The audience had gathered in their seats, the curtain was drawing open, and the stage was set and ready. The dim orange lights of the Candid Cantina were barely enough to illuminate the faces of all those present, but as Alex stood atop his table, it was as though a spotlight was shining on him. With his arms outstretched, he cast a shadow on the wall behind him, his silhouette miming his slightest movements. It was as if the world had faded out around him, and now the only thing that was in focus was him, and he wasn’t going to let the opportunity pass him by.
“Allow me to begin with the story of Corpus Rex.” He spoke, his voice low and booming. “Once upon a time, there was a man who didn’t have much to his name. He made a living in a dangerous place, sure, but it was never enough to satisfy him. But, as luck would have it, he would find that suddenly, almost out of the blue, his whole life would be turned around. You see, my fiendish friends, there was this lottery! A lottery with a prize so big, that starships from all over the galaxy blocked out the sky, just trying to get a shot at it. It was not through his own actions that he acquired a ticket to this once-in-a-lifetime event- no- that thanks would have to go to a strange blond outsider! Stealing the ticket, he thought nothing of it, until of course it was announced that he, of all people, had become the lucky winner!”
The crowd watched as the boy, almost unthinking, jumped across the booth to the next table. His landing was flawed, and he stumbled to keep his balance, but he just barely managed it. The spotlight seemed to shift to him, like a persistent cloud of smoke at a campfire. “Corpus was overjoyed! He shouted his praises from the rooftops, declaring himself the richest man in the universe! Unfortunately, all was not as it seemed. For you see, the lottery that he had won was miscalculated, and the prize was not meant to be so glorious. However, this would not stop the man from claiming his promised prize! But, as the old saying goes, the bigger they are the harder they fall.” The shadow on the wall moved as Alex pointed his fingers out in the shape of a gun, and mimed firing. He beat his chest, acting as though something had struck him. “The man was found shot dead in the dark by his own weapon, and the strange outsider was falsely blamed for the crime! This was the story of Corpus Rex, but allow me to tell you another! It’s the tale of a room full of murderous pirates, robbers, and mystery men- all with a motive to kill.”
Sophia walked over to Timothy, locking his arm through hers, just in case they needed to run or fight. She didn’t like the looks he was getting from the crowd, and she got the feeling that some of them were still waiting for a bloodbath. “Alex, is all this necessary?” She asked through gritted teeth. “Can’t you hurry it up a bit?”
He shot her a nervous side-eye. “But the show must go on, Soph! These people were expecting a spectacle, and I feel that denying them that, may lead to a… poor reception.”
The girl nodded, picking up what he was laying down. “Sorry I stopped you.”
“I am also sorry to interrupt you,” WaldAcker began, raising a gloved hand. “But I assume you mean me when you say, ‘mystery man.’ I don’t want to dent your performance, or whatever this is that you’re doing, but I certainly didn’t have a motive!”
Alex placed a tentative hand on his chest, feigning surprise. “But WaldAcker, don’t you remember your face?” The room all turned and glared at the helmeted man, and it was clear that he didn’t like the attention all that much. “The night he died, Corpus said he recognized you. Now, with a helmet that dark and uncomfortable looking, that must have been something that you wouldn’t have wanted.”
“What are you implying?” The man asked, the charm gone from his voice.
“The same thing that I’m implying about everyone else in the room.” Alex continued. “Short-Barrel John-John, you were devastated that you wouldn’t be able to get a cut of the ticket, and with the Cutters on your back, that loss could have deadly consequences for you.” As he spoke, he pointed an accusatory finger, casting a shadow not only of light but also of doubt in the room. “Vander Extemorst and his robot ARI-47, your motives were obvious from the start! With all that money accidentally thrown away, you could’ve done anything to get it back, even shoot a man in the dark!” The businessman straightened his tie, but the fire that was once inside him seemed to have been extinguished, and he let the insult slide. “Jenny McClain, the pirate captain with a troubled and mysterious past. Perhaps you killed out of the pure need to keep your livelihood afloat, or maybe it was vengeance for an old crew that has long since passed.” The long brim of Jenny’s hat lowered as her eyes peered out, giving her the impression of a tiger hiding in wait in the bushes. “And then there was Sally Silver, who was down on her luck and could have used the extra credit. She was also the only one to remove evidence from the scene of the crime.”
