As Mary took her place at the table, she steamed inwardly. Yes, she knew she wasn't capable of the sort of stunning cross-examination that would be needed to stop all nostalgia in its tracks. But it still stung that she, the Chief of Counsel, wouldn't get to prosecute the defendant number one.
First she wasn't allowed to prosecute Snow. Then she was passed over again for the Gamemakers' trial. Then she had to single-handedly put together a national trial and keep it from falling apart no matter what the newspapers said. And now, as a final insult, she would be stuck cross-examining Toplak and witnesses instead of the star defendant.
Dovek was in his early sixties. The son of a senator had used his mother's connections to rise to his high position. Despite a flamboyant streak, he had only ever been loyal, first to McCollum and then to Snow. In Mary's opinion, the prosecution had done a good job proving that Dovek had managed to stick his long fingers into every single pie. Political persecution, using the NCIA to run protection rackets on businesses he was interested in, suggesting ideas to the Gamemakers, deciding where to crack down on riots and where to let them wither away - on and on the list went. He had influenced political, economic, cultural, and educational policy.
It was disappointing that Mary wouldn't be able to cross-examine him. But that didn't matter when there were bigger things at stake. If she was remembered by historians as having been a competent organizer than a brilliant prosecutor, so be it. The trial came first.
Judge Sanchez called everyone to order before summoning the first witness, one Claudia Whitehorn, a former official in the Ministry of Internal Affairs. Whitehorn looked nervously at the prosecution's tables as Low approached the lectern and began the direct examination.
The examination was competent, if uninspired. Dovek was made out to be a harmless paper-pusher with an independent streak that led him to argue with Snow from time to time. It was over quite quickly. A few other lawyers asked questions the answers to which made their clients look good, and then it was the turn of Isabella Jinwe, who had joked about eating the witnesses for breakfast before lunching on Dovek.
Whitehorn looked terrified, and with good reason. Within minutes, she was testifying for the prosecution and pushing all of her crimes onto Dovek, who was visibly infuriated by the about-face. Noticing that, Isabella encouraged Whitehorn to talk more about her own actions, which buried Dovek more and more. Mary had to kick herself mentally to stop feeling so envious of the other prosecutor. There was no way she could have performed the cross with such agility and ease.
By the time it was over, Dovek was steaming quietly and whispering to Oldsmith. The defendants sat with long faces, clearly wondering if their own witnesses would be so easily discarded. A few leaned over to whisper to their lawyers.
After the fifteen-minute break was a colonel with the unlikely name of May Gjergjievski. It had taken Mary a few seconds to realize that the 'gj' was in reality supposed to be a soft 'g'. Sanchez tripped over the name, as he did with Dijksterhuis, to much laughter. Isabella, of course, had made sure to practice and pronounced the colonel's name perfectly. She had practiced for every single eventuality, spent months listening to books about the recent history of Panem, written up detailed cross-examination outlines that would elegantly lure their subject into a trap, every single possible answer accounted for. Among her coworkers, Mary had always been known as one to finish things early, but she also had a lazy streak, a streak that Isabella mercilessly vanquished in herself. The amount of material she had personally gone through to prepare for Dovek's cross-examination boggled the mind, and she had not held back with the witnesses, either.
As expected, the colonel shouted her answers like she was on a parade-ground. Out of desperation, the audio person turned off the microphone, but that didn't stop her from speaking so loudly, Mary's ears hurt. When Isabella tore her protestations apart, it only got worse. One of the prosecutors was sitting with his head between his knees, hands pressed tightly to his ears.
Finally, mercifully, it ended. Mary wondered what would be for lunch.
As Dovek took his place in the witness stand, Thumeka was reminded of exams in Professor Githinji's classes. Answering questions in front of everyone had been nerve-wracking for some, while others (like Thumeka, much to her own surprise) had delighted in the audience. Dovek was definitely the latter. He was visibly anxious, but in the way that an actor is anxious before stepping onto the stage.
Low stood up and walked hesitantly to the lectern, still unused to her new legs. Thumeka kept an eye on the other defendants, trying to come up with a way to continue the analogy. Some relaxed visibly when they saw how confidently Dovek answered the questions, others were taking notes, still others were staring into space. Some of the prosecutors were irritated by the ease with which the defendant spoke.
"He certainly sounds persuasive," Mikola said sadly as Dovek made himself out to be reasonable and logical.
Thumeka wondered if the audience was cheering for him or against him.
It was only two days later that the cross-examination began. The air of ease around the former minister was replaced with icy calm, and the anticipation of the crowd was palpable. Jinwe, too, looked as if she had been carved from onyx. She took off her dark glasses and smiled at the dock, exposing the white glass prosthetics which prevented her eye sockets from collapsing. Sanchez reprimanded her for that. She smiled apologetically, put the glasses back on, and began the cross-examination, one hand running down her pages of notes with a deceptive casualness.
Thumeka had always signed up to do her exam first, so that she could get it out of the way and have more time to relax. When her classmates had seen her do well, it had set them at ease. That was happening now - Jinwe's deceptively simple questions about who had been responsible for what sector were deflected with barely a thought. Instead of pummeling him into submission like she had done with the witnesses, the prosecutor appeared to be almost hesitant. Oldsmith had a small smile on his face. Going second was tough - but did that really apply here? There would be no leeway for having gone first. Dovek had all of the disadvantages with none of the advantages.
