The Doctor (3)

Acacia (2)
King Arthur (2)
Batman (2)
Terry Prachett (2)
Mr. Rodgers (2)
Gene Roddenberry (2)

Anne Frank (1)
Newborn Baby (1)
Council of Gandhi, Lincoln, Churchill, etc. (1)
Death (of the Endless) (1)
Neil Gaiman (1)
Your Mother (1)
Captain Jean-Luc Picard (1)
Superman (1)

And I think that's everything. Based on what I know about the community, I am not surprised that the Doctor is in the lead. I find some of the ones tied for second a bit surprising. Will the Doctor be our chosen champion? Will someone else supplant him? Or will our champion be a yet unknown answer? Stay tuned for our next episode.

Gene Roddenberry and Terry Pratchett spring to mind, but you could take your pick of any of the great SF/fantasy authors. My reasoning is that you have to know people pretty well to write about them convincingly. You have to know their flaws, their pettiness, even their evil... and yet, through all that clear-eyed cynicism, you also have to believe in your heart of hearts that people have it in them to be more. Otherwise you'd have nothing to write about.

~Neshomeh

Nienna is a good candidate, I think, because she can bring good out of bad in the form of wisdom from sorrow. She weeps for the horrible things in the world, but the fact that she's willing to weep means she thinks it's worth weeping for, if that makes any sense.

Manwe because (a) no way he'll be intimidated and (b) he doesn't truly understand evil, and I think that's good, in a way, because he'll always bring it back to the positive. I think. I haven't made a great study of his characterization.

-Alleb, who is getting tired and loopy, and you should disregard her if she makes no sense.

Batman. Point A: He would've expected this to happen at one point. Point B: He's human. A fictional human, but completely human nonetheless. If we were going to try to dominate the judges, I'd go for the Batman of the 853rd century. If we're going for convincing that humanity can change, The one from the JLAU. Also, wouldn't Harbinger just indoctrinate whatever we sent to defend ourselves? Just saying. Another choice would be a newborn child. Just let them see the innocence of certain humans.

There are basically three ways for someone to win this scenario (such as it is)

1. Convince a majority (5) of the panel that humans are worth saving/sparing. This is what most of you have been going for which is what I was hoping for.

2. Convince one of a select few individuals on the panel that could force the others to follow along. I would say those are Q, Aizen, or Father. If you think another could force all the others to go along feel free to suggest it, just be prepared to answer how. For example Q has near omnipotence. Aizen has his zanpakuto which lets him hypnotize and manipulate others. Father has a philosopher's stone and stupid powerful alchemy.

3. There could also be a more violent solution, but if just one of the panel is still able to function without changing his/her/its mind then the Earth is doomed.

So far this has been pretty interesting, I think Mr. Rogers is my favorite answer so far. I have another possible solution I'll share later. But as an update the following have been proposed.

1. The Doctor
2. Mr. Rogers
3. Anne Frank
4. Acacia
5. Saitama
6. Death of the Endless
7. King Arthur (just for simplicity hS, I'm calling your second option this)
8. Superman
9. Your Mother (again for simplicity just using Your Mother overall)
10. Council of Gandhi, Lincoln, and Churchill
11. Captain Jean-Luc Picard

Currently the leading champions of Earth are (vote numbers are included, any time the individual is suggested regardless of 1st, 2nd, 3rd choice etc.):

1. The Doctor (3)
2. Acacia (2)
3. Mr. Rogers (2)
4. King Arthur (2)

1: Death of the Endless

AKA this lady:



Okay, so she's (a) Death, but hear me out. This is the woman who meets everyone in the universe twice. She has a conversation with you after you die, of course - but she also has one just before you're born. She has sat down with every member of the human species and heard their hopes and dreams for the life ahead of them - and for the vast majority (ie, the ones who aren't still living), she has then sat back down at the other end of their life and found out how things have gone for them.

She knows us all. She loves us all, for what we actually are and for what we hoped we would be. And since she's also met (if we assume 'all canons are real') most or all of your panel of judges at least once, she knows them, too.

But some Scapegraces want a human defendant. Very well, I have one of those too:

#2: Name Unknown

Arthur is gone . . . Tristram in Careol
Sleeps, with a broken sword - and Yseult sleeps
Beside him, where the Westering waters roll
Over drowned Lyonesse to the outer deeps.

