by Chris Hechtl
Horatio initially didn't understand the thrust of the questioning. Many made no sense to anyone except the psychologist. He apparently got some clue to a person's state of mind and bias from how they answered a question even ones completely irrelevant. It was clear that neither did Commander Steele, and she was a bit put out over a few of the questions. “You got their backgrounds from their jobs?” she murmured to the doctor as the prosecution asked a question of juror number four.
“And their social media posts and that of their families,” Doctor Bullettine murmured to her. “We can't go out and ask each if they were ordered to be biased of course. Military personnel are supposed to be above that, trustworthy and such. They may or may not answer honestly, and it would be prejudicial against our client. They are supposed to be officers and follow the rules. We have to pretend they are doing so.”
“Understood.”
“Our computer models are on the fence about Marines on the jury. Your thoughts, Commander?” he asked.
“No,” she argued, scuttling the idea. “They are rigid and follow orders. Most naval officers do not take them seriously or as equals for good reason. There are very few Marines.”
“Ah, I see.”
They managed to bounce one of the jury with their single challenge, but the prosecution went after every marine. When they were finally settled, they had nine primary jurors, all but one were naval officers, and three alternates. If any of the primary jurors had to be dismissed, the alternates would step in. If they ran out of alternates, they would automatically go into a mistrial. If that happened, double jeopardy was normally attached, unless he waved it. Considering his odds of survival if he got out and went back on duty or on half pay, he wasn't certain ending the trial was a good thing.
“Interesting. Given this is a capital case, they need all of the members to vote guilty while we only need one to acquit. I see the prosecution didn't agree with you about Marines though, Commander. Maybe next time you'll see it my way,” Doctor Bullettine noted mildly.
Commander Steele pursed her lips but didn't reply.
@
The following morning, they began with opening arguments. When it was their turn, Commander Steele took the floor. She was instantly slapped down when she called the accused by the rank of rear admiral.
“Several of the charges against the accused are that he disobeyed orders. Given that the actions that took place were in another star system and outside the jurisdiction of Admiral Childress, it is outside the scope of his convening authority. We intend to prove this simple matter. It is interesting that Admiral Childress has conveyed this court-martial after being relieved of command for disobedience to orders. I believe Admiral Childress recently stated that the situation we find ourselves in is a quote, misunderstanding …” she had to pause when Captain Rising Tide rose.
“Objection. She is testifying and smearing an officer's name and prejudicing the jury,” the captain stated.
“Sustained,” Admiral Thurgrad said. Colonel Talia started to protest, but Admiral Silvestri grimaced and nodded in support of his fellow admiral. “Sit down, Commander; your time is up. The jury will disregard your opening statement. It will be stricken from the record,” he stated.
“So! I see how this is going to go,” the commander said with a huff as she took her seat.
“Yeah,” Benny drawled. “Next time, I lead,” he murmured.
“If there is a next time,” the commander replied sotto voce.
@
Since the accused had a presumption of innocence, it was up to the government as burden of proof. That meant that the prosecution laid out its case first.
Horatio was surprised when they began with the design of Ilmarinen. He fought to keep his face impassive as he was accused of disobeying orders and misusing the architectural servers to build the ship. They called in a few witnesses to verify that Horatio had worked on the project before it had been officially sanctioned and then moved on.
“Low hanging fruit. That one is minor,” Commander Steele murmured to them. She still worked to counter the accusations anyway. She managed to work in a statement that it worked out in the end since they built the ship anyway.
The following day, the prosecution moved on to one of the insubordination claims. To Horatio's surprise they played an audio clip of Commander Thistle's rant to Rear Admiral Zekowitz.
“Objection, relevance. This is not relevant to my client. If the prosecution wishes to charge either officer involved in that conversation, they should do so,” Benny said, rising to his feet.
“The members are excused, so we can move to an Article 39a session,” the admiral said. When the courtroom was cleared, he turned to the prosecutor.
“The evidence goes to show the accused was harboring an air of insubordination that spread to other officers around him,” the prosecutor argued.
Horatio shook his head and leaned over to Commander Steele. “If I'd known, I would have issued a verbal reprimand after a counseling session, just like Admiral Zekowitz did,” he said in a voice loud enough for everyone in the courtroom to hear.
Admiral Thurgrad grimaced as he saw hesitation and doubt in Admiral Silvestri's eyes. He glanced at the marine and realized there was no help there. “Overruled,” he ruled reluctantly. “A conversation between other officers cannot be used to charge this officer with insubordination.”
“Move to strike conversation and testimony, Your Honors,” Commander Steele stated.
“The prosecution withdraws the charge,” Captain Rising Tide said a beat behind the commander.
Horatio pursed his lips in surprise. “They overreached,” Doctor Bullettine said softly from behind him. “That should have been stricken before it got to trial. That was a mistake on everyone's part, ours included.”
“Let's try not to make many more mistakes,” Benny replied as he turned slightly to look at the doctor.
“Very well. The charges are dropped. Send the members back in,” the admiral ordered. Once the jury was settled, they returned to the trial.
