Devolution

Among the first police on the scene was Adrian Jacobssen, who was accompanied by three officers, two Adonites, and a Deist: his second-in-command, Kevin McNalty.

‘Move back, please,’ ordered the policemen as they attempted to create space around the crime scene. The crowd surged, forcing them to use crowd matter propellers, as a less than gentle means of persuasion. CMPs were one of the most popular new toys for police officers available and were very effective in most cases. Unfortunately now was not one of those times because some of the on-lookers could not retreat due to the pressure on them from the human swell behind. A deadly crush of rubber-neckers.

‘Move back!’ yelled the police. Firing rapid short bursts from their CMPs, they were eventually able to subdue the crowd, many of whom were slightly injured in the squeeze. Curiosity had hurt a few of these cats so they decided to take their bruised bodies home. It was an offense to disobey any order from a police officer, and everyone knew that, but people being people they simply could not help themselves sometimes. Police were taught, and reminded continually via official memos, to be mindful of the failings of humanity and not be too legalistic in the application of public order laws. Knowing where to draw the line was a skill only experience could instill in an officer. Trainees and junior officers often had to bumble their way through an embarrassing series of mistakes, usually in the form of exuberant overreactions, before they learned to properly handle a crowd.

‘Bloody vultures!’ said a young Adonite officer, full of raging testosterone.

‘You’d think they’ve never seen a corpse before.’

Jacobssen turned sharply to face the young man and said, ‘They probably haven’t.’

The following two hours witnessed a repeat performance of what had transpired earlier at parliament house. Same procedure: different environment, different faces, and different circumstances. Definitely a case of murder however, definitely an assassination and definitely linked to the parliament house strike on Senator 15.

Adrian stood and contemplated Harish Singh’s corpse. Two hours ago or less, he had talked to the man; sat face to face with a living person, seen anger and confusion in his eyes, smelled anguish on his breath. A life hurt but not destroyed. Now the senator was a lifeless piece of meat: another statistic.

‘Sir?’ said one of the Adonite officers.

Adrian had not heard him the first time, but now looked away from the Senator’s body slowly as though afraid to lose him.

‘Detective Martini from F.I.U. wants to talk to you.’

‘Where is he?’

‘Over there talking to his partner,’ replied the officer, turning and pointing towards two men wearing dark suits and serious faces.

‘Well, if they want to talk to me they had better bloody well come over here then.’

The officer left with a nod of his head, and Adrian chided himself for becoming unsettled and talking like that. It was an overreaction. The Federal Investigation Unit had a job to do, just like he did. There was really no need to be offended or agitated by their presence except for…As the memories surfaced he banished them immediately, straining to push away the mental pictures of his wife, Monica.

The F.I.U. told him they did all they could but he didn’t believe them. They had all failed him, the F.I.U., the doctors, all of them, and now he was alone. He felt like all that was good about him had died in that operating theater when Monica drew her last breath.

The two federal officers approached Jacobssen.

‘Detective Martini,’ said the shorter of the two before gesturing to the other, ‘this is Detective Huy Luc. F.I.U.’

‘Gentlemen,’ said Adrian politely. ‘Chief Inspector Jacobssen. Are you guys up to speed on the 15 case?’

They nodded in unison.

‘Agreed are we,’ continued Adrian, ‘that the two apparent murders are related?’

They nodded again.

Adrian looked at Martini, then at Huy Luc and raised his eyebrows. ‘You guys don’t say much do you?’

Martini smiled a weird sort of smile, possibly the least sincere smile Adrian had ever seen. ‘Do you have any suspects or leads at this stage?’

‘Nothing apart from the killer of Singh himself, a Deist by the name of Moses but he’s also dead on the scene and there’s no way, in my opinion, he was acting alone. How about you?’

They shook their heads in unison.

‘Are you guys for real?’

Martini pulled a business card from the breast pocket of his suit and handed it to Adrian. ‘Keep us informed of any developments, Chief Inspector.’

The twin detectives walked away but were replaced almost immediately with a press gang. Jacobssen dutifully answered the questions mostly with curt ‘no comments’ and then dismissed them. Reluctantly they were hustled away by Adrian’s officers. Gathered outside the Hibiscus Club, the reporters and their film crews had been listening and uploading the information as he spoke with the F.I.U. guys so their questioning was more a formality than a quest for information.

He stood for a while watching Singh’s body being carried away and placed inside the coroner’s van, then stared at the place where he had fallen dead to the pavement. There was something deeply troubling about these murders. A policeman for thirty years and chief of detectives in Mumbai for three, Jacobssen had never faced anything like this. Political assassinations were rare, none since the war was concluded by the Treaty of Darwin. Two in one day? Unheard of.

