The Impossibles

by Kristine Kathryn Rusch

  Instead of lashing back at Peir, she said, “I am honored that the prosecutor believes I am a nice person. I hope the court clerk will keep that in the record—”

  Chuckles rose behind her. Others had caught the slight.

  “—because it is court records that we are relying upon here,” she said. “My client has been accused of many crimes. She has faced a judge or a jury on twelve separate occasions, and in each case, she has been acquitted.”

  “That’s lovely for her, Your Honor,” Peir said, “but those cases have no relevance—”

  “If you would let me finish, counselor,” Kerrie said. She paused so the judge could weigh in. Peir’s behavior was unorthodox in open court, but so was hers. The judge had probably forgotten what it was like to have an argument placed before her, with its rules and structures. All of her other cases on this day, in this week—hell, in this year— would be pro forma gavel-down cases: Two speeches, one by each attorney, a ruling, followed by a curt next. Nothing this elaborate had happened in this court in a long time.

  The judge did not speak up. She was watching Kerrie closely, clearly waiting.

  “In all twelve of those cases, Your Honor,” Kerrie said, “my client stated that she was not a member of the Earth Alliance, that she had been born on a ship of the Black Fleet outside Earth Alliance territory. All twelve cases have been adjudicated in Earth Alliance courts. All twelve have court records, and judgments were made based upon the facts presented in those cases. In short, Your Honor, we have twelve different courts, scattered throughout the sector and the Earth Alliance itself, that have ruled that my client is not a subject of the Earth Alliance.”

  The courtroom was quiet now. Everyone stared at Kerrie, including Peir. He had a look of panic in his eyes. He had no idea how to argue this, or what to even say.

  “Those twelve cases were human-on-human crime cases, Your Honor, which fall under Earth Alliance jurisdiction no matter whether the accused is part of the Alliance or not,” Kerrie said. “This is the first case in which my client has been accused of theft against a nonhuman member of the Earth Alliance. Different laws apply. These laws are based on treaties between the Earth Alliance and the Ziyit. My client is not subject to those treaties since she belongs to neither culture. I can cite case law, Your Honor, if you would like. Jurisdictional issues were argued in the first years of the Multicultural Tribunals and they found—”

  “I’m familiar with the law, counselor.” The judge looked bemused. “I have looked at the court cases, and you are right. Your client is not a member of the Earth Alliance. We have no choice but to drop the charges against Donnatella Waltarie You are—”

  “Your Honor!” Peir took an extra step forward, his voice filled with panic. “We ask that Ms. Waltarie be detained, so that we can ship her to the Ziyit so that they may prosecute her for these crimes.”

  “Have the Ziyit made an extradition request?” the judge asked.

  “Um, no, Your Honor. But once they hear of this, they will—”

  “I cannot rule on what someone will do, Counselor. I can only rule upon the cases in front of me. That’s covered in the first week of law school. Are you in need of a refresher course?”

  “No, Your Honor.” Peir stepped back. “I’m sorry, Your Honor. But—”

  “If you can figure out a reason to hold her, do so, counselor,” the judge said. “But I won’t rule on it. This case is dismissed.”

  She brought her gavel down and the courtroom erupted. People began talking, laughing, shouting. Even the bailiff looked bemused.

  Kerrie turned to Donnatella. “We have to get you out of here before they have a chance to contact someone on Ziyit.”

  Donnatella blinked at her, looking confused. “I’m free?”

  “You are, unless they can get an extradition order. So let’s go.”

  “How do I get out off the base?” Donnatella asked. “They brought me by shuttle.”

  “The shuttles are free and run every hour.” Kerrie took Donnatella’s arm and shepherded her toward the aisle. People were grabbing at them, asking questions and trying to talk. No one had had an acquittal this year—and technically, this wasn’t one either. It was a dismissal. But the result was the same.

  Donnatella wouldn’t be punished for her crime.

  “The shuttle will take me where?” Donnatella asked.

  “Helena base,” Kerrie said. “It’s the nearest stop and large enough for you to get lost in. Come on.”

