First journey chapter 23

Chapter: 23 Preparing Death They issued a long floor-length dark red dress and hood, to match Dawn's uniform, someone pinned a mini- golden pin with the Justice Logo and the sword on the full collar of the dress. After which I swore allegiance to the Union. Then I was sworn in as a member of the Justice Department, Corrections and Punishment Division, Deputy Executioner. I certainly had never dreamed about being an executioner, if only a deputy. After a two hour session in a Cerebral Uploader unit which crammed my head with laws and regulations, the Union Judge updated my CIT and said. "Don't look at me like that. Even as a Klack, I can see your frown. I promise you it's going to be over soon, and you will have done the Union an enormous service, for which I thank you in advance." The ever-present Union Police officer handed me a blaster in a standard government issued holster. "As a member of the Corrections and Punishment Division, you are authorized to carry up to Level VII weapons at all times. I suggest you do not advertise much about your duties or where you are living." Dawn came in the room dressed ready for work, but her face reflected her sorrow and concern and said, "I am extremely sorry for all this stress. I honestly haven't planned it to turn out this way, and originally, I thought you would only help with the admin work ." "I blame no one but myself. Somehow I have a hidden talent for ending up in ridiculous duty situations for which I have no desire to perform, but end up doing them." She sighed and said. "Put on your hood. We are going to check the gallows and see the prisoners now." She handed me an official PDD in Clipboard mode and said. "This is the easy part, all you are required to do is follow the checklist, check each item as I perform the function. And all the while you will be recording both video and audio of everything I do, please be sure it is on at all times, it may save yours, and my life. We never know when someone, a fanatic or relative will swear we did something against the law." I noticed that she too now wore a belt with a holstered blaster attached. This time we went out the front door and the crowd went silent as they saw us, but then someone yelled. "For my sister and me make'em hurt for a while. Those bastards sold my sister to the Togar, and I never saw her again." After entering the police flyer, I turned to face Dawn, and I asked. "Do you know why the Union still uses hanging for executions?" She nodded. "It is one of the ten execution methods approved by the Union. Hanging is a genuinely ancient method of execution for pirates and is also used by the Navy to execute mutineers and traitors. She added. Usually, the societies of union members have their own methods, and most are accepted by the Justice Department. In some cases, the delinquent may choose the way. It really depends on the culture, the crime, and the species of the delinquent. You could hang a Klack all day long without ill effect. There was one X101 execution, and they simply turned him off.  I hope it will all go quickly as hanging sometimes can get very rough and emotionally draining." The Gallows were a metal scaffold put up in a picturesque park. Like the rest of the city, it was located below the ice which covered the entire planet and craved into the rocky core of the planet. Corri-City was a network of tunnels with the houses and businesses build into the tunnel walls. According to the Police Chief, usually about seven hundred thousand beings lived and worked here, but the recent events and the news of the executions had swelled it to over a million. Located in an excavated cavern of approximately one and one-half kilometer and the ceiling one-half a kilometer high, the town center included its' government offices and community center. The houses and buildings not craved into cave walls were typical buildings with windows, doors, advertisement signs, and roofs. There were ten tunnels, each emptying into a street which led to the center of the city. Lining the streets were genuine Terra oaks and wide strips of grass. Single-family houses lined most of the avenues, but two lanes were dedicated to apartment buildings and several high-end hotels. A little fusion Sun was suspended underneath the cave ceiling and appeared to be on a suspension system that allowed it to traverse from the eastern side to the western side each day. This gave the dwellers the sense of day and night as it would appear to set into the horizon of the west and then travel via a rail system back to the eastern wall. The ugly, menacing, drab gray scaffold seemed out of place in the pristine lust green grass covered park. On top of the scaffolding, stood the Gallows, a girder with twenty nooses mounted between two upright columns, with a third supporting tower in the center. The scaffold and gallows were cordoned off by police and barriers. Robots and workers put up rows and rows of chairs on the other side of the obstacles. Twenty elongated boxes were unloaded from a cargo flyer and placed underneath the scaffold. That more than the nooses brought home to me what would happen here tomorrow. Beyond the park and the chairs, I noticed vendors putting up tables and sales booths. I mentioned them to Dawn, who said. "It is inevitable. Even though the law prohibits making executions into an entertainment circus. We cannot prohibit vendors form putting up sales stands on private property, and while this aspect galls me greatly, they will do brisk business tomorrow. There will be plenty of news media, a massive cheering crowds that on occasions have quickly turned into a mad ugly mob. There will be the obligatory protestors and possibly a few violent protesters, although as this is primarily a military base, both may be absent tomorrow, for that we will wait and see. I believe that is the main reason for having it in this particular cavern as the rest of Corri-Door is a civilian colony." A Sentmac X101 and a blue-faced Thauran in work coveralls greeted us at the bottom of the stairs. The machine being padded the hand railing. "We put great effort into making it nice and solid, Chief Executioner. The Thauran was chewing something."It's the biggest one we build so far for the justice department." Dawn turned to me. "That is Seris Seven-eight-seven, he runs a small specialty business building execution devices