Born in the early post war years, Adrian celebrated his tenth birthday on the anniversary of the signing of the treaty. In the years immediately following the war, when the survivors struggled to overcome their shock at the devastation it had wrought across the planet, and attempted to rebuild their lives, peace reigned. It seemed as though the war had achieved some good in purging aggression and selfishness from the human psyche. Unfortunately it was an illusion, a honeymoon period which only lasted as long as it took people to recover their old lives and move forward. As time passed, the horrors of the war, although still fresh in many of the survivor’s minds, were not strong enough or vivid enough to prevent people from lapsing into the kind of behavior that led to the outbreak of war initially.

He knew of course, from history lessons at school, about the two infamous political assassinations which many believe directly led to the declaration of war. Mohammed Shah III, the Yemeni dictator in late 2049, and soon after, in early 2050, the American president Cain McMurtry who was killed by his own personal bodyguard.

‘Excuse me sir,’ said McNalty who had moved to Jacobssen’s side without him knowing, ‘Have we finished here?’

‘Yes, forensics will be a little longer but our job here is over. Now we have to try to find out who did this.’

‘We already got the guy, didn’t we? The deist, Moses. He was D.O.A at the scene.’

‘He wasn’t acting alone. He was put up to it, and he probably wasn’t responsible for the murder of Senator 15 either, yet these crimes are related. I know it.’

‘How do you know it, sir?’

Jacobssen looked the officer directly in the eyes and said, ‘It’s a hunch. I believe the two senators were murdered and someone is responsible for both these deaths. I don’t have any evidence yet but that’s our job now, to find the evidence and find out who was behind this.’

Noticing the other officer seemed ready to argue the point, Jacobssen prepared to explain himself further, but for some reason the young man changed his mind.

‘See you back at the House. You right for a lift?’

Jacobssen nodded and quickly returned his thoughts to the birth of the New Asian government which was formed six months after the Darwin Treaty. Was he getting old? Is that why he indulged himself so often these days with rivers of nostalgia? There were much more urgent tasks to which he should set his intellect, but these increasingly frequent trips down memory lane were oddly comforting.

Fascinated by politics and history, Jacobssen had been a keen student of both all through his schooling, from primary school to university where he was awarded a first class honors degree in political science. Nobody understood why he had chosen to join the police force. His parents and tutors all though it was a waste of his abilities. He could find precious few of his peers to support him either and sometimes he wasn’t totally sure himself. There was one friend who encouraged him all the way, even through his own doubts. Her name was Monica. She reminded him continually of the need to be obedient to his calling. No one else thought of the job as a calling but it rung a note of authenticity in Adrian’s mind. The friendship grew to love and after graduation, he married his inspiration: Monica.

The footpath outside the club was now almost deserted again in stark contrast to the mass of energy inside, with just the occasional walker strolling past, and the odd club patron coming or going. Traffic on the street flowed normally as the city returned to its rushed but comfortable pace as though nothing had ever happened. Jacobssen decided to leave as well.

As he drove, he thought of how the New Asian government had offered so much hope, had presented such a positive message of unity through diversity, it was impossible for the people of Asia not to support them and help them and hope to God they were right. Initially egalitarian, the newly elected parliament soon began to struggle with the same divisive forces that had plagued mankind all through human history. After only a year the parliament announced its inability to achieve consensus on a significant number of issues and dissolved itself. New parties were born along tribal lines; the Newtonians, the Adonites and the Deists came to the fore all espousing the romantic credo that differences did not mean there could be no cooperation. Unfortunately none of the parties had a clear policy agenda, nor were any of them forward thinking enough to be truly effective.

Then, in May 2065, an independent body of environmental scientists released the Kinshasha Report; the finding of a ten year study into the immediate and long term environmental impacts of the war. Its conclusion predicted a global ecological disaster. In the ensuing years, the differences between the tribes became more pronounced as each responded differently to this threat. Scientists across the world began to realize the environmental effects of the war which included low to non-existent rainfall despite continually cloudless skies, accompanied by high temperatures and humidity, were yet to reach their full impact. The acceptance of the Kinshasha Report gave birth to a complete reorientation of scientific research and development programs around the world.

Jacobssen continued to drive through the bustling city without paying much attention to life outside his transporter as he lamented the fact that the only institution which had remained truly egalitarian was the police force. It was the last bastion against the tide of tribalism. From the beginning he had always felt the tribal division and the continual emphasis on differences and isolationist policy production from their representatives in parliament could only be bad for society.

He had been an enthusiastic and active campaigner against tribalism right up to the day his beloved Monica failed to return from work. Jacobssen felt raw emotion balloon inside him as he remembered the note which had made it quite clear that he was being punished for his outspoken stance, and he took the hint. The next time he saw his wife, three days later, she was dead. Willing to do anything to have Monica back, he had immediately stopped his vociferous protests but they had killed her anyway. With her died his inspiration and his will to continue the fight. Many causes and injustices continued to haunt him but from that day he lost the energy and enthusiasm to be their champion.

Despite not having a strong faith himself, Jacobssen was also worried by the strong atheistic bent of the world’s leaders. He felt it was a gross overreaction on their part against what they believed was the source of the conflict which boiled over and gave birth to war; religion. Whoever or whatever men wanted to blame for their various misfortunes, suffering always came down to the selfish decisions of individuals. Blaming God or religion was a cop out. People who put their own interests over and above the interests of others were the real culprits.

