It was a perfect day for an execution, sunny and clear with a cool whisper of wind coming from the north. An accused man, shackled, stood before a council of twelve robed jurists. He maintained a defiantly erect posture and an indignant expression was scrawled across his face. His name was Devin Moore. The rectangular hall was completely still, frozen in anticipation. Then one jurist rose.
“We’ve reached a verdict,” proclaimed a white-haired man with thick black glasses and a pipe that hung from the corner of his mouth. A din rose amongst the hundred or so gathered in the hall’s gallery. The standing jurist held his glasses with one hand and hammered his gavel three times with the other. Puffs of smoke leaked out from the corner of his mouth with each violent pounding. The murmur began to subside. “We’ve reached a verdict!” he shouted. He took a draw on his pipe.
The eleven other black-robed jurists remained seated and expressionless. These twelve, selected by lottery, were known as The Council and they were the ‘deciders’ for the colony. The position was unpaid, unheralded, and generally undesired. They looked unanimously uncomfortable in their flowing, priestly robes.
The walls behind The Council were adorned with holovisions which projected three-dimensional images of court exhibits and witness’ testimonies. They were all muted, their floating images frozen in space. The standing jurist, who was still waiting for the din to fully subside, was known as Mr. Brooks. He was biologically blind as was revealed by the complete opacity of his lenses. His physiological eyes might have been useless but he was not without sight. Built into his lenses were tiny cameras which converted stereoscopic images into brainwaves and transmitted them into his visual cortex by way of tiny arrays buried in the stems of the frames. One could have eye or brain surgery to correct nearly all forms of blindness, but the glasses were a far less invasive and far less expensive alternative. Seeing eye frames were cheaply available at either of Goldstein’s general stores.
The accused man, Mr. Moore, had no issues with visual acuity or any other physical handicaps of any significance. He was young, lean, and strong. He stood alone, looking afflicted in front of the gallery and facing The Council, chained up like some medieval felon.
“Are these chains absolutely necessary?” he asked holding them up as he spoke. The throng began to mumble.
“Quiet, please!” ordered Brooks, his baritone voice echoing through the hall. Devin wasn’t entirely sure if Brooks was ordering him or the gallery or both. The noise finally subsided. “Thank you,” Brooks continued. He puffed out a ring of smoke. “After much deliberation, The Council has come to the conclusion that Mr. Devin Moore, standing before you now, is guilty of breaking The Law.”
Devin shook his head. “Bullshit!” he shouted.
“The surveillance video was particularly damning evidence in this case,” Brooks explained.
“You call that evidence?” Devin protested. “It was doctored!”
Brooks pounded his gavel. “Quiet! The Council has rendered its verdict. You are guilty of breaking The Law.”
“The Law?” Devin mocked.
“Thou Shalt Not Steal, Devin Moore,” chimed another jurist.
“You know The Law, Devin,” Brooks continued, trying to sound patient. “It is the only law. Do you wish to make a statement?”
“I do.” Devin turned towards the gallery. His chains jingled. He scanned their faces. They averted their eyes. Then he turned back to The Council. “This trial’s a sham. You can’t sentence me. I’m an Amerikan and I have rights.”
“Boo! Thief! Liar!” Called the crowd.
“I have a right to a trial in a real court— not this kangaroo court. You have no authority.”
“Boo! Traitor! Execute the Traitor!”
“Quiet, please!” shouted Brooks while pounding his gavel again. “Do you have anything to say that is relevant before we sentence you?”
Devin stared into Brooks’ blackened lenses. Then he scanned the rest of The Council. Their eyes remained fixed on him. They knew he was guilty. He knew he was guilty. He always wondered if he would be able to delude himself into thinking that he was somehow the victim in all of this mess but he couldn’t bend his mind that way. Despite his luck for getting out of past jams, he would not be able to get out of this one. Once the Council rules it is finished.
