Suspicion, Part 1

Date: 03/09/2001
From: ThomasMalthus

The courtroom went from being empty and lifeless to bustling with people within a few mere moments. Pretty soon, security had to close off the room. The disappointed onlookers who couldn't get in lined the streets outside, trying to get just a peek in at what they expected to be a big show. From all indications, it looked like their expectations were right.

The two sides of the case filed into the courtroom. The prosecution came in neat and orderly and with smiles of confidence on their faces. Quite smug, to look at them. The face on the attorney for the defendant was less joyous, if equally determined. The jury came in next, looking a little bit overwhelmed by everything. The judge took his seat at the bench and looked over everyone. 'This is going to be a circus,' the man complained to himself. At last, the bewildered-looking accused entered the courtroom and took his seat. This was the judge's cue.

"Maximilian Patrick Arturo, you are charged with suspicion of duplicate impersonation. How do you plead?" The judge read in the most dispassionate voice he could muster.

Arturo turned to the man sitting next to him. "What in hell is going on here, Mr. Mallory?!?"

Quinn sighed heavily. "Just say 'not guilty'. They're not going to buy an insanity plea now. Don't screw this up for yourself, Mr. Arturo."

Professor Maximilian Arturo felt he was going insane. How had he ended up here, in this courtroom, charged with this ridiculous crime? He didn't even remember sliding onto this world! Still, even in maddening times, sometimes the best policy was to follow the path of least resistance. "Not guilty, your honor."

"Very well," the judge said with some amusement. "Mr. Brown, Mr. Mallory, your opening statements."

While Rembrandt Brown rose in his gray suit to make his case before the jury, Arturo turned to Quinn again. "At least let me see my casefile." Resignedly, Quinn Mallory handed the Professor the manila folder that contained everything about the elder man's case and then turned his entire attention to DA Brown's opening statement.

"Ladies and gentleman of the jury, it is the assertion of the state that the Maximilian Arturo you see before you willingly and unlawfully deprived his counterpart of another dimension of his livelihood and existance by..." Arturo tuned out the prosecuting attorney, who apparently liked to hear the sound of his own voice as much as his own Rembrandt did. 'The others,' Arturo thought. 'Where in blazes are they?' Glancing around the courtroom, he saw no sign of them, only their lawyer doubles (Miss Welles was apparently also on the prosecution's team, taking fierce notes while Mr. Brown spoke). Arturo caught a snippet in Rembrandt's opening statement about an "Azure Gate Bridge". 'Good Lord,' Arturo's brain panicked, 'they really are putting me on trial for trading places with my double. Which I did, in a way, but I had no other choice. Surely a jury will understand that.'

Quinn sat back in his chair and whispered to Arturo. "Brown's aiming for the governorship next year. That's the only explanation. There's no way a bigshot like him would take this case otherwise." The Professor finally got a look at his casefile. It was threadbare and mostly comprised of copies of sworn affidavits from the other sliders. He had no time to look at them in detail, they were quite extensive, but he was sure if this world's government was able to make a case against him, their testimony had to be fairly damning. And why shouldn't they be? Quinn and Wade both knew that he had impersonated his 'Azure Gate Bridge World' double, and Wade knew that the wrong one had ended up sliding with them from that world. They would be lying under oath to say otherwise in their statements.

He began listening to Rembrandt's speech again. "This interdimensional charlatan forced the real Earth Prime Maximilian Arturo to remain on Azure Gate Bridge World, where presumably he is to this day. And did he do this for any noble purpose? To better mankind, perhaps, or make the sliders' journey an easier one? No. He merely wanted to use the timer, the Earth Prime sliders' only method of reaching their homeworld, to win the Nobel Prize for Physics." The jury gasped. Arturo was equally shocked. 'They're putting me on trial, thinking that I'm that rapscallion who took my place?!?' It was everything Arturo could do not to bellow loudly in protest. 'This whole world is insane!!!' At last, Rembrandt ended his opening statement and took his seat next to Wade's.

"Mr. Mallory," the judge spoke. "Do you wish to make an opening statement at this time?"

"Yes, your honor," he spoke up. "As the jury well knows, California Statute 35115 is a relatively new measure. It's only been on the books for a few years. As you also know, Maximilian Arturo is the first person to be charged with violating the statute. Now maybe you're thinking, 'what's that got to do with this case'? Doesn't it still all boil down to innocence or guilt on the part of the defendant? Certainly it does. But keep in mind that you are not just deciding Mr. Arturo's fate, but setting a potentially dangerous precedent for any future interdimensional travellers. The charge of duplicate impersonation is difficult to prove and the defense believes that there is no way the prosecution can hope to conclusively do so in the case of Mr. Arturo, other than using smear tactics and vague allusions in hopes of making the jury so fearful that it will have to decide in their faithful. But I know that you can be judicious and fair to Mr. Maximilian Arturo, a man wrongfully accused of a crime he did not even know existed until he arrived on this world. Ladies and gentleman of the jury, I thank you."

