Article 23 (24 page)

"That is a violation right there,"
MacKenzie's
defender cried.

"Yes, it was but necessary to protect evidence, sir. Kowalski feared that if she sought the necessary court order the delay might enable someone to purge the system. In fact, I think Lieutenant Kowalski was surprised to still find the records intact."

Justin looked over at
MacKenzie
for the first time since the start of the questioning and saw the Captains face pale.

"This is highly irregular,"
MacKenzie's
advocate shouted, "and I question the admissibility of such evidence."

Singh looked over at the Judge Advocate.

"The bugger was doing it for months," a voice shouted from the back of the room.

Startled, Justin turned and saw O'Brian on his feet.

"O'Brian, sit down!" Singh shouted.

"You officers, quit playing your games covering one another's ass and stop trying to hang these kids!" O'Brian snarled.

Singh slammed his gavel down but O'Brian continued to shout.

"Ask any enlisted man on that ship. Ask Doc
Zhing
,
ask the other cadets, we all knew he was taping us. Hell, he had every channel feeding into his computer. The crazy bugger couldn't watch one-one-hundredth of all he was taping!"

"O'Brian, you'll be stripped of rank for this!" Singh shouted.

"Fine, go ahead, it won't be the first time, damn it!"

As he sat down a ripple of applause broke from the cadets and the enlisted men sitting in the room.

"He's right," another voice chimed in and to Justin's astonishment Doctor
Zhing
came to his feet. "I can't take this anymore. I was
wrong,
I should have placed him on medical disability the moment this whole thing started."

Breaking into tears,
Zhing
turned and walked out of the room, ignoring Singh's shouted orders for him to remain.

After several minutes of angry debate at the front table Singh finally looked back at the audience.

"If there is one more outbreak I'll place every last one of you under arrest. Now, I reluctantly agree to the viewing of the recordings but given the nature of how they were obtained I shall hold my decision as to whether they are admissible or not."

Marcioni
, grinning, switched his computer display to the screen behind Singh.

"Item one,"
Marcioni
announced.

It was a recording of the lounge, the incident between Matt and Colson unfolding. With the general background noise it was hard to hear, but it was obvious the two were arguing, Matt almost lightheartedly, Colson increasingly angry.

Colson suddenly raised his voice.

"You're a traitor," Colson shouted.

"Come on, lighten up," Matt laughed. "You need to unbend a bit, Colson."

"You're a dirty
offworlder
, a cheap sailor."

Matt stiffened. "Listen, buddy," he said coldly, "your old man's company sold faulty seals to cheap sailors like me,
a
lot of guys I know died from it, including my parents when an airlock blew. I think if my buddies knew who your family was they wouldn't be happy."

"Are you threatening me?"

Matt stared at him angrily. "I wish I was, but I think they'd tear you apart out in the mining camps if they knew who you were. Just stay out of my life. Now get away from me."

Petronovich
now stepped in, breaking them apart, and Colson started to shout that Matt had threatened him.
Petronovich
ordered them to separate areas of the room.

Colson drew back and several of his friends gathered around him, while Matt withdrew to the other side of the room. It was hard to hear the conversation for a minute,
then
Colson raised his voice. "That's what he
said,
he said he'd get us all. I think he's planning a mutiny."

Marcioni
stopped the scene and the room was silent.

"Item two, though I think if we spent more time on this recording and did a digital cleaning we could zero in on all that was said."

The second clip was of the main corridor, cadets passing down the hallway, snatches of conversation showing they were upset.
Madison passed under the camera, followed by Matt and then Colson. Colson suddenly looked back as if to check if anyone was behind him. Balling up his fist, he struck Matt on the back of the head. Matt fell into the room, his feet spinning up and catching Colson on the mouth, knocking him backwards. Yelling started, Colson shouting accusations. The recording showed Justin coming into the room and then the image switched inside the room. The scene ended with Colson storming out.

Marcioni
stopped the recording for a moment and looked over at Colson.

Justin turned in his chair and saw Colson, face ashen, jaw trembling. An icy silence seemed to be enveloping him.

"There were several hundred billion K of recorded images and sound in the Captain's computer. Apparently he had every single connection running all the time. I don't see how he could have kept track. It is evidence of an obsessive compulsion to spy but I think he even lost track of all that he was spying on, as manifested by the next clip."

It was the recording of
MacKenzie
coming into the room to arrest Matt. Everyone in the room was quiet, leaning forward to watch. Several in the audience gasped as Justin pleaded for Matt while the Captain grabbed him in his sleep and tore him out of the net. The camera clearly caught Mart's arm banging against the side of
MacKenzie's
head, his open palm waving back and forth and not balled up. Justin could feel all eyes on him as the recording showed the Captain leveling his pistol and threatened to shoot Justin if he moved.

The clip ended.

Marcioni
looked about the room. "In some circles what the Captain did in that room would be defined as assault. There are more clips, of the Captain badgering Doctor
Zhing
in sickbay, threatening to destroy his career and retirement if he did not vote for execution. There is a disturbing scene with Lieutenant
Hemenez
up on the flight deck, the Captain threatening to ruin her career as well if she did not comply with his wishes. At least
Hemenez
had the courage to take that risk rather than compromise."

