Furious

52

Kris’s first day in court started bad and then got worse.

She was all decked out in starched undress whites and about to get into the limo beside Jack when “that” happened.

She quickly scrambled back into the house and found one of the young housekeepers with the proper feminine necessities. Fortunately, it hadn’t progressed to the point she needed new whites. As she rejoined Jack in the limo, he give her a raised eyebrow.

She whispered, “That time of the month.”

“Sorry about that, and today of all days,” he whispered. Was there something deep in his eyes, maybe a hint of regret that it was still just the two of them, and not a threesome.

Would that change anything? Kris wondered.

Kris was in no mood for bull, but that was all she got that day in court. It seemed that the law let the prosecutor go first, and that meant the defense had to listen to whatever the prosecution could get the judge to let its witnesses say. The defense only got to put an oar in the water at cross-examination.

But Kris’s lawyers seemed uninterested in cross. Lawyers, as in plural. There were half a dozen at the prosecutor’s table. Kris’s team matched them one for one.

The prosecutor gave an opening statement that accused Kris of everything under the sun, from going outlaw and starting a war all on her own, coming up with a lousy plan to do it, then seducing the admirals to go along.

“Seducing!” Kris whispered in Tsusumu’s ear.

“The word has other, nonsexual meanings,” her lawyer whispered back.

“But you know what he means.”

“Sit still. Keep quiet. Can’t you see how the judges are looking at you?”

Kris had been warned that her job in court was to sit still, look innocent, and keep her mouth shut until and only if her lawyer called on her to testify. Kris had no idea how hard that would be.

Well, she’d faced hostile lasers. She could face a few hostile words.

With an effort.

The prosecution paraded a long line of retired generals and admirals who all showed up in court in their dress uniforms bespeckled with medals. Everything about their bearing, dress and demeanor shouted, “I know what I’m talking about.”

And, boy, did they talk.

One by one, each of them meticulously tore apart Kris’s battle plan. They pointed out every turn at which the fight could have gone horribly wrong, long before it actually did. They highlighted every risk Kris took and every option she didn’t follow that might have led to a better outcome.

“Her scouting was ridiculous,” one admiral growled. “She had only one contact with the force she assumed was the aggressor. An assumption she had little or no basis for. She based all her further actions on the unsupported assumption that she knew where it was going and the speed it would maintain. Every one of her actions rested on that untested supposition. She had a force of corvettes and courier ships. Any competent commander would have put them to use as scouts.”

He thinks I should have scattered my tiny force even more! Kris scrawled on a pad for her lawyer to see. What happened to concentration of forces?

Her lawyer scratched through Kris’s comments after hardly a glance.

One of them raised the issue of the attack on the mining head that delayed their arrival at their final ambush.

“Even if we allow that she had some purpose for that distraction,” the general said, “why would a commander of a battle fleet risk her own life flying direct cover for such an operation? And it did nearly cost her her life. Her target proved to be more difficult than she thought, and she was shot down. This was totally unacceptable behavior on the part of a fleet commander.”

Kris risked a glance back at Jack, expecting an “I told you so” look. But he stared straight ahead, his face a neutral mask.

And Kris’s lawyer elbowed her in the ribs to bring her back face forward.

After each witness, Kris’s lawyer was offered a chance to cross-examine. Tsusumu never even rose from his chair to confront the prosecution’s witness but mumbled, as if half-distracted. “Have you ever been in combat, Admiral?” or “General?” as the case might be.

The answer was muttered, or growled, but it was always the same. “No.”

“No further questions.”

The first couple of times the prosecution seemed too puzzled by the question to do anything but dismiss the witness. By the fourth or fifth time, the redirect got lengthy as the prosecutor asked the witness to give a long account of their years in command or even command of the War College.

Tsusumu never asked a second question.

By morning break, Kris was boiling. Mr. Kawaguchi hustled her out of the courtroom and into a small room down the hall, where they could have some privacy.

“Why are you letting them say all that about me?” Kris demanded in a voice that wasn’t quite a scream.

“Because they are doing exactly what I want them to do,” Tsusumu said calmly.

“What? Have you already measured me for my white kimono and the headsman’s slice?”

“No,” he said with maddening calm.

Kris kicked one of the large leather chairs that surrounded a heavy wooden table. That hurt. She took a deep breath.

“Okay, then what are you doing?”

“They are calling you a fool. A young fool, but a fool nonetheless. Have you read the ribbons on their chests?”

“No,” Kris admitted. Musashi decorations were not in her training.

