The Night's Dawn Trilogy (291 page)

“So far you’ve had a lot of luck, and no genuine obstacle. That’s going to end as soon as the
Jamrana
enters Gov-central-controlled space. You don’t understand what it’s going to be like, Louise. There’s no way you’ll ever
get inside High York. Look, the only reason you ever got inside Phobos was because we smuggled you in, and no one bothered
to inspect the
Far Realm
. You got out, because no one is bothered about departing ships. And now you’re heading straight at Earth, which has the largest
single population in the Confederation, and runs the greatest military force ever assembled—a military force which along with
the leadership is very paranoid right now. Three forged passports are not going to get you in. They are going to run every
test they can think of, Louise, and believe me, Fletcher is not going to get through High York’s spaceport.” He was almost
pleading with her. “Come with me, tell our government what’s happened. They won’t hurt him, I’ll testify that he’s not a danger.
Then after that we can find you a ship to Tranquillity, all above board.”

“No. You don’t understand, they’ll send him back to the beyond. I saw it on the news; if you put a possessed in zero-tau it
compels them out of the body they’re using. I can’t turn Fletcher in, not if they’re going to force him back there. He’s suffered
for seven centuries. Isn’t that enough?”

“And what about the person whose body he’s possessing?”

“I don’t know!” she cried. “I didn’t want any of this. My whole planet’s been possessed.”

“All right. I’m sorry. But I had to say it. You’re doing a damn sight worse than playing with fire, Louise.”

“Yes.” She held on to his shoulder with one hand to steady herself and brushed her lips to his cheek. “Thank you. I’m sure
you could have blown the whistle on us if you really wanted to.”

His reddening cheeks were confirmation enough. “Yeah, well. Maybe I learned from you that nothing is quite black and white.
Besides, that Fletcher, he’s so…”

“Decent.”

Louise gave Pieri the kind of look that told him she was immensely interested in every word he spoke. “So what will happen
when we arrive at High York, then? I want to know everything.”

Pieri started to access all his neural nanonic-filed memories of High York spaceport. With luck, and a surfeit of details,
he could make this last for a good hour.

•  •  •

The Magistrature Council was the Confederation’s ultimate court. Twenty-five judges sat on the Council, appointed by the Assembly
to deal with the most serious violations of Confederation law. The majority of cases were the ones brought against starship
crews captured by navy ships, those accused of piracy or owning antimatter. Less common were the war crimes trials, inevitably
resulting from asteroid independence struggles. There were only two possible sentences for anyone found guilty by the Magistrature:
death, or deportation to a penal colony.

The full Magistrature Council also had the power to sit in judgement of sovereign governments. The last such sitting had determined,
in absentia, Omuta to be guilty of genocide, and ordered the execution of its cabinet and military high command.

The Council’s final mandate was the authority to declare a person, government, or entire people to be an Enemy of Humanity.
Laton had been awarded such a condemnation, as had members of the black syndicates producing antimatter, and various terrorists
and defeated warlords. Such a proclamation was essentially a death warrant which empowered a Confederation official to pursue
the renegade across all national boundaries and required all local governments to cooperate.

That was the pronouncement the Provost General was now aiming to have applied against the possessed. With that in the bag,
the CNIS would be free to do whatever they wanted to Jacqueline Couteur and the other prisoners in the demon trap. But first
her current status had to be legally established, if she was a hostile prisoner under the terms of the state of emergency,
or a hapless victim. In either case, she was still entitled to a legal representative.

The courtroom in Trafalgar chosen for the preliminary hearing was maximum security court three. It had none of the trimmings
of the public courts, retaining only the very basic layout of docks, desks for the prosecution and defence counsels, the judge’s
bench, and a small observer gallery. There was no permitted or designated place for the media or the public.

Maynard Khanna arrived five minutes before the hearing was scheduled to begin, and sat at the front of the small gallery.
As someone used to the order of military life, he had an intense distrust and dislike of the legal profession. Lawyers had
abolished the simple concept of right and wrong, turning it into degrees of guilt. And in doing so they cut themselves in
for fees which came only in large multiples of a navy captain’s salary.

