My Lawyers took a moment to readjust. Arturo caught my eye and gave me a thumbs-up. What about this did he think was going well?
“We would like to call Miss Carol Amanda Harving to the stand,” Arturo said in a rush. I wished I could tell him to slow down. We needed to give Kel as much time as possible.
Lucretia Rog stood. She adjusted her black legal gown. “If it pleases the court,” she said, sneering at me and the Téjican Lawyers, “we feel it is only appropriate that Miss Harving be called to the stand as the last witness. This befits someone of her high stature and top billing.”
“Objection,” one of my Lawyers said. “Statute 117A-451A clearly states that the prosecution chooses the order of witnesses.”
Silas Rog the younger stood and addressed his father. “Your Honor, Statute 117A-451A should be amended to allow an exception in the case for persons of high public profile, Influence and Affluence, like Miss Harving. Anything else would be an insult.”
Several of my Lawyers chortled at this and were met with the sound of the gavel. Finster and Grippe glanced at each other and smirked. The Commander-in-Chief Justice paused for a moment, and then, with a finger on his visor, said, “Statute 117A-451A has been so amended. Said witness will be last as befits a person of high public profile, Influence and Affluence.”
My Lawyers were stunned, but I wasn’t. They leaned over and whispered to each other. Arturo looked crestfallen. Saretha was shaking her head. Who did they think they were dealing with? As the Affluents in the court applauded, I finally understood how Silas Rog had wielded such power all these years. Of course he never lost a case. If the Law worked against him, he had his daddy rewrite it.
One of my Lawyers stood up. “Your Honor, permission to approach the bench.”
“Denied.”
“Speth,” Kel said through my ear receiver. I could scarcely contain the relief I felt at hearing her voice. “Security pulled off as your case started,” she explained. “We’re in.” Her voice was breathless and eager. This was just what we’d wanted.
“This is highly irregular,” the Lawyer said. “You cannot simply rewrite the Law in the middle of a court case.”
“Federal Statute 19D of the Patriots Act® allows the Commander-in-Chief Justice to amend, rewrite or expunge any and all Laws pursuant to the safety and economic welfare of the citizens of the United States of America® and its assigns,” Justice Rog recited.
“That is not in accordance with international Law.”
“Correct,” he confirmed without emotion.
“This isn’t right,” Arturo muttered. He’d finally realized what I’d known from the beginning. The trial was a sham. It was impossible for us to win. I saw his posture change as the truth sank in.
“Speth, we’re going to need a little time.”
“I’ll do what I can,” I said. “But before you do anything, wait for my instructions.”
Arturo thought I was talking to him, and that was my intent. I didn’t want the Rogs to spot that I was communicating through the implants Lucretia had provided.
“I don’t know if we can,” Kel whispered.
I peeked over at Silas and Lucretia Rog. Lucretia was smirking. I tried to anticipate what their next move would be. The Rogs had the court tied down—we couldn’t win here. Would defeating us be enough?
No. They would want more. The forces moving off at Delphi™ weren’t a misstep. It was an intentional move.
“They want you to destroy the system,” I whispered, but in the quiet court, my words were heard.
The Commander-in-Chief Justice banged his gavel. “I will have silence in the courtroom.”
Lucretia turned and scrutinized me, her eyes narrowed in suspicion.
“Why?” Kiely called out from somewhere near Kel, but I couldn’t answer without drawing more attention to myself.
“You will call your next witness,” Justice Rog said, his tone filled with warning this time.
“We haven’t called our first,” Arturo muttered. My Lawyers were still reeling, trying to figure out how they could function if the Laws were simply written out from under them.
“Call me to the stand,” I said quickly.
“I should go,” Saretha argued.
“No,” I said, grabbing her arm. I needed an opportunity to speak. “Please, I have an idea.”
Saretha didn’t understand, but she relented. I stood.
“We call Speth Jiménez to the stand,” one of my Lawyers offered, still a little off balance.
