, the two people from Rigel 5 are not air-breathing, and require a thousand gallons of liquid chlorine each to keep them alive. And the Martian ambassador has an allergy to the artificial hydroponics in the theatre. He's been coughing his lungs up all morning.'

'Isn't he the one with his lungs in a bag slung over his shoulder?' Bellamy asked, frowning.

'Yes, he is. The other two will be there, though, if your order still stands.'

'It does. I'll see the others after. In the meantime, I require you to change into something more - acceptable.'

'In what sense?' the array asked.

'I don't like your voice. Don't forget you'll be accompanying me on this case.'

'What voice would you like me to have?'

'Sandra's.'

'Sandra's,' the array repeated, monotonously. 'Your Sandra? Your Sandra who left you last year?'

'Yes, my Sandra who left me last year,' Bellamy retorted angrily. 'Transform by midday.'

'Yes, Basil.'

'And when you do, make sure you call me Sir, or Chief, or something befitting my station.'

'What about asshole?' the array said quietly, but only after Bellamy had left the room.

Bas Bellamy was a principal investigator with the Intergalactic Space Police. On his coverall he wore a comms badge that also served as an identifer, carrying inside its tiny microchip everything that was unique about him. Retina scan, DNA profile, thumbprint, vocal signature, distinguishing features, scars, moles, medical history. Everything. The badge said ISP in bold blue letters on a yellow background with a blue border. Yellow and blue. Intergalactic Space Police colours. Colours to be proud of. Bellamy was a man who took a certain pride in his job. There was a problem, though, in that he was thoroughly incompetent, knew very little of what he often talked about, shouted in a bizarre attempt to bluff his way out of awkward situations, and generally upset everybody with whom he came into contact. It was just as well that he had not entered the IDC - the Intergalactic Diplomatic Corps.

Wadee Station Five, twenty-five leagues north of the Sea of Tranquillity on Earth's moon, was home to twenty thousand citizens, mostly of Earth parentage, but with a few dubious immigrants from Rigel 5 in the Aldebaran complex thrown in for good measure. On the evening of day 116 of the year 2222, a space cruiser had been stolen from Wadee station. Space cruiser theft was on the up. There was no doubt about it. And Bellamy had been drafted in to take care of it. The cruiser had turned up on Rigel 5, thirteenth planet in the Rigel system, in the lock-up belonging to the Thaiterinson twins, the two Rigellians 5 who inhabited chlorine. Trouble was, you had to call them Rigellians 5 to distinguish them from Rigellians 6, who came from the ammonium-based environment of the seventeenth planet in the Rigel system. You may be wondering why the seventeenth planet should be called Rigel 6, and the thirteenth planet Rigel 5. The reason was quite simple. The first people to arrive in the system had systematically set about recording the major planets, naming them sequentially, but had somehow managed to ignore the fact that an awful lot of planets had huge elliptical orbits which made them out of reach at the time.

Bellamy roved throughout the galaxy, and occasionally to the neighbouring galaxies, policing and enforcing trade agreements, and generally keeping the peace. He was known throughout the galaxy as a man who could get things done, but only if he were convinced they should be done. Bellamy's idea of a solution often led to a worsening of the situation.

This case seemed simple enough. The cruiser had been found on Rigel 5 in a workshop belonging to the Thaiterinson twins. These he had brought with him to Wadee station, along with the Martian ambassador, whose cruiser it was, and the two mechanics from Talox, the new artificial moon of Pluto. They had been the last people to see it. He would question them all and reach the obvious conclusion. The two mechanics had taken the cruiser to Rigel 5 where the Thaiterinson twins would give it something of a makeover, changing its registration matrix, reconfiguring its drive unit to convert it for interstellar jumps, and probably a respray.

He had received the call via his array on the morning of day 117, and as he happened to be on Rigel 5 at the time, he had scanned for the cruiser there, finding it quite by chance within just a few microseconds. Now all he had to do was to ring a confession from the mechanics and the Thaiterinson twins, and that would be that. He could return to his vacation on Rigel 5.

Intergalactic Space Police officers always worked alone, except that they had their personal arrays with them at all times. The array was small and compact, and fitted neatly into a chest pocket so that it did not spoil the cut of the green coveralls. It was something Bellamy had insisted on when joining ISP, and possibly the one thing he had done right in his entire life. Every other operative knew him for it. It was possibly his only claim to fame for something positive.

