Star Trek Hunter
Episode 7:
The Great Mushroom
Scene 6:
Trying Their Patents
7.6
Trying Their Patents
Justice Minerva Irons was getting tired of dreaming about the Mad Hatter, the Cheshire Cat and other characters from Alice in Wonderland. She had no idea why - she had never read the book or even a review. But after all these centuries, the characters were still iconic and omnipresent, even if she had no idea what they stood for. It made a sort of rough sense: she was dreaming about the hookah-smoking caterpillar while sleeping on a soft bed of mushrooms in the midst of a vast forest of gigantic mushrooms. It was still annoying.
But the relentless hatter and omnipresent caterpillar in her dreamscape were nowhere near as annoying as the even more surreal reality of this case she had been sent to try. It was bizarre because the two primary litigants - Planetary Administrator John Westinghall and Mayor Sally Chesticut - both acted as though they had already lost the case. Both sides were completely failing to put on a case. Given the unbelievably poor performance of the litigants on both sides, the abysmal state of the case notes and the complete lack of precedent, Irons had to admit she was no wiser about this case than when she arrived. Neither of the litigants seemed to want to talk to her or even to try the case at all.
Mysteries like this were why Irons had an investigative team. Tauk, Buttans and Shran had found some very interesting communications that shed light on the mood of the litigants. At the same time, Dr. Carrera had weighed in on the technical evidence - and his opinion was devastating to both sides of this case.
“All right.” Justice Irons called the court to session on the second morning of this trial with a squawk. The squawk came from the bizarre gavel she had been given that was connected by a flexible tube to the judicial bench, which, like all of the other furniture in this courtroom, appeared to have been sculpted from living mushrooms. Apparently the inhabitants of Pillo had developed a method for shaping the ever-present mushrooms to their needs and this courtroom, one of the oldest public spaces in Porte Abello, was entirely furnished, decorated and lighted by the local flora.
The room wasn’t even a room - it was a space defined by walls of giant living mushroom stalks, lit from below by a glowing carpet of mushrooms and from high above by the ever-present glowing strands that were bundled in great numbers, creating a glowing ceiling of many different colored lights. The room could only be entered from the open public area toward the back of the room or the judge’s chamber behind the bench by pushing aside more bundles of these brightly colored glowing strands. It was an impressive accomplishment.
As impressive as this room was, Justice Irons felt more than a little silly opening court by striking a mushroom with a squawking mushroom while sitting on a mushroom, which action permitted everyone else in the room to sit on other mushrooms while the court reporter sat on a mushroom behind a mushroom to the side of the plaintiff and defendants and their lawyers, sitting on mushrooms behind their own separate mushrooms.
“Administrator Westinghall,” Irons started, addressing the defendant, “I understand you put in a call to Fleet Admiral Miriam Stewart to try to have me reassigned.” She turned her attention toward the plaintiff’s mushroom. “And Mayor Chesticut, did you speak to Tribunal Justice Mreek in a similar attempt to have me replaced by another appellate justice?”
Before either the defendant or the plaintiff could respond, lawyers for both objected: “Your honor, on behalf of the plaintiff I have to object to this line of questioning due to personal bias…” “I also object…”
“I’ll be the judge of that, overruled,” Irons snapped.
“But your honor…” Planetary Administrator John Westinghall started, then thought better as Irons’ face immediately reflected her infamous judicial fury - made even more terrifying by her amazing beauty. In her role as a justice, Irons had been compared to an avenging angel and at this moment she very much looked the part.
“Administrator, how many judges do you see in this room?”
Mayor Sally Chesticut, whose mayoral duties included adjudicating disputes, started tentatively to raise her hand. Her lawyer, without looking at her, caught her wrist and gently but firmly guided her hand back down to the plaintiff’s mushroom. She turned to look at her lawyer, who, without turning to look at her, shook his head very slowly.
“My apologies, your honor, only you,” Westinghall wisely replied.
Irons leaned back into her mushroom and closed her eyes. “So tell me, precisely and in great detail, what led you to believe that I would rule against you?”
“I saw you reprimanding…” Westinghall started.
At the same moment, Sally Chesticut said, “I saw my team discussing how we could…”
The defendant and plaintiff both stopped and looked at each other in considerable confusion.
