Chapter Twenty-Nine: The Trial Begins

"Hurry," said John.

"Ah EM hrraengh," replied Sherlock. He was gnawing his way through the last of John's bonds, the one on his right wrist.

"Come on. I want to be up and at 'em before the welcoming committee gets back."

"Ergh," said Sherlock, sourly. He spat out a wad of hard jelly. "You try chewing your way through this stuff. It's not exactly the lemon mousse at the Café Royal."

John felt like a bad partner. Why hadn't he offered to give Sherlock four more orgasms, one for each of the rubbery cuffs securing him to the bed? There were time considerations, yes, but getting off seemed to add extra power to the man's bite, and it certainly made him happier.

"You take a break. I'll get this one." John nudged Sherlock's head out of the way with his own and bit down.

He had just gotten free when two prison guards returned from lunch. Immediately, the smaller one clapped tentacles on Sherlock and dragged him towards the door.

John rose to his feet. "Hang on a tick. Where d'you think …"

The tall guard laid John out on the floor with a blow that had to be felt to be believed. The pain was sharply focusing. John staggered to a crouch.

"You fucking pails of wank. Where the bollocks do you think you're taking him?"

He was about to execute a spectacularly ill-advised rugby tackle on the guard who had backhanded him, for some definitions of "hand," when Sherlock shook his head.

"John, please. Do not make trouble for yourself. I'll see you at trial."

John hesitated. "I don't like it," he grumbled, as the tall guard opened the door to the cell.

"You don't have to like it. You just have to stop running full-tilt into things made of non-Newtonian fluids. "

"Tell these arseholes I'm only backing off because you said 'please.' And tell them to bring you back in good shape, or I'll bite their arsing nuts off."

As the short guard bustled his captive towards the door, Sherlock allowed his eyes to dip towards the tall guard's smooth and unadorned middle.

"You're sure you're a doctor," he intoned.

For the third time that day, the sight of Sherlock's smile lines hit John hard.

He hadn't had smile lines when John met him. Now he did, and their deployment rendered John speechless with fiery, implacable love every time he saw them. He closed his eyes for a moment and let the image of the fine wrinkles emanating from the corners of Sherlock's eyes turn into arcs exploding from the center of a firework, projectiles shooting from the barrel of a rocket launcher, red bullets exploding from the quadruple chambers of his locked and loaded heart.

"Very sure. When's trial?"

"Tomorrow," called Sherlock. "Try not to hurt anybody until then."

John made no promises. He pressed himself against the transparent wall of the cell and glared at the two guards as they led Sherlock down the hall. When they disappeared from view, he sat down on the floor of his cell. Immobility succeeded in pissing him off further. He turned onto his front and counted off push-ups while his arms burned.

John's mental push-up counter had stopped incrementing by the time the two guards returned. His language skills were limited (here, his inner Sherlock piped up, "Nonexistent"), and he wasn't able to get any information out of the guards before they tossed a haggard Keplerian into his cell and left. The creature fell heavily to the floor, his peripheral shapes barely stirring.

John noticed the Umber Hexagon on his new cellmate's head. "Soldier, huh? What're you in for?"

He sat down next to his new cellmate and drew a hexagon in the gelatinous floor in greeting. He was mildly surprised when the Keplerian flashed a Silver Circle across his communicative plate in response.

John eyed his cellmate carefully. "How do you know my name? Have we met?"

The Keplerian sat up and began talking in earnest. John didn't understand a word he said.

"Sorry, mate. No idea what you're on about. Pa de ze ne pohegem."

Speaking Pashto, if only to say he didn't understand, lifted John's spirits a bit. (Take that, inner Sherlock.) He drew three diamonds of Keplerian incomprehension on the floor. They remained visible for a while, then slowly melted back into nothingness.

The new cellmate slumped against the wall. He seemed to have given up on talking with John. The creature wasn't a healthy color. As a Hexagon, he should have been a tawny amber, but he was roughly the color of cat piss. John suspected the prison guards had not been gentle with him.

"Want a drink? My partner hasn't been drinking his soup." John pushed a bowl towards his new cellmate. "Wayward bugger. Him, not you."

The cellmate was apparently parched. He flashed John five circles of gratitude, then put a tentacle in the soup and drank. Satisfied, he pushed the soup back towards John. John took a swig and coughed.

"That packs a punch. Argh! Blimey. Why so boozy? The old recipe didn't ferment."

