Takumo's Trial

[Kazu Chidori]

Umayado Island, Kazu Family Estate, Planet New Tokyo, House Kusari, 836 A.S

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Hearing Room, Kazu Courtroom - Kazu Family Estate

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A moment of glory and patriotism turned into an arrest, and an acquittal turned into a second arrest. Owari Takumo had protested and then fought in Galileo, seeking glory, honor, and perhaps even fame at home. Upon his return, he was hounded out and arrested by law enforcement, but there was a quiet glory and respect that came from enduring undue injustice. He was investigated, but quickly set free as it turned out that he did not fire until he was fired upon, and that though he was hostile towards the Prime Minister's presence, he had not fired upon her neither, and instead had fired upon her attackers.

The Black Cypress, however, was not as forgiving as the Kusari criminal justice system, and now Kazu Kumano's frigid gaze speared him from the highest point of the courtroom. Takumo was made to kneel in front of the entire courtroom, with the blades of his cousins from the Owari family at his neck, daring him to move. Kumano read out his charges.

"Before the Kusari courts, you were found not guilty of assaulting the Prime Minister. You were found not guilty of attacking unlawful aggression in a neutral zone. You were found not guilty of high treason.

However, in this court, you are held to different standards. Those eyes of yours are not merely gifts. They are an agreement, one which you respond with in kind. You will bring no dishonor on the name of Owari. You will bring no dishonor on the name of Kazu. You will bring no dishonor on the names that bind you. The act of passing into Galileo without military acceptance, agreement, or blessing means you abandoned your station as an Onigoroshi. Not all who are called devils are devils, and not all who are not called devils are not devils. You have a duty to discernment, and that duty you have failed.

Even though the Kusari courts find you not guilty of assault on the Prime Minister, your skill and power as an Onigoroshi is known to the court of Kazu. Had you truly made an attempt, the Prime Minister would have experienced no threat, instead a leisurely flight home. There was no inability on your own part, only unwillingness. You have attempted an assassination on not only a Kusari citizen not convicted of any crime in either heart nor court, but on a friend of the Kazu Family, who sat at Katsuherabo Shinobu's bedside while she lay suffering the wounds inflicted on her by a terrorist attack.

With the evidence provided, I see only treason against Kazu by an Onigoroshi, a chosen warrior blessed with unmatched power. There are few punishments in our power that match your crime, death being far beneath this treachery."

The silence that followed was an invitation to speak. Honey in a trap, welcoming Takumo to dig his grave deeper. He did all that was in his power during that battle. He flew a single Shirogane against a hoard of Xenos and...

"A gunboat! Honored Mother, there was a gunboat from Kusari amongst the number attacking the Prime Minister. It was called Gaikotsu. I did as much as I could, but among the numbers was a gunboat, a ship too heavy for me to contend with alongside the hoards of Liberty devils!"

The silence was now deafening. Desperation had gotten the better of him. There was no greater shame for an Owari than to beg for mercy, and that was what this would be seen as. They were tools, weapons even. They trained their lives for this, and for a weapon to be disobedient was for a weapon to render itself worthless. To beg for mercy was to confirm his own worthlessness, and trying to offer a defense wouldn't be seen any other way.

"I am aware." Damning words. "I saw the evidence. We are investigating the individuals crewing and captaining that gunboat as well. We are aware that that gunboat did the most damage to the hull of the Prime Minister's fightercraft. Which means you, in the fastest bombercraft in Sirius, in the pinnacle of Kusari engineering, should have engaged and destroyed that gunboat. And your failure to do so betrays your intent.

We are aware that misdeeds can be done by pure hearts. That is why we judge on intent. Your intent is made obvious, and from that your sentence stems: You are stripped of the name Owari, and the counsel of Kazu. You will be given to your sister, Tokudaiji Saru, until you are no longer a threat to Kazu. After which, you will be discarded. Death would be a mercy. You will live on in shame."

Takumo was grabbed by another pair of Onigoroshi, and escorted from the courtroom. The trial had been concluded long before it ever began, by speaking, he had simply made a fool of himself. Being given to Tokudaiji Saru was not any mere punishment. Saru was a girl without a soul, having sold it for scientific might. A madwoman who had traded morality for eternal life, uploading her mind into a machine and then taking her own life. She now puppeteers nearly a thousand bodies, engaging in sins against human decency in pursuit of "perfect life". She had been adopted into the Owari family because of her knowledge on the augmenting process, and now enjoyed absolute impunity as the horrors of her lab expanded and evolved.

Being given over to her was a sentence of torture in eldritch and unimaginable ways. Owari Takumo resigned himself to die there, as no life touched by her is truly still alive. Kumano stood, other matters now requiring her attention.

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