Books in the EMPIRE Series by Richard F. Weyand: EMPIRE: Reformer EMPIRE: Usurper EMPIRE: Tyrant EMPIRE: Commander EMPIRE: Warlord EMPIRE: Conqueror by Stephanie Osborn: EMPIRE: Imperial Police EMPIRE: Imperial Detective EMPIRE: Imperial Inspector by Richard F. Weyand: EMPIRE: Intervention EMPIRE: Investigation EMPIRE: Succession Books in the Childers Universe by Richard F. Weyand: Childers Childers: Absurd Proposals Galactic Mail: Revolution A Charter For The Commonwealth Campbell: The Problem With Bliss by Stephanie Osborn: Campbell: The Sigurdsen Incident Other books by Stephanie Osborn The Division One Series: Alpha and Omega A Small Medium At Large A Very UnCONventional Christmas Tour de Force Trojan Horse Texas Rangers Definition and Alignment Phantoms Head Games Break, Break, Houston Tourist Trap Mega Moth Coming soon: Byegones Everywhere Signs Shake, Rattle and Roll Die Glocke Diplomatic Catfight Forming Terra Popular Science: INCOMING! The Chicxulub Impactor Kiss Your Ash Goodbye: The Yellowstone Supervolcano Rock and Roll: The New Madrid Fault System The Weather Out There Is Frightful: Solar/Space Weather Sherlock, Sheilas, and the Seven-Percent Solution: Victorian Era Drugs A New American Space Plan, with Travis S. Taylor EMPIRE Imperial Police by STEPHANIE OSBORN Copyright 2020 by Stephanie Osborn All Rights Reserved EMPIRE Universe and characters used with permission ISBN 978-1-7340758-2-3 Printed in the United States of America Cover Credits Cover Art: James Lewis-Vines Back Cover Photo: Fritz Ling Published by Weyand Associates, Inc. Bloomington, Indiana, USA July 2020 CONTENTS Foreword In The Beginning Round Two Scrambling for Position Repercussions Hitting the Ground One Way or Another First Case Teamwork and Leadership Reprisals The Sandman Sitting Ducks Background Work Recuperation and Other TLC First Blood to the Council Surveillance Time – Team Armbrand Surveillance Time – Team Rassmussen Surveillance Time – Team Ashton Bronze Gets Busy Evacuate! Busting Asses Interrogations Looking for Trouble Getting the Hell Outta Dodge Catalonia Coronations and Assassinations Unexpected Welcomes Author Notes Foreword Dialogue in scenes that are common between this trilogy and previous trilogies written by Mr. Weyand in this series is used verbatim, in order to maintain the content of this book as a stand-alone story. In The Beginning Nick Ashton was from the city of Norwich, on the planet Flanders, in the Allemagne Sector. It was a relatively nice city, on an average planet, in a sector that was neither Earthside, nor farside, and not that far from Sintar. It was neither rich nor poor, relatively stable politically and economically, and as such, his family had found it a good location to raise children for several generations. Nick Ashton was the latest product of that family, and an only child. His doting mother ensured his intellectual progress, and his loving father taught him calm discipline and determination. At the age of ten, Nick discovered that the Ashtons’ neighbors in a quiet subdivision of Norwich had their house burgled, and considerable quantities of household goods robbed as a consequence. Since their son Andrew was Nick’s best friend and playmate, he saw quite a bit of the investigation, which ultimately led to the capture of the burglars, if not to the recovery of all the stolen goods. Seeing young Nick’s interest in and curiosity about the investigation, a quick discussion between father and mother resulted in the father introducing Nick to the investigating detective, who took a liking to the boy. Meanwhile, the mother introduced Nick to classic mystery novels, ranging from ancient texts by Arthur Conan Doyle and Agatha Christie to those by more modern authors. Quickly, Nick was hooked. More, Detective Waterford stayed in touch with the bright youth, answering questions and mentoring him. So Leya and Hans Ashton were not surprised when, a year later, Nick declared he wanted to be a detective when he grew up. Ten years later, Dominick “Nick” Xavier Ashton, formerly of Norwich on Flanders, was a rookie officer in the Imperial Police, in the sixteenth year of the reign of Empress Ilithyia I. Not just a rookie, but a soggy-green-behind-the-ears rookie, fresh out of the Empire’s police academy. But he was not without gray matter; he’d been the top cadet of his year with a certain amount of ambition – specifically, to become a detective – and as a consequence, had drawn the attention of the Imperial Police on the capital planet of Sintar. So instead of returning to Flanders – he had no close family left there; his parents had died when the house in which he’d grown up got struck by lightning and burned down overnight, shortly before he had graduated from the police academy – he’d been assigned to the Imperial City office on Sintar, though not to the Imperial City Police Department, which was… somewhat separate, though he hadn’t understood why, at the time. His superior was Captain Lee Harding Carter, the veteran officer over all of the beat cops, an older, grizzled man who tended to mentor the rookies whenever possible. This resulted in considerable respect from most of the younger officers, though the captain was somewhat overlooked, if not outrightly scorned, by the older ones. Ashton sometimes wondered why Carter wasn’t farther up in the hierarchy; he was old enough, and had the experience. So he had asked Carter that once, and Carter had replied it was because he preferred looking after the young ones like Ashton, just coming into the system, to try to ensure they stayed…safe. Given the fact that the rookies were generally either assigned experienced partners, or placed under experienced investigators – sometimes both – the statement had made little sense to Ashton at the time. Ashton had also noted the wry, almost sardonic smile Carter wore as he made the statement, and puzzled over it, but Carter hadn’t offered additional explanation, and Ashton had nothing else from which to reason, so he let it drop, deciding he was only more confused by the “explanation” than he had been by the question. It wasn’t
