It is the Destiny of a Tainted Mind
by Oscar Deadwood
forum: It is the Destiny of a Tainted Mind
speculative fiction for the internet generation.

 
 
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It is the Destiny of a Tainted Mind

 

       Judge Kozlowski, a pretty and platinum-haired young woman of about sixty, returned to the courtroom and sat in majesty behind her elevated bench.

       Billy rose with his court-appointed lawyer, a Droid of Sympathy who did well in defending Billy as he explained Billy's actions away via an unhappy childhood and a less than fulfilling adulthood of missed potential and wasted opportunities. The Droid also did well in illustrating Billy's acute and pervasive addictions, addictions that caused his mind to think the worst about himself and others, especially women.

       The invisible jury found Billy guilty of degeneration and recommended death by decapitation.

       Judge Kozlowski read the verdict and she agreed, but she felt just a little bit sorry for Billy, she felt herself stifle tears as the well-dressed and elegant Droid of Sympathy spoke about Billy's unorthodox childhood, a childhood where he was raised by two parents. His parents had fought all of the time and never showed affection for one another and they refused to divorce or separate because they thought it would be bad for Billy and his younger sister.

       But the judge hated Billy too. Billy was an addict of perversion and she could hear his projected thoughts, she could hear his mind straining to catch a glimpse of her legs that were bare behind her black and slit robe.

       She hated perverts, she hated men who thought lewdly about women and the culture had gone a long way in eliminating perversion through intervention and entertainment manipulation.

       But there were still the Billys of the world, the Billys who walked through life drooling at women, their thoughts like ink stains on a white, white world.

       "The defendant will need to keep himself in check for the sentencing," the judge said and Billy's Droid placed a silvery hand on his head, the metal shielding and scrambling Billy's thoughts from view.

       "Thank you, counselor," the judge continued. "The jury of peers did find Mr. William Williams guilty of degeneration and recommended the death penalty based on his age as they feel he is too old for corrective therapy and his brain is too ingrained with corrupted thoughts. And I have to agree, a forty-year old is too far-gone and I find it hard to believe that Mr. Williams has made it this far in life without getting caught before."

       True enough, Billy did his dark thinking in private and had trained himself well enough to keep his perversion in check when at work or in the company of others, even though his mind was running rampant while in court.

       But he had slipped; finally. He had slipped in front of his wife who interrupted an early morning reverie by barging into the bathroom unannounced.

       His wife heard his thoughts and was shocked and disgusted and horrified. She ran out into the street screaming and Billy was arrested almost instantly, with an inventory of his brain taken upon his arrival at the police station.

       The brain inventory cinched his fate, and gave the prosecution a strong and invincible case.

       "And I must add that it is good that Mr. Williams and his wife didn't have children," Judge Kozlowski continued as she readied herself for the sentencing.

       Billy and his wife were going to wait until they were fifty before having kids; they didn't want to be too young for the responsibility of child rearing. And Billy couldn't wait to have kids; he thought having children might change him, he thought it might shift his perverted thoughts, thoughts he enjoyed but life would have been easier and safer without them.

       "I do not recommend the death penalty, however," the judge continued and her magenta and long-lashed eyes rifled through the screens on her bench. "I am not convinced that Mr. Williams's soul is corrupted; I think his mind is the cause of all of his problems…" and she proceeded to give her sentence.

       Billy screamed when he heard the sentence, even though his defending Droid congratulated him.

       "But you'll still be alive, and if you're alive, there is always hope," the Droid said as he tried to give Billy a compassionate hug.

       Billy screamed. He screamed until the bailiff muzzled him and led him shackled to a waiting Volvo Hovervan outside the courthouse.

       The Hovervan took Billy to a hospital where his muzzle was removed and Billy kept on screaming until the anesthesia that was injected into his still shackled arm took effect. He fell asleep to the sound of a surgical saw making contact with his skull.

       His brain was removed and his body was destroyed, per the judge's sentence. His brain was placed in a silver jar in the storage network underneath the courthouse, the collected and sentenced brains kept alive through a closed and flowing circuit of oxygen and nutrients that hydrated the hundreds of minds sentenced to eternity.


 

copyright 2006 Oscar Deadwood.

Oscar Deadwood lives in Royal Oak, Michigan. His novel The Perfect Revolution will be published this spring by Silverthought Press.