“Please place your arm in the court-provided Cuff,” a bailiff ordered. Behind him, two of the watery-eyed Modifieds glared at me. They were all over the place. One by the main exit with a shaved head had wide, deep creases around his mouth that reminded me a little of Henri. I wondered if that was intentional. He appeared less brutal than the others, but that might have been my imagination—or part of a typical Rog trick. I wouldn’t put it past Lucretia to choose someone who looked like Henri—or even alter them—to rattle me as much as possible.
As I walked past her to the stand, she muttered something into her hand, then waited for my response. She got nothing. She didn’t know she was being blocked from being in my head. I was glad even for this small victory.
The bailiff held a Cuff open for me. Lucretia wore a sick grin. I never wanted to wear one of these again, and she knew it. I hesitated, then put my arm forward. The bailiff snapped the Cuff around as quick as he could. It clicked, sealed and hissed. This one was the heaviest I’d worn yet. An AGREE button popped up, accompanied by Terms of Service that permitted the Cuff to analyze my answers and levy perjury fines if I lied. I tapped it, and an Ad for Arkansas Holt appeared. I swiped it away, but I had to admire his ability to keep afloat.
“Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and pay for all words representing that truth?” the bailiff asked.
“I do,” I said.
Speth Jime—phrase, nonmarital (I do): $13.99
“Have a seat,” the bailiff commanded. I obeyed, putting myself within arm’s reach of the Commander-in-Chief Justice and a few of the Modifieds similar to Uthondo and Bertrand.
Lucretia stood up and said, “Please state your name for the record.” She looked much too pleased with herself.
“Speth Jiménez.”
Lucretia faked a patient smile and turned to her father. “If it pleases the court, this girl’s legal surname is Jime. I have the records.”
She flipped them from her Cuff. The Commander-in-Chief Justice nodded.
“It is legally registered so. The witness will give her legal and rightful name,” he instructed.
“The Cuff has detected no lie. I have given you my rightful name,” I said. “Speth Jiménez.”
“Aka the Silent Girl,” Lucretia said, her voice full of effort. “Why, you have so many aliases, I don’t know how anyone could be expected to keep track.” She turned to the Commander-in-Chief Justice and held up her Pad, showing the list. I wondered if her father saw her, or her digitally enhanced self.
“You will comply with my lawful order,” Justice Rog demanded.
“I have complied.” I held up my Cuff and pointed out the Lie Detector™ mode. The Cuff buzzed, showing my words and a $3 fee for pointing.
“The witness is mistaken,” he said after a moment of reflection. “You will comply and give your legal name.”
“Kel,” I said.
Lucretia narrowed her eyes.
“Speth?” Kel asked. “Can you talk?”
“Perhaps the Lie Detector™ doesn’t work on someone so practiced at trickery,” Lurcretia offered.
“If I said my name was Kel, that would be a lie, even if you legally assigned it to me,” I said to the Judge.
“No, my dear,” Lucretia said, her voice dripping with disdain. “That is what you fail to understand. I ca
n assign you any name I please. You are legally obligated to accept it.”
“You could assign anything to me,” I said, choosing my words very carefully now.
“Assign anything?” Kel asked. “Me?”
“You—” I said, adding a thoughtful pause “—could assign everything to me.”
“What?” Lucretia asked suspiciously.
“Everything?” Kel asked, her voice unsteady.
The Commander-in-Chief Justice banged his gavel. “Your outbursts will not be tolerated.”
“I move to strike her comments from the record,” Silas Rog burst out.
“They are so stricken,” his father replied.
I was suddenly delighted. They’d given me the perfect opening. “Don’t erase everything,” I said slowly, so Kel would understand. “Assign it all to me.”
“Oh...” Kel’s voice trailed away, then she yelled in excitement. “Kiely! Spider!”
Silas Rog erupted to his feet. “She is obviously incompetent.”
The Commander-in-Chief Justice banged his gavel again. “This is your last warning, Miss Jime. Each infraction will be fined according to Courtroom Statute 39-1, and you will be charged the maximum amount of $10,000 per violation.”