Devin’s only hope was for a spectacular, fantastical, perfectly timed miracle rescue by the National Police. He prayed for the appearance of the black-clad, NaPol tacticals, repelling from hovering dragonflies, smashing through the hall’s sensorglass windows, and wildly firing their heat-seeking assault rifles into the throng. They would rescue him and take him back to Amerika where he would be released on his own recognizance while awaiting a larceny trial that would be delayed ten years. That was a preferable outcome to being stoned to death by a bunch of Bohemians.
“I demand you turn me over to NaPol. This is not a real court.”
Goldstein was certainly outside the bounds of the Amerikan justice machine, but its court was indeed real. The Colony had its share of thieves, swindlers and bandits, lured from the Lower Fifty Three. Its insulation from the omnipresent eyes and pulse emitters of National Police made the Colony a prime destination for those lacking moral inhibition. But the skeptical nature of the colonists quickly flushed the criminal element into the open. A life of crime rarely paid well in Goldstein. The Council was notoriously ruthless at sentencing. They had very few resources by which to enforce The Law so justice had to be swift and decisive. It was a Draconian system but very efficient.
After mumbling to each other, Brooks spoke again. “The Council has taken your position into consideration. Mr. Moore,” he continued while holding a stem of his glasses, “in light of your numerous declarations during this trial about the invalidity of this court and your desire to be turned over to the National Police, we think you’ll find the sentence for your crimes to be to your liking.”
“What is it? Hard labor?”
“That might be one aspect of it.”
“Detention?”
“That is very likely.”
“Death?”
“Possible.”
“So you’re going to put me in a labor camp and then execute me?”
Signaled by a vibration in his multi, a burly man of six and a half feet sidled up to Devin. The man rolled up his sleeves revealing his tattooed forearms. He was the Sheriff— the sole elected law enforcement of the colony. Devin began to come to the realization of what his sentence was going to be. His head dropped as he was overtaken with dread. He didn’t seriously expect to be executed but this might actually be worse.
“Have you named a custodian for your property?”
“What?” asked Devin, distracted by his thoughts. “I uh…I don’t have anything worth worrying about.”
His mind began to race. He needed a plan. He had to figure out how to escape since it was increasingly unlikely that NaPol was going to save him.
“I believe we have nothing more to do here except carry out the sentence,” concluded Brooks. “Sheriff, will you take Mr. Moore to the river?” Ryland put his paw on Devin’s shoulder. “Get your damn hands off me!” Devin barked. “I’ll go peacefully.”
“Fair enough,” replied the sheriff.
Devin, weighed down by his jingling chains, turned towards the gallery and faced their condescending glare as he lumbered out of the hall. He was followed by the sheriff, Mr. Brooks, and a dozen or so gawking colonists. The procession made their way to a utility truck where Devin was helped into the back. The sheriff got in next to him. The gasoline engine roared to life.
They motored slowly out of the cobblestone plaza and onto a paved thoroughfare. The road was flanked by stone and log row houses which were capped with whirling wind turbines and smokeless chimneys. Ice still coated the narrow alleyways and shaded surfaces between the buildings. The snow had receded into the cooler places but the road itself was dark and wet from the thaw.
As they drove out of the plaza, the tightly packed storefronts and houses of the village gave way to small industrial and agricultural Kwanset huts tucked into the dense spruce and budding birch trees. Inside their arched plastic skins, articulated robot arms were knitting textiles, sowing seeds and scribing millions of nano-processors.
The road took them by several construction sites. Construction was an ever-present phenomenon in Goldstein. Cranes and scaffolds were the predominant feature of the colonial skyline. An excavation near the road had made a deep scar in the tundra and a spider web of steel lattice rose up from the pebbly mud. Steel was an unusual and fantastically expensive commodity in Goldstein. ‘BROOKS’ was emblazoned in black on every beam.
The site was alive with a mixed crew of brown, smooth-faced Natives and pale, bearded Anglos buzzing around the hive-like foundation hoisting and hanging and welding and riveting. They were building a fusion reactor that would serve as the prototype for future power plants. It was rumored that some venture capitalists from Hong Kong were bankrolling the project.