Sally stood straight up, and instinctually pulled the ends of her long furry coat together, a scowl forming on her face. “I did nothing like that, darling.”
“Yes, you did, we saw you!” Neil cried with a twitch. “You took it right off of him!”
“As I told you before, you must be remembering something wrong!” Sally insisted, her foot stomping on the ground. “Look, see? I’ve got nothing on me.” She quickly turned out the pockets of her coat and dress, revealing that there was no gun on her person, besides the compatible pistol she carried in her hand.
“That’s because you gave it to John-John!” Neil countered, feeling uncharacteristically bold. “I saw you give it to him on the street!”
The woman looked angry, but strangely also a bit proud. “You were following me for way longer than you let on, weren’t you?” She shook her head. “I should’ve known.”
Alex’s finger now pointed towards John-John with a flourish. “I’ve been wondering for the longest time about why you wanted Corpus’s gun, but now I think I see the answer.”
“You don’t know anything about me! Sally’s lying, I ain’t got the gun either!” John-John also turned out his pockets, revealing only dirty pieces of scrap and a barely lit credit chip.
“I’d hope so, seeing how you sold it.” The boy put blankly.
“You did what?” Sally barked.
“He’s lying!” The scoundrel protested.
“I’m not lying, not this time.” With a short hop, Alex flung himself from the table, only to crash onto his arms in a heap. The crowd looked confused as he picked himself up with some difficulty, brushing off his pants with his last scrap of dignity left intact. “I remember my legs working better than they are now, how strange.”
John-John watched as the boy approached him, straightening his tie with newfound confidence. “I don’t know what you’re on, mate, but you’ve got nothin’ on me!”
“You’re wrong because I do know what you’re on.” He countered. “Vlairdust? Is that what it was called? We’ve all seen how you normally behave, and we know why you owe that massive debt to the Cutters. You’re not as jittery as normal, and you seem much more confident than the sobbing man in the bar yesterday, and it’s all thanks to Corpus’s gun!” With a sidestep and flowing gesture, he presented the man to the crowd, like a model showing off a car. “He got the gun from Jenny, not to cover his tracks like I first thought he had, but instead to get some extra credit for his unfortunate addiction! I feel sorry for you, John-John, bad habits are hard to break.”
“You acted like there was some important reason you needed that gun!” Sally said, her voice full of frustration. “I could’ve sold it myself!”
“Oh, come off it, Jenny!” John-John yelled, his patchy face scowling. “You didn’t give the gun to me to be nice, you pushed it on me to get suspicion off your back!”
“Have something you need to hide, Jenny?” Pollum Mock chimed from behind the bar.
“Of course, not!” She cried. “I just didn’t want to have to deal with some scrapers snooping around my business.” She looked at the group of friends, her head shaking. “Guess that didn’t work out.”
“I suppose we’ll never get to inspect that gun then,” Sophia added with a grunt.
“Oh, don’t worry about that, the gun was never really that important!” Declared Alex with a wave.
“What do you mean the gun wasn’t important?” Vander spoke up angrily. “It was the murder weapon for god’s sake!”
Alex looked over at his audience, all eyes had become plastered onto him, and it seemed that his little show was at least entertaining. “I’m sorry to say it, but I’ve been a little misleading.” He spoke as he slowly, and with much visible effort, forced himself on top of the bar. Normally, Pollum Mock would’ve been quite cross, but he forgave the rudeness for the moment. “I began by telling you the story of Corpus Rex, but I’m afraid that wasn’t important. You see, he was just a footnote in this storybook- a page filler to glance over. No, this tale wasn’t about him, and it never was!”
Timothy’s brows narrowed. “But the poor man was killed!”
“Think about it!” The boy was insistent, his arms outstretched in a plea. “What do all these motives for murdering him have in common? It’s that none of them were ever really about Corpus Rex himself! In all of our investigating, what else did we find about him? Nothing! To John-John, Sally, and Vander, this was all about the money! To WaldAcker and Jenny, it was about their mysterious pasts! No one in this bar actually gave a shit about him, and that’s where everyone is linked! You were right, Neil, this case has always been backward.”
