The inventory came back swiftly with a full list of everything in that soldier's supplies. Much of it was banal, such as his armor, tags, a picture of another minotaur, a friend or family member left behind perhaps? He had a an automatic rifle, as was standard.

He had 52 bullets remaining.

The prosecutor nodded softly. "And one grenade. When firing with limited ammunition, I assume you have discipline to save each shot, to maximize effect?"

The soldier looked confused, and so did many members of the audience. "Yes? No purpose firing on the dead."

"Then rather than insisting you would have shot 'every egg', let's keep this simple. If you had cleared the field of active combatants, you would have moved for the eggs next. Perhaps more dragons would have appeared, perhaps not, but you were, at the least, willing to discharge the ammunition you had. That was, as you said, your job."

He turned away from the accused. "It's already been submitted to the court that the field had 178 eggs." Including notes that many would not eventually hatch, but it was not his job to defend the accused. "If your path had become clear, you would have discharged 52 bullets. Your grenade could have taken out many at once, but let's keep it to your bullets for easy accounting. 52. I move that you are guilty of 52 charges of attempted murder, only stopped by the selfless intervention of their concerned parents."

Murmuring rose in volume. Some inhuman witnesses leaned closer to their human peers, asking what that entailed exactly.

The human justice nodded, looking to the defense. "Do you have any closing statement?"

The defense frowned faintly, considering his diminished means of sparing his client. "I urge that the situation be considered. Unlike the other attacks, these were soldiers that were sorely pressed from the moment the activity began. Being ripped apart and burnt to cinders, it is less of a wonder that they acted out of desperation. While this doesn't excuse their actions, it can help explain it. Few are the people that could stand where they stood and not act irrationally."

Novo clapped her hands softly. "Thank you. I confess, some of the jargon used is beyond me and I require clarification. What is 'attempted murder', insofar as a crime? What makes one 'second degree' rather than first, third, or any other number? Is it not assault?"

Proceedings came to a stop as it fell to the human justice to explain what attempted murder was. "First degree implies planned measures, while second degree is often used for 'heat of the moment' exchanges. In either event, taking a direct action that would have led to murder, had some outside force not prevented it is attempted murder."

Ruddertail hopped up in her seat. "Seem clear. Guilty! Death!"

Novo raised a talon. "Is death the proper punishment for this crime?" She was looking to the human justice. "I'm not familiar with it."

"It is not." He stood up. "A charge of attempted murder in the second degree requires imprisonment, ranging from five to fifteen years. The multiple charges would stack, giving us a range of --" He paused, clearly doing mental math. "-- 260 to 780 years."

"Harsh, but fair," sighed out the female minotaur. "Agreement."

"Agreement," echoed Novo.

"Agreement," cried Ruddertail, sinking back onto her seat.

"Very well." He directed his gavel at the accused. "You are hereby found guilty of fifty-two charges of attempted murder in the second degree. You are to be jailed for a duration of seven hundreds years." With a soft strike of the gavel, the future of the minotaur was set.

The next bull on the stand learned his lesson perhaps. When the prosecution approached and asked, "How many eggs did you harm?"

He had replied, "I wasn't trying to hurt any of them."

Ripples of conversation picked up in the crowd. The prosecutor frowned softly. "But you were with the others, were you not?"

"Yeah, so? I thought we were moving for cover. Is that against a law now?" He threw a hand aside. "I had angry dragons to deal with. I wasn't wasting a single bullet on a damn egg. If I had hurt an egg, they would have made me pay for it, slowly, without changing the outcome of the battle."

The prosecution doubted that was the truth, but how did he prove it? How could he show that the bull had intended to attack and destroy a living egg. The first had admitted it. This one did not... This would not be as easy of a trial.

Tirek's cell was stout and strong. It had been made to be impervious to any attempt from within to break free.

It was a shame that it stood empty, with no centaur inside.

Cozy Glow paced with a soft frown. "Stupid humans!" she fumed to herself. Her plans were coming together so nicely. She had all the pieces, but to proceed, madness such that even she could see it. They did not use magic. On the other hoof... "They'll adore me." She put her hooves to her cheeks. "They love cute little ponies. They won't be able to get enough of me."

But that relied on giving them no reason to get nervous or alarmed. A scared human was a supremely dangerous one. She just had to figure out a way to become reigning monarch of Equestria without alarming... basically all of them. "Hmm..." The data she had gotten from Tirek would let her suck all the magic away. That part was so simple!

She bounced in place impotently, trying to puzzle through things. "Wait." She rushed over to the corner of her room and pulled out a magazine. Printed in America, it talked about their celebrities and stars. It showed the ritzy lives they led and how much people hung on every word. "Maybe I'm doing this wrong..."

But would a celebrity ever own the world? Would a celebrity ever command anything?

Cozy crashed to her haunches, considering as she tapped at a cheek with a hoof. "Think now, think..." She would not be denied so close to her goals!