“Why not make it a billion dollars?” I asked.
“Statute 39-1 dictates fines between $1,500 and $10,000. That is the Law.”
“You can rewrite it to be anything you want, though, right? Why waste time with small amounts? Why not make each word a trillion dollars?”
“Is she asking what I think she’s asking?” Kiely yelled to Kel with glee.
Lucretia narrowed her eyes at me and whispered, “I’m going to call your bluff.”
Lucretia didn’t understand what I was doing. Neither did my Lawyers or Saretha or anyone else in the gallery. But I didn’t care—all that mattered was that Kel, Kiely and Mr. Stokes understood.
“Your Honor, if the ‘witness’ wishes to be fined a trillion dollars for each infraction, perhaps it would please the court to oblige her,” Lucretia said with a sinister smile.
The Commander-in-Chief Justice mashed his lips uncomfortably with his fingers.
Kel breathed deep. “I hope this works,” she said in my ear.
I was ready to fail. There was nothing else I could do now. I had to hope, and enjoy what freedom I had left.
“The amount suggested is fiscally and administratively imprudent and therefore rejected,” Justice Rog said finally. “However, the fine in Courtroom Statute 39-1 is hereby raised to $800,552.99 for each immaterial, extraneous or irrelevant word you speak while being questioned.”
I didn’t know how he arrived at that number, but it was probably some absurdly specific calculation of the fiscal and administrative maximum.
Lucretia nodded in satisfaction. “Now, please state your name for the record,” she said, turning back to me.
“Tattoo, polecat, flipper, beef,” I answered. My Cuff bleated wildly with warnings for the cost of each irrelevant word. Kel laughed in my head.
“Enough!” Silas Rog Junior barked from his seat. “She is making a mockery of this court. She is in contempt!”
“Is that an objection, Attorney Rog?” the Commander-in-Chief Justice asked.
“Yes, sir,” Silas muttered, sounding like a sullen teenager.
“Objection sustained. The witness will not be allowed to testify if there is another outburst. Is that understood?”
Saretha sent me a pleading glance. My Lawyers conferred with each other, trying to think of good rational questions they could ask so they could get good, rational answers in return. Did they still believe they could win a case like that with the Rogs around?
“Do I need to agree that my name is Jime?” I asked the Commander-in-Chief Justice.
“It is legally required,” he said.
“Spider says we can do it,” Kel whispered in my ear. “But it’s a lot more work.”
“Luscious, effervescent, surreptitious, cruft,” I said, letting my tongue linger on the sound of each syllable. My Cuff shuddered at the expense, like it feared for me.
“Remove her from the stand,” Justice Rog said. Behind me, one of the nine brothers stirred. It was Uthondo. He held out his hand, rather than grabbing me, and I took it. He escorted me to my seat and then thumped back to his spot. The one next to him—Bertrand, I realized—looked at him askance. Andromeda watched them both with care.
“Please tell me there is a reason for what just happened up there,” Saretha begged me. Arturo leaned closer to hear my answer.
“There is,” I said.
“We’ll put your sister up next,” one of the Lawyers said.
“Then we have testimony from—”
“No,” I said. “We’re not calling any more witnesses. Make them bring out Carol Amanda Harving.”
“I hope that gives me enough time,” Mr. Stokes grunted, as if whatever hacking he was doing required physical effort.
“But, Speth!” Saretha whispered urgently. “I need to explain! And we have other witnesses. Mrs. Nince is here! She can testify about giving me the scar.”
So someone had found her, the old prune. She was in among all the other clapping Affluents and surely couldn’t be trusted to do anything but turn on us when the moment came. They must have all thought this was the way to safety for them.
“Mrs. Nince would never admit to injuring you in a court of Law. She’d be liable,” I said.
Saretha knew this was true.
“I don’t want to leave Sera to them any longer,” I added. “If we call the last witness now, hopefully she’ll be spared some suffering. Who knows what they’re doing to her back in whatever room they’ve got her in.”