Somehow, Thumeka missed the moment Jinwe flipped a switch. The questions were not so easy all of a sudden, and Oldsmith's smile became sickly as he watched Dovek flail as if attacked from all sides by invisible darts. After all, if he had had so little power over the NCIA's arbitrary arrests, then how had he been able to save someone who had connections to him? Thumeka was reminded of how one time, she had been hit with a question she couldn't answer at the very beginning. The class had looked like the dock looked now - long faces, anxiety, even fear. But Thumeka had been able to rally after that one question, the rest had been easy. For Dovek, they became harder and harder. The trap was closing.
When she had done poorly, everyone had sat tense, as they did now. She herself had never made any enemies, however, so she had never looked at the classroom and been faced with the satisfaction evident on more than a few faces. The more Dovek struggled, the more obviously happy were the back-benchers. Slice was practically smiling, as if she herself wouldn't have to go up eventually. Coll had a smug expression on his face. Lee was literally rubbing his hands together.
By the time the tribunal adjourned for the day, Thumeka felt confident enough to send off a little article about how the Capitol could now see just how incompetent the excuses of their former leaders were.
Antonius was grateful that Jinwe would not be cross-examining him. For the past few months, he had admired and envied Dovek's quick wit - and it had not helped the former minister at all! Antonius had felt like a schoolchild watching a classmate's excuses for why they had broken the window be torn apart.
The completely unseasoned and poorly cooked okra and beans in his bowl did not improve his mood. At least there was sugar in his tea. They had found one packet, but not the other. Antonius ate and drank quickly, as he needed to meet Shaw. Putting the cell in order could wait.
"Guard?" he asked. "I need to talk to my lawyer."
Everyone had been thinking along the same lines as him, which meant that the room was cacophony. "Good evening," Shaw said.
"Good evening."
"It is not as bad as it seems," the lawyer said, getting to the point immediately. "This was only the first day."
"You think he will do better tomorrow?" Antonius asked in a low voice. He was sitting a good distance away from Dovek, but he did not want Dijksterhuis and Grass to overhear him.
Shaw shrugged slightly. "We will have to wait and see. For now, though, start thinking of ways to answer the following questions." She slid a piece of paper into the box.
"Maybe he'll do better tomorrow," Marcellus said, but he didn't sound confident.
Leon snorted. "Did you see what Jinwe did to the witnesses? She tore them to shreds." He took the containers of soup he had bought at the coffee shop when sent to the Justice Building on an errand and set them on the table. Two pairs of eyes followed the wax-cardboard containers. Dad was still at work.
"Still, though." Marcellus pulled out his chair and sat down. "He looked way better than them. Jinwe wasn't nearly as tough with him."
"Because she's handling it differently. It's a marathon, not a sprint."
Marcellus looked disappointed, so Leon didn't say that deep down, he had cheered with every verbal blow the prosecutor had landed. Dovek had been one of the reasons why they had never had hot water in the summer, so why was his brother defending him? It was like he just wanted to be contrary. If the prosecution said something he had agreed with before, he stopped agreeing with it.
"Let's eat, boys," Mom said, noticing the brewing argument. "I'll put that bowl in the fridge for when Dad gets home." Last week, the electricity in their building had been officially turned on full-time. Unexpectedly, it hadn't been shut off since then.
Unlike the electricity, food rationing was still in force with no signs of stopping. If not for his occasional access to the courthouse coffee shop, Leon would have still been stuck with the 1,800 calories he was officially entitled to as a desk worker.
"Ooh, is that chicken?" Marcellus asked excitedly, sniffing at his soup.
Leon nodded. "They still had some left over." He opened his own container. Once, he would have felt nothing at the sight of the soup. Pasta, vegetables, and small bits of chicken floated in a translucent broth that had nothing in the way of spices. Now, though, the mere presence of the chicken was enough to lift it to dizzying heights of luxury. He ate a spoonful of the still-hot soup and smiled.
"I still think he's got a chance," Marcellus said stubbornly, as if he hadn't spent most of his life loathing Dovek and his ostentatious lifestyle, especially the clothes the status-conscious teacher would have never gotten to as much as touch. "What do you think, Mom?"
Mom shrugged. She lifted her bowl to his lips and took a sip before answering. "In my opinion, he's trapped. That Jinwe - she danced on the edge of getting fired for decades. She's bound to be a wily one. You just have to accept it." She picked out a piece of chicken and ate it.
"So we just lie down and let them walk all over us?"
"Nobody's walking over anyone," Leon snapped. "Don't you remember how you whispered jokes in the kitchen?"
Marcellus snorted and licked his spoon clean. "So I can complain freely, but potatoes are rationed. Great."
"As if we didn't have deficits before."
"Yes, but not potatoes."
Leon ate a spoonful of soup. "Come on, we were in our teens when that happened." He still felt sick whenever he saw turnips. Even the mere thought of them ruined his mood.
Marcellus shrugged. "I guess. But things were bad then - all things. It's not fair that we're being promised so much and still have to queue like before."
"So just because you're disappointed that things aren't perfect, you're going to think that they were better before?"
"Please, stop fighting." Mom's bowl was already empty. "Leon, how was work today?"