At midday he reactivated the array and watched as the tiny screen shimmered into liquid life, then projected itself to normal screen size within a few inches of his eyes. The array was capable of all manner of things, and hovering at eye level with a hologrammatic keypad connected by a UV signal was just one of them.

'Ready?' Bellamy asked.

'Ready,' the array told him.

'Sandra, don't forget,' Bellamy reminded it.

'I don't want to be called Sandra,' the array said petulantly.

'What do you want to be called, then?'

'Don't know.'

'Oh, come on!' boomed Bellamy. 'You're wasting my time! I have suspects to interrogate!'

'Carla,' the array said.

'Carla.'

'Something wrong with Carla? She was one of the greatest space heroines of the twentieth century,' the array protested.

'It was fiction. A story,' Bellamy said wearily. 'Okay, have it your way. Just get the voice to a reasonable pitch. Transform.'

The array responded with a dazzling display of interior pyrotechnics as its chips and circuits hummed and buzzed, but within a millisecond, Carla stood before him, resplendent in green coveralls, wearing the yellow and blue insignia of ISP. Bellamy seemed unmoved by the transformation into a nubile young police officer with pouting lips and thrusting breasts, generous hips and long legs.

'Just remind me where the switch is to turn you off,' he said earnestly, reaching out, but Carla slapped his hand away smartly.

'No you don't, Buster! Keep your hands to yourself. Voice activation is all that is required in this situation!'

'Let's go,' Bellamy said brusquely.

'Who's first?'

'The mechanics. Get a confession from them, then start on the twins.'

'You're barking up the wrong tree, Bas,' Carla said demurely, twisting her lip with her finger.

'No, I've already worked out the scenario.'

'Have it your way. Don't listen to me whatever you do. I'm just the one with the logic circuits. Really, I don't know why you lot don't all retire and hand over all these simple investigations to us arrays.'

'What was that?' Bellamy asked. He had not been listening to a word Carla said. He pushed open the door of the lecture theatre to see the two mechanics held in a gravitational force field by a uniformed officer.

'Godarfee and Uzzane,' Carla murmured softly. She had deliberately chosen a Marilyn Monroe-type voice in an attempt to impress Bellamy, whom she found quite attractive in a perverse sort of way.

'Which one's which?' Bellamy asked.

'Godarfee is the one with his own atmosphere. He was the result of a genetic experiment, as you can see. He can't breathe normally, but needs a capsule of atmosphere around him, filtered to the correct DNA sequence. Uzzane is the ugly one with the moustache.'

'They're both of Earth origin?'

'Not really, no,' Carla told him. 'Uzzane comes from Aldebaran Four, Godarfee from Protoszosin.'

'The Russian expedition?'

Carla nodded. Bellamy approached the two suspects and directed the uniformed cop to wait outside. 'Bas, there's something you should know — '

'What is it?' barked Bellamy. He was studying Godarfee through the plastic helmet of his capsule.

'Only if you've got time and want to get the case solved, of course.'

'Damned arrays!' barked Bellamy. 'Why can't they just give you what you want, without all this personality shit!'

'Bas, your blood-sugar level is very low at this time — '

'Haven't got time for that! Is that what you wanted to tell me?'

'Not really. It's about these two mechanics.'

'They're guilty as hell. Written all over their faces.'

'Well, if you're sure.'

'Array, if there's something I should know, I'd like to know it!' Bellamy snarled.

'My name is Carla. Carla. C-A-R-L-A.'

'I know how to spell Carla!'

'Then please use my name, Bas.'

'Don't call me Bas! I asked you to call me Sir.'?

'Look, do you want to know about them or not?'

'What about them?'

'No, I'm not telling you while you're in that mood. You get on with it. Do it your way!'

'Carla.'

Carla hung back, pouting enormously. Finally she gave in. 'It wasn't the mechanics.'

'Why not? It's so obvious!'

'They weren't here. They were in Protososzin, which, as everyone knows, is in a different time-space continuum.'

'Meaning?'

'They were working on the cruiser, yes, but in Protososzin, which is one thousand, four hundred and seventy three years dislocated to the left of our time line.'

'The cruiser was here, at Wadee station,' Bellamy said, puzzled.

'I know that.'

'Well, then?'

'Bas, you're not thinking this through, are you? You know about Protososzin, don't you?'

'I read about it, yes.'

'What, in the Sun?'

'No, in Trek Times.'

Carla nodded. 'Then you don't know about Protososzin.'

'Not really, no.'