“You’re not making sense,” Sophia said with a shake of her head. “If no one cared, why would they kill him?”
“Because this is the story of someone else...” Alex spoke slowly, taking small steps across the bar as the attention of the crowd followed him along. “There’s something else that everyone here shares in common, a fact that seems to be universally accepted on the Ring…” He came to a halt as he now stood over someone, and his finger of guilt pointed down at a familiar businessman. “The fact that everyone truly hates Vander Extemorst!”
There were confused glances and looks, and a small humdrum erupted into the air. Vander had become used to these sorts of insults, but his will to fight back waned. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Alex tilted his head, seemingly disappointed by the response. “Yes, you do! You’re not blind, Vander, you’re just an idiot!” His eyes flickered for a moment, suddenly distant. “It took me a while to see it, I admit. But as I sat there, thinking about how much of a failure I was, I found the truth! These people that you call scum, hate you! Like, they detest you. They lined up to catch just a look- a single glimpse- of your sad face when your casino was broken into! Everyone we talked to had something bad to say about you, and your behavior hasn’t garnered you any friends in us either! I thought I was a failure, but then I saw you and thought, damn- it could be so much worse.”
Vander rolled his eyes, slouching in his seat. “What does this have to do with anything?”
The boy gasped. “Everything!” He looked at the faces of the crowd, a smile forming as he saw his friends. “Look at it like this, who here was the most harmed by all of this? It wasn’t Corpus, and it wasn’t Timothy, it was Mr. Extemorst himself! Your businesses’ credit has been depleted, the lottery’s reputation has been tanked, and I have a feeling that something much worse has happened to you since then.” He leaned forward, looking the businessman up and down. “That phone call with your father, how’d it go?”
This struck a nerve with the tentacle-like man, his eyes flaring. “That is none of your business!”
“Sir, wouldn’t this information be useful in furthering the investigation?” ARI spoke up.
“Shut it!” He cried. “Just stop it!”
“Tisk, tisk.” Alex clicked his tongue. “Your father dropped you, didn’t he? That’s what the call was about! He got word of how badly you messed up, and you finally ran out of lives! Did he cut you off entirely, or is he just putting you someplace new, where you can’t ruin anything else?”
Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.
For a moment the anger in Vander’s eyes ran hotter than the sun, but quickly it shifted into waterworks as he covered his face, clearly on the brink of tears. “He disowned me!” He cried. “My father abandoned me like trash in an alley! I’ve only messed up twice, I swear! Father has always been strict, but this must be too harsh, surely?” He glared out between his fingers, fear setting into his heart. “Now I’m just like… them! This can’t be right; I can’t be like these grunts! I’m an Extemorst! Vander Extemorst! I’m from one of the best business families in the cosmos!”
“Not anymore, oily.” Jenny snarked. “Welcome to the rift-raft.”
“I must be a little lost,” Timothy admitted, biting his finger. “Why would someone that wanted to get at Mr. Extemorst, kill poor Corpus instead?”
“Yeah?” Neil chimed in. “If he was going to cash the ticket anyway, why would someone kill him? Wouldn’t he have ruined Vander either way?”
Alex nodded, his brows narrowing. “Because this crime wasn’t committed with any regard for the money! No, the murder was crafted in a way that would, specifically, hurt Vander the most!” The shadow behind him mimicked his movement as he raised his arms to the crowd, his voice becoming louder. “If Corpus claimed the ticket, only Vander’s bank account would have suffered. With that expensive shipment of Splindine in the works, there was a low chance of actually risking the livelihood of his business. By killing him, the murderer ensured that not only was Vander humiliated, but it made sure that half the galaxy would know of his incompetence- including his father!”
“So, Corpus was just a tool?” Sophia remarked.
“Yes, it never mattered who won the lottery ticket, the events probably would have played out the same.” Alex cringed for a second, a thought occurring to him. “In fact, if Timothy wasn’t robbed, he may be the one who was killed.”
Timothy shuddered. “So, what does this all mean?”
There was a silent moment before the response came, and Alex took a deep breath to steady himself. The crowd was on the edge of their seats, and all eyes turned to stare at the boy standing so carelessly on the bar. Do you really think you got it right? His hand reached up and straightened his tie. Yes, yes, I do.