She fled her room, leaving the magazine behind. Darting through the secret passage, she stood before the place where she could start the magic transfer. All she had to do...

"It's not fair, is it," whispered a voice in her ear. "You were so close."

"Yeah! Wait, who said that?" She turned in place rapidly, but there was nocreature there to see.

"Someone with a shared interest. Come."

Cozy tried to ask a question, but she suddenly didn't have a body, being drawn away from that basement to another dark corner of the world, where others faced similar troubles.

Of the soldiers, roughly half had claimed no intention to harm the eggs. With no easy way to prove they would have harmed the eggs, there were no war crimes left to charge them with. One had succeeded, smashing an egg with a shot. They were found guilty of murder, assault of a non-combatant and murder of a non-combatant. He would go to jail.

Ember tapped a foot, claw tick-tacking on the smooth surface. "I thought there'd be more, you know, dead people. Why are half of them walking off when they were going after the most 'civilian' civilians ever to civilian? What makes humans and ponies so much of a worse target?"

"It's not that." Spike landed just beside her. "Your eggs are, you know, equally important."

Ember rolled a hand. "Great, so why are they getting jail time instead of off with their heads?"

Spike lifted his shoulders. "Because dragons are too awesome."

"Come again?"

"They failed," explained Spike. "Only one egg was smashed, and the rest were perfectly fine. So we can only say what they 'would' have done, and how do you even prove that?" He shrugged softly. "Dragons are just way too awesome. Seriously, you guys handled this like it was nothing."

"Yeah, we did do that." She smirked lightly, pleased with herself and her people. "Still ticks me off that they're all getting off without a good stomping. I only flew all this way to see them get what's coming to them."

Spike slapped her once on the lower back. "Hey, look at it this way. It's now on the records just how amazing dragons are."

She paused a moment before reaching to boop Spike right on the snout. "Sometimes, Spike, you know just what to say. Also, uh, no offense for before. I mean, you're still are a kid dragon."

"I am not!" he huffed, flapping his wings. "See, I got these!"

"Congratulations, no, really, but you just got those. You have survived dragon puberty, and I'm proud of you--" She rolled a clawed hand, a little smirk on her face. "--but you are not an 'adult' yet. Hey, don't look at me like that. We all had to go through it."

Spike crossed his arms with a mighty pout, grumbling a bit to himself. "Well this kid's saved the day more than most 'adults'."

"And that's what makes you special." Ember patted him softly on the head. "Like I said, no offense. Doesn't make you an adult, but you're damn cool as the dragon you are now."

It would have to do.

Court came to a close for the day, many more trials played. Novo stretched languidly. "This is taking quite some time. I need to check in with my darling people and be sure everything's alright."

"Least your people can be mostly alright," spat Ruddertail, her thick tail slapping the floor. "Phone." She stormed off.

The female bull offered a hand towards Novo. "We've been so busy, I feel we haven't really met. I'm Copper Bell. Though these are dark times, I can see the light ahead."

Novo accepted the hand, shaking it lightly and stepping aside to let the human justice step closer. "I am Queen Novo, though I imagine you're aware of that."

"Supreme Justice Korrigan," he announced, taking her hand in a firm shake. "I'm glad justice is being done."

Copper inclined an ear at Korrigan. "I imagine you would be, for such is your position. I was never trained in the art of judgment, nor did I imagine I would do it one day... But this is good, for us, those of us that have to pick up the pieces."

They chatted amiably for a time.

Hoku patrolled down the city street. He wasn't alone. Only the foolish would have considered patrolling alone. They had been assigned to a minotaur metropolis, and they were its police.

He perked an ear, hearing something. "Trouble. With me." He charged forward, Hawkeye and Lucky just behind him. Reaching the end of the block, he threw himself against a wall and peered around the corner to see the source of the disruption.

Two minotaurs were screaming at one another, hands balled into fists and waved. Punches did not seem to be being swung, but tempers were clearly quite high.

"I told you we should have left!" shouted the female of the two.

"When the going gets tough, we have to be stronger," roared the male. "This is our home!"

"Some home this is!" she retorted, shaking a fist at him.

Hoku lowered his gun, determining the two weren't killing each other, nor was one mugging the other. Still, they were disrupting the peace... "Hello." He stepped out into view.

Both looked over sharply, their conversation dying instantly.

"Loud," noted Hoku simply, bringing up a hand with pointer and thumb close together. "Quiet."

Hawkeye took up at his right side. "People are still sensitive to noise at this time. Out of consideration for your neighbors, if you could lower the volume of this argument?"

The cow hiked a thumb at the bull. "Then convince him to let us move away from this warzone."

"This is not a warzone!" he huffed out. "The war is over, and this is our home. We have to rebuild, not run away."

Author's Notes:

Hoku gets to be a peace officer. Not his usual job, but he signed up to be a soldier, which means getting things done, darn it!

The first soldier gets nailed to the wall, but some others get a clue. Was justice done?

Someone seems to be collecting the forces of evil... Can this be a good sign?

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