Dark Side of the Force Ch. 01

"Certainly." I said as I unclasped my Medal of Valor and gently put it on the desk.

"I... I don't feel I deserve this." Cindy said, holding her Medal in her hand, the ribbon still around her neck. "How did you deal with it?"

"I know how you feel." I said. "I've never quite felt I deserved mine. But I just tell myself that I wear it in honor of all those wearing the Shield, putting it all on the line every day for the Citizens, and I tell myself that I need to earn it every day, in everything I do."

"I'll try to live up to it, also." Cindy said. "But still... I didn't do anything others haven't done, certainly not what you did or the Chief did..."

"Let me stop you right there." I said. "I saw what you did with my own beady little eyeballs. You acted, you went forward, you were prepared to sacrifice yourself to save a fellow officer and the mission. Whatever else you think, don't try to tell me you don't deserve it, because you absolutely do. And I made damn sure the Council understood that, too."

I then picked up the phone and called Teresa Croyle into my office. "Lieutenant Croyle, welcome back! Your first assignment is to take Lieutenant Ross home, right now. And when you get home, see to it that she actually goes to bed and gets some rest. Go. Move. Get out of my office."

"Yes, Commander. With pleasure." Teresa said gruffly, scowling at Cindy but in a loving way. "Let's go, Miss M-O-V."

It was good to have Teresa back, all my chess pieces in place, and Cindy receiving the award she so richly deserved. The only bad part was the Chief retiring. But in the overall, this has been a great day.

Oh yes... it was also my daughter Carole's first birthday. I told all of my Detectives to go home unless they were on a mission, and I headed out myself. The evening was going to be great, also.

Part 3 - It Begins

On the following Monday morning, the Chief called for an 8:00am meeting of all Detectives in Classroom J. He had me attend, as well as Lt. Scott Peterson of Media Relations, Lt. "Curly" Goodwin of I.A., Captain Charles of Uniformed Officers, and now-Captain Harlow of Personnel & Records. I'd encouraged her promotion when I found out she'd been looking at the Campus Police and other jobs. She'd been doing a Captain's job for some time as a Lieutenant, and she was an excellent administrator. She was now happy.

Once we all assembled, the Chief made sure the door was closed, then took a chair and placed it on the podium and sat down to address us.

"There are two things I need to discuss with you." said the Chief. "The first thing is something I want you to hear from me first, rather than from the rumor mill out there. I am retiring at the end of the year." There was a large groan in the room. "I appreciate it, folks, but it's way past my bedtime in that regard. I do appreciate all the work you have done for me, especially Leslie Charles with his fellow Uniformed officers."

The 'fellow' was the Chief's tribute to Charles, who always considered himself one of the 'Boys in Blue' and treated the uniformed officers as if they were his own sons and daughters. Charles did not fail to notice, and was pleased.

"The second thing is about our new Commander." said Griswold. For some reason the room got very still and quiet as the Chief began his storytelling style: "When Don first got here, he was a Detective and 'one of the guys', so to speak. When he showed his capabilities and I promoted him to Lieutenant, there was still an informality and friendship between him and you Detectives."

"I let that go because he's so baby-faced..." there was general laughter... "and it was his style of leadership. But all that changed yesterday. This is going to be worse for him than it will be for you, and he is going to have to adapt to this also: he is no longer one of you. He is not your equal: he is now your leader, your boss. Now that doesn't mean he's not a friend and that he doesn't love you anymore, because he does. But he is at a different level now. You've given me respect as Chief of Police, which I appreciate but also which the office deserves. You must now respect the Commander for what he is and for the office of tremendous responsibility that he now holds."

"For you Captains and Lieutenants, this is not a normal situation, and having someone younger than you and at the same rank or beneath you in rank two days ago now outranking you might be strange, if not difficult. But I know you are professionals and will handle it, and you'll work just as hard for the Commander as you have for me. Okay, that's all I've got. Don, do you want to talk to them?"

"Yes sir." I said. The Chief left and I took his seat on the podium. "Captains and Lieutenants Peterson and Goodwin, you can go; I'll talk to you later. I need to address the Detectives right now." The dismissed officers left.

