Marlene McGregor's Story

In one of the seats there was a well dressed young woman casually observing the proceedings, her hair was pulled in a tight bun, and her blue eyes were focused on Zosimos. Resting on her lap was a notepad where she had scribbled some alien looking characters. So this was some infamous vampire that caused the people here a fair bit of heartache. She was here for educational purposes though, and the others in the room didn't bother her a bit.

Crossing one leg over the other, she scritched a few more notes and looked to her surroundings. Law enforcement types. Well at least the security here would be somewhat decent.

The Sheriff appeared on camera after the arrival at the courthouse, with Zosimos whisked away to the courtroom. Daylon and several other suits appeared before the waiting press. After the first few astroturfed questions a young woman turned the camera onto the Sheriff, obviously recognizing the enigmatic matte gray suit of Central’s government functionaries. “Excuse me, Sheriff. What resources has the Authority provided to ensure the integrity of this trial?”

Daylon took a moment to run a hand through his hair, taking an exasperated breath. “The Central Authority has committed its full confidence in the court, and will be enforcing whatever the juries of the sovereign peoples decide on punishment for these crimes.”

Another gray suited man pointed an idle finger into the crowd. “You, and don’t be a bore - we’ve only got a few more minutes. The rest of you vultures get into the journo-box and quiet down.”

“Has the prosecution entertained a plea deal?” Another reporter inquired. Daylon gave a sniffle as he processed the question then promptly spoke.



The other suited man, with eyes hidden by sunglasses, snapped his fingers. “Alright, feeding frenzy over you sharks.” He said, making sure to block a flashing camera as the government personnel filed their way into a nearby office. The door shuddered shut, and Daylon fished an index finger into the knot of his tie to bring it loose.

“Talk about a clusterfuck … when did the defense leak they were entertaining a plea deal?” The Sheriff’s suited comrade spoke, the fizz of a can cracking open as Daylon glanced over and spotted the six pack on the table.

“I talked to the Sub-Prefex working with the defense yesterday - she told them to keep it close until the trial got too hot for the blood-sucker.” Daylon said as he ran two hands over his face, standing himself in front of an air-screen projection on the wall of the courtroom. He sat back on the table then, fishing a can from beside him.

All the necessary players for the trial of The Public V Zosimos were sliding into position. Enter the attorneys - both defending and prosecuting. They shuffled files and consulted with the others at their respective tables. One whispered a line into Zosimos's ear. Another swiveled around to take in the crowd- calculating the presence of Ulrich Paternosta and wait a minute was that coffee?

A hush swept through the murmurs of the crowd.

The small door to the side of the Judge's podium had opened and closed without a sound. Dressed in sweeping black robes the Judge ascended to their place, high powdered wig curled to perfection in a frame surrounding their timeless face- which was painted with traditional makeup.

The bailiff piped up, "All Rise!"
& the shuffling was quick as all obliged.

"Thank you all, you may all be seated," The Judge announced to the room. They settled into the chair, which had been compared to a throne by many and they could easily see why. They folded their hands and rested them on the podium desk, taking in the room. It appeared Wing City and beyond had turned out for the trial.

It was an inevitable one.

Tensions between the mortals and the vampires had been growing in ways that just didn't make sense. Both sides grew more aggressive, with the vampires failing to police their predators and the mortals demonizing them for what even they fail to do. The allegations regarding the Van Helsing family were downright sinister, and there was a long history of resentment for those who received similar lack of ends.

"The Public v Zosimos," announced the bailiff, and the Judge banged their gavel.

Draven tore his gaze away from the intense accusatory stare he had fixed upon Zosimos. Instead, his attention shifted downward, focusing on the doors as Eurydice made her long-awaited entrance, now looking little different from a young, albeit quite tall, woman with amber-gold eyes. He gestured for her to hurry up, and she quickened her pace. But just as she was about to reach her destination, she couldn't help but steal a momentary glance, her eyes locking onto the figure occupying the defendant's side.

In that instant, she recognized him – and there he was, a haunting presence, a blight, a bane. Her pupils rapidly constricted to pinholes as her focus zeroed in on the figure before her, and her eyes flashed yellow very briefly. A surreal sensation washed over her, as if a ghost from her past had materialized in the present, brief pieces of a foregone childhood. Yet, beyond the eerie familiarity, something else simmered within her, a feeling that seemed to bubble just beneath the surface.

"All Rise!"

