Chapter 11
The courtroom projector hummed to life, casting a stark, blue-white light against the pull-down screen behind the judge’s bench. The audio-visual technician tapped a few keys, and the grainy video feed of Captain Marcus Vance filled the room. He sat in a Spartan interrogation room, wearing an orange jumpsuit, looking thoroughly defeated. His eyes darted nervously away from the camera lens before he cleared his throat and began to speak.
"Yes," Marcus’s recorded voice echoed through the courtroom speakers, flat and devoid of its previous arrogance. "We were operating under a direct commercial contract brokered through intermediaries at the Pentagon. The objective was the recovery of a prototype telemetry pod from a sunken foreign vessel located inside the Orion's designated patrol zone."
Arthur Vance sat frozen at the defense table, his hands clenched into tight fists. His legal team whispered frantically among themselves, desperately trying to formulate a damage control strategy that could salvage their corporate clients from criminal indictments.
"And the USS Orion?" the federal magistrate’s voice asked from the off-camera audio in the video.
"The Orion happened to be on station right above the recovery site," Marcus’s recorded image replied, staring down at the metal table. "We couldn't risk them logging our coordinates or reporting unapproved foreign salvage operations in restricted waters. Orders came down from corporate command—relayed through secure channels matching naval encryption codes—to direct the Orion’s captain to stand down and execute a diversionary course two miles south of our position."
"Who gave the direct order to abandon the salvage site while the Orion experienced navigational failure?"
"Arthur Vance," Marcus said plainly, looking straight into the camera lens. "He coordinated the legal cover-up and ensured the communications scrub was executed before the Navy launched its search and rescue grid."
The courtroom was so quiet that the faint buzzing of the overhead lights sounded like a distant swarm of hornets. Every eye in the gallery turned toward the defense table. Arthur Vance kept his gaze fixed straight ahead, refusing to look at the screen or the sea of disapproving faces surrounding him.
Judge Thomas Sterling clicked off the projector with a remote control, plunging the room back into its normal amber lighting. He looked down at the defense table with an expression of profound disgust.
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"Mr. Vance," the judge said, his voice cold and deliberate. "Do you care to amend your opening statements regarding the navigational error of the Orion?"
Arthur Vance slowly stood up, smoothing his tie with trembling fingers. He knew there was no defense left. The corporate shield had shattered, and the architects of the cover-up stood fully exposed in the harsh light of judicial scrutiny.