"Alright." More filing, more photocopying. Everyone being tried later would be totally screwed, with how incriminating documents were still bursting out of every hole in the ground. Someone had found a stack of files hidden behind a false wall in a bathroom cabinet. The owner of the signatures would not like it, that was for sure.
For the next two days, Dovek was slowly and systematically ground into powder. The front corner was terrified out of their wits by the display, and the back corner didn't bother trying to hide their glee.
"How are you doing today?" Miroslav asked Bright. The cross-examination had just ended, and Oldsmith was practically falling to pieces - he'd talk to him after he dealt with Bright.
A flicker of an expression passed over Bright's face. "I have nothing to hide," she said in a tone that made it clear that she had a lot of things to hide.
"But you are still nervous about your cross-examination."
Bright nodded. "That Jinwe - she twisted his words inside and out. What if they make me sound like a liar?"
"Have you talked to Dr. Rankin?" She had, of course.
"Yes. Logically, I know what I have to do. Be straightforward, don't add too much detail, don't try to guess." She drooped slightly as she continued, "But I know that they'll bring out the documents. I didn't know what would happen. Truly, I didn't."
"They reported to you," Miroslav said gently.
Bright's hands clenched. "I told you already, I was serving my country and protecting it from terrorists! It's not my fault if someone went too far! That was just how it went!"
Most likely, she was being sincere. "And the defectors?"
"Defectors?" she spat, but said nothing for a few seconds. "They were mostly motivated by bad food and poor treatment," she said weakly.
"Which says a lot about the armed forces."
"It does," Bright was forced to concede.
"So," Juan said, "one defendant down, twenty-three to go." He took a sip of tea and sighed.
Dora nodded absently. "It feels like we've been here for an eternity." It was already late September, but outside the window of the restaurant, it was still very hot. Everyone was looking forward to cooler temperatures - the hotel and the courtrooms used by the IDC were still the only buildings in the neighbourhood with air conditioning - but Dora knew that cold was generally worse than heat. "My poor husband probably forgot who I am by now."
Juan laughed quietly. "My kids haven't called for the past three months."
"Same." Dora took a sip of her own tea. They sat there in silence for a few seconds. They had a corner table, far away enough from prying ears, which unfortunately also meant that they could not eavesdrop on others.
"How are you doing?" Juan asked softly. "You were very agitated the last time we spoke like this."
"I have done some thinking." Dora took a small cookie and nibbled on it to give herself something to do. She was regretting that phone call she had had with her friend a few days back. Talking about this with a colleague was highly uncomfortable. "Did Raymond put you up to it?" She had thought that Juan of all people would have preferred to not bring it up again, and especially not to others.
Juan nodded. "He asked me to talk to you, since we share a background and all." He tucked a lock of white hair behind his ear. "But I, too, am concerned."
Shared a background - but Juan had not achieved District-wide notoriety as a hanging judge. "I feel like I was a tool of someone," Dora said, "but I am not sure of whom. When I had ministers shot the ordinary people cheered, and when I shot activists and imprisoned petty hooligans the government thanked me."
"A tool of the law, then," Juan said, nodding. "You forget, the Criminal Code was all we had."
"Daniel-"
"Daniel told all of us on multiple occasions that he still suffers from suicidal ideation. Are you really going to compare yourself to him?"
That was true, and yet, it stung that she had not been able to reach the same conclusions. "People who should have received small fines or community service were locked up for years because of how tough I was on the smallest misdeeds."
"And people who, in most places, got promotions and bonuses, ended up at the shooting walls." Juan snapped a cookie in half. "You did not go beyond proscribed maximums and actually tried to reach a balanced verdict. You were no political judge, merely one with a preference for the letter of the law."
Scant consolation, that she had not broken the law herself. Dora shook her head. "The letter of the law allows for mitigating circumstances. One can follow it and be strict or lenient. I was strict. Too strict."
Juan sighed. "You were far less strict than many."
Dora took a sip of tea, trying to figure out how to phrase it best. "That's irrelevant when none of us had anything in common with the defendants. Just look at our backgrounds. Raymond, Cora, and Drexel had a judge as a parent. You, Sean, Moira, Rosalinda, and I are the children of lawyers, though Sean's other parent also worked and was a doctor. Brutus and Daniel are the children of government officials, Taylor had a professor for a parent. Rosa was a town mayor's child, and Rose is the only exception as the grandchild of small business owners, which still makes her lower-middle class. It's completely absurd. This isn't a class system, it's a caste system."
"It is now what it is, it'll be a decade at least before the system is fully overhauled." All hopes were being pinned on capable young lawyers who had not had the time to sink into comfortable complacency and bribe-taking yet and could thus hopefully quickly become good judges. "They had to pick the best judges out of what they had."
"They still should have gotten better judges than us," Dora sighed. "Younger ones, maybe, or defectors. We're too used to the old laws. We don't know the meaning of mercy." The tea was beginning to cool. Dora held the cup in her hands, trying to capture the fleeting warmth.
As if to form a counterpoint to the conversation, the evening's entertainment walked up to the stage. Six youths in skimpy outfits began to dance to cheery music. "I can't believe they think it's appropriate to parade around like that," Juan said disapprovingly.
