52. Who had lost everything

• “Prosecution calling next witness to stand, Mr. Vince Pier.”

In immaculate white military dress uniform packed with a few medals, Vince strolled to the witness stand from outside. Crossing between multiple audience stands past John without looking at him. John got the message, he will never talk with him again.

• “Mr. Pier, what role you played in the Giant of the Stars accident?”
• “Me and my ship, my family were the first to make contact. Then became the civilian liaison, essentially being a non-official fleet commander organizing the rescue efforts.”
• “Is it true that you have been awarded the Federation Cross, our highest civilian medal for exemplary courage and sacrifice?”
• “Objection, irrelevant.”
• “Not at all, establishes the witness’ credibility.”
• “Overruled.”
• “Yes, it is.” — Vince not wasted words, instead pointed to the cross on his chest.
• “Let the record reflect, Mr. Pier currently wearing 4 medals on the witness stand, including the Federation Cross. What are the other medals?”
• “Objection, irrelevant.”
• “Same, establishes credibility, Mr. Pier was a key leader during the accident and his future accomplishments reflects on his character.”
• “Hm. Overruled. Go on, prosecutor, want to see where this leads.”
• “Thank you, ma’am. Mr. Pier.”
• “Highest Valor, for bravery in combat. And two North Stars, for exemplary service and leadership demonstrated on the field.”
• “How did you earn these?”
• “After the accident, I joined the army, Captain Sebes of the Irondome gave me a field commission as junior ensign. After the case was closed, I participated in the fast track cadet training on Hell’s Gates and had been sent to patrol the spiral arms. All three medals earned for fighting pirates and saving cargo ship crews from certain death.”
• “Exemplary, Mr. Pier, without such fine men, our peace would be nothing, thank you for your service!”
• “Objection, not a question.”
• “Sustained, prosecutor, please get to the point.”
• “Mr. Pier, what was your experience with the first officer on board the Giant?”
• “It was a long time ago, yet I still remember clearly. He was erratic…”
• “Objection, speculation.”
• “Sustained. Mr. Pier, please keep your answer to what you observed without conclusions. Latter is the job of the jury.”
• “Understood, your honor. Let me start over. When we located the ship, we hailed them multiple occasions without an answer. Then we tried to board through the main spine, was too dangerous with all the damaged small crafts inside. We managed to pull off a risky docking maneuver with the rotating body and I boarded the Giant, looking for the captain.”
• “However the captain was already deceased.”
• “Yes, sir, shrapnels in his body, dead in minutes after the detonation.”
• “Objection, he could not know.”
• “Saw the body myself on the bridge. Excuse me for missing the order. May I continue?”
• “Overruled, yes, please do.” — judge like mother hen keeping the procedure on track.
• “When I arrived to the bridge, it was in rubbles. Multiple dead bodies, including the captain. A few lower rank trying to fix consoles, starting to coordinate with engineering and repair teams. We set up a video conference with the first officer, Talm Shibar, Admiral Haggardt, Captain Sebes, me and my crew on the Perseus Train to plan rescue operations.” — Vince took a few deep breaths as even mentioning his home rushed in all the memories and unprocessed feelings — “Mr. Shibar was not engaged with us and could not provide crucial information. He took the responsibility of cleaning the main dock, however that never happened. We even lost a few souls to move a small craft out before it blew up all of us.”
• “What else can you tells us about Talm Shibar’s behavior?”
• “I remember him telling me…”
• “Objection, hearsay.”
• “Sustained.”
• “Mr. Pier, try to describe what he did without his words.”
• “Okey, he grabbed me after the conference and threatened to keep myself out of his way.”
• “Thank you. Now let’s move on to the failed attempt at pulling the Giant to higher orbit, tell us what happened?”
• “Objection, relevance.” — the defense lawyers looking confused onto each other then to the judge.
• “It is relevant to demonstrate the content of crew toward standard procedures, absent in the rescue efforts.”
• “I’ll allow it, but keep the detour short.” — judge looking at the prosecutor.
• “We managed to connect most of the civilian fleet to the Giant and started the synchronized pull. Slowly, but we had enough thrust to overcome the moon’s gravity. At a critical point, the previously entered pirate fleet reemerged and the Bendeghuse tried to stop them from leaving. This is when… when… ahm…”
• “How the Giant’s crew contributed during this time?”
• “Well, we had no contact with Talm for a long time so the remaining junior officers on the bridge coordinated. Not much, as in this time the Giant had nothing to do just sit tight and let us make the pull.”
• “When the fight broke out, you could not maintain the necessary trust?”
• “No, we could not, I saw many ships destroyed, the Bendeghuse had no chance neither the another section of the Perseus Train… then the chain reaction wiped out part of the civilian fleet.”
• “Hold on, commander, you are doing fine. I know it is hard to talk about it. Can you tell us why?”
• “Objection, relevance.”
• “Demonstrating the scale of the accident and the sacrifice that happened the day, all on account of the defendant.”
• “Overruled.”
• “Because…” — Vince despite his years of psychological treatments and long military training, was on the verge of breaking down in tears — “cause I lost my family. My son, and my wife, with one of my oldest friend, was on the another section of the ship and perished immediately.”
• “Objections?”
• “No…”
• “Defense, cross-examination?”
• “No, we don’t have questions to Mr. Pier.”
• “Okey, anything else for today? We are at half past three.”
• “There was no other witness and next witness only available tomorrow.” — chimed in the defense lawyer.
• “Then we have an early close. Mr. Pier, you are dismissed, thank you for your presence. Thank you all, as usual, don’t discuss the case outside of this courtroom with no-one, see you tomorrow.” — well known knock-knock of the judge as every day so far the weeks long trial.

Vince walked past John again on his way out, straight face, only looking at the heavy double door.

• “Hey, Vince, how are you? You can’t even look at me? Damn…” — John stood up as he circumvented him. Prosecutor joined him.
• “What was that?”
• “Well, not related to the case. It is just… He won’t forgive me for the loss of his home. The last part of it, anyway.”
• “Is that the, the white paper you and some of your team wrote about dark matter reactions? The data is from…”
• “Yeah, after two years, he gave up the Perseus Train and we used it in the experiment. Unfortunately, the data was inconclusive.”
• “Oh.”
• “Yeah. Anyway, how is the case going?”
• “You know we should not discuss it.”
• “Let me rephrase, do we really need to add that exhibit?”
• “Well, so far it seems we don’t need it. But stay until Monday, tomorrow is hard.” — prosecutor’s eyes looking far into the nothing, planning all his steps in advance — “The ISV board member in charge of the Giant’s operations will be the witness. He may throw us some curveballs.”
• “Okey.” — John’s best pokerface still could not hide entirely his panic.

Read the story leading up to now:

Giant of the Stars

Fictional story of a luxury starliner’s catastrophy