“It means that the killer is the one that hates Vander Extemorst the worst!” He declared; his voice clear as crystal. He took a new stance, his hands pushing forward as if he was opening a portal to a new world. “Once upon a time, there was a person who was scorned over and over by a rich man in a suit. They spent years suffering his abuse, and the abuse of all those around them that simply didn’t care enough to help. They could do nothing, but one day an opportunity arrived! They would find their justice with a shot in the dark, and they would revel in their deed as they watched their enemy crumble! For you see, dear audience, this is the story of ARI-47.”
The crowd all turned to the little bronze robot standing next to its master. The eyes on its disc-like head immediately went slanted, indicating confusion. “Further explanation is required, fortune-seeker!”
“You’re crazy!” John-John barked. “The robot? It’s just a bucket of bolts!”
“A bucket of bolts with feelings!” Alex countered, rather angrily. “Have none of you noticed what hell this robot has gone through? We’ve all seen him shot down in public, abused, and beaten to death. I’ve personally witnessed what Vander gets up to when he gets angry! He has a tendency of making robots jump off buildings, just for his sick amusement! I would pity you, Mr. Extemorst, but you make it very easy to dislike you.”
The hated man in question turned to his mechanical assistant, his face full of confused wonderment. “My bot?” He cried. “But it’s nothing! It’s just something that I assign tasks to, it’s like my automated butler!”
“Is that how you truly see them? Only as a thing?” WaldAcker butted in. “I told you that you should treat your robot better, didn’t I?”
“It’s always the butler, isn’t it?” Neil’s eyes narrowed. “But ARI works for Vander, why would he want to ruin him?”
Alex turned to the crowd, “I wonder, how many of you know that Vander keeps his pain receptor on? Raise of hands!”
There was no reaction from the crowd, and this seemed to unsettle everyone present.
“You allowed it to feel pain?” Jenny sounded disgusted, retreating from the man like he was contagious. “Fuckin’ hell! All you gotta do is flip a switch!” Her stomach twisted as she remembered all the times that she had killed ARI out of boredom. Jenny was a pirate, not a monster.
“It is up to me to decide what I do with my property!” Vander insisted though he found himself moving away from the robot.
“Mr. Extemorst!” Timothy shouted, never having been so appalled in his life. “This has to be the worst thing I’ve ever seen anybody do! How could you be so cruel?”
“I know why.” Declared Sally, moving forward. “Because men like him are all the same, they don’t care about anyone but themselves.”
“Who cares?” Shouted the businessman. “None of this makes any sense! How could my machine do any of this? He was the one that got blown up at my casino, remember?”
The gaze of the crowd turned back to Alex, searching for an explanation, and luckily, he was ready. “Do you remember that false door in your casino? You know- the one you didn’t even know was there? At first, I assumed someone had used it to get inside, but now I realize it was only used to get out!” Raising his hands, he mimed a door opening and stepped forward, almost forgetting where he was standing. “After you put ARI on their post, they simply slipped out the door. Yes, the floor plan wasn’t on the schematics, but anyone who paid any attention to their surroundings could’ve noticed it there. I wonder… raise of hands again, how many of you knew about the back door?”
Over half of the room followed his instructions, raising their hands or other hand-adjacent ligaments. “It ain’t exactly a secret! That casinos always had shit security,” Sally said with a shrug.
Alex continued. “ARI simply strolled out of the back, and I’m sure it wasn’t that hard to find a grenade somewhere! When they came back, they cashed the winning ticket that they had stolen from the body of Corpus Rex and set off the grenade for an alibi.”
“But we saw the footage, remember?” Sophia recalled. “We saw ARI standing there when something fell behind them”
“We saw it through ARI’s perspective!” He clarified. “They simply showed us the footage of themselves looking forward and dropping the grenade behind their back! It was a simple trick, but it was effective. I’m sure if we look further back in the footage, we can see them priming all this to happen.”
“Terribly sorry, fortune-seeker!” The robot beamed. “But my memory-footage has since been erased in ordnance with standard data-space procedures!”
