Aside from another species who operated virtual particle drive saucers that flew through the sky, most of Urania existed at a tech level similar to Earth circa 1978. Computer processing was just beginning to become practical, and phones were starting to get smaller. Incidentally phones were always wireless thanks to the mysterious energy provided by the superior species called the Aungtalli, and the receiver technology that had been invented hundreds of Earth years before by Uranian scientists. Lots of apparatuses used the wireless energy receiver technology, but there were also electric grids distributing the energy along wire lines from a central Aungtalli energy plant in the Lands of the Swerites to the east of Keshdesh, the capital of the planet.
The economy of Urania might appear to an Earthling as kind of a communist dictatorship where everyone had been given so much worth based on class, status, and accomplishment. No form of physical currency actually existed on Urania. All citizens had to produce ID, which would be charged to accounts that were tracked by the government. People received statements routinely that reported a citizen’s correct worth. The wealth of the planet had long been controlled by the three royal families who jointly owned the entire planet by virtue of an ancient history of hostilities from which the three families had emerged in a mutual truce that established long ago the current monarchy of kings. Alternating nominations from the 3 families succeeded the Kings, which added an element of randomness to the government that had otherwise been determined by bloodlines. The full faith and trust of the central government reimbursed the ID receipts from the planet’s various businesses, and adjusted a business’s value accordingly. In this way the royal families controlled all worth and civilization, while the Aungtalli were worked into the picture as controllers of divine technologies, keepers of the truth, distributors of the sacred energy, and overseers of the masses. The admirable thing about such a system is that it only works if everybody’s value can be determined with fairness that left nobody neglected.
Of course this system of economy could be said to not be perfect, and value fraud crimes were rampant, with varying degrees of seriousness. For the most part citizens were law abiding and enjoyed a generous amount of worth for little or no effort. Royalty understood the mutual benefits of a thriving middle class for all who worked hard. A world of people enjoying their middle class lives tended to have little use for revolution and defying the monarchy. To a large extent, the Aungtalli religion reimbursed loyalty to the monarchy as a necessary virtue, which held Uranian society intact like glue. Nobody on the planet could be said to be worthless in Urania society. Most were worthy of a base value unless they had ran themselves into some terrible debt, which also happened a lot, punishable by industrial prison time of hard labor till the debt could be made up. There was also very good counseling and therapy available for those who had trouble controlling their own worth. For those beyond simple budget failures, who used the system fraudulently, there were also those in law enforcement who were prepared to prosecute those crimes. This is one of their stories.
Eistia the Investigator had been undercover the next morning at a wiffsue house where early morning workers stopped for a hot cup of wiffsue to start the day off. Eistia had been notified of a value fraud case who had been coming in lately to this place using a forged ID of a long since deceased Uranian of some established wealth. The family of the deceased saw this discrepancy in their inheritance worth statements, which had been supplemented by the inherited worth of the deceased Uranian’s estate. The fact that value crime could be caught at the level of perpetration of a purchase of a cup of wiffsue every morning gave credit to law enforcement efficiency on Urania. A Uranian entered the wiffsue house and approached Eistia’s table. Grega then sat down greeting his partner. “A cup of wiffsue. I’ll now go get mine.
No sign of the culprit who’ll get a fine?”
Eistia took that to be a dig at the petty nature of the crime they were undercover waiting to bust. “The thing about crimes worth only a fine
is that stopping them is your job and mine.
They’re also committed by criminals
or the desperation from when one falls.”
Just then the cashier at the counter signaled to Eistia that the guy they looked for had come in for his cup of wiffsue. The guy, as he walked in, noticed the signal and suddenly turned around running. “Maybe it’s not so petty as you say,
if the culprit when caught just runs away.”
Both Eistia and Grega got up and began pursuit of the culprit. They both paid no attention to Eistia’s cup of wiffsue that tipped over as they both rocked the table getting up. Wiffsue flooded the tabletop and began dripping its purple-brown liquid on the floor. Outside the plaza became relatively empty as the three running bird-like men that were wearing kilts ran out into the quiet morning. Two of the running figures were Grega and Eistia about a half a block behind the middle-aged suspect that now headed to the road where morning traffic scuttled along. Grega started to kick it out ahead of the slightly older, more exhausted Eistia while the culprit knocked into a passerby that caused groceries to spill across the plaza. Grega just hopped over some groceries with his tail swinging in time to his legs. He ignored the annoyed passerby who began loudly picking her groceries back up. Grega became determined to end this chase before the culprit reached the traffic up ahead. Grega, clearly the better runner of the law enforcement team, had been a Uranian track star in his younger school years. The value fraud criminal had been tackled by Grega just before the culprit had a chance to weave through the traffic of electric cars. Eistia became relieved to be able to use that as an excuse to stop running in time to help the poor woman pick up her spilt groceries.
Eistia and Grega both returned with the criminal they apprehended in possession of forged ID way beyond the worth of most ordinary Uranians. They now had forgery on the guy as something else they would charge him with, a bigger crime than just falsely purchasing a cup of wiffsue, not to mention resisting arrest and careless assault on a passerby who back there vowed to stop by and file a report. The other investigators at the station cheered Eistia and Grega as they brought in their Uranian. No true ID had been found on the modestly dressed middle age Uranian man except for the obvious forgery. Grega promised the guy, who remained silent, that they would find out who he was. Grega carted him off for fingerprinting and to the jail. Eistia went to file the forged ID in his case files for further investigation. Then Eistia noticed the note in his desk drawer that he had found on Nickteslo's dead body, who had been the Ministry scientist that “accidentally” crashed his car off the Keshdesh River Bridge.
Eistia took out the note to take a closer look at it. He had just tossed it in his evidence file after the boss chewed him out for just doing his job. The case was closed, but the note looked like an interesting piece of evidence. Eistia unfolded the papers in the envelope and laid them on his desk. It revealed a map of the whole continent of Urania, which had been overlaid with complicated diagrams and schematics. There were lines that circulated all across the map along the southern landmass where the lines then turned around converging back together on the northern part of the continent near the great Ice Mountain at the North Pole. The other piece of paper consisted of diagrams with instructions that showed how to adjust the voltage of an energy release by moving two poles buried 20 klepts in the ground closer together or farther apart. The instructions were about burying a pole of blue metal and another pole of coaglium in the ground at an angle 45 degrees toward the magnetic North Pole, which then would evidently draw energy out of the ground. Eistia thought about trying this sometime. Then the boss came over to congratulate him on a good bust that morning.
“Congratulations Investigator
I’m over here to congratulate ya.
That was a good bust, good detective work.
Maybe I won’t demote you to a clerk.”
Eistia put hi
s hand out to shake the boss’s hand; also a gesture their culture had in common with Earth. The Commander looked over at the papers on the desk. “Isn’t that the case I told you to close?
You don’t need to figure where that clue goes.”
Hanson responded. “Sir, I just thought that this was curious.
It’s not evidence I take serious.
These were found on the victim from Hanson.
I was having a look at them for fun.”
The Commander looked over the letters, which reminded him of something else. “Hanson! That reminds me I do not jest.