The accused were entitled to a defence, Maynard conceded, but he still never understood how their lawyers avoided feeling
equally guilty when they got them off.

Lieutenant Murphy Hewlett sat down behind Maynard, pulling unhappily at the jacket of his dress uniform. He leaned forward
and murmured: “I can’t believe this is happening.”

“Me neither,” Maynard grumbled back. “But the Provost General says it should be a formality. No court in the galaxy is going
to let Jacqueline Couteur walk out of the door.”

“For God’s sake, Maynard, she shouldn’t even be let out of the demon trap. You know that.”

“This is a secure court; and we can’t give her defence lawyer an opportunity to mount an appeal on procedural grounds.”

“Bloody lawyers!”

“Too right. What are you doing here, anyway?”

“Provost General’s witness. I’m supposed to tell the judge how we were in a war situation on Lalonde, which makes Couteur’s
capture legitimate under the Assembly’s rules of engagement. It’s in case her lawyer goes for a wrongful jurisdiction plea.”

“You know, this is the first time I’ve ever disagreed with the First Admiral. I said we should just keep her in the demon
trap, and screw all this legal crap. Gilmore is losing days of research time over this.”

Murphy hissed in disgust and sat back. For the eighth time that morning, his hand ran over his holster. It contained a nine-millimetre
semi-automatic pistol, loaded with dumdum bullets. He loosened the cover, allowing his fingers to rest on the grip. Yesterday
evening he had spent two hours at the range in the officers’ mess, shooting the weapon without any aid from neural nanonics
programs. Just in case.

An eight-strong marine squad and their sergeant, each of them armed with a machine gun, marched the four prisoners into the
court. Jacqueline Couteur was the first in line, dressed in a neat grey suit. If it hadn’t been for the carbotanium manacles
she would have been a picture of middle-class respectability. A slim sensor bracelet had been placed around her right wrist,
monitoring the flow of energy through her body. She looked around, noting the marine guards at each of the three doors. Then
she saw Murphy Hewlett scowling, and grinned generously at him.

“Bitch,” he grunted under his breath.

The marine squad sat Jacqueline in the dock and fastened her manacles to a loop of chain. The other three possessed—Randall,
Lennart, and Nena—were made to sit on the bench beside her. Once their manacles were secured, the marines took up position
behind them. The sergeant datavised his processor block to check that the sensor bracelets were working, then gave the clerk
of the court a brief nod.

The four defence lawyers were ushered in. Jacqueline manoeuvred a polite welcoming smile into place. This was the third time
she’d seen Udo DiMarco. The lawyer wasn’t entirely happy to be appointed her counsel, he’d admitted that much to her, but
then went on to say he’d do his best.

“Good morning, Jacqueline,” he said, doing his nervous best to ignore the marines behind her.

“Hello, Udo. Did you manage to obtain the recordings?”

“I filed a release request with the court, yes. It may take some time; the navy claims their Intelligence Service research
is classified and exempt from the access act of 2503. I’ll challenge that, of course, but as I said this is all going to take
some time.”

“They tortured me, Udo. The judge has to see those recordings. I’ll walk free in seconds if the truth is ever known.”

“Jacqueline, this is only a preliminary hearing to establish that all the required arrest procedures were followed, and clarify
your legal custody status.”

“I wasn’t arrested, I was abducted.”

Udo DiMarco sighed and plunged on. “The Provost General’s team is going to argue that as a possessor you have committed a
kidnap, and are therefore a felon. That will give them a basis for holding you in custody. They’re also arguing that your
energistic power constitutes a new and dangerous weapons technology, which will validate the Intelligence Service’s investigation.
Please don’t expect to walk out of court this morning.”

“Well I’m sure you’ll do your best.” She gave him an encouraging smile.

Udo DiMarco flexed his shoulders uncomfortably and withdrew to the defence counsel’s bench. His sole comfort was the fact
that the media weren’t allowed in; no one would know he was defending a possessed. He datavised his processor block, reviewing
the files he’d assembled. Ironically, he could put up quite a good case for Couteur’s release, but he’d made the decision
five minutes after having the case dumped on him that he was only going to make a show of defending her. Jacqueline could
never know, but Udo DiMarco had a lot of family on New California.