Shit. Her attention snapped back to the present moment. She hastened to Draven's side, momentarily oblivious to the presence of Ulrich and Lewis. Regaining her composure, she adopted a more professional demeanor, her undivided attention now directed at the judge. In a hushed tone, she quietly offered an apology to Draven. It wasn't lost to her, that feeling, that palpable tension that hung in the courtroom.

With the formality out of the way, they seated themselves and there was a brief moment she glanced over at Ulrich, then at Lewis, nodding her head to each in an attempt to make herself more curteous. There was... a bit of confused familiarity with Lewis, but she couldn't quite place it.

Lewis rises at the command of the Judge, then seats himself again.
He feels slightly numbed to his surroundings, something to do with the sudden amassment of people. He acknowledges the two newcomers to the row with a slight nod. He knew those two from somewhere...
The vampire was easy to place, funnily enough. Ulrich or something, he had been present at the... altercation. He hopes for a moment that he doesn't recognize him, then assures himself that he probably couldn't.
The lady was different. There was a vague familiarity with her, something about the facial structure... That was it. She had revealed her face to him, back out in the woods. Eurydice.

They were working together. This was a sting operation or something, they were going to get him.
Think. Slow your panic.
They probably couldn't do anything here, right? He does his best to quell the slow burn of fear inside of him, glancing over at Draven, then back forward towards the front of the room. He was probably working with them, so he was a cop. Can't move, they'll know that I know. Just sit here.
This was why he didn't go to public events. Fuck. He notices that he's tensed, and relaxes himself back into his seat.

Play it cool.

Standing at the command of the bailiff, the well dressed woman said nothing, and once she was seated back down she surveyed the interior of the four and her surroundings. Vampires had no place in the galaxy, and each of them deserved a fitting death. Suffer not the mutant to live after all.

Shifting in her seat she continues to quietly take notes. Anonymity was a good thing at times, a break from the retinal scans and telescreens of the central government back home.

As the tones settled in the court house, the prosecution team seated at the table before the stands returned to their chairs. They talked quietly amongst themselves, various papers then changing place on the table before them. The two men that were the “custodial leads” of the prosecution wore a gray and black suit respectively. They both turned to each other, hands stretching out as they made a quick game of rock paper scissors.

With a loss, the Edenite adjusted his suit and rose from his chair. “Ah, thank you, your Honor …” He started, shoe steps falling as the quiet returned to the courtroom and all eyes seemed to be falling onto the man. “My name is Pavla Altana, I’m the Civil Utilitor assigned to the prosecution, I only had a few words before our first witness.” He started, taking a brief pause for the judge’s nod before he continued.



Pavla gave another calm glance over his shoulder to the judge, sunken eyes noting a hint of blase in the judge. “That was all your Honor, I’ll get along with it now.” Pavla said, looking down to a Fokus device wrapped around his wrist. “For my first witness, I’ll be calling Hannibal Hattar to the stand.”

As the name rang out, it was followed by a few short mumblings. Then, from the end of the witness box a cinnamon-colored man stood up. For many, the man seemed just another aged Gardenite, some may have recognized an earlier image from the holo-net years ago. While his feet carried him along through the courtroom, he gave a short bow to the judge and jury before taking his seat.

Pavla didn’t waste much time however, quickly adjusting his sharp glasses. “Mr. Hattar, for those of you who may not know who you are, if you could … ” Pavla said as he stood close beneath the witness box for what came next. The microphone creened quietly, before the aging Soruk spoke into it.



As Hannibal stopped, Pavla didn’t turn to acknowledge him. Instead nodding. “If you could, Mister Hattar.”



“The death of the previous governor?” Pavla then inquired, putting a hand to the cold wall of the stand. With his Fokus, smaller holographic projections detailing the specific dates and names began scrolling out before the jury. For others, much of this information was readily available through haptic feeds. “For some of us this was a series of events known as the Tashua Murders - eleven targeted killings of pro-unity politicians in both Coalition memberstates, and throughout the galaxy as a whole. Will you clarify for me Mister Hattar, what was the planet Hawadimara’s relations to the Tashua Murders?”

Hannibal seemed resolute on the stand, features hardly changing - besides a perpetually annoyed look of the lighting. Old eyes simply squinted more as he leaned before the microphone.



Pavla seemed to walk with a step now, letting a bit of a nervous personality show as he digested the information. “Quite a lot of information, though as you take a step back it can sometimes begin to look clearer. When it comes to matters like this there is a first inclination to always want all the information - this means everything from the legal documents, to even the gritty-gritty. Social and civil indicators, statistics on the crime between human and vampire offenses - “

As Pavla spoke though, the otherwise stone quiet Hannibal learned forward, his voice not quite carrying through the microphone. “There - there are no suitable records of human-vampire crime on Hawadimara.”

