Chapter Nine: Moment of Truth, Part Two

After my XO's testimony Captain Prim called for a brief recess. While the judge left the courtroom in his usual way, back through the doorway nearest the bench, the rest of us remained in our seats - although we were free to talk, or drink some of the water provided, or move around. I opted to stay seated, highly aware of my husband's presence just behind and to the left of us.

I took a deep breath, a little unnerved by the testimonies that came before now. And it still wasn't close to being over yet.

"Relax, Colonel," Commander Roth whispered in my ear. "We're actually doing great. Nothing Lee's been going for has revealed anything unsavory about you so far - or the commander, for that matter." He smirked slightly. "Being disliked by your co-workers does not mean you slept with someone else's wife."

"No." That hadn't stopped him from pursuing me, though - and I hadn't exactly given him a hard no in the beginning, either, as I should have.

Like I said, stupid.

"I didn't know you asked my husband to testify," I said to him, and Roth smirked again.

"Part of my strategy, ma'am. The judge needed to see your genuine surprise at that, so he'd know we hadn't collaborated in any sort of way with Major Hawk. He especially needed to see that the major wasn't here by your convincing." Roth leaned back in his chair. "That he's here of his own accord, without any sort of intervention, speaks volumes about your innocence in all this."

"I suppose so." I still wasn't sure if the tactic would ultimately pan out for us, but I wasn't an attorney. I guess it was worth a shot.

"Still nervous?" Roth asked, and I heaved a sigh.

"Yes. That, and the fact that a lot of...very personal details about me are being paraded around in front of people I work with daily. Not exactly a position you want to be in."

Roth nodded. "I understand. But it's actually very fortunate for you that your XO witnessed what she did. Between you and your husband, I mean. And really, in a trial like this one, it's unavoidable, unfortunately. Your private life will be scrutinized for every last dirty detail."

"I figured as much when we began," I replied softly, a little defeated. "But it's...different actually living it."

Commander Roth was about to respond when the judge walked back in. At the enlisted woman's prompting, we all stood again.

With a wave of his hand, Captain Prim announced, "The recess is over. Let us proceed. Commander Roth, I believe you had one more witness?"

"Yes, sir." He turned back momentarily. "I'd like to call Major Hawk to the stand."

I had to force myself to keep my gaze straight ahead as Willis stood and made his way to the witness stand. Only once he'd sat down again did I look over at him.

I took another deep breath as Commander Roth stopped in front of him.

"State your full name and rank for the record," Prim ordered.

"Major William Peter Hawk, sir."

"Do you swear to speak only the truth here today?"

"Yes, sir."

"You may continue, Commander."

"Sir," Roth said, then turned his full attention to Willis. "Major, please state your relationship to the defendants for the court."

"Colonel Cooper is my wife. We've known each other for seventeen years, married for just about fourteen. Professionally, we've also been assigned together on a handful of missions in the past."

"Would you care to elaborate on which ones?"

"More recently, that would include Khan, but not Requiem. We did serve together on Earth afterward, and my air wing and I were sent to Puget late in the campaign as reinforcements."

"And Commander Ackerson?"

Willis sighed. "I knew him for about a year in high school. I don't...have a very favorable opinion of him as a person. I've only been around him very briefly a couple times professionally."

"Would you like to explain to the court why you don't have a favorable opinion of him?"

"No."

That brought another hush to the room, but Roth didn't seem deterred.

"Okay. That's your right." He paused, then said, "Can I ask why you've decided to sit in defense of your wife today, given the allegations?"

"Because I know they're not true," Willis answered, without hesitation. "I know she never slept with...the commander."

"And how do you know that?"

My husband paused. "Well, obviously I wasn't present during the time frame that this is...said to have occurred. I know they kissed; she readily admitted that to me once I'd arrived. But when I asked her if things went any further, she denied it. Given her open honesty about the rest, I believe her."

"Very well. No further questions."

Commander Roth came back towards our table to sit, and Major Lee took his place. For a moment I held my breath before he began.

"Major Hawk," Lee said. "Thank you for providing your testimony today."

"My pleasure."

"I think the court is especially anxious to hear your side of things, given your unique position. When did you first get a sense that something wasn't quite right in relation to the...rapport between your wife and Commander Ackerson?"

Willis frowned, and Major Lee quickly held up a hand.

"I'm sorry, let me rephrase: did you ever get a sense that the rapport between them wasn't strictly professional?"