The clerk of the court rose to his feet and announced: “Please stand for Judge Roxanne Taynor. This Magistrature Council court
is now in session.”

Judge Taynor appeared at the door behind the bench. Everyone stood, including the four possessed. Their movement meant the
marine guards had to alter the angle they were pointing their machine guns. For a moment their concentration was less than
absolute. Everybody’s neural nanonics crashed. The lighting panels became incandescent. Four balls of white fire exploded
around the machine guns, smashing them into a shower of molten fragments.

Murphy Hewlett bellowed a wordless curse, yanking his pistol up, thumb flicking at the safety catch. Like most people he was
caught halfway to his feet, an awkward position. A brutally white light was making him squeeze his eyelids closed; retinal
implants were taking a long time to filter out the excess photons. The sound of the detonating machine guns was audible above
the startled cries. He swung the pistol around to line up on Couteur. Marines were screaming as their hands and lower arms
were shredded along with their weapons. The lights went out.

From dazzling brilliance to total blackness was too much for his eyes. He couldn’t see a thing. A machine gun fired. Muzzle
blasts sent out a flickering orange light.

The possessed were all moving. Fast. The gunfire turned their motions into speedy flickers. They’d run straight through the
dock, smashing the tough composite apart. Fragments tumbled through the air.

Two lightning streaks of white fire lashed out, striking a couple of marines. The lawyers were scrambling for the closest
door. Roxanne Taynor was already through the door to her chambers. One of the marines was standing in front of it, sweeping
her machine gun in a fast arc as she tried to line it up on a possessed.

“Close the doors!” Murphy yelled. “Seal this place.”

A machine gun was firing again as the light from the white fire shrank away. People screamed as they dived and stumbled for
cover. Ricochets hummed lethally through the blackness.

Murphy caught sight of Couteur in the segments of illumination thrown out by another burst of gunfire. He twisted his pistol
around and fired five shots, anticipating her direction for the last two. Dumdum bullets impacted with penetrating booms.
Murphy dropped to his knees and rolled quickly. A pulse of white fire ripped through the air where he’d been standing. “Shit!”
Missed her.

He could hear a siren wailing outside. Sensor modules on the walls were starting to burn, jetting out long tongues of turquoise
flame which dissolved into a fountain of sparks. Three more bolts of white fire zipped over the gallery seats. There were
heavy thuds of bodies hitting the floor.

When he risked a quick glance above the seat backs he could see Nena and Randall crouched low and zigzagging towards the door
behind him. Eyeblink image of the door to one side of the smashed dock: three marines standing in defensive formation around
it, almost flinging a lawyer out into the corridor beyond. But the door behind him was still open. It was trying to slide
shut, but the body of a dead marine was preventing it from closing.

Murphy didn’t have an option. They couldn’t be allowed out into Trafalgar, it was inconceivable. He vaulted over the seats
just as an odd rosette of white fire spun upwards from behind the judge’s bench. It hit the ceiling and bounced, expanding
rapidly into a crown made up from writhing flames which coiled around and around each other. The three marines guarding the
door fired at it as it swooped down at them, bullets tearing out violet bubbles which erupted into twinkling starbursts. Murphy
started firing his pistol at Randall as he sprinted for the door, trigger finger pumping frantically. Seeing the dumdum rounds
rip ragged chunks out of the possessed’s chest. Shifting his aim slightly. Half of Randall’s neck blew away in a twister of
blood and bone chippings. A screaming Nena cartwheeled backwards in panic, limbs thrashing out of control.

The crown of agitated white fire dropped around one of the marines like an incendiary lasso. It contracted with vicious snapping
sounds, slicing clean through his pelvis. His machine gun was still firing as his torso tumbled down, spraying the whole courtroom
with bullets. He tried to say something as he fell, but shock had jammed his entire nervous system. All that came out was
a coughed grunt as his head hit the ground. Dulled eyes stared at his legs which were still standing above him, twitching
spastically as they slowly buckled.