Monday 13 October 2008

Conversations of Court

It is the year 2112, and thanks to various nuclear experiments and an incident involving 10,000 spoons, the entire earth minus one man has turned completely bonkers. This is his (and a little of theirs, to be honest) story.

“Court is now in session!” yelled a rather excited voice, who just happened to be wearing a wig and a pair of stripy legwarmers.
“Jolly good! Shall I start the defense?” asked a lawyer, getting up and shuffling papers, all of which seemed to be blank.
“No no, the chap’s defending himself. I think you’re the attacky one.”
“I am? How very rude of me,” he then got up and addressed the jury, “I’d like to beg the pardon of the court. After all, I never wanted to be a lawyer. I wanted to be a can can girl, but the dress wouldn’t fit.” The jury mumbled in an approving manner. “Right! So you there! Bill Tiliwingle!” The lawyer pointed to the defense in an accusatory manner, “I’m accusing you of murder of Doreen Mcnugget! What say you?” He narrowed his eyes at the defense, which was sort of a trademark thing to do of his. He thought it a terribly intimidating and professional thing to do indeed.
Bill dismissed this show of intimidation by rolling his eyes. “The defense pleads not guilty,” he said, holding back an exasperated sigh.
“Gasp!” shouted the lawyer, “On what grounds do you plead such insane codswallop?”
Bill flinched at the word insane; if only he knew… “You know you’re not actually supposed to say ‘gasp’, don’t you? It’s not a word, it’s a sound.”
“You honour!” gasped the lawyer, “He’s demeaning my presence, I say! Shout at him! Go on!”
“Defense is out of order!” said the judge, banging his hammer happily (albeit slightly enthusiastically).
“Alright, Alright,” said Bill, “I plead ‘not guilty’ on two grounds. The first being that the said murder took place before I was even born-”
“Mere technicalities!” shouted the lawyer.
Bill closed his eyes in annoyance. No, first he would try and knock some sense into them all by adhering to logic. He raised his voice slightly, “And the second being that the murder victim, Mrs. Doreen Mcnugget, is sitting over there,” He pointed to an elderly woman with a stuffed pidgeon on her hat.
Doreen yelped when he pointed at her. “Lies!” she shouted, “Lies and slander!”
“Well that settles it!” said the judge, “The man’s clearly lying; make some more accusations at him so I can declare him guilty.”
“I have one more thing to say, your honour,” said Bill, realizing that logic was out the window.
“Yes?”
“I’m very sorry, and I’ll never do it again.”
The whole courtroom gasped and murmered approvingly.
“Oh my!” exclaimed the lawyer, “The lad’s got manners, you have to grant him that! Go on, let him off. You heard him, he’ll never do it again.”
“Oh, all right then,” winked the judge, “He does seem very nice a polite. Off you go, Bill. Scamper off to unknown happy places.”