50. Expert in witness

John arrived days late to Earth. He got a short message from the prosecutor to remind him of the new slot his witness testimony is expected. The day long travel on the cramped economy class of the small shuttle siphoned the life out of him. A rambling thought as he fall to the hostel bed in New Campignon, at the outskirts of Paris, “the government is really cheap on the costs of this trial”. Deep asleep moments later.

Relentless knocking woke him up in the morning. Examining his watch through a small crack, this much he could muster his eyelids against tons of pressure to stay closed. Five in the morning, in a hostel without room service, having hours until he has to wake up, this wasn’t right.

Just as he reached the spy hole on the door, the knocking switching to a metallic clinging. And the lock started slowly moving to open position. Whoever is, they will come in. Unarmed, he pulled down the wooden rod holding old fashioned cloth racks, silently releasing the racks onto the bed.

All in vain. The door flung wide open and tall suit was already on him. Expertly defusing his makeshift baseball bat, silencing with a chokehold. His attacker wasn’t alone, two more suits, two heads taller than him secured the corridors as his captor navigated around.

They took him downstairs, to the hostel’s common bath area. Empty except his entourage this early, showed into one of the showers, thrown to the ground and cold water opened on him. Another two showers were turned on next to his cabin, the sound made him notice he was alone with his captor.

• “Not a chance, Mr. Sotomayor.” — another figure locked the shower cabin after himself, first familiar face for John. — “I assume you remember me.”
• “Mr… Mr. Coldman?” — the bodybuilder suit, short haired, wide neck still stared closely into John’s face, muscles contracted, ready to act if he would do something rash.
• “Yes, indeed. We have a business to conduct here.”
• “Are you responsible for the shuttle’s destruction?”
• “Right to the point, Mr. Sotomayor. That was an unfortunate miscalculation on our part.” — put on unnerving smile of his cold face — “At least it demonstrates you how far we would go.”
• “For what?”
• “That you never mention the manifest file, neither its content, nothing about it.”
• “I won’t lie under oath.”
• “That would be rather… unwise. Presuming you want to live. And that your little girlfriend wants to live too.”

If Victoria was threatened, that would explain why she dropped her arguments for releasing what the Giant was smuggling.

• “Yes, John, if I may call you that, much shorter. You would not be a good poker player. She agreed to drop the case so nothing going to happen to you. Yet.”

Mr. Coldman turned around and his lapdog followed suite.

• “One more thing, John, if you are thinking on a rather stupid idea, the streaming is five minutes delayed. We will know and eradicate the whole room before you would get the info out. Understood?”
• “Aham.”
• “And no comms between you and dear Victoria either.”

John really needed the cold shower and a deep thinking of his life choices. The cozy office job and being the generally good guy life felt betrayed. Yet he could not really digest Mr. Coldman’s threatening.

The class action lawsuit filed by the families of victims never uncovered anything linking the Giant to smuggling. It should not be a problem to avoid mentioning it. However the proceedings are televised across the whole Federation.

As he was lamenting over Federation politics and his deep wish to stay out of it, he arrived to the courthouse. A bailiff led him to the room and told him to wait until called by name. How long, it is unknown. The previous witness, the bailiff told, some business management expert was being grilled over his analysis of InterStellar Vacations strategic decisions.

John felt the rare need of caffein. At this point, he was more bothered that he could not finish his sleep properly than the threats against him and Victoria. Weird brain of humans, always on the immediate needs and rarely on the second order consequences.

Just as he returned with a coffee he acquired from a nearby working automat, his thoughts shifted to the case. His boredom just grew.

Run of the mill case, company underinvested in maintenance. Age old skimping on essentials to make more money. While the passengers and crew paid the price ultimately with the public to clean up their mess. And they will weasel out of the accountability with some business shenanigans.

Or the government will bail them out as elections coming up and ISV serves over two thirds of the Federation’s high-class tourism needs along a few lifelines of agriculture colonies. The price of bread changing governments. Just as everything changes, all stays the same.

• “Sir, it’s your turn. 2 minutes.” — told the bailiff John as he sipped the last drop of his coffee.

John entered precisely, just as the frustrated business analyst left the courtroom. Bright lights and flashes blinded him during his swore in, confusing for a moment if he is just an actor on screen or it is the real deal.

Reciting his name, accreditations and accomplishments took a few minutes before the prosecutor could go on to the chunkier foundations.