Lancelot is fallen . . . The ardent helms that shone
So knightly and the splintered lances rust
In the anonymous mould of Avalon:
Gawain and Gareth and Galahad - all are dust.

Where do the vanes and towers of Camelot
And tall Tintagel crumble? Where do those tragic
Lovers and their bright eyed ladies rot?
We cannot tell, for lost is Merlin's magic.

And Guinevere - Call her not back again
Lest she betray the loveliness time lent
A name that blends the rapture and the pain
Linked in the lonely nightingale's lament.

Nor pry too deeply, lest you should discover
The bower of Astolat a smokey hut
Of mud and wattle - find the knightliest lover
A braggart, and his lilymaid a slut.

And all that coloured tale a tapestry
Woven by poets. As the spider's skeins
Are spun of its own substance, so have they
Embroidered empty legend - What remains?

This: That when Rome fell, like a writhen oak
That age had sapped and cankered at the root,
Resistant, from her topmost bough there broke
The miracle of one unwithering shoot.

Which was the spirit of Britain - that certain men
Uncouth, untutored, of our island brood
Loved freedom better than their lives; and when
The tempest crashed around them, rose and stood

And charged into the storm's black heart, with sword
Lifted, or lance in rest, and rode there, helmed
With a strange majesty that the heathen horde
Remembered when all were overwhelmed;

And made of them a legend, to their chief,
Arthur, Ambrosius - no man knows his name -
Granting a gallantry beyond belief,
And to his knights imperishable fame.

They were so few . . . We know not in what manner
Or where they fell - whether they went
Riding into the dark under Christ's banner
Or died beneath the blood-red dragon of Gwent.

But this we know; that when the Saxon rout
Swept over them, the sun no longer shone
On Britain, and the last lights flickered out;
And men in darkness muttered: Arthur is gone . . .

('Hic Jacet Arthurus Rex Quondam Rexque Futurus', from The Island, by Francis Brett Young)

The King Arthur of legend and myth didn't exist. But in that time, when Britain's soil still remembered the boots of the departed Roman legions, and the people of this isle fought for life and land against the Saxon invaders, there was - there must have been - at least one chief or war-leader who fought, not for power, or possessions, or any other selfish motives, but to preserve the last glimmers of Roman Britain against the barbarians. He was someone who saw humanity at (what he thought) its best and its worst - and who stood up for the things he thought deserved preserving.

I don't know his name. It wasn't Arthur. But whoever he was, I want him on the defence team.

hS

(PS: I have never read The Island, and didn't actually know it existed until today. 'Hic Jacet...' appears as the prologue to Rosemary Sutcliff's excellent historical-realist Arthurian novel Sword at Sunset, which I highly recommend.)

If she can't handle it, then bollocks to it.

But seriously, hasn't the big blue actually done this a couple of times already? Not necessarily in a court setting, but still giving justification for the continuation of the human race.

So the purpose of the trial is to determine if humanity should survive. Are they worth anything. If the trial should fail Humanity will be wiped from existence, if humanity wins they will be left alone in peace from this body forever. The charges laid out are that humans are a vicious plague that will contribute nothing to greater to the universe than destruction and war. That even if given time to develop they will never rise beyond their baser instincts. That if they are allowed on the universal stage they will become vicious conquerors, and never go beyond that.

There are possibly photo spoilers below, you have been warned.

The panel that has laid these charges against the human race consist of the following:



Name: Q; Home: Q-Continuum



Name: Missy, AKA The Mistress, AKA The Master; Home: Neathersphere


Name Sosuke Aizen; Home: Hueco Mundo



Name: Father, AKA Homunculous; Home: Amestris



Name: Skynet, AKA Alex; Home: Skynet



Name>: Agent Smith; Home: The Matrix



Name: Kl'rt, AKA Super-Skrull; Home: Skrull Empire



Name: The Joker, Home: Gotham City

And Presiding:



Name: Harbinger, Home: Dark Space

Can you provide more info about the setting? Y'know, what are the aliens like, what part of humanity (and humanity's history) are the judging, etc.