  She looked for the Peyti, but didn’t see him. He would probably meet them at the shuttle station. She hurried Donnatella out of the courtroom and to the lawyers’ elevator. As she got in, Kerrie ordered the doors closed so no one could follow them.

  She didn’t stop at the usual courthouse shuttle station stop. Instead, she went down to the public defender level, crossed the hall, and took another elevator. Donnatella had to struggle to keep up.

  “Where are we going?” she asked.

  “Somewhere they won’t look for you.” Kerrie took one flight of stairs down and walked through two doors. The second door opened to a small shuttle station. The red numbers above the door said the next shuttle was due to arrive in five minutes.

  Donnatella stopped beside her, red-faced and breathing hard, her hand protectively over that stomach. She didn’t say anything, though, about troubles, so Kerrie didn’t ask.

  She needed to get Donnatella on that shuttle.

  “You will talk to no one once you board,” Kerrie said. “If someone asks your name, you pretend not to hear the question. Move away. Do not identify yourself. There are no conductors or bots to take tickets. Don’t let anyone trick you. If you don’t identify yourself, they can’t serve you with an extradition order. You don’t need to identify yourself at the other end either. When you get there, just mingle with the crowd. Do you understand?”

  “Yes.” Donnatella’s expression had lightened. She was almost smiling.

  “Do you have money?” Kerrie asked, silently cursing herself for even thinking of the question.

  “I can get it,” Donnatella said.

  “That’s what I’m afraid of.” The last thing Kerrie needed was for Donnatella to steal money on Helena base and get caught. Then she’d be served that extradition order. Kerrie needed Donnatella to get as far away from here, as quickly and easily as possible. “Do you have access to your own money?”

  Donnatella smiled. “I don’t have any money of my own.”

  Kerrie extended a hand. Donnatella looked down.

  “Take my hand,” Kerrie said.

  Donnatella did. Kerrie pressed the unlinked money chip in her thumb. The unlinked account had no personal information on Kerrie at all. Just funds. It transferred its entire reserve into Donnatella’s account. The entire reserve sounded like a lot, but Kerrie only used that account for incidentals. It had maybe one hundred credits.

  “Now you have your own money,” Kerrie said, letting go of Donnatella’s hand.

  “That was yours?” Donnatella asked.

  “Yes,” Kerrie said. The red numbers on the wall were counting down. The shuttle was only one station away. “Now it’s yours.”

  “But you didn’t have to do that.” Donnatella’s smile had faded. She looked shocked.

  “Yes, I did,” Kerrie said. The shuttle pulled up, doors slid open. The nearest car only had two passengers, both of whom looked exhausted. Family members of people on trial, probably.

  “But—”

  “Stop arguing and board,” Kerrie said. “Remember what I told you.”

  “I owe you,” Donnatella said as she climbed through the doors, using one hand to brace herself.

  “No, you don’t,” Kerrie said.

  “I do,” Donnatella said with great emphasis. “And my people always repay our debts.”

  The doors swished closed. Donnatella stood by the window. She waved as the shuttle pulled out.

  Kerrie watched it disappear. It had one more stop before it detached fro
m the base and flew the short hop to Helena base. One hundred credits wouldn’t get Donnatella far on Helena. It had two segments—the rich resort side and the cheap side that connected to the InterSpecies Court starbase. Donnatella couldn’t afford an upscale hotel room there, but she could get herself a meal and maybe a low-rent place to stay. There were also good medical facilities on Helena that wouldn’t turn away a woman about to give birth.

  Kerrie let out a small sigh, then put a hand to her forehead.

  She hadn’t ever sent a client back on a shuttle. Just sobbing family members and disappointed friends.

  She staggered back up the stairs, feeling lightheaded. She had won the morning, but she still had the afternoon and the evening to suffer the usual defeats.

  As she walked to the public defenders office, she sorted the afternoon and evening cases, surprised at how light her workload was. She had forgotten that she had traded most of it for Donnatella’s case.

