Isolation

Chapter 22

"Whitfield... Sara... it's not what it looks like."

"Is it?" She asked boldly. "That woman just walked out of your quarters, and now she's dead. You can't explain that?"

"No! I don't know what happened!"

"Pardon me if I'm out of line, sir, but I was there. You were her last known contact."

"No, I wasn't," he said. "You were."

She scoffed. "Me?"

"Yes, you. She was walking out of my room and ran into you. You could have done something to her."

"Why would I do that?"

"I don't know, but during this confrontation, you were the one that was quick to accuse me when I had no intention of marking you as the killer."

"That's something the real killer would say," she said, "to deflect the blame onto someone else. Just because you were not first doesn't mean you're innocent."

"Whitfield, work with me here. She was doing me a service. Why would I kill her? It's not like I can just sleep with anyone on the ship as I please."

No one could really stop you, she thought but didn't say.

"If it wasn't you or me," she said, "then who is it?"

"We don't know that yet."

He looked at the officer.

"You. Did you see anyone?"

"No! I was on my normal patrol and found her on the ground. She was spitting up blood. I didn't know what to do, so I called for help."

He put her head down.

"She's gone. She's dead, and it's my fault."

"Calm down, soldier," Mansell said. "You did what you could. Now isn't the time for emotions. We need facts. If there is a killer on this ship, we need to find who it is."

"If it's poison, then did she drink it? What exactly happened before I showed up?"

"We had a casual conversation for a while. I made some tea. She got some water from the faucet. Then we had some romance, and that was it. I swear nothing else happened. In any case, there's a dead body and an unknown assailant. We need to do an autopsy."

He opened his comm.

"Med Ward, this is the captain. We have a deceased passenger that needs to be transported to perform an autopsy to determine cause of death."

"Right away, sir."

He made another call.

"I need security to Deck Four to transport three potential suspects for murder. Be advised. I am one of the three suspects."

There was silence for a few moments.

"Yes, sir."

He ended the call. He looked at the other guy, then at me.

"We're going to get to the bottom of this one way or the other," he said. "I'm giving one of the other officers control as temporary captain while the investigation takes place. No one say another word until we are questioned."

He looked down at the woman.

"She was beautiful. Such a waste."

~~~

"What is one of our cans doing down here?" James asked.

"I don't know. Could it have fallen from the ship?"