The Diego Diaries: Incident: Waiting Game (dd8 250) (NO EDITING YET!)
=0=Home
The sun was up and bright in the winter sky. It was also blisteringly cold and the pace of the city almost seemed to reflect that. Everyone was hurrying about on the way to who knew where. Light glinted off the big buildings and the towers that seemed like a glass forest as far as the optic could see. The airfield nearby was busy with military crafts and Seekers coming and going from their mustering hangar when they came and went from flights around the solar system. Those were increasing even now.
Cars sped along, sentient and non-sentient along with buses of tourists and those who had a purpose other than sightseeing. N.E.S.T. vehicles and those from habitats here and there mixed into the traffic pattern.
Most humans used the Metro now unless they had to go pick something or someone up. Metros were now open for general travel at all the human habitats and they were heavily used by the residents. The Mall of Terra was a favorite destination and humans were always there getting a taste of home. Travel to other habitats between habitats was brisk and the downtowns of all of them were busy places.
Restaurants were busy as were department stores and all of the other commercial businesses in The City which was the epicenter of many activities. It was the oldest part of the entire colony and held a lot of buildings which couldn't be found in other satellite habitations. The Temple District was always busy and so was City Hall. The main hospitals were here as was the mental health center where Sio and the others were still resident.
Ratchet hiked it along after leaving The Fortress, heading onward to the Medical Center. Some of the children of the Watch and Medical Auxiliary were coming to do school credit rounds with him. They were going to be seeing children today, those who had been hurt on the trail to safety here. They were all on the mend or the kids wouldn't see them. There was no way they would see anything that hadn't been factored by their age and innocence.
He entered the building to disappear into the vast lobby which was buzzing with individuals doing and going here and there for this and that. It would be a good morning. It would be better if they had their team back and the mess sewed up.
=0=Courthouse, Autobot City
They had their first meeting with counsel, the two human traitors who were held in confinement pending some sort of outcome to their accused crimes. Murder, treason and spying were heavy charges for the two and they listened carefully to the team of bots that had been chosen to guide their progress through the maze of legal hearings and mediations before they were most likely to be sent back to stand trial on Earth.
Horst Mueller and Colin Anderson were agreeing to nothing but they were listening long and well to the earnest young lawyers that were handpicked by Blackstone to represent both of them.
"The way this works is that we have to have preliminary hearings to determine the types and kinds of evidence against you before the grand jury hears it. If they find that there's enough to proceed to trial then we have to work out how this will go. We have motions to file and depositions to take for those who might be witnesses or those who arrested you.
"The evidentiary hearings could take a few orns. Then there's the petitions to your governments declaring that you have been arrested for these crimes and that the grand jury has indicted you, if they do. At that point, your governments and N.E.S.T. will step in and take up your cases as well," Balien, the lead attorney said. He was a very kind, very intense youngster who had finished law school in half the time it took and had interned with Barron and Blackstone before choosing defense as his career path.
"So … what does that mean? Do they get to extradite us to Earth?" Mueller asked.
"That's part of the process. We inform them and they'll send attorneys and representatives here to interview you and meet with us. The countries you come from will be allowed to file what are called 'briefs of interest' … that is, a motion to be allowed to work on your behalf both inside the courts and through the Office of the Primes. In the end, he will make the determination whether to send you home to face the charges or keep you here for trial," Balien replied.
"Once the indictment is filed, the pathway to trial begins. The many hearings, all of which you can waive and the hearings with the representatives of your countries and N.E.S.T. will follow. Only after this which allows the evidence to be understood and the witnesses interviewed by all concerned, only then will an extradition hearing be held. Prime oversees all of it and he has the final word since these charges amount essentially to a Primal Hearing," Candle said. She was a small femme with a towering intellect and was dazzling at cross examination of witnesses.
"So we have to go through all of this to get to the point where we can asked to go home," Collin Anderson said. "What if it doesn't happen, we get tried and convicted here … what would happen after that?"
"The sentencing guidelines are specific and the Prime has discretion. In the past, you would be executed for crimes of this nature but we don't do that anymore. We've developed past the need for vengeance. It would be up to Prime to devise a punishment and him alone. He is a mech without the lower instincts. He wouldn't devise a punishment that would harm your lives," she said.
"Sitting in jail is worse than death. We've been here forever," Mueller said as Anderson nodded.