  Kerrie actually had time to get some real coffee before her next client meeting.

  Maise stopped her before she reached her desk. Maise was smiling. “Come with me. You know the rules, right?”

  Of course Kerrie knew the rules. Her job was about the rules. But she couldn’t think about what applied at the moment.

  Maise led her into the main conference room. It was stacked with empty coffee cups and discarded clothes that needed cleaning. The room smelled faintly of sweat and old food.

  Maise closed the door.

  “When you win a case,” Maise said, “your debt is forgiven. You’re free to go if you want, Kerrie.”

  Kerrie frowned. She had forgotten that rule, or maybe she never really believed it. Or she thought it wouldn’t apply, because no one ever won.

  “But I would stay at least another week if I were you,” Maise said. “You’re about to be recruited like no one gets recruited. Not even the number one graduate of Alliance Law gets pursued like you’re about to. Someone is first in their class every year, but almost no one wins on the defense side in InterSpecies Court unless they’re already a lifer. You’ve hit the jackpot, Kerrie.”

  Kerrie sat down. She had just sent a pregnant girl with no prospects to a resort she couldn’t pay for, and that was a win? Kerrie made herself breathe.

  “I’m going to be the first to recruit you,” Maise said. “We need people like you to stay here, to fight the good fight. Most of the good attorneys go on to private practice, but the people who need us cycle through every day. And if you win a case—”

  “You said I would win,” Kerrie said. “That’s why you gave me that case.”

  “I hoped,” Maise said. “We get cases like that every now and then. But not everyone pulls out the win. You did.”

  Kerrie looked at her. A lifer? Here? Always behind, always scrambling, watching people who really didn’t deserve their punishments shuffle away, never to be seen again.

  “Thanks for the offer,” Kerrie said. “I’ll consider it.”

  She lied, of course. She couldn’t do it. But she didn’t want to say any more, not when Maise had orchestrated this.

  “I can move someone to your afternoon cases,” Maise said. “You can take the rest of the day off.”

  Kerrie shook her head. “You said I could leave if I wanted to.”

  “You can,” Maise said. “But as I said, if you stay one week—”

  “I will,” Kerrie said. “I’ll stay that week.”

  Because it was easier to stay and think than it was to flee just like Donnatella did.

  Besides, Kerrie hadn’t given life after this job much thought. She hadn’t had time, for one thing, and for another, she had had no idea who would recruit her, and if they didn’t, what she wanted to do. Apparently, she was going to get recruited now. And that alone made her a little shaky.

  “I’ll take my cases for the day,” Kerrie said. “But ease me out of the rest of the week.”

  “Done,” Maise said.

  Kerrie nodded, stood, and stopped. “Thanks,” she said.

  “Don’t thank me,” Maise said, and somehow that didn’t sound like a perfunctory statement. Maise really didn’t want credit. Probably because of her bigotry against the Peyti. Or maybe because she hadn’t known exactly how to approach the case herself.

  Kerrie let herself out of the room. She’d buy herself a coffee somewhere else. She had time for once.

  She murmured thanks to her colleagues as they congratulated her, a number of them touching her arm as if her good luck could rub off on them.

  As she stepped outside of the office, a movement beside the door caught her eye.

  The Peyti, Uzvik, straightened. He had been sitting there, and apparently he had been waiting for her.

  “I already put Donnatella on the shuttle,” Kerrie said. “She’s probably in Helena now. I’m sure you can find her there.”

  “I did not come to see her,” he said in his soft voice. It sounded hollow because of the breathing mask. “I came to see you.”

  Kerrie frowned. “Me?”

  Uzvik nodded. “I have come to offer you work.”

  She stopped in the middle of the hallway. “Work?”

  “The Black Fleet needs lawyers,” Uzvik said.

  “I’m sure they do,” Kerrie said. “But I know nothing of Black Fleet law. I’m not even sure there is any.”

  “For their interactions with the Earth Alliance,” Uzvik said.

  She tilted her head, uncertain what he was saying. “You’re recruiting me to work for the Black Fleet?”