"Guys, the Chief is right." I said. "I was informal in my leadership in MCD, and that'll have to change now. You now have some excellent Lieutenants leading your departments, and they're your bosses and you go to them for anything of a professional nature. However, if there is something of a personal nature, or a problem you have that you need to talk to me about, my door is always open to you. And it's not like you can't speak to me in the hallway, either. But I'll tell you something I learned in the Army: I would treat a superior officer as if his first name was 'Sir'. 'Good morning, sir.', et cetera. My first name is now 'Commander'. And the Chief is right: I'm hating this as much as anyone; you've been my friends, and you still are."

"One last thing: you now have new leaders in your departments, and I'll leave it to them to decide their styles of leadership. They may be more or less formal than I was, and it's your job to adapt. Okay, any questions?"

Julie Newton raised her hand. "Commander, what happens when Captain Malone comes back?" Laughter began slowly, then got stronger, with me included in it.

"Well, Detective Newton," I said, "we'll burn that bridge when we come to it. If he wins the Sheriff race, it's a moot point; he's the boss of all of us. If he loses and he does come back, we'll see what happens."

----

After dismissing everyone, I had not even made it down the hallway when Detective Martin Nash came flying out of MCD towards me. "Commander, can you come in here?"

Inside the MCD room, sitting on Cindy's old desk and leaning against the wall was a large painting, 4x3 feet, in an ornate frame. It was an oil painting of very high quality, not something cheap. The plate at the bottom said "The Fall of Troy", and the painting depicted that battle, with the Trojan Horse breaching the wall in the upper left, and Greeks ransacking the town and killing people.

Disturbing to me was what was painted in the bottom portion of the picture. It very explicitly showed two Trojan women, one black haired and one blonde, being raped by Greek soldiers; and just to the right of that, soldiers were spearing little babies to death. I understood. I understood the meaning, and the threat.

You see, my name is Troy. James Donald Troy.

And the sender was saying that the 'Fall of Troy' meant the fall of me.

"There was a note with it." Tanya Perlman said, having already bagged the note as evidence. I read the note, which said "Congratulations, Commander Troy!", followed by these four words:

"crossed path,

incommoded,

seriously inconvenienced,

hampered,

positive danger."

"What the hell does that mean?" asked Theo Washington as I smiled at the note, almost laughing.

"It's for me, and it's a threat." I said. "The name of the painting says it all. The person who sent this is letting me know that he is going to take me down, and harm my family in the process."

"Torres, can I borrow your computer?" asked Tanya Perlman, not waiting for an answer and sitting at Diana's desk. She began typing furiously as everyone watched. Finally, she looked up and said "Moriarty."

"Yes." I said. The words were from Moriarty's quote to Sherlock Holmes in Conan Doyle's The Final Problem:

"You crossed my path on the 4th of January,' said he. 'On the 23d you incommoded me; by the middle of February I was seriously inconvenienced by you; at the end of March I was absolutely hampered in my plans; and now, at the close of April, I find myself placed in such a position through your continual persecution that I am in positive danger of losing my liberty. The situation is becoming an impossible one."

"So what does this mean?" asked Claire Michaels.

"It means..." I said, picking up the painting, "that I need to take this to my office and make some phone calls. Meanwhile, you guys get settled in. After lunch I'm going to begin hitting you with some serious training."

"Do you want the lab to dust that for prints or anything?" Tanya asked, not quite having released her Crime Lab associations and way of thinking yet.

"No." I said. "I'll call Christina to bring IR and UV lights to see if there is any secret writing on them, but I expect we won't find any fingerprints on it, except mine now."

"How did it get in here?" asked Lorena Rose.

"That..." I said, "is something you guys can work on." With that, I took the painting and retreated to my office.

After I left, Claire Michaels turned to Cindy Ross. "He knows something. Does he always keep things to himself like that?"

"Oh yes." Cindy replied. "Get used to it." She saw Tanya's disapproving look. "But in his defense, he's a lot better about it now than he used to be."

-----

Meanwhile, once alone in my office, I called Laura on her cellphone. When she answered, I asked "Are the kids with you?"

"Yes." my wife replied. "Why?"

"I've got a red alert." I said. "You and the kids might be in danger. Call my mom and ask her to come guard them, bring a couple of campus cops to guard the doors, then come down here to my office and I'll show you."