"You have been accused of terrible crimes. Actions have consequences. However, if you have any information that would be useful to the general overall security of everyone then you can ask to speak to Prime about it," Balien said. "You might consider that if there are others involved, you are the only ones who will be spending time in prison if you're convicted. Whatever loyalty you might have for them, they aren't going to be you sitting in jail for whatever sentence Optimus might impose. He had a case where he imposed a million year sentence on the individual once convicted."
They stared at him, then glanced at each other.
"That's idiotic," Anderson said.
"Not when you live as long as we do," Balien replied.
It would be silent in the room for a while as the two listened to their team explain the process.
=0=Out there
The ships were within sight of each other with neither side making a move. The standoff was holding.
"What now, Commander?" a youngster asked Lissie.
"Well, we sit it out and see what happens. We're stuck here unless we want to fly endlessly that way," she said nodding toward the nebula that appeared to be thinner in its density in the direction heading away from the surge zone. "Eventually we'll find a place to use the bridges or to be bridged. But if we leave and they don't they hook up with their boss and they get the intel they scanned."
"They won't surrender will they?" he asked.
Lissie considered that. "Not right now. We have to convince them of the error of their ways. Commander Hercy has some small bit of rapport with the commander."
=0=Nearby
"You there, Cord?" Hercy asked out of the blue as he lounged on his shuttle with the others.
A moment passed, then Cord spoke, his voice as calm and steady as before. :Thought about leaving but you know:
Hercy grinned. "I had the same thought but it'd mean leaving you and that was too much to ask from me right now. I've sort of grown fond of ya, Helex mech and all."
The ghost of a grin reached them over the sound system. :I hear ya, too. What now, Appa?: he asked using the term of endearment that was used for elders that someone liked whether they were related or not.
"Well, we can have a sit down and figure this out. Something tells me that you've been out of the loop a long time. You might want to consider changing employment if we let you know how much has changed since you left home."
:I imagine it has:
"How about I send you some videos to watch, you and your crews. We made them for the refugees that come every orn in droves. We show them the vids to save time and help settle their nerves. They think they're coming to a refugee camp."
"Is that a good idea, Commander?" a youngling mech asked. "They'll know ever more."
Hercy grinned at the sincere kid. "If they defect, they can see it first hand. If they don't, more incentive to take them down."
It was silent a moment, then Cord spoke. :Sure, Appa. Send them. We got time:
Hercy grinned, then nodded to Rem. "Send them, infant. Let them see what they've missed."
=0=Hospital
Sil, Pulley, Coros and Sev, a tiny mech who was a dynamite note taker followed Ratchet from crib to crib as he assessed the progress of the babies lying there. They were progressing and the terror of the families that were there as well had receded a bit.
"What now?" Sil asked as she looked up at Ratchet with her data pad in one hand and a long stylus with a feather glued to the end of it in the other. She was shockingly cute.
"We send this one home tomorrow," Ratchet said, "and keep the others for a couple of more orns. They're all doing really well."
Four kids smiled up at Ratchet as he grinned at them. They would continue the rounds and he would tell them more about this hard but rewarding career. It would be tons of fun.
=0=Out there
It was silent in the ships as the crews watched the videos. Narrated by Ultra Magnus and featuring every part of the colony, updated even with the additions of different habitation sites, the content was overpowering in its shocking effect. None of them expected to ever see Cybertronian cities again, certainly not like this.
The abundance was also hard to see. There was everything that a bot could want and lots of things they didn't know until now they needed. They ran one after another, all of them updated to reflect the growth of the colony as well as Cybertron. Interviews with individuals who worked here and there were added, all of them off the cuff and non-rehearsed. It was evident that they were delighted to live where they were rather than where they'd been.
What was especially good were the specialist videos that featured Decepticons telling their tales and how things were better now. Some of them held their children when they were filmed on the street or in some work place or recreational area. The children were beautiful and the family with them usually nodded in agreement as they told how their lives had changed.
The flyovers were also important because it showcased not only what they'd wrought but the number and kinds of metrotitan made up part of the colony or served as security by postings or flyover duties. It was shocking to see that many titans but to see the videos of Cybertron where they seemed to anchor every nook and cranny was more so.
The crews watched silently. Cord watched silently. His gnarly nemesis did as well.
=0=TBC 9-12-2021 LOVE YOU! REMEMBER THAT! :D:D:D