Dust to Dust: Maxwell’s Demons Episode 1
But it was his job to answer questions with as much precision as he could muster. That was what the doctor wanted, that was what the doctor would get. Then Elmer would do further investigation and refine his analysis.
So Elmer was ready when Dr. Costello asked, “What about incoming footprints. Did you find any?”
Elmer answered as confidently and completely as he could. “No, Doctor, but I didn’t not find them, either. Closer scans might reveal something. If some of what I found were footprints, there had to be incoming prints as well. There were no vehicle tracks, no drive wash. Those would be harder to miss. Since we know no one sprang fully formed from the regolith, someone had to have walked out here to leave the tracks that were returning. And the victim had to, as well. And since we saw no sign of tracks coming from the direction of Maxwell City, the victim probably came the other way.”
“Probably?” Dr. Costello asked.
“Image analysis puts it well above r 0.9. The victim did not come from the city and no vehicle deposited him here.”
Dr. Costello’s face was hidden behind his visor, but he sounded pleased. “From you, Elmer, I’ll take 0.9 as 1.0. It fits with everything else we’ve seen. Let’s get all the video we can get before the storm gets too close.”
Here, Elmer was in his element. Video was pure data. It was an objective, all-seeing eye in multiple frequency bands. And with proper gear–like Elmer’s–it was impossible to fake. The encryption algorithms in his equipment were the best on the market, and constantly upgraded. Here was data Elmer could analyze by algorithm and by eye, sifting out facts from noise like Maxwell’s mythical demon sifting cold molecules from hot.
Dr. Costello continued his dictation as Elmer recorded. “Decedent is male, approximately 80 to 100 kilograms judging by the suit. The suit is in Mars pressure from the wounds, so the shape of the body is clear.”
Elmer focused on the limbs and how the material clung to them. He would not hazard a guess to the decedent’s mass, but Dr. Costello was right more often than wrong.
The doctor continued, “Visual confirmation of the wound has not been made yet. I want to leave the body exactly as we found it until we have adequate video of its position on the regolith.” Dr. Costello uncapped a laser pointer on the index finger of his right glove, and he started tracing out relevant details. “Accumulated dust between 0.2 and 0.5 CM. Given currently reported rates of deposition, that implies a period of two to five hours.” Behind his faceplate his visor, Dr. Costello looked up at Elmer. “r 0.8.” Then he turned back to the body. “This is how the corpse was photographed by the commercial overflight that landed at Port Shannon Lopez. There is no visible change in position since then, and all is as we found it when Moné, Priest, and I marched out to the site. The body is sprawled face down in the dust, with right arm splayed out beside the head. Legs are twisted, as if decedent was turning away at the time of the injury.”
Elmer recorded the position of the legs as well. The left was bent approximately thirty degrees underneath the corpse. The right was bent farther, and laying down beside the left. Elmer could believe that this person had died in the middle of turning and doing… Doing what?
Dr. Costello continued, “Probable cause of death is a projectile wound through the left upper thoracic, possibly followed by rapid exsanguination due to exposure to Martian pressure.” He highlighted dry foamed blood around the fringe of the hole in the suit. “Or death was instantaneous. The wound could have gone right through the aorta. We need an autopsy to be sure.”
Long, hard gray tendrils stretched through the wound opening. Two or three stretched all the way across. This was vacuum resin, an old, proven technology for repairing small suit leaks through an epoxy compound that flowed and hardened in the presence of extreme low pressure. But this was no small wound. It was beyond the limits of the resin.
“Victim is wearing a full surface environment suit, suitable for extended excursions. The injury missed the air tanks, so those may give another indication of when the attack happened.”
Elmer chuckled softly to himself at that. Once they got into the lab, there would be multiple different indicators of time of death. The suit’s medical recorder, assuming it was functioning, would be the most precise, but there were plenty of other telltales. The rate of desiccation of the body. The rate of air leakage, the body temperature. There were probably others. That wasn’t Elmer’s area of expertise. Dr. Costello would determine the time of death so precisely that even Mr. Aames would approve. Dr. Costello leaned closer to the wound. “From the stress on the environmental suit, the entry wound came from behind. There’s probably a matching exit wound, which we’ll find as soon as we turn the body over.”
Return to the world of The Last Dance and The Last Campaign, Martin L. Shoemaker’s bestselling science fiction mysteries!
Maxwell City, Mars. 50,000 residents, plus visitors, merchants, diplomats, scientists, and soldiers. It’s the largest city off Earth, and the most dangerous. Police Chief Rosalia Morais and her force have their hands full with day-to-day crimes; so when there’s murder and mystery on Mars, Maxwell’s Demons are on the case! This elite team of experts in science and survival are ready for the challenges of the Red Planet and the deadly criminal forces scheming in darkened tunnels and in the halls of power.
This day starts with a uniquely Martian mystery. a corpse in a spacesuit, far from the city, with a sandstorm looming. The Demons must puzzle out the murder before Martian dust buries and destroys the clues. Their search leads them to the distant Power and Services District. What they find there threatens to destroy Maxwell City itself!
Publishers Weekly said of The Last Campaign: “The wonders and dangers of living in space are grounded in the grit of Martian sand and the procedural mysteries that could just as easily have taken place on Earth as in space. This is smart, subtle speculative fiction.” Now the story continues in Dust to Dust: Maxwell’s Demons Episode 1, the first story in a new series of mysteries on Mars.
Available for Kindle now on Amazon.