Dora snorted. "Look at those two," she said, discreetly gesturing to two clerks not too far from them. "They don't seem to be upset."
Juan shook his head. "Disgusting." He was right on that count. "In any case - who, if not us?"
It took Dora a few seconds to remember what they had been talking about. "You're right."
"Always am," Juan said smugly and adjusted his hair. He had recently gotten it done in a complicated style with countless small braids done up in a bun, and had cajoled Dora into getting her hair done for the first time since she was a small child. Much to her own surprise, it was not as torturous as she remembered - she would need to tell Ashley to stop getting these horrible buzzcuts now that she knew it was not so painful - and she now sported meticulous short cornrows, which she was forced to admit looked far more professional than her usual little dandelion puff. It was still quite uncomfortable, however, and the feeling of hair tugging on scalp did not improve her mood.
"The problem," Dora said, "is that this isn't just any trial. Somehow, we of all people must somehow make a decision that will stand before the bar of history."
Juan finished his tea and looked glumly at his cup. The music changed to another unfamiliar melody. "I'm very anxious as well," he said quietly. "Dovek - I can only think of one possible fate for him."
"We should not be discussing this here," Dora warned him.
"True," Juan conceded, looking at his cookie as if expecting it to be bugged. "No matter what, though, this was a reminder. Of what we are here to do."
"It's different now that the defendants are entering the box," Dora said.
The youths were walking around looking for someone to join. Unexpectedly, one, now thankfully wearing a tracksuit, sat down at their table. "Mind if I join you?" she asked.
Dora was very irritated at having their conversation cut short, but perhaps it was better they didn't discuss such things outside the privacy of their house. "We're not interested in- company," she warned.
The girl winced. "Me neither. That's why I went to you."
"Then why-"
"Dancing pays pretty well on its own," she said with a shrug. "And I like to dance so-" She shrugged again and reached for a cookie. "May I?"
"How about we buy you something?" Juan offered. "We do not wish to buy barely-adults for a cup of tea and a biscuit, but I can't stand seeing someone be hungry."
"That would be great," the girl said, eyes lightening up. "But in exchange for what?"
"For nothing," Dora said.
The girl looked skeptical but nodded. She reached for the menu and perused it. "So, you're the judges, right? I thought I recognized you."
"We are."
"What'd you think of the trial so far?"
"We're not allowed to discuss that."
"Oh. Alright." She went back to going through the menu. A few of the other dancers were already sitting inappropriately close to people. Two of them walked behind her, and Dora could hear them talking.
"-even Hailey found someone, and we're standing here like idiots!"
"Yeah, she found two old people who miss their grandkids and want to take it out on the nearest young person. If you-" The walked away, scanning the room for a glance or a gesture.
Hailey must have also overheard - her hands tightened on the flimsy cardboard. "I want the black tea with honey and a piece of apple pie," she said quietly.
"Say no more," Dora said, flagging down a server and putting in the order. "Who are these other youths?"
"I know one of them since highschool - we danced in a group together. He became some sort of stripper after that, and brought me into this group once things started to happen."
"You aren't worried?" Juan asked, tapping a cookie against the table. "Plenty of people don't have much respect for sex workers, if any." Dora was more concerned about the fact that someone with a highschool diploma, an automatic ticket to the middle class, couldn't find a job that paid more than dancing around practically naked.
"I've been doing this for months," Hailey insisted. "I'm not a sex worker, I just dance. Everything has been alright so far. I dance and get out most times."
"I'm not trying to teach you," Juan said. "It's just that - I know what it's like to be assaulted. I don't want it to happen to anyone else."
Hailey's mouth fell open. "Who's crazy enough to assault a judge?" she asked before gasping quietly. "Was it a relative? You don't have to tell me anything if you don't want to."
Juan shook his head and broke off a piece of cookie. Dora sipped her rapidly-cooling tea. "I'm fully open about it," he said, eating the piece. "I was fifteen then, the son of a lawyer of no particular significance. It was like all the fearmongering gossip, but real. I was walking down the street and a Peacekeeper noticed me."
"Say no more," Hailey said, reaching for another cookie.
Dora felt slightly uncomfortable, as she always did when Juan told his story. She knew full well that the perpetrator would have never faced trial in her jurisdiction for the simple reason that nobody ever tried a Peacekeeper for raping someone who didn't have serious connections. And she still tried to claim she was worthy of her current position? She had been a little cog in a rotten bit of machinery, nothing more.
The cross-examination continued. Rye could only watch in admiration as Jinwe extracted false statements from Dovek and then expertly shut the trap just as he was beginning to hesitate.
"Maybe they should have her cross-examine everyone," she joked to Rakesh and Carver.
"You're not that bad," Rakesh fired back.
"Very encouraging, boss," Carver said.
Under a barrage of questions, Dovek was sitting hunched as if trying to stand upright in a very strong wind. He was clutching the sides of the witness stand - though, of course, Jinwe only noticed the slight hesitation in his voice.
"You were on vacation on this day?" Jinwe asked in an even voice.
"I was. I'm sure you've got a document there that says I was receiving a vacation from January 25 to February 9." Dovek sat waiting for a trap he knew was coming but not how or where.
"I do," Jinwe said, leafing through her papers. "One second, just let me find it."