“I had a retired general of my own do that. All of that fruit salad, that is what you call it, isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“All of it is for peacetime activities. Not one of those mighty men has ever faced combat. My retired general showed me a picture of you in full dress uniform. By the way, you will wear it the day you testify. Every decoration you have involved combat, does it not?”

Kris mentally went down her own fruit salad. “Pretty much.”

“Let them talk. And quit making faces when they say things. There are cameras in this courtroom. Your faces will be on tonight’s news. Some of the more unscrupulous news sources will doubtlessly take your reactions and put them out of context. Please give them as little to play with as you can. Now. I have things to do, and, certainly, you must have also.”

“I need to go to the bathroom.”

“Please do and don’t bother me.”

Kris retired to the ladies’ room, did what she needed to do, and found that she had the place all to herself. She kicked the wall, careful not to hurt herself this time. Rather than punch the wall, she tried slapping it a few times. She found the window would open, so she did and tossed a few primal screams at the wind.

This was so different from what she was used to. Yes, it was tough waiting for that right second to slam a hostile with lasers or torpedoes, but she was doing something. Here she had to sit, and sit, and sit.

But she could end up just as dead.

She kicked the wall again. Gently.

She was almost calm when a young woman member of her legal team timidly stuck her head in the door, and announced, “It is time to return to court.”

They continued picking apart Kris’s every decision, every move, for the rest of the day. The prosecutor had them talk. Kris’s own defense asked its one lone question. It went on and on until even Kris was finding it repetitive and boring.

She wasn’t alone, it seemed.

As the time drew close to recess for the day, notes flew up and down the bench between the nine judges. As the last witness for the day stepped down, the chief judge called the prosecutor to the bench.

“It has been pointed out that none of the last three witnesses have added anything new to the record before us.”

“Well, Your Honor,” was cut off.

“Will any of the, ah, eight witness you have scheduled add anything new to the record? I notice that all but one of them is a former general or admiral.”

“The exception to that is an expert on international law. He will testify that a declaration of war is not an action for an individual but for a sovereign state or planet.”

“Mr. Kawaguchi, will you stipulate that an individual does not have the right to declare war?”

“Under normal circumstances, yes, Your Honor.”

“The court has before it a stipulation that no individual has the right, under normal circumstances, to declare war. I assume the defense accepts the burden of addressing the matter of ‘normal circumstances’?”

“We are prepared to do that.”

“Then, Mr. Prosecutor, it appears that you have presented your case. Are you prepared to rest?” carried a strong hint that he better be.

Not surprisingly, the prosecution rested.

“Mr. Kawaguchi, are you prepared to present your case in the morning?”

“This is a little sudden, Your Honor. We are still attempting to locate a witness.”

“See that your witness is located by tomorrow. We will allow you to introduce this surprise witness, assuming his or her testimony is relevant. I’m sure the prosecutor will see that you verify it is.”

“Certainly, Your Honor.”

The gavel came down. “Court dismissed until nine o’clock tomorrow morning.”

Everyone rose as the judges departed.

“Now, my fidgety, angry, young woman, you will have your day in court. I suggest you get a good night’s sleep, and oh, see that your maid has your dress uniform ready in the morning with all the trimmings and sauces.”

“Fruit salad, sir, is never served with sauce,” Kris said.

“No sauciness, please.”

“I will try, sir.”

Kris took a shower before dinner. It left her feeling less . . . tainted. Jack and Penny did their level best to talk about anything but the trial. Kris discovered that Jack had once been expelled from school briefly for a rather spectacular invitation he made to a girl for the prom.

“Did she go with you?” Penny asked.

“No,” Jack said forlornly. “I was expelled for the great night. Worse, she went with my best friend, and they were a couple after that.”

“So clearly,” Abby said, “you signed up with the Foreign Legion and ended up in the Secret Service.”

“Something like that. Never a girl in my life.”

Kris got away with giving him a hug and kiss to solace his loneliness. Sadly, the kiss was little more than a peck because a serving girl came in to refill water glasses.

Dinner done, they adjourned to the drawing room to sample the night’s news. They’d come to categorize them as those who were after Kris’s head, those who weren’t, and those who hadn’t made up their minds yet. Even that middle group seemed taken aback by the universal condemnation of her battle plan. Several left their audience with a final question. “Why would someone as experienced as Admiral Kota follow such a flawed plan?”

Penny turned off the monitors before the talking heads got going.

Kris went to bed early but found sleep hard. She kept waking up from dreams of her facing the headsman in a white kimono.

A headsman who looked too much like her lawyer, Mr. Kawaguchi.