A Little further into the future of punishment.......

Just Punishment

Insert Nine of the Federation Newsbeam July 2172

“ The execution of Jeremiha Ayshela will take place at 12 noon on the third quarter at the Public Arena...all are welcome”

It wasn’t as if I’d committed a First Class crime either. Impersonating a Federal Officer whilst trying to get to the scene of a real crime for holopics is a relatively minor misdemeanour. But I knew the Laws when I committed the offence so I suppose I have only myself to blame. Problem was that the Officer I’d chosen to duplicate had been a cyber so my attempt at disabling him for the duration of my infringement had merely resulted in my immediate freezure....the look of astonishment on my face has to be seen to be believed.....and storage in the crime vats until sentence.

The Lawbrain assigned to my case had no hesitation in recommending the Council make an example of me, hence my sentence of Nine....quite unprecedented in today’s freethinking and liberal society but as Council person Rav Vallarian said

“ Crime of any description cannot, and will not pay”

I had been through the Duplicating and Impressing programme many times of course, who hasn’t, but the Memorisers were a little cavalier with the received Impressions and I got worried...and indeed still do worry...about the safe storage of these priceless artefacts although of course this set will only be used in emergencies.

One of the few mysteries left in life is what happens when your stored memories are destroyed before you can be allocated a new body. Death is still the ultimate frontier, still the one fear above all fears, still the only certainty in life despite the fact that with D & I and plasmic body cloning a man can go on living almost indefinitely. But accidents happen and as we all know the Duplicator needs the brain within three minutes of bodies destruction to capture the neurone net complete.

But I digress.

The Council has decided that I should chronicle the events leading up to and after my execution for two reasons. Firstly it is hoped that the intimate details will prove a deterrent for others contemplating a life of crime, and secondly that the number of credits I will receive for the work would provide me with sufficient income to cease my own criminal activities.

It is now the eleventh hour of the third quarter, July 2 2172. I have been unfrozen since the fifteenth hour yesterday so that I could faithfully record the moments leading to my slaying. I have to say that I’m feeling somewhat apprehensive. Will there be pain? What does the rope feel like around the neck? This is not to be a regular hanging...the snapping of the neck vertebrae....but the slow strangulation type. I will apparently be slowly lifted from the floor and allowed to dangle, squirming and kicking, until my body ceases to function. I am also told that there will be no suppressing of my bodily functions and that I will urinate and defecate as my brain switches off. How embarrassing in front of all those people.

Yes, most of my Marshall Canton will be there, gloating, weeping, laughing, spewing. They’ve put up with my shenanigans for some 470 years now and a little comeuppance won’t go amiss. They won’t miss much either. Those without a front row view can catch the ioncast through their skullplates and sit shivering in an ecstasy of revulsion in the comfort and safety of their own halls whist I dingle dangle in the breeze.

I hear voices. They are here, time for a deep breath, straight back and serene expression. Wonder if they will take off the mindchains.

Fourth Quarter, July 4 2172

Great Jesu! I record this on the very brink of madness. My body took some sixteen minutes to cease to function. I was about to say thankfully the Duplicators removed my head just in time but I’m not at all sure that is the right word.

It was barbaric.

I was led out of the Law Hall and into the open air...I hadn’t realised it meant actually going outside the Canton Bubble.....that was the first fright. All that space! I have to admit I faltered and had to be helped by the cyberlaws either side of me. Ahead of me stood the most ghastly thing I have ever seen.

Somebody had clearly been viewing the history capsules for a real wooden stage had been erected with real wooden steps leading up to it. Upon the stage reared a gibbet (the cyber laws told me this as they led me to it) which is an upright pole with another pole extending from it a right angles some six feet from the ground.

Dangling from this was a rope ending in a loop. The rope was real, that is not synthetic, God above knows where they got it. Clearly only the best for old Jeremhia.

The Canton Elders were seated in comfort under a plastidome which edged the front of the stage. No doubt Councillor Vallarian had a front seat view.

At this point my legs refused to obey my overloaded brain and I had ( to my embarrassment) to be half carried up the last two steps. I was stood under the noose which was lowered slowly over my head, the knot placed under my right jaw. I cannot find the words to explain the terror that rope inspired in me. My mindchains were released and my hands tied behind my back with more rope. The two cyberlaws stood back and I had sufficient time to see the anticipation of the front row audience.

The section of stage I stood on started to lower itself. As I went down the rope tightened and started to lift my head. I panicked mightily! Drummed my feet on the floor and screamed. I remember the crowd laughing in my face then the floor was gone and I was hanging, all breath stopped.

I struggled and struggled, kicked and thrashed my mind a veritable hell of disassociated images. I bit my tongue and felt the blood flow freely down my chin, my eyes bulged in my head and I felt one of them burst. I called on God, Jesus my Mother and all the Galaxy Angels but none helped me. The sky darkened as I bounced and cursed my stupidity. The agony of not being able to draw a simple breath Oh! The agony......

I understand the second execution will take place in August...Federation day in fact....so that all the holiday makers can watch too. It is to be poison. The length of time between executions is deliberate. It is to give my mind time to absorb the horrors of the last slaying.

The Duplicators took the neural net immediately after my hanging death throes so my memory of the event is complete. They’ve even repaired my old body, I can clearly see the rope marks...rather than use a new clone. Less expensive I suppose.

I don’t quite know what to think about poisoning. I know little about it and I don’t know what poison will be used. What really frightens me is execution number five.

Burning alive.