To: 
From: "Jay  P Hailey" 
Reply-To: trekcreative{at}yahoogroups.com


Title: Long Arms
Author: Jay P. Hailey (jayphailey{at}tic1.net) and K.A. Strickland Series:
Vista City/Four Corners
Part: 08/13
Rating [PG] (Some Violence)

 Breakfast tasted especially good to Karla.  She knew she was hungry because
it was Denny's and Denny's was never that good.

 Over some special with a funny name Sonja asked casually.  "How are you
feeling, today?"

 Karla thought it over.  "I'm fine.  Why?"

 Sonja took a deep breath.  "Because you were a might...  testy,
yesterday."

 Karla opened her mouth the reply harshly and then realized how it would
sound.  She looked deeply into her breakfast as she gathered her thoughts.
"It was a long plane ride."

 "Have you ever flown before?"  Sonja asked.

 Karla shook her head. "Not like that."

 Sonja sighed.  "It can sneak up on you.  You're physically fine, but
emotionally drained."

 Karla nodded.  "I think I'll be able to do better today."

 Sonja asked  "Have you traveled very much?"

 "Well, a little."  Karla admitted.  "This is the furthest
that I have ever
traveled, before."

 Sonja nodded.  "Why not?"

 Karla looked at her.  "You don't know?"

 Sonja shrugged.  "Nope."

 "Well, like it said on the news, until recently the existence of people
with four arms was a closely held secret."  Karla explained.  She was
hoping to lead Sonja into remembering the events of the last two years
without heavy coaching.

 "Why isn't it secret any more?  Why was that any reason not to travel?"
Sonja asked.

 "Seriously.  You don't know?" Karla said stunned.

 "Nope."  Sonja said.

 "Well, two years ago this summer, the story of our existence was broken
when one of our truck drivers named Cody Macabee had an accident and was
rescued by government agents."  Karla started.

 "Two years this summer? That explains it.  I was in Calgary, Canada at a
ski lodge.  There was no cable and I didn't give a damn enough to learn how
to work the satellite.  I was isolated from the world media for the entire
off season."  Sonja said.

 "You have no idea how fortunate you are." Karla said.

 "Sure I do." Sonja grinned.  "So this Macabee guy turned into a media
circus, huh?"

 Karla nodded soberly.  "Uh huh. And when the press discovered that there
was a whole town full of us, the Circus came straight to Four Corners."

 "And poof! No more secret, huh?" Sonja said.  "I bet that
was mess."

 "We had a number of deaths.  Someone took a shot at the President and
killed our Mayor."  Karla explained.  "It was a nightmare."

 "The President?  You mean of the United States?"  Sonja asked.

 Karla nodded soberly.

 "Wow.  And yet when I came back to town there was not a word anywhere."
Sonja said.

 "Once it became plain that gun battles and assassinations were not on the
regular social calendar of Four Corners the mainstream media sort of lost
interest.  We stayed quiet.  America stayed complacent.  Soon enough the
Ukraine/Russia war brewed up and all the people in the Banana Republic
clothing left to find more blood." Karla said.

 Sonja shook her head.  "I always thought that the short-attention-span
press was it's own reward.  It worked out okay for you."

 Karla nodded.  "It worked out okay. That was because we didn't solve the
problem in an hour including commercial breaks.  Nothing was solved.
Nothing really changed.  We got our fifteen minutes and then were left
waiting for the next shoe to drop."

 "But that still doesn't explain why you didn't travel much, yourself."
Sonja said.

 Karla stared.  She wriggled twenty fingers in the air.  "Hello?  I have
four arms.  We all do.  It's weird and it's a secret.  We were honestly
afraid that if it came out, we'd be hunted down and exterminated, or locked
into concentration camps and tortured in mad experiments.  It simply never
occurred to anyone that we'd turn out like the Spice Girls.  Fifteen
minutes and then 'Yawn, what's on the next channel, Marge'!  We're
yesterday's news."

 "Ah," Sonja got it.  "But before then, the outsiders were the enemy.
Unpredictable and untrustworthy.  Liable to turn and get you at a moment's
notice."

 Karla nodded.  "Yep.  It hasn't gone away.  Just now it's on a quieter one-
on-one basis.  Sometimes people can deal with you and sometimes they can't."

 "I know exactly what you mean." Sonja said.

 "Really."  Karla challenged.  "I don't see your other set
of arms."

 "You're not looking closely enough.  I am a Gypsy."  Sonja explained.

 "What?"  Karla was confused.  "What does that have to do
with it?"

 "You don't know anything about Gypsies?" Sonja grinned. 
"Looks like the
shoe is on the other foot, now."

 "I've led a sheltered life. Please explain."  Karla said, scooping up the
last of her breakfast.

 "We're the terminal outsiders. Always on the move. Always viewed with
suspicion.  Always in a state of undeclared war with the outsiders.  I
moved around a lot as a child.  No school, no permanent last name, no
friends outside of the Gypsy community."