  “We pay our lawyers more than any other group. You cannot even make this much in private practice. You wouldn’t even work that hard.”

  “I don’t understand,” Kerrie said. “What do you want with me?”

  “You have proven yourself to be creative and flexible, two things the Black Fleet needs in its attorneys. Most lawyers cannot find the loophole that you discovered in this case. You are gifted, counselor.”

  Gifted. Most lawyers. It took her a moment to process what he was saying.

  “You were never here for Donnatella, were you?” Kerrie asked. “This was some kind of test, wasn’t it?”

  “Yes,” Uzvik said.

  “And if I failed, what then?” Kerrie asked. “Would Donnatella have gone to the Ziyit?”

  “Yes,” Uzvik said.

  “You were willing to sacrifice her for a test?” Kerrie asked, her voice rising. “Did she know that?”

  “Her case was legitimate,” Uzvik said.

  “So she didn’t know,” Kerrie said. “Would you have told me if I had let you second chair?”

  “That would have defeated the test,” Uzvik said.

  “She could have died,” Kerrie said.

  “But she did not.”

  “Did you get her kicked out of the Black Fleet, then?” Kerrie asked. “Did you turn her in to the Earth Alliance?”

  “No,” Uzvik said. “The circumstances were of her own making.”

  “They were simply there for you to exploit,” Kerrie said.

  “Just so.” Uzvik folded his long thin fingers.

  “And you think that I would work for you after this?”

  “It is easy work,” he said. “You would make money and you would have maybe two cases per year.”

  “All I would have to do is sell my soul,” Kerrie said.

  “The matter of the human ‘soul’ has never been proven,” Uzvik said.

  Kerrie stared at him. He was Peyti, literal, difficult, brilliant.

  “The Peyti are known for their ethics,” she said.

  “We are known for rigorously defending our clients to the fullest extent of Earth Alliance law,” he said.

  He was right; she had simply taken that as ethics.

  “Get away from me,” she said.

  “I am authorized to make a generous offer—”

  “No,” she snapped. “Get the hell away from me.”

  “You would be perfect—”

  “No.”
She walked toward the coffee nook, so fast she was nearly running. Just when she thought she had seen everything, every kind of permutation of Earth Alliance law, every type of victim, someone came up with something even more venal.

  A test, one that would have sacrificed Donnatella for no reason at all.

  “The result would have been the same.” The Peyti had kept up with her. She could hear his labored breathing as he struggled to remain beside her. “She would have gone to Ziyit without my interference.”

  “But you could have prevented it.” Kerrie said. Then she stopped again. The Peyti nearly walked into her. “Did Maise know about this?”

  “We asked that the best be assigned this case,” Uzvik said.

  She did. She knew. And she had manipulated Kerrie into taking the case.

  Kerrie’s stomach turned. “I told you to get away from me,” she said. “And I mean it. I’ll call base security if I have to.”

  She turned around and headed back to the public defenders office. Uzvik remained where he was, looking small.

  She went through the doors. Maise was talking to one of the associates. Kerrie was so angry, she almost couldn’t speak.

  She wondered if Maise’s prejudice against Peyti was a ruse, one she used whenever she was working with the Black Fleet.

  “Do you get a cut?” Kerrie asked.

  Maise looked up.

  “A recruitment cut?” Kerrie asked. “From the Black Fleet? Do they pay you to bring them the best and brightest?”

  “Let’s go to the conference room,” Maise said.

  “Let’s not,” Kerrie said. “Everyone can hear this. I quit. I’m done. And you guys, if Maise offers you a case, watch out. It might be poisoned.”

  “You should stay,” Maise said. “The recruiters—”

  “I know,” Kerrie said. “I don’t really care. I’m going to find a job. And it won’t be one that requires a high-end recruiter. Because I’m done here. Right now.”

  Then she slammed her way out of the office. Messages ran along her links from the various lawyers in the PD’s office. Some messages were automated, telling her how to wrap up her career with the InterSpecies Court. Others were filled with questions, questions she wasn’t going to answer.