Power Thief's Revenge [BL]-Chapter 200: The Trial of Fate

Chapter 200: The Trial of Fate
The International Criminal Court was a cathedral of silence.
Every sound... The scrape of a chair, the shuffle of papers.... seemed to echo through the glass walls and high steel ribs. Hermes had never been in a courtroom before, but something about it felt heavier than any battlefield.
A row of judges sat behind the curved bench. Their faces were composed, weary, bureaucratic. No capes, no insignias. Just humans in robes, burdened with impossible questions. Cameras had been banned from the trial; only written transcripts and witness statements would leave this room.
At the far side of the chamber, a young woman sat at a narrow desk surrounded by towers of blank paper.
Cynthia Vandeberg.
Her fingers hovered over her keyboard, but the real work was in her eyes. Pale, sharp, darting across each speaker like radar. Whenever someone spoke, thin sheets on her desk filled with clean printed text, conjured from air.
Her ability, Speech-to-Text, shimmered faintly in the air around her like static. Every few minutes, she switched to stenography when the stack of pages reached her fifty-sheet limit.
"Court is now in session," the presiding judge announced. "Pre-trial hearing: The People versus the Russian Federation, concerning the alleged abduction and endangerment of twelve minors in the Soyuz MS-37 mission."
Hermes sat beside Raphael, who looked unnaturally composed... as if the whole thing were another formal ceremony rather than a trial that could spark an international crisis.
Shani, sitting on the opposite table with the defense, gave a small nod in their direction but said nothing. He looked calm as always, his file closed before him, one hand resting loosely over it.
The prosecutor began. "Your Honors, the United States presents evidence that the Soyuz MS-37 mission was an illegal experiment involving minors who were abducted and weaponized. These were children, superpowered children — forced into service for Russia’s Mars colonization project."
Cynthia’s pages fluttered as the words printed themselves in crisp black. Hermes watched her hand move to catch each new sheet, sliding them neatly into order. Even the rhythm of her work had a strange serenity.
When Hermes was called to testify, the court lights felt too bright.
He stood at the podium, hands clasped behind him.
"State your name and class."
"Hermes Potentia. Also known as Copy Cat. American, A-class Hero working for the Golden Apple."
"You were one of the two heroes responsible for intercepting and retrieving the Soyuz MS-37 vessel, is that correct?"
"Yes."
"Tell the court what you saw."
Hermes took a breath. "We— Raphael and I — were deployed to hijack the Soyuz. We intercepted the ship’s descent and brought it down safely. There were twelve children on board."
"Were they harmed?"
"No. Physically, they were stable. Confused, but unharmed."
The prosecutor paced. "And did they confirm they were kidnapped?"
Hermes hesitated.... too long, maybe.
"...They said they entered voluntarily."
A ripple of murmurs spread through the courtroom. The prosecutor frowned. "Voluntarily? Do you expect us to believe minors volunteered for an unauthorized space mission?"
"That’s what they said," Hermes replied quietly. "They remembered training. Tests. They were aware of the risks."
From the corner of his vision, Hermes saw Shani’s faint smile... Not smug, just quietly knowing.
The defense table remained still, waiting.
When it was Shani’s turn to speak, he rose with the composure of a man reading scripture.
"The prosecution argues abduction, coercion, and exploitation. But there is no evidence of compulsion. The children were chosen through Russia’s Heroic Academy program. Their consent, training, and intent were all documented and approved by the Russian Space Federation. Every record corroborates their willingness."
He turned a page, eyes never leaving the judges. "Your Honors, what we have here is not abduction. It is the world’s first attempt to create a self-sustaining Martian colony — a scientific, humanitarian endeavor. The tragedy lies in misunderstanding, not malice."
Cynthia’s eyes flicked between him and the bench, her papers filling in graceful lines of type. Hermes could almost feel her ability humming... recording, translating, immortalizing every contradiction.
The judge asked, "And what of the American claim that this endangers global security?"
Shani folded his hands. "The children are not weapons. They are pioneers. And if the United States had simply asked, rather than storming a ship in orbit... none of us would be here today."
The room went still.
Hermes felt his stomach twist. He knew Shani was right... but saying so would betray his country.
He glanced at Raphael, whose expression was unreadable. Then back at Cynthia, whose pages glowed faintly as her ability caught up with the courtroom’s silence, one word appearing by itself at the top of a new page:
[Truth.]
Hermes blinked. Maybe it was just a glitch... her ability sometimes misfired when it picked up stray thoughts.
But something told him it wasn’t.
Outside, rain streaked the courthouse windows. Inside, the balance of power was quietly shifting.
And Hermes could already sense which way it was tipping.
The trial resumed after recess, but the air had changed.
The room felt tighter somehow, as though the rain pressing against the windows had seeped inside. The defense had grown confident; the prosecution, restless. Hermes sat straighter in his chair, his fingers curling slightly against the table’s edge.
He could feel the weight of the world’s eyes, even if the cameras weren’t here.
Cynthia was already typing again, her ability conjuring pages one after another. A living metronome that measured the courtroom’s rhythm.
She didn’t flinch when the prosecution’s tone sharpened or when the defense made another objection; she simply tracked every word, every breath, transcribing the battle as if it were scripture.
