John Karr - Detonation Event

Difficult to believe there would be zero reaction.

He wished Karen Wagner would correspond with him, but she shunned his attempts at email, and the government confiscated his mindtext chip once he was incarcerated.

In the back hall near the delivery port, he changed out of the suit and tie and hard shoes and back into the time-honored orange prison jumpsuit and sandals. Two deputies observed as he mechanically hung the coat and slacks and handed them to Tonya, his lawyer’s latest assistant. His primary counsel couldn’t be bothered with such mundane affairs, as there were other defendants to defend, supposedly.

Schiflet found this interesting, as it conflicted with the “cosmic proportion” attributed by the media to this trial. Lawyers and publicity were intimate with each other. This wasn’t just an American trial, though it was held in the federal courthouse in northern Virginia and broadcast live over all media, public and private. Anyone on Earth, the moon, the Mars orbiters, and in transit between could watch, if they had interest in doing so.

Even governments that weren’t fond of free speech pointed to the trial and the accused “terrorist” as an example of the failure of a free society.

“Where is Gray, the customary assistant to Jerome Vines, Esquire?” Schiflet said. He didn’t mind the fact the assistant was a female and he basically stripped before her so the guards could make sure nothing was passed between them. Schiflet didn’t mind, but the young woman could scarcely keep the boredom from her face, and this was his life at stake now.

“Gray has the week off,” Tonya replied.

“How much longer will your boss keep extending this thing?” one of the deputies said. It was partially sincere, but he also used it as an excuse to eye Tonya’s legs, still shapely despite her pregnancy.

“As long as it takes to make sure our client receives the best legal representation,” she replied dutifully, glancing at Schiflet with an insincere smile.

The deputies nodded.

“So, you must be about ready to get that child into the world,” one of them said, nodding at her swollen belly.

She put her hand there. “Oh, yes, it’s been long enough! She’s been kicking like crazy lately.”

Schiflet grunted. Both the head lawyer—and to a lesser degree this assistant—were the recipients of the proceeds from the sale of his house, and his life’s savings. “She probably doesn’t care for imprisonment any more than I do.”

“Hey!” Tonya said, her brow furrowing. “How can you equate the two?”

The deputies stepped closer, ready to intercede.

“Because he’s a murderer,” one of them said.

Without warning the other deputy tossed the foot shackles so they struck Schiflet’s upper chest. One of the rings swung up and caught his lip before they fell to the floor with a loud crash. The deputy unbuckled his gun holster and rested his hand on the grip.

Schiflet stared and wiped blood from his mouth.

“Is there a problem, prisoner?”

Schiflet remained silent as he boiled.

“Put ’em on, prisoner.”

Tonya backed away. “He hasn’t been convicted of a crime yet.”

The deputies nodded and grinned at each other before turning to the pregnant legal assistant.

“Not yet…”

“…but soon.”

Schiflet rode in the van back to the federal pen, hands and feet shackled, wiping blood on his shoulder as he listened to the radio.

“A state investigation is underway to address the disturbing trend at the three northern Virginia hospitals. There’s been a considerable rise in the number of stillbirths.”

Schiflet heard but didn’t pay too much attention.

“…Other hospitals in the DC metro area have also started to see an increase, though not such a sharp rise.”

Schiflet’s gaze went to the radio.

“Further investigation has revealed the spike in stillbirths began only during the last six months. Environmental factors are being examined.”

Interesting, but unrelated to his own situation. The effects of the microbe were overwhelmingly beneficial to mice, as far as they could tell. Of course, lab work had halted due to lack of microbe material.

He wondered if testing him for it would return a positive result now. It was possible the microbe had remained dormant or encased in microscopic rock particles until his body ate away at the geologic material and set it free. He felt fine and hadn’t caught the various colds and other viral nastiness that worked their way through the prison circulation system.

Like the stillbirths, his immune system was interesting, but unrelated to Mars.

Schiflet heard the news about SCONA setting off the Detonation Event while there were still personnel on Martian soil.

It made him smile.

Time dragged on.

He’d been jailed in Jackson Federal Penitentiary in Manassas, Virginia, a suburb of Washington, DC, for seven months.

Once again he was in the courthouse as the struggle for justice continued. At the defense table Schiflet sat beside Jerome Vines. Gray, the customary legal assistant, sat on the other side of the lawyer. The name Tonya came up in conversation between them.

Schiflet turned toward them. “Did she give birth to her child?”

The pause was telling.

“Tonya suffered a tragedy,” Vines said stiffly.

“The baby had been healthy up to the last few days,” Gray added.

“Cause of death?” Schiflet said. When they paused again, he added, “I’m still a geneticist, and such items are of interest.”

“Doctors said kidney failure.”

“That’s it?” Schiflet said. “There should have been signs. Were the child’s organs underdeveloped, or was it cancer, or something else?”

“No one seems sure,” Vines said, scrolling through his notes on a notepad computer. “The week before birth the doctors listened to the baby’s heart and it was normal. It’s very strange, the rate at which it happened.”

The bailiff announced the judge’s arrival and instructed them to rise.

Schiflet stood and gazed with renewed interest at the bulge in Judge Jenna Morray’s mid-section, which had been showing more and more of late.

“Almost unworldly,” he said.

Darkness, laced with pain.

Devans was inclined to embrace the former and sleep off the latter. But a tug at the corner of his mind warned of vague and unfolding consequences. What’s more, the pain was centered in his head and growing more insistent. A headache that was escalating. On the build.

Pound. Pound. Pound… in synch with his heartbeat.

Bad taste in his mouth, too.

This was akin to those first waking hours after a drunken binge, when the ramifications were just beginning to give notice that the host body was in for some real nastiness. A lot like that, only that a grimace also brought pain. And stickiness. New attributes for a hangover. An experimental follow-up let him know the right side of his face was swollen, and it wasn’t hard to deduce that the stickiness was blood from over his eye. Not even the strongest alcohol caused him external physical trauma. And he had never actually fallen on anything harder than a couch or bed while inebriated. Sway and stagger, yes, but no real face-plants.

A fight, then? Wouldn’t be the first. Maybe sparring with Nuro or the others in the gym?

He reached for his face. His hand encountered a hard block that thudded in his ears and made him blanch, which brought a fresh flash of pain. Second try fared a little better, but he didn’t actually feel much with his fingers. There was a glove involved. Could be a striking glove for the martial arts and he’d gotten thrashed. But while he could move his hand and arm, access to his face was blocked. He felt around to other parts of his head. More of the same blockage, which meant—face shield. Space suit.