The cellmate helped himself to a bit more. His color was already improving.

"Call me crazy, but I liked the old recipe," said John, taking another hit. His veins were weirdly radiant and he was in a confessional mood. "It reminded me of the broth that comes with udon noodles. Plus you could make a bomb with it. Can't get that at Wagamama."

The cellmate responded with a mellifluous belch. This must have coincided with a braingasm, because he reached out a tentacle and drew a long, undulating line on the floor.

John tilted his head at it. "Eh?"

The Keplerian drew two round circles on top of the line. Below the line, he drew what appeared to be two human bodies, one tall and one appropriately proportioned, thank you very much.

"Me," said John. He pointed at the appropriately proportioned stick figure. Then he made a circle with the fingers of his left hand and held it to his forehead, where it served as a crowning shape. "Silver Circle. Me."

He was rewarded with an umber square for his trouble. Yes, said his cellmate.

"And the other one is Plum Cross. Sherlock." John pointed at the tall stick figure, then made a cross with his index fingers.

Another umber square from his cellmate. Yes.

The picture on the floor was starting to fade, so John and the Keplerian poked it into the jelly again, this time with more force.

"Right," said John. "What's this wavy line? Sound wave? Blast wave?" He pointed at the long, semi-horizontal line that appeared to cut him and Sherlock off at head height. Then he drew three more confused diamonds on the floor. They were becoming his signature shape.

The cellmate's peripheral shapes spun with Sherlockian impatience. He drew various shapes under the wavy line, then drew two Keplerians with large crowning hexagons off to the side. As the pièce de resistance, he drew three heavy, wiggly lines entwined with each other next to the two humans. There was no mistaking them. The lines fairly buzzed with coital energy.

"Snakes," said John. "Midorian fire snakes. This wavy thing is — d'oh! — a wave, yeah? A regular wave. As in water. The wiggly things are snakes. These other shapes are animals having a soak. Fuck me, are these pandas? Nice one, mate. Good definition on the, uh, component blobs."

As if understanding John's emotional state, the cellmate glowed with biofluorescent modesty. But how would a Keplerian decipher human emotions? John thought about Sherlock's comment, during the bonding ceremony, that Oh experienced a specific internal vibration when in Ut's presence, and vice-versa. Perhaps humans, like Keplerians, also gave off vibrations. If so, could Keplerians read these vibrations for clues to who a person was and what he was feeling? John felt more and more certain that humans and Keplerians could communicate in ways beyond the purely linguistic.

"So. Here we are, the three of us. I'm in the water. Sherlock is with me. And you're at the side of the cleansing pool."

John pointed at one of the Keplerian soldiers in the drawing. It was, he thought, the better looking of the two. Then he pointed at his cellmate.

This earned him three umber squares, twirling and leaping in the middle of his cellmate's soup. Yes yes yes.

"Good Cop! How are you? Sorry I didn't recognize you. What'd you do to get yourself thrown in here, you old bastard? It's good to see you again."

Drink made John more than usually sentimental. He threw his arms around his companion and hugged him. For a split second, the companion looked confused. Then he returned the gesture with four affectionate tentacles, including two manufactured expressly for the purpose.

"We'll be all right," said John, once the hug was over. "We're soldiers, yeah? Our kind sticks together. 'In Arduis Fidelis' and all that."

He drew a hexagon on the ground. He pointed from the hexagon to his cellmate, then from the hexagon to himself. Rarely had John spent so much of one day indicating things with his hands. He was beginning to feel like Vanna White.

"See? Soldiers. Comrades in arms." He woozily patted his own chest, then the chest of Good Cop.

This caught Good Cop's interest. A silver circle appeared in his midriff, flanked by a military hexagon. You're a soldier?

"Hell yes." Without realizing he was doing it, John sat up straight, sucked in his stomach, and threw back his shoulders. Then, with enormous gravity, he dipped his finger in soup and painted a hexagon on his forehead with it.

Good Cop's peripheral shapes began to do cartwheels with excitement.

The next thing John knew, the Keplerian was gently tracing the painted hexagon with one tentacle. This wasn't like being grabbed by Plum Duff, whose touch had felt like being assaulted with a rubber octopus. Being touched by Good Cop was different. The contact was enjoyable. It was unexpectedly warm, with a bit of suction. There was something familiar about it.

"Oh my God," said John, giggly and incredulous. "What was that? Did … did you just do a body shot off my forehead?"