Bang! With a jolt, Jacobssen was expelled from his melancholy. He had collided with another RV so he issued the safety override and ordered the doors to open. The engine had been automatically turned off on impact.

As he got out of his RV and looked around he saw he had been run into from behind. Startling! A Newtonian emerged from the offending vehicle which sported a severely crumpled front end, and glided towards him shouting abuse.

Noticing the damaged white RV had no markings, Jacobssen prepared to run a search on stolen vehicles but the angry Newtonian advanced on him too quickly, and was yelling in his face.

‘Don’t you know the difference between stop and go? Are you color blind, you moron?’

Holding up his hand to silence the angry man who was shaking in his hoverchair, Jacobssen pulled his wallet from his pocket and opened it in clear view of the other revealing his police badge.

Surprisingly, this did nothing to placate the man. ‘A policeman? That’s even worse, you are a disgrace. Why don’t you pay attention, fool!’

‘Sir, I realize you are upset but abusing me will only get you into more trouble.’

‘More trouble,’ shrieked the man as he brought his chair right up to Jacobssen’s chest. ‘Why do you say more trouble? I’m not in trouble. You are! You caused the accident.’

This man’s reaction seemed so out of proportion to the scale of the accident that Adrian felt a laugh stirring inside him. He wasn’t hurt and the damage to his RV would be repaired quite easily. Why was he so irate? Why wasn’t he, like Adrian himself, wondering what the hell went wrong with the A.C.S on both vehicles?

‘No sir,’ replied Jacobssen calmly. ‘It was, as you say, an accident. First of all, as I was traveling slowly and the light turned amber, I stopped.’

A bubble of saliva popped on his protruding bottom lip as the livid Newtonian opened his frog like mouth to speak, but closed it quickly when Jacobssen raised his large hand again to warn him. ‘Secondly,’ Adrian continued, ‘Your anti collision sensors appear not to have worked. Were you aware they were faulty?’

The other looked surprised by the question.

A crowd had gathered around the two men, and traffic had completely stopped moving in both directions. There was some yelling and some honking of horns, but generally the gathered mob were merely interested on-lookers. Some obviously as amused as Jacobssen felt.

‘If I knew I had faulty A.C.S., do you think I’d be driving around?’ asked the Newtonian recovering his attacking frame of mind and speech. ‘Especially with idiots like you on the road.’

Someone booed and was joined by a hiss of disapproval. The man was making enemies with every word he spoke against Jacobssen. The police were respected by the general population. Many however were the enemies of the Newtonians and their number was growing quickly. This one was not doing the already bad reputation of his race, any favors by his performance.

‘I suggest you control yourself, sir. Are you hurt?’

‘I might be.’

Another boo from the nearby crowd. Turning sharply to discover its source, Jacobssen noticed the scene had become dangerous. The novelty of the event - transport collisions almost never happened anymore thanks to A.C.S. - was beginning to wear off and people were becoming agitated, eager to continue on their way.

Excusing himself, Jacobssen returned to his transport and called to confirm crowd control assistance was en route, hearing as he did the arrival of some of his police colleagues. Next he activated his C.M.P.

A swarming hive of people buzzed in to fill the space all around the two men and their vehicles, and began jostling. The jeering and hissing grew louder and Jacobssen was pushed accidentally by a man who had in turn been pushed by another. Despite the presence of more police with more not far away, Adrian realized the situation was quickly getting out of control. The crowd was like fish dumped into a fisherman’s bucket after being pulled out of the river. Regaining his feet, Jacobssen did not see a short, slightly built man slip through the crowd and move purposefully towards him.

Dressed all in black, the man reached into his pocket and withdrew an electrogun. Two meters from Jacobssen, now one, and stretching out his right hand with finger on the trigger he neared the chief inspector who was still oblivious to the immediate danger. Suddenly the hole the would-be killer had been squeezing through closed, and he was knocked over. As he fell, he pulled the trigger and the electrogun fired a compressed beam of energy towards the police chief. Cutting through the flesh of two people standing in the way, the beam had lost its force by the time it reached its intended target. Jacobssen felt a stinging sensation in his chest, like a wasp bite, without realizing what had happened or how close he had come to death.

The man managed to scramble back away from the middle of the crowd and escape into the waiting arms of two policemen. They disarmed him and locked his hands in suspension, but before they could move him away and secure him inside the police ATV, he collapsed suddenly on the footpath; dead.

Moving slowly through the crowd, barking orders to disperse, and clearing people from their path with C.M.P.s, Jacobssen’s fellow officers reached him by the side of his vehicle. Jacobssen brushed off concerned inquiries about his health and pointed to the other car.

‘Find the Newtonian. The driver of that RV. He caused the accident. I think it was deliberate.’ The car was abandoned in the middle of the road where the collision had occurred and the Newtonian had disappeared in the crowd, merging easily with the throng.