I have edited this for grammar, reworded some parts etc.
I can hear them. They want to know that they're not alone.
But I can't answer. I have no voice.
Senior Special Agent Tobias Smith stepped down from the hatch of his transport and scowled. He hated outer colonies.
It wasn't that he hated the people. On the contrary, he admired their frontier spirit, it took a hardy soul to prosper out here in the sticks.
As he He observed the poor excuse for a city, just a few straight roads cut into the basin of some ancient dried out ocean bed, with dust devils whipping about the silent streets.
This, he thought, is worse than being stuck in that cabin for months.
The agent looked up and down the narrow road in which he was parked. Battered shop fronts were closed because of the weather, storm shutters down. Nobody ventured outside during the stormy season unless it was an emergency, or unless you were a Federal Agent too dumb to accept a desk job.
Leaning into the wind that howled down the street, Tobias turned up the collar of his trench coat and jumped down from the running boards.
Paraxis was one of the wealthier frontier planets, made so by the rich seams of trace metals that ran below its rocky surface, but still, it was not Earth. Agent Smith missed his creature comforts.
I'll give this **** up, Tobias thought to himself, someday soon.
He allowed himself a little smile. He loved it really. Almost as much as he loved moaning about it.
A short man in a button down storm coat approached Tobias, a close fitting fur lined hat, tied to his head under the chin, threatening to be blown away any moment.
The man was Smith's local liaison, a detective Barclay if he remembered correctly from the correspondence.
He looked less than happy to see Smith.
"Special Agent Smith,question mark" the young detective shouted, the wind snatching away his voice.
Tobias hesitated, before taking the proffered hand and shaking it once.
"Call me Tobias," he replied.
"You took your time comma Tobias." He was not pleased, that much was obvious by his tone. "Let's get inside."
Tobias gestured with his hand to say lead the way and followed on.
Behind the uniformed officers, the sign posts, and the neon lit strips that said POLICE LINE: DO NOT CROSS was a fairly innocuous looking factory complex.
The two men ducked under the shock barrier and entered the compound perimeter, an empty vehicle park leading up to the doors of the factory building itself.
It was several stories in height, constructed of brick and durasteel, and the front was lined with windows that stretched from floor to ceiling, shuttered down against the impending storm, like every other building on the street.
Smith and Barclay stepped inside, their footfalls echoing loudly in the vast, silent space.
Barclay stopped for a moment to close the door behind them as Tobias swept an unruly mop of dark hair from his face and hit the lights, Who switches on the lights? Barclay is much more likely to know where the switch is. bathing the shop floor in a cold, white luminescence.
The smell hit him right away. Human faeces and rotting meat, a combination that became impossible to forget once it pushed its way into your nasal cavities with its cloying stench.
He exhaled hard to no avail, a natural reaction, futile, as the next breath was always deeper.
It was the scene of a massacre.
Bodies of workers and scientists lay everywhere, strewn about their workplace, looking like they'd been savaged by some wild animal.
The MO is the same, thought Tobias, as he covered his nose against the rank odour. It had taken him a few days to reach Paraxis from several systems away and the corpses had begun to turn, becoming bloated with gasses, their skin a pasty grey except where the blood had pooled in ugly bruised patches. He was thankful to the local PD for honouring his request not to touch the crime scene until he had arrived, but it didn't make it any easier on the nostrils.
"What's this all about?" Barclay said, in between painful dry heaves. He was used to seeing bodies, there were no shortage of murders on frontier worlds, but the smell of decay was one you never got used to in a lifetime of police work.
Smith walked deeper into the factory, peering into several of the dozens of defunct birthing tubes that were lined up in neat rows.
Each one could house an adult human, but none ever would again, the facilities turned over to the production of luxury enhanced organs for the rich and famous since the end of the war.
"Seventeen cloning facilities, like this one," he replied, taking in the details of the gruesome way in which the workers had died. Several were piled up against a fire exit at the far end, and he could imagine them fumbling to break the emergency seal as death bore down on them.
"Ten different systems throughout the spiral arm. All hit like this one, all trashed, the workforce butchered just like this."
Barclay snorted. "Looks like Cartel activity. It's been on the rise around this area the last few years. It matches their methods, hit hard to intimidate the local populace, stalling any follow up investigation, make off with the goods. Cloning labs are ripe targets now, since they stopped using them to make soldiers. Everyone wants new organs or limbs these days."
Tobias turned, tapping the Perspex viewport of a birthing tube. It contained a slowly decomposing human arm, semicolon whoever trashed the place had saw fit to switch off all the machinery.
"Nothing is ever stolen," Tobias chewed his lip before he finished the line of thought," and we think it's one man."
Barclay stopped. His jaw didn't actually fall open, but it was damn close.
"Forensics have measured the wounds on all the victims. Each is consistent, they all match the same bladed weapon. Whoever is doing this he's doing it alone."
Barclay still stood there, staring at the horrific scene in disbelief.
Tobias turned and moved further into the building, shouting over his shoulder.
"Why don't you check the security feed, period who knows comma we might get lucky."
Barclay blinked, screwed his face up and scratched his head before looking around for a sign to guide him towards the security office.
"Yep. I'm on it."
Later, after Tobias had taken some DNA samples, taken some prints, and was about to wrap up his end of the investigation, he happened across a birthing tube. It was operating, several status lights blinking away on the control panel, the only one Tobias had seen that had power.
Tobias moved over and tapped the display, bringing up a report of the tube's contents. What he saw caused him to frown, heavy lines creasing his middle aged brow.
It was a man. An entire human male.
It didn't make any sense, nobody had cloned a full person in years, at least not at a facility like this.
Why would anybody do that and leave it? It would be a complete waste of time.
Unless...
Where are your characters placed in the following scene? Tobias went off into the factory while Barclay went to the security office.
"I've got something weird," Barclay leaned from the door of the security office.
"I've scanned all the footage from every camera on site, covering all the exits. I have your perp entering, bold as brass. Big guy, looks like he has claws instead of hands." He scratched his head, a habit that he no doubt did when unsure of what to do.
"Only uh, there's no footage of anybody leaving."
The lights went out before the sentence finished leaving his mouth.
Tobias heard a parting of air, followed by a thud in Barclay's direction.
The veteran agent called out. Nothing.
Then footsteps, behind him.
Tobias reached across his body, palm finding the grip of his Colt Executor where it sat in a shoulder holster beneath his coat and he turned.
A hand clamped on his wrist, not hard enough to hurt, but firm so that Tobias' hand was stuck there, his pistol remaining holstered. Another hand clamped around his shoulder, stopping him from stepping back to escape the grasp. He could feel immense strength in the grip, like it could crush him in an instant if the owner chose to.
A man's face leaned into his, shrouded by shadow, close enough so that Agent Smith could smell his breath. It was surprisingly clean, like he'd just brushed his teeth.
What did you he? expect, rotting flesh breath?
"They are getting louder," said a voice, not quite a whisper but with barely enough volume to be heard, "and my search is not bearing any fruit."
Tobias wanted to scream out, wanted to say something. The excitement of having found his mark, coupled with the frustration of being powerless to do anything about it.
"Regrettably, I feel the need to change tactics."
The veteran agent's gut knotted, his mind threatened to lapse into panic.
Tobias had to act. He thrust his head forward, butting his mark solidly in the nose, hearing it break with a satisfying crack. The grip on his wrist loosened, and the agent drew the Executor smoothly, blinking from the impact of the headbutt, trigger finger taking up first pressure.
There was nobody there. Good line, but how does he know there's nobody there, with the lights off?
