Chapter 7: Judge Singh

Luna City was a vast hive, mostly underground, that had grown to such tremendous proportions over the years that if its main mallways were above ground and on one level the sprawling city would cover a quarter of the face of the moon. It was said that half a billion people lived there, no one really knew for sure. The outlying districts merged with Tycho City far to the southeast, and some neighborhoods had been delved out, illegally, beneath the sanctified plains of the Sea of Tranquility.

The center of the city was in the Mare Ibrium, which was not the flat plain it had once been but was now dotted with domes and the mounded rubble from the spaces ripped out below, the lunar mare being ideally suited to downward growth. Then there was Capitol Square with its great flashing buildings that rose thousands of meters above the lunar landscape. The official quarter, where the Senate met to feign the decisions of the Human Stellar Network and where the great ministers, the oligarchs who ruled humanity, made their homes.

The Aldrin building was the tallest of them all, rising over fourteen hundred meters above the airless surface. The top two floors were the private residence of the right honorable Haradnathan Singh, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the Republic of Luna. In short: the arbiter of justice, the last word and the stopped buck for all of humanity. It was a five-minute elevator ride to the top of the Aldrin building from the tram stop on level 39C.

Bolton stood with his back to the doors, staring at a dark sheet of glass that covered the back wall. He was wondering about the glass when the darkness within it suddenly fell away, and he caught his breath as the blue-white light of earthrise bathed the cab. The ethereal reflected light from the Earth washed over the bright sands of Luna that he could now see beyond the glass. The city disappeared below him as the elevator rose and rose. He could see the lights of the spaceport in the distance of the mare, with the shuttles that came and went every minute on the minute.

Ships. Ships and space had always fascinated him, which was probably why he had gone to Andur when he was young. Most kids from Terra did, or tried, when he was young. It was either Andur or the Fleet to get to space, and when Bolton was young it was a disturbing fact that ninety percent of the young men who went away to war with the Fleet never came back. No one was stupid enough to actually join the Fleet. Of course, this was when Bolton was young, and many things had happened since then.

At the top he was met by a functionary who ushered him through a series of impressive reception rooms, down a side hall, and into a small but luxurious study. Real books lined three walls, a large window in the fourth looked east toward Tranquility. At a cluttered desk in the corner by the window sat a white-haired old man. He was looking out the window. The white lunar sands reflected dancing photons up from below that washed across his craggy face. Deep seams crisscrossed his cheeks and gnarly hands clutched a dusty book in his lap.

"Please, sit down," the Judge said when he saw him. He pointed with a withered finger. A little geyser of dust erupted from his seat cushion as he shifted his weight. The chair creaked as he turned it to face him. Bolton sat. They surveyed each other for a moment.

"Well ... Admiral Bolton, you look a bit older since last we met."

"Sir." A number of snappy replies entered his mind, but somehow when you were in the presence of one of the men who ruled three-hundred odd worlds and countless billions of human beings, you just said 'sir' and gave the man the respect that was his due.

The Judge reached over to his desk and took up a rather thick paper file. He opened it and began thumbing through the pages.

"Louis Anton Bolton," he pronounced it 'bolt-on', "born 3770 in Yuma, Wisconsin. Where the hell is that?"

"North of Andur, several hundred miles. I don't think it exists anymore."

"Mmm," the Judge grunted, a wheezing rustle deep down in his lungs. Bolton saw he was not a well man.

"How many regens you had?" The question surprised him, and there was a strange sparkle in the Judge's eye as he asked, almost eagerness in his voice as he said the word regen. The treatment could only take you so far, then the drugs became useless, or allergies developed in the patients. May be the Judge had developed that allergy.

"Well?" snapped the Judge.

"Four." Bolton lied.

"Ah, four huh? Doing better than me. I've had six, and I've only got a hundred and five years on you. I don't think I'll get another one in though." He went back to the file.

"Says here you were on the Board of the Port Authority at the same time you served in the Fleet. That seems a little strange doesn't it? I think there's a conflict of interest somewhere there, being both a seller and consumer of military contracts."

"It was wartime, sir. These things were gone over during my courts martial; you may recall. I resent--"

"SHUT UP!" The Judge swiped his hand. Bolton huffed, but was silent. "This isn't an inquisition. You needn't worry, too much, about the past."

Bolton sat back. The Judge returned to the file.

"I'm merely refreshing my memory about your case," said the Judge finally, to ease the tension that had descended. "You commanded the 704. The EarthÕs Hope. I remember that ship." The Judge calmly looked out the window as Bolton fretted.

"You were a brilliant commander, you know, right up there with Patterson and Li Suk, a true hero of the Republic É" The Judge turned his piercing gaze directly into Bolton's eyes, "until you mutinied, and took off on your own personal vendetta. Yes, I do remember. You didn't really deserve what you got you know."

"Yes, that I do know," said Bolton with just a hint of sourness. "But it was politically expedient."

"Yes," the Judge laughed. "Sometimes we must do not what we know is right, but what others would have us do." He leaned back in his chair, dust balls and rotted foam rubber falling from his seat cushion to the expensive wooden floor. He stared out the window while Bolton pensively sucked his teeth and counted the sweat drops that rolled down his back.

"Auriga," the Judge said suddenly, rolling the r.

"Sir?"

"The situation in Auriga, this 'Declaration of Independence'. What do you think we should do about it?"

"I'm hardly qualified to--"

"Don't play the idiot with me, Bolton." He pronounced it 'bolt-on' again. "Any man who sat on the Board of the Andurin Port Authority is more than qualified to advise an executive of the Luna government."

Bolton eased back into his chair, breathing a little easier now, a bit more sure of his place. It was obvious the Judge wanted something from him. Something for which he seemed prepared to skirt old scandals to obtain, scandals that could well jeopardize his own position. Bolton's can of worms was quite an embarrassment to the government of the Republic.