Pavla stopped in his tracks, turning back to the grizzled Soruk. “You said ‘there was no human-vampire crime’ on the planet, Mister Hattar … could you please clarify that for me? There are no suitable records that I was permitted to see, after all.” There was a silence that then permeated the court, and Pavla even had to give another gesturing tip of his hand to the old Sorukan before he spoke.



Before the first shouts and rumblings became too loud Pavla swept an arm over towards the judge. “Your Honor, I’m done with my first line of questioning and will now yield the floor to the defense.”

As the courtroom proceedings continued, Draven's attention remained fixated on the events transpiring before him. He took notes as it went on, a rather tense first testimony he had to admit to himself. His attempts at maintaining composure were evident, but an undercurrent of tension ran through him. The uncertainty of the trial's outcome gnawed at his nerves, and he couldn't help but feel an anxious tightness in his chest.

"Wh... the hell? The entire bloody planet..? How..?" Eurydice muttered quietly, biting her lip.

Draven's caught something from the corner of his eye, a shift in Lewis's demeanor. The man, who had appeared haggard and worn, now seemed even more tense. Draven couldn't help but wonder about the guy. His mind raced with questions, pondering if the bloodsuckers had inflicted some sort of harm upon him, or if there was another reason. Maybe he was a hunter?

"Yeah... me too, buddy," he said quietly.

He then noticed the woman in glasses taking, what he figured was notes as well, another organization perhaps? Or maybe just study? This was no doubt a momentous occasion to say the least.

Lewis was on edge, not really focusing on the stand until he's set his mind at ease. Pay attention.
He doesn't have any visible response to the testimony of the man, but an internal disgust slowly builds as he realizes the weight of what it carried. Not here. Never here. He feels slightly shaken by the idea of it, but quickly thrusts it to the side once he realizes that the cop was paying attention to him. You could usually tell, they would go still and watch you for a split second. That didn't do anything to help his paranoia, but he quickly relaxes himself, and slowly withdraws a notebook from his jacket, opening it to a drawn sigil that he glances at before closing the book.
He knew where this trial was going to go, and knew how it would end. Either result, Zosimos would die. He would be sure of it. Him being watched by police wasn't much of his concern right now, and he reassures himself that they wouldn't make a move in the middle of a court case, that would be insane.

Still... He had seen his share of insanity. Best to be careful.

"Very well," said the judge, their high powdered wig not moving a millimeter as they shifted towards the defense. They gestured a small, yet well manicured, hand to the small team sitting around Zosimos. He was still in shackles. They were wrought from iron and laser coated in silver. Enchanted, state of the art.

The defense waited for the courtroom to settle then cleared her throat. Vanessa Berentes rose from where she was settled, closing a black file on her way up. Her entire ensemble was a pale silken sweeping thing down to her silk dyed heels in an odd blocky shape. The attorney moved like fluid around the table and approached the stand.

Vanessa regarded Hannibal Hatter silently, for a long moment, her sharp eyes checking him over twice. A small smile set on her honey colored face.

She asked him, "Mr. Hatter, are you a vampire?"

Marlene quietly took some more notes, using the augmented reality glasses she wore to overlay dossiers of everyone who took the stand. She pulled up what she could for the prosecution, and the defense while quietly scratching some more notations on the pad in her lap.

She wasn't aware that some eyes were on her, but her allegiance would be revealed in the moments to follow as two men entered the courtroom.

The first man was in a sharp indigo colored suit with a simple spiral shaped enameled lapel pin that adorned his collar, an older gentleman that seemed regal in appearance, and the second man whom was clad in a dark grey military uniform. The second man's uniform was trimmed with blue, various pins and decorations, and a polished leather sam browne style belt that crossed his chest. His peaked officer's cap bearing the phoenix motif of the Imperial Aschen Navy was kept under the crook of his arm while he moved to sit, while handing a latte to the woman with glasses, and a hot coffee to the man in the indigo suit.

The woman regarded the uniformed man with a nod, as he made himself comfortable. She whispered a few things to him, and he nodded. The man surveyed the others in the courtroom, and then whispered something to the woman, but for the most part the trio kept themselves away from the others.

Hannibal Hattar steadied himself in his seat for a moment as the defense took the court, his suit jacket hanging on shoulders that had narrowed with age. As Vanessa fielded her first question, the Soruk’s lips stretched against against his firm jaw, leaning in towards the microphone as he spoke. “As of the most recent medical examination when I was brought to the court, yes. I am in the terminal phases of what the Health Union is calling the Sanguiphage. It was a 'genetic treatment' made by an interstellar conglomerate known as the Hemlok Group, sourced from materials and resources stolen from the - well, here everyone will know them as the Vankoryth Detente.”

