STAR TREK: A Long Road (Voyager Fix It Quest)

Tuvok frowned. "I shall talk to Dr. Kray. Can you interview Mrs. Ren?"

Kes gave him a quick nod and the two advanced in opposite directions.

The turbolift opened onto the rain and Tuvok stepped out. "Dr. Kray!" He called out as Dr. Kray walked to one of the corner side transportation pads, surrounded by a thin plastic partition to keep anyone from stepping onto it by accident. Dr. Kray, his umbrella in his hands, turned and sighed.

"What?" he asked, his beak grinding as he turned to face Tuvok. "Did you not get that I didn't want to talk to you offworlders?"

"This is an ongoing murder investigation, Mr. Kray," Tuvok said, walking forward, rain pattering onto his hat, streaming along the shoulders of his brown coat. "You can't simply walk away from it."

Mr. Kray sighed. "Fine. Ask your questions." He said, leaning against the plastic partition.

Kes stepped to the door, and her voice was soft. "Miss Ren? I'm Kes, I'm from the USS Voyager. May I come in and speak with you?"

The door opened and Kes found herself looking in at a beautiful Beaneran woman - her plumage tall and vibrantly colored, her beak a sleek little triangle of nearly orange keratin that she had touched up with a bit of coloring and makeup, though it looked faded now. Her eyes were rimmed with red. Even in a species with feather and fur, she had red eyes from crying. "What is it?" she asked, her voice tight.

"We're...investigating your husband's murder," Kes said, gently. "And, uh...I...what the fuck was that up with Dr. Kray? I'm not being nosy, we're just trying to find out who killed your husband and...motive...you know?"

Lindel laughed, bitterly. "Oh...oh, yes, that little sniveling toad bastard would have killed Tol, if he thought he could get away with it. But his alibi is airtight - he was nowhere near...the..." She shook her head. "He was here to offer his condolences." She frilled up her ruff. "He put his hand on my ass."

"What a dick!" Kes exclaimed.

Lindel let out a little churring hiss of pure rage. "That's one way to put it."

"Tell me, were you-" Tuvok started.

"Mr. Tuvok, please, if we must converse, can we at least get out of the rain?" Dr. Kray asked, gesturing. A tiny tremor went along his hand. His breath caught as he spoke, like he was breathing heavily. Like he had run quite far, quite fast. "We can beam to my offices, and talk somewhere sensible."

Tuvok inclined his head. "Logical," he said. He stepped forward, but he moved with his body angled slightly - shoulder forward, presenting a narrowed profile to the agitated doctor.

And then, as he came close, Dr. Kray jerked something blunt and rough and rectangular. He thrust it in Tuvok's general direction as the rain came pouring down and pulled back on the trigger.

Kes watched Lindel, looking so sad and angry, her eyes focused on the window of the room, at the streaks of raindrops sliding along the window. Her reflection looked broken up by jagged lines of water. She sighed and then said, quietly. "I still can't believe he's gone, you know. Tolen and I would always look at the stars together - but...now...I can't see anything out there." She looked into the window, turned into a mirror by the light in the place.

"Tolen might be gone," Kes said, quietly. "But you can still get justice for him - come with us."

"I play a detective on TV. I'm not-" A flash of light came from the streets. "That was a beam!"

"Shit!" Kes hissed, drawing her phaser from her transporter buffer. "Come on!"

She sprinted down the corridor, hit the turbolift, and then barked out: "Ground floor!" Moments before Lindel reached the door, the other woman running after her. Kes realized, then, it might have been a bad idea to ask for Lindel to come along - but before she could process that, the turbolift doors opened and she sprang out, rushing to cover, phaser at the ready.

She saw Tuvok standing above a prone figure, his hand drawing away from his throat. "Ah, Miss Kes, Mrs. Ren. I believe we have found the murderer."

"...oh..." Kes said as she looked down at the prone Dr. Kray, who was still grasping a crude phaser.

Tuvok picked up the phaser, frowning. "This has been modified to not be detectable by local security..." He frowned.

"That's great! We just call them and-" Kes started.

"We need more evidence," Tuvok said, his voice firm. "This proves that Dr. Kray attempted to kill me. The local authorities need no room to wiggle out from the accusations against Tom. Pick him up. Do you mind, overly much, Mrs. Ren, if we interrogate him there?"

"Not at all," Lindel growled.

They hustled into the building and into the turbolift, dragging the unconscious man. Kes glanced around quickly, but saw no one looking their way. In the turbolift, Lindel was practically quivering with rage. She glared down at him, her voice soft. "This bastard..." she whispered. Tuvok shook his head, ever so slightly.

"I must ask you to restrain your emotions for the time being, Mrs. Ren," he said, then the turbolift doors opened and they hustled into her apartment. There, Kes and Lindel set Kray against the couch, and Kes hastily tied him up, using her rolls of duct tape - pulled straight from her transporter buffer. Once she was done, they stepped back - and Dr. Kray groaned, opening his eyes slowly.

"Good evening, Dr. Kray," Tuvok said.

Dr. Kray glared at him.

"If you would like to confess-"

"I would like to see my lawyer," Dr. Kray said, his voice clear.