 "Ugh."  Karla said "I'm sorry."  She tried to picture
growing up without
Four Corners around her and failed utterly.

 "Well it's not that bad really." Sonja said.  "It's just
different from
what you're used to.  And yes, just like your people, we were told that if
the outsiders ever paid any real attention to us, then we'd be arrested,
killed, carted off to concentration camps, and so on.  It happened
before."

 "Really?"  Karla sounded surprised.

 "World War 2?"  Sonja said.  "Gypsies went into the ovens
along side the
Jews.  Our reaction was different, though. We became more committed to
hiding and stayed out of 'normal' society."

 "And yet, here you are." Karla pointed out.  "Wearing a
badge and enforcing
the law."

 "It's just something I do today."  Sonja shrugged.

 "Oh. And tomorrow?"

 "We'll see about that when it happens.  Are you done with your breakfast?"

 Karla looked down and was surprised to find her plates clean.  "I guess
so."

 "We can pick some donuts on the way into the office, but I would like to
move, now." Sonja said grabbing her purse.

 "Why?"

 "Scott warned me when he asked me to pick you up this morning.  The media
has been alerted to your presence."  Sonja said standing up.

 Karla hurried to catch up. "That explains the hippy-mobile."

 "You have to admit, no one is going to mistake it for an official car."
Sonja grinned.

 "Not by a long shot." Karla smiled back.

-*-

 "Does your presence mean we can expect more four armed people coming to
Vista City?"  The reporter asked.

 "As Americans we are free to move around the country.  I am a resident of
Four Corners, Georgia and I have no plans to change that."  Karla answered.

 "Do you attribute the murder of the four armed woman to racial prejudice?"

 "We are working to ascertain the motive for the crime now."

 "Do you have any suspects?"

 "We are working on several promising leads."

 "Sheriff Morgan? Jerry Berry, San Francisco Chronicle.  Does this mark the
beginning of the end for the isolation of Four Corners and it's people?"

 Karla sighed.  "The beginning of the end was two years ago. All the King's
Horses and all the King's Men can't put that particular shell back together
again."

 "Then why are you here?" Another reporter barked.

 "Was that some sort of obscure reference?" another chimed in.

 By then Karla was through the guard of uniformed officers holding the front
door against the frenzied reporters.  She turned to face them and bellowed
"Thank you gentlemen! Now I must get to work!"

 The roar in return was deafening.

-*-

 "So you don't like Freddie Rios for it?"  Karla asked.

 "No."  Angelo said.  "On the surface it looks good but
right under the
surface it all falls apart."

 "So what's the next move?" Scott asked.

 "Well there are two courses of action open to us.  Both of them are fairly
routine investigation procedures.  We question Mrs. Arnold and the regulars
of 'The Soul Attraction' about the other car, and we start digging into
Marlene's past."  Angelo explained.

 "What?  Why?"  Karla asked.

 "It's twelve times more likely that a murder victim has been killed by a
member of his or her immediate family as any other category of
assailant." Angelo explained.

 "The next most common form of murder is the drunken brawl."  Rebecca said.
"I don't think we're looking at one of those."

 "Don't you think that this could be the act of a person with some grudge
against four armed people?" Karla asked.

 Sonya shook her head sadly.  "It could easily be, but that leaves us
nothing to do.  With no connection between the killer and the victim,
tracking the killer becomes much more difficult and conviction becomes
unlikely at best."

 Karla sighed deeply.  "Well I can assure you digging into Marlene's past
beyond the last year is a dead end."

 "What makes you say so?" Scott asked.

 "Because Four Corners is a small town.  It seems even smaller than usual
because we're all kind of stuck together.  If there was anyone liable to
murder Marlene then I would have known about it long before now."
Karla explained.

 "Oh." Angelo said quietly.

 "So why did she leave?" Sonja asked.

 "What?" Karla said irritatedly.

 "Why did Marlene Summers leave Four Corners?"  Sonja asked again.

 "Oh, well I suppose it was to seek greater career opportunities as a
singer..."  Karla said.

 "Don't you know?" Rebecca asked pointedly.

 "Ah..."  Karla frowned.  "No.  She never told us.  One day
we woke up to
the news that she was gone."

 "Did she stay in touch with anyone in Four Corners?  Did she write letters,
telephone anyone on a regular basis?" Scott asked.

 Karla shook her head. "Not that I am aware of."

 Angelo nodded.  "Uh huh.  Then that's what we dig into next."

 "You're not even going to double check on the racist violence angle?"
Karla asked.

 "Sure we will."  Scott said.  "But solving murder is a game
of the odds,
really.  We'll try to track down the type of car seen at the time and start
asking questions of local hate groups.  But the odds say that it's someone
close to Marlene and so we'll check that out, too."

 "And what does that entail?" Karla asked.