• “As an expert witness, what was your task in relation to this trial?”
• “Nothing specific from the trial or the lawyers.”
• “Then why were you called as witness?”
• “I was the lead investigator from the GTSB assigned to the case of the Giant of the Stars luxury liner, and one of the co-signers of the final report delivered 3 years after the incident.” — from the corner of his eye, he noticed at least some respectful nodding in the ranks of the jury. — “And to my understanding, this trial examines the accountability of the operating company in regards of under-maintenance leading to the catastrophe and overwhelming loss of life…”
• “Objection, subjective opinion.” — defendant’s lawyer didn’t even look up from his notes.
• “… which our report dives deep into.”
• “As an accepted expert of space crash investigations, he is entitled to share his opinion.”
• “Overrule. And Mr. Sotomayor, please pause when you hear an objection so we can evaluate. Prosecutor.”
• “Understood, excuse me, ma’am.”
• “Thank you, so, can you lead us through the findings delivered in the final report? Amy, can you please pull up evidence 1234-A from plaintiff, page 789…” — many screens in the room and over the live streamed media blips up with the few bullet points — “Thank you, can we please blow up the full second paragraph”
• “Yes, of course, here you can see our major findings summarized after extensive investigation.“
• “Can you read out loud the paragraph, please?”
• “Yes. The major contributing factors to this accident were, one, negligence of maintenance in key systems responsible for drive shut down in case of containment failure. Two, major breach of Alcubierre-ring containment due to foreign object penetrating hull.” — John raised his sight for a moment meeting with dozens of pairs of eyes stuck on him.
• “Please, continue.”
• “Three, foreign object, sized at least thirty meters diameter, possibly a rouge asteroid breaching forward ring due to under-maintained safety sensors failing to disengage faster than light drive.” — John noticed the defendant lawyers conversing as he delivered his lines.
• “Four, crew content of standard operating procedures due to missed deadlines by detour to a different system. Five, altered route not filed leading to delay in effective rescue response.”
• “Six, shipmaster’s immediate death and executive officers breach of emergency procedures leaving rescue efforts unorganized. Our recommendations to implement the following…”
• “Thank you, Mr. Sotomayor, that is the next paragraph.”
• “Ah, sorry, just nobody ever paid so much attention to my documents before, nice to read to you all.” — room erupted in a small laughter as John blushed away his embarrassment.
• “Order.” — even the judge chuckled once.
• “Mr. Sotomayor, I would like to focus on number three for now.” — prosecutor took back the initiative — “What were the evidences leading to the conclusion of under-maintained safety sensors?”
• “First of all, maintenance logs were missing, first we suspected human error, not documenting their work is very usual still among engineers especially when overloaded with work. However data from the black boxes aligned perfectly to the retrieved samples of forward sensor blocks from the wreckage.”
• “How could you be sure the sensors weren’t damaged by the accident and then the subsequent impact?”
• “These sensor blocks are designed to withstand much higher acceleration than what was experienced in both cases. Plus the retrieved blocks were in areas not directly affected by the impact as half of the main drum took the brunt of the force. And…” — John stopped mid-sentence and not for breathing.

He just realized, the another clarification data came from the chip Victoria retrieved during their adventurous excursion bringing him uncomfortably close to the manifest’s topic. Again, he missed the bigger picture, this time at least he realized.

• “And? Sir.”
• “Ah, nothing. Those two reasons were conclusive to our analysis.”
• “What is your expert opinion, what would have happened if those sensors work?”
• “Objection.”
• “Overruled.”
• “The catastrophe may have been entirely avoided as the emergency system shuts down the particle accelerator. The entire reason these systems exist is to avoid contaminant in the particle stream leading to matter annihilation.”
• “Thank you. And would there be other ways to avoid the unfortunate outcome we all know about?”
• “Objection, speculation.”
• “He is an established expert, your honor, he can speculate in this matter.”
• “Overruled. But keep it narrow.” — judge nodded toward John.
• “Alternatively to avoid even the impact of those asteroids, standard operating procedures require forward positioned drones leading the ship through FTL.” — John tried to simplify the cause-effect chains for the jury and turned to talk directly to 18 — “While this is less reliable due to wireless communication with the ship’s main computers, and not recommended above immediate maintenance, it would have been prudent as the ship was crossing the empty space between two spiral arms, far from capable stations to help.”
• “Was this procedure part of ISV’s internal standards?”
• “After reviewing all document they shared, no, it was not mentioned in their books nor training materials.”
• “Was the crew aware of the maintenance issues prior to the accident? Did they experience any, and if so, what did they experience showing system problems?”
• “Objection, call for speculation outside expertise.”
• “As the report was already entered into evidence, he can comment on the recorded interviews.”
• “Sustained, establish foundations first.”
• “Yes, your honor. Amy, please scroll to page 354, and blow up paragraph 2 for the jury. Thank you, that was very fast. Mr. Sotomayor, what do we see here?”
• “This is the transcript of our interview with a surviving bridge crew member.”
• “Can you read the next two dialogue exchanges, please.”
• “Yes, I ask him, was there any sign of impending system failure or the incoming rogue asteroid? He answers, yes, we saw the sensor readings skipping for minutes randomly and no, the sensors were reading zero for 3 minutes straight before impact.” — muffled aw from the observing crowd expanded in the courtroom.
• “Order, or I need to remove the audience from the room.” — as the judge looked around, dead silence ruled with her.

Read the story leading up to now:

Giant of the Stars

Fictional story of a luxury starliner’s catastrophy