"Yes," my husband answered immediately, and my heart dropped. I knew that admission wasn't going to go over well with the judge.

In response, Major Lee practically beamed. He did his best to cover it up fast, though.

"Right. So please, tell the court why you felt that way, and when."

"Well, after my wife's internment, I didn't hear from her for a very long time, which is highly unusual for us. She normally checks in pretty often during deployments, to see how the kids and I are doing."

"You share four children together, correct?"

"Yes."

Major Lee let that hang in the air for a moment. "Four. Not one or two or three. That's quite a commitment."

At that my husband snorted. "Any child is a commitment."

"Yes, but, nonetheless, a large family is quite the undertaking. Quite the...responsibility."

Commander Roth stood. "Objection, sir. Relevance? Neither the colonel's status or capacity as a mother are under question here."

"Yet again, I agree," Captain Prim said. "Major Lee, please keep your questions on target. I won't ask again."

"Yes, sir. My apologies. I'll reframe."

Major Lee paused for a moment, thinking, and I saw Willis let out a discreet breath. This trial was putting everyone on edge.

"Let me ask you a different question, Major: you say you noticed your wife was acting...abnormally distant."

"Yes."

"That's what first tipped you off that something wasn't quite right."

"Yes."

"But you said yourself she'd just been released from a rebel prison. What made you feel this was something beyond just...normal shock, or a coping mechanism following her captivity?"

Willis hesitated. "I knew Eth - Commander Ackerson was with her. I knew he'd been the team leader of the group who rescued her and Lieutenant Lloyd."

"How?"

"My brother-in-law, Commander Mark Cooper, works in ONI. He kept me up-to-date on what was happening with my wife's rescue throughout."

"I see. And why was it a problem that Commander Ackerson was with your wife? What gave you misgivings about them working together?"

Again my husband didn't answer right away. "Colonel Cooper and I...had already had some tensions about their relationship the first time they'd worked together. On Requiem. I felt that since she'd just been interred for so long, she was...especially vulnerable at this time."

"Vulnerable to what?"

It seemed clear on his face that he didn't want to answer, but had to. "To having an affair."

I felt a sharp spike of pain pierce my heart at his words. Not because they were damning, but because in the end, Willis had been right to worry. I hadn't had an affair in the traditional sense, but certainly I'd crossed lines that shouldn't have been crossed. For that - as well as for the pain in his voice when he said it - I felt devastated. And ashamed.

Major Lee took a prolonged pause again, making sure Willis's words really sunk in before he asked his next question.

"You and Colonel Cooper are now separated, correct?"

"Yes."

"And is that why you're separated? Because of what did occur between her and the commander?"

This time, Captain Prim intervened directly. "Be more specific, Major."

"By that I mean their closeness, the kiss?"

"In part. We're also just...not as close as we used to be, for that and for other reasons."

"Reasons I'm sure you'd rather keep to yourself, given it's not relevant to the case?"

"Yes."

Major Lee nodded. "That's perfectly fine. Thanks again for your testimony, Major."

As he walked back to his table on the far side of the courtroom, I could see the prosecutor's smirk. He didn't even try to hide it now.

In the end, Willis's testimony had proven a major win for him...and a huge blow for us.

Watching Willis on the stand had been emotionally rough for me. I wasn't really sure what Ethan hoped to gain by testifying himself - maybe just to reiterate that we hadn't ever gotten physical. If we were let off the hook now, I knew it'd be on a technicality only. Thankfully, that was the sole stipulation here - the fact that we hadn't slept together.

If Commander Roth had been rattled by my husband's testimony, he didn't show it. And for now, he got a chance to rest for the remainder of the trial, until he and Major Lee made their closing arguments. Now it was Ethan's counsel who took to questioning.

She approached him as Prim went through the usual inquiries.

"State your full name and rank for the record."

"Lieutenant Commander Ethan James Ackerson, sir."

"Do you swear to speak only the truth here today?"

"Yes, sir."

"Captain, the floor is yours. Proceed."

"Thank you, sir," Johan answered. Despite what I already knew of her - that she'd willingly date a client - she surprisingly didn't show any sign of unprofessionalism here. Instead she gave Ethan a hard stare, like she knew exactly what he was going to say. They'd obviously rehearsed this.

"Commander, would you please state your relationship to your co-defendant, and in what capacity you two have served together."