He placed his hand to his brow, and sure enough, the hexagon was gone. Good Cop had slurped it off him.

Afterwards, everything was a bit of a blur. There was more talking and more drawing. More hugging. Possibly more slurping. Then it was morning, and John was rampagingly hung-over, and Good Cop was gone.


"I don't know what you did to your lawyer," said Sherlock a few hours later at trial, "but he adores you." His voice was crisp and disapproving.

John peered about. He and Sherlock were on display in a transparent box in the center of the courtroom. To their left, several meters away, was a throng of priests, identifiable by their crowning squares. In front was a crowd of scientists. And to their right was a collection of soldiers. But on the floor behind them, there was no one. All the Triangles were missing.

In the space between the humans and the onlookers, a Heptagonal creature — perhaps a prosecutor? — orbited their box, looking severe. John's former cellmate orbited the box too, like another, kinder moon.

"Ungh," groaned John. "That's my lawyer? I thought he was Good Cop from the pool."

"He is Good Cop from the pool. Nobody wanted to be your attorney, and there is no dedicated barrister class. They held a lottery yesterday. His number came up."

The grim light of day poked John in the eye. "But he's a lifeguard."

"He's a soldier. He adapts to whatever position his superiors place him in. Normally, he protects order at the pool. Now he's supposed to be protecting order by participating in your trial. However, he's currently exhibiting besottedness to the point of near incapacitation. Why do you suppose that is, John?"

John pawed his aching head. "I'm sure you're exaggerating."

They watched as Good Cop delivered an impassioned plea to the jury. The only part John understood was "Silver Circle." At the moment, it appeared to be one of Good Cop's favorite words. Even for a defense attorney, he was using it a lot.

"Oh, for God's sake! Did you see that?" demanded Sherlock. "He just told the jury you're too beautiful to die."

"Okaaay. Unusual tactic. Is it working?"

"Somewhat. Keplerians are nothing if not susceptible to groupthink." Sherlock should have sounded pleased, but he sounded more annoyed than ever. "Did you fuck him?"

"Are you out of your mind? No, I didn't fuck him!"

"Did …"

"NO! He drank some fermented soup off my forehead and we hugged. It was that kind of thing. You know. Two mates at a stag do."

Sherlock knew nothing about two mates at a stag do. "John, precisely how well do you remember events that occur when you're drunk?"

"I don't have to remember. I wouldn't fuck around on you."

"Mmm," said Sherlock. It was what he would have said if somebody had pointed out that there was a cockroach under the sink, except that he would have been more enthusiastic about the cockroach.

"'Mmm,' my arse," said John. "He wasn't coercive with me, and there are things I wouldn't be up for no matter how drunk I was. I wouldn't slap my Gran, I wouldn't vote UKIP, and I wouldn't cheat on you. You're my mate."

And with that, John seized Sherlock by the cheekbones and kissed him.

Keplerians do not communicate via sound, and a Keplerian courtroom is invariably silent. How then, was John able to sense a hush falling over the crowd? When the kiss was over, he looked around and found that a number of communicative plates had gone completely blank.

Good Cop had gone pale again. A court officer led him away.

"Your advocate is taking a short break," drawled Sherlock. His body language was now relaxed, and he was dabbing at his lips with a daintiness rare in someone so blunt. "Something appears to have upset him."

"No doubt," said John, feeling a pang of regret at having hurt his cellmate's feelings. Clearly one creature's stag do was another creature's hot date. "What now?"

"Witnesses," said Sherlock. "The prosecutor is introducing somebody."

"Who?"

"We're getting to that! Pentagon of some sort. Scientist."

"Is it one of the engineers who was responsible for patching the hole in the ship and generally getting things working again?"

"I think not."

"Thank heavens. Those people must hate us."

The humans watched the prosecutor talk. She was the highest-ranking Keplerian John had ever seen, and her communicative polygons were huge. Consequently, she could only get out a few words at a time before the screen on her midriff was full. It took her ages to say anything.

"Bigwig," muttered Sherlock.

"The prosecutor?"

"The witness. At the top of his caste, apparently. Very high-powered. He's taken Scar's old job."

"Sounds import—" said John. And then he stopped talking, right in the middle of a word, because they'd just led in the new Head of Xenobiology.

It was Plum Duff.


Author's note: Thanks to guest beta Mr. Mirith for providing super-quick proofreading. Happy Leap Day!