The Three of Us

Part 33 - Findings

The trial's continuation was packed. Everyone started murmuring when Sandra walked in, sporting a shiner and the reddish hand print on her face. She sat down by herself.

Captain Archer finally had to call for order. "All right," he announced, "we are here to progress the trial and, hopefully, bring some of it to a conclusion. The following charges are being investigated today – the attack on Patti Socorro; the attempted attack on Lili O'Day; the involvement, if any, of Sandra Sloane in the creation and distribution of anonymous PADD messages and the assault on Sandra Sloane that occurred yesterday."

There was more whispering as the last charge had not been at issue the first time they had convened to try to dispense justice. Jonathan called for order again. "That last item is potentially related but if it cannot be decided today, then so be it. Ebrona?"

"I would like to have each of the accused speak, intermixed with the witnesses," she declared. "First, Sandra."

Sandra got up. Phlox got up as well. "The Crewman's injuries preclude her from speaking."

"Then can you speak to her injuries first?" asked the Ikaaran.

"I can."

"Tell us what her injuries are."

"Crewman Sloane has a hairline fracture of the jaw. The placement of the fracture, its severity and the attendant dislocation all point to a hard blow from a person taller than her."

Sandra tapped on a PADD furiously and then gave it to the doctor to read. "It says here," he stated, "that she should be cured by one of you and then she'll tell you who assaulted her."

Ebrona nodded and Corda, the youngest of the Ikaarans, got up. She did as they had all observed – put her hand on Sandra's jaw and then a light traveled up her arm to her own jaw and then it pulsed back into Sandra. Sandra rubbed her jaw once the procedure had concluded. "I think I can talk now," she stated.

"Proceed," said Ebrona.

"My husband hit me. Private Daniel Chang. Should I spell that?"

"That will not be necessary," said Ebrona.

"Dan hit me because we were arguing about the conjugal visit. But there have been other arguments. A few months ago, he wanted to know how to create an anonymous PADD message. I told him. It didn't seem like it was for anything bad."

"Did he explain why he wanted this knowledge?"

"He said," Sandra stated, "that it was for a gag. Then he started to ask about making graphs and stuff. I told him, 'cause, you know, we had argued before. I didn't want to do that in front of our kid."

"Anything else? What are these other arguments?" asked Ebrona.

"Yeah, there were arguments before," Sandra confirmed, "but this is the first time he actually took a crack at me. A lucky shot, I guess. I have better reflexes than that. I shoulda ducked."

The tribunal just gazed at her.

"And?" asked Archer.

"Look," she said, "I'm not here because of some heightened sense of duty, or because it's the 'right thing'," she made air quotes as she spoke, "to do. I'm here because I wanna stay on the ship. Far as I can figure, the off-ship options are bad ones."

"We have not yet decided what the punishments, if any, shall be," Ebrona stated.

Sandra said, "I won't pretend that I'm Miss Congeniality or anything." The Ikaarans looked puzzled at that, so she added, "That I'm nice. 'Cause God knows I'm not. I don't suffer fools gladly. But I didn't know what they were really being used for, the anonymous messages. Now you can believe me, or not. I only care insofar as I'd rather not be kicked off the ship. Even Paradise is a problem 'cause there's no medical care and no entertainment. But the bottom line is this – I figured it out – Dan was using it to drum up support for what he really wanted to do. And then he used it to plan the attacks."