KILLING TYME

“All rise,” hailed the clerk as Judge Chronos entered the courtroom. The prisoner was immediately brought before the bench.

“How do you plead?” barked the Judge, glowering harshly at the handcuffed perp.

“Guilty, your Honor. I did it; I wasted Ms. Idyll.”

“I see,” the judge grumbled. “Yet you seem so cavalier— without remorse when this is a killing we’re talking about. Do you realize how serious a matter this is?”

“I do now, but not then. I was bored.”

“Bored?” the judge challenged in disgust. “That’s all you can say before I pass sentence? Your crime is despicable! Your age-old victim is deemed most precious, let alone a curative healer revered by all within Hour Community. And all you can say in your defense is, ‘you were bored?’”

“I 'spose it was foolish, but chanced it anyway, your Honor.”

“So be it! Your indifference leaves me little room for mercy, Ben Dover. Having pled guilty to killing Idyll Tyme, I hereby sentence you to thirty days of solitary tick-talking. That ought to keep you busy.”

The judge’s gavel echoed finality as a gallery of movements erupted into a cacophony of approving clangs, gongs, chimes, and cuckoos. “Case closed!”