Laura arrived within half an hour. I told her the story of the painting just appearing in the MCD room, and the note that had come with it. When I showed her the painting, particularly the title and the depictions at the bottom, she gasped in shock and anger. "Who sent this?"

"I don't know for sure, but if I had only one guess..." I said, "...it would be our good buddy Henry R. Wargrave."

Part 4 - Office Management

On the main floor of Police Headquarters, the Chief's suite is in the back left corner, southwest as the crow flies. The main conference room stretches along the back hall next to it, then a suite of two offices meant to be for ADAs. To the side hall, left of the Chief's suite, are the Commander's offices, one of which Paulina Patterson had occupied, the other being mine.

Moving down the hall, to the left of my offices were two Captain's offices with an anteroom for an administrative assistant. To the left of those were two suites of Lieutenant and Supervisor offices, eight tiny little offices in all, one that had been mine, one that was still Tanya's, with Teresa Croyle taking over the one I'd had.

The Captain's offices were not quite as long as mine, and they would be as deep as mine except that someone decided to carve in side doors, requiring a little "L" shape. So the doors were to the left or right, with Levelor-blinded windows facing front.

The right side office was Harold Malone's, and would not be cleaned out until he formally resigned from the Police Force. The left side office was empty. It was into the left office that I led Cindy Ross and Tanya Perlman that afternoon after getting back from lunch with Laura.

The door coming into the left side office gave way to a desk against the right side wall. A love seat sofa was under the inside window, and there was just enough room between the love seat and the desk for a guest to sit down. The back windows looked to the outside.

"Tanya," I said, have a seat on the couch. Cindy, sit behind your new desk." Cindy gaped as I handed her the keys to the office.

"Oh my God!" exclaimed Tanya, and I understood the humor beneath her comment. "What's this all about, Don?"

"It's 'Commander' now, so sorry." I corrected her, hating doing that but knowing I had to. "At least in public and here at the station. But here's the story." I took the small chair to the side of the desk to address both ladies.

"This stays between the three of us right now." I said. "After you have your baby, Perlman, you'll be in charge of MCD, and you'll continue to have your lovely Lieutenant office."

"Happy happy, joy joy." Tanya said with something of a groan.

"I empathize." I said. "But the question is what to do with Lt. Ross once she comes off light duty." I looked severely at Cindy. "Which won't be for quite a while if you continue to strain yourself."

"Noted, sir." said Cindy, and it was not an approving acknowledgement, I could tell.

"And again, just between the three of us... the Chief and I do not expect that Malone will be returning. Don't tell Teresa, but even if he loses he won't be back, especially after what's going to happen to him during the campaign."

"Oooooh, you do have something up your sleeve!" Tanya said, her eyes sparkling.

"We'll talk about that later." I said. "But the bottom line is that I'm going to need a Captain over all the Detectives. There is no way either the Chief or I will incite the Council's wrath by trying to brevet you to Captain, Cindy, but you can be put in the position as a Lieutenant."

I continued: "And since it's regulation that every officer except the Chief have a formal partner, you're still my partner, Cindy. Croyle and Perlman are formally partners. And by the way, Perlman, you and Croyle are going to have to decide who is partners with who in your squads."

"So Cindy, you'll be my liaison to the MCD and Vice Squads, though I'll have a lot of direct contact with all three of you." I said. "This is the only solution I can figure out for having three Lieutenants in my Detective ranks, and I hope you'll be satisfied with it."

"Crowbar's Angels, we are." replied Tanya, ever playful.

"Geez, that is going to stick, isn't it?" I said, pretending to groan about it.

"It's a done deal, Commander." Cindy Ross replied. "A done deal."

"Cindy, your only job is to move into this office. Take your time, no heavy stuff, get help if you need it. Go home by 3:00pm or I will have you carried out. Clear?"

"Crystal." replied Cindy.

"By the way," I said. "I have to go get the ADA offices on the other side of the Conference Room cleaned up. They wanted my office back, and technically it was theirs, but they've decided it's not worth getting a crowbar shoved up their Ikeas." Both women laughed at my new word for 'asshole'. "So that office is now officially mine forever. Meanwhile, we're going to have a new ADA replacing Sanders, she'll be working with Vice, and she'll have an office here like Paulina does. I don't know her, but I hear she's damn good with drug cases in Court."

"And the second ADA office?" Tanya asked, and I saw the underlying motive.