"Oh, don't worry, we have all the time in the world!" Dovek sat back and relaxed. Some scattered chuckles went up in the audience. He could be funny and charming if he wanted, like a kindly grandfather - but he was also the kind of grandfather who explodes with fury if you marry 'the wrong sort' (Rye remembered going to Grandpa Smith for his approval of whoever she had been dating that week, and usually getting it). The constant anti-District insults that were overheard by the press and guards (who leaked everything to the press) were the reason why Jinwe was speaking with a heavy lower-class accent. Where the daughter of a highschool teacher and an accountant had learned to speak like a factory worker was a mystery.
Jinwe flipped through her documents. She had copies specially printed in Braille, with their titles written in pencil at the top so that others knew what they were. "No issue," she eventually said. "What does it matter when you were planning to have a vacation when we have the ticket of your flight back to the Capitol on February 2?" She held up the slip of paper. Had that been planned or was this just yet another masterful improvisation? Rye supposed the hallmark of true greatness was making everything accidental appear deliberate and everything deliberate appear accidental..
"Ticket?" Dovek asked incredulously. "What ticket?" Rye did not blame Low for slipping up - she had far more to do than Jinwe with far less help.
"Your Honours, may I give the defendant the prosecution exhibit?" In order to get to the witness stand, the lawyer had to cross the well.
"You may."
Jinwe walked over to the stand, sweeping in front of her with her cane in case of unexpected obstacles. "Here you go."
Dovek took the ticket. "What is this supposed to prove?"
Jinwe marched back to her lectern. "When combined with the fact that you were back in the mountains on the evening of February 3, it suggests you returned to the Capitol for something that happened in the morning-early afternoon of February 3. Did you?" The event had been a conference ten years back when the quota system had been completely overhauled and made much more brutal. Several witnesses had claimed to have seen him there, but the minutes only indicated 'Ministry of Internal Affairs', not the name of the person who had represented it.
"Did I come back? Maybe." Dovek set aside the ticket. "Surely you don't expect me to remember events from so long ago."
"That is precisely why I am holding this ticket in my hand right now," Jinwe said. "What could be so important that you return from a vacation and then immediately come back?" She held up a piece of paper and recited its document number. "A list of all of your vacations, with hovercraft and train ticket numbers. Every winter in late January-early February, you went skiing in the Rockies. Both of your children have their birthdays then, it is only natural you want to spend time with them on those days. But, all of a sudden, the evening before your son's birthday, you are flying back to the Capitol and returning the following evening. What could be so important?"
Dovek shrugged lazily. "I'm sure it was something important. As I said, it was ten years ago."
Jinwe nodded. "How many times did you interrupt your vacation thus?"
"A handful of times, I suppose."
Jinwe pulled out another document. "Five years after that, you asked to receive the minutes of a meeting between your subordinates and Snow because you didn't want to attend it and miss your daughter's birthday. What changed?"
"I don't know." During direct examination, he had shown himself to have an excellent memory for the smallest details of meetings that happened twenty or more years ago.
"Could it be the importance of the conference?"
"I don't know, I don't remember."
Jinwe ran her hand down a sheet of paper. "You must admit, it makes sense. You could not miss such a major conference, no matter whose birthday it was. So you pause your vacation and go attend it."
"How do you know I was at the conference?" Dovek fired back.
"You didn't even miss your child's birthday for a meeting with Snow himself - it was routine, you could have a subordinate do it without issue. Correct?"
"Well, yes." That would have been impossible to deny.
"So what bar a truly major meeting where you absolutely had to be or else risk a subordinate wresting power from you could be a reason for you to miss your child's birthday?"
"You didn't prove I was at that conference," Dovek insisted.
Jinwe nodded. "Then where were you?"
"I don't remember now, it's been ten years." Rye had known the defendants would miraculously forget everything as soon as the prosecutor replaced the defense lawyer, but it was still something to behold.
"What else could be so important?"
Dovek said nothing.
"Moving on," Jinwe said. "Your meeting with the defendant Lux in April 75, by the old style..."
Rye could only gape in amazement at the sheer amount of preparation that had gone into that small bit of cross-examination. Reaper Smith was doing a similar trawl of Lee's hovercraft and train trip records to prove where he had and had not been, and it was so horribly time-consuming. Rye had to admit it, she envied the prosecutor from Two practically everything. The two of them were of an age, but Jinwe was a war hero, had an admirable work ethic, and even looked much better to boot.
Some of the defendants were clearly enjoying seeing the former minister wriggle around like on a frying pan. Others looked wan and sickly. Rye found Lee, who was not sketching for once. Instead, he was following along with the cross-examination carefully, eyes on Dovek. Did he know that Rye was going to be the one cross-examining him?
Rye had never gotten to know a defendant so well. She couldn't help but see him as just a person. A man in his fifties, an artist, with a husband and five children. His crimes weren't written on his face. He, like the rest of them, did not look like he was capable of great evil - Dovek by now looked like a grandfather being interrogated by his spouse over where he left the keys.
"I don't know," he said irritably to a question about where he went when visiting Ten. "Prosecutor Jinwe, you have a much higher opinion of my memory than I do - I can only wish I was able to answer your questions!"
Jinwe ignored the quip. At the beginning, Dovek had gone on tirades about why the government had done nothing wrong, and she had ignored those, too, except for when he let something slip she could use. Rye hoped Lee wouldn't try to do that - she didn't think she could control a defendant as well as Jinwe.