Irons sat up and smiled grimly. “You didn’t know that both of you thought you were going to lose this case. Well, if my ruling makes you both unhappy, then it must be one of the better rulings of my judicial career. Not that I have a clue at the moment what that ruling will be. And, let me emphasize this, and neither do either of you. But perhaps we will all have a better idea once Dr. Carrera provides his expert opinion about the patents this case is based on.”
Federation civil law allowed justices at the appellate level and higher to supplement testimony from the defense and the plaintiff with additional expert witnesses if, in the judge’s opinion, a salient point of the evidence had not been addressed by either the witnesses for the plaintiff or the defense - a feature of vulcan jurisprudence that had been adopted into the tribunal charter.
Dr. Carrera sat down on a mushroom and spread a number of electronic readers on the witness mushroom that he was seated behind. “As you know, the issue of this case is the validity of the patents filed on behalf of the people of Pillo by the planetary government as directed by Planetary Administrator Westinghall. These patents are based on inventions that have not yet been invented, but that various residents have had premonitions about using, helping to manufacture or even helping to draft or invent. More than 300 such patents have been granted, some relating to items that will, allegedly, be invented by future residents of Pillo, some of whom have yet to emigrate to this planet and others who may not yet have been born.”
“While all of the testimony in this trial has been about whether such premonitions fall under the time-travel laws or whether these represent a new area of law and whether these patents may be unfair to the future inventors and might even prevent some of them from emigrating to Pillo,” Carrera continued, “no one has argued the validity of the patents themselves.”
Dr. Carrera lifted one of the readers, turned it toward the room and held his finger on a scan button, causing the readout to flicker through thousands of pages faster than the human eye could follow. “I have reviewed each and every one of 354 patent applications based on these premonitions.” He dropped the reader onto the mushroom for emphasis. “They’re all garbage. Each and every one of them. Not a single one of these patents describes a machine that I could possibly build from the schematics provided. While several describe some manufacturing technique or some function of the item, I could not take a single one of these patents and build a functioning device without inventing more than half of the device myself.”
One of Westinghall’s lawyers stood up, evidently not impressed by a young witness who looked even younger than his 23 years, “For the record, Dr. Carrera, could you explain your level of expertise with patents?”
Justice Irons leaned forward in amusement. “Dr. Carrera, please respond in detail. This is not a time to be humble…”
Carrera looked at Irons, gave her a quick wink, then turned back to respond. “Ten years ago I earned a doctorate in mathematics from the Daystrom Institute. Since then I have been presented honorary doctorates by the Daystrom Institute, the Vulcan Science Academy, Juliard University and the Vulcan Academy for the Arts in Warp Field Engineering, Structural Engineering, Nuclear Chemistry, Astro Physics, Mathematics, Advanced Warp Theory, Starship Design, Ethics and Personal Development of Sentient Holograms, Music specializing in Piano Performance and Vulcan Music Theory. On behalf of the Daystrom Institute, I have personally filed 662 patents related to hologram behavioral development, warp engine design, warp field design and starship design, most of them related to the development of Star Fleet’s first fully artificially intelligent manned space vessel, for which I served as one of the lead designers and on which I now serve as the Director of Engineering. I hold the rank of 1st Lieutenant in Star Fleet and have been authorized by the Federation Tribunal to practice Federation law with a specialty in engineering.”
Westinghall’s lawyer seemed to wilt during this recitation. He managed, “Thank you, Dr. Carrera. I suppose now I know why everyone refers to you as ‘
Doctor Carrera’.”
Justice Irons smiled again, finally relaxed. “Do we have any final arguments?”
The lawyers at both mushrooms consulted briefly with their clients. Administrator Westinghall’s lawyer stood up again. “The defense rests, your honor.”
Mayor Chesticut’s lawyer also stood. “Your honor, the plaintiff also rests.”
Irons was not surprised. If there had been any fight left on either side, it was long gone by now. “I need some time to consider my ruling,” she said, then lifted the mushroom. “Court is in recess until tomorrow morning.” She struck the mushroom with the mushroom, ending the session with a now appropriate sounding squawk.
