Ttaa

28) I wasn’t expecting some kind of…

So there has been a question that people have been trying to avoid answering, at least those whose answers would be official.

Is someone who was reborn in another world still legally the same person they were on Earth?

That question has finally come up in court.

But it isn’t a question of legal identity, or property that was inherited, but something else. It’s coming at that question from another angle.

Is it murder to kill someone if souls exist?

If someone continues to exist even after their body has been damaged unit ll it is no longer functional, has their life ended? And has the person who damaged the body committed a crime that should be treated as worse than assault?

Or would property damage be a better comparison?

When the magic level of Earth reaches the point that bringing someone back to life is no worse than another expensive medical bill, there needs to be a precedent for questions like that. But rather than deal with a question of inheritance or legal identity, the powers that be decided to deal with the issue with a murder case.

Simon Warrent died in prison for drug possession in a fight between two gangs over some conflict happening outside of the prison.

Simon, who now styles himself Reznor the Black, was reborn in the form of a pale sickly child who grew up as the heir of a fallen noble house and mastered black magic with a focus on necromancy.

When his activities led to him being tracked down by the authorities of his world, he murdered an entire town with a magical plague and used their deaths to power a ritual to take him back to Earth.

Where he then proceeded to take out some payback on the people who had killed him in prison, members of their gang outside of the prison, their families, and some random people kidnapped off the streets to power his rituals.

I’m a little on the inside of all of this for two reasons.

One, Reznor's rituals reach out for help from some otherworldly dicks, and getting up to his old tricks let my Sister eventually zero in on him and lead a strike team to hit the old high school he had holed up in.

Imogene was not happy with him.

"The idiot had pulled the school out of reality and lodged it into to an unstable planer breach. He had to kill people just to keep it there. If he hadn't taken shortcuts by ritual murder he could have just learned enough about magic to shield himself from most divinations and could have gone on doing whatever he wanted for years.”

I nodded along with her, “So the lesson is, don’t be sloppy.”

She shot me a mild glare, “It’s don’t be Evil. Being evil is being lazy, and being lazy leads to being sloppy.”

The other reason I got involved is because I’ve become a little too well known.

Imogen and several of her associates have created enough sufficiently tough magical wards on our house to keep the bad guys away, or even the good guys we don’t know.

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

It also keeps the religious types and door to door annoyances away. But the mailman still shows up, as well as deliveries.

Aside from the box with the plague roaches in it, I had to go pick those up since the delivery guy circled my block seven times without being able to find the address.

But at the Otherworld Faire, people know me, and the people who came looking for me gave out such a “Good Person” Aura that no one thought not to point me out to the group of knights in golden armor and immaculate white cloaks who then walked up to the edge of the practice field before settling in while looking over at me every now and then.

My teacher tilted her head at them when we stopped for a breather. “Friends of yours?”

I glanced over to the guys with golden white auras leaking out in the magic spectrum which I could see. Their apparent leader, a big, almost seven foot tall, beefy guy made eye contact and shot me a happy smile.

“Never saw them in my life. I have to go over and talk to them don’t I”

She nodded. "They seem really nice, so better you than me."

Look genuinely nice people are great, but they don't know when to quit being nice, they end up making me feel like I'm not meeting the standards of being a decent person.

So I gave the golden giant a nod, and held up one finger for him to give me a moment, while I began stripping off some of the protective gear and toweling off some of the worst of the sweat.

He gave me a nod in return, then turned to shoo away some of the various people with him. Some of them protested while others seemed pretty eager to explore the explore the Faire.

Well, for someone who just has to be an extrovert, at least he had good instincts.

So I headed over while guzzling down some water, and replacing the cap as an excuse to not have to figure out if he came from someplace that shook hands.

“Jim Brenner. Can I help you with something?”

He beamed, “Yes. You see I’m Signant Jorren with the Inquisition of Justice.”

I wasn’t expecting that.

"I've come to this world in pursuit of a fugitive. Reznor the Black, only to find signs that he has already been taken into custody. Leaving me with the issue of trying to extradite him to face Justice back in our world. But I can’t find anyone willing to receive our petition.”

I blinked at him. “Ah.”

Okay, I can follow the logic trail. People here know who Imogene is and what she does, and that I’m her brother, it’s just figuring out the next step here and how I’m involved…”

I slowly raised a single finger as I stared blankly off into the distance, "Got it, mostly. This is just not what I was prepared to deal with right this moment and I need a second to figure out what’s next.”

He gave me a cheery nod and did the best thing he could at the moment.

Looking away from me, he took a step back, shut up, and waited patiently.

“Okay, come with me. I have to call someone.”

By the time I got to my bag, and pulled out my phone, he and his entire crew had closed in on me without crowding me, with two of them happily munching on turkey lets. Some of the people I had gotten to know at the Faire had also begun to gather around a little further out. As if ready to back me up.

Good people.

I checked my contact list for Secret Agent Mam.

"Hi Jim."

“Special Agent. An Inquisition is here for the psycho who was killing people and turning them into zombies over in LA. The Inquisition is from the world he came from and they would like a piece of him as well.”

One of Golden Boy's people started to protest, but her boss waved her down.

“Can you give him your phone? I’ll reimburse you for the charges.”

I held the phone out and then backed well away.

Their conversation went on for a bit and ended with my sister showing up in a swirl of dim white light spiraling out of a reddish core. She did a sort of curtsey toward the people in gold and white, then turned to come to say hi to me before wrinkling her nose at the smell of sweat and backing away. “I’ll see you tonight. This shouldn't keep me since it’s above my pay grade for once.”

Golden Boy returned my phone. Imogen took them back to where she worked. Then I cleaned up and took the gate she had set up for me back to our backyard before I began cooking up the meat for Taco night.

That should have been the end of it…

But I was invited to the Inquire.

The Special Judicial Tribunal decided to grant a petition of extradition rather than deal with the legal implications of reincarnation and redefining murder in the evidence of immortal souls.

Maybe because they don’t want to risk annoying the people who have made it know they are now in charge of our world, or maybe they just decided they would kick the can down the road for a bit in the hopes that someone else would have to take responsibility for making a decision.

So, cowards, who aren't doing their jobs either way.

Addendum:

The links down below are to their official web pages. While their positions on the Special Judicial Tribunal are not a secret, which is why I got to sit in on their session, they haven’t made it public knowledge either.

I just did.

Let them know your opinions of the matters above, and how they are doing their jobs. And remember, each message you send them is figured to represent about a thousand other people who feel the same but not strongly enough to bother to send a message.

Their sites have mailing addresses as well. Written messages count as ten thousand people.