“How convenient.” Neil chided.
“Sir, the allegations currently being presented to me are false, I did not take such actions,” ARI said, its glowing eye’s flashing to its owner. “I believe these lucky Fortune-Seekers have made an error!”
The helmet on WaldAcker’s shoulders tilted over, craning his neck at an awkward angle. “Your theory is rather brilliant, Alex, but it has a bit of a leap of logic.” He spoke. “If ARI hated Vander so badly, why wouldn’t it just kill him?”
The boy clapped his hands together, excited. “You’ve touched on one of the most important points! ARI couldn’t kill Vander, that’s why they did all this! Vander told me himself in his office, IBT droids are programmed to be unable to murder their owners… which you’d think would be a given.”
“Huh, that must be new to the latest model.” The strange man replied.
Vander Extemorst had received way too much abuse for his liking, and he finally stood to defend himself. The stool behind him gave away as he slid to his feet, patting down the sides of his damp suit. “I’ve heard this long enough!” He said, literally putting his foot down. “I will not accept that! Not one line of it, you hear me? It’s clear what you’re doing, you’re trying to humiliate me! Of all the methods to choose, you insist on saying that my machine, which I purchased with my credit, was the one that would dare ruin my life? You can put on this ‘show’ of yours all you like, but we all still know the truth!” It was his turn to point the finger, and he decided that Timothy to be at the receiving end of it. “All this talk, but you're just lying to save your liability of a friend! Let’s not forget the facts, we saw him holding that gun! He did it, and it’s simply impossible that he didn’t!”
With a tender step, Alex removed himself from the bar. He nearly fell again, but it was clear that he had learned from his past mistakes. Taking a confident stride, he walked over to his friends and joined them by their side. “No, Mr. Extemorst, the only thing that is impossible here is that Tim would ever think to hurt someone.” His lips curled in a confident grin. “And I think a famous detective in a silly hat once said, ‘when you have eliminated all which is impossible, then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.’”
For the whole show, Mr. Ham behaved like a gracious audience member and remained silent. He had almost forgotten that he was still holding his cannon- it seemed strangely obsolete now. That strange feeling that he had experienced, the one of doubt and apprehension, was suddenly gone. The boy that had remained an enigma in his eyes now was clear, but there were still the formalities. “Evidence?” He grunted.
“Yes, where is your evidence?” Vander sneered. “You told us a very lovely story, but stories are often fictitious! I know how much you like to lie, boy. Show us the proof!”
John-John nodded in agreement. “Yeah, I ain’t buyin’ it!”
ARI-47 rolled over to his master, taking a position at his side. “Fortune-Seeker, I feel you made have made a miscalculation! Based on my analysis of the situation, all the evidence provided links Timothy to the crime, not me!”
“Yes… I suppose you’re right.” Alex’s head lowered and he hid his face, which caused his friends to exchange worried glances. “In all honesty, it wasn’t until a few minutes ago that I even thought to accuse you. I admit it, I didn’t pay you much attention, much like everyone else in this room. That’s why you did it, isn’t it? All these people passing you by, killing you for fun, and treating you like scrap, it must have been exhausting! Honestly, I feel sympathy for you! People have killed for way less, and a lifetime of death and pain would drive even the strongest of us to break. But this isn’t about Corpus, ARI. This is about Timothy, and if you don’t tell us the truth, my friend is going to die!” He looked at the robot, hoping that the machine had some form of compassion programming. “Tim was never a part of your plan- he was just in the wrong place at the wrong time! It’s ironic, isn’t it? If he hadn’t stumbled over the body, no one would have bothered investigating! Everyone would have moved on like they always do, and you would’ve gotten away with no problem. But he just had to be there, didn’t he? Please, he doesn’t deserve to die for something he didn’t do! If you confess now, maybe everyone will be kind to you?”
The crowd now turned to the robot, holding their breath for its response. The bright lights of its eyes went slanted and low, clearly contemplating the proposal. Timothy felt a tug around his arm, Sophia was holding him closer, and he felt a little bit safer. Something was ticking inside the machine, it was barely noticeable like a clock in the dead of night, but it was there. ARI-47 rolled forward, its eye’s turning into two slanted down lines.