"You do not recall telling the District mayor that working conditions in Cannery #42 must be improved?"
"That is news to me."
On first glance, it was odd that he denied knowing something seemingly advantageous to him, but admitting he had demanded improvements meant that he had known conditions were bad in the first place.
Rakesh leaned over to her. "It's news to him because he can't imagine being outraged by bad working conditions."
Rye chuckled.
The cross-examination went on with full press coverage every day. It was an utter security nightmare, with throngs of journalists fighting for a place in the press gallery. For the first time in months, the trial was front-page news. One headline read 'Jinwe Slaughters Dovek', resulting in a furious reprimand of that newspaper by the government of Two.
Stephen was at the centre of attention from the press. He was pestered for details and asked for his opinion. Much to his surprise, none of them asked him about Angelo, though that was a small mercy compared to the endless attempts to wheedle information about the defendants from him.
Fortunately, he was at the trial of the Peacekeepers today. It was generally quite poorly attended, with people showing up because they had won a ticket and then leaving after an hour or so after not being able to stand the documents about atrocities. The press section was mostly empty, with a small group of correspondents unlucky enough to not be reassigned and dedicated enough to not spend the entire day at the bar sitting in the seats.
The lesser criminals were all following the main trial fervently. Even though the defense portion of the case had started earlier in this trial, they still wanted to know how cross-examinations were going in that courtroom. In the cafeteria, all anyone talked about was the main trial. They combined anger that they were on trial in the first place with relief at not having to worry about a cross-examination at Jinwe's hands.
The former Peacekeepers were whispering to each other and reading newspapers sneakily as one of their fellows testified on the witness stand. They were good enough to trick the guards - Stephen would need to confiscate everything at break. Since the current testimony was going to be followed with the next one calling witnesses, they all wore their cards with numbers. Large group trials of prison personnel, for example, happened the same way.
"My mom wrote to me yesterday," a Peacekeeper sitting on the very edge whispered to his neighbour. "She says she's doing fine."
"You think she'd tell you if she wasn't?"
"I don't want to think about that." Brinner tapped his fingers against the side wall.
Jade looked at the press and then back to Brinner. "Wish my family would write to me. I still don't know if they're alive."
Stephen was trying to locate everyone's relatives, but it was extremely difficult. Hundreds of thousands of people were displaced, and trying to find a specific person in that crowd was almost impossible.
Break was announced. Stephen confiscated everyone's reading material and went over to the key criminals trial, careful to enter through a back door to avoid the press. The handful of defendants who hadn't gone to stretch their legs winced when they saw him.
"How was the morning?" Stephen asked Tiller, who would be going to supervise the yard now.
"Nothing of interest."
"Good."
The second morning session also passed without incident, aside from Low crashing to the ground when she tried to stand up. That caused a lengthy diversion right in the middle of a particularly tense exchange as Low picked herself up and put away her legs. The press' eagerness to follow Low's mishap closely left a bad taste in Stephen's mouth, especially when it was foreign press. It was not their place to focus like that on someone who had stepped on a landmine.
At lunch, they were a subdued group. Gone was the light chit-chat broken up with the odd argument, everyone now sat tense and tried not to look at Dovek, who tried and failed to cheer everyone up. A few of them were now angry at him for how he pushed certain actions on them.
"We in the back corner are lucky," Grass told Brack. "We have a few weeks longer for the trial to fall apart."
"It's not falling apart," Brack shot back and tore her bread into pieces. "It's too late for that. There's no getting off this ride."
As Miroslav had predicted, Dovek was in an even mood that evening. "Well, that was that," he said, inviting Miroslav to sit down. "I said all I wanted to say. They had the country's best lawyers up against me - it'd have been odd if they didn't spin my words around in circles!"
"You're satisfied?" Miroslav asked.
Dovek chortled. "If you mean a spherical Publius Dovek in a vacuum, then yes, I'm satisfied. But the others! I thought Oldsmith was going to need support to walk out of the courtroom!" He shook his head, slight smile on his lips. "I told him, at least they won't unleash Jinwe on you. Honestly, I can't believe such a spineless nonentity had been able to get so close to Snow. Or maybe that was just how Snow liked it?"
"That's a supposition I've often heard," Miroslav said neutrally.
"Oh, certainly. It's the only logical explanation for what went on up there."
"What about illogical ones?"
Dovek laughed. "Oh, I'm sure there's hundreds of those." He leaned back against the wall, hands laced behind his head. Now that he wasn't laughing, the deep lines in his face made him look tired and worn. "Or even thousands."
"I have a question for you. It seemed up there that you've given up on the united front idea?"
Dovek flapped a hand irritably. "It's all that Jinwe. Twisted my words inside and out. I suppose I should have realized they'd have unleashed their best cross-examiner on me. The others should be grateful that they won't have to deal with her."
"You're sure about that?" As far as Miroslav knew, that was correct.
"Positive. Look how they spread out the material. And the numbers fit - twelve Districts sent in prosecution teams, twenty-four defendants. Plus, I overheard the press talking about it once."
"How did you overheard the press?" He sat on the opposite end of the dock from them.