"Yes. She's my superior officer. I'm one of two ONI operatives attached to her command, the other being Lieutenant Lloyd."

"And I'm sure the court has heard the answer to most of these questions, but let's hear it from you: when did you first meet the colonel, and what was your impression of her?"

I tried hard not to make any obvious motions of interest, but I was curious to hear what he'd say.

"I met Colonel Cooper well before she was a colonel - just like Major Hawk. It was eighteen years ago for me. We were both sophomores in high school. I saw her in class one day, asked her out, and we dated for a while."

"So you're exes, correct?"

"Yes. But that was a very long time ago."

Captain Johan let that settle. "Right. I mean, you could say that people can generally change completely in eighteen years."

It was Major Lee's turn to stand now. "Sir, objection. I don't see how that's relevant."

"Agreed. Captain Johan, please focus your line of questioning."

"Yes, sir. I'll repeat my initial question, then: what was your first impression of her?"

"Well...I was a teenage boy. She appealed to me on a physical level first. Then, once we started dating, I noticed her other qualities, too. She was quiet, thoughtful, kind, and inquisitive. Certainly a better person than me at the time."

"And what was the reason for your eventual breakup?"

Ethan didn't miss a beat. "That was entirely on me. I was a kid and didn't treat her right."

Understatement of the century.

I was worried about where things were going to go from here - if Johan would take it to the next level and reveal exactly why we'd broken up, to many people I didn't want to ever know - but thankfully, she didn't.

"And soon after, she began dating her now-husband, Major Hawk."

"That's right."

Johan nodded. "So get me up to speed here: what did you notice about her more recently? When you finally saw her again as an adult?"

"Well, she'd changed. Pretty radically." He smiled a little. "She's no wallflower anymore, that's for sure. She's very take-charge, no holds barred, a hundred percent Marine. Not afraid to jump into the action, not afraid to get dirty, willing to do the exact same job as those under her command. And yet somehow, she's retained that essential sense of wanting to do right, and be fair to those around her. She's earned a lot of respect from her subordinates for that. I'm sure it's a big reason why she outranks both her husband and I by two pay-grades."

"So you'd say you admire her, yes?"

"Definitely."

"Right, then. No further questions."

I was almost surprised she'd just left it at that. I guessed Johan was trying to play it off as his interest in me being purely one of respect for an old peer, rather than someone he pined after.

But now it was Major Lee's turn, and his questions wouldn't come across as practiced. If I knew anything by now, it was that the prosecutor was good at twisting the real, raw truth out of people.

"Commander Ackerson, I'm just going to get to the heart of the matter with my questions, if you will. You say you admire the colonel - what she's become now."

"Yes."

"Did that ever manifest itself or evolve into romantic interest?"

"On my part, yes."

"And on hers?"

Ethan paused, remaining silent for a while.

"Commander?"

"No. It didn't. She made it clear to me on several occasions that she loved her husband, and only him."

"But there was a mutual attraction there."

"Well, I can only really speak for myself, and what I think was going on with her. But yes."

"And did that...attraction ever manifest itself in the physical?"

"Once. We kissed."

"Which is what the rebel prisoner said she was witness to," Major Lee reminded everyone. "But nothing else?"

"Never."

"Not even later?"

"Never," Ethan repeated more forcefully.

"All right. Go on."

"After we...kissed, she became insistent that it would never happen again, or evolve from there. She told me she would absolutely not take things any further, even after...I told her of my feelings."

"That you wanted to be involved romantically."

"Yes."

"An interest she did not share?"

"Correct."

Major Lee paused. "So, in effect, if she had agreed, and had reciprocated your feelings...you would have had no qualms about breaking regulation."

Captain Johan stood. "Objection, sir. Speculation."

"Sustained. Major Lee, you're on very thin ice. Clean up your questioning. Now."

"Yes, sir." He turned back to face Ethan. "And what about the rebel prisoner's claim that the two of you did have intercourse?"

My ex snorted. "A flat-out lie. As you've heard here today, and know from official reports, Colonel Cooper and I held that interrogation along with Lieutenant Lloyd. It was obvious the girl was trying to get a rise out of one or all of us, and divert the attention away from her own questioning. So she tried to say something sensational to provoke a reaction in the lieutenant." Ethan smirked. "Joke's on her, though. He's a good spook, and it didn't work."

Major Lee finally nodded. "Thank you, Commander. No further questions."

