Helix-Astro Mining Corp v. Unit K-734 (Biological Asset)

 The docket read: Helix-Astro Mining Corp v. Unit K-734 (Biological Asset).

The courtroom on Apex Station didn’t look like a court. It looked like a sterile shipping container with a view of Earth—a blue marble hanging 400,000 kilometers away, tantalizing and unaffordable.

Kaelen sat at the defense table. He was twenty-two, lean, bone-density adapted for 0.8g. He looked human. To the man sitting opposite him, however, Kaelen was a walking ledger of unpaid receipts.

Senior Counsel Verris adjusted his cuff. He didn't look like a villain. He looked like an accountant who was tired of explaining basic math.

"Your Honor," Verris began, his voice smooth as processed nutrient paste. "The Defense keeps using inflammatory language. 'Slavery.' 'Bondage.' 'Human Rights.' We ask the court to strike these terms. They are irrelevant. This is a property dispute. Simple asset recovery."

Kaelen’s public defender, a frazzled Earth-born woman named Jenson, slammed her hand on the table. "You are trying to claim ownership of a human being! That is slavery, Counsel, no matter how you dress it up in spreadsheeting."

"Not the being," Verris corrected gently. "The apparatus."

Judge Kallas, a gaunt woman whose face showed the grey pallor of sixty years breathing recycled air, looked down from the bench. "Clarify your position, Counsel."

Verris tapped the holopad. A 3D schematic of Kaelen’s body rotated in the air between them. It was color-coded. Bones were white, water was blue, carbon was grey.

"The Defendant, Kaelen, was born on this station," Verris said. "Let us trace the provenance of the materials."

He pointed to the blue sections. "Seventy percent of the apparatus is water. This water was filtered, purified, and pumped by Helix-Astro systems. It was imported from the Shackleton Crater mines at a cost of 4,000 credits per liter."

He pointed to the white sections. "Calcium. Imported from the Belt. Refined in Helix foundries. Cost: 12,000 credits per kilo."

He pointed to the grey. "Proteins. Carbon chains. Synthesized in Helix vat-farms."

Verris turned to the judge. "Your Honor, the Defendant’s consciousness—his 'soul,' if you like—is absolutely free. We make no claim on his mind. He is free to leave this station, free to work for a competitor, free to go to Earth."

"He can't go to Earth!" Jenson snapped. "The transfer cost is two million credits!"

"That is a travel expense, not a legal impediment," Verris countered. "But here is the crux. While Kaelen the Person is free to leave, he cannot legally remove Helix-Astro property from the premises without paying for it."

He gestured to Kaelen’s body.

"That biomass represents a capital investment of roughly 4.2 million credits, adjusted for inflation and the initial Launch Lien of his parents. If Kaelen walks out that airlock, he is embezzling corporate assets. He is stealing the water in his blood and the calcium in his bones."

The courtroom was silent. The hum of the air scrubbers seemed to get louder.

"This is insane," Jenson whispered. "You're arguing Unjust Enrichment applied to flesh?"

"It is the definition of Unjust Enrichment," Verris said. "The Defendant has spent twenty-two years consuming corporate resources to grow this biological chassis. He has paid for none of it. To allow him to keep it without compensation is theft."

"He inherited the debt?" the Judge asked, looking at the file.

"Standard Orbital Law, Your Honor," Verris cited. "Partus Sequitur Massa. The Orbit Follows the Mass. Kaelen’s mother was a debtor. She did not own the raw materials she used to gestate the fetus. You cannot transfer title to property you do not own. Therefore, the biomass of the infant remained the property of Helix-Astro."

Verris looked at Kaelen with something almost like pity. "We are not monsters. We don't want to repossess the asset. 'Liquidating' the defendant—returning his water and carbon to the station’s tanks—is a waste of a trained welder. We prefer a restructure."

"A restructure," Jenson said bitterly. "You mean an Indenture Contract."

"I mean a Lease-to-Own agreement," Verris corrected. "We capitalize the value of his biological mass at 5% interest. He works for Helix-Astro. 30% of his wages go to oxygen and rent, 20% goes to servicing the debt on his body."

"For how long?"

Verris checked his notes. "At current welder wages... eighty-four years. Assuming he doesn't get sick or require expensive medical repairs, which would be added to the principal."

"That's a life sentence," Jenson argued.

"It is Physics, Counsel!" Verris finally snapped, dropping the calm veneer. "Do you think water appears by magic? Do you think the Delta-V required to lift that carbon out of Earth's gravity well was free?"

He turned to the Judge.

"Your Honor, if you rule that individuals own their own mass simply by virtue of being alive, you bankrupt this station. Every worker could walk onto a shuttle with 70 kilos of our water and minerals. We would bleed dry in a week. The survival of the Colony requires that the Corporation retains title to all imported mass. Including the mass currently sitting in that chair."

Judge Kallas rubbed her temples. She looked out the viewport at the black void. She knew the precedents. Admiralty Law. The safety of the ship comes first.

"The Court finds for the Plaintiff," she said, her voice flat.

Kaelen flinched.

"The Defendant is found to be in possession of stolen corporate property," Kallas ruled. "The Court orders immediate restitution."

She looked down at Kaelen. "Unit K-734. You have two choices. Option A: You immediately pay the sum of 4.2 million credits to purchase your biological apparatus."

Kaelen stared at his hands. Rough, scarred hands. "I don't have it."

"Option B," the Judge continued. "You surrender the asset. You will be remanded to the Reclamation Center, where the water and minerals will be extracted and returned to the company stores."

Jenson gasped. "Execution?"

"Recycling," Verris corrected.

"Or," the Judge said, "The Court accepts the Plaintiff's offer of a restructuring agreement."

A datapad slid across the table toward Kaelen.

It was a standard employment contract. But the header didn't say Employment. It said Biological Equipment Lease.

"Sign it, kid," Verris said softly. "It's just paper. You're still you. You just... rent the suit."

Kaelen looked at the pen. He looked at Earth, hanging in the window. A world where rain fell for free and you didn't have to pay rent on your own blood. He realized he would never, ever walk on it.

He picked up the pen.

He wasn't signing away his freedom. The law said he was free. He was just acknowledging a simple fact of physics: he was 70 kilograms of stolen goods, and the owner had come to collect.