Tuvok frowned. "Is that so. He will be most interested in hearing what we've discovered," he said. Tuvok frowned to himself. They had a number of clues - but Tom had a limited amount of time. If Dr. Kray tied things up in legal proceedings, maybe made up a lie about thinking himself threatened by the off-worlders, then the already antagonistic government would have every reason to be on his side. That slowdown would lead, then, to Mr. Paris' death.

He needed to convince Dr. Kray that they had him dead to rights, with an airtight case...

---
We're at the FINAL update! Based on the clues you have, construct what happened. The more right you are, the more likely Tom lives without having to beam him out with a daring commando raid. We've got a motive, we've got a killer, now we just need to convince everyone else!

[ ] Write in

"I want my-" Dr. Kray started again.

"Dr Kray, the morning of the murder you stumbled upon Lindel and Mr Paris engaging in what they expected to be a cuckold scene expecting to be found by Dr Ren instead. Instead, you found them. Correct?" Tuvok asked. He saw the flush on his nares, blood flowing beneath his beak. "Lying about it will serve no one - Lindel has already told us."

"...yes," Dr. KRay growled.

"Uou had already decided to kill Dr Ren at this point, having an alibi setup and you were on the hill to find a point on the face visible to both your alibi and the house," Tuvok said.

"Now, hold up here-"

"Backups of the security logs shows you, Dr Kray, providing instruction to the automatons at the house to take a mirror to the hill at a predetermined time," Tuvok said - a statement that caused Kes to look at him in shock. Dr. Kray...though...

Looked smug.

He smirked. "And did they find any evidence of a reflector? Or any of them missing? No. They didn't. They're all nice and in place, fully accounted for."

Tuvok cocked his head. "That is true," he said. "However, I did not say they took one of your experimental reflectors. I said they took a mirror."

Dr. Kray blinked, then tried to hide whatever he felt about it.

"A mirror you had specially designed for the act," Tuvok said, sureness growing in himself. "A mirror-"

"There'd be something left, particles, you have nothing!" Dr. Kray shot back, his voice desperate. But then Kes snapped her fingers.

"Mercury, the cops found mercury there-"

"Not enough!" Dr. Kray exclaimed.

"There is one thing we found there. In abundance. In such abundance that it would have been dismissed," Tuvok said, then turned to Lindel. "Mrs. Ren. Please call your maidbots and query any of them if they have been tasked with refrigeration logistics. Specifically...in the movement of ice."

Lindel blinked, then pulled out her communicator. She flipped it open as Dr. Kray froze - and then she spoke into it softly, then turned up the volume on the speaker: "Robot-3 task report: Move ice sculpture to picnic."

"Ice?" Lindel asked.

"Ice...coated with a thin layer of mercury to turn it into a mirror, placed just as Mr. Paris arrived. His being present at the hill must have been an unexpected complication to your assassination. Without him, the modified phaser would have been completely undetected, and there would have been no warning that something was amiss. His medical alert that recorded his time of death would simply have been written off as an accidental discharge of high energy particles from an experiment he was working on, the exact cause easily able to he setup after the fact if required. Even if someone suspected a weapon discharge from the hill they would find no evidence of a shooter due to the vanishing mirror - with the storm coming tonight, you knew the water would be missed, as easily as a tree in the forest."

Dr. Kray gaped at him.

"But Mr Paris is a Starfleet officer. He returned fire. This triggered the security response and foiled the rest of the existing plan, leaving you to improvise as what was supposed to have gotten treated as an accidental death instead started a murder investigation."

"B...I..." Dr. Kray stammered.

"We have been working with the local authorities since the start of the investigation and sharing our findings and evidence with them. While I understand your legal system offers you a number of protections to attempt to stall I also understand that the Death Penalty is common for crimes of this nature. Starfleet does not condone such sentencing and outside of a request for asylum cannot interfere. I suggest you cooperate with the local authorities, case history shows a high likelyhood of a man of your background and lineage being offered a plea deal for a significantly lesser charge when the victim has been...someone like Dr. Ren."

Lindel drew in a sharp, short gasp, but did not comment more. Dr. Kray hung his head forward.

"I just...why did you love him!?" he asked, jerking his head up. "How!?"

Lindel turned her back on him, snarling. "If you have to ask, you'll never get it. I...g-get him out of here!" She put her hands over her face, as Kes stepped forward, shoving him to his feet.

"Lets get you to the station," she said, her voice tight and furious. She shoved him towards the door and Dr. Kray stumbled, his head hanging forward - defeated. The two left the room as rain continued to patter against the window. Tuvok turned to look at Lindel, who was wringing her hands as she stood before the window.

"What was the point, Mr. Tuvok? I..." She turned back, her eyes gleaming with tears.

"There's rarely a point, Mrs. Ren," Tuvok said. "Among my people, we try to control these emotions for this very reason."

"S-So...no murders on Vulcan, huh?" Lindel sniffed, then sat down on a chair. "It sounds nice."

Tuvok lifted an eyebrow. "I never said there were no murders on Vulcan. They just are draped in logic, hiding the base emotional reasons behind them. We seek to control our emotions. But we often do not attain the mastery we look for." He placed a hand on her shoulder, with a stiff formality that somehow did little to dim the compassion of the gesture. "It is not logical to blame oneself for actions beyond our control. And yet, Vulcans do this as well."

Lindel placed a scaled hand on his hand, squeezing. She looked out to the darkness - and her beak clicked as she realized that she could see, faintly twinkling, the stars.