The prosecution moved on to another charge of insubordination. They played a conversation out of context. Benny objected when the audio file was played. “Objection, did the prosecution obtain a warrant to put my client under constant surveillance? There is no proof of wrong doing prior to his arrival.”
Once the members were escorted out, Colonel Talia took the lead.
“Well, Captain? Is there a warrant?” Colonel Talia asked.
“No. Naval Intelligence was monitoring the accused and others for signs of treason.”
“Did they have a warrant?” Benny pressed. “And if they did, was this conversation within the scope of that warrant? I don't seem to have one on record. I have all relevant files, well, all but the classified ones. A warrant against the accused though shouldn't be classified …?”
“We … request a recess to check on that, Your Honors,” the prosecutor stated.
“Given that I haven't seen a warrant on file either, I would be highly suspicious if one magically turned up now,” Colonel Talia said dryly.
Several officers turned to stare at him. He just looked at the prosecutor.
“We … will need time to check the records, Your Honors.”
“Recess for one hour. If you can't find it in the system by then, it isn't there, Captain.”
@
After the recess, the prosecution had to admit that ONI had no warrant. The defense pounced on that admission and demanded all surveillance recordings of Horatio be thrown out. “Fruit from the poisonous tree, Your Honor.”
Captain Rising Tide grimaced when the judges were forced to agree and throw the evidence out. “In that case we will withdraw those charges with leave to represent at another time.”
“Understood.”
@
“Damn!” Benny murmured when they got together after the time in the courtroom. “Why is this going so easily?”
“Because
they are rushing so fast and shot down a lot of our motions beforehand. Now that they are in the spotlight, they are getting torn up. Which just means, they'll be even more out for blood later,” Commander Steele said.
“Agreed,” Doctor Bullettine stated.
@
“What the hell are your people doing?!?” Omar demanded, glaring at Admiral Shren.
“Their jobs.”
“But, he's winning!”
“He's making a case of malicious prosecution and harassment,” Admiral Hill stated.
“Which is valid apparently,” Admiral Shren replied. “The lower charges are all dismissed. I'm not going to represent them.”
“But …”
“Whoever ordered the surveillance didn't get their ducks in a row. They didn't get the warrant. Finding one now would be a little too convenient,” the elf said dryly. He turned to Admiral Hill. “Had your people gotten the warrant after the fact, we could have backdated it. This mistake cost us.”
“It damn well did!” Omar snarled, glaring at the Neochimp.
“Hey, don't look at me! I didn't do it. I didn't order the surveillance. We've never had this problem before!” she said.
“That's because we backdated it as I said. We got caught flat-footed here, swamped with evidence with little time to process it all.”
“Excuses,” Omar growled.
“With a kernel of truth. Can you continue?”
“We're going to recess for the weekend. We'll pick up Monday morning with the bigger charges and see how they go,” Admiral Shren replied.
“They better be a knockout blow,” Admiral Childress growled dangerously.
@
The following Monday morning, the prosecution moved on to the more dangerous charges on the docket. Horatio was accused of engineering the Xeno virus crisis. The deaths and destruction of naval property were attributed to his negligence. “Which is it? Did I do it as a puppet master or did I not breathe down everyone's neck, check every line of code personally, and not see it?” Horatio murmured in exasperation to his counsel.
“As many of us in the Republic remember from our history books, nanotechnology and artificial intelligence are proscribed for good reason. Centuries ago experiments in recreating nanotechnology led to the horrifying Gloucester incident, as well as two others before the Republic government rightfully banned such technology.”
“Aren't you going to stop him? Isn't there supposed to be a question?” Horatio asked.
“Let him have his say. I want to see where he's leading with this,” Commander Steele murmured.
“Also during that time period, the A.I. that remained in the star system had gone senile over time from a lack of resources and from age. Two went rampant, killing thousands of people until they were stopped.” After that, it was decided out of caution that all of the other A.I. would be forced to shut down before they went rampant out of a need for public safety. Such technology, along with implants and cybernetics was discarded as unnecessary.” The captain shook his head. “Not just unnecessary, but evil,” he said, turning to the jury.
Horatio felt unsure of those stories. It didn't feel right; it didn't sit well with him. Unfortunately, it was too far in the past for anyone to get a full read on, even with modern electronic documentation. Given how Bek liked to manipulate such data, he wasn't certain he'd trust it anyway.
“Now I see where he's going with this. He's playing off those fears to the judges and jury. Equating what you are and what you did to the Xenos and to what happened earlier. Benny, shut him down,” Doctor Bullettine said urgently.
“Objection,” Benny said rising to his feet. “Prosecution is not asking a question, he's testifying,” the counselor said.
“Members are excused,” Admiral Thurgrad said impatiently. Once the jury box was cleared, he looked at the prosecutor.
“This is foundation, Your Honors. I'm merely painting a picture and crave the court's indulgence,” the prosecutor replied smoothly.
“We'll give you a little more leeway, but you better tie this in quick, Counselor,” the chief judge said, motioning for Benny to sit back down.