The road wound on, down into a gauntlet of birch trees. Down for two miles past a scrap yard and a quarry, dropping a hundred meters in altitude along the way. Down through the pulse-emitting field array that fenced the inner colony from human and animal intruders with an invisible beam of coma inducing microwaves.
Brooks keyed some digits into his multi unit. A segment of the field turned off. They drove through the invisible fence, to the banks of a meandering river where the truck stopped and the driver turned the engine off.
“Get out!” The sheriff rudely barked at Devin. Devin held his chains up with an expression of helplessness etched in his face. The sheriff and the driver helped him out. The three of them along with brooks walked down to the banks of the river.
“So you’re really going to do this to me?” Devin asked.
“You did it to yourself, thief,” the sheriff replied.
“Isn’t there another way, Brooks? I can make things right. You know me. Give me a chance.” They gathered around a dilapidated wooden rowboat pulled up onto the shore. Devin felt even more dread. “You know this is a death sentence,” he exclaimed.
“A slow death by starvation,” added the sheriff as he unlocked Devin’s shackles. “You shouldn’t have broken The Law. Now get in.”
The sheriff palmed his 9mm as Devin slowly climbed into the tiny boat. Brooks stayed the sheriff’s hand. Devin took a seat in the boat and pretended to row. The sheriff tossed him a thermal which hit Devin in the face as he pulled on the oars. Devin rolled it up and tucked it under his seat. He had given up. There was no getting out of it. He wondered how long he would last. Would the animals get him first? The cold? Hunger? “Well, what are you waiting for? Shove me in,” Devin ordered.
“Hold on,” Brooks intervened. “You know this need not be a death sentence…”
“How?” Devin asked without enthusiasm.
“You can still be pardoned. The Council has signed off on it.”
“I’ll be dead before I get to McGrath.”
“Maybe,” Brooks continued, “Certainly if you give up. But things aren’t as hopeless as you insist. Just make The Delivery and you’ll be pardoned.”
“Deliver what?”
“Here, catch…” Brooks tossed Devin a leather satchel which landed with a thud at Devin’s feet. before Devin could open it and look inside, the sheriff grabbed hold of the splintery boat with his massive hands and shoved it off into the gray water.
“…And I better not see you back here unless you deliver it!” the sheriff shouted.
“Deliver what?” Devin asked again. “To who?”
“It’s there, in the satchel. Don’t worry. They’ll find you. Just read the instructions first,” Brooks shouted. “Make The Delivery and you’ll be pardoned. We’ll even come get you.”
Devin began to row. “Maybe I’ll come back and make a delivery to you,” he blustered as he rowed the bobbing boat through the icy gray water.
“I’ll be waiting for you,” replied the sheriff as he fastened the snap on his holster. “Watch out for moose, they kill more people then bears, you know!”
The three stayed behind on the shoreline until the current swept the frantically rowing Devin around a bend and out of sight. He was an exile, now. If he was to return, the mandatory colonial response would be to shoot him on sight. But that had never happened in the thirty plus years of Goldstein history. Several dozen exiles had tried to return either openly by groveling on their hands and knees, or covertly by slipping into the perimeter when the field was down. The vast majority of colonials lacked sufficient ruthlessness to shoot exiles on site but they were always disciplined enough to maintain the boycott of them. With no possibilities to exchange with the colonials for food, shelter, or clothing, the exiles would soon give up in frustration and drag their starving, emaciated, carcasses back into the wilderness. Sometimes, usually not more than two miles from the perimeter, their half-gnawed skulls would be discovered by hunting parties.
Brooks took a moment to ponder Devin’s fate. “Will he make it?” He asked himself. There was something in Devin’s persona that gave Brook’s hope. Devin was a loner and mentally tough. That gave him a better chance than most. Brooks imagined him washing up on shore somewhere fifty kilometers downstream, hungry and shivering. Would someone find him? Would someone help him? “We’ve got to give him a chance,” Brooks thought.
“Do you think the son-of-a-bitch’ll make it?” asked the sheriff.
“You mean make The Delivery?” asked Brooks.
“Yeah…”
Brooks didn’t answer. Instead, he placed a call on his multi.