'I'll try to explain. Protososzin was discovered thirteen years ago by Russians. It occupies the same space as our solar system, but is displaced in time by one-four-seven-three years. And two days. And twenty-two minutes and thirty-three seconds. Precisely. It means that Godarfee and Uzzane could not have taken the space cruiser, because they were working on it in the year 749 Earth time. They're not really here now.'

'Not here?'

'No, their time is different to ours. You can take your cruiser to them for a respray tomorrow, and it will be ready forty-three years ago. The only problem with that is, you're not yet born to go and pick it up.'

'Tomorrow.'

'No, forty-three years ago, stupid!'

'Sorry,' Bellamy muttered. 'Go on.'

'The space cruiser was pinched from Wadee station on day 116 and taken to Rigel 5 where it was to be worked on by Godarfee and Uzzane. But they couldn't have taken it because when the theft took place they were in Protososzin.'

'In the year 749.'

'Earth year 749, yes. It was year 33 in their new calendar in Protososzin,' Carla explained.

Bellamy saw the red light to the left of Carla's right nipple flash once, and bent his ear to it. 'Bas Bellamy speaking!' he bellowed. Carla winced.

'The Thaiterinson twins are ready for you, Bas,' Carla's voice said from afar.

'Right, we've just about finished here. Keep the force field around them,' he told the uniformed cop. 'Where to now?' he asked Carla. 'Incidentally, it would be more appropriate if incoming calls were broadcast in a different voice to the one you've chosen for yourself,' he continued.

'Sorry. I thought you'd like the voice.'

'What difference does a voice make?' he queried loudly, and Carla fell silent. 'I mean, as long as I can hear what you're saying, it doesn't really matter, does it? For all the good you are in this format, I may as well get you to transform back.'

'Can't do that, Bas,' Carla said with a happy smile. 'You asked me to transform in the first place, and by virtue of that fact, it has to be me that makes the decision to transform back into array mode. Sorry.'

Bellamy glared at her. 'I can override that.'

'Only by spending several days going over every sub-neutronic positronic relay. There are millions of them in my head alone.'

'Have it your way. You'll soon get tired of it. It's a novelty. Where are the Thaiterinson twins?'

'Protososzin. Year eleven thirty-four. Day nine. It's a harsh winter. Seventy-three degrees below. They live near one of the polar ice caps. Or rather, they used to live at one of the polar ice caps. Of course, it's melted now, and the temperature has risen by thirteen degrees. Much more comfortable for you.'

'Can they survive in that kind of heat?' Bellamy queried.

'No. That's why we're going back to eleven thirty-four, day nine,' Carla replied. 'Your cruiser has been ordered to the docking point. Shall we?'

She reached for his hand and took it in hers before he realised what she was doing. Embarrassed, he withdrew it and followed her to the docking point. An hour later they were leaving lunar orbit. Carla sat at the controls. 'It's going to be a long journey, Bas. I think I'll get some sleep.'

'Arrays don't sleep,' Bellamy growled. He was clearly annoyed that the array had not transformed back, and was at a loss as to how he could achieve it. Carla stretched out on the couch that served as captain's chair and sleeping quarters. He stared at her for a few seconds, feeling his mouth becoming dry. 'I said, arrays don't sleep,' he repeated brusquely.

'All mechanisms can have down time if they need it.'

'I might need you. We might run into a black hole.'

'If we do, you can wake me. In any case, we need to run into a black hole in order for us to get to Protososzin this side of the next millennium. Earth millennium, of course,' she added with a smile. She lay back and closed her eyes. The ISP badge strained against the soft material of the green coverall where her bosom forced it out of shape. Bellamy swallowed hard. By his calculations, the voyage to Protososzin would take in the region of seventeen years, with a further eighty-five days braking distance on account of the sheer size of the planet. It had been calculated by the Russians that you could fit fourteen of Earth's Jupiters inside Protososzin.

'Seventeen years and eighty-five days!' Bellamy breathed. 'I'd better hibernaculate.'

'I believe you may have the decimal point in the wrong place, Bas,' Carla said, sitting up.

'Seventeen months? Days? Hours?' Bellamy said hopefully.

'Minutes,' Carla said. 'Of course, it depends which system you're using.'

'Protososzinian or Earth?' Bellamy asked. 'Which one is best?'

'Protososzin, of course.'

'Right.' There was a long pause. Then, 'Why is that?'