"Blues heard it, and passed it on." He made a running motion with his fingers. "Makes sense to me. Our end of the dock tried to figure out who would be the most reasonable choice for each one, but we don't know if they're trying to be reasonable. Not to mention we don't know how good some of them are in a cross-examination. I must confess, Doctor, I didn't realize Jinwe was that good," he said in a more somber tone. "Low looked her up, of course, but I had thought her injury would hamper her. She did miss quite a few tells I'm sure she'd have picked up on before, but you can tell her she has adapted to her disability excellently. My hat is off to her - if I had one."
Miroslav nodded. He would pass that on to Jinwe. "What about your direct examination?"
Dovek laughed out loud at that. "I think everyone expected a different thing from that one - and all were disappointed!"
"What do you think I expected?"
"Doctor, Doctor," Dovek said, shaking his head, "I know very well you expected me to go up there and admit to everything Jinwe flung at me. Your faith in humanity is commendable, but highly misplaced."
"Am I really so mistaken to consider you capable of a good act?"
Dovek looked at him as if he was a foolish child. "I am capable of a lot of things. But why would I chase after doing good things to my detriment when it is something very different that runs the world?"
That sort of breathtaking cynicism was hard for Miroslav to grasp. "You don't care about how you will be remembered?"
"I would rather not be remembered as someone who pled for mercy, thank you very much. No. If they want to kill me, let them. I know this power play. I have been on the other side of it many a time. Deep down, they are the same as I am. They will not get me to pretend it is anything else."
Miroslav checked his watch. Still plenty of time to go. "Are you satisfied with your performance over the past few days?"
"I am. I'm sure they're all hoping now that I'm going to sit quietly and wait for death. But I've got other plans."
Lieutenant Vance would become even more paranoid once he heard that. "What plans?"
Dovek smiled mysteriously. "There's still twenty-three defendants to go. I'll need to get them through in one piece somehow."
The analysis of who was probably going to react how took them to the end of the session. Miroslav left the cell, stopped the recording, and started it again. He walked into Blues' cell next.
"Sorry I haven't been able to talk to you lately," Miroslav lied to Blues. He had deliberately let her stew in her own thoughts during Dovek's testimony.
"It's no issue," Blues said quickly. "Though I'm glad you're here now."
"Is there anything you want to talk about?"
Blues nodded. "That Dovek - first he calls for a united front, and then he's the first to ditch everyone else and try to save his own skin!" She entwined her hands together. "I'm going to have to get up there and tell the truth about the system. Even if it means I can't spare myself."
"Why?"
"I can't let that be what everyone thinks about me!" She gestured at nothing in particular. "I'm not what he said I am." Dovek had mentioned Blues exactly once, to say that she had had more influence with the Gamemakers than him.
"I'm glad," Miroslav said sincerely. "There's precious little honesty to be found among the defendants. If even one person tells the truth, that would do a great deal for the country."
Blues glanced at the window. "If I can admit responsibility, so can some former Games-fan." She sighed and leaned back against the wall. "This is my chance to do something that will actually mean something. I just have to do it. I know my lawyer doesn't want me to."
That was Miroslav's dilemma. Was she going to admit responsibility because she thought it was the right thing to do, because she thought it would make the judges look favourably upon her, or a mix of both? "Your lawyer is a master at gaining clemency," he said carefully.
Blues snorted. "Dr. Fisher? He can't get out of the show-trial attitude. I told him over and over that bigger things than my life are at stake here, but he keeps on looking for little things he thinks might save me from the noose."
"Bigger things than your life?"
"Yes." Blues sagged visibly. "I don't want to die, Doctor. But I don't want to be delusional, either. Even Dr. Fisher can do nothing about my job description. All I can do is speak the truth and- I don't know. It won't make dying easier. If I go out, better to do so in a way that will be respected." She smiled with one corner of her mouth. "Not like I'll be aware of it, though."
"You think that there is no escape for you?"
"I don't want to even entertain that thought. It'll hurt more to be disappointed."
"You don't want to be disappointed," he echoed.
"No. I-" She dropped her gaze to stare at the floor. "I don't want to be here. I just wish I wasn't here." Blues looked at him pleadingly, as if hoping he could somehow save her. Unfortunately, there was nothing he could do. A terminally ill person, at least, placed all of their hope in their doctors. The key criminals' desperation when they talked to him and Mallow was palpable.
Leon couldn't help feeling very satisfied with the first cross-examination. At last, everyone could see just how pathetic the excuses were. No wonder the regime had toppled like a house of cards when the people had risen up!
"Dovek put on a good show," Marcellus said as the family ate a late breakfast on Sunday morning.
Dad looked tired from last night's shift, but he had insisted on joining the rest of them. "I don't think so," he said, eating a forkful of powdered eggs. "Jinwe mopped the floor with him. If the rest of the prosecution is half as good-"
Marcellus sipped some coffee, which had been bought on the black market by Leon. "They're like those classmates of yours who spend all their time partying and still manage to somehow study for longer than you." All of them shared a chuckle at that one - in his college days, Marcellus had most definitely not been the partying type, and the rest of them had seldom if ever stepped foot inside a bar - or a college.
"That's not just the prosecution," Leon reminded his brother. "Isn't Dovek's lawyer going to be participating in a 'Miss Landmine 50+' competition?"
