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Alliance.”
    â€œHow are they going to stand trial?” asked Blackraven, gesturing to the corpses around him. “They all killed themselves rather than allow themselves to be captured.”
    â€œNot all of them,” Stan and Kat said at the same time. Stan looked down at the would-be-assassin who he had knocked unconscious with the butt of his axe.
    â€œFour of them weren’t killed,” said Kat. “Stan knocked one out, and G and I knocked out three more. When they come to, we can have them stand trial inthe name of their co-conspirators.”
    â€œWe’d better strip them of their stuff, though,” added Ben, “or else they’ll just try to kill themselves when they come to.”
    â€œGood idea,” said Kat, giving him a smile, which he returned. Stan noticed G instinctively edge a little closer to Kat.
    â€œOkay then,” said Stan. “Charlie, come with me and clean up the items these guys dropped. Bill, Ben, Bob, and DZ, you take these four.” He jerked his thumb at the four remaining black figures, the others having vanished. “Bring them down to the jailhouse, but strip them of their items first. The rest of you, go down to the courthouse and let them know that we have four assassins who attempted to kill us, and we need to have an emergency trial. Okay, let’s go.”
    And with that, Rex, Ivanhoe, and all the players went off in their respective directions.
    By that evening, the Elementia courthouse was prepped for what people were calling the biggest trial of all time. Indeed, since Stan had come to power on the server, this was the first attempt by anybody to attack him. The trial of those responsible was extremely important.
    All those necessary for the trial, which was to take place in the Avery Memorial Courthouse, were present. The four surviving conspirators sat side by side, inside a machinedesigned by the Mechanist that restrained their movement.
    Stan sat in the middle chair of the Panel of Judgment, with four members of the council on each side of him. Bill, Ben, and Bob stood at attention at the base of the podium on which the Panel of Judgment was sitting. As the chiefs of police, it was their job to call in their forces if anything bad should happen.
    Ben stepped forward and, after opening statements and taking a roll call of the council members, he spoke out. “You four players before me, who have given their names as Arnold S, Stewart, Lilac, and Roachboy, you are hereby charged with the crimes of attempted murder and terrorist activities. Do any of you plead innocent to any of these charges?”
    â€œNo,” came the reply. Completely in unison.
    Stan’s eyebrows flew up. The Mechanist had designed the machine holding the suspects so they could hear the members of the Panel of Judgment, but not each other. Somehow, though, they had all answered Ben’s question at exactly the same time.
    â€œIn that case, I find you guilty of all charges. You are to be interrogated by Mecha11, and then, depending on how you cooperate, you will either be given a painless death by lethal consumption, or be imprisoned for life in Brimstone Prison.”
    â€œWe will not speak,” came the reply, again in complete synchronization. “And we would rather die than bear witnessagainst our noble leader, Lord Tenebris of the Noctem Alliance.”
    Stan leaped to his feet. “So you
are
with the Noctem Alliance! Where are you organized? Who is Lord Tenebris?”
    The reply never came. All four of the co-conspirators smiled, again in perfect harmony. Suddenly, in a rush of clicks and whirs, the whole detainment machine sunk into the ground, freeing the four players. The Mechanist’s jaw dropped. He had been standing by the levers that controlled the machine the entire time, and he hadn’t touched them. More incredibly, the four players, who had previously been searched thoroughly and were holding nothing, drew Potions