“That is why we have orders, and certain orders must be obeyed or people die,” the prosecutor said with a look to Benny. “I don't expect civilians to understand that,” he said quietly. Benny grimaced but then looked over to see the jury returning.
Horatio was amused that the prosecutor was playing up the fear of the tech as a reason for not following orders. “Do they seriously think that will wash?”
“Don't doubt them. They have a plan. At least, I think they do,” Commander Steele murmured dubiously.
“I know what he's doing. He's playing into the fear of fire and sharks. Primitive, primal in all of us. Yell shark or nanotech and everyone is terrified. He's trying to push them into acting without thinking,” Doctor Bullettine said. “React. It's herd mentality. That the orders are good, and therefore, their prosecution is justified.”
“Nasty. But we've still got them since you sent the log to Admiral Irons, right?” Benny asked, looking at Horatio. Horatio nodded as the prosecutor started to ask the witness about the events leading up to the Xeno virus attack.
@
Zek rubbed his back as he considered what he had done. It wasn't technically treason, which was why his implants weren't pestering him about it. He'd had a long night explaining it all to his security suite, which had been an interesting experience, one he never wanted to repeat.
During the refit, he had plugged a secret Wi-Fi dongle into the communications system to link it to astrogation and the rest of the ship's network. If his plan was going to work at all, the systems would have to be linked. He added a link to his back door as well so he could keep a running update.
Second weekend he got the first reactor up. It had been frustrating but felt good. He was not happy about the missives Dreamer of Ships had sent him while he had been at the academy. The classes had been testing so he had expressed his frustration with the commander when the T'clock had pushed things too far and shown an almost complete lack of progress without the admiral there to breathe down his neck. It seemed the only way to get things done was when he was there to supervise. Captain Clayton was also useless. He wanted it done but wouldn't get his hands dirty. All he did was poke his head in and demand progress reports, which only slowed the work down.
That second weekend was the beginning of the two-week vacation time. Some vacation! He shook his head at the thought. He'd spent the entire time getting Ilmarinen sorted out. Once he had the replicators producing parts they were missing, he had to go over to Harmony of Space to oversee the work there.
The programming had been a major bottleneck initially. He'd relied a lot on the basic software embedded in the firmware of the electronics he'd replicated to get them started. There had been a lot of teething issues to sort out. Just getting the systems to see and talk to each other had been an interesting experience.
By the time, his vacation time was up; Ilmarinen's new crew had started to report aboard and the ship had been sufficiently along for her crew to start looking after her hardware. From there, he'd gratefully returned to the academy for his usual routine of class work and overseeing the engineering department during the day while coding at night.
By the fifth week, all of the ship's hardware had been reinstalled and final integration had begun. And that was when he found Dreamer involving him less and less and his access becoming restricted. Apparently, the commander had learned enough from the process to apply it to Harmony of Space's rebuild. He'd gotten an extension out of the brass to complete the liner's repairs. The bug only asked for help from the admiral to use the replicator to replicate the special computer parts for the ship and the next in line.
Zek found out that they had pulled some of Ilmarinen's tugs and factory equipment out in favor of additional weapons. That was a troubling thing to consider. He couldn't do anything about it, however.
“It looks like you are about done, Admiral,” a familiar voice said from behind him. He turned, wiping at his hands to see Captain Clayton standing there. The captain wrinkled his nose at the sight of the flag officer.
“Just about.”
“I've been told all of the yard dogs will be switching to Harmony of Space and the other vessel to meet the deadline. Thank you though for getting my ship back together.”
“Not a problem. I really didn't have any plans for the vacation time anyway. I mean, I'm not big on sitting on the beach and getting a tan while dodging reporters and angry mobs,” Zek replied with a shake of his head.
“Yeah,” the captain drawled with his own head shake. “I'm supposed to get some liberty. I don't know if that will happen though. The relaunching ceremony is coming up next week, and we're still not quite there as far as coding is concerned.”
Zek nodded silently. He'd seen the captain take some time off but usually just for twenty-four hours or so. He did admit the man had a gift for keeping up with the ship's paperwork.
“If I don't see you again before you launch, safe sailing,” Zek replied.
“Thank you, sir,” the captain said. He hesitated briefly, sizing the admiral up. Zek wondered why until he realized the other man wanted to salute but Zek was not in uniform. In fact, he was in a coverall. A rather dirty and stained coverall since he'd just helped get a sticky motor rebuilt. The seals had cracked and gone bad, preventing a vacuum from being pulled. But getting to the part had been a chore and a half.
He nodded once to let the captain off the hook. The captain returned the nod and then left without a backwards glance.
@
“So, now that you have one ship up and running, you can copy the software to the others?” Admiral Callisto asked when the call went through to the commander.
“It's not as simple as that, ma'am. But we've got Ilmarinen up and running, yes. I don't know how Admiral Zekowitz did it. Will he be there at the ceremony?” Commander Dreamer of Ships asked carefully. He didn't like sharing his spotlight with the admiral, but he had to admit the admiral deserved his share.