"Don't get ideas, Tanya." I said. "It's going to be generic use for other ADAs that come by here. In his infinite wisdom, Krasney wants his people to work more closely with us, and that'll include them making more visits here than us going to the Courthouse complex. I can see the good in it, but I'm not sure I want a bunch of legal beagles lapping around my Headquarters..."

----

Okay, do you want old people paired with new?" Cindy asked me, "or are you okay with past teams sticking together?" Cindy, Tanya and Teresa were meeting with me in my office. I had requisitioned three very comfortable office chairs, knowing that 'Crowbar's Angels' would be using them a lot over the next few months and years.

"Depends." I said. "Let's hear what you've got. Teresa?"

Croyle responded. "Okay, I'm thinking Geiger and Cummings, even though he gets an uncontrollable hard-on whenever he's around her." The room erupted in laughter, then Croyle continued. "I was thinking Jefferson and Purvis. They're both straight-laced types. That'd leave Julie Newton and 'Grubby' Paul."

"And Sharples?" I asked.

Teresa looked straight at me. "Leave that fat ass dangling. In fact, I'm going to request you remove him from the Vice Squad."

"As much as I'd like to do that," I said, "the Union would give us holy hell if we did. And unfortunately, you have to give Sharples a partner. Julie Newton never goes into the field, she's an accounting and computer geek."

"Then Sharples with Paul? Naaah." said Teresa, thinking to herself. "Okay, Geiger and Sharples, Cummings and Purvis, Jefferson and Paul. The new people are together, but they're my new core, anyway."

"I'll go with that, but monitor them to see if any of the new people start flagging." I said. "But I like your thinking: new people together, being molded by you into a great new squad. Okay Cindy, Tanya."

"Martin Nash has worked very well with Diana Torres." Cindy said, "but Nash has also worked well with Theo Washington. I was thinking Nash and Torres, and Washington with Teddy Parker, at least until we find out how good Parker is." I nodded in agreement.

"That leaves Claire Michaels and Lorena Rose." said Tanya. "Rose is a very energetic, go-get-'em type of girl, but she's going to need to be harnessed, if I don't miss my guess. We're thinking that Claire's experience might be helpful there, and I'll be watching her a lot myself."

"That just leaves Newton." said Teresa. "Lainie and Sonali are technically partners, Myron and Mary are partners... as well as one hell of a hot item in the bedroom, if I don't miss my guess."

"Your powers of observation improved remarkably while you were in Midtown." I complimented.

"Knowing that bastard Nathan Allen was trying to have me assassinated is what did that." Teresa said, and I knew she wasn't kidding. "Okay, Newton..." she said, trying to change the subject back to the original.

"List her with Sonali and Lainie as a group of three." I said. "That's a temporary fix, but it's a fix for now."

-----

'Just between the three of us' didn't last long. The next morning, Tuesday, the Chief told me that the Detectives were buzzing about Lt. Ross's new office and what it might mean. And considering that despite her advance pregnancy, Tanya Perlman had joined me in putting the Detectives through some grueling training about crime scenes, it made sense to tell the Detectives what was going on. So I had everyone come to Classroom J. As they all came in, Cindy brought along a long, huge wad of newspaper. Wassup wit dat? I wondered.

"... and that's the plan, people." I said, wrapping up the explanation of the rank structure as well as assigning the partnerships. "I'll still monitor your training and I might show up at a crime scene or two, but I'm also now in charge of the Uniformed Police and Internal Affairs personnel, so I'm delegating the Detectives to Lieutenant Ross. And that brings me to the next thing. Lieutenant Ross, would you please come up here?" Cindy came forward, that look of 'what the hell are you up to?' on her ruggedly attractive face.

I brought out my blue crowbar. "I hope this will become a new tradition, that the person in charge of the Detectives will hold and use this with distinction. I relinquish it and the honored titles it brings to you. Lieutenant Ross, you are now the Iron Crowbar!"

I had decided to do this because I did not need my previous reputation any more, Cindy deserved it, and also to start a new tradition.

"Aww, I can't take this!" Cindy protested as everyone clapped, but I insisted. She surprised me by giving me a warm hug, and I realized that this meant a lot to her, more than the other honors she'd received. Then she pretended to swing the crowbar at my rear end, making everyone laugh.