"Does the prosecution wish to call its first witness?" the judge intoned from the bench.

"We do, your honor," Rembrandt replied. Arturo's head was spinning. 'This is all moving too fast,' he inwardly complained. 'They can't really hope to conduct a trial this way, can they?' "The state calls Earth Prime Wade Welles." Arturo looked hopefully at the entrance to the courtroom. Nobody came through. Bitterly disappointed, the Professor turned back around in his seat...

...only to see the same Wade that had sat with Rembrandt being sworn in.

"It's like bloody 'Alice in Wonderland'," Arturo cursed in a whisper. "If that is the same Wade Welles I've been sliding with for the last few weeks, then I'm the Queen of England."

"Calm down, Mr. Arturo," Quinn cautioned. "This angry British guy act isn't doing you any good with the jury."

"Believe you me, Mr. Mallory, it's no act. This entire experience has been sheer madness!!" Arturo exclaimed, perhaps more loudly than he should have.

The judge pounded his gavel. "Another outburst like that, Mr. Arturo, and I'll hold you in contempt of court. Proceed, counselor."

"Miss Welles, did you or did you not sign this affidavit in regard to your and the defendant's actions on and succeeding the duration of the slide which took you to 'Azure Gate Bridge World'?" Rembrandt inquired.

"I did indeed," Wade replied.

Remmy nodded. "Let the affidavit be admitted into evidence then as Exhibit A. Now, Miss Welles, you got to know the Maximilian Arturo that was native to that world pretty well, didn't you?"

"Yes, I suppose I did."

"How would you describe his character?"

"He was... incredibly self-centered. Fixated on getting all the glory for inventing sliding for himself. He would have done anything for that."

"If this was true, why did you so readily believe that he was the same Maximilian Arturo that you had known for eighteen months?"

"We didn't know that the other Arturo didn't slide when the rest of our doubles did."

"And?"

Wade sighed. "And it wasn't that out of character for our Arturo to act that way."

"I see." Rembrandt let a slight grin slip out. "To what degree was which Arturo left that world with you ambiguous?"

"Extremely. The rest of us slid out, leaving the Arturos there slugging it out with each other. We all had our suspicions about which one slid. But we couldn't do anything about it, couldn't go back to that world. I guess we all just convinced ourselves he was the right one."

Rembrandt looked as though he was about to drive the point home. "But now you believe that this is not the case."

"I know it for certain." The courtroom was abuzz. The judge pounded his gavel for silence.

"How do you know for certain, Miss Welles?" Rembrandt asked.

"He confessed it to me." Wade held her composure as the crowd held their breath in.

Rembrandt leaned in to her. "What exactly did he say to you?" At this point, Quinn ineffectually objected on the grounds of hearsay, only to be quickly overruled.

"When I stated that 'We took the wrong one' on the Azure Gate Bridge World, he replied in the affirmative, and then went on to describe what life was like for him after having taken his double's place." Arturo cursed inwardly. What Wade was saying was technically true, there was no way he could disprove it. 'The system's set up all wrong,' Arturo thought. 'There's no way I can win here'.

"No further questions," Rembrandt stated with an air of confidence in his voice. Quinn turned to Arturo for a moment. "Unless you've got a way for me to clearly refute her charge, we're sunk." Arturo slumped in his chair. This had truly been a nightmare world.

ThomasMalthus

Wow!

Date: 03/09/2001
From: EustiSlider

For Arturo not to remember sliding in means that there's something else going on here. Still, things don't look good for our hero. And technically, the Quinn they've been sliding with is impersonating Earth/Kromagg Prime Quinn too.

This should be very interesting to watch unfold. Great work, TM.

Eusti

Tremendous

Date: 03/09/2001
From: Recall317

This is stuff I like to see! Stories that stretch the boundaries. We've seen our Sliders inpersonate their doubles, but what would happen on a world where sliding has gone mainstream? Where it is accepted technology? Wouldn't there be persons, both unscrupulous and/or desparate, who would seize the indentity of a fellow double if given the opportunity? And what recourse would society have to protect itself from such intrusions?

I am very excited about this story, TM! I can't wait for the next installment.

R317

P=Patrick?

Date: 03/09/2001
From: QBall79

I thought we'd established it was PLUM!!!

Keep up the grea work, TM.

Q-Ball79
http://www.slidersweb.net/

What a sentence!!

Date: 03/15/2001
From: MuleSlide

"To what degree was which Arturo
left that world with you ambiguous?"

...is that some of Remmy's 'Fro-nese'?

LOL

Mule

Original URL http://bboard.scifi.com/bboard/browse.cgi/1/5/545/25225
Nominated by DMD