All eyes turned toward
MacKenzie
as
Marcioni
fell silent.

Slowly he stood up, his eyes cold and lifeless. "You will never understand," he said, his voice distant, almost mechanical. "I did this to show everyone, to show everyone" His voice trailed off.

Stepping away from his desk,
MacKenzie
stalked out of the room. Singh watched him leave, saying nothing as the door closed behind
MacKenzie
.

"We are adjourned until 0800 tomorrow," Singh said quietly.

Justin felt as if he would collapse in his chair and he barely had the strength to stand as Singh walked out of the room.
Marcioni
came up to Justin and extended his hand.

"I knew from the beginning, son, that you were right. You might not believe this but maybe even the Old Man felt that way as well."

"He sure didn't seem that way."

"Well, he was caught in a bind. A lot of powers beyond what you see here were playing the game out."

Marcioni
fell silent as Colson, head
lowered,
hurriedly walked past them. Justin was tempted to say something but the hunted look in
Colsons
eyes stilled him. Kicking a beaten dog came to mind and he knew that as long as Colson lived the bitter revelations in this room would haunt him.

Marcioni
looked up as
Thorsson
approached. Smiling,
Marcioni
extended his hand.

"You were a darn good cadet and an even better officer,"
Thorsson
said, eyes beaming.

"Thank you, sir. Just trying to do what was right, as you taught us."

"Well now, I think this young cadet here needs a little rest, so how about if I walk him and his friends over to their quarters. I think it's safe to assume that all charges will be dropped against them and they will receive a full and honorable exoneration."

"Full and honorable at the least,"
Marcioni
replied. "I think some decorations are in order once all of this gets sorted out."

Thorsson
put his hand on Justin's shoulder and led him to the door. As they stepped out into the corridor Justin saw a flurry of activity down at the end of the hallway. A marine, his uniform disheveled, came running up the corridor. Grabbing another marine he darted back down the hall and around the corner.

"Something's wrong,"
Thorsson
said quietly.

Justin started forward but
Thorsson
put out a hand, stopping him.

"It's not your responsibility now, let it go."

"I still can't believe he killed himself," Justin said.

"I can,"
Thorsson
replied, leaning against the wall of the lounge and nursing a scalding cup of coffee. The burn out of Mars' orbit had finished half an hour ago and
Thorsson
had called the crew of Somers forward to the lounge to talk things out.

The ship was heading back to Earth, with a stop at the Academy to drop off the cadets and
Thorsson
.
Hemenez
had been placed in acting command of the ship until its return to Earth Base One, with
Seay
as acting second pilot. Rumors were already spreading that, given the "bad luck" name of the ship, and its age, chances were the old Somers would never sail again, at least under USMC colors, and would be sold off as a high-speed transport.

"What happened to the Captain, sir?"
Livollen
asked.

"He was already far over the edge of paranoia when you people came aboard and for that I must apologize. Let that be a warning to all of you young officers, when an old hand like O'Brian here brings you a warning, you darn well better sit up and take notice."

O'Brian nodded his thanks from the corner of the room. He, of everyone involved in the incident, had wound up taking the hardest punishment, the dark swatch on his shoulder indicating where his stripes had been pulled off for his outbreak in the courtroom.

"Not the first time," O'Brian announced cheerily when Justin tried to console him. "Hell, young sir, you might be pulling my stripes yourself someday."

The days after the end of the trial and the full exoneration announced for all cadets, enlisted personnel and officers who had resisted
MacKenzie
had gone by in a confusing whirl. As
Thorsson
had implied, heads had rolled over the incident, and were still rolling.
Zhing
had taken early retirement, Lewis had resigned, and Singh had suddenly been recalled to Earth for an "administrative review." It was rumored as well that there had been an overhaul in the Office of the Director Service Personnel, with sharp questions being asked about the review process that promoted captains and gave them command.

As for the press, Justin found he simply couldn't understand it. On the one hand he was being hailed as something of a hero, especially by the Mars press and the pro-separatists leaders. That in turn had created something of a backlash in conservative quarters, with some wondering if the service had gone too soft and Justin was being overly praised for his actions. Before Singh had left he had called Justin in and suggested that in the long run his career with the service was now dead no matter what any court might say. He had led a mutiny, and regardless of the justifications that stigma would always surround his name. No officer would ever fully trust him in the future.

Thorsson
in turn had laughed at Singh's comments, replying that Singh was a generation on the way out.

"Concerning Captain
MacKenzie's
suicide,"
Thorsson
continued, "it was tragic, but in a more traditional sense it was, perhaps, the only avenue left to him. It was a shame that marine guard was wounded trying to disarm him; there was a time when a man went quietly to his office, wrote a letter of apology, and then ended it."

Justin looked at
Thorsson
in surprise for implying support for the idea of suicide.

"Just talking about an older time, which
MacKenzie's
mind functioned in,"
Thorsson
said. "
MacKenzie's
world came apart long before you people ever set foot aboard his ship. I wonder if having so many of you young cadets around might have triggered something buried deep within.
A memory, a fear from when he was young.
Be that as it may, once the unraveling started it couldn't be stopped, sort of like when you crack open an intricate machine and all the little springs start leaping out. No matter how hard you try you can't get them back in and trying to fix it just means more leap out.