-*-

 "You want to go to Four Corners?"  Moody asked surprised. 
"I don't know if
I can find the money for that..."  Assistant Chief Alejandro Moody was
of average height, a trim figure, short, bushy black hair and an olive
complexion.  He was younger than most of the Detectives he supervised.
Moody had the schooling and the training to make Chief Arbuckle look good
and that secured his position.

 "That's where the immediate family lives.  That's where the woman's past
is.  That's where I have to go to dig."  Angelo said.  "Don't
worry about it.  I'll hop a plane and go myself off the budget."

 "I might know someone who could help..." Scott said thoughtfully.  Would
Dane Taylor agree to foot the bill for the investigation?

 "Tell the Chief that this will get the controversy out of his jurisdiction
and away from the local media's zone of coverage." Sonja suggested,
only half joking.

 Moody sighed "That might work, if I absolutely have to beard the lion in
his den.  I'd rather find a way around it if I can.  Can't you suggest a
line of inquiry to Sheriff Morgan and have her people there look into
it?"

 Angelo and Scott looked extremely uncomfortable.

 Sonja looked about ready to say something but couldn't quite work out how
to say it.

 "Mr. Moody."  Karla said grimly.  "I think that your people
are off on an
irrelevant trail myself, but I can't claim anything like the experience in
this type of investigation that I'm told Detective Mancuso has.  Maybe it's
a little spendy, but I'd like your people to get to know this brick wall
really up close and personal, so that we can get back on track more quickly
and find the murderer."

 "Maybe Four Corners doesn't have the same sorts of budget problems as Vista
City, Sheriff, but I'm working off of the Vista City budget and I have to
pinch every penny that happens by until it screams."  Moody said
"In short, I don't think we can afford it unless the mayor and the
City Council okay an emergency outlay.  And that's not going to happen any
time soon."  Moody said sadly.

 "May I use your phone?  I think I can find a way around this problem."
Karla said.  She'd never heard a city official complain about his budget
being too tight before.  Mike Conners and Jim Mosley regularly returned
money to the individual tax payers because the income tax on the Industrial
Waste plant in Four Corners paid off so heavily in income tax that the city
was barely able to spend it all, even with extravagant investment in
education and services.

-*-

 "Jim, I have Karla for you on line one." Ricky said.

 Mosley snapped up the phone and jammed the button.  "Karla!  How are you?"

 "Fine, Jim.  The people handling the case are treating me very nicely and
things are going well."  Karla said.

 "How's the case going?  Got any suspects?"  Mosley asked.

 "No suspects.  There was one local who looked good but there's no evidence
for him. They let him go twenty minutes ago.  The lead Detective says we
need to start poking into Marlene's background for leads and possible
motives."  Karla said.

 "What do you think about that?"  Mosley asked.

 "Well, I don't think that they'll find anything, but we wanted an honest
investigation.  It seems like it would be spitting in Kharma's eye to deny
it when it goes places we don't like."  Karla said.

 Mosley thought about it.  "Did they tell you the statistic that it's twelve
times more likely that you'll be murdered by someone in your immediate family?"

 "Yep. That's exactly the one they referred to."

 "Ah Hell.  That means they're treading water and hoping for a break.  Okay,
bring 'em down and let them spin their wheels in beautiful down town Four
Corners."  Mosley said.

 "You've been hanging around with the tourist bureau for too long." Karla
said.

 "We don't have a tourist bureau, Sheriff."  Mosley growled.

 "See?  I have been gone for too long.  Jim, one more thing.  I'm going to
have to truck them down on my expense account.  Their Assistant Chief says
that he can't pay for the tickets to get them down there."  Karla
said.

 Mosley rolled his eyes and sighed heavily.  "What the hell?  It's only
money."

 "Thanks Jim.  We'll prepare Marlene's remains for shipment and be on the
first flight down."

 "Right. How many should I tell Marcy to get ready for?"  Mosley asked.

 "Hold on."  Karla told Jim.  "How many are you
sending?" she asked Scott.

 "Angelo, Sonja, Me." Scott said.

 "Three."  Sonja said.

 "Okay." Karla replied.  "Three." She repeated to Mosley.

 "Right.  I'll get everything ready.  Call me again and tell me what plane
you're on." Mosley said.

 "Alright.  Jim please call Jake and Danny and let them know I'm coming
home, Okay?"  Karla said.

 "I'll let them know." Mosley grinned.

 Karla hung up the phone.

 Moody spoke quietly to Ashby.  "You too, Scott?"

 The SIS Captain replied thoughtfully.  "I have been asked repeatedly to try
and make sure this thing goes down quietly.  Call it a hunch, but I figure
some on site supervision might be called for."

 Sonja snickered.  "Scott just wants an excuse to get out of the office."

 Angelo didn't say anything.  Usually when a Captain supervised a case
directly it turned into a nightmare for the investigating detective.
Nevertheless, Scott had surprised him before.

 Scott shrugged theatrically. "She's got me on that one."


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