The prosecutor rose, voice clipped. "Mr. Potentia. You claim the children went willingly. Yet you also claim they were subjected to combat drills, genetic augmentation, and sensory deprivation before launch. How can such conditions be called voluntary?"
Hermes looked down. "I’m not saying it was humane. I’m saying they knew what they were signing up for."
A few heads turned among the observers. The judges exchanged muted looks.
"And you verified this by reading their memories?"
"Yes."
"Then what did you see?"
Hermes hesitated. "They weren’t afraid. They were proud. Like soldiers going to war for their country."
The prosecutor’s mouth tightened. "Children should not go to war, Mr. Potentia."
"I agree," Hermes said. "But that’s not what they thought they were doing."
At the defense table, Shani leaned forward slightly, resting his chin on one hand. His eyes never left Hermes. Calm, probing, almost sympathetic. It was the look of a man who’d already weighed Hermes’s words and found them honest.
When Raphael was called, his tone was perfectly measured. "We did what we believed necessary at the time. We acted on the intelligence we were given. If there was a misunderstanding, the fault lies in the failure of communication between nations, not in malice."
The judges murmured among themselves. One of them. an older woman with wire-rimmed glasses, asked, "Mr. Nakshatra, given that your clients are citizens of a non-member state, what obligation do they have to this court?"
"None," Shani said softly. "But they are here anyway. Because the innocent do not run."
Cynthia’s hands faltered. A blank page fluttered off her desk. She caught it before it hit the ground, her expression tight for the first time since the hearing began. Hermes noticed the words that had appeared halfway across the page before she crumpled it:
[Lies.]
His chest tightened. Whose voice had that been? Hers, or someone else’s?
Maybe Verdict wasn’t the only power that could sense imbalance.
The prosecution called its final witness... a former engineer from Roscosmos who was now an American citizen, pale and nervous under the fluorescent lights.
He spoke haltingly about "pressure from higher-ups" and "data inconsistencies," but every line of testimony crumbled under cross-examination. Shani dismantled it gently, almost kindly, until the man’s certainty dissolved into guesses.
By the time the defense rested, the courtroom was silent. Even the rain seemed to hold its breath.
The presiding judge spoke at last. "Before the Court retires to deliberate, we will hear any closing statements."
Shani stood first. He didn’t raise his voice; he didn’t need to.
"Your Honors, I ask only this — to distinguish tragedy from crime. The Soyuz children were not hostages. They were heroes of another nation. The United States acted with good intent, but also with fear. Both sides sought to protect, not to destroy. Let the verdict reflect that balance."
Then came the prosecutor. Her tone was harder, desperate. "Intent does not erase consequence. The Soyuz mission risked twelve young lives. It violated every international safeguard for human experimentation. Whether voluntary or not, those children were endangered. The world cannot turn a blind eye because the guilty claim good intent."
As she spoke, Cynthia’s papers filled faster, her eyes darting from speaker to speaker. One word flickered across the top of her stack again —
[Fate.]
Hermes couldn’t look away.
When the judges finally rose to deliberate, the courtroom emptied into uneasy quiet. Hermes stared at the table before him, tracing a droplet of rain that had found its way down the glass wall.
"He’s going to win, isn’t he?" he murmured.
Raphael turned to him. "He isn’t aiming for a win, even though it is what he deserved. He’s aiming for balance. Compromise."
Hermes exhaled slowly. "I just don’t know if balance is enough."
An hour later, the judges returned. Everyone rose. Cynthia straightened, palms hovering over her desk. The lead judge unfolded a sheet of paper.
"This Court finds that the Russian Federation’s actions do not constitute abduction or unlawful experimentation. The evidence does not meet the burden of coercion required under international law."
The room stirred. Whispers, shock, fury. Hermes’s heart pounded.
"However," the judge continued, "the Court also recognizes that the United States acted without full intelligence. This hearing exposes a failure of communication between nations. The Court orders the establishment of an international oversight committee for superpowered missions beyond Earth’s orbit. No state may act unilaterally."
Shani’s head bowed slightly. Satisfaction, not triumph. Hermes could see the faint shimmer of Verdict flicker behind his eyes, like the echo of a scale tipping back to center.
Cynthia’s last page printed itself in silence. A single line at the bottom of the stack read:
[Ask him about the tree.]
Hermes’ blood went cold when he saw those words. Cynthia seemed to realize these extra words and tried to remove them, looking around nervously to see who said them.
Hermes was equally confused.
"Ask who about what tree?"
More words appeared.
[Saturn. The First Tree. The First Man.]
A/N We’re 200 Chapters in. Thanks for reading up to this point. Cynthia is a character idea from our dear reader 8oni! If you’re reading this, I hope you enjoyed seeing your character features hehe
Unfortunately, I will be publishing less often now. I would try to publish on alternating days, at least 3-4 Chapters a week. But I’m really busy and burnt out.
Anyway to celebrate the 200th Chapter, I will be asking you for any romantic scenarios you want to see the characters in for a special AU Chapter in the future! Would you want to see one of the pairings in a high school slice of life setting? Or maybe even a murder mystery setting? Omegaverse? Medieval fantasy? Comment below and I’ll consider them!