"Stolen?" Vanessa asked, tilting her chin up a hair in a curious manner. Zosimos was a high ranking member of the Vankoryth Detente. They had denounced his behaviors and worked with prosecution to hand over facts and timelines. However, the implication that the Detente was the source of this vampyrism epidemic?

The audience swept with a whisper. It seemed everyone was picking up what both parties were putting down. Vanessa quickly crossed to the table and back, picking up a dictionary and flipping through it's soft pages with a whirr. Somewhere near the middle she stopped. Vanessa cleared her throat, and followed along with a french manicured finger while she read.

"The Sol's Word Dictionary defines stolen as 'to take another person's property without permission or legal right and without intending to return it'. Do you agree that this is how do you define 'stolen', and how 'stolen' was used in your prior statement regarding the materials and resources acquired by Hemlok Group?" Vanessa asked Hannibal Hatter.

In the witness stand, the old Soruk propped himself up with one elbow, as if settling in for the explanations owed. His arms were thin against the wood of the podium, distant images of a warrior from a planet long forgotten. “Yes,” He said, taking a shuddering breath. “Because they stole material and resources the Detente had intended to help my planet to instead, destroy it. The deaths of foreign dignitaries were 'secondary casualties' that allowed them to seize the materiel needed to build their weapon.” He then went on.

Vanessa nodded.

The Vankoryth Detente had been sabotaged. A bad domino effect of technological advancement had been set off; but, at whose hand first?

"Are there any members of Hemlok Group present, in the Wing City High Court? Can you identify them?"

Draven himself had gotten antsy as the cross-examination went on, shifting in his seat slightly, yet trying his best to remain stoic. The idea of being infected, of changing was enough to even make a veteran's skin crawl. An entire planet subjected to what is essentially a supernatural take on a bioweapon. And this man was one of its victims. These proceedings had gone from bad to worse. Was there nothing to be done for this man? Was this his final plea as a human being?

"Can't we do something for him..?" Eurydice said to Draven.

Draven let out a sigh and, instead of answering, just opened his coat and took out a vanilla folder from his coat, a file from which papers he had copied for these proceedings. Though nowhere near as heavy as a full world infestation incident, it was still relevant... and important to Terra. On its cover was Operation Stygian Reverie. Seeing these, there was notable discomfort from Reverencia.

"Sure you want this?" Draven whispered to her.

"Gonna... gonna have to face my bogeymen eventually, luv," she whispered back, a notable hesitation in her voice. "Might as well be today."

Hannibal steadied himself before the microphone. “The man known as Zosimos - Hemlok framed him as the one that released the contagion in a diplomatic summit that killed a hundred and thirteen people. This was before the war began in earnest,” He twisted his torso to be more comfortable as he hovered by the microphone.

Lewis withdraws a notebook from his coat, a smaller, leatherbound one. He begins writing down the things gone over that haven't already faded from his memory, something he should have been doing when the trial started. That was why he was here, after all.
- full vampiric obtainment of a planet, unknown time range. Planet is Tibra, year 2589. Look into ICON records?
- Hemlok Group. Genetic manipulators? Made "sanguiphage." Stole "aid" materials from the Vankoryth detente, turned into virus/bioweapon. Possible puppet group? Unknown. Research if public organization.
- Hemlok framed Zosimos?
- Find Bruno Babich in Int-Planet travel records, run facial recog if false names are being used. Possible alteration of appearance so identify vehicles, find contacts on Terra. See about interrogation, look into police records for the guy and his coworkers
- Potential that this witness (Hannibal Hattar, age unk, Gardenite) is bullshitting? Follow him to where he's staying and talk to him about it after looking into security. Might need to dress well. Look into his military records if anything is public.
- False terrorism? Potential to damage rep of Vankoryth is strange if they are a puppet group. Don't know about testimony but an attack made by a foreign group to blame the Detente would look bad until it was proved innocent (unless this is a long-play deal)

At the bottom of the page, after writing most of the things he could find about the court, he writes a message to himself.

- Look into what D17 is later. Might be related to Detente, potential puppet organization. One member I've interacted with, might be grander scale than first thought. Record names and interactions, involvement with local govnt, motives, etc. Either visit a website or find a guy who forgets to check his closet
He feels satisfied with what he has down, quietly shutting the book before anyone can get a long look at it, staring up at the front of the room.