As soon as the prosecutor returned to his table, there was a momentary pause. I think everyone just needed to decompress a little after all the testimonies. I was hoping for another break in between before the final statements, but that's not what happened. Instead, Captain Prim glanced up from his datapad and addressed the court.

"We will now hear concluding statements from both the prosecution and the defense." He gestured to Major Lee's table. "As is customary, the prosecution will go first."

"Thank you, sir." Lee came forward then, pausing in the middle of the room to glance up at Captain Prim. "Sir, you've heard the testimony here today, and I think it's been very revelatory. From the accounts of Major Hawk and one of the defendants himself, they say the only thing that happened was a kiss. But the truth is, in cases such as these, we can never really know that for sure. What we do know, based on the testimony of Sofía Rios and Commander Ackerson himself, is that both he and Colonel Cooper were alone long enough to engage in a mild illicit act. What they did or didn't do in addition to that, only they will ever know for sure.

"But even just by what's been corroborated here today, it's clear that lines were crossed. With attraction on both sides, and romantic feelings on the part of the other, can we really trust that they didn't go even further?"

Major Lee left it at that, and Commander Roth approached the bench next.

"Sir, I don't think anyone here would deny that mistakes were made, and that perhaps a single regrettable action was taken. However, having heard the testimony here today, I think it's clear the type of person my client is, and where her morals stand. Colonel Cooper has the respect of her subordinates, her superiors, and her peers. Her own husband has testified that he himself does not believe an irreversible line was crossed. And might I remind you, sir, respectfully, that that is the only consideration here - was that ultimate action taken? Did the relationship between Colonel Cooper and Commander Ackerson escalate to a physically intimate level? And the answer to that is a resounding no.

"Other than the statement, under interrogation, of a teenage girl who fights under the banner of the neo-Insurrection, no one else has claimed to have seen, or heard, anything untoward occur - let alone a condemning sex act. Please believe what the majority have told you, sir: that adultery, in its truest and legal sense, never occurred between these two servicepeople."

With that, at least the proceedings were finally over. Now, we had to await the verdict.

An hour passed before Captain Prim reappeared at the judge's bench. Everyone stood again.

One hour. I guess that's all it took to decide Ethan and I's fate.

It was strange; my palms were sweaty, but my mouth felt dry. I almost started to feel that same sense of constriction at my neck again, but I swallowed and briefly shut my eyes. When I opened them, it was gone.

"The presiding judge, Captain Terrance Prim, will now read his decision," the enlisted woman announced.

This time, I held my breath for real.

"After careful deliberation, as to the charge against Colonel Natalie Cooper and Lieutenant Commander Ethan Ackerson for adultery, under Article 134, I find the defendants not guilty."

I sagged for a moment. Actually sagged. Like my legs just felt like jelly and I might fall.

Captain Prim went on.

"I have heard from several witnesses today on this matter, and no one ever saw or heard of any sexual misconduct from either of you. You never privately visited each other's quarters, and you were never discovered in any compromising position elsewhere. In fact, the only thing that was witnessed firsthand was Colonel Cooper leaving Major Hawk's quarters, with the implication that she had stayed the night. As the two of you were married at the time, and in camp, there is nothing to be questioned there, legally or morally."

Commander Roth glanced at me out of the corner of his eye then. The side of his lips were already turned upward slightly in a grin.

"However," the captain spoke louder then, and I felt the air in the room shift. "While a kiss alone is not grounds to convict for infidelity, nor proof that the pair ever became physically intimate, there is a general consensus here that the defendants became much too close during their deployment. More than a subordinate and his superior should, and past the point of professionalism or friendship. While I do not believe that the relationship ever progressed beyond that, or became sexual, it was, without a doubt, inappropriately intimate all the same.

"For that reason, it is my decision here today - and therefore, that of the court's - to find you both guilty of conduct unbecoming an officer, under Article 133. You will each receive a reduction in rank of one pay-grade as punishment.

"Lieutenant Colonel Cooper?"

"Sir?"

"You may resume your command of the 52nd Regiment as an O-5. Lieutenant Ackerson?"

"Sir?"

"You are hereby ordered to transfer to a new unit as an O-3, to be selected for you shortly. You may remain in charge of your ONI team, but you will do so at a reassigned location." Prim looked out at the court. "Thank you everyone for your testimonies and your time. You're dismissed."