Russell Twyce

An alien is on trial for sedition  -  Short Story by Russell Twyce

“My words and actions in this courthouse,” a man acting as his own defense council said to the jury in his opening statement on the charge of sedition, “will be what they are. You’ll view what I say as sedition if you will. But to me, this trial is an opportunity to share my truth. I suppose that I’m really signing my own death warrant. By a paradox, your finding me not guilty of sedition would be absolute evidence of my guilt because convincing you of my innocence can only be accomplished by my committing further sedition in front of you.”

The Unexplainable Store

Then the accused turned sharply on the heel of his wheelie sneaker, and glided on back to his seat. “I’m done,” he said to the prosecutor.

“The young man who stands accused,” the government lawyer orated in his turn, “has brought this all on himself.” He went on to describe the alien’s actions of going into a police station and confessing his crime. “Neither the police nor the district attorney’s office had any option but to bring this charge, because he was continuing to commit sedition in both the police station and in all interviews with him since.”

“Calling the accused as a prosecution witness is highly irregular,” the judge stated for the record: his main concern wasn’t for how injurious the defendant’s testimony might be to his own case, but rather in preventing an appeal from besmirching his judicial reputation, “but as the defendant has suggested it, I’ll allow it.”

“You’re an alien.” The prosecutor began. “Why would you choose to practice your sedition here, in a state that isn’t your own and which employs the death penalty?”

“Your question is illogical to me on several points. The first is that I’m not an alien by any definition. I don’t ‘belong’ to any other states: both my body and mind are for my soul’s free use in experiencing life. I’m from here just as I’m from everywhere on earth. My death experience showed me that I, and all of us, really come from a place existing in the gap between matter and time, I ‘belong’ to that place but it isn’t a state.” The accused young man then pointedly directed his next words at the judge. “I wasn’t originally born in this part of the planet you’ve put a border around and arbitrarily called a state—which you wrongly profess has some authority.”

“I’ll have no more seditious talk in my court!” The judge hammered his gable.

“The second,” the defendant ignored the magistrate’s outburst, “is that the term ‘sedition’ isn’t anything that exists. A state has no form in reality: it’s a concept some deluded people have agreed to think of as real. ‘Sedition’ is defined as conduct or speech inciting people to rebel against a state’s authority. The ‘state’s authority’ is a piñata that exists only in your unreal vision of reality. Opinions I state are of what I see truly existing in this material world and your mind’s eye interprets my words as being a fiesta stick aimed at damaging your fictional papier-mâché treasure trove.”

Instantly Attract Women

“Which like Pandora’s box,” the judge retorted, “would spill evils into the world.”

“It would disgorge the true freedom that is our human birthright and which your delusion of statehood, rooted on your lust for power, has stolen from us.” The youth smiled. “But my absolute liberty can’t actually be taken away, so I’ve taken it back.”

“Yet you’re here in custody,” his honor stressed the ‘in custody’, “and awaiting the decision of this authority on whether you will live or die.”

“And I arrived here of my own free accord,” the accused quipped back, “while fully cognizant of all the potential outcomes.”

“Uh.” The prosecuting attorney had been biding his time. He hadn’t wanted to interrupt the judge. “You haven’t answered my questions yet. Why here? You’ve placed yourself in a life or death situation because sedition is still punishable here, by death.”

“That’s another notion of yours which is utterly incorrect. Death isn’t a penalty. Death is a soul’s reward for having completed its life mission. Spending my lifetime incarcerated in a penal institute would be a torment for me. I’d rather put myself to a mortal hazard. I’ll be found not-guilty and walk free, or be found guilty and die.”

“If this court sets you free,” the judge angrily interjected, “it would be guilty of the sedition that you are charged with. The justice department would be undermining its authority to keep citizens safe from criminals. Crimes are real things that happen to actually existing people and cause true-to-life harms.”

“But slavery to the rule-of-law isn’t the only way to address those issues.” The man in the witness box stated emphatically. “In fact, rooting a real need for public order keeping on a series of unreal tenets is the worst possible method. It causes some crimes to be committed, exacerbates others and contributes to the motivation of all crimes. I’ve come into this court charged with sedition for inciting people to rebel against an authority that is guilty of heinous crimes against humanity.”

“Crimes against humanity!” The judge’s face went blood red as he ejaculated.

“But the court holds itself as immune from prosecution for the wrongs it commits so I’ve brought the matter before the bench by an alternate route,” the young accused spoke directly to the jury box, “in having myself put on trial for sedition against the state’s law.”

