"Sparky, I know what your high-priced mouthpiece just told you. I'd like to give you a bit of advice that will cost you a lot less. Go before the Judge. You won't regret it. And I guarantee that."

I was about to say Hildy Johnson never lied to me, but of course the first words out of her mouth when we met were a lie. But we had become quite good friends, way back when, and she had never betrayed me. Even when it would have been to her professional advantage to do so. So the Judge it would be.

I'd have been a lot more confident of my chances if I didn't keep remembering that the Lunar CC had, not long before, suffered a planetary nervous breakdown.

Everything about the Juridical Protocols Test was different.

All trials were televised, even if no one tuned in. Most were dull enough so that a tiny room, a table, and half a dozen chairs were sufficient. But in higher profile cases larger halls were available.

The case of Luna v. Kenneth Valentine was held in the largest JPT courtroom, which could accommodate five hundred. It was an instant sellout, with seats at ringside being scalped for over a thousand dollars. The room itself was unremarkable, nothing more than a big barn with maroon velvet drapes against the walls, uninspired lighting, gray carpet, and more maroon in the upholstery. This operation was badly in need of a set designer.

Close to one wall was a big round table with low-backed chairs on casters, enough to seat twenty people. On that wall was hung a twenty-foot television screen. The table was wood-grain Formica. A few feet behind it was a low U-shaped barrier (the bar?) and behind that concentric rows of seats, steeply raked to give everyone a view. It was like an operating theater from an old movie, or a college lecture room: Freshman Introductory Law 101. One aisle came down the center to the only break in the barrier. Witnesses testifying in person would enter through that break.

The prosecutors sat directly across the table from me, my defense team, the clutter of paper and briefcases and computerpads they had made around their places, and Toby.

I had managed to tell Polly about Toby's plight as I was being led away, manacled. She got him to a vet and had delivered him to the holding cell just down the hall not an hour ago. He had been happy to see me, but not inordinately so. Toby is a genius, for a dog, but I'm sure he had no idea of what had happened to him. And no idea what he had done to Izzy; I imagine he regarded the steady diet of raw steak he'd been getting from Polly—at my request—as no more than his due.

Digesting all that steak is hard work. After I set him on the table he looked around, counting the house, but when he saw the people were not here to watch him perform he curled up on a stack of legal briefs and went to sleep. Every once in a while I could hear his stomach rumble.

In the center of the table was the Judge.

Not really, of course. There was no "Judge," in the sense of a physical object present in the courtroom. But except when interfacing directly with the CC, in which case its voice came through one's own personal implanted telephone, people prefer to have the sound come from some visible source, not just emanate from the walls. It gave the defendant and the lawyers something to look at, and it made for better television. So a small box had been rigged up with screens on each side. Evidence and taped testimony could be displayed, and when the CC was speaking, the screens showed an officious-looking logo of the JPT Department.

As soon as the court was declared in session I stood up.

"Your Honor," I said, "I would like to make an opening statement."

Billy Flynn was looking up at me as if I were insane.

"Mr. Valentine," said the Judge, "it is not necessary to address me as 'Your Honor.' And it is not necessary to stand when speaking."

"I understand, Your Honor, but I would prefer to do both."

"As you wish."

"Your Honor, I wish to state for the record at this time that, if I am found guilty of this charge, and if my sentence includes a period of time in which I am locked up in a jail cell, I will wish to be provided with the means to end my own life."

There were shocked gasps from the audience.

"Say it ain't so, Sparky!" someone shouted.

"Bailiff," said the Judge, "please remove the occupant of seat 451." The idiot was promptly hustled from the seat he had paid dearly for, and an alternate ticket holder ushered into his place. The Judge didn't mind murmuring, gasping, or laughter, but comments from the audience were forbidden.

"That is your right, of course," the Judge went on. "It's premature, but your request is noted. Tell me, are you claustrophobic? I see no mention of it in your psychological evaluation."

"No, Your Honor," I said, recalling my trip to Oberon, and my berth in the Guy Fawkes. "Maybe the word is penophobic. I can't handle jail. I'd go crazy."

"If this is an appeal for leniency, you really should save it for the sentencing phase, if any."

"It's not an appeal, Your Honor. I simply want it on the record. I also have another reason, which I will reveal if it becomes necessary."

There was indeed no good reason to say any of that, except that it made me feel much better to get it off my chest. I was completely serious, too. And why not? Jail time might as well be a death sentence for me. It gave the Charonese two options. They could assassinate me in prison (getting into a prison is the easiest thing in the world), or they could simply wait at the gate until my release and roll me up then. Whichever they planned, I would not give them the chance.

Yes, they would still be after me. And I knew they would much prefer option two, with the chance for about a year of sophisticated torture before my eventual death. Much better to take the Black Pill.

But I wasn't going quietly. I knew the Charonese hated publicity, hated any kind of fuss. Well, I was going to show them one hell of a fuss. I was going to tell my entire story, reveal to the civilized world why I was electing to take my own life. I knew where their sympathies would lie. Someday, someone is going to have to do something about the Charonese, and anything I could do to rally public opinion against these monsters... well, I'd think of it as my memorial.

"We will proceed on Luna v. Valentine" said the Judge. "It has been alleged that Kenneth Valentine, seventy-one years ago, violated Lunar criminal law by murdering John Valentine, his father." On the screen before me and the one on the wall to my left appeared a copy of the formal indictment, which would never be read aloud in this court. One of the many ways things were speeded up with the Judge. The minutiae of proceedings were simply assumed.

"The physical evidence supporting this accusation is as follows:

"One handgun." On the screen I saw a picture of the gun, followed by a technical description. If my lawyers wanted to challenge any part of this evidence they could simply speak up. None of them did.

"Bloodstained clothing belonging to John Valentine." Again, a picture. The actual items would not appear in court, and I was thankful for that. The Judge paused while the screen displayed and identified a series of reports, all of them seventy years old, all of which were available to my attorneys on their own computers. The reports were by forensic scientists, and established that the blood was my father's blood, and so forth. Then there were statements by cast and crew of that long-ago production that, yes, these items of clothing, a costume, had been worn by John Valentine in his role as Montague.

And so forth. It took about two minutes to establish that all this data existed, a process that might have taken a week in a regular court. Why bother with all the wasted time of cross-examination? None of it was tough to understand, all of it was reviewed and authenticated by the Central Computer, the Judge. And indeed, Billy Flynn had no problems with any of it, though he told me he would have worked over each "expert" for at least a day if trying this case before a jury. Those who could still be found, that is. Seventy years is a long time, even these days. Some might well be living on Pluto. Some would be dead.