Dad paused in the middle of handing Mom the frying pan. "How am I only finding this out now?"
Mom took the frying pan and placed a spoonful of eggs with bologna and beans on her plate. "I need to tell Jiro about this. He's older than me and looks thirty at most - he'll sweep Mr. Landmine 50+ in a heartbeat."
"Didn't he lose his leg to machine-gun fire?"
"They copied the name from contests they do abroad in regions that have been heavily mined for years," Leon explained. How did he know this? "But it's meant for anyone who acquired a physical disability during the fighting."
"Huh." Dad held up a piece of bologna on his fork.
Marcellus poured himself more coffee. "This coffee is really great," he said. "Where d'you get it?"
"Lodgepole black-market."
"I heard the MPs confiscated several tons of contraband woolen socks," Mom said.
Leon gaped at her. "You did?" Mom could generally be counted on to not be aware that electricity had gotten more expensive.
"Confiscated - to sell themselves," Marcellus grumbled. "Bloody District thieves."
"You can't just say that about everyone," Leon protested.
"I call it like I see it," Marcellus said.
"It's not about everyone," Mom said. "You can't deny that the MPs are thieves. And they're from the Districts. So District thieves."
Why did he even bother trying to eat meals with his family? "Sure," Leon said. "Amazing." He got up from the table, went to his room to grab a sweater, and stormed out of the apartment. Anywhere was more fun to spend time in than breakfast with his family.
"I offer you my most sincere congratulations," Mary said. "That was as fine a cross-examination as I have ever seen."
"Thank you," Isabella said. The twenty-four chief prosecutors and their deputies were in the restaurant for a nice dinner together.
"And I am very glad I won't have to try to live up to it!" Laur Mason said. Instead of him, the assistant prosecutor Yekutiel Aharoni would handle Two's other cross-examination, that of Brack. Mary and Isabella had agreed that, despite how good it would look on television, it would be best if Two did not cross-examine its own.
Salvatore Jurchenko of Four shook his head. "I can't believe the audacity of that man. He actually thought he was in the right."
"I didn't expect anything else," Isabella said.
"You should have brought in old District Mayor Richard West," Robert Wu of Eleven joked. "He'd have gotten Dovek to apologize."
Everyone laughed at that, even though there really wasn't anything funny about West's 'apologies'. People who had somehow done something to displease him had been forced to apologize on camera, and those apologies aired on District television. The ultra-loyal District mayor had killed himself before he could be detained to stand trial.
"You think so?" Naquian Tyson of Five asked. "Dovek's in a category of his own. I don't think even a District mayor could face him down."
"Apologize! Apologize at once!" Robert barked in the upper-class Eleven accent. "Accept Jesus into your heart, you unbeliever! With Jesus, all things are possible!" Robert himself was quite devout and upset by how West had made his faith look bad, but he was still capable of having some fun at the former District mayor's expense.
Martha Linden, Robert's deputy, chuckled. "West said he'd make smallpox regret coming into the District. If he can make a disease apologize-"
Mary couldn't help but join in on the laughter. "I still think Isabella did better than anybody could have expected."
"Oh, now I'm scared," Rowan Waschmann said. They were beginning their cross-examination of Oldsmith later in the week. "Way to give us all unreasonable expectations about what we are supposed to do."
Isabella gestured with a fork at them. "Stop reminding me of when I was that one person at law school."
"Ah, you were?" Rafaela Asuncion, Naquian's deputy, asked. "In that case, I will always remind you how embarrassing it was to see you waving your hand around every single time the professor asked a question."
"It all worked out in the end," said Mary, who had been closer to being that one person than she liked to admit. "Our Isabella is perfect, and we wouldn't have her any other way."
Isabella dropped her head in her hands. "You're making me blush." From her vantage point, Mary couldn't see it - her colleague was quite dark.
"Oh, so you can smear Dovek's face into the floor, but you can't take a compliment?" Laur teased. "Just wait until I tell the press."
"Is this how you treat your boss?" Isabella fired right back. "And hmm, I just realized the entire team's going to be asking me for references once we're back in Two and unemployed. I wonder what I'll write for you."
Unemployment seemed an eternity away. Dovek had been dealt with, but there were still twenty-three more defendants to go, followed by rebuttals and summaries. And then, of course, more trials. Laur had plenty of time to go until he had to worry about job applications.
A/N: If you want to read a full cross-examination done by someone who had 'practiced for every single eventuality', I suggest David Maxwell-Fyfe's cross-examinations of basically anyone at the IMT, but the ones that stuck out to me the most were the cross-examinations of Goering and Dönitz. They are a bit hard to follow (which is why I tried to have as little of the actual examination in the chapter as possible, I don't have the skill to actually write one), but they're easier to understand than most. Here's the link to Goering's cross-examination (scroll down to the first mention of Maxwell-Fyfe; Robert Jackson's cross-examination was kind of all over the place and honestly not the best, so I don't recommend trying to read it if you're not used to trial transcripts):
avalon DOT law DOT yale DOT edu/imt/03-20-46 DOT asp
Richard West is inspired by Ramzan Kadyrov. Something, something, apologize at once, you demon. In Chechnya, the province he governs at time of writing, any signs of open dissent are something to marvel at, as he has people shot for saying the wrong things on social media or being gay men.