“Will you enlighten us,” the state’s prosecuting lawyer inquired: he was seriously interested because he often felt in his innermost psyche, that law was inserting a measure of ruination in some peoples lives that his conscience felt responsible for. ‘Might there truly be a better way: one that wasn’t just anarchy?’ But he used a mocking tone of voice so as not to openly betray his oath to law, “of precisely which crimes the law has been complicit in and how an amazing new form of policing would work in practice?”

“Overruled!” His honor snapped, though none but he had objected to the question. “My court won’t be the soapbox for the rants of a fanatic. He has already shown his contempt for society’s welfare and freely admitted to his sedition. Were this a trial without a jury, I would be ready to hand down my decision right now.” Further to this, the judge would’ve eagerly ordered the bailiff to perform the execution on the spot: so that notions even more threatening to his way of life couldn’t spread to the death row cells and into the general prison population.

“As the magistrate is ready,” the young man in t-shirt and jeans stood and faced his peers, “then you must be able to deliberate now too. I’m not permitted, and likely not able to concisely describe my vision of our wonderful future, free of law. I also doubt that a person still enslaved to the notion of law’s rule could envision it yet, so I’m quite happy that I’m not required to elaborate. I can emphatically state that I am strongly convinced and the statements I’ve made leading up to my charge of sedition were born in my freedom of beliefs and uttered with a right to free expression — whether you understand or agree with my opinions or not. My turning myself in to the police, in a state that retains the death penalty, and openly displaying so-called sedition in this trial are undeniable proof of my faith’s conviction. So decide now if freewill is more important to you than an imaginary state’s theoretical authority.”

“I will determine when the jury should begin deliberating!” The judge screamed.

“Then do it.” The youth challenged. “I’ll wave my defense. I’m prepared to sum up my case to the jury.”

“It seems to me,” the prosecutor intoned quietly, “that you just did that.”

“I took the tirade as that too.” The judge said. “But to satisfy formalities, I’ll call for those now. Wrap up your case for the jury.”

“Thank you.” The young man leaned back slightly on his wheelie shoes and rolled to a position in front of the jury box. “The crime of murder, which shares the ultimate penalty with sedition, is far different from the one I’m accused of. A murder is an act done to a person, yet the court deems that a wrong happened to the law itself. Had I killed someone, you would be asked to decide if I’d broken the law against murder, instead of deliberating on whether or not I killed someone. That concept is murky when thinking of a murder, because a human did wrongfully die.”

“With sedition on the other hand,” he continued after a slight pause, “no one person can be shown as having received a harm. The victim is the theoretical state and all supposed damage done to it, or intended to it, is entirely subjective. Your choice is to deem that my actions and words hurt the entity that you see embodied by a flag.” He pointed. “Yet I see that as a tablecloth on a stick: it doesn’t represent anything that truly exists, it’s only the symbol of a notion—a false impression. In my defiance against the non-existent state, and in my inciting others to rebellion, I didn’t damage the one physical item that presumably represents it.” An index finger had remained targeted on the nation’s banner. “In other words, I’ve not done anything in the real world to be construed as a wrong, I’ve only challenged an ideal I believe is untrue. Have you ever allowed your consciousness to realize that the law against ‘sedition’ was enacted in a direct contravention of a constitutional right of free expression? I would rather be dead than accept and feign obedience to such a dishonorable rule system that embraces obvious absurdity and fakes it off as truth.”

“I see your decision hinges on only one factor.” He took a deep breath. “Is your view of the world, and the judge’s take on society, worth intrinsically more than mine is? Is my death necessary to muzzle a philosophy that you don’t want to see explored?”

The prosecutor’s wrap up included the predictable platitudes about society’s needs over the desires of an individual, but his full fervor was conspicuously absent. The government’s lawyer was thankful that he wasn’t on this jury duty. An obligation to his profession would’ve compelled him to vote one way, when the entire essence of his being was yearning to cast an acquittal on the sedition crime.

“You’ll now be sequestered, until you’ve reached a decision.” The judge growled and with a glance at the defendant’s satisfied expression, he knew that the verdict of no importance. The alien had already achieved the victory he’d sought and in fact, a guilty verdict and his death at the hands of the state would gain his ideas even more exposure. In either eventuality, his precious court was defamed by the soon to be condemned man’s last question. ‘Is my death necessary to muzzle a philosophy that you don’t want to see explored?’

Readers, you’re the jury. Please voice your verdict in a comment. A life is in your balance.