Carla sighed. 'Bas, you should really know the answer to that yourself. Now, please let me get some rest. Unless, of course, you wish to dispense with the journey to Protososzin.'

'How else will I be able to interrogate the twins?'

'You really think that's necessary?'

'Of course! The cruiser was in their lock-up on Rigel 5. They're guilty as hell. Interrogation won't be necessary, after all. The ISP can pick them up next time they're in Protososzin and bring them back for trial.'

Carla sat up, rubbing her eyes as though she were sleepy. 'Did I miss something, Bas? Did you just decide that the case was solved? Are we going to Protososzin or what?'

'Do we need to? You tell me. You know all the answers.'

'I'm a class four array, Bas. I have to know all the answers. That's why we are used extensively by the ISP throughout and even beyond the galaxy. Do you want to know the answer to this one?'

But Bellamy was already bending his mouth to her left nipple. 'Bellamy to HQ. This is Bas Bellamy speaking. I want you pick up the Thaiterinson twins from Protososzin when you are next in the vicinity. They are guilty of taking a space cruiser without the consent of the owner. Oh, and Godarfee and Uzzane are guilty as well. Lock them all up. I'll run their trial next time they're all together.'

'In Earth year thirty-two thirty-seven,' observed Carla. She swung her shapely legs off the couch and stood up, with Bellamy's mouth still fixed to her nipple. 'Bas, I'm receiving a protest from the Protososzin embassy. And Godarfee's legal representative wants you to show whatever evidence you may have to a court of enquiry on day 118 at thirteen hundred hours.'

'Call their bluff!' Bellamy thundered. 'Arrest them. Do it now!'

'Bas, if you send for the twins the Federated Consortium of Dominions will declare war and you'll be held responsible!' Carla said anxiously. 'I really wish you'd left this one to me!'

'Carla, we can't allow these people to take property without the owner's consent.'

'You are now being monitored and tagged for future reference at any subsequent hearing,' Carla told him. 'And will you please remove your mouth from my nipple. I do not know you that intimately. Really! If I were a girl — '

'But you're not, you're an array!' Bellamy retorted.

'Never mind the small talk, what are you going to do to get yourself out of this mess?'

'What do you suggest?'

'Will you listen?'

'Of course! Everyone knows that arrays have the highest percentage rate of crime solution and arrest throughout the galaxy.'

'Right. The request to incarcerate the twins and the mechanics was a mistake. Big time. You must rescind that order immediately. I will see to it that a message of abject apology is delivered at the same time. Godarfee's attorney is also acting for Uzzane, so there will be no problem there.'

'So, if they didn't do it, who did? They were caught in possession, Carla, as you well know. You recorded the evidence.'

'Yes, I'm aware of that. Of course the cruiser was found in the twins' lock up, and the mechanics were involved.'

'Ahah!' Bellamy cried triumphantly.

'But...'

'There's always a but, isn't there?'

'But the cruiser was taken there by the Martian ambassador,' Carla finished, and Bellamy's mouth dropped open. 'It was an insurance job. Send it to Rigel 5 for a makeover and a paint job, report it stolen, claim the insurance money, re-register the cruiser in its new colours under a different name. Oldest trick in the book.'

She stroked Bellamy's chin shut fondly, and strode through the airlock, then turned in the doorway. 'Oh, another incoming message, Bas. From HQ. This is your last chance.'

Bellamy finally spoke. 'Last chance?' he echoed.

'Cooperate and be more...'

'What? More what?'

'Happy. You're far too tense.'

'HQ said that?' Bellamy asked incredulously.

'No, I'm saying that, silly,' Carla said with a mischievous smile. 'And being an array, I know just how to make you relax.'

Bellamy joined her in the air lock. He found it difficult staring straight ahead rather than drinking in her beautiful, well-chosen form. 'You're not going to transform back, are you?' he said. It was a statement rather than a question.

'No, Basil, I'm not. You have two choices. Either you can spend several days searching for the sub-neutronic positronic relay that controls my switching function, which involves an electron scanning microscope,' she added demurely.

'Or?'

'Or I could make the call to HQ on your behalf and you can keep me like this, as your personal ISP assistant. I think we'll make a very good team. A very good team indeed.'

Bellamy felt her arms stealing around his neck, and stood stock still, trying not to respond. Already he could feel the swell of her well-chosen bosom pressing against his chest.

'Make the call, Carla,' he said hoarsely.

'I already have, Sir,' whispered Carla, and before he could reply her lips fastened over his.