“Apologies, but based on my analysis, you have yet to provide any proof for your claim.” It spoke, almost seeming sad. “I cannot confirm your story, Fortune-Seeker.”
The group of friends all looked at each other, their hearts sinking. Sophia’s grip on Timothy’s arm got tighter, almost to the point of pain. Neil felt the urge to run, but he kept his composure, although he did it with a twitch.
“Well then.” Said Jenny, unenthusiastically. “I guess the show’s over.”
Suddenly, the lights flickered, but oddly instead of turning off, they went brighter. Alex was a blur as he darted to the bar, passing the crowd like a jet plane over a field. With a running leap he jumped right on top of the bar yet again, but this time it was a perfect landing. He spun around on his heel, twirling dramatically as the orange light flooded through the bottles of alcohol on the shelf behind him, reflecting into spectral beams all around the room. “Oh no, the show isn’t over!” He cried with a flourish of his hands. “Did you forget about the audience participation?”
“The what?” Sally gawked.
Ignoring her, the boy went on. “Yes, it’s true! I don’t have any evidence that can prove what I’m saying, but all of you do!”
His audience felt confused, and so did his friends. “Alex, what are you talking about?”
“We’ve had the evidence under our noses the whole time!” He replied with a smile. “It’s hiding in plain sight!”
“Wait, you mean you’ve had the evidence this entire time, and you didn’t say anything?” Sophia gritted her teeth. “God, I could punch you right now!”
“Well, at least wait until I’m finished.” The boy remarked. “Everyone, I need you to think back to the day this all happened! We were in this very cantina, and no one knew what was to come. I need you to think about what happened and visualize it in your head. Don’t think about the lottery or the murder, think about the crime that happened earlier. Do you remember? Vander Extemorst enters with his robot, and after receiving his bad news, he beats ARI to death! What happened then?”
“The poor thing was destroyed!” Timothy spoke up. “But they repaired themself?”
“And what happens when ARI gets killed?” Alex prodded.
“Their number goes up?” Neil proposed.
“Ten points to the boy in the coat!” He cried with a snap of his fingers. “ARI-46 became ARI-47, and everything moved on.”
“I saw it happen before!” Timothy recalled. “At the casino when I first met him. The man who dragged me there shot them, and their number changed!”
“Your friends at IBT would like to show you how many bots you would’ve needed to replace if you didn’t have an ARI!” It was instantly clear that the voice erupting from the machine’s speaker wasn’t voluntary, sounding strained and forced as though it was being squeezed out.
Vander Extemorst rolled his eyes. “Yes, yes, we all know the basics of how my droid operates. What’s the point?”
“No, there’s something else to it,” WaldAcker spoke up, a gloved hand over where his chin would be if he wasn’t wearing a helmet. “They said it to Corpus… the death toll is not affected by self-harm!”
“When you made him leap from the roof, nothing happened.” Alex continued. “WaldAcker remembers correctly, ARI’s number didn’t go up, because technically he caused the death to happen himself.”
“Why does this matter?” Vander spat. “That’s just a feature IBT installed so that weaker-minded owners wouldn’t know if their droid was… unhappy with its existence.”
“Oh my god, you’re such a bastard!” The girl in green yelled. “Don’t you get it?”
Vander frowned. “Get what?”
“Your robot is still ARI-47.” Alex attempted to clarify. “Everybody look! You can see it with your own eyes!”
The robot rolled back as the audience leaned in, inspecting its chest plate. “Why is my function important?” It asked, the lights in its head narrowing.
“Because you made an error, ARI.” The boy said, straightening his tie. “When you blew yourself up at the casino with the grenade, you didn’t take to account that your number wouldn’t change. If Timothy had destroyed you, like how your owner is trying to say, that number would have gone up. The only way that you can still be ARI-47, is if you had done it yourself.” Alex shot a look at Neil. “You were right, it doesn’t add up.”
There was silence.
The ticking inside the robot rang softly through the cantina, and the lights slowly faded to their usual brightness. For a moment, there was no one else on the Ring besides ARI, but that second quickly passed. “C-C-Congratulations Fortune-Seeker!” The machine boomed, taking the room by surprise. “You’ve figured it out! Bravo!”