Saretha and Arturo didn’t like it. None of the Lawyers did, either. But all that mattered to me was getting Sera in the room. If my plan worked, I wanted to see her face when everything changed.
Another Carol Amanda Harving: $64.98
Sera walked up the aisle with as much movie star attitude as she could muster. The dropters went a little crazy at the sight of her. She took hard steps in her heels, swaying her hips, her head held high. Her hair—I couldn’t tell whether it was a wig, extensions or genetically enhanced—was full, dark and wavy, just like Saretha’s. Her eyes were an icy blue—nothing like Saretha’s, or her own, but the exact shade of blue of Carol Amanda Harving’s eyes on-screen. The shape of her face had changed, too; it was a little fuller. The skin was a little raw, as if it had been scrubbed.
She didn’t look entirely like herself, but she didn’t look like Carol Amanda Harving, either.
“I don’t know who she’s supposed to be,” Saretha said dismissively.
“Miss Harving,” Lucretia said, like she was awed. Silas Junior grinned behind her. The faces in the courtroom were transfixed, and not nearly as skeptical as Saretha’s and mine. Even Mandett looked impressed out in the crowd. Then I realized that we weren’t seeing the same thing as everyone else. They were being fed a perfect digital re-creation over the reality of Sera. Saretha, the Téjican delegation and I were immune without corneal overlays. It made me wonder why they’d bothered to change her physical appearance at all, but then I remembered how cruel Lucretia Rog was.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered to her as she passed.
Her glee crumpled. “What?” she asked. Then her eyes darted to her mother and widened in shock.
“Sera?” Mrs. Croate said hesitantly. Sera shook herself and glared at her mother like she was a scuff on the floor.
“I’m sorry we left you to suffer under her,” I said with a nod toward Lucretia.
“Charming, but a distraction,” Lucretia said, taking Sera’s hand and pulling her away. “Please enter the witness box.”
“You aren’t sorry,” Sera sneered, unable to let it go.
; “I am,” I said. “I’ve felt awful about it every day. I kept trying to think of a way to free you. You never deserved this.”
“Sera!” Mrs. Croate called to her daughter as Sera moved toward the witness stand.
Sera shirked away from her mother’s voice. Her eyes reddened.
The Commander-in-Chief Justice banged his gavel again. “Order!” he commanded.
“We’re going to need a little more time,” Kel whispered in my ear.
“Miss Harving,” Lucretia said, taking her by the arm, but getting nowhere. She nodded for help from the brothers, and Bertrand stepped out of the line.
“She’s taking care of me,” Sera said to her mother, her icy blue eyes looking unreal up close.
“Please sit,” Lucretia Rog asked.
Sera’s anger boiled away, and her phony grin returned. She tottered into the box and settled down, assuming a proud posture and folding her hands obediently in her lap.
“Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and pay for all words representing that truth?” the bailiff asked.
“The Rogs will be paying for my words,” Sera said haughtily, “but yes.”
“We need more time,” Kel whispered in my ear.
“Please state your name for the court,” Lucretia said, smirking, looking out toward the gallery like she had us.
“Stall!” Kel whispered in my ear.
“Objection,” I shouted.
Lucretia’s face pinched with annoyance. Her father turned to me, his gaze an eyeless, glowing line. The Lawyers from Téjico fell in around me. The objection wasn’t mine to make.
“On what grounds?” Lucretia laughed.
I stood. “The Law requires words be used with intent to convey their proper meaning,” I said, bracing myself. I didn’t speak Legalese, but felt the need to mimic its sound. “Does this not include names?”
“Names are a special class that are not assigned meaning,” the Commander-in-Chief Justice said.
“With all due respect, Your Honor, names do have meaning.”
Gasps rippled through the court. I had just disagreed with a Judge in his courtroom—and not just any Judge. The Supreme Commander-in-Chief Justice himself. Lucretia shook her head, like I was being foolish.
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