such as scaffolds for the Justice Department. I worked with him a few times before." I tried to keep the sarcastic tone out of my voice."I guess he found a suitable market." The whole contraption was quite simple; a set of hydraulic arms would yank the crossbar girder with the nooses, two meters in the air, suspending anyone attached to those nooses off the ground. Each hangman's rope had life sensors embedded that transmitted data to the control panel. The LEDs on the board would turn from green to red when no life signs remained. Trapdoors would then open, and the bodies released and slide directly into the open coffins. All was thought out and very efficient, in a macabre way. Dawn checked the equipment and tested a random noose with a test dummy. I was behind her making the required check marks when she told me to do so. She told me that the justice department basically copied the Union Fleet manual on executions and she found there was no institution in the known universe more efficient in making detailed manuals on every possible subject. Dawn took great care and made sure every detail was checked and tested and approved by her inspection. She found a little drop of hydraulic fluid at one of the lines and made Seris check, then replace the steel braided tubing and test the system again. Only when she was satisfied did we go to the prisoner location. The prison was located in a prefab building drab looking building underneath a force field dome on the surface of the cold planet. Every door was guarded by at least two fully armored and armed guard and one menacing looking robot. There were at least fifteen doors we passed through until we reached the cells which housed the prisoners to be executed. Dawn and I had to place our weapons into special holding bins before entering the area housing the prisoners. Each of the seventeen Dai was held in small cells constructed of solid Ultronit rear walls, and Ultronit bars and a force field closing the cells to the corridor and the cells on each side. The Dai could see but not talk to or touch the other prisoners. The Dai were wearing clean, transparent coveralls, of which I found very humiliating. The Prison guard who accompanied us said. "We have to keep them under High threat confinement as they try to kill everyone including themselves. The coveralls have mittens that allow the prisoner to hold food cups and feed themselves, but keep fingers away from throats and eyes. They are highly trained warriors who know dozens of ways to kill with their bare hands." I still found it demeaning, and I was sure there were other ways to keep a prisoner. Besides, if they commit suicide, what was the harm, other than taking this sorry task away from the Executioner? None of the first ten Dai Than Dawn spoke to would even so much as part their lips and simply stare into the distance. The eleventh looked somewhat younger than the rest and tried to spat, but his spittle evaporated as it hit the force field. "So what are you, some sort of priestesses?" Dawn said, "I am the Chief Executioner tasked to fulfill the sentence tomorrow. We came to see if you have any last wish or request. Or if you have anyone, you like to call. Do you wish to have a priest or some religious representative present?" It took him a moment and then he understood. "You are the ones that are going to kill us tomorrow. Yes, I have a last wish. I want to fight your strongest and best warrior, knives, swords, bare hands no matter. I do not want to die by the hands of a woman." "This is not a choice you have. Executioners have no face and no gender. We are simply tools of justice. You may request something to eat, a special song, music, entertainment or something similar. According to your documents, you refused to be pardoned by joining the Dai Clans that have become Union Members." "You Unions know nothing of the Dai Than. Offering me to become an Ulkatai slave in an enemy clan is worse than death. Being a Ulkatai in a clan of Okthi-Dai, my spirit and the spirits of all my forefathers would be shamed. I glanced on the clipboard and pulled up his information. According to the read-out, he was one of the youngest Tribal Chiefs in the Dai Than and took part in the Partook massacre. According to his mind dump, he had sold over a thousand Partook slaves to the Slave traders of Alvor's Cove. He was eager to make himself a name and was among the first tribal leaders to pursue the tribes that made the decision to join the Union and was among the first to enter Union Space with blazing cannons. He spoke no further after that outburst, no matter what Dawn said.                           The rest of the Dai were as stoic silent as the others. Three of the Delinquents were not Dai. One was a thief caught with a whole kilo of Califerm at a colony 12 light years from Corri-Door and brought here to be executed after a local court had found him guilty. The second was a human Saresii found guilty using psionics to influence others to empty their Credit strips into his, and then commit suicide. I had to admit this was a case where I wholeheartedly agreed with the sentence. That had to be the cruelest and cowardly way to kill someone by making them commit suicide. The last one was, to my surprise, a woman. She had killed her husband and her mother in law. She was a resident of one of the Floating cities and had been arrested in the Bubble Top restaurant celebrating with her new lover. She cried as she saw us and pleaded for her life. But all to no avail as this was not the court. She finally asked for some food dishes and perfume. She requested a hairdo, and Dawn promised to have a hairdresser come. Finally, outside again, I realized how depressing and how much the prison and the fate of the 20 had affected me. Even though it was exactly the same artificial created air, I felt I could breathe easier. Dawn put her hand on my shoulder. "You did great. I know the first time is always the hardest." "I don't mind your company, Dawn, but I sure hope this is the last time I ever have to do something of this nature." "We are almost done; all that is left is to file the paperwork and give the Justice Department my okay, and then we are off till tomorrow. The Department has found us accommodations here on Corri-Dorr. So we don't have to go all the